Early Thoughts on "Fuck Your Breath"

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[Note: This post is an expansion of a series of Tweets I posted this morning and subsequently compiled on Storify. Since most of this site's small readership isn't especially active on Twitter, I'm extending it here.]

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So I awakened this morning to news of yet another lynching of a Black man by cops (and by "cops," as we have learned). It's not enough that I'm dealing with death on a very personal level right now; for people of color in this country, and especially for Black folks, it's impossible to escape it. I've seen the stat floating around to the effect that cops in this country are now executing Black men once every 28 hours; a few days ago, I saw a reference to that time span being reduced (!) to every 21 hours. More, there has apparently been exactly one — one! — day thus far in 2015 that not included a Black person dead at the hands of police. I haven't found the sources for any of these (right now, who has time to look?), but it's indicative of the situation that I find it not in the least difficult to believe.


Below is an expansion of what was my initial reaction to that moment when the hood slips, and everyone sees and hears that the honest response to "I can't breathe" is "Fuck your breath."

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"Fuck your breath."

Said by a white cop to a dying Black man who the cops were killing right then.

The shooter? A 73-year-old white insurance executive-become-"reserve deputy."

[Also, as we've since come to learn, a huge donor of money and flashy paramilitary "toys" to the police department, the former campaign manager of the sheriff during his last run for office, and one of some 130 such "reserve deputies."]

What the fuck does Tulsa need with a "reserve deputy," anyway?


A seventy-three year-old desk jockey? He'd never pass the physical as a regular cop. So why is this adrenaline tourism being allowed under the guise of "reserve?"

[Of course, turns out that he's one of 130, as noted above. These are not actual cop jobs; these are vanity appointments, political favors done supporters and donors and friends and relatives, "adrenaline tourism" that takes the very specific form of "cop tourism" that effectively becomes "killing Black bodies tourism." Which is, actually, the entire point.]

And it's not just "adrenaline tourism," either. They used to call it "slumming." And it encompassed more than trying on poverty like a jacket. It was a way to appropriate "Black life."

Now, it's a way to appropriate CONTROL OF Black life. Because these are lynchings, no mistake.

It's terrorism as sport. These cops (and "cops") all watched too many seasons of "COPS" on Fox and thought they could work out their racial hatred in paramilitary costume, become "vets" and "heroes," all for enacting their lynching fantasies. Now the genuinely employed cops are bringing civilian friends and their bosses' political allies along for the ride.

White people need to get this: This is "cop tourism" on Black bodies. This is terrorism for sport.

This is LYNCHING, with the attendant social gatherings by way of bringing friends along for the ride.

These are Night Riders . . . .

And "Fuck your breath" is the celebratory picnic while the Black body emits its death rattle.

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I've seen references today to that line being "mockery." I've seen others contesting that characterization, insisting that it's simply a "denial of basic humanity."

The two are not mutually exclusive.

It's both of those things, and it's less, and it's more. It's Othering taken to historically deadly depths; it's the fundamental insecurity and paranoia that are inherent in a culture founded on slavery and genocide. This is what this society is, it's who these people are. Get your head around that fact, because nothing changes until white folks recognize the deadly poisonous nature of this nation's dominant culture, accept the fact of it, and work to change it.

Because without doing it, there will be many more deaths of men like this:

Photo copyright Family of Eric Harris[?] 

There will be continual lynchings, on the daily basis we have now, and it is not sufficient to post photos and beat one's virtual breast and profess one's grief amid virtual weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.

And then deflect, punt and pivot from #BlackLivesMatter to #AllLivesMatter and hey, didja hear Hillary's big announcement, and hey, what about those Yankees?

No.

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At some point, we need to examine (and then tear down) the lexical frameworks that permit, no, ENCOURAGE these societal behaviors.

Seriously, have you ever listened to a police report being read aloud? YOU NEED TO. It's instructive about what it is that's really occurring. Here. There. Every day.

All written and recounted in the passive voice: Things just happen — they occur organically, not through the personal intervention of the cops themselves, but those organic "happenings?"

THOSE are what then "require" (i.e., justify) their subsequent intervention. It's one great big collective cop shrug: "I had to do it."

And now they're bringing in civilians to play cop tourist, too — and an INSURANCE EXEC?!

This is interesting to me for many reasons . . . .

Not least of which is the choice of profession here. Because insurance companies make their profits off cost/benefit analyses, off hedging bets, off amortizing risk and life and death. Off doing it for profit, in a way that lines pockets.

Amortize THIS, motherfuckers: You shortened the life expectancy of Black men some more. Because "Fuck your breath" is a thing. Still.








All text copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.