The Denial Of Police Brutality

One morning, in May 2013, a 14-year-old by the name of Tremaine McMillian was walking with his pet and his family on Haulover Beach near Miami, Florida. Some local police thought that he was “roughhousing” on the beach and told him to stop. Tremaine asked the officer what he was doing wrong and why he was asking him to stop. According to an article by Huffington Post, the officer simply said, that it was because “he said so.” After Tremaine asked again, the officer told the boy to show them where his mother was and so he proceeded to walk towards where his mother was on the beach. Tremaine’s mother reported that the police jumped off their ATVs and forced Tremaine onto the ground abruptly and put the boy in a chokehold. But Miami Dade Police …show more content…
This concept has a lot to do with the abuse of power that we see from authorities that are meant to protect us. But it also correlates greatly with racism in our society as a whole. The denial of police brutality goes hand in hand with the denial of racism in today’s society. This racism is internalized and its damage is said to be nominal and inconsequential. Police brutality is one example of systemic bias against minorities. In drastic demonstrations of police brutality, we see the results of the denial of racism. These results come in all shapes and sizes. For example, in situations such as Eric Garner’s death, the life of an American citizen was lost because of a police officer’s violent force. This man contributed to his society just as much as anyone would want to and he was killed by the very authority whose role was to protect him. A more general example of a damage that results from police brutality is poor representation in our governmental system. This creates tensions between authorities and people under them, because the people have less to relate to and all their interests are not being …show more content…
A more immediate solution to police brutality is a raise in standards for the officers and a better training program. Also, even if the officers are trained well, they should be going after criminals with an appropriate priority level. Since the beginning of the war on drugs, police forces have been pushed towards going after crimes such as drug offenses, rather than gang violence, rape, or more immediately dangerous crimes. This has resulted in the militarization of local police forces and this has brought a focus on poor communities and minority communities. This has also raised the number of inmates in US jails. These issues require solutions, but this does not mean that our current police force is completely wrong, it just means that the instances in which they are wrong are unacceptable. These instances and situations sprout from problems within the system that do not require incredible effort to