"Will I Die Before They Get To Know Me?" On Oscar Grant

Politics and Activism
"Will I Die Before They Get To Know Me?" From J. Cole to Oscar Grant III
by Michael Ralph

"Will I live or will I die before they get to know me? If I go, I know the ones that's pourin' liquor for me ... "
-J. Cole, "Can I Live?" The Warm Up

While rappers from Kanye West to Jay Z have celebrated Obama's ascent to the US Presidency as a victory for black people and for the prospect of democracy in the US, more broadly, J. Cole remains unconvinced that we have entered the age of Hope, as he makes clear on "I Get Up," the sixth track from his standout mixtape, The Warm Up:

"We raisin' babies in Hades, where it ain't no Hope...Politicians hollerin' 'bout problems, but I ain't gon' vote. Keep talkin' 'bout Change, we floatin' in the same ol' boat."

Like the Notorious B.I.G. and Nas before him, J. Cole's lyricism centers on the unlikely prospect of individual success in a gothic underworld defined by corrupt social institutions ("like a corpse six feet, shit's deep," "Grown Simba"; "My mind's elsewhere: my mom's health care. To get out this hell, here," "I Get Up"). J. Cole specializes in elaborating an unruly cityscape where death is familiar, making fantasies of bling desirable (where social reproduction lies in the slim possibility that some of the "seeds" he and members of his cohort manage to help produce might survive to see a brighter tomorrow; where he and his peers might live on in legends told by the women they too often reduce to accessories and vehicles for sexual satisfaction, despite the longing they routinely express for a partner who could appreciate the social and psychological suffering that defines their plight). Precisely because J. Cole doesn't consider himself to be much interested in electoral competition or protest politics, I was struck by a single line from, "Can I Live," that echoes ominously in the aftermath of Oscar Grant III's tragic death: "He didn't even get a chance to run before the bullet hit his lung."

In the first few hours of 2009, Johannes Mehserle stood over, shot and killed, Grant, as the twenty-two year-old father lay face down on Oakland's Bay Area Transit platform, while another officer kneeled on the young man's neck. The bullet passed through Grant's torso and hit the ground before bouncing back into his lung, ending his life some hours later. In courtroom testimony, Mehserle maintained that he meant to reach for his taser but mistakenly drew his semi-automatic handgun, although he was wearing his taser on the left side and his .40 caliber on the right side of his body, and despite the fact that the former weighs about half as much as the latter.

On July 8, 2010, Mehserle was convicted of involuntary manslaughter, marking the first time in the history of the state of California that a police officer has been convicted for shooting and killing an unarmed African American man, although it happens at an alarming rate. What some onlookers view as a just conviction was met with widespread disappointment and diverse methods of protest. Supporters of Grant, legal experts, and grassroots activists hoped the jury would return a verdict of second-degree murder or, perhaps, voluntary manslaughter. But then, Mehserle's defense team had insisted in pretrial correspondence, apparently with far-reaching effects, that the presiding judge should instruct the jury to limit its deliberations to either second-degree murder or acquittal. Even more unsettling, Michael Rains, counsel for the defense, managed to have each potential African American juror removed from consideration for the trial based on the dubious rationale that Oakland's black residents cannot be expected to deliver an unbiased verdict in a criminal trial involving a police officer suspected of violent conduct. The kind of shooting J. Cole writes about (involving miscellaneous "niggas" and rival drug crews) would seem wholly different from police violence wielded by a state employee, except that we are too often discussing "accidental shootings," in either case.

Read the Full Essay @ Social Text

***

Michael Ralph teaches in the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis at New York University. His scholarship on crime, economics, political transformation and urban youth culture has been published in Public Culture, Social Text, Souls, Transforming Anthropology, Afrique et Développement and South Atlantic Quarterly.

Davey D: A Wake-Up Call in Oakland

The verdict in the Oscar Grant shooting case was a slap in the face to a community sure that this time justice would be served, says radio journalist Davey D.

A Wake-Up Call in Oakland
by Davey D

It's been five days since the verdict of involuntary manslaughter was handed down to former Oakland, Calif., transit cop Johannes Mehserle for the shooting death of unarmed Oscar Grant III as he lay face down with his hands behind his back in front of a train packed with horrified passengers who were returning home from New Year's Eve celebrations in January 2009. His murder, which was caught on video by dozens of cell phones, sent shock waves all over the world.

