This Rock Sucks
A Harvard professor arrives home from vacation. Finding his front door damaged, he enters his house from the back. Some time later police arrive to investigate the supposed “break-in”. Despite confirming his identity and address, the professor is arrested and spends four hours in detention. Could it possibly have been because he was black?
The internet being what it is, the comment thread at that article is filled with people defending the police and claiming that this incident couldn’t possibly be about race. Obama is president, racism is dead! The police are just trying to protect us; you can’t blame them for making an occasional mistake! Besides, it’s not like anybody got shot! That Gates guy will be able to tell this story at parties for years to come! These things must be true, for if we admit that they’re not then we must also admit that the world isn’t as simple as we want to believe, and once you admit that the world is complex then you might actually be required to think.
Hat tip to Alice Pawley of Sciencewomen for the story.
July 22nd, 2009 at 4:58 am
Yeah, he certainly wasn’t arrested for chasing the cop out of his house while yelling at him. Nope, must have been his blackness that did it. I bet if I chased a cop around yelling at him, I’d be just peachy. Some people just can’t handle their adrenaline.
July 22nd, 2009 at 6:50 am
If the cop was in your home and still treating you like a criminal after you had identified yourself, I’d say that it might not be smart to yell at him but you’d certainly be justified.
I started writing a third paragraph above in which I addressed the race issue, but deleted it due to a lack of time. I don’t know if the cop involved was racist or not. His racism or non-racism isn’t even an important point. The big point, to me, is that he was sent to investigate a break-in and ended up arresting the owner of the house. That’s a pretty big screw-up. I don’t care what Gates said to him- as soon as he identified himself and explained the situation, the cop had no more reason to be there. Arresting him for speaking his mind is a clear abuse of authority.
July 22nd, 2009 at 8:20 am
Here’s the catch, the cop arrested Gates outside of his house. After Gates identified himself, the cop did leave. Gates followed him, yelling at him. At that point, Gates was (by definition) disturbing the peace and the cop was within his authority to arrest him. Gates was riding an adrenaline high and was in fight mode, he started an argument with the cop the moment he arrived and he continued as the cop was trying to leave. The only people that cared about the color of people’s skin were the woman that reported “2 suspicious black men attempting to force the door on a nearby house” and Gates himself.
July 22nd, 2009 at 9:20 am
“Gates was riding an adrenaline high and was in fight mode, he started an argument with the cop the moment he arrived and he continued as the cop was trying to leave.”
Quite an evocative piece of imaginative writing, Burzmali. Ever considered being a novelist? Because you obviously didn’t read the account Joe linked to.
This bit is on page 2, if you can be arsed:
“So he’s looking at my ID, he asked me another question, which I refused to answer. And I said I want your name and your badge number because I want to file a complaint because of the way he had treated me at the front door. He didn’t say, ‘Excuse me, sir, is there a disturbance here, is this your house?’—he demanded that I step out on the porch, and I don’t think he would have done that if I was a white person.
“But at that point, I realized that I was in danger. And so I said to him that I want your name, and I want your badge number and I said it repeatedly.
“TR: How did this escalate? What are the laws in Cambridge that govern this kind of interaction? Did you ever think you were in the wrong?
“HLG: The police report says I was engaged in loud and tumultuous behavior. That’s a joke. Because I have a severe bronchial infection which I contracted in China and for which I was treated and have a doctor’s report from the Peninsula hotel in Beijing. So I couldn’t have yelled. I can’t yell even today, I’m not fully cured.
“It escalated as follows: I kept saying to him, ‘What is your name, and what is your badge number?’ and he refused to respond. I asked him three times, and he refused to respond. And then I said, ‘You’re not responding because I’m a black man, and you’re a white officer.’ That’s what I said. He didn’t say anything. He turned his back to me and turned back to the porch. And I followed him. I kept saying, “I want your name, and I want your badge number.”
“It looked like an ocean of police had gathered on my front porch. There were probably half a dozen police officers at this point. The mistake I made was I stepped onto the front porch and asked one of his colleagues for his name and badge number. And when I did, the same officer said, ‘Thank you for accommodating our request. You are under arrest.’ And he handcuffed me right there. It was outrageous. My hands were behind my back I said, ‘I’m handicapped. I walk with a cane. I can’t walk to the squad car like this.’ There was a huddle among the officers; there was a black man among them. They removed the cuffs from the back and put them around the front.”
Maybe you looked up and read the police report instead of Gates’ account, Burzmali. Naturally, they would characterize a request the officer identify himself as “loud and tumultuous behavior”. This is something cops do all the time. They even have a word for it: “testilying”.
