I used to be the only white kid on the city bus in Akron Ohio, back in 92 taking the bus from drug infested Fess Ave to Downtown bus exchange. I've lived in the projects, as well as the florida trailer parks.
But Deblasio "telling his biracial son" to be careful - I don't think my dad was being racist when he told his white son (me) to watch his ass around cops.. Heck, my grandfather was on the police force and he told me the same thing 30 years ago - "ALWAYS MOVE SLOW" was what he told all of us grandkids. It wasn't cause of skin color.
So unless deblasio said "because my son is bi-racial, I had to tell him to be careful", I see this as nothing more than a father telling his boy to move slow and carefully around cops. I think asian parents need to tell their kids the same. And Samoan parents. And swedish parents. And australian parents too. UNLESS deblasio said "It has to do with race", it isn't fair for any of us to assume that.
And, shit, even if the Mayor did tell his son that he should be careful due to his non-white appearance, would that be wrong?
Maybe I'm wrong but I could swear that I've read that non-whites were stopped and searched much more frequently than whites when the NYPD's "Stop and Frisk" program was in effect.
Or are some folks here just saying that it's OK for the Mayor to tell his kid to be careful around cops because of his race (and age and gender) but not OK to proclaim that he did this publicly?
Seems to me that all the mayor is doing is saying, "Yes, there is a problem". And that seems inarguable to me (though how big a problem is certainly arguable).
BTW, I have no problem with the police expressing their displeasure with the mayor by turning their backs to him. As others have said, police are not soldiers so there's no law against them expressing their political views even when in uniform.