Correction officers need corrective lenses.

For this blog, I wanted to share an experience of a friend on campus. He will remain unnamed for privacy, but I wanted to share this story because it relates to (not to the drug war) one of the main topics in Alexander's book The New Jim Crow: the black man being targeted. It also shows how very real the "new" Jim Crow is and how systematic and unauthorized it truly is. I am not sure how many of you have any experience with/ know anyone who has been the subject of unnecessary policing (because of skin tone), so for those who don't know anyone (and you have not been) I wanted to show how very close to "home" structured racism is being (pretty overtly) exercised. I'm sure (or hoping) you all are aware of the racism within our government and police force, but it changes when you see and experience the affects of what you have always been around. Anywho, here is what happened in our own backyard to one of our fellow UC students.... whom is black and male. 

He, who shall not be named, took his car (which was recently gifted to him from his mother) to Wawa. The wawa that is walking distance from the school--the one which, I feel I could safely say, about 85 percent of the UC population goes to weekly. On his way out from the parking lot from this Wawa the police decided to put on their sirens and stop him. So far, the man has done nothing wrong. The police go through the standard "pulling over" process but not without adding a touch of extremely racist precautions. They asked who's car this was and made it clear they did not think it was his. After giving the car's registration (which is under his mother's name as he tried to explain) this made the police think even more that this black man before them was a criminal. The person tried to explain it was his mother's name, who has a different last name, but he can provide documentation. He also tried repetitively to explain that he went to Ursinus college, RIGHT THERE. Their response? "Yea. Right. Sure you do." When he tried to show them his ID from the school they refused to even look at it. I keep referring to the cop that pulled him over as "they" because the cop did call for back up--where two more cars showed up. Now, I have been observing the Collegeville area, and I even saw an accident where only ONE cop car was at the scene. I remember noting how unusual this was, because back where I am from, no matter the situation cops call for at least one more car to assist. However, Collegeville didn't seem to function like that...until this particular case. They made him get out of the car, asked him in their "asking voices" to search the car, and did accordingly (of course with his helpless permission to do so). After having him sit there for a couple of hours, for no rhyme or reason in the first place... they finally let him go to the on campus job he said he was going to be late for in the first place. They tried every trick to pin something on this man at the Wawa where drunk, high, and mostly white college kids treck in and out of every single day of the week at all hours of the day. Times that are much more suspicious than 10pm on a week day. 

I did not want to share this just because I wanted to show you that this was happening right outside our gates, but I wanted to purpose a question: What could he do, we do, anyone do to fight back? I told him to write a letter to the police department. Although it will most likely get dismissed, if everyone who was subject to, or saw someone being subjected like this, spoke up somehow, a pattern might be revealed, exposed to the public eye, attract media, and hopefully starting righful action that cases akin to this all over America are calling for. Otherwise, it's another case brushed under the bed, disregarded, and accepted to be the American way of life for colored people.