State sponsored violence

Cecily McMillan was found guilty, remanded without bail, and is awaiting sentencing. Reminder, during Occupy Wall’s occupation in New York City, McMillan was accused of felony assault against Officer Grantley Bovell, but there is substantial evidence that Officer Boyell had assaulted McMillan. Molly Knefel wrote an excellent discussion of the implications of the verdict for The Guardian. To be clear, I believe McMillan, not Boyell, who continuously misidentified the eye she injured, while she had photos of the bruising on her right breast.

Knefel described more than just the consequences of the verdict for McMillan, which is up to seven years in prison because of disproportional punitive sentences. This is terrible, and we can discuss at length sentencing and the arbitrary nature of the criminal justice system. However, I wanted to discuss state sponsored violence, and the cultural embrace of it by the general populace. State sponsored violence is violence or terrorism conducted by the state against its own people. This is seen as an implication of corruption because states with the general support of their people don’t have to beat them into submission. Additionally, those who embrace it are usually not being threatened, while those who have a general acceptance usually fear becoming targets themselves. So, stop and frisk is a racist policy used to inflict violence against and terrorize the black community, but white people think it is ok because they aren’t being stopped. After this policy became actual policy, the black community was forced to either accommodate the policy or expect severe consequences.

So what do we know about state sponsored violence? Well, it is a problem:

1.      It is more common among vulnerable populations, and in the US that means in low-income and neighborhoods of color (both black and Hispanic).

2.      Police act as violent forces within these communities, which causes distrust among the populous.

3.      Sexual assault and the response to sexual assault are frequently seen as violence perpetrated by the state.

4.      Those who are seen to deserve a violent response by the state are dehumanized by the perpetrators of the violence.

5.      There is usually little consequence for the individual perpetrators of this violence because they are actors of the state.

There should also be a consideration of the history of state sponsored violence. For example, slavery is obviously an example, but that includes the systematic rape and sexual exploitation of black women. There are strong parallels between the violence perpetrated by the state against blacks during slavery, and contemporary mass incarceration of black men and the violence subjected upon them. Organized labor has been on the receiving end of state sponsored violence, and so have student protestors (Kent State).

Clearly, I think what happened to McMillan is a miscarriage of justice. There was a substantial response on Twitter about the black experience and police brutality, which is also very true and should be discussed. However, what I hear and see with McMillan is that the state sponsored violence is branching out, and what will the ramifications of that be in the long term? Obviously, I’m not arguing that black communities should be used to this violence, what I’m trying to get at is that if those who traditionally have some privilege (racial privilege in this case) are being targeted then how long until the police state can response with absolute violence against all citizens without repercussions? This is how repression works, they target a vulnerable group, and those with power and privilege shrug their shoulders and continue on with their business. Then the repression spreads to other groups. We are witnessing an evolution how state sponsored violence is used and accepted. And the Department of Justice just said it is ok.