Online Activism

In order to under online activism within policing we must first know what activism means. Activism by definition means the intentional action to bring about social and political change. This is similar to advocacy or speaking on behalf of groups usually in relation to legislative change. There are many different forms of activism. The one I would like to discuss is online activism. Online is any thing that can be reposting or a call to action.

Black Lives Matter is an online activism for specifically the black community. This was brought about mainly because many black people had their lives taken from them due to police brutality. This movement started because they did not believe that blacks were getting the right representation in the media when this stuff was happening. They believed that they needed more attention to black people because they were being killed by guns or being found as missing or dead within prison walls. They felt like they needed this to be publicized and put themselves out there so that people are more aware of this issue.

They do this because they would like to do an action in order to bring around social and political change. They want people to be more aware of this issue and then do something to promote change.

Social Media

Social media has changed over the years but it does not change how we use them. Social media is a form of connections with other people. We often see police brutality happen through social media. Social media has grown so much over the years, because it has not been a big thing until just recently. Social media are usually sites like Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, and Instagram. There are many more websites used. They websites all have different meanings and ways that you can use them.

Social media is a new upcoming trend, especially for the generation that we are in now. We are so attached to our phones and with being attached to our phones we begin to be attracted to the social media that comes with it. Phones have gotten better and better the older that we get. We used to have flip phones and not having access to websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Now that we have the access to these websites we are more aware of the things that happen in the world.

 
We see protest more and more and since we have the access to social media more then we have ever had we can build a bias. We see so much talk about police brutality that we think that it happens more frequently than it actually does. And if we do see a side of the story usually it is not all the story and can be framed for a specific audience. Which promotes this constant divide between police and the minority community. Social media can be a good thing, but it can also promote negative things.

Public Relations in Policing

What is public relations? Being in the position of Public Relations is being the mediator between your organization and the public. This is a strategic communication process that mutually beneficial relationships organizations their publics.

Being in this position includes anticipating, analyzing and interpreting the public opinion, attitudes and issues. This also includes counselling management at all levels in the organization with regard to policy decisions, courses of action and communication. Lastly, it is also researching and conducting and evaluating on a continuing basis, programs of actions and communication to achieve the informed.

While doing Public Relations you may run into pitfalls. Pitfalls are assuming similarity instead of difference.

In policing you need a public relations because you need that middle man to explain what is actually going on and keep people up to date. This is so important because this can change how people view police brutality. People having access to this public relations is important. Police Brutality can have many different views and these views can change based off what people see. If people only see police officers beating on minorities the minority community will have certain reactions to police solely off of what they see.

An example of this would be #Ferguson.



This was a big movement that was within the marginalized communities. When you are within the position you can spend a lot of money trying to get this together. Having this promoted can spend a lot of money and also look into the case. You have to determine what to display and what not display. Because what you display can change how people view a situation.

Satrical Cartoons about Police Brutality

Satire has always been an interesting topic of discussion for me. I personally love satirical cartoons or videos. Satire is literacy/ mediated work that diminishes or derogates a subject by making it ridiculous and evoking toward it attitudes of amusement, contempt, scum or indignities. Satire is usually witty and often very funny. The purpose of satire is to criticize in or order to shame someone or something. Within satire their are 3 different kinds of satire in which are Horatian, Juvenalian, and Indirect.

There are also many ways that you can go about using satire. There are 4 specific techniques of using satire. Those ways are Exaggeration, Incongnity, Reversal, and Parody.

Exaggeration is enlarging/ increasing or represent something beyond normal bounds so that it becomes ridiculous and its facts can be seen. Incongnity is to resent things that are out of place or are absurd in relation to their surrounding. Reversal is to resent the opposite of the normal order of events hierarchal order Parody is to imitate the techniques.

The first form of satire is Horatian Satire. This type of satire is when it is gentle, urbane, and kind of makes you want to smile. It is like a wink and a nod. This satire types aims to correct through gentle sympathetic laughter. An example of this would be:
 This is gentle because it is still displaying that sometimes the things that we see on TV are manipulated in some way to send off the wrong message and we have this ongoing conflict. In this photo, it is clear that the man said "Down with Police Brutality" But it is showing the news reporter with scissors and the word brutality on the floor so it just says "Down with Police" This is gentle because if you watch Fox News you know that they often exploit a lot of the things before they broadcast to the world. This is kind of doing the wink and nod that we know how Fox News is, and how they make stuff seem more different than what they are. I would say that is satire is effective by what people will decide to watch for News if they are being accused of not portraying the right news it can, bring there views down due to credibility issues. The technique that is used here is parody because they are imitating what Fox News does.






