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So...much to my surprise (and I should definitely make the deliberate choice to stop being surprised these days) I have learned that there are folks out there who think that people who *film* Karens in the wild are somehow responsible for provoking said Karens.
A thread.
A thread.
I sat with this for a while, and realized that if one had not had much exposure to the way Black men are utterly brutalized by our system, and if one imagines a stranger randomly filming them *doing nothing wrong, minding one& #39;s own business* how filming could seem provocative.
So...I feel like I have to explain this if you& #39;re out there (or if your friends or relatives or family) take this view.
Christian Cooper--and everyone else who has captured these videos--is doing the single best thing they can do to protect themselves from harm.
Christian Cooper--and everyone else who has captured these videos--is doing the single best thing they can do to protect themselves from harm.
I don& #39;t just mean the violence of the police, though countless Black and brown men have been killed because of a false complaint, often from a white woman feigning fear (as we see in the Amy Cooper video).
I also mean, as a public defender, I have seen hundreds of cases where the only evidence of what--if anything--went down between two people is a voice on a 911 call. Where one person says they were punched, for example, but has zero injuries and the other says it never happened.
These situations are awful, because there& #39;s no evidence, really, at all, and police and prosecutors are apt to believe ANYTHING that is said by whomever calls 911 first.
This person strangled you and hit you with a tire iron but you have zero bruises whatsoever? Sure.
This person strangled you and hit you with a tire iron but you have zero bruises whatsoever? Sure.
So filming--and beginning to film the SECOND things become even mildly contentious--may be a bit inflammatory, but it& #39;s also the single best thing a person can do to prevent being wrongly accused of a crime.
The earlier one can start filming, the better. Because the more of the encounter that is captured on video, the stronger the proof that the accused person didn& #39;t actually do anything.
This is, as you might imagine, especially important for people who are historically wrongly accused ALL THE TIME, ie Black and brown men.
Christian& #39;s video proved Amy was lying, but he probably *started* filming to ensure he could prove that he didn& #39;t do anything wrong.
Christian& #39;s video proved Amy was lying, but he probably *started* filming to ensure he could prove that he didn& #39;t do anything wrong.
The fact that BIPOC have to think this way--to be constantly on guard against the system being used as a weapon, to be constantly on guard against false accusations that could lead to death-by-police--is something anyone who questions this filming should sit with.
