Michigan city moves to criminalize calling 911 on people of color who are just living their lives [View all]

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Sweeping amendments to a 66-year-old human rights ordinance might make Grand Rapids, Mich. the latest city to try to tackle the epidemic of racially-motivated abuses of emergency services. The planned changes “would make it a criminal misdemeanor to racially profile people of color for ‘participating in their lives.’”

Diversity and Inclusion Manager Patti Caudill said the ordinance is a new concept in Michigan. It isn’t meant to discourage 911 calls, she said. Rather, it’s meant to make people “check their biases” before calling the police.

“Call the police, but if you’re calling because your neighbors are having a barbecue and you’re calling because of some implicit bias because they’re people of color, we don’t want to see that,” she said.

The scenarios Caudill cites are all too familiar these days: White people keep calling 911 on people of color while they’re simply trying to live their best lives. The depressing #LivingWhileBlack hashtag never lacks new fodder, since black people face the brunt of these racist actions that waste valuable first-responder resources. The epidemic, which we can only hope peaked in 2018, showed the nation just how hard it is to be a person of color in spaces that bigots have declared to be for “whites only.”

More: https://m.dailykos.com/stories/2019/4/20/1851828/-Michigan-city-moves-to-make-a-crime-to-call-911-on-people-of-color-who-are-just-living-their-lives?fbclid=IwAR1uqK3MBdDIW8BOCOrjxWkhC89aOElWm0uotYRJqSZDJwRiM_HKgcVlqx0