The second form of satire is Juvenalian Satire. This satire is more biting, bitter and angry contempt, and moral indignation. An example of this would be the photo that is on left. In this photo a man that looks like he identifies as African American (Black) is in the doctors office saying "I'd like to have this birthmark removed.." The birthmark looks just like a "target" that you hit. This is implying that he is tired of being a target. This is more biting because in history African Americans have been know to be a target in many different areas such as police brutality, and racism mostly. This is biting because it is not just a wink and nod and something that you laugh at. This is something that someone made because it is how they see the word and/ or themselves and they are tired of being the target for everything. This is important because it is making a statement saying that this is happening, and it needs to be changed. Many claim that we live in a post-racial society but we still have marginalized people feeling as if they are still a target. I think that this was very effective because it can make people think about what is really going on and let people know that certain groups are still being seen as a target. The technique used for this satirical cartoon is exaggeration. It is something that they enlarged to show the faults.

The last form of satire is Indirect satire. This is expressed through narrative. Characters and/ or groups who are the focus of the satire are ridiculed not by what is said about them but by what they themselves say and do. An example of this could be the movie Clueless.

Police Sex and Gender Abuse

Rape Culture is defined as accepting rape as an everyday occurrence and even a male prerogative. This encourages gender violence, as well as perpetuate "rape myths", ranging from treating rape as merely "rough sex" to blaming the victim for inviting rape. This rape culture validates and rationalize the normative misogynistic practices. This culture shames all female sexuality.

The effects in this is that people fear the acts that can be done to them and have a long term effect on the person. Sometimes this issue is too narrow and also excludes men. In the video displayed above a lady was pulled over for a headlight but then later in the video they wanted to search her for drugs. The cops tell her to lift up her shirt and to shack it, not once but twice! The people on the talk show mention that she is not in the fancy car, it is always the people that do not know the laws or that are poor. This video in specific humiliated the victim. Not only did she have to go through this but now she is also in the media. Although it is great to catch the bad cop, this is public humiliation for her and can have long term effects on her.

In the second video displayed, a lady had gotten pulled over for throwing out a cigarette from window a couple of times while driving. By the end of the video a woman cop does a deep search on the side of the road, public for everyone to see. The lady searched even said that she has had an interesting stop, she has never been stopped and now that this was her first stop she is suing because the way they went about the stop is illegal.

What I find frustrating about our rape culture is that people get away with this all the time not knowing the effects that it can leave on the person assaulted. People I am assuming everyday get sexually assaulted not only by police but by other people who may be strangers or people they even might know. Being touched in ways that are inappropriate, can make them feel differently about themselves, being around that sex that assaulted them (man and woman)  and just always being on high alert because no one wakes up and thinks that they will be assaulted today. This is when rape culture comes in. We see this happening so much, it seems as if we accept rape because it happens so much. There are resources but after that happens to someone they will forever remember every second of them being assaulted and will not be the same person they were before. This is important because since we do not see rape as such a big thing, people are scared to report the crime and get justice. They start to blame themselves for the situation like "Why was I that drunk" "Why did I wear short shorts that day" "Why did I say hi to someone, because they could have felt like I was leading them on" There is no excuse for rape. Just because you are wearing a crop top, shorts, a shirt, or drinking at the bars that does not give someone the right to come up to you and make you do something that you do not want to do. That does not make it okay for them to do something when you have said no. There is NO excuse for rape. Any man or woman who thinks its okay to have sexual activity with someone while drunk or because of what they are wearing or even because they THINK they have authority to do so is lower than dirt and I have no respect for them. 

Acculturation in Policing

Lets start off by defining what acculturation means. Acculturation are attitudes and/or beliefs modified as a result of contact with a different culture. There are 2 different models that can show this. The first model is the Linear Model, this is when acculturation is weakening of ethnic identity. The other model is the 2 Dimensional Model.

The two dimensional model is also known as Berry's Two Dimensional Model. There are 4 possible outcomes to the acculturation. The first outcome is assimilation. When this happens it is usually a movement towards the dominant culture. The second outcome is integration. integration is when you synthesis the two cultures. In other words, you are able to equally function in both cultures. The third outcome is rejection. Rejection happens when you are reaffirming the tradition culture. Lastly, the other outcome is marginalization. This is alienation from both cultures.

