I'm so glad that my teenage son is white and that he most likely won't be profiled by the color of his skin. That he can walk out the front door with his saggy shorts and teen attitude and won't be immediately profiled as a thug.
Nope, he's just a dopey, sometimes mopey teen still growing into himself. Some days he does stupid things, he might be swayed by the crowd. But most days, god, he's still the most amazing young man on the planet, and I still adore him with all of my heart. He's my son. And he's my world. And I'd do anything for him.
Thank god he doesn't do stupid things hardly ever. But god forbid he ever walks out that door and gets into terrible trouble, I hope to god he gets a good cop, the kind who assumes he's a good kid, and not, you know, a thug, and I hope he's the kind of cop who doesn't panic and immediately unload his weapon and fire ten times on an unarmed teen who maybe did something stupid, and is stronger than he knows, and then made things worse by panicking (because god forbid he grew up in a racially-charged neighborhood that taught him not to trust cops who seem rather trigger-happy, and the cops, well they don't trust the kids either, because they don't know them except they represent something by the color of their skin).
My son walks the street and doesn't know what it's like to be constantly judged because he is white. And as his mother, I have no idea what if feels like to be the mother of a black son in American 2014. So I can only imagine. The point is our white sons get make many, many free passes. They get to mistakes that probably won't be fatal or even all that horrible. I'm sure many mothers of black sons don't feel that is true. And this must cause them much anguish and pain.
So before I pass judgment or speak about the reactions to Ferguson I try to walk in the shoes of others. I try to remember I have freedoms and liberties that I take for granted that others around me still do not have. So is it any wonder they are upset and don't trust the system or feel that no matter how the prosecutor tries to justify this grand jury's decision, justice has not been served?
And those on facebook who respond otherwise, who think their white kids would never get into trouble are kidding themselves. Our kids do stupid things all the time. But at the end of the day we live in neighborhoods where our white cops are our friends and they look out for us. They are more likely to bring our kids home to us with a warning when they do something stupid like get caught drinking or smoking pot or vandalizing a storefront or shoplifting a couple items. They don't immediately jump to conclusions or shoot our children down on the streets like they are Public Enemy #1.
Truth is Ferguson needs more black police offers. Or they need white officers who are color-blind. Racially-diverse areas need to be represented accordingly. This way the police can be a trusted part of the community and they can look out for the black sons of Ferguson the way the Marlboro police look out for my son. Shouldn't we really be looking out for each other and for all our sons?
Then maybe next time things won't escalate the way things did in Ferguson. Because god knows I really don't want to hear about a NEXT TIME.
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