Silence of ‘Them Laws’ on Black lynchings must end

Every time there’s a discussion about police brutality and misconduct, a chorus of folks chimes in saying such a conversation unfairly lumps together “good” cops with the few bad apples.

But where are the “good” cops on this issue of a violent uptick in lynchings of Black people? And if they’re such good cops, why are they so damn silent?

Current playbook

Currently, the cops making all the noise are the ones who arrive on the scene where a Black person is found dead, hanging from a tree with a Boy Scout/U.S. military-approved noose around their neck. And those “good” cops and/or the lead “investigator” immediately declare (without any real investigation) that no foul play was involved. Suicide. Case closed.

Then law enforcement, elected officials, and others demean and denigrate those who dare push back and call the death a lynching. They shun the lynching label as if white American culture doesn’t have a long and storied history of engaging in lynchings and then treating those violent murders of Black people as festivals, community gatherings, and white cultural rituals.

American tradition

This country has hundreds of years of history of white people traveling across county and state lines to attend lynchings. Dressing in their Sunday best for lynchings. Bringing their children to take in the glory and spectacle and “good white American times” of lynchings.

The general public, law enforcement, elected officials, ministers, teachers, shop owners, farmers, new mothers, and children (infants to teens), etc., all celebrated and participated in the lynching of Black people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPdh46k7b38

They took pictures of lynchings. Made postcards out of photos of lynchings. Sent them to loved ones unable to be there in person for the lynchings. Many folk who were there participated in the decimation and desecration of the Black body, the human being who was the “main attraction” of the lynching.

Many participants regularly cut off Black body parts and fought over those valued souvenirs and keepsakes from the lynchings. They often tortured, castrated, shot up, and burned the Black human being before they actually ended his or her life via lynching.

Lynching, quite honestly, isn’t as American as baseball, hot dogs, apple pie, and Chevrolet. Lynching is more American than all of them combined.

The first recorded apple pie was made in England, to let the white internet tell it. Hot dogs trace their roots back to Frankfurt, Germany, and Vienna, Austria. Scholars contend that even baseball traces its origins beyond U.S. shores. But lynching—that’s as American, or rather, as white American, as it gets.

Police silence

So, why in the hell do members of law enforcement treat the notion of this “potential” current resurgence of lynchings as nonsense dancing around in Blackfolks’ heads? Especially when there is a whole-ass white nationalist administration in the White House leading a charge to the “good ole days?” You know, the days when there were zero consequences for violently attacking Black people and communities.

Where were the “good” cops then? And where are they now?

In all the movies and TV shows about cops, there’s always those officers who won’t let a case die because they know there’s more to it than folk are letting on. Even when higher-ups in the department or local government want to squash a case, these fictional “good” cops refuse to stop digging until justice is served.

Where are those committed beat cops now? Where are those justice-driven police detectives today when lead investigators or police spokespersons get on camera five minutes after a Black body has been found with a noose still wrapped around that person’s neck, and they declare for all to hear that no foul play was involved, and the death was a suicide?

Where were those hero cops when the 70-plus Black people who have been found dangling from nooses over the past few years had their cases basically dismissed by the declaration, “suicide”? Or do they just exist in Hollywood fiction?

By the way, Blackfolk don’t have it in our DNA to commit suicide-by-lynching. The poor, broken soul who contemplates, then acts to take their own life, if Black, doesn’t consider driving around town to find a tree, after putting together a perfect white nationalist militia-approved noose, climbing said tree, then sending themselves to their death in the most white nationalist-facilitated manner possible.

Yet and still, I haven’t heard one cop, good, bad, or otherwise, publicly say, “Hey, there’s more to this case than a quick, under-investigated suicide designation.”

Hell, on the history of lynching alone, every such case (and those who half-ass investigate them) demands investigation.

‘Them laws’

Yet, “them laws” remain silent. Who are “them laws”? If you ask a multi-racial room that question, every non-Black person will probably respond, “What laws?” But Blackfolk know exactly what you mean.

When I first started driving, especially from home (Houston) to college (Austin), my dad would say stuff like, “Such-and-such town is a speed trap, so watch out for ‘them laws.’” Or “Don’t be rippin’ and runnin’ (speeding) when you’re out driving. ‘Them laws’ is everywhere.” In other words, 5-0, po-po, the police.

And “them laws” have been silent as a flea peeing on cotton regarding Black people and lynchings. So, if we’re waiting on those mythical “good” cops to speak out for justice and serious investigations into these killings, we have to define what “good cop” means.

If a “good” cop is one committed to “protecting and serving” all equally and to seeking justice when an injustice has been committed, then we need them to speak up. Continued silence means we need to forever throw away the notion that calling out “bad” cops is giving “good” ones a bad name.

However, if a “good” cop is one who excels at protecting the people, interests, and institutions that uphold anti-Blackness (i.e., like their “slave patrol” predecessors), then we can expect more “Silence of ‘Them Laws.’”

Speak out

Either way, “We the People” can’t afford to stay silent. So, use your voice to demand that your elected officials force local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies to take up these cases. Remind them that the Emmett Till Antilynching Act empowers them to investigate suspected cases.

And don’t forget to do everything possible to protect yourself, your family, and your community to prevent becoming the next lynching victim.