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True but that isn't the issue. The issue that Obama brought up is discrimination/racial profiling. Maybe the cop should have just walked away but I don't see anything racism/profiling here.
Maybe next time they can send this cop...
Is this about race or about being elite?
Skip Gates, please sit down
July 24, 2009 | The Ivy League is not real life. College in general is not real life, and the Ivy League is a more fantastic version of college. The amenities are better, the rules are flexible, and everyone, student and faculty alike, is well aware that the realities of life as most people know it are merely a peculiar footnote to the day-to-day of campus life. I do not speak out of turn when I say this. I know because I am in and of that world.
As a black Ivy Leaguer, something funny happens as you become ensconced in ivy. You’re smart enough to understand that race and racism are a reality you deal with on a daily basis, but you also know that your university ID sets you apart. Does this mean you are kept from hurtful incidents? No, but it is to say that much of the outrage felt at a racial slight is replaced by outrage at a class slight. Sure, we get pissed, knowing we’re getting hassled because we’re black, but the real indignation comes from being hassled as members of an elite group. How dare you hassle me? I go to school here. I go to work here. That second part of the thought is always present. I go to school here. I go to work here. When the Ivy League Effect is going full tilt, our black compass gets confused; the realities we know to exist become other people's problems.
True story: One night, years ago, many of the black students at school were throwing a party in a dormitory common area when three police officers arrived, flashlights searching the crowd. Nobody moved, nobody left, nobody did anything but keep dancing as three police officers walked through the crowd, flashlights in faces. I didn’t run either. In fact, I wondered if they were chasing someone on foot and wondered if the person they were chasing had run into the party.
That could only happen in the Ivy League. Three cops come into a party and nobody, surrep iously or otherwise, made for an exit? It seems like the beginning of a joke. On one hand, you could argue that this is a sign of progress; a sign that we’ve moved past the days of fearing police presence. I say that that quasi-luxury is brought on by the muscle backing these students (and, by extension, the faculty) -- the school. All the lessons about dealing with police as a black person seem to have no place in the ivory tower. We can forget those lessons because, more than we’re black in America, we’re Ivy Leaguers.
Which brings me to Skip Gates. He isn’t outraged because he feels he was the victim of racial profiling by the police (that dubious honor goes to his foolish neighbor) [in fact, the woman who called the police is not a neighbor, but works nearby]. He’s outraged because he was the victim of class profiling. He didn’t resent being identified as black; he resented being identified as that kind of black, the kind of black that can be hassled and pushed around by simpleton cops. How dare you hassle me? I’m Skip Gates: Harvard professor!
Skip has fallen victim to the Ivy League Effect. Check out his articles -- you can definitely go to the Root -- the Web site he is editor in chief of -- if you want to see a repository for the whole masturbatory display. He all but says, “Do I look like that type of (black) person? I was wearing a blazer and a polo shirt!” Gates is Ivy League pissed with a dash of black anger. Not the other way around. Is this to say the police weren’t in the wrong? Hardly. As a person who is familiar with the Cambridge/Boston P.D., I can say that the prospect of some procedural malfeasance on their part is entirely believable, if not an abject certainty.
But I’m also sure the good doctor was talking some . The Ivy League Effect, when it’s potent, wouldn’t allow otherwise. It made Gates forget that, no matter what, even when you’re right, you don’t talk to the police. And that’s not a matter of manhood or pride; it’s a question of survival. Why? Because you’re black before you’re a Harvard professor. Because, in an extreme case, you can’t tell your side of the story if you get shot reaching for your ID. As a black man and a Harvard professor, Gates’ thought process should have been: “Wow. I am so thoroughly pissed right now. When this current situation is resolved and I am out of harm’s way, I’m going down to the station and I’m going to use my considerable influence to make heads roll. But right now, I need to be the smart one, remember all the details and not give him any reason to escalate this situation.” That’s what many of my colleagues have done, guns drawn on them at night in the middle of campus by the police. They didn’t get loud; they got smart. They defused the situation, then got pissed and did something about it. And, I assure you, they did so with much less juice than Dr. Gates.
I remember when I heard about the story, I couldn’t help thinking: Wow, that Ivy League Effect has washed out his healthy fear of the police. Yikes.
Can he be outraged? Absolutely. The cir stance should outrage any person that happened to. But why is he outraged? Because he didn’t think the black tax applied to him anymore. In his mind, he was Skip Gates, well-regarded Harvard professor who was being treated poorly in his home by the police. Believe me, if this took place at North Carolina State his sense of indignation would be far different and his ability to garner attention would be much less. And if he was just a working-class stiff? Forget it.
