If You're Black in Philly, Every Day is a TSA Day

Why all the furor and consternation about the government sanctioned group grope playing out in our nation's airports this Thanksgiving season?

Okay, I'll admit the prospect of having a blue uniformed minion of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) feeling me up - the so-called "enhanced pat-down" - isn't something I find appealing.  Still, it isn't an indignity that any of us has to put up with day in and day out.

If you are an African-American like me, however, and you happen to live in Philadelphia or in an ever growing list of US cities, having to possibly endure the humiliation of being singled-out, pulled aside and frisked is a daily concern.

Of course the uniformed authority behind these invasive and dehumanizing body pat-down security screens isn't the TSA but local police. Worse yet, this type of civil rights violating affront is not confined to just the airport, where at least the reasoning behind the searches (to guard against terrorists) is clear and where everyone is subjected to basically the same treatment. No, the security screening measures I'm speaking of are being conducted on the streets of cities like Philadelphia.

Further, unlike the understandably disgruntled  folks who believe the airport invasion of privacy is an outrage, black folks in Philly don't have the option of opting out. If you're black or Latino and walking down a Philadelphia street, you're fair game.

Philly police, at the direction of that city's mayor and its Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey, have "stopped and frisked" thousands of its black and brown citizens, subjecting them to illegal searches and questioning for no other reason than they "looked suspicious." The declared goal of the policy is to fight crime and get guns off the streets.

However, according to a recent article on Philly.com, Philadelphia police department statistics indicate a dramatic jump in pedestrians being stopped and frisked, from 102,319 in 2005 to 253,333 in 2009 - an increase of 148 percent. Of those individuals stopped in 2009,  some 72 percent were African-American. Only 8 percent of the searches led to arrests, and most of those arrests were for disorderly conduct because the folks stopped and frisked complained about their treatment.

When it comes to Philly, a brother shouldn't expect any love, at least not from the authorities.

Both the mayor and Commissioner Ramsey defend the policy and argue such measures need to be taken in order to combat crime.

But earlier this month, a class-action lawsuit was filed in federal court on behalf of eight black and Latino men, including a state lawmaker and a former police officer, who claim Philly's  "stop and frisk" policy is unconstitutional. The lawsuit asks the federal court to bar police from searching and questioning Philadelphia residents simply on the basis of race, nationality or without reasonable suspicion - basically, asking for a ban against racial profiling.

Instead of waiting for the lawsuit to play out in the courts, contact Philly's leaders directly and tell them to rescind Philly's stop-and-frisk policy now.

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