Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

"He committed no crime the day he was killed. Even the officer who shot him acknowledges that. There was no struggle. The details are not murky.

"But because no one was marching in the streets on behalf of John Geer, because he was absent from national headlines, the system was able to make his outrageous death go away by the simple expedient of doing nothing and refusing to discuss it.

[...]

"But the killing of John Geer should frighten everyone. It is the best example yet that while police often target minorities disproportionately, their basic and overriding demand is total and unquestioning submission to their authority."

--Neil Macdonald, "In Fairfax, Va., a different, no-less-scary police shooting, CBC, 2015-02-18

[I can see a big difference between this case and the better known stories of Garner and Brown and others. In those, there are at least two issues in play: profiling of African-American citizens and social/institutional devaluing of their lives, and out-of control, unaccountable, scaredy-cat police bullies. In the Geer shooting, only the latter pertains. Still, it illustrates why people like me -- white privilege, class privilege, and all -- are afraid of the police (sure there are apparently-good cops (but not good enough to protect us from the bad ones, eh?), but the consequences of finding out the officer you're dealing with is a bully can be fatal), and maybe this'll get the attention of any white people who want to continue dismissing shootings like this as someone else's problem because they either don't believe systemic racism is real or just don't care. Though white folks' risk is a whole lot lower, it's everybody's problem.]