There is governance and leadership for goodwill and order, and then there’s just plain nonsense. A meeting of members of the faith and police communities (Is that how we say it, now?) took place yesterday in Asheville. It was driven by hype and served to show that people can let mass media yank their chain. The pretzel logic goes like this: A white cop shot a black boy. Therefore, all white police officers are racists.
In Asheville, we have our own Ferguson, consisting of two incidents: (1) A black police chief was forced out of office. Though his skin was closer to 3Y12 on the Pantone SkinTone chart than black, none of the reasons cited for his dismissal had anything to do with the amount of skin pigment he had, nor do I believe the exact quantification thereof ever played into any argument. Allegations, true or false, had to do with him being in over his head and picking and choosing rules. Also, (2) A police officer allegedly spat on a black boy.
To solve these problems, the media informs us the masses are crying for us to call racist all who think skin color has nothing to do with upholding the law and respecting the officers charged with enforcing it. The true, un-racists want us to count color and heed only people of our own color. In case you don’t know who you are supposed to obey, here‘s a link to a chart to help you identify your beauty shade. Carry it with you in your car, and resist arrest from anybody without your same color. I can say that because anybody as sickly green as me is too vegetarian for a street beat.
I’m not callous. I happen to believe, and I am right, that the people of color starving under tyrannical regimes in Sub-Saharan Africa have less opportunity than whiny Americans. The greater spiritual need, however, may be with the whiny Americans who don’t see this. My request would be that we obey the law, hold police officers accountable, and put the race card away.
