Tyre Nichols: A Black Academic Response to Police Brutality within a Culture of Violence

We live in a country where some are quick to enact laws and apply pressure to ban black history. This serves to erase the violence of the past that created the realities of black people's present, where they are brutalized and discriminated against within a system that is slow and reluctant to react. The result is an absence of pressure and policies now to counteract violence and discrimination and to address accountability. It has become such a political issue, which is the strategy that has mitigated and diluted any effective strategy of police reform and the systemic injustices to black and brown peoples. Thanks to video technology, we have uncovered the truth that led to Tyre Nichol’s death, yet another black man that has been killed by the police within a culture of brutality and violence.

In retrospect, it was white cops that killed Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, but today black cops beat Tyre Nichols to his death. This is a symptom of a society that has been damaged by colonization, a process that Frantz Fanon calls the depersonalization of the individual, the black peoples, for it strips away the individual (Fanon, p. 63). It redefines, so as to justify and advance violent control. It comes from within a neo-capitalistic attitude of power, one that corrupts and stems from the fallen human nature. We know of the “house slave mentality” and the slaves who whipped their slave brothers during the plantocracy. Maybe it was their resistance, a way to escape their realities, or maybe they, too, believed and accepted the hierarchical society that placed them in second place as they came closer to power and privilege. Fanon wrote, “The Negro is not. Any more than the White Man.” (Fanon, p. 218 – 231). He interrupts the usual language of the day to punctuate his violent break from standards, placing a period where a comma should be, changing the comparative constant and value of language using any more instead of any less. Indeed, if we are to understand the damage done to the world due to colonization and fallen human nature, then reading Fanon’s psychoanalysis of the colonized world will help provide an analysis and an effective way forward. For here, in “Black Skins, White Masks,” Fanon provides a psychology of the black man and the world that has abnormalized humanity in that of all things we are bent to think in a white supremacist milieu. Fanon interrupts that by saying in order to break free we must disrupt the standards with a new language and attitude that breaks the power of the status quo that has caused damage (See Bhaba Ch. 2).

It wasn't a few Police Officers that murdered Tyre Nichols, it was the culture of Police Brutality against black and brown peoples. The culture that hasn't changed since the Black Lives Matter movement marched against George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. The Memphis Police Department released the video of Tyre Nichols in Memphis, a violent testimony of police brutality and a culture of violence against black people. It is so cultural and deep, this callous attitude toward black men by police, that policy won’t matter. What else must we do? They don’t care.

Two years ago, after Jacob Blake was shot in the back by police in Wisconsin I had written:
Soon after Police killed an innocent unarmed Blackman in Lafayette, another story developed just yesterday of another police killing of a black man. There’s no end to their violence and vigilante justice proving only the point again that NO POLICY WILL WORK ON POLICE REFORM. Just two days ago #Police gun down #JacobBlake in Wisconsin sparking #nationwide #protests. WHAT THE HELL!! You, @OutnumberedFNC @foxnewstalk, are denouncing nationwide protests and riots over the #brutal assault by police who shot Jacob Blake in the back. When #blackmen are being gunned down every day by police and demonized as conducting suspicious activity warranting murder. See the story entitled: "In Spite on BLM Movement Another Blake Man Gun Down by Police, Jacob Black Shot In The Back," a blog article in The Neoliberal Blogs at renaldocmckenzie.blogspot.com.

Memphis Police announced it is enacting major reforms after the release of the Tyre Nichols Video. The video was graphic, showing four black police officers beating an unharmed and helpless Tyre as he yelled for his mother. Several government officials, and even the White House, denounced the actions of the four police officers as criminal and callous as the video showed just how violent the police treat black men. They vowed legal and political action. However, after George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and the Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests two years ago, we saw the same reactions and promises which resulted in what we thought were major police reforms. In fact, I had written that article two days after I posted a previous commentary entitled: “And Another Innocent Black Man killed By Police Today... No Policy will work on cultural ills.”
On June 15, 2020, I wrote that Another Black man was killed by Police.... With all the looting and protests last week surrounding police brutality on black lives and inequities in our system, they killed Rayshad Brooks on Friday; he was just sitting in his car sleeping and unarmed waiting at Wendy’s and the Police made a huge scene out of this.

Sadly, today August 23, 2020, I am writing that same story as the cycle continues...Another (Innocent) Black Man Killed by Police, this time in Louisiana. Louisiana State Police are investigating the death of Trayford Pellerin, a 31-year-old Black man who was fatally shot Friday night during an encounter with officers from the Lafayette Police Department. It was captured on video by a passerby. The video revealed police shooting a man who was walking casually seemingly unresponsive to their directive to STOP. He never brandished a gun and was just walking casually when he was taken down by police for failing to stop walking. https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/22/us/trayford-pellerin-louisiana-police-shooting/index.html

But, what is the new police? The answer probably lies in algorithms. More recently, I wrote in an article entitled:
"To Hell with Police Reform, A new Computer Algorithm May Prevent Police Violence,” Remember my post recently calling for #Police Reform that includes Rebranding and changing their Look? http://renaldocmckenzie.blogspot.com/2020/06/police-reform-must-include-rebranding.html Well, we have yet to see that materialize. Instead, while doing my daily news read, I saw a tweet on @Twitter with the heading “Can a New Algorithm Prevent Police Brutality? Minneapolis Wants to Find Out”: https://www.thedailybeast.com/can-a-new-algorithm-prevent-police-brutality-after-george-floyd-minneapolis-wants-to-find-out

Absolutely not. If what you’re thinking is to use some computer-based system to identify bad cops… Algorithms to identify bad cops, like those damn lie detector tests or Psychology Tests that people can cheat and beat and are never accurate most of the time? People are either inherently good or bad and anyone can be bad at any given time. Jesus knew he had to die so that we could use his righteousness and not ours. What we need is for cops to always wear body cams and for there to be an independent body that polices the police and harsher penalties for police when they break or violate the laws. The cops should not feel safe to racially profile blacks or to get away with violence or criminality in executing their duties to serve and protect. They should not feel that they can hide behind the law when they are lawless. So, don’t waste money with that stupid algorithm. What about building on community and police relations in these communities through expanding community policing and creating a space for dialogue between police and community at the local and federal levels. We need a conversation and dialogue, as for right now there are tensions between police and black neighborhoods. Deal with the hurt and the pain first and explore ways to heal before you talk about computers to fix a human issue that goes deeply beyond the scope of an algorithm.

