Henry Louis Gates Fnord

Whenever there's a mainstream media story about misconduct by police, the message always is "The individual officer needs to be punished!" or "The government needs better policies!" Nobody on the mainstream media ever says "The State police monopoly is immoral!" or "If you believe that the police are being unreasonable, then you should stop paying taxes!" Individuals are blamed, or individual policies are blamed. A fundamentally corrupt system is never blamed.

The latest incident involves Henry Louis Gates, who is a professor of African American Studies at Harvard.

My analysis is that both Henry Louis Gates and James Crowley behaved unreasonably. (James Crowley is the policeman who arrested Henry Louis Gates.) Both of them are totally brainwashed pro-State trolls. It serves the interests of the State propaganda engine to say "The policeman is a racist!" instead of "Both the policeman and the person arrested were behaving like idiots."

A good fictional story must have a hero and a villain. In this story, Henry Louis Gates is the hero and James Crowley is the villain. The story wouldn't be effective propaganda if both parties were presented as villains.

Here is a copy of the police report, which is probably biased but has some correct facts.

Another interesting bit, according to this article and this article, is that a newspaper published the police report on their website, and then immediately removed it. The newspaper removed the police report, because Henry Louis Gates is being set up to be the hero, and the police report makes him look like a jerk.

Here's my interpretation of what happened. The lock on the front door to Henry Louis Gates' house was broken. He got in through the back door, and then attempted to force the front door open. Another person was helping him.

A pedestrian saw two men trying to force a door open, and she called the police reporting a robbery in progress.

A policeman responded to the call. Up until this point, nothing inappropriate happened.

Henry Louis Gates got very hostile when questioned by the policeman. The policeman figured out pretty quickly that Henry Louis Gates really lived there. If it really was an attempted robbery, then the people forcing the door open probably would have run away or acted differently.

At this point, the policeman should have just left, even though Henry Louis Gates was angry at the policeman for questioning him.

A policeman is a State bureaucrat. A university professor at Harvard is a high-ranking State bureaucrat. This led to a confrontation. The policeman probably thought "Some jerk is questioning my authority!" Henry Louis Gates probably also thought "Some jerk is questioning my authority!"

The argument escalated, and the policeman arrested Henry Louis Gates for disorderly conduct.

Racism is one of the few times the mainstream media doesn't portray State police as saints. "Racism is a problem!" is a much more important evil fnord than "State police are perfect!" Besides, the individual officer is blamed and not the corrupt system. I conclude that the racism fnord is more important than the "State police are perfect!" fnord, because the mainstream media could have told the story as follows. "A policeman was doing a routine investigation of a robbery report. The person was not a criminal, but was merely trying to fix a broken door. After the policeman approached him, Henry Louis Gates freaked out and started swearing at the policeman. The policeman tried to calm him down, but failed. The policeman left the house, but Henry Louis Gates followed him outside and kept swearing at him. According to standard police procedures, after failing to calm him down, the policeman arrested Henry Louis Gates for disorderly conduct. It was wrong for Henry Louis Gates to automatically assume that a policeman conducting an investigation is a racist."

"Disorderly conduct" is one of those catchall crimes. It allows the policeman to arrest someone merely for disagreeing with him. Arguing with a policeman is not really a crime. "Disorderly conduct" allows a policeman broad discretion when deciding to arrest someone.

In this case, the policeman was trespassing. There was no crime occurring, and he had no reason to be there. Once he determined that Henry Louis Gates really lived there, the policeman should have left, even though Henry Louis Gates was behaving like an ***hole. The policeman should have just gotten in his car and driven away.

As a professor of African American Studies, getting arrested by a white police officer for something stupid is a brilliant career move. He probably got $1M+ of free publicity from this incident. It was in Henry Louis Gates' best interest to goad the policeman into arresting him.

Now, Henry Louis Gates can go around saying "Waah! I was abused by a State policeman! Therefore, the State should have more power!", and then everyone will congratulate him for being such an excellent pro-State troll.

