==Why someone in Chicago may see police differently==
I posted this comment over at The New York Times today, in an article about out of control violence in Chicago. I am very honored it became a New York Times pick:
In the wake of the George Floyd protests, because of my spiritual and yes religious beliefs, I have been thinking a lot about what progressives refer to as my “white privilege” and how being born and raised white has resulted in my having a lot of implicit biases.
The world I live in and grew up in is one that the police are the good guys who are there to protect me and keep my neighborhood safe. I am coming to understand that many Black people see it differently, and feel that not only do the police harass them and are very confrontational with them, but also that the police fail to keep the streets safe in many Black neighborhoods, as illustrated in a recent article at The New York Times about Chicago’s violence.1
Based on my experiences with police, when someone says “defund the police”, I think they’re being preposterous. However, I can also empathize that someone from a world where the police are not keeping neighborhoods safe and where interactions with police can be dangerous would entertain that notion.
I don’t think we should defund the police, and I also believe we should increase funding for Chicago’s “Project Safe Neighborhoods” program. Studies show it is quite effective at reducing this kind of violence.
Being in a safe neighborhood where the police are the good guys and where I can walk by myself at night is something I take for granted; I want more Black people to be able to have the same experience.
==MaraDNS update: ip_blocklist==
I have added a new parameter to Deadwood, MaraDNS’s recursive component: ip_blocklist. This parameter acts the same as ip_blacklist, but does not have the possible negative connotations “blacklist” can have.
I have no plans to break the older ip_blacklist name in existing dwood3rc files; while the newer ip_blocklist name is preferable, both names continue to work.
A look through my blog makes it clear I am no fan of what is called “cancel culture”. This is in no way an endorsement of cancel culture nor of out of control “political correctness”. This is about having compassion and empathy for people who have been born and raised in a very different world than the world I was born in to.
July 7 2020 update: I have now released MaraDNS 3.5.0007 with this change.
- “Chicago Gun Violence Spikes and Increasingly Finds the Youngest Victims” by Neil MacFarquhar and Robert Chiarito, published in The New York Times.
Did you know that all of my blog entries are available in a free to download eBook at https://www.samiam.org/blog/ebooks.html.