Let’s talk about police brutality in Colombia

By Luisa Lafaurie

On September 9th, 2020 our city experienced something that triggered our indignity and devastation as Colombians. In the early morning, two police officers abused their power; and it ended up with the death of an innocent man named Javier Ordoñez. He was a 42-year-old father of two children, and he was about to graduate as a lawyer while working as a taxi driver to earn money for his family.  That same night, and the following day many citizens went out to protest, not only to seek justice for Javier but for the victims of the 55 massacres that preceded it. During the protest, ten more deaths of young adults occurred at the hands of the police, and many more were injured.Throughout the protests, many streets and “Comandos de Acción Inmediata'' also known as CAI were destroyed by the rioters, which caused a reply from Bogota's Mayor, Claudia Lopez, saying that even though she understood the pain and anger, destroying the city wouldn't fix the police. She showed her support and condolences for the families and organized a day of forgiveness and reconciliation to which she invited the Philharmonic Orchestra to perform. On September 16th, the Ministry of Defense declared that Ordoñez's death was indeed caused by the police, along with the deaths of the other ten protestors. Fernando Carrillo, the general attorney, commented on twitter that the military judicial system couldn't provide immunity in circumstances where police brutality was present, and that's why Javier's case passed to ordinary justice. 

As we should expect, the 11 deaths over the last few days aren't the only cases of police abuse. There have been about 137 reports this year in which are present different complaints of physical abuse, extortion, and even sexual assaults. In the protests, there was a noticeably repeated acronym, “ACAB”, which stands for All Cops Are Bastards. I noticed that the media has a wrong interpretation for this; they say that people are generalizing and that “not all cops are bad,” they say that “there are just a few bad apples”. First of all, that is not what ACAB wants to communicate; it means that even though the officer as a person can be good and have good intentions, the system is rotten. Cops are limited by their job, which might make them do some things even against their will; so ACAB does not attack each cop, it's attacking the system that is robbing the morality and sense of humanity. And secondly, by saying that there are just some “bad apples,” people are justifying those who lack the good intentions mentioned before. So how do you expect people to trust a system that is supposed to protect you, one where they can justify their abuses?

This situation is very similar to the one that happened in Minneapolis a few months ago when George Floyd died thanks to police brutality. When that happened, people from around the world encouraged the BLM movement and protests. Many Colombian influencers and celebrities showed their support to it and I don't mean to take away its importance. But, I'm wondering why the same reaction doesn't occur in Colombia when problems arise. Where are all those influencers now? These movements are not trends. If you cared about Gorge Floyd, why didn't you care about Javier Ordoñez? If you cared about Breonna Taylor, why didn't you care about Julieth Ramirez? If you used #BlackLivesMatter, why don't you use #ColombianLivesMatter? I'm not saying that it's wrong to support international initiatives; I'm saying it's wrong when you don't support the ones of your own country. 

I want this to be a wake-up call for everyone who reads it. I want you to ask yourself if you are treating this as a trend or if you care and are informed about the things you support, not only in this matter but in all the controversial topics. I invite you to keep investigating them so you can have an educated opinion and know why you support what you support. Finally, I invite you to start caring more about what is happening here in Colombia, because most of the time things don't get the attention they deserve because we are too busy watching what is happening elsewhere.