Ferguson: White Fantasies

What’s been phenomenal about Ferguson is how its exposed and, more so, fractured the fantasy of a post-racial America. I keep trying to segue toward other stories, and then I’ll see still another photo that pulls me right back again. I was completely captivated by this white male cop helping the white female cop strap on her helmet, the trunk and the doors of the patrol car protecting “the couple” like a dressing room.

In three-quarters of the picture, we see “law enforcement” pushing out to the sidewalk/dividing line that separates the white people from the brown people. And in the foreground, it’s: “here honey, let me help you.” Its, simultaneously, like a vision of the white power base doing turf protection, and a domestic parody of paranoia in protecting the nest.

More Ferguson at The Bag.

update: last sentence changed to remove reference to Aryans. It was accidentally published from a draft.

(photo: Larry W. Smith/EPA. caption: Police get geared up as demonstrators protest the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., Aug. 19, 2014.)