first up: Injustice

This year I wanted to write a bit about the words I read/listened to, and I’d like to kick off with the first book I finished this year that made a big impact. From Radley Balko, the author of Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America’s Police Forces and the person who put the word “puppycide” into my vocabulary, this book made it even clearer to me how broken this country’s so-called justice system is. And how easy it is to pretend otherwise if you just accept the concepts that the system is based on as perfectly functional.

How many times have you seen a movie or tv show or read a book where “bite marks” were presented as conclusive evidence? Like most things that are repeated so often that they become accepted as fact in most people’s heads, once one is exposed to the how and why and actual evidentiary science (or lack thereof) that such forensic magic is based on, and how easily these things can be abused by prosecutors/cops looking for a “Win” and providers looking to make a profit – well, it just makes one feel rather bamboozled all over again

The victims of the bamboozle are Black and/or poor and/or any of the other people who should be used to being sacrificed so that those with more comforts to protect can go on believing that Omelas is still the best of all possible worlds for everyone. Until they are selected to suffer at the hands of corruption and expediency – a fate that Balko & Carrington make plain can happen to any of us not breathing the rarified air of this society’s uppermost strata.

There are those who fight the uphill battle against the power-that-be and they are deservedly given praise for their work. Sadly, there are few who can forego steady paychecks and devote themselves fully to that work. Still, I like to think that a book like this may allow a few people to refuse to go along with a slamdunk ‘guilty’ vote if they find themselves on a jury presented with the forensic ‘evidence’ that we’ve been schooled to rely and trust on by mainstream media.