Protests in McKinney

[Content Note: Racism; police brutality.]

Yesterday, I wrote about the incident of police brutality in McKinney, Texas, in which Corporal David Eric Casebolt, a white police officer (among many) called to a pool party where white adults caused a fight by hurling racist epithets at black teenagers, threw 15-year-old black teenager Dajerria Becton to the ground, dragged her across the grass, and kneeled on her back, while also wielding a weapon (either his gun or a Taser) at two other black teenagers.

Last night, there were protests in McKinney, as residents marched demanding justice and calling for a federal investigation.

On Monday night, close to 800 people marched through McKinney, a city of almost 150,000 people.

They walked from a school to the swimming pool, carrying placards with slogans including "My skin colour is not a crime" and "Don't tread on our kids."

Civil rights leaders in McKinney said they wanted an investigation by the US justice department, and to see Mr Casebolt dismissed.

...Police said the video "raised concerns that are being investigated."

Casebolt has not publicly commented, and he doesn't need to, because naturally there is just an endless number of white people, in McKinney and outside the town, who are willing to defend him.

The voices of reason continue to be the teenagers involved: Dajerria Becton has said that nothing short of firing Casebolt will be sufficient, and Brandon Brooks, the 15-year-old white boy who filmed Casebolt assaulting Becton, continues to insist that Casebolt was being unreasonable and abusive.

"I was one of the only white people in the area when that was happening. You can see in part of the video where he tells us to sit down, and he kinda like skips over me and tells all my African-American friends to go sit down."

Things got really scary for the teen behind the lens as he watched his 14-year-old friend being thrown to the ground.

"I think she was quote unquote running her mouth, and she has freedom of speech and that was very uncalled for him to throw her to the ground," Brooks said. "When he pulled his gun my heart dropped. As soon as he pulled out his gun, I thought he was going to shoot that kid. That was very scary."

..."[The white public] just going to discriminate against [the teenagers seen in the video being mistreated by police] because they're black," Brooks said. "What if that was your kid getting slung to the ground? Would you still be talking about them in the way that you are?"

Dajerria Becton is a child. There is an unfathomable amount of dehumanization behind any adult looking at that video and finding any way to defend an adult police officer pressing his knees into the back of an unarmed child whose only crime, quite literally, was being a teenage black girl.

Which isn't actually a crime. But her very existence has been criminalized by our white supremacist patriarchal fuckculture.

This is a social justice issue. This is a feminist issue. This is not just about how that cop saw Dajerria Becton and her black friends, but about how their country sees them; how each of us sees them.

What if that was your kid getting slung to the ground?

I understand why Brandon Brooks asked that question, but, in a decent world, he wouldn't need to ask it, because we'd all be angry about seeing any kid getting slung to the ground.

But we live in a world where there are still people who don't even see a kid in the first place.

Non-black (especially white) people: This is one of the key roles we can and must play in the #BlackLivesMatter movement, and in deconstructing white supremacy generally. We need to talk to other non-black (especially white) people and challenge them every time we see them talking about young black people in a way that they would not talk about young white people. (Every time we are able.) We need to push back, hard, on dehumanizing and othering narratives that monolithize black lives and criminalize black bodies.

We need to say, simply, "You are talking about a child. Her name is Dajerria Becton."