In her Halifax Examiner Column, El Jones examines the response offered by Chief of Police Blais to those who contacted him through Solidarity Halifax’s phone and email action to demand a stop to street checks.
“The refusal to believe not only the Black community, but also professionals within that community, essentially suggests that African Nova Scotians are too biased to assess their own experiences and therefore don’t count as objective analysts. Meanwhile, in the same breath the police continue to deny their own bias. This is one way that white privilege is enforced — while white opinions, viewpoints, feelings, and experiences are treated as normal, universal, objective, and factual, Black perspectives are seen as subjective and therefore less valid. Despite the huge amount of research, testimony, journalism, and lived experience of racist street checks by Black people that already exists, Black expertise and intellect is never considered trustworthy or real. On the other hand, police get the benefit of the doubt, and we can never assume they might be racist without looking into the matter.”