"WHO AM I?!..."

an ongoing discussion/moment of clarity.

words. 

"...The reality, though, is this is America. Ferguson is a mirror, and it represents exactly what America is and has been. What causes the discomfort is how far this falls short of the ideals we have for ourselves and project around the world.

...America is a country where citizens of color live in economically isolated communities, where the police force tasked to “serve and protect” them are white and don’t live there. Ferguson, for example, is 67 percent black, but the police force is 94 percent white. Ninety-two percent of all arrests were of the black residents... America is a country where police are more likely to arrest and use force against black protesters.

America is a place, as Ferguson has shown us, where those rights and freedoms that we commend our military personnel for fighting in faraway lands for can be taken away under questionable circumstances. We live in a country where the Westboro Baptist church can picket funerals and the Ku Klux Klan can organize rallies, but a grieving black community staging a protest to demand answers for the death of one of their sons is met with rubber bullets and tear gas.

So America, once the media and cameras leave Ferguson, which they will do, we must ask ourselves: Who do we want to be as a country? Because as uncomfortable as it is to admit, Ferguson is who we are right now."

THE WASHINGTON POST: In the battle for America’s identity, Ferguson is Ground Zero

SEE ALSO: 

pandora.

be free.

the sounds.

healthcare.gov.