Lessons in The Great Race

Lessons In The Great Race


We are all human. No matter our political affiliation. No matter what religion, or lack thereof. No matter what nationality. No matter what sex. No matter what color.

Color.

Race.

The arrest of Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. has been called 'a teaching moment'. His words. This Harvard professor who was arrested in his own home recently by a police officer, Sergeant James Crowley who was responding to a call of someone breaking and entering someones home. This was reported by a local passersby who thought she was serving the public good.

The good professor was handcuffed, hauled off and booked. After spending four hours in local custody, he paid a bail of a whopping $40.00 and was released on his own cognizance. A few days later, all charges were dropped. Now it should be noted that in many other circumstances, these men would have likely worked together rather than at odds.

Professor Gates is a renowned authority on matters of racial inequity as it relates to people of African descent. Sergeant Crowley is a veteran officer and indeed a training officer for the local police force who specializes in getting rid of 'racial profiling'.

Everyone seems to agree Professor Gates should not have been arrested. What everyone can't agree on are the exact circumstances directly leading to the arrest. Sergeant Crowley maintains, Professor Gates was behaving in an increasingly hostile manner towards him, so much so that he felt moved to arrest him for disorderly conduct. While admitting that he was not cool as a cucumber, Professor Gates maintains that the officer refused to give him his name and his badge number when repeatedly requested to by Professor Gates after professor Gates showed him both his driver's license and his Harvard ID card.

Even the President had to get into the act, speaking a bit rashly when he called Sergeant Growley's actions 'stupid'. Perhaps they were.

Perhaps things would have been different had both these men approached the situation as you or I might approach the simple act of going to work, calm, cool and collected. But neither man was in this case.

Professor Gates had just returned from China. Finding he could not open the door, he and his driver went to the back. After unlocking the door, they still could not open it. Returning to the front, they applied their shoulders to it and the door opened. His driver brought in his bags and departed. Thus the stage was set for this little drama.

When Sergeant Crowley appeared, saw Gates through the open door and ordered Gates to speak with him outside of the man's house, Gates refused. And the little play started in earnest.

Adrenaline is a wonderful thing. Sometimes. Both men had adrenaline running through them like a river. Both men were facing unknown terrors. One wanted to be sure he would make it home. The other just wanted to be left alone. Was this racial profiling? Yes, to be sure. But both men were profiling the other. This is why things got so extreme.

Adrenaline is funny stuff. In some ways, it makes things very, very clear. In other ways it tends to cloud up the truth. Adrenaline is a response to a life or death situation. It is there to help you survive. It doesn't care about right or wrong. It only cares about being alive or dead.

We will never know for sure what was said to who. Perhaps they don't even know themselves. I can see it now.....somewhere in the future of the cop on the street will come the 'Badge-Cam', the ultimate recording device. With a tiny camera lens and recording device, it will track the interactions an officer makes for every call. Technically, it is possible.

So, what's the lesson here? Perhaps first realize that everyone is a member of the same race, and spend less time worrying about the color of their skin. It may be unconscious to a large degree and it may be something we will never outgrow. We always view someone who is different from us with a suspicious light, until at least we get used to them. We just use color as an excuse because of our shared histories.

But there is in reality, only one race. The Human Race.