Yesterday, a peaceful and well-organized protest led by the Rev. Al Sharpton tied up traffic around Manhattan and resulted in over 200 arrests, according to Newsday.  In contrast to spontaneous protests of the past, involving rioting or car-burning, this was a “pray-in”, and was designed to bring New York to a halt for the afternoon rush hour. 

The protesters intended to engage in civil disobedience, and expected to be arrested for it.  It was really quite cooperative, protesters waiting patiently in line for the police to bind their hands and take them away. 

Put aside any ill-will one may have toward Al Sharpton’s integrity (a lot of New Yorkers remember Tawana Brawley, or just see Al as an opportunist) and consider the bigger picture.  There is a point to be made about the treatment of blacks by police in New York City, and the protesters were determined to make that point.

Will anything change?  Nothing changed after Amadou Diallo.  Not after Abner Louima,  Will Sean Bell be the tragedy to make a difference?  No.

Unlike some, I am firmly of the opinion that institutional racism remains firmly entrenched in the New York police department.  Others argue that it’s not racism, but just the fact that blacks are inclined to be criminals.  It is my belief that this view, standing alone, reflects the very problem of intransigent racism.

But while people protest, the question that remains is whether anybody is paying attention to the message.  After a while, it’s just another protest.  People become used to it.  People anticipate a protest after an event, and when the protest happens, they briefly look up from their coffee and remark, “they had another protest yesterday,” and then take another sip.  It’s just another day.

The targets of the protest, the police, the politicians, just shake their heads at the Rev. Al’s antics.  He’s very predictable.  They take comfort in the fact that Judge Cooperman made the right decision when he announced the “not guilty” verdict.  And the judge was right.  But that has little do with the fact that there is a problem, a very real problem. 

The verdict was a comment on a prosecution, but not the attitude that led up to the needless death of a young man who would probably not be dead if he was white.  This detail is dependent on a very subtle appreciation of what happened.  Many people will be incapable of seeing it, and will resort to a knee-jerk assertion that I’m saying that Sean Bell was shot because he was black.  That’s not what I’m saying. 

I’m saying that if the cops were dealing with a young white man, they would have hesitated before pulling the trigger because they would not have had the same degree of fear that they had in a black neighborhood with a young black man behind the wheel.  This is what distinguishes an everyday situation from the killing of a man, the moment that a cop decides to pull the trigger of his service weapon.

Just as there are deniers here, there are deniers in the police department.  They don’t see it.  Not at all.  They reject that there is institutional racism in the cop culture, in the fear and belief that young black men are more likely criminals than not.  They take comfort from the certainty of their belief, because they don’t want to be racist and don’t want to believe that they are. 

Just as firmly as I belief that racism remains pervasive, I believe that police do not believe that they, as a group, are racist.  I truly believe that they don’t want to be, and believe they aren’t.  When protests like this happen, they shake their heads at the foolishness of it, because it’s seen as just another misguided effort by people who want to find racism under every rock, when the truth (their truth) is that these protesters just don’t get it.

And so, the protest falls on deaf ears.  Again.  Civilians just don’t understand what it’s like to be a cop.  They don’t understand the pressure, the split second decisions, they fear that they could be killed at any moment.  It’s all so simple to civilians.  Only another cop understands. 

So to police, there is nothing that the protesters could say or do that would matter, because they could never understand what it’s like to be a cop.  So the protests fall on deaf ears.  Again.

The police have a defense mechanism like no other.  It’s a shell that protects them from all accusations, that allows them to sleep at night, comforted by the belief that they are right.  Bad things happen, and have happened over and over again.  And yet it is never a systemic problem.  There is always some excuse, coupled with their “civilians can’t possibly understand” culture, that shields them from their institutional failures.

It’s not just killing black men.  It’s inherent in their culture.

Nothing changed after the Dirty 30.  Nothing changed after Serpico.  Nothing changed after the Brooklyn narcotics scandal of the past year. 

Nothing ever changes because nothing can penetrate that shield around cops.  Yesterday was a fine example of civil disobedience.  But it will accomplish nothing.