Passing The Torch of Police Brutality: Sean Bell & The
Solution
By: Adisa Banjoko, The Bishop of Hip-Hop
Though
we live dangerous, cops could just/ Arrest me, blaming us, we're held like hostages- Nas, NY
State of Mind
I got my first car when I was 18. "Now when you get pulled over, it's a serious thing," my dad said to me before he
handed me the keys to a brown Toyota Celica. "You keep your hands on the wheel if you get stopped. Move slowly. If
you are going to reach for anything like a wallet you tell him what you are going to do and do it slow. If you move too fast they
will kill you.
"
There was a seriousness in his eyes and his tone that I knew better than to ignore. But in my head, a part of me, said,
"All right Pop slow down. This ain't the deep South where you're from. We live in the Bay and it's the
1980s.
"
The first time a gun was put in my face, it was by the SFPD.
A cop drew a 9mm pistol on me for wearing a red and black jacket with the words PARIS (a pro-black
rapper not the chick) across the back. They said I looked like a gang member from Pinole (a surrounding
city), and said I made an illegal u-turn to get a parking space. They were physically smaller than me (the one with his
gun on me was trembling and was afraid) and I knew they would not hesitate to put a bullet through my eye socket if I did
anything but breathe. All of my father's advice crystallized in that moment. I spoke slowly and clearly
as they made eye contact, and explained I had no weapons, was unarmed and that I had broken no laws.
It took the cop a few seconds to hear me through his fear, and eventually he put the gun down. He smiled and said,
"Gangs in the area are wearing your colors." Funny how, being a 6 foot tall black man, I always seem to be in
"gang colors." I wake up in gang colors. I got to bed in gang colors. I walk to the corner store in gang colors. I
was born in gang colors. I'm black.
Today I'm 38, and have a son. In 10 years, I will have to have the same conversation with him.
How can I not?
This past Friday, the cops that murdered Sean Bell were acquitted. So many were surprised. I wasn't.
Surprised at what?
The same courts that let the cops in Rodney King's videotaped beating walk, the same courts who set up the
three strikes and Rockefeller Drug Laws, and the same courts that let Amadou Diallo die in cold blood gave no
justice to Sean Bell. Again. And people are surprised? Our system is failing us on so many levels.
No rational human being with knowledge of the American justice system could really be shocked. This is
America and American courts have never made justice for black men a priority. The fact that they allowed his
parents to file anything in court at all is simply the illusion of democracy.
When N.W.A.
dropped "Fuck The Police " in the late 1980s many in the American media attacked them. Even the
F.B.I. saw fit to write their label a threatening letter about how inappropriate the nature of the song
was.
And shortly thereafter, the release of Paris' "Coffee Donuts and Death " and
Ice T's "Cop Killer " created a firestorm of controversy in the media.
Hip-Hop music has documented racial and systematic injustice more effectively than any other art form to
date, and this has been in large part because of the fact that much of what America has tried to sweep under the rug
hasn't gone unnoticed by hip-hop artists who care.
So many questions were asked.
"Why would black men write songs again
By: Adisa
ThoughI got my first
"
There
"
The first
A cop drew a 9mm pisto
It took the cop a few secon
Today
How can I not?
This past Frida
Surpr
The same court
No ratio
When N.
dropp
And short
So many quest
"Why would