It is testing to see the media suddenly start to behave as if Freddie Gray’s death and the resulting charges thrown at the six officers is the end of the problem. It is abominable to know that we all realize that Freddie Gray is one illustration in a wide spectrum of similar atrocities committed on minority Americans, especially African Americans; and yet, we seem to have moved on so quickly after the rioting frenzy. The Freddie Gray case is a point. The minority question and police brutality are pages in a book of a failing society. There should be much more going on in communities all around the country in these critical early days before the whole thing becomes another O.J. Simsonesque spinoff when TV corporations will count their dollar tallies in the name of justice. We cannot continue to stand by and allow History to record these great tragedies of our time as a period when good men were equipped to make change tangible, and yet they did nothing. We are a generation that is gifted with advances in communication technologies like no other before us. We can rally from the North to the South and from the East to West without the need to move or travel. We can do so by simply sharing in direct terms the intent of our motivation to change the dynamic of how our legal system handles police brutality, police credibility, and minority profiling, segregation, and economic imbalances between the races, the classes; which have resulted in a divided nation, and potentially a weakened republic.
This resulting chaos; where countrymen are suspicious of each other, where some are destined to inherit and some hopeless, where some meet and marry to guarantee the survival of our sphere and some without that ability to sustain their family, where the pride of one country under God varies so much across the lines and between its peoples. It is no longer enough to depend on one example such as Freddie Gray, or Treyvon Martin if, and the many more we know are out there, for the change to happen in our justice system. That dependence on single instances is a kind of weakness and lackadaisical passivity that only guarantees that our children will inherit our burdens as we did our fathers. When one is neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. We can no longer ignore the overwhelming advantage that law enforcement has over the civilian population, especially minorities, in the face of the justice system. They are too strong and have little room for accountability. In fact, their power is in my opinion a disservice to the economic strength of the American civilization. Anyone who cannot see that a lion will feast on goat when in the same pen, and is neutral when the lion begins to claw the goat’s eyes out; will not be appreciated by the goat. This bystander is us if we do nothing now when the stage is there and the time is ripe.
We should petition that all state prosecuting attorneys from all the States of our nation must in this moment rehash all cases of police brutality; docked, dismissed, or pending now. Only all at once can we recognize as a people, the similarity that is between all these cases and only all at once will we see the focus of minority abuse in the American justice system. Only all at once can we together move the heavy hand of change through legislation by participation. How can it be that an absolute population minority is an absolute majority in our prison system? How can it be that in modern America, the second oldest race upon the continent is still the most impoverished? How is possible that in the 21st century, there are children in the United States who cannot sustain basic math compared to children in 3rd world India? These sorts of facts are a shaming blow to us as people. This is an economic problem. If we do not soon learn to incorporate all our citizens into our economic machine presently, we will be marginalized and outperformed by a homogeneous China. Our diversity as Americans if harnessed through one sociopolitical philosophy is potentially forever unmatchable by any emerging power. However, ours is a socially divided country where the effect of our History continues to deny the future generations of a natural republican evolution. In the words of the great Robert Kennedy, “Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in total; of all those acts will be written the history of this generation.” My plea is that we try to do just that with Freddie Gray as the open door through which we can ask our leaders the critical question; why?
Let this occasion of Gray’s death and the upcoming legal battle be a theater for us. Let us gather to once and for all correct or attempt to, this painful condition of injustice and racism in our beautiful homeland. We must start with the enforcers of the laws, laws that we hold so dear which guarantee that we remain a most civilized nation amongst the nations of the world. Gray is a stepping stone toward a greater challenge. The challenge is social, its economical, its moral, it’s historical, and it’s a revolution. We must endeavor to warranty a small portion of the American experience to all people living in America. It is what made us strong as a power internationally, and it is what keeps the appeal of our culture above others. Yet we must strike from it racism at all institutional levels, rid it of profiling in our housing and labor markets, and give it the steam of growth with the inclusion of all our people in the developing destiny of this great country. Minority men are wasting in our prisons while minority children are growing shorthanded without the proper education or exposure they need for tomorrow. Our economy will thrive when all of its people contribute and rip from it equally. You will be surprised how scarce economic depressions will be as soon as we can apply the full human resources and diversity of our people in full strength. In the words of the great Franklin Roosevelt, “The test to our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have little.”
I believe that the Gray question is a clarion call from our ancestors. All of them; white, black, Asian, Indian, Jewish, European, African, and all. It cannot be only about Freddie Gray this matter. It is about my son, and yours, our daughters, our children. It is about the future of this country and the stability of our socioeconomic structures. It is about the future morality of this world. It is about ensuring that the core foundation of society through Christianity is preserved. It is respect for the essence of human life and the value of family in culture. It plain simply is about goodness versus badness. We have to choose goodness and to do so will be to say no to any future injustices with adamancy now, indeed. Nothing is greater than positive change. We are capable and we are equipped to pursue it civilly, respectfully, structurally, and successfully. I can only implore in modest words for a commitment from the American people in this matter. Let us not allow the media and its backers to soon change the “Gray Theater” into a silver screen of TV displays of substance-less beautifully spoken analysis’ and analysts. Let us not allow the deaths of many more like Freddie Gray to earn their own primetime slots first before we watch and hear them out. Let us embrace the power of America which is diversity in the way that is most productive for the sakes of our children and this gargantuan republic that is ours. Let us uphold justice for all with an accommodation for morality and humanism. In the words of the great Abraham Lincoln, “The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew.”
Edmond A. Arrey