White Woman Calls Cops on Black People Having Cookout

What is there to say at this point? In something that is only now coming to the forefront as a stomach-churning trend of citizen vigilante racism.

We’ve covered the story of two black men who were arrested for waiting in Starbucks for a friend, a black woman who had the police called on her for taking a nap in her Yale common room, and now we present the story of a white woman who called the police on a black woman for having a barbecue in a public park in Oakland, California. The incident was recorded by a different caucasian woman named Michelle Williams. The woman who called the police’s name is unknown.

The twenty-five-minute video is an incredible thing to behold. We see someone trying to call the police on black people minding their own business, claiming she is being harassed after walking into the space of a family having a barbecue and being shoved (though clear footage shows nothing of the sort happening). The 12 minute mark is when the weird call with the police begins.

The reason for her call is obviously clear, and it’s the next story in a miserable pattern including white people calling the police on black people using an AirBnB without waving, black people moving into their own apartment, and a Chinese restaurant in Toronto charging black people before their meal arrives. Blech.

The white woman’s reason for calling the police? Because she claims that it is illegal to use charcoal in that area, and maybe it was, but it’s not the kind of thing you should call the police over. As a member of the Oakland City Council specified:

“I want to encourage people to know when to call the police when to raise a question of regulations with the City Council; maybe there is a passive way to reach out to us.”

The following tweets state it best:

Incredibly, when the woman finally talks to the police (in tears), she paints an abject scene of violence and harassment despite the fact that the 25 minutes of footage captured show her bothering a family at a park and harassing them. Ugh.

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