That ‘Black Scholar’ and His Arrest

As I have been accused of racism on this very site, I am going to start with a nice big disclaimer:
I AM NOT RACIST. IF I COME OFF AS RACIST, THEN CLEAN YOU PC-GLASSES AND READ AGAIN. Good, that is over, now we can move on.

Last week, Henry Louis Gates Jr. was arrested outside of his house. Gates, who is now known as the Black Scholar (because there are no other black scholar in the world, apparently), was arrested for disorderly conduct. Long story short, he was questioned for breaking into his own house and then arrested for disorderly conduct.

One of Gate’s neighbors (which was a white woman, which the story loves to point out), called the cops to report a break in at Gate’s house. When the cops got there, they started to question Gates about it, and he promptly told them to go away. Over the course of the conversation, Gates got agitated and all up in the face of the cops. He then got arrested.

The officer asked Gates to “step out onto the porch and speak with me,” the report says. “[Gates] replied, ‘No, I will not.’ He then demanded to know who I was. I told him that I was ‘Sgt. Crowley from the Cambridge Police’ and that I was ‘investigating a report of a break in progress’ at the residence.
“While I was making this statement, Gates opened the front door and exclaimed, ‘Why, because I’m a black man in America?’

Now, obviously, Gates made a major mistake here. Instead of saying ‘this is my house, go away’ or proving that he lived there, Gates instead argued with the police officer. Now, you are required by law to say your name, and had Mr. Gates done that the cop easily could have checked this out. Instead, Gates refused to do anything helpful, and instead immediately charged the cop with racisim.

Now, if I had been the cop, I would have arrested him too. In this situation, I have a reported break in, a guy who will not cooperate, and he is yelling at me about his being black. Frankly, I would assume that he is the robber (as he is not saying it is his house) and promptly arrested him.

See, he didn’t even shut up while in handcuffs

Had Gates simply explained the situation it would have been handled well.

Really, this story intrigues me on many different levels. I believe that Gates was in the right to be pissed off, I do not believe that he acted in the right way. Cops exist to protect and help us, and attempting to annoy or force them off does not help in any way. In this case, Gates is actually harming his argument by refusing to give any information, and thus he is playing into the hand he sees, creating it, if you will.

So, the moral of the story is, if a cop thinks that you are breaking into your own home, the logical thing is to prove to them that it is your home, thank them for the concern, and send them on their merry way. If somebody was entering my home, I would be glad the cops checked.

Now, this story gets even more interesting when you notice that Obama decided to call the cop’s move stupid. That’s right, Obama decided to get into a race-filled argument. NEWS FLASH TO OBAMA, you are our fucking president, don’t play petty politics. Obama should simply have said that both sides made bad choices, explained that cops are helpful to us, and saved face. Instead, he harmed our police force and really played his hand badly. Frankly, Mr. Obama, You lost my respect.