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In the sixth to eighth
grade division, the winners were : first place – Kaleiah
Carpenter of Rosary Cathedral; Brysen Davis of Keyser
Elementary; Breya Norwood of Rosary Cathedral.
Cash prizes were awarded
to the winners - $250 for first place; $175 for second and
$100 for third.
Below are the essays of
the two first place winners.
Freeze
By Thomas Perkins, Waite High School
Do birds swim? How about fish, do they
fly? You might be thinking “Of course they don’t” and you’d
be right. I had the same answer when asked the question up
for discussion.
“Do law enforcement officials unfairly
target African American males?”
In my opinion they don’t, not saying
they haven’t in the past, because they absolutely have but
at this point in time I feel that officers are less likely
to pull over or interact with black men for one primary
reason – they don’t want to be the next “racist” cop with
his face plastered all over TV and Facebook.
The media has officers everywhere
walking on eggshells. The issue isn’t so much targeting as
it is escalation. A cop would get violent with a black man
way before any other race and that simply was caused by
perception and stereotypes. American society has created the
image that black men are naturally violent and aggressive so
when a situation arises involving a black man, they assume
the worse is about to happen and nine times out of 10 jump
to conclusions because they feared their “life was in
immediate danger.”
Society has thrown us all into one
box, how do we get out? The solution is simple – we as a
people have to change ourselves. I personally feel that in
most officer-minority situations that end in conflict, the
minority initiated the tension because he felt as if he was
being singled out because of his race. Even if that is the
case what is you getting an attitude going to do to change
it?
Now, I’m a black man myself and I know
how I get when I feel discriminated against. It’s a horrible
feeling but we can not let emotions drive us to bad
decisions. If all minorities would stop and ask themselves
“Is me calling this cop racist going to get me out of this
ticket?” America would be much better.
We can’t control how the officer sees
us when he walks up to the window but we can control how he
sees us when he leaves. If he sees “an angry black guy”
walking up, make him see a calm respectful member of society
when he leaves. We have to think with our heads and not our
hearts, it might just save our lives.
Too Many Unjustifiable Cases
By Kaleiah Carpenter,
Rosary Cathedral
I strongly believe that
some law enforcement officials do target and mistreat
African American men because of the color of their skin. Not
all officials are the same, but there are many law
enforcement officials that will judge African American men
just by their appearance and the neighborhood they live in.
There has been many
unjustifiable cases involving police officers using extra
force and aggression towards African American men. This
makes me very sad and scared because police officers are
supposed to be good cops, that keeps us safe and protect us.
Seeing the videos all over
the news and internet makes me think that they can not keep
me and my family safe, because my family is African American
as well. The videos I have seen recently involve different
incidents when African American could just be asking the
police officer a simple question about why they are being
pulled over and questioned, which triggers the officers to
get angry and start attacking the innocent men for no
reason. I have realized that this issue is very important
because every time I go over to a different family member’s
homes, they are always talking about it and it is always on
the news. The issue of law enforcement unfairly targeting
African American males has been going on for a while now,
and I wish things could change.
Recently, I have read a
story that happened in November 2016 about a 19-year-old
African American male teen named Kajuan Raye who was being
chased by a Chicago police sergeant before the sergeant shot
and killed him. Kajuan did not have any weapons on him when
this incident happened. He was shot in the back, which means
the police sergeant should not have felt threatened. This
was the second time in three years that the sergeant shot an
unarmed suspect. The investigation on this case is ongoing
and I hope the family of Kajuan gets justice.
I think that police
officers should wear mini video cameras on them at all times
so that if something happens, law officials can go back and
look at the incidents quickly.
I think that police
officers should have training on different scenarios yearly.
Many innocent African American men are being targeted daily
and nothing is changing. How many more innocent victims are
going to be harmed and killed before change happens? I may
only be in the sixth grade and 12-years old, but I
understand a lot about what is going on in my country.
I understand that there
are some bad police officers and I also understand that
there are some good police officers. What I do not
understand is why bad police officers are getting away with
the crimes and not being punished. I am thankful for being
given this opportunity to write about an important topic
that affects everyone, but mostly African Americans. This
has been an honor to share my opinion especially since it is
Black History Month.
Work Cited
Horning, Eric and Nagy,
Liz “ABC7 Chicago.”
http://abc7chicago.com/news/chicago-police-fatally-shoot-man-19-in-west-englewood/162356.
February 17, 2017
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