Some believe white privilege is nonexistent, or that it is used as a scapegoat by those that are not successful and do not want to take responsibility for their failures. Contrary to this belief, white privilege is alive and well in this country. A prime example is the “peaceful protester occupation” of the wildlife sanctuary on Oregon.
An example of white privilege regarding this situation was apparent from the get-go. If these “peaceful” armed protesters would have been Muslim, they would have been labeled as terrorist or if they were Black, they would have been labeled as “thugs.”
However, I will not focus on mere semantics to support the reality of white privilege in this country. No, I will use the tragic event that took place last week when authorities arrested the leaders of the “militia” who were occupying the sanctuary.
LaVoy Finicum, the famous “Tarp Man,” was shot and killed by law enforcement officers during an attempt to arrest the militia leaders. I refer any incident that involves the loss of life as a tragedy, regardless of differing opinions between myself and those that have died. However, this is a prime example of white privilege in America.
Finicum was interviewed by reporters during the “occupation” and earned the nickname of Tarp Man for using a blue tarp as form of concealment. Finicum also made statements such as willing to die before seeing a jail cell, willing to do harm to anyone government official that would dare try to stop him or the militia and so on.
Law enforcement officers shot Finicum after he blew past a roadblock and tried to run from the officers. The officers say that they shot Finicum after he had reached for a firearm.
White privilege played a huge role following the unfortunate death of Finicum. Right after Finicum was shot, fellow militants posted online that Finicum was unjustly shot by law enforcement officers when he had his hands in the air. Some went as far as to claim that Finicum was executed or assassinated by the law enforcement officers.
The reason that this is a prime example of white privilege in America is because when a minority is killed by law enforcement officers, the officers are usually given the benefit that the killing was justified. For example, in the deaths of Brown, Rice and Garner, or the death of Martin at the hand of Zimmerman, Zimmerman was given the benefit that he was justified in shooting Martin.
Just a reminder: Brown was shot and killed by an officer after he had raised his hands to surrender after robbing a convenience store; according to eyewitness accounts, Rice was shot within second of officers arriving on the scene after 911 was called about a kid playing with a toy gun; Garner died due to a chokehold for selling untaxed cigarettes in NYC and Martin was shot by Zimmerman for looking suspicious.
In the previously mentioned events, there would have been no justification for the use of lethal force on Brown, Garner or Martin on the basis of being in possession of a lethal weapon. However, the officers and Zimmerman were given the benefit that they acted accordingly.
In the case of Finicum, a man who has made such statements that he was willing to kill law enforcement officers, die before allowing the authorities to arrest him and was believed to be armed and dangerous, some people are willing to believe that the cops would have been less justified in shooting Finicum than in the previously mentioned people.
They main difference between Finicum and Garner, Rice, Martin, and Brown is that Finicum is white.
The other four deceased were black.
Yet, the militia supporters are more likely to believe that the deaths of Martin, Brown, Rice and Garner are much more justifiable than the death of Finicum.
The question that we need to ask ourselves is why? Finicum specifically made antigovernment statements, threats directed at law enforcement officials and had the means to carry out those threats, but yet is viewed as the victim.
Even when the FBI released footage of the shooting (relatively quickly following the incident as compared to other incidents), which shows Finicum reaching for a weapon, people did not believe it to be true.
The prime example of white privilege in this country is that when a minority is killed by law enforcement officials, the burden of proof falls on the victims and their families. When a white person gets shot, however, the burden of proof falls on the government.
NDSU is serving no one if this is the quality of thinking for which they pass out diplomas.
Aristotles,
With what do you not agree with and why?
The reason some people don’t call them terrorists, even though many people do, especially leftists, is because no civilians were involved. They occupied an EMPTY building.
The reason they weren’t label thugs like those who protested deaths Garner, Brown, and others, is because they didn’t burn their own city into the ground.
So no, the biggest difference is that these are very different cases.
The definition of terrorism used by the FBI: “Domestic terrorism” means activities with the following three characteristics: Involve acts dangerous to human life that violate federal or state law; Appear intended (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination. or kidnapping; and Occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the U.S.
In this case the militants were interacting with the locals and in fact schools shutdown due to the militants.
They also did destroy government property, such as cameras and even looked at confidential employee information.
In the incident at the Bundy Ranch, the militants had blocked off roads around the ranch and were stopping vehicles and demanding to see people’s ids.
You also need to keep in mind that there were a lot more people that took part in the protests after the killings of Garner, Brown, etc, and you’d expect more people to do more damage.
>>>acts dangerous to human life
it was an empty building they occupied
>>>intimidate or coerce a civilian population
the building they occupied was in the middle of nowhere; no civilians around
>>>mass destruction, assassination. or kidnapping
none of that happened
the school that shut down was miles away and they did that on their own
Never mind the rights and the wrongs of the protest: when the video runs on to show the surrender of the other occupant of the truck there are quite clearly another set tracks adjacent to “Lavoy Finicum’s” footprints, and they lead to a patch of trampled down snow. How come?
@Bill
You mean the right to illegally set fire to government owned land which endangers the lives of civilians and first responders in order to cover-up evidence of ones illegal activity?
Or even that those people did not want the militias help.
@J,
First, this is an opinion piece not a news piece.
Second, the reason Black Americans are killed more often by other Black Americans is because Black Americans spend more time around other Black Americans.
Third, yes, one can easily find those statistics. You can usually find those statistics on the FBI data page which is more credible than google. However, it is much harder to understand what those numbers mean or the significance of those numbers.
Fourth, your example of OJ, is an attempt to use an outlier to disprove a known fact.