But this didn’t happen anywhere else. It happened in Cambridge on Ivy turf and now his story has taken on Paul Bunyan-esque qualities. If you didn’t know better, you’d think a lynch mob was waiting outside Gates’ door with the rope and the hitching wagon before Ving Rhames came along and saved the day.
Skip Gates thought that he’d worked hard enough, achieved enough, become Harvard enough that this sort of treatment did not apply to him. And now, rather than channel that outrage in a way that is subtle but effective, he’s very publicly suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, having "joined the ranks of the million incarcerated black men in America." That’s laughable. He does not see those million men as kin and he doesn’t, by and large, give a damn about those guys. He’s merely annoyed that such an irritation as police misconduct found its way into his home. If he read about this story happening to a plumber in Roxbury, he’d shake his head in disappointment and then go on with his life.
So before we heed the call of racism, let’s be mindful of the tower from which that call came. This has something to do with race. But it has a lot more to do with messing with Skip Gates.
The Ivy League Effect, people. The Ivy League Effect.
True but that isn't the issue. The issue that Obama brought up is discrimination/racial profiling. Maybe the cop should have just walked away but I don't see anything racism/profiling here.
Maybe next time they can send this cop...
Holy crap, that officer has more patience than Jesus Christ and Buddha's love child.
more pie in the face.
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CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The white police sergeant accused of racial profiling after he arrested renowned black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. in his home was hand-picked by a black police commissioner to teach recruits about avoiding racial profiling.
Friends and fellow officers — black and white — say Sgt. James Crowley is a principled police officer and family man who is being unfairly described as racist.
"If people are looking for a guy who's abusive or arrogant, they got the wrong guy," said Andy Meyer, of Natick, who has vacationed with Crowley, coached youth sports with him and is his teammate on a men's softball team. "This is not a racist, rogue cop. This is a fine, upstanding man. And if every cop in the world were like him, it would be a better place."
Gates accused the 11-year department veteran of being an unyielding, race-baiting authoritarian after Crowley arrested and charged him with disorderly conduct last week.
Crowley confronted Gates in his home after a woman passing by summoned police for a possible burglary. The sergeant said he arrested Gates after the scholar repeatedly accused him of racism and made derogatory remarks about his mother, allegations the professor challenges. Gates has labeled Crowley a "rogue cop," demanded an apology and said he may sue the police department.
On Wednesday, President Barack Obama elevated the dispute, when he said Cambridge Police "acted stupidly" during the encounter.
Obama stepped back on Thursday, telling ABC News, "From what I can tell, the sergeant who was involved is an outstanding police officer, but my su ion is probably that it would have been better if cooler heads had prevailed."
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This rogue cop is a racist. He probably let Reggie Lewis die on that basketball court.
F Skip Gates
15 minutes of fame are over
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Your mama.
- Skip Gates
What?! No Gates trolls yet?
The article doesn't coincide with what you're saying. The article is basically saying that it does have to do with race, but argues that Gates is more angry by the fact that he was harassed moreso because his is member of the elite.
I don't know. It's a "what if" scenario. Maybe your neighbor noticed the police leaving, then you call the station to find out what happened.Uhm... how would I find out that the cop was even there? Do I have a videocamera on my house, or am I psychic?
My whole point is that it appears the police officer was responding to a call, and you act as if you want them to ignore such calls.
Last night In heard some details of this on the radio on my way to work. I still won't say that it wasn't a racist cop, but it doesn't look good for the proff. There were several police officers and witnesses before it was over. He was absolutely uncooperative if what I heard is correct. I have seen enough examples of bad police officers that I am only playing devils advocate with what I have been posting. I do acknowledge it is also possible the officer simply used any reason to arrest a black man. I just see that chance diminishing.
If you believe the words of a police officer that you don't know, then I have a bridge I'll sell you...
I agree. But was iden y established before the arrest?
I believe the words of a police officer I don't know . . . when his words can be corroborated by several other people, which is the case here. Read the report.
yes, by all means, read the report that they all agreed to submit.
a white man, the same age, in his own house........none of this would have happened.
You saying a white man wouldn't have had the police called if someone saw him forcing entry into a home? Or are you saying that a white man would have reacted in a reasonable manner? Or are you saying that he wouldn't have been arrested for disorderly conduct, even if he followed the officer outside and continued yelling?
he probably would've remembered his keys.
What if the white man had behaved like Professor Gates?
I didn't read that he was locked out of the house; but that the door had swelled shut.
Do you have some other information about that?
then why would you need to break into your own house.
You might need help forcing the door open. That was the version of events I heard and read.
Again, did you actually read or see or hear something different or are you just talking out of your ass?
he didn't
When I've been stopped by a black officer, it never occured to me to start yelling about racial discrimination. Maybe I should try that.
What your not listening to your man anymore?
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