Tom Fulks: Highway 101 protest march in San Luis Obispo was a ‘strategic error’
Local racial justice advocates have been on a roll in recent months — on point, organized and repeatedly turning out large crowds to press the case again systemic racism in our very white county.
Despite this success, due to a strategic error, the narrative about local race relations and social equity has been hijacked and is now controlled by the very criminal justice institutions street protesters are trying to reform.
In blocking U.S. 101 on Tuesday, demonstrators triggered the transparently political arrest of their leader on “rioting” charges, which have conveniently morphed from a popular call for racial justice into a controversy over “law and order,” cynically propagated by the targets of their effort.
The timing is unfortunate for local Black Lives Matter supporters, whose cause is righteous, because their message is being subsumed by the “law-and-order” trope pushed by opposing political opportunists — shifting the narrative away from something we all should be talking about.
And that’s San Luis Obispo County Sheriff Ian Parkinson’s incendiary, racially charged, decidedly partisan polemic delivered recently to a gathering of North County Tea Party / Republican activists. We should be talking about his department’s exceedingly militarized response to street demonstrations, his equation of protest to criminality, his refusal to enforce this county’s COVID public health measures and his infusion of personal politics into his department’s supposed non-partisan approach to law enforcement.
Instead of Parkinson’s dereliction, we’re talking about in-the-weeds detail of who struck whom in the streets of SLO, who are the actual victims and perps, the SLO Police Department’s heavy-handedness, and how our openly partisan district attorney — Dan Dow, SLO County’s Bill Barr mini-me — is going to handle this highly politicized, polarizing incident.
There’s serious public discussion to be had about the core issues leading to conflict in our streets today, starting with the in-your-face politicization of the Sheriff’s Department and District Attorney’s Office, focusing on Parkinson’s malignant obtuseness toward race relations and his disdain for widely accepted measures to prevent COVID spread.
In its place, our public discourse has devolved into an online shout fest about fealty to authority and “law and order” vs. fidelity to the fundamental American right to gather, speak freely and protest.
Rather than attracting attention to video-recorded revelations into Parkinson’s authoritarian mindset about race, protest and infidelity to his oath, the opposite has occurred: The protesters have drawn a negative public spotlight onto themselves, and it’s being magnified by politically partisan local authorities.
The late civil rights icon John Lewis encouraged “good trouble,” trouble that calls attention to the historically embedded institutional and societal injustices that today are front and center of the national dialogue. Local protesters instead got themselves into strategically dumb trouble by not waiting for the public flaying of Parkinson before rushing the freeway and triggering politically sacrificial arrests.
Now, the political narrative is controlled by “law-and-order” political partisans populating our public institutions and their shrinking political base. That works to the advantage of Parkinson, Dow and their ilk throughout local government who deny racism in SLO County and believe preventing the spread of COVID isn’t their job.
The North County Tea Party (aka Republican Party) was apparently so enamored of Parkinson’s 19-minute diatribe of right-wing demagoguery that it posted a recording of it on YouTube. After his remarks triggered a social media backlash and The Tribune started reporting on it, the video was removed.
So much for standing behind their man, and for Parkinson’s integrity.
As summarized in a Tribune editorial, the video shows Parkinson believes there’s no racism in SLO County; that shifting the burden of mental health care away from law enforcement is “a whole bunch of garbage;” that street protests serve “no purpose, other than destruction;” that mask wearing to prevent COVID should be optional, in spite of statewide orders to do so; and that he can unilaterally refuse to enforce the governor’s public safety orders, clearly violating his oath of office.
If Parkinson and the local GOP actually believe these things, they should put the video back up for all to see. As well, Parkinson should quit hiding behind his tax-paid spokesman, publicly explain himself and answer unfiltered questions.
Moreover, Dow should announce publicly and forcefully that there will be no charges filed against local BLM activist Tianna Arata. Anyone who’s read the First Amendment can see the absurdity of calling Tuesday’s street demonstration a “riot” and the politics behind that smear.
If Parkinson and Dow want to de-escalate tensions in SLO County, they can. All it takes is the will, honor and courage.
Columnist Tom Fulks serves on the San Luis Obispo County Democratic Central Committee.