I live less than a handful of miles from Ferguson. I’ve attended meetings, participated in a protest or two, and made a few forays into discussions over endemic injustice and talked of justice for the oppressed. Yet, I still never experienced what it’s really like to be on the front lines where the police are lined up ten deep with flares and tear gas in the air.
Then a young man was shot and killed by police officers during an investigation at a house about a block from the church I attend. I saw the alert on my phone announcing the incident, but assumed that everything had settled down by the time I arrived for a meeting at the church.
The meeting went off without a hitch. After it ended, most of us headed towards the sanctuary for Bible study. However, upon entering the main hallway, I saw other members moving to an exterior door. I could hear snatches of conversation about some disruption on the street.
I followed the group outside only to see at least 40 police vehicles, all SUVs, lined up three or four across and at least 10 rows deep. About a block to the west were 100-plus officers, more police cars, at least one armored truck, a helicopter circling overhead and a sky filled with smoke.
Suddenly, some people in the street and the police officers started to run in our direction. It was then that we smelled the stench and felt the effects of tear gas released at the site of the earlier shooting incident where some people had gathered to protest, while others seemed intent on creating mayhem. With our eyes and noses burning, we ran back into the church building.
I was stunned! So this is what it feels like for a community to be under siege. Tears rolled uncontrollably, not from the tear gas or fear, but sorrow.
The bitter fruit of planned inequality has come into full bloom. When decades of policies and legislation have been enacted to structure and maintain a society that benefits some at the expense of others, it should come as no surprise that volatile responses will come from oppressed communities.
Later in the evening, I called a dear friend who lives in the heart of the affected neighborhood. She claimed that she and her husband were safe and unafraid and determined to stay in their home and protect it. At that moment, her husband was next door, inside his business securing it from roaming vandals, who were taking advantage of the protest scene.
My friend reported that she saw a fire started and immediately called the fire department, only for them to show up 45 minutes later. This, after she called the police chief, her alderman and a number of other officials. By the time fire department arrived, the burning car was completely destroyed and other small fires had been started.
There really seems to be enough blame to go around. However, there is a tendency to divide into groups or factions. One of the more prominent means of divisiveness is to separate ourselves by generations: the Greatest Generation, Baby Boomers, Gen-X, Millennials and so on. This model creates a marvelous opportunity to point fingers at one another: “Those old people don’t know what they’re talking about,” or “I don’t know what to make of these young people today.”
Division is the master tool of deception and distraction. As long as mistrust can be generated between groups, the status quo will remain intact. What incentives exist to change systems of inequity? Until we, individually and collectively, acknowledge our accountability (responsibility) to something larger than ourselves, to something higher than our own interests, we will continue to experience anarchy.
Thomasina F. Hassler is a veteran educator with more than 40 years of experience in the metropolitan area. She currently serves as adjunct assistant professor at Harris-Stowe State University and the University of Missouri-St. Louis.
