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In reply to the discussion: This Is Not a Gun: So, Officers, Stop Shooting Unarmed Black Men [View all]NickB79
(19,301 posts)As for other items that minorities are frequently shot over, I have far less leeway in my opinion of the police. While I am white, my wife and mother-in-law are minorities, and have been hassled by police in the past. My MIL especially has been stopped many times by cops just looking for excuses to arrest her because she has a large Afro when she doesn't take the time to comb down her hair. And I've seen the way they're treated differently by police: the first time I was stopped by a cop with my wife in the car (forgot to turn on my headlights), I reached for my wallet before he even came to the car, he was smiling and polite, just reminded me of my lights and sent me on my way. My wife and MIL told me if they were driving, there's no way they'd so much as take their hands off the wheels until the cop told them too, or the cops would become aggressive. I didn't believe it until I was in the backseat once and my MIL got pulled over for "running a stop sign." She had stopped completely, but the fucking cops used it to try to search her truck until they saw me, a white guy, in the back. Then they immediately became polite again.
Like I said, I can fault the police for a lot of things. Mistaking a cell phone or wallet for a firearm is inexcuseable, IMO.
My only issue in this thread was when someone suggested they could tell an Airsoft pistol from a real one, with the orange tip removed, at a distance, while the kid was reaching for it in his waistband. That was all.