It’s Friday, y’all!
How’s your week been so far? Well, if you get through today, you’ll be looking at the weekend, “Baby”!
You know, I wonder what people do daily that makes them act like something is stuck up in their derriere?! I mean, grumpy and nasty, rude and uncouth demeanor only leads to even worse behaviour!! You’ve gotta have some fun in your life. “Fun” can be playing a pick up game of basketball; cooking a meal for oneself and/or loved ones! Fun is listening to some good music … whatever kind you like that “soothes the savage beast”! Fun is dancing at your favorite club … or to your favorite tune in your own living room!! Me thinks that if folks could learn to enjoy themselves more … in simple ways … they would be less stressed, have less chaos and confusion in their own lives, which ultimately manifest themselves in “hate”!
Over the years I’ve lived on this Earth, and I know there are those of you reading this who have been “here” longer than me, but I’ve learned to “count it all joy”! Sometimes, through my own tears, I find some joy … something to laugh about … if only my wrinkled up, wet face in the mirror causing me to chuckle out of my moments of sadness. It’s weird sometimes. These past few days, I have been thinking and “feeling” my mother’s presence. She “is” always here … as she has been through out my life … in the good times … and the more difficult ones! She ALWAYS believed in me. My father did, too, but he had a set of rules and regulations … even if I did something wrong … tell him the TRUTH!! How’s that for a great role model?! That’s the way he raised us … and I was the youngest so I heard it the most! “Don’t lie to me, boy!!”
It intrigues me why people have to lie about every darn thing nowadays. No values, no morals … nor respect for themselves and apparently …. no respect for “humanity”! Okay, so I have a great nephew attending school at the University of Virginia. Jovan Cook grew up in the Bronx, NY (son of my oldest sister’s son, Daric, and his wife, Janet) … met some wonderful people … got into the Quaker School there and graduated last year … and is now a freshman at UVA. Yep, same place where the local police grabbed Martese Johnson, an honor student with no criminal history … until now, and is a junior there. When I messaged my great nephew about it, he simply replied, “He’s my friend …”. Suddenly, this honor student, according to the news stories, purportedly had a fake ID, was drunk, and had been refused entry in to a local Irish pub on St. Patrick’s Day across the street from campus! There is no videotape of what happened before the Alcohol Control police arrived; but other students disputed the “false claim” that he was refused entry. It was simply crowded and the door staff told him so. So, why did the police come up to him … then touch … er uh … grab him according to the videotape … in the first place?! Do police have the authority to just walk up to someone and put their hands on them?!? It’s happened to me before … by the police here in the FTL … same department that allowed an officer, already with a questionable past, to slap a homeless man at the bus terminal. That cop slapped that man as if he were his parent!!!
I mean, have we citizens lost our “right” to ask an officer why he is touching “us”, not to mention stopping “us”?!? This is where we often find the African American male in this country … being touched, mistreated, kicked or punched, knees place on their head while handcuffed and on the ground … and shot and killed! Most recently, Thursday in Texas, a mother called the police, told them … yes TOLD them on the PHONE that her son was bi-polar and schizophrenic and wasn’t on his medications!! So, as soon as they arrived and the young man’s mother answered the door and walked out unharmed, the son entered the door well quietly behind his mother to their OWN home holding a screwdriver in his hands. He was twirling it in a NON MENACING way … more like a bi-polar confused way … and the cops went freaking ballistic. One cop yelled to the already non-medicated bi-polar schizophrenic to put down the screwdriver. They always want to order someone around FIRST rather than try the human approach – talking. How many cops have been stabbed and killed by a mentally challenged young man wielding a screw driver?!? Why don’t so many officers know how to talk to people … Black Men in particular?!? Then of course, if you don’t follow THEIR instructions, you are resisting arrest!!! Protect and serve … OR … harass, push buttons and KILL? Perhaps, this all says a lot to America … cops are human, too … and need training just like everybody else. They weren’t “born” to be police officers, and many of them don’t make the grade. Between the corruption we’ve witness, the out right lying, to which videotapes can bare witness, it should be clear that many of them are not trained well enough to do their jobs – protect and serve.
Have a great first day of Spring, and stay sharp!
Peace,
John I. Cook, Director
Educational Excellence 