Khalil Muhammed, the Director of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture argued that Officer Darren Wilson’s description of Mike Brown was “evoking” racial stereotypes on Saturday’s “Melissa Harris-Perry” on MSNBC.
Muhammed said, in reaction to parts of Wilson’s testimony where he claimed Brown’s facial expression looked like a “demon” and looked like he was prepping to run through gunshots, “what he’s evoking here goes back to the days of the negro cocaine fiend, who is a super predator who cannot be put down, or the Mexican immigrant who’s high on marijuana and is as strong as a horse. These metaphors of these people are so violent that we have to resort to extreme means, even killing a 12-year-old [Tamir Rice, not Michael Brown] who potentially can’t be put down by a set of simple instructions.”
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