TWO WRONGS!---are just two wrongs.

I heard the horrible news about the two officers gunned down in their car in NYC.  I was heartbroken for them and their families.  And knew, just knew that it was somebody thinking they were making a statement.
They failed.  All they did was give the world one more view of a violent and dangerous black man.

We know the shooter wasn't smart.  We know the shooter was angry.  We know that all the peaceful activism aimed at raising the consciousness of the rest of the world about the unequal treatment frequently received by people of color and specifically post-pubescent black men, was endangered.

To all those people out there participating in peaceful protests for the good of all--thank you--very sincerely--thank you.  You have put yourselves out there.  You have taken a stand.  You are making a difference.

For all of you out their looting and committing crimes and otherwise doing things that negate the actions of the people trying to achieve a positive change.  What is wrong with you. Are you so stupid and self-serving and unthinking that you don't see you are not part of the solution.  You are the problem. 

In every riot over injustice I have ever heard of, it is not the cause of the riot that is remembered, it is the fact that the looters and vandals and otherwise violent people go out and destroy their own neighborhoods. People that weren't there act as if that means the people in those neighborhoods deserve destroyed neighborhoods and probably deserved whatever offense started the riot in the first place. ( For some reason, when frat boys and sports and music fans get out of hand--its just expected from the excitement and their age.)  

And the stereotype, the profiling that is responsible for the excessive force and murderous response by police officers towards nonwhite men women and children, how does making it seem to be correct, stop the problem.  I would never ask people to put up with disrespectful, overly rough treatment by people that use their authority to act on their own personal prejudices.  Shooting people because they are wearing a uniform is no different than shooting people because of their race or their religion.

But too late, the damage has been done--and done--and done.

The mayor, who was openly supporting the examination of the shootings of unarmed black men, is now anti-police because he doesn't like the shooting of unarmed black men.

I'm having a hard time seeing  the 2 sides.  I'm having a hard time with the polarization that is being expected.  Did all police shoot unarmed black men?  Should police be allowed to shoot unarmed black men without any repercussions?  And how does anyone get to "I'm going to fix this problem by shooting someone."

So now, I'm being blasted with "support your police".  I don't not support the police.  I do wish that there weren't so many men and women going into police work that think the answer to all problems is a gun.  I also wish I had never seen a policeman abuse someone under their care.  But I am not prone to stereotyping.  I have seen acts of greatness and acts of horror--by people, some in uniforms, some not.  They are all individuals.

We need to not feed the machinery of hate.  If we know there is a problem--and I do think that there are places where the police need to be policed--the idea that an officer from a place that lost control of its force due to racism and excessive force is not the person that I would hire--institutionalized hate is not less hateful--it's more.

So no more wrongs should be committed, no more lives should be lost.  The answer is transparency and not secrecy.  Its time to expose the problems and fix them rather than hiding them and pretending that everything is fine.  There is such a thing as righteous anger, but hate and violence are never righteous.  

Hate is not the answer.  If you are angry, and anger is justified, then help.  Participate in the nonviolent demonstrations.  If you have a personal story--put it on the internet, tell someone that doesn't believe such things happen. Be part of the solution.  Its time to do something right.