Now, now, at the debate, both candidates were asked
the question, with all the recent police shootings,
how do you begin to heal the racial divide in America?
Because it seems like it's getting worse.
In fact, in some communities, even the Oreos are segregated.
And, now, Hillary went first,
suggesting better police training,
getting guns off the street,
and improving community relations
by hosting regular dance-offs in the streets.
Uh, all right? Okay, that was fake, that was fake.
But I think it would be a great suggestion.
Just Hillary's like, "And now dance."
(beatboxing)
Uh, but then, after Hillary,
it was time for Trump's rebuttal,
and he had a slightly, completely different answer.
First of all, Secretary Clinton doesn't want to use
a couple of words, and that's "law" and "order."
And we need law and order.
We have to take the guns away from these people that have them
and that are bad people that shouldn't have 'em.
These are felons.
You have to have stop-and-frisk.
Ah, Donatello, you're a genius.
That's why you're the science turtle, my friend.
Yes. To help black and white people get along.
Black people have to stop committing crimes.
It's that simple. And I get what Trump is saying, you know?
I get this divide. Being half black and half white myself,
I face this internal conflict every day. Every day.
Hell, I frisk myself all the time.
All the time!
-(cheering and applause) -And, I mean...
Other people call it jerking off,
but I know what I'm searching for.
It's love.
Now, Trump wasn't bringing up stop-and-frisk out of nowhere.
For the last 20 years or so, it's been a major theory
of policing, where if cops on the street think someone
is asking suspicious, they pat them down, stop them,
you know, look for weapons, and then send them on their way.
Uh, it's like a mini massage.
Even the name sounds fun. Stop-and-frisk, yeah?
It sounds like sexy role play, yeah,
or-or two German characters on an adventure.
Stop und Frisk. Hallo!
But the truth is, stop-and-frisk is very controversial,
and if you've never been stop-and-frisked,
it may be hard to imagine why.
But think of it like the TSA.
You know when you're at the airport,
and you're getting patted down?
Now imagine if, instead of patting,
they're violently going through your pockets,
throwing you against the wall,
cursing you out in front of everyone.
Oh, and on top of all of that, there's no flights.
It looks like this.
Three officers approached me, sort of roughed me up a bit,
particularly when I asked questions.
I could feel the presence
of police officers standing over me, pointing weapons at me.
I remember them banging me head into this.
MAN: Well... well, for what? For what?
POLICEMAN: Shut your (bleep) mouth, kid.
-MAN: For... Why am I getting arrested for? -Shut your mouth!
MAN: What am I getting arrested for?
Why did you stop and frisk me? I'm gonna give him my ID.
-I'm gonna give... Shh. Relax. -(bleep)
Officer, don't touch me!
-(indistinct chatter) -(bleep) -(garbled radio transmission)
-I'm not resisting! -(bleep)
You know, whenever you see a video like this,
you can't help but wonder how many earlier incidents
we will never know about
because people didn't have camera phones back then.
I mean, now, everyone has an iPhone, so we see the videos.
Back in the day, if you witnessed something,
you probably just had to thumb it
to someone on your flip phone, just be like...
-(muttering gibberish) -(laughter)
Now, you may be thinking, "Oh, well, who cares?
Those guys are criminals so they got what's coming."
But here's the thing that Trump
and many stop-and-frisk supporters seem to gloss over.
At its peak in New York,
there were almost 700,000 stop-and-frisk searches.
88% of those searches turned up nothing.
That means in one year,
there were 605,000 stops
when people had done nothing wrong.
What's even worse is that many of these were teenage kids.
Now, don't get me wrong.
I mean, most teenagers are dicks,
but still, not legally speaking.
So, stop-and-frisk is problematic enough,
and here's why it's especially problematic
to say that it's going to heal the racial divide.
MAN:
police stopped over four million people,
according to the NYPD,
nearly 90% of them black or Latino.
Blacks make up one-third of Chicago's population,
but they accounted for nearly three-fourths of those stopped.
WOMAN:
and then frisked people...
with African-Americans accounting
for 69% of all stops.
Yeah, although stop-and-frisk is supposed to be applied equally,
in reality, most of the time,
it only affects people of color, like rhythm.
-Now... -(laughter)
Police
they're stopping people based on suspicious behavior,
which, again, seems reasonable
until you see how vague the term "suspicious behavior" can be.
For instance, for instance-- this is all true--
they can justify stopping and frisking a person
for looking around,
because looking around is a thing that drug dealers do. Yes.
And also, I mean, people who cross streets
and also tourists, and also pigeons.
(laughter)
All suspicious.
In fact, the number one reason
New York police said they frisked people
was because of something called "furtive movements,"
which sounds like a dance class for shy people--
right, it just sounds like a... but it's not.
It's actually any movement that the police feel is suspicious.
And here's how you know that this is targeting black people.
You could even be stopped and frisked
just for having a bulge in your pants.
(laughter)
-Yeah. It's what you're thinking. -(laughter)
Which the police could probably make better
if they just said that.
If they said, "We're stopping you
because it looks like you got a big dick,"
then guys would be like, "Well, go ahead, Officer.
"Go ahead! Go ahead! That's right!
Who's getting stop and frisked today, baby?!"
-(laughter, applause & cheering) "I got stopped three times!
"When was the last time you got stopped?
You ain't never been stopped! Ha, ha!"
(laughter)
But that's not what's happening.
And now, to be clear,
I'm not saying stop-and-frisk was useless.
I'm saying it wasn't worth it,
because although it helped take illegal guns off the street,
stop-and-frisk may have other costs.
In fact, a recent Yale-Columbia study has shown
that when police regularly harasses a community,
that community loses respect for the law.
And that could very well lead to a rise in crime.
Here's an easy way to think of it.
Imagine if you were in a relationship,
and you're completely faithful, but every single day,
the person you're dating goes, "Are you cheating on me?
"Are you cheating on me? Show me your phone!
"Are you cheating on me? Show me your phone.
"Show me your phone. What-what are you doing?
"Show me your phone. Are you cheating on me?
"Show me your phone! Show me your phone!
"All right, I'm glad we've been working
"on healing the divide in our relationship.
"This has been going well.
"Right. You want to have dinner tonight?
"No? You're busy? Busy with who? Show me your phone!
Show me your phone!"
It's not gonna work.
You know, people talk about stop-and-frisk
like it was some magical medicine that cured crime.
Here's the suggestion I have.
If they're gonna try and sell it that way,
the least they could do is be honest
about the side effects.
Sort of like this.
MAN:
keep you up at night?
Well, guess what? There's a solution,
and it's called Stop and Frisk.
Stop and Frisk is strong, fast-acting
and completely safe...
for white people.
Some potential side effects of Stop and Frisk may include:
blurred legal rights, racial tension...
oh, yeah-- forget about ice cream--
sudden loss of dignity, riot outbreaks,
thoughts of being trapped in a dystopian police state,
and now that glass of Merlot is considered a weapon.
At the first sign of furtive movement,
use Stop and Frisk.
Don't let a little thing like the perpetuation
of racial disharmony get in the way of you living your life.
I know