Some are saying Mehserle's conviction is a good thing; after all, it's the first time in the history of this great blue, liberal state of California that an officer was convicted for killing a black man while on duty. That may be true, but as far as I'm concerned, being the first to get a crumb when you deserve a meal is not good enough. Justice was not served. The Grant family deserved more. This hard-working Oakland-Bay Area community, which came together and tirelessly and meticulously organized for the past 18 months to see this case through, deserved more.

A Series of Wake-Up Calls

Mehserle only getting involuntary manslaughter, and not second-degree murder or voluntary manslaughter, cut deep. It was a slap in the face. It symbolized just how broken the justice system is and how powerless we are within it. It was another wake-up call that left me wondering just how much more can you invest in a system that is continuously unresponsive to black people and other marginalized communities?

The first wake-up call, for many of us in Oakland, came the night Grant was murdered. To better understand, one has to remember what was going on at that time. The inauguration of President Barack Obama was three weeks away. Many of us were in a hopeful, festive mood. Hope, change and the anticipation of new beginnings are what many of us were thinking as this nation was gearing up to have its first black president.

Many of us were happy that he had already named Eric Holder, another African American, to hold the nation's top law enforcement spot as attorney general. The thought of us black folks having to revisit the all-too-familiar scenario of white-cop-shoots-unarmed-black-man-and-gets-away-with-it was the furthest thing on our minds the night Oscar Grant was killed. I've often wondered if similar thoughts were rolling through Grant's mind that fateful night.

Was he thinking it was a new day when he was approached by an aggressive Johannes Mehserle that night? Did he feel comfortable enough to question why Mehserle had pulled him and his friends off the train? Did he think that the days of having to cower and be scared of white cops in black and brown neighborhoods were over?

Grant's murder was a harsh wake-up call. It reminded us that there would be no post-racial America, that it was business as usual. This was further underscored when we learned that moments before Grant was shot, he was called a "bitch ass nigger" by Mehserle's racist partner Tony Pirone, who has since been fired after months of community pressure. One can only wonder what Grant was thinking when he heard those words.

Read the Full Essay @ The Root

Video: Reaction to Mehserle Verdict: Oakland, CA

Reaction to Mehserle Verdict: Oakland, CA: 8 July 2010 from Oriana Bolden on Vimeo.

from Oriana Bolden:

Community response to U.S. systemic racism as evidenced by the murder of Oscar Grant, then reinforced by the Mehserle verdict.

This is the first round of going through my footage. I will try to update with clearer shots of police activities and some of the activities that happened after police began arresting peaceful citizens.

Disarm the Police After Oscar Grant?

Police should find a more rigorous way to do their job – unarmed

After Oscar Grant, Just Take Guns Away from US police Officers

by Lola Adesioye

People in America always ask me what police officers do in the UK without guns. They find it hard to comprehend how you can enforce the law or get people to comply without the threat of a gun. I tell them I find it weird and disconcerting that police officers in the US carry guns, particularly when I hear about the various accidents that happen as a result.

One of these "accidents" is currently the source of intense upset and was the reason for several large protests in Oakland, California. Last year, millions of people watched cellphone videos captured at the scene of the shooting and killing of 22-year-old Oscar Grant by police officer Johannes Mehserle on a train station platform in Oakland. We watched in horror as we saw an unarmed Grant, lying face down with a police officer's foot in his neck, shot in the back by Mehserle, a transport officer.

Mehserle, who was yesterday found guilty of involuntary manslaughter – a charge that carries a maximum, laughable four-year sentence – claims that he did not mean to shoot Grant, mistaking his Taser for a gun. That is one of the reasons why I am deeply thankful that police officers in the UK do not carry guns.

"Oops, I didn't know" has become a refrain that I have unfortunately heard too often while living in the US. Each year has brought another major incident, usually featuring a police officer who has shot and killed a young black person by accident. Just recently, it was seven-year-old Aiyana Jones. Last year it was Oscar Grant. In 2006 it was Sean Bell, who was riddled with bullets on the day before his wedding. All accidents. And these are just the ones that reach national attention.

People all across America are upset, disappointed and angry about the Oscar Grant verdict, which many see as symptomatic of a much deeper issue. They want to know why this type of accident only seems to happen to black kids. It's hard to remember the last time a police officer accidentally killed a young white person. Why do unarmed black people statistically overrepresented when it comes to police shootings?

Read the Full Essay @ The Guardian

***

Lola Adesioye, a US-based writer, specialises in issues affecting the black community.