Is the focus on the bad apples or the majority?

By Karl Cassell

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I offer a rebuttal to the Dec. 3 article (“Follow up on race and crime”) by Stephen Hanisch that focuses on the disproportionate numbers of Tased African-Americans relative to other population percentages. Mr. Hanisch, a former four-month police officer, wrote: “Is it possible that African-Americans are Tased more often because African-American criminals are more violent with police in general?”

I will address these comments, but more importantly, I prefer to celebrate and recognize the teachable moments of silent protest in the wake of police brutality toward African-Americans. I hope that Mr. Hanisch will join in studying history and not just look at isolated cases.

There are hundreds of millions of African-Americans today who are law-abiding citizens, who have never been violent toward law enforcement or have ever been arrested. I think it would also be noteworthy to acknowledge the tremendous public service we provide to this country and always have, even during a time in our history when we worked for free and by force, and continued to serve alongside other Americans in time of war. But we can discuss that point at a later date.

The perception of African-Americans as more violent toward law enforcement is a self-fulfilling prophecy, if that is what you are looking for. It would be counterproductive to pretend that there are not cases of violence toward law enforcement from African-Americans, and when it occurs, it should be appropriately dealt with.

But ignoring the fact that brutality, or excessive force, happens to innocent victims is also choosing to be ignorant of the facts. This, of course, does not give me liberty to assume that because two cases of brutality occurred it taints all law enforcement.

Mr. Hanisch would have a better argument if he would have stated that focusing on stopping crime all together would be in the public's best interest. Often we use percentages to make a point, but please don't let these percentages determine what is considered normal. The greater numbers of African-Americans are law-abiding citizens and the majority of law enforcement officers uses force judiciously. Each time we communicate, we articulate the future we want to create.

Finally, I would caution Mr. Hanisch to not paint all African-Americans with a broad brush. There are many African-Americans in Cedar Rapids who are non-violent law-abiding citizens and have taught their children to conduct themselves likewise.

Karl Cassell is executive director of the Cedar Rapids Civil Rights Commission. Comments: coachcassell@hotmail.com