this is not a design blog

Thesis Writing #4: Pose a Question

Can I finish my Thesis without getting arrested?

I have the evidence. It’s a small sheet of yellow carbon paper, and it’s from the Baltimore Police Department. All I had to do to get this evidence was drive down Edmonson Avenue, a beleagured section of road in the western district. I was collecting photographs of local Bail Bonds establishments with a fellow grad for the research project that has since grown into my master’s thesis, and we had been pulled over for the single reason that we didn’t “fit” in the neighborhood we were in. We stuck out, so we were stopped. And we have the official paperwork to show for it.

As a fan of the Wire, I can’t say some part of me wasn’t curious as to what my real-life experience with Baltimore’s finest would be like. Would they plant evidence on me? Would I decide to run for it at the last minute , punching the gas in my borrrowed 1995 Toyota Corolla station wagon just as the officer reached my window, and take my friend Joe on a high-speed tour of the city’s back alleys as I tried to elude my pursuers and set us up for fugitive status? Or would I simply hand over the information requested by the officer who stopped me, quietly and respectfully complying with his orders?

I didn’t run, and I’m not writing this from some criminal safehouse, and I’m not on the run from Johnny Law. And I’m glad I didn’t, not just for the fact that I really don’t think a criminal record and/or jail time for attempting to avoid arrest would help me in my post-graduate job search. I’m glad I didn’t run because it gave me insight into what was a surprising and unexpected turn of events. By the time the traffic stop was over, there were no less than 5 police cars at the scene, with 8-10 police officers on hand. Each was gracious, none were threatening, but it was made crystal clear that if we continued our current course of action, driving and photographing these businesses, we would be targeted for being stopped on sight, because they would assume we were in the neighborhood to buy drugs. This highlighted a disparity in the dna in the makeup of my city that I knew about but had never experienced first-hand. Being hassled and having to deal with having my car searched by gloved police officers purely based upon the assumption that I was up to no good due to the neighborhood I was driving in and the color of my skin. And despite the mileage I’ve gotten out of this story when people start sharing their Baltimore experiences, I didn’t like. Not one bit. Not what it said about my city, and not what it says about where we still are in terms tacit invisible boundaries that we are expected to respect or pay the consequences.

On the back of my citizen copy of my police experience, it says “You have been given this receipt to document the contact you had with a member of the Baltimore Police Department. In the event you have any questions or concerns regarding your contact, the following is provided.” A list then follows which includes all the of the main switchboard numbers for the city police districts. I’m even given the opportunity to really turn up the heat, as the last item on the page is the number for the “Internal Investigations Division”, ominously separate from the other information, suggesting that it has some unspoken weight. I’ve seen enough to know that IA is where the rats go when they have a problem, when they want to cross the thin blue line and turn the cops who police other cops loose.

I’m no rat. But I do have a few questions. Why is such a large portion of the city I live in off-limits to me? Why can’t two white men drive down Edmonson Avenue without being stopped by half of the Western district? And how am I supposed to document my thesis research if I can’t go into the neighborhoods that these businesses are located?