A Culture Of Racism: The Staten Island PD And The Tea Party Congressman

Rep Grimm and NYPD Captain Peter DeBlasio

I grew up in New York in a neighborhood that was largely Italian. New York, like Anytown, USA, has its own version of racism.  It is not the kind you hear in the post-Jim Crow South; it is more “ethnic.”   Conversation amongst high school friends included racial epithets in Italian, very offensive to African Americans, thrown around casually.   It almost seemed normal to hear the word “moolignan,” Italian for eggplant (technically Mulignane; could be combination of Moolie and hooligan) or “spic” for a Hispanic person. Between Stop and Frisk and the abhorrent record of racial abuse in the NYPD, we can see this is an attitude shared by some law enforcement officers, but obviously this isn’t unique to the New York Metropolitan area.

However, Staten Island is especially susceptible to this attitude, and with recent events, we see this prejudice can turn lethal.  Compared to other New York City boroughs, Blacks are a relatively small percentage of Staten Island’s residents. Only ten percent of residents is Black compared to one out of every four residents in New York City overall.  Staten Island is almost 50% Italian.  It is by far the most conservative borough of NYC, as seen by the election of the Tea Party candidate Michael Grimm (R), who rode the wave of hate to victory in the 2010 election that gave us the 112th Congress.  Mr. Grimm is infamous for threatening a New York One reporter and for charges of corruption and criminal conduct that are still pending.

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Grimm’s bad attitude towards African Americans was evidenced by an event in a nightclub in 1999 where he was involved in a skirmish with a black man.  His words that night culminated with, “all the white people get out of here,” as he had a conflict with a black man and was using abusing his then-FBI status to show his power. 

It is certainly not Representative Grimm’s fault that the Staten Island Police have conducted themselves in a manner that is unfair and abusive to Black people.  Perhaps some of the culture inherent in the Italian-American population has negatively impacted the attitude of some in law enforcement.

The problem exists in many cities all over America, but we must consider the systemic racism in the most conservative New York borough as a cause for many abuses against non-whites.   Hopefully, the investigation of the Staten Island PD’s multiple cases of brutality will put a stop to this behavior.  As the old attitudes of racial intolerance die out, perhaps the police culture will change right along with it.

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