It is hard to describe and go into detail with acculturation in policing, but lets try and work through this.

With police brutality the model I will be using today will be the Berrys 2 Dimensional Model to describe acculturation. 

In the video above, you will see an officer playing with the neighborhood kids. With all the negative media going around, this may sound unheard of. We always hear all the negative stuff about police officers and how they want to pull their guns out any chance they get, or that they abuse there power. Even in the video the lady pointed out that when she say the cop car, she was worried for herself and her kids because of the negative stigma that they have. This video can be see as a integration outcome.

 

I believe that this is an integration outcome to the 2 dimension model because it is playing to cultures. Like yes, they have a job and sometimes that job includes being violent but that is not the only thing police officers do. The second part of their job is to serve for the community. This man is in uniform playing football with the neighborhood children. They are able to function into both cultures. He is doing his job by enforcing the law but he is also making sure that the neighborhood is okay.

 

Sometimes we often only see the bad in people when something is done but then we forget about all the good stuff that they do. I also once heard that "People do not like cops, until you need them" which I can see as true. People fear these officers but when they are in need of help that is the first person they call to solve all kinds of problems. I am not justifying that some stuff that police do are okay but sometimes we must step back from the media and see what is really is going on. What is being displayed? What is being hidden? What is being exploited? Is everything we hear in the media true? We also cannot judge the mistake of one officer on all of them. They are their own person and make their own decisions. We should look at both sides of the story. In every story there are 3 sides; His side, her side and the truth. 

TV Race and Class Representation in Everybody Hates Chris Sitcom

A sitcom is usually a situation comedy, half hour series. Within these half hour serious there is usually a problem that gets solved by the end of the show. Examples of sitcoms are: Family Guy, Modern Family and How I Met Your Mother. We study sitcoms because some shows support the status quo while allowing for contrary readings, we like that it is simple, easy, and we know what to kind of expect.

Frames the Working Class  are defined by 5 different characteristics of the working class that are shown in media specifically television shows such as Everybody Hates Chris.

1. Bad Taste
2. Lack of Intelligence
3. Disinterested in Politics
4. Poor Work Ethic
5. Dysfunctional Family 

I will be evaluating the television sitcom Everybody Hates Chris. In this sitcom the minority representation is more of a ridicule. A ridicule means that minorities specifically in this sitcom African Americans are there for amusement, they are not laughing with you, however they are laughing at you. The reporting policy regarding minorities (the issues) is police brutality. In the first video, a son is sitting down with his mother and a guy from a college to discuss  his plans for college. In the meeting, the college professor ask the mom how long she has had a heroin addiction, he then ask if she has multiple fathers for her children. This is indicating bad taste and also possible lack of intelligence and poor work ethnic. After she says that they have one father, he asks if she is aware of the fathers name. She then begins to feel very disrespected because these are stereotypes that are held against African Americans. At the end of the video 4 cops burst into the household during the interview with guns pointed at all the African Americans, one officer says "step away from the white man, out the pamphlets down" The bring Chris down to the floor as well as the college interviewer and they apologize to the white man but not Chris. This can be seen as a Dysfunctional family.

In the second video Chris is thrown in jail at the age of thirteen because of a racial profile saying that he "fit the description "of the person who was identified as robbing a white males house. When you look at the video of what the man actually described he said that it was a black man, medium completion, 6 foot 4 inches, brown eyes, yellow beanie, dark pants, size 14 dark shoes, and birth mark on back of left wrist. You it very apparent and said in the show that all the officer heard was, was that the person who robbed him was black.

I have noticed that within the sitcom although it is funny and points out the negative stereotypes that we have as African Americans it fails to say what to do. I see this show as funny but in reality majority of it is regarding racism that does not get fixed. In reality, we are ridicule, we are the joke essentially. There are a few positive attributes like the father working but he works so much that he is unable to see his wife or kids often. This is not showing a single parent household but they portray all the stereotypes of an African American. It does not help that he is the only black kid in his classes and he gets talked down to all the time. There are some sitcoms that try and make life as a person of color specifically black people, seem like everything is "okay" such as the Cosby Show. This show does not attempt to make life as a black person to seem "okay". They point out what is wrong but fail to address what they can do to fix the problem, instead it seems as if black people are the joke.