SSDD: White People Do Hateful Racist Stuff, Get No Punishment

Same stuff happens every day.

Remember this story back in January?

Some 57 charges of child abuse and assault reportedly will be filed against the drunken hockey fans who subjected 57 American Indian students to racially-charged taunts the included spraying the students with beer and lacing them with racial slurs, according to unnamed sources.

.........

THE STUDENTS, WHO ATTEND THE AMERICAN HORSE SCHOOL IN THE HAMLET OF ALLEN ON THE PINE RIDGE INDIAN RESERVATION, SUFFERED THROUGH AN ONSLAUGHT OF BEER BEING SPRAYED ON THEM AS THEY WERE TOLD BY THE PERPETRATORS TO “GO BACK TO THE RESERVATION.”

Well, that was then, this is now:

Seven months later, only one of the perpetrators faces criminal charges. His trial begins today, and if found guilty he will be convicted of disorderly conduct and fined $500 — avoiding hate crime charges, a jury, and jail time.

That's fucking it.

ONE disorderly conduct misdemeanor and a piddling $500 fine IF--and ONLY IF--he's convicted.

Oh--but this is what proves all of this was a sham from the beginning. From the Think Progress article cited:

Gloria Kitsopoulos is the superintendent and principal of the American Horse School and a member of the Lakota tribe. According to Kitsopoulos, the chief of police, city attorney, and state attorney drove to the school to explain the results of the investigation and deeply offended the parents and school officials who had assembled there.

“The first thing that really offended me was that they brought the communications guy from Rapid City with them and I gave him the microphone so he could talk to the people. He said, ‘if anyone wants to use the talking stick when I’m done, let me know,'” she told ThinkProgress. When the misdemeanor charge was announced, “nobody really said anything because [they] thought ‘okay that’s the first one, that’s probably the lesser charge.’ And that was it. Everybody was just dumbfounded.”

Parents were outraged and began to yell, at which point the chief of police approached Kitsopoulos and said, “I think we should leave. I’m fearing for her safety” and pointed to the female state attorney. Back in Rapid City, officers claimed they fled the reservation out of fear. But the superintendent maintains nobody was showing signs of aggression at the meeting.

On the day of the first hearing, O’Connell, who has plead not guilty, was a no-show. Rapid City Attorney Joel Landeen, who is representing the students, asked that a jury hear the case and for jail time to stay on the table. Due to their large presence in Rapid City, Native Americans were hopeful that some of their own would sit on the jury. But the judge presiding over the case has since denied both requests, so the maximum penalty is a $500 fine. No hate crime, assault, or child abuse charges are being pursued.

First of all, "talking stick"? What. The. Fuck. Can you be any more racist? Then, the whole "fear for the safety of the women" bit. I guess you can. And of COURSE the White guy is a no-show to his own hearing. And in a scene right out of the Jim Crow South, NO Natives are allowed on the jury, and there will be NO jail time if convicted. Just a piddling fine.

Honestly, is it in our fucking genes to be this racist?

I'm just too sickened for words.