July 22nd, 2009 at 8:17 pm
That’s his story, the cop tells a different one. Of course, you can choose to believe Gates’ word as gospel or you can believe that both sides embellished. The cops in Cambridge are about as liberal as they come, do you really think the cop said to himself, “I’m gonna teach this uppity black guy a lesson by bringing him to one of the least intimidating police stations in the nation and possibly getting him fined $200!”
It’s real simple in my book, after the argument, the cop attempted to leave and Gates, by his own admission, continued the fight. Gates is playing the race card though, and playing it extremely hard. It will probably let him win, but it is a step back as far as race relations are concerned.
July 22nd, 2009 at 9:35 pm
I don’t know which sides embellished, or how much. I do know that my local cops aren’t doing anything to endear themselves to our local populace, liberal or conservative, and the local police union is doing even less to spread the love.
Mrf. And to think, as a child I wondered why people hate cops.
July 22nd, 2009 at 11:00 pm
“do you really think the cop said to himself, I’m gonna teach this uppity black guy a lesson by bringing him to one of the least intimidating police stations in the nation and possibly getting him fined $200!”
No, I don’t believe that, and I’m sorry if I gave that impression. If race was a factor in this incident it was of the implicit rather than explicit variety. What I do believe is that regardless of the motivations involved the police officer was a dumbass. If they were two private citizens then I’d be perfectly happy sharing the blame around; from reading both accounts it does appear that they were antagonizing one another. However, one of the two was an on-duty police officer, and IMO should be held to a higher standard.
July 23rd, 2009 at 5:15 am
The cop was responding to a burglary in process for all he knew. When he got there he ran into a belligerent Gates (a gentleman that had just got off a long distance flight, was sick, and had just spent a while breaking into his own house). After some arguing, Gates presented enough ID to establish his identity, but he continued to verbally spare with the officer. At some point, the officer decided that, in his agitated state, it was a good idea to hang around Gates without backup, so he exited the building.
At this point, Gates could have let his head cool and the situation would have been resolved without further incident. But no, his adrenaline (or pride) dragged him out onto the porch after the cop at which point the cop called it a day, slapped on the cuffs and dragged him downtown for a time-out (and, knowing Cambridge, probably a latte).
Seriously, what do you exact when you antagonize the police? If you antagonize someone, you pay the price. If it is a waiter, you get spit in your food, a plumber will over charge you, a DMV employee will give you the run around, and a cop will toss you in the pokey. Sadly, we don’t all have a nice deck of “get to be a douche” cards pre-printed (or the will to use them as the case may be).
July 23rd, 2009 at 6:30 am
I’m not sure that’s a good argument because in each of those cases, I would expect the employee in question to be disciplined if their retaliation came to light. It’s the same thing here. I’ve already admitted that antagonizing the police is not a smart decision, and I’m not claiming that Gates is a saint or that his version of events is gospel truth. It’s just that none of that excuses the actions of the police officer.
I think at this point we’re arguing past one another, using different senses of the word “responsible”.
July 23rd, 2009 at 7:43 am
Here’s an article that summarizes things a bit more fair-handedly:
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/07/23/machismo_and_the_gates_incident/?s_campaign=8315
July 23rd, 2009 at 8:59 am
Also, the problem in this case, and in many of those cases, the retaliation may not be anything you have a position to complain about. If the plumber overcharges you compared to other customers, but can justify all the expenses, what can you do?
If a DMV employee sends you on a wild goose chase because you were snippy to them and they “misunderstood” what you wanted because you seemed “agitated” do you think their supervisor is going to punish them?
In this case, the cop was within his authority to arrest Gates, though he may be retaliating or he may have been acting out of racism, but he covered himself by ensuring that Gates was breaking the letter of the law before slapping the cuffs on him. It’s an awfully slippery slope when you start punishing people for failing to follow your interpretation of the spirit of the rules.
July 23rd, 2009 at 9:45 am
I do have bias on this issue, as most people do in one manner or another. I wish, for example, that my local police still used guns instead of tazers; if it were the case, they might (note, might) be less likely to shoot people.
Now to clarify, Burzmali, are you saying that it is right and good that a police officer’s motivations in an arrest can be personal? Are you saying that we should not expect the examination of personal motivations to be a part of ethical conduct in the police, the DMV or a professional plumber? Or are you simply stating that we can’t know what this cop’s motivations were, except that his actions were defensible?
July 23rd, 2009 at 10:19 am
Mostly I am saying that trying to determine whether or not personal motivations are behind a single, defensible event is folly. If you can find a pattern of conduct, sure, but not on a single event.