I liked the picture on this page. The expression on Henry Louis Gates' face says "Hooray! I just got a white policeman to arrest me for something stupid! This is going to be great for my career!" Via passive aggressive mind control techniques, Henry Louis Gates psychologically manipulated the policeman into arresting him.

I thought that James Crowley would be fired for this incident. However, Boston's police department said that he didn't do anything wrong. Under normal circumstances, a policeman gets away with misconduct. Occasionally, an individual must be sacrificed for the good of the State. He had a confrontation with a State bureaucrat that outranks him. Even though Henry Louis Gates was being a jerk, the policeman still should have just left. The policeman is responsible for letting the situation escalate.

James Crowley is also a celebrity now. He can say "I was the victim of someone with political connections who was being a jerk, when I was trying to investigate a potential crime." Even if he got fired, he would find another job.

Another important point is that, even though James Crowley mishandled this incident, he should not be fired if his job performance was otherwise good. It's wrong to judge someone based on the worst thing they ever did. In this incident, nobody was injured.

Henry Louis Gates will probably sue the city of Boston. As I mentioned before, suing the government is pointless. If he wins a lawsuit or settles, the cost is merely passed on to everyone else as higher taxes. It's in Henry Louis Gates' best interests to have a long drawn-out trial, because that's free publicity for him. If fired, James Crowley might sue for being inappropriately fired. It's possible that both of them could sue Boston's government and win!

Departments like "African American Studies" or "Latino Studies" or "Women's Studies" are stupid. Those subjects are worth studying, but segregating them as their own specialty leads to professors who profit from spreading racism and sexism. The job of an "African American Studies" professor is not to reduce racism, but to increase racism.

The job of a policeman or State bureaucrat is to define as many possible things as crimes, because that increases their own power. If you're a professor of "African American Studies", then your job is to see racism everywhere, because that increases your own power. (I wonder if a pro-State troll will say "FSK is being racist for saying that 'African America Studies' is stupid." The point I'm making is that an "African American Studies" professor has an interest in promoting racism.)

Of course, most subjects in the humanities have very little content or negative content. It's pointless to argue the merits of one waste of time compared to another waste of time. An "African American Studies" professor is a parasite as much as an economics professor or a politics professor.

Most university professors get their funding directly or indirectly from the government. I object to people stealing from me via taxes, and then using the profits to pay the salary of university professors that promote bad things.

Those subjects are also damaging to minority students. A black student might decide to study "African American Studies" instead of studying Math or Science or Computers, where he would actually learn something useful. I knew someone who originally was planning to study science, but decided that "Latino Studies" was more desirable. After all, saying "White men are racist and sexist!" is a much easier way to earn a living than by actually doing something useful. Someone studying "African American Studies" is provided with the illusion that he is learning something, when he is really receiving pro-State brainwashing. Of course, the same statement applies to almost all of the humanities and soft sciences.

In this incident, the State propaganda engine is promoting the story in a manner that increases racism. A stupid black person will believe "Henry Louis Gates was the victim of a racist policeman!" A stupid white person will believe "Henry Louis Gates was being an abusive jerk. The policeman was correct to arrest him." The truth is that both Henry Louis Gates and the policeman are parasites with absolutely no useful skills. An accurate presentation of the story, "Both people are jerks!", doesn't serve the State propaganda engine's goal of promoting racism.

By promoting racial tension, the State propaganda engine distracts people from issues of genuine importance. Instead of arguing "Is taxation theft!", the slaves argue "People from ethnic group X are out to get me! Therefore, the State needs more power to protect me from group X."

It's in the best interests of the bad guys to promote racism, because it allows them to divide and conquer the cattle. The coverage of this incident actually increases racism, rather than decreases racism. I don't know of any mainstream media story covering this incident that said the correct answer, which is "Both parties in the dispute were behaving like idiots."