Implicit bias on full display in teen fight at NJ mall (Opinion)

I didn’t want to write this. I didn’t want to think about this.

I didn’t want to think that what is called implicit bias was a very real thing. I wanted to believe it was an invention of the far left, the same people who will find fault in every single police shooting no matter what overwhelming evidence shows a cop was completely justified.

I wanted to believe we’re farther along the road than we maybe are. I wanted to believe if two kids in a mall got into a brawl and one was white and one was black that they would be dealt with equally.

I still hope that’s mostly true.

But what I saw in the video of the incident that went down at Bridgewater Commons is something I can’t kid myself about.

Watch the video here. Warning, there’s some rough language.

First off, I don’t know what the beef was between these two. Learning how to walk away comes with age and wisdom and they were clearly not there yet. But as far as it turning physical, look at this video and decide who the aggressor was.

With the threatening, obnoxious finger poking in the air inches from the other’s face, then the shoving in the chest, it was clearly the white kid. Yes, the black kid pushes the hand away, but who wouldn’t push away a hand that was aggressively jabbing like that? That was defensive. The next move, the shoving in the chest, was offensive.

Now let’s assume the police who show up didn’t see the start of the fight. Watch where both kids are at the point the cops physically break them up. As the police step in, the white kid is the one on his feet. The black kid is the one on the ground.

Who do they focus on?

The black kid.

The black kid is thrown flat facedown by one officer while only briefly does the other officer guide the white kid onto the sofa. Then leaves him unattended entirely to add a second knee to the black kid’s back as handcuffs are put on him.

While this is happening the white kid gets back to his feet unchallenged. You see the police do nothing to get him to sit back down.

Granted the video ends there and we don’t see what happens next. But we’ve seen enough.

Enough to witness the thought process of the officers play out in real-time. The black kid who was already on the floor being pummeled by the white kid who was on his feet is the one brought facedown with a knee in his back and arms restrained. He was perceived to be the threat here. The white kid seems to be handled with a pretty please young man attitude.

There’s now an internal affairs investigation into how the police reacted. I think we all need to investigate internally, peer into our own hearts, open up our eyes and look at what this is.

This is implicit bias.

I didn’t want to see it. I didn’t want to know otherwise good cops could so easily draw such unfair conclusions. And why? I suppose because I’ve been guilty of my own implicit bias.

I admit it. I finally understand the depth of implicit bias.

And I didn’t want to write this.

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Jeff Deminski only.

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