Breathing is Fundamental (Why Cops Love the Chokehold)

By Gamal Hennessy

“Protect Your Neck”

— Wu Tang Clan

As passive outrage online shifts from Eric Garner to Charlie Hedbo and Boko Haram, a disturbing tradition continues to thrive among the NYPD. According to a recent story in the New York Times, chokeholds are still a preferred tactic among police officers despite their illegal status.

Despite Scrutiny, Chokeholds Persist in New York City

It’s not difficult to see why this type of deadly force is preferred by law enforcement:

• Chokes serve the short and long term goals of the officer using the technique (See Who Watches the Watchers?)
• Chokes are an effective means of achieving those goals. It is difficult to physically or verbally challenge someone when you have no blood and/or air going to your brain.
• The likelihood of meaningful punishment for officers who use the chokehold is low. See Eric Garner and Anthony Baez before him.

The technique isn’t designed to kill, but it can lead to death, especially in the middle of a violent uncontrolled confrontation. But in the collective mind of the police the potential for a suspect’s death is not a justification to abandon the technique, because the antagonistic relationship fostered between elements of the police and elements of the community creates an environment where lethal compliance is easy to rationalize. When the police feel justified in turning their back on the mayor and are willing to manipulate arrest rates to make a political point, the subculture of policing threatens the health of the city. Chokeholds are only a symptom of the disease. (See Police Departments and Power Games)

Chokeholds may be illegal, but laws on their own are not the key to improving society. (See Laws Don’t Improve Society, We Do). Improvements in police/ citizen relations will come on an individual level, encounter by encounter, block by block. Until then, the Moscow Rules and a bit of luck might be our only protection for surviving a police encounter. (See Women, Minorities and the Moscow Rules)

Have fun.

Gamal

Whose Life Matters?

“The ability of man to inflict suffering on another man is boundless.”

— David Morrell The League of Night & Fog

Boko Haram and the Nigerian Army appear to be trading massacres on the eve of the presidential elections. No matter who wins, the people lose.

Boko Haram's Massacre in Nigeria: What Happened and Why (Vox)

Police Departments and Power Games

The NYPD may or may not be refusing to make arrests as a part of their spat with the mayor. According to the New York Post (whose credibility is always in question, arrests for petty crime have dropped more than ninety percent.

See NYPD Punishes City by Not Making Arrests

How do we interpret this response? Is it a collective temper tantrum from out of control, over privileged civil servants?

Not at all.

Is it a defensive tactic to protect the safety and welfare of officers afraid of being ambushed by a cop killer?

Not really.

It is a direct attack on the city's finances. It is a message from the NYPD to City Hall that hits the city where it hurts the most, in the budget.

Fines and tickets make up a big part of the city's income. If the mayor won't support the police by letting them kill minorities at will, then the police won't support the mayor with cash.

This fight isn't about laws, justice, freedom or even lives. It is about money and power. Everything else, including us, is collateral damage.

The Crossroads of Privilege

Each person in our society falls into multiple categories defined by class, race, ability, gender, orientation, education and others. As we move through different environments, our multiple forms of "membership" are perceived as positive or negative. This class gets attacked for X but has an easy time doing Y. This race is accepted here but not there. Navigating the different currents can be treacherous, especially when several factors come into play at once. 

A piece in the Huffington Post called Explaining White Privilege to a Broke White Person looks at the defensiveness certain people have when confronting the concept of white privilege. The author, who has the benefits of race but the challenges of gender and race, points out that white privilege (or male privilege or American privilege or cisgender privilege) isn't a magic wand anyone can use to erase all the other obstacles in their lives. It suggests most of us are dealing with a complex tapestry of issues which are only becoming more intricate as our subgroups grow.

““The concept of intersectionality recognizes that people can be privileged in some ways and definitely not privileged in others. There are many different types of privilege, not just skin-color privilege, that impact the way people can move through the world or are discriminated against. These are all things you are born into, not things you earned, that afford you opportunities that others may not have.””

— Gina Crosley-Corcoran: Author of the Feminist Breeder

I read the piece thinking about both my own complex relationship to the world around me as well as the multiple layers I want to build into my characters. I'm sharing it because if more of us saw each other beyond a singular two dimensional image we can turn our privilege into something positive.

Have fun.
G

A Futile Call for Justice for US Torturers

The editorial board of the New York Times has called for the masterminds behind the US torture program to be prosecuted for their crimes against humanity. They claim the country cannot move forward until it comes to grips with years of systemic disregard for humanity. They call for Chaney and several members of his inner circle to stand trial.

This wouldn't be the first time a trial was used to try and restore dignity to a country. The Nuremberg Trials after World War II and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission after Apartheid in South Africa attempted to achieve restorative justice not just for the specific victims of these regimes, but to help the respective countries regain international respect.

We will not have the same process here. There is a lack of political will to go after anyone except the people who exposed the torture program. There is too much financial and social power in the hands of the people who directed the program. We don't have the collective strength to face our demons or admit to our mistakes. If we can't indict police officers caught on tape killing unarmed men, we will never even consider going after the power brokers of Washington. We believe less in the rule of law or the dignity of human rights and more in the cliche concepts of "an eye for an eye" and "might makes right".  

It might be a generation or more before America ever comes to terms with the crimes committed in retaliation for 9/11. In fact, we may never achieve reconciliation for this dark portion of our past, since our historical crimes against native Americans, Africans and women have not only never been resolved, but continue into the present day. 

Gamal

America's Love Affair with Torture

A poll conducted in the wake of last week's CIA Torture report suggests that up to fifty percent of Americans believe the CIA program was justified. Responses were split along party lines, race and gender, with Republicans standing behind the legacy of Cheney and Democrats split on the issue. Minorities, women and younger people were more likely to reject the program while older white males accepted it.

The results aren’t earth shattering, considering the history of American society. Our treatment of indigenous Americans, African slaves, Chinese migrants and women in general has included systemic violence since before we were a country. Modern examples also support this premise. From what I understand, entertainment popular in the wake of the 9/11 attacks from 24 to Zero Dark Thirty, depicted torture as a viable means to extract critical information in a short period of time.  The poll results only clarify what we already knew.

I’m not innocent when it comes to using torture in my work. Both Smooth Operator and A Taste of Honey include torture scenes. The difference between my stories and other situations is the goal of the torturer. In my books, the torturer wants to punish the torture victim or use images of the torture victim to force action from a third party. The collection of information is secondary or not an issue at all. Based on my understanding of the subject, torture is not an effective way to gather information, but it’s a great way to display aggression, generate fear or act out repressed anger.

I think those of us who support CIA torture are less interested in intelligence and more interested in venting the feelings of rage and insecurity in the aftermath of 9/11. They accept torture because they imagine it acted out on someone who does not look like them or follow their beliefs. One of the few Republicans to speak out against torture was Senator John McCain. His position is influenced by his own experience as a POW tortured by the North Vietnamese. I’m sure if more Americans found themselves or their loved ones in the horrible position of being tortured, they’d be less likely to throw their support behind this program.