That's it, I'm moving to Ca—oh wait.

I had a black English teacher in undergrad. He wore suits and drove a nice car. He got stopped all the time (this was in Texas). He said the Midwest was worse than Texas, unbelievably. He'd get stopped by Kansas police who would outright accuse him, "Did you steal that car?" "What do you do?" "I'm an English professor." "You can't lie to us, you know we can look it up." -_-

When I told my white friends about these encounters with police, they’d often respond with skepticism and dismissal

I'm white (or white enough), and I get the same reaction from my white friends. "Racism isn't a problem anymore" "One of my best friends grew up Hispanic in El Paso; you're trying to tell me El Paso police aren't racist?" "Oh, but it's not bad here." "Yes it is, you just don't see it." It's infuriating. Part of why I left Texas. I have a lot of friends there, who otherwise seem like really good people, but when race comes up, suddenly they're blind and deaf. It was really hard to live around. Kinda like having a nice neighbor who bakes the best cookies with swastika icing. Same BS if I mention Native American atrocities, or current rez poverty.

All that information lives in a top-secret database

Freedom can't exist without transparency.

it’s important that you always carry identification

Ihre Papieren, bitte?