CommentsALPERN AT LARGE--Black Lives Matter. Period.
Everyone reasonable knows that, and has known that for a long, long time--to say that lots of white Americans, including Westside (L.A., Santa Monica, Culver City) liberal white Americans don't believe that, and are selfish a--holes is inaccurate, unfair, and downright cruel.
Also, that's frightfully divisive.
All black lives matter, and the extension of saying that "Blue Lives Matter" or "All Lives Matter" is what's creating a new slate of black Americans who are suddenly running as Republicans in blue states.
And the stunning conversion of lifelong liberal civil rights leader Leo Terrell to an angry, ardent Trump supporter is also evidence that times are complicated and changing.
Again--it's complicated. Many Americans are becoming both highly supportive of both why BLM, Inc. was created but yet frightened of what it's turning into...including black Americans who want BOTH more police but also police who behave like professionals without any criminal behavior of their own.
Enter Dr. Melina Abdullah of CSU Los Angeles, co-founder of BLM-LA and other PhD's who wanted up to 97% reduction of funding to the LAPD (yes, you read that right), and called the many attendees, many of them white liberals, all sorts of profane names and cruel epithets at a recent town hall, as reported by the Santa Monica Observer.
The town hall, called by West L.A. Councilmember Mike Bonin, entitled "Reimagining Public Safety", was filled with insults and expletives in what should have been a cordial and open-minded discussion of a complicated but vital issue (or series of issues). The suggestion that Dr. Abdullah "terrorized" the attendees and Bonin's constituents was from the Observer (hardly a right-wing rag).
Both Bonin and the other panelists did appear uncomfortable, and clearly Bonin (who has cherished family members and dear, close friends of color) would never want a town hall to become divisive when it was meant to be unifying.
The surveys and data described by the academics were highly biased in their selections of responders, and the misleading conclusions and "woke scolding" and "white shaming" arguably helped no one.
Worsening the situation is that up to 30% of the survey respondents declared they did not even live in Bonin's district This is NOT science, and is NOT helpful, to resolving the benefits and excesses of having a given level of a law enforcement.
Although police and other peace officers can't fix all of our problems, the dealings with homelessness and domestic violence too often result in unanticipated explosions involving lethal force, and the concept of eliminating the police is easily one that can lead to a lot of unnecessary injuries and deaths.
So, the arguments of having more police and law enforcement, and having more police oversight, are NOT mutually exclusive--after all, didn't LA County voters just create a LA Sheriff's Oversight Commission.
Furthermore, when the removal of police and other law enforcement has been tried, as in Portland, the months of lawlessness and violence ultimately requires their return.
It's NOT a crackpot conspiracy theory that Seattle, Portland, Chicago and New York City are having major, major crime problems when the police are being marginalized and defunded.
But it IS a crackpot conspiracy theory that suburban Americans are all racist, and want protection in the suburbs from overdevelopment and left-wing policies as much as urban Americans, including black urban Americans.
Because we need to be protected from extremist, ill-behaving, and tone-deaf police officers...but who will protect us from the extremist, ill-behaving, and tone-deaf so called "civil rights" leaders who claim they will protect us...but really just want to rule us?
(CityWatch Columnist, Kenneth S. Alpern, M.D, is a dermatologist who has served in clinics in Los Angeles, Orange, and Riverside Counties, and is a proud husband and father to two cherished children and a wonderful wife. He was termed out of the Mar Vista Community Council (MVCC) twice after two stints as a Board member for 8-9 years and is also a Board member of the Westside Village Homeowners Association. He previously co-chaired the MVCC Outreach and Planning Committees, and currently is Co-Chair of the MVCC Transportation/Infrastructure Committee. He was previously co-chair of the CD11 Transportation Advisory Committee, the grassroots Friends of the Green Line (which focused on a Green Line/LAX connection), and the nonprofit Transit Coalition, and can be reached at [email protected]. The views expressed in this article are solely those of Dr. Alpern.)
-cw