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TheBlaze posted a story earlier this week about Dorothy Bland, dean of the journalism school at the University of North Texas, who wrote that police stopped her for “walking while black.”
Image source: You
Bland penned a column about the encounter for the Dallas Morning News, saying that even though she lived there, she “was simply a brown face in an affluent neighborhood. I told the police I didn’t like to walk in the rain, and one of them told me, ‘My dog doesn’t like to walk in the rain.’ Ouch!”
Corinth Police Chief Debra Walthall caught wind of the incident and wrote a response that was added to the Morning News piece. Walthall said the dashcam camera footage from the police cruiser told a very different story.
“Impeding traffic is a Class C misdemeanor, and it is our policy to ask for identification from people we encounter for this type violation,” the chief added. “I am surprised by her comments as this was not a confrontational encounter but a display of professionalism and genuine concern for her safety.”
Here's what some readers of TheBlaze had to say about the incident:
Busman55Why, I ask, was she walking in the street with two perfectly good and EMPTY sidewalks to either side of her?
I know she is lying based upon the longwinded BS she said she told the officers. “I’m a taxpayer and I pay a lot of taxes”? Seriously? How many people bring up how much they pay in taxes to an officer during a stop?
I don’t buy this at all. She is looking to make it all about “race.”
Pathetic.
It wasn’t her “I’m a taxpayer…blah, blah, blah” line I found interesting, but the fact that she started to add in, “Do you realize I bought the hoodie I was wearing after completing the Harvard University Institute for Management and Leadership in Education in 2014? Do you realize I have hosted gatherings for family, friends, faculty, staff and students in my home?” That shouted "rabble rouser" loud and clear to me. Why on God’s green earth would they know that? Get over yourself, chickie.
The same thing happened to me a few years ago in my neighborhood in Arizona, but since I’m white, it’s not a national news story. It’s funny though, all I had to do was show my ID and the police and I had a good laugh – and I THANKED THEM for the great job they do to keep us safe. Guess I was just raised with a different mindset.
She got in the street to do this on purpose. Plain and simple. She was trying to up her “street cred” with the rest of the elitist liberals in the university system. Smells like a set up.
It’s a matter of intelligence.
As a young Boy Scout I learned a LONG time ago that “when there is NO sidewalk you can safely walk on” and you must walk on the road or shoulder, walk facing toward oncoming traffic so you can see if you need to get out of the way. By walking on the right side of the road, a car can more easily hit you without you being aware.
Her darker and non-reflective clothing can be some of the most difficult to see in overcast conditions.
The pedestrian was NOT stopped for being black in her neighborhood. She was stopped for doing a foolish thing in her neighborhood. Those neighbors who she mentioned could verify her residency could have turned out to be the ones who identified the body after a car hit her.
Just because you work at a university doesn’t make you smart. Another knee-jerk reaction from an overly racial victim.
How can they tell she’s black before they stopped and she turned around? Until that time, all it looks like is some wackadoo flapping her arms like a flightless bird in the middle of the street.
I live in a “transitional” neighborhood in the People’s Republic of Atlanta and I see this ALL the time. This level of stupidity can only be explained by the gene-pool trying to self-cleanse.
This is very big/popular now, at least here in Jersey. Majority of people (black/white, young/old) walk on the street and not the sidewalk. Some are courteous and get off the road when you drive by, but others push baby carriages and wear ear plugs and act like they haven't a care in the world.
I side with the cops. I walk 9 miles a day around a lake. The trails are asphalt, not concrete. There's a big difference in the surface on which you walk or run. She chose to walk on asphalt rather than concrete. However, I do think she tried to make it a racial thing when it wasn’t. And when you walk or run on a surface reserved for vehicular traffic, the law says you must walk against traffic so you can see the vehicles as well as the drivers can see you.
A 4-minute video, and one car drives by in that amount of time.
It’s clearly a residential neighborhood with a low amount of vehicle traffic.
I seriously don’t see what the issue is. Growing up, I used to play football and soccer and street hockey and all sorts of games in a street just like that. We never got hit by any cars. We never had a neighbor throw his hands up “complaining” about the situation.
It’s her neighborhood. And the people driving are her neighbors. Is it really that hard to go around a person in the street?
Much ado about nothing here.
I don’t see why the cops needed to talk to her. I don’t see why she needed to make it into a racist issue. It had nothing to do with race. It did have something to do with cops and the government in general thinking that everyone needs their advice. Go away. I’ll walk in the street in my own quiet neighborhood all I like.
The perpetually offended have an instantaneous source for venting. She’s a college dean, for goodness sake. My hope is that she would apologize and walk her comments back, but I doubt she will. There is fame, money and perhaps a visit to the White House for perpetrating the narrative.
What’s hilarious is that this dean is the type of person who's probably cried the loudest for police dashcams and bodycams to be included in all patrols. Now, it’s no longer the word of the perpetually offended against the word of the officers; there’s video proof that most stops are legit, and anything wild that goes down is generally the fault of the one stopped. Please, continue to use dashcams and bodycams to turn these race-baiters on their heads.
Apparently she has segregated herself from the sidewalk in order to exercise her self-perceived privilege to walk in the street — because if she walks in the street, then other people will have to adjust what they're doing to accommodate her.
Why is it that people want to fight with those in authority?
How about a simple, "Hey guys, thanks — I did not realize I was almost run over by a truck because I was wearing earbuds impeding my hearing while I was walking in the roadway while there's a perfectly good sidewalk for me to use (which was made because of all the taxes I pay and because it is unsafe to run in traffic on the roadway)." And please note: Nice sidewalk on the right and left!
"Oh, and I took pictures so I can post this on the Internet and gain tons of attention and maybe a lawyer will say there is a case and I can get a lump-sum settlement if I claim I was a victim."
Boy how times have changed!
So the dean of the journalism school disregards facts and chooses to create a story that advances her personal agenda? And is there any question why our media is so biased and incompetent and we have a nation of useful idiots!?!
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Follow Dave Urbanski (@DaveVUrbanski) on Twitter
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