The Self-Righteous System and the Prophetic Task

On December 8, an Orlando-area police officer shot Cedric Bartee, an African-American man, while he was unarmed and standing with his hands in the air. The Sherriff asked the public to trust that the justice system will discover the “truth.” In the wake of grand juries refusing to indict the police officers responsible for killing Eric Garner and Michael Brown, however, it seems inevitable to many that the shooting of Cedric Bartee will not be prosecuted. In the words of Jelani Cobb, African-Americans face both the “dangers of crime and the perils of those whom other communities can trust to protect them from it.”