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“Why a Hoodie?” She Asks
My latest contribution over at PJ Media concerns the circus atmosphere that sometimes prevails at the Los Angeles police commission’s weekly meetings. The local chapter of the Black Lives Matter movement, most of whom are unburdened by employment or other responsibilities, have been making regular appearances at these meetings, taking advantage of the public comment portion to harangue the commissioners and LAPD Chief Charlie Beck.
As I explain in the piece, the police commission is composed of five members appointed by the mayor, who selects them not for their expertise on law enforcement matters, of which they have none, but rather for their ability to satisfy an unwritten but steadfastly observed “diversity” formula. “But this diversity,” I write, “as is most often the case when the term is used today, does not extend to a diversity of thought or political opinion, only of race, sex, and sexual orientation. As it’s currently composed, the police commission is uniformly liberal, albeit with some members leaning farther to the left than others.” Thus on the commission can be found two white men (one of whom is gay), a black man, an Asian woman, and a Hispanic woman.
The piece got a bit long, so I didn’t include all I might have. But in watching the video of the May 10 police commission meeting I was struck by a colloquy between Commissioner Sandra Figueroa-Villa and two department officials who had made a presentation on how the LAPD investigates officer-involved shootings. So revealing was this exchange that I wanted to present it here. The presentation included a news report on an exercise conducted at the LAPD academy which demonstrated how these investigations are conducted. In the exercise, a pair of officers respond to a radio call, upon arrival at which they are fired upon by a man armed with a handgun. The officers return fire and kill the man.
As it happened, the “suspect” was wearing a hooded sweatshirt, a detail that did not sit well with Commissioner Figueroa-Villa. After other commissioners had posed questions dealing with more substantive issues raised in the exercise, Figueroa-Villa felt compelled to address the simulated shooter’s choice in clothing. “I have a question, just for my mind,” she said. “So, he had a hoodie … Is there – why? Why a hoodie? Why, you know, there’s all these perceptions about kids in hoodies, and I work with kids all the time and they feel they’re targeted, and there you did that. So could it have been, could we have gotten the same result – I think I know the answer but I’m going to ask it anyway – if you hadn’t have, if the kid hadn’t had that same garb, you know, normal, no – maybe not the hoodie, just a jacket, even a suit?”
Reading the above transcription cannot possibly convey how insipid the woman sounded in asking this question, so I encourage you to watch the video, which is available here. Arif Alikhan, the LAPD’s Director of Constitutional Policing and Policy, did an admirable job of feigning respect as he explained that considerations of the actor’s “garb” were not the point of the exercise. He might have asked, “When do you suppose was the last time a cop was shot by somebody wearing a suit?” (The exchange begins at the 1:43:00 mark, but the entire meeting is entertaining for its exposure of the antics displayed by the Black Lives Matter protesters, all of whom were at long last ejected after multiple disruptions.)
Figueroa-Villa’s profile on the LAPD website reveals that she has been a social justice activist since high school, and that she apparently has never held a job that didn’t involve soaking the taxpayers for its existence. If you’re wondering why the “Ferguson effect” has taken hold among LAPD officers, just watch a few minutes of that meeting and ask yourself if you would dare stick your neck out trying to make an arrest in the knowledge that this woman and her colleagues would be passing judgment on your actions.
Published in Policing
I don’t blame a single big-city cop for basically sitting on his duff and collecting a paycheck. They shouldn’t stick their necks out for a people that hate them. Me, I’d rather go to a smaller town where people value cops, but there are only so many of those jobs. All these BLM people calling police occupiers and invaders, hey, let them police their own neighborhoods.
In Chiraq public notables like Louis Farrakhan, Michael Pfleger, Jerimiah Wright, Jesse Jackson Sr. & Jr., etc. could take a try at running something besides their mouths by marshalling their followers to primary a weak councilman and state representative. Concentrate in one ward, one district; win it, then go to the next one.
Let the emirs of Incumbistan know they aren’t anointed for life.
I spent years in Seattle Public Schools dealing with the same kind of stupidity. Part of the problem is that nobody with a brain in their head wants to sit on a school board or police commission. The effect is that you end up with ineffective schools and police departments where the officers themselves might as well be handcuffed. Add to that the incredible stupidity of voters in both Los Angeles and Seattle in terms of the people they put in elective office and you have a formula for complete social collapse that groups like BLM exploit to their hearts’ content. We are seriously past due for a reset.
The first problem is “weekly meetings”. There is another problem and that is some police officers cannot wait for the day that they can get off the street and become admin cops. After two to three years of street experience they believe that that they have enough experience to second guess every street officer’s decision, and then pontificate on how veteran cops have screwed the pooch, usually on CNN, MSNBC, or your newspaper of choice.
The combination of admin cops and citizen review boards leads to grant writing and eventually the DOJ, when they don’t have guns to sell to Mexican drug cartels will join the party.
I know, it’s a generalization.
I worked with lots of them. They were afraid to be out on patrol. I would just as soon have them working pogue jobs because they’re worthless on the street.
Most big cities are now run by 1960s radicals who think of the police as “pigs” and act accordingly. Another reason I stay out of Seattle as much as possible.
Sigh. Jack. The issue is not whether people in suits shoot cops, but the violence done to poor communities by people in suits in the guise of “capitalism” and “profit.”
Well, someone’s thinking that.
“So, he had a hoodie … Is there – why? Why a hoodie?”
“That’s how people who want to hide their faces manage do do so without actually wearing masks. Now, I have a question: are you really that stupid?”
Yes, my call to the Snowflakes at Yale is pretty much: want to make a difference in how policing is done? Become a police officer.
Or: try. Getting onto some departments (the Maine State Police, for example) is a whole lot more exacting, intrusive and difficult than getting into…dare I say it…Yale?
Why a hoodie?
here’s why….
3% of population, Black males 14-35
commit 1/2 of all violent crimes, 1/2 of all murders.
Violent Crime
Blacks 24.7/100k 7x higher violent crime rate
White 3.4/100k
Blacks 13.2% of the population Commit 52.2% of murders, homicides
Blacks 6.8 times more likely to commit Murder
See you prove the point. Blacks are being over represented in arrests and crime statistics because LEOs are singling them out. LEOs need to arrest members of other races in proportion to their representation to the areas population. It is only fair.
People from Yale do not get their hands dirty with the grunt work of being a police officer. No they get into positions to dictate to police officers how they are to do their jobs.
Yes, James, I see it now. It should have been some corpulent white guy in a morning coat like one of those caricatures of “capital” from a ’30s cartoon.
I watched quite a bit of the hearing at the link but I will not hold that against you.
There is a Star Trek Next Generation episode where an alien race can only speak using allegorical references to their core myths and are utterly incapable or using or understanding more direct uses of language.
A big part of our society is devolving that same way. For many there can be no thought or experience or idea outside The Narrative. The word “hoodie” was all Ms. Figueroa-Villa understood in the entire report of the exercise because it alone could easily relate to The Narrative.
When I worked for a county government for a while, I was required to attend many meetings and presentations. There was a sizable cadre of people whose entire job description appeared to be showing up for these activities, missing the point at hand and delivering impassioned or simply pompous PC gibberish while others pretended to grasp the depth and value of their contribution.
Some Native American tribes gave great leeway to lunatics in their midst on the theory that such persons may have been touched by the gods and have some higher purpose. They anticipated our approach to “diversity” and BLM by centuries.
As an employee for the Navy Department a couple of years ago I had to do the annual evaluation, which included a section on “goals”. I found an online jargon generator and cut and pasted the resulting gibberish . No one batted an eye. No. One.