Despite the protests and promises of reforms surrounding police brutality within a system of violence and politicization of the crisis, there has been NO CHANGE. ACTIONS speak louder than words. I have experienced police violence myself as a black man and had to invoke my fraternity and other connections before the policeman relented his aggressive attacks without justification. If it weren't for the people passing who started videotaping the assault, I thought that I would have been tased or beaten, for the police had turned off his camera and was making a huge scene, abusing my rights to question his reason for the stop. It was an issue of power. The white police officer did not expect me to know the law and to question him. He was loud, disrespectful and violated my rights and his own police rules of engagement. What was not a routine, but unlawful stop became a matter of force infused with vitriol that could have turned into something worse. I was calm and respectful, but demonstrated my dignity as a person to inquire about why I was being stopped. He approached me with his hands on his gun and shouted, “Do not speak sir!” He then resorted to shouting commands and treating me as a criminal in my Tesla, which I assumed he was perplexed about as he had asked, “Where’d you get the car from?" I answered, he shouted, "Shut up, don't talk, don't do anything, I am in control here!" Eventually he backed down as the bystanders gathered and yelled "Turn your camera on!” On January 7, the very cameras that law enforcement erected to capture and deter criminality, caught that very law enforcement committing the crimes they intended to deter. Little did these officers know that they were being recorded, they had forgotten about the cameras. Thus, they would have done something else or done it elsewhere, but if it weren't for the unseen eyes of technology, we would not have acquired the truth that has always been the modus operandi of police.

If we are to prevent police brutality within a culture of violence, we may consider technology. The police officers who act outside of regulations do so because they know they are not being watched and have the protection of their unions and a system that protects the purity of the batch. Police have a tendency of turning off their cameras. The ability to operate incognito provides an opportunity for them to disregard laws and abuse their power. But, if some people have power in society to enforce laws over others, and we know that power is corrupt due to human nature, then it stands to reason that they must be scrutinized. They must be placed under tremendous surveillance and observation so as to ensure that they do not act outside of the laws within the culture of violence. If we are to be resolute on stopping police violence and abuse of power, they must not have the ability to turn off their cameras and must be penalized if they do so. We must develop technology that keeps the police under surveillance. We may need to employ independent quality assurance professionals who randomly do "spot checks" on police officers on duty and implement GPS tracking on each police vehicle, weapon and uniform. If we can do these, then we will be sending a message that we are serious about police brutality and the abuse of power for police that will not stop their disobedience of laws leading to death.

To cover up the realities of abuse stemming from a history and culture of violence by the status quo, minimizing records and narrative of its truth will never heal wounds in society that may ultimately lead to abnormalities such as civil wars, terrorism, extremism, etc. This is the kind of truth that hurts, for it may contain painful things about you leading to anxiety. Sigmund Freud asserts that we use denial to block one of six defense mechanisms leading to abnormalities, if not psychoanalyzed properly (Freud, 1901). Yet, Governor Ron DeSantis and the GOP in Florida are doing just that. Defense mechanisms are psychological strategies that are unconsciously used by individuals to protect anxiety from arising from unacceptable thoughts or feelings. According to Freudian theory, defense mechanisms involve a distortion of reality. Defense Mechanisms include: Repression, Denial, Projection, Displacement, Sublimation and Regression (Sigmund Freud.) How do we deal with the issues we are not dealing with properly to avert abnormalities? DeSantis and the GOP need a kind of therapy and psychiatry that speak to the psychoanalysis assessed in Freudian theory. The fix is psychological not political or the usual human tendency to ban symptomatic defenses. If we are to truly heal, it begins by unearthing and coming face-to-face with reality so that we see the issues calling for change. Anything else is pushed to the unconscious until it festers and finds an outlet that may lead to revolution or civil wars.

Reference and Sources

Fanon, Frantz. Black Skins, White Masks. Introduction by H. K. Bhabha. London: Pluto, 1986.

Toward the African Revolution. Harmondsworth: Pelican, 1967.
The Wretched of the Earth. Harmondsworth. Translated by Richard Philcox, 2004.

Sigmund Freud, Richard Wollheim, Publisher: Cambridge University Press (March 23, 1981)
Sebastiano Timpanaro, The Freudian Slip (1974)
Tyre Nichols Video released by Memphis Police available for request by the Memphis Police and at The Neoliberal Corporation Archives www.theneoliberal.com
Mckenzie, Renaldo. And Another Innocent Black Man killed By Police Today... No Policy will work on cultural ills, in The Neoliberal Blogs, renaldocmckenzie.blogspot.com, https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/22/us/trayford-pellerin-louisiana-police-shooting/index.html)
-Neoliberalism, Globalization, Income Inequality, Poverty and Resistance. Palmetto, SC. 2021.
Bhabha, Homi. Location of Culture. Routeledge, New York/London. 1994.

Tyre Nichols: A Black Academic Response to Police Brutality within a Culture of Violence

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