In the days immediately following the initial mistrial of Baltimore Police Officer William Porter on charges relating to the death of Freddie Gray, Bounce TV broadcast Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing several times. I could not help seeing this as a commentary on the mistrial. Bounce had likewise shown the film several times in the days following the April 2015 riots.

The last straw for certain things came with a Baltimore Sun front page banner headline: I anticipate no response from Julia Craven, Jenee Desmond-Harris, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Stacey Patton, or Brittney Cooper.[*] What was the last straw? In short, it’s time for me to stop concerning myself with racism and race. All my life, I’ve been intensely concerned about both. Countless hours have gone into agonizing over any possible solution. One version of my conclusion is, there is non