Thread by @sunlorrie

In light of record gang-gun violence in Toronto today, recall that in 2005's Summer of the Gun, the city's only Black councillor said police should be able to stop & search young black men in crime-plagued parts of T.O. theglobeandmail.com/news/national/… #topoli #tocouncil #onpoli #cdnpoli

"We ought to be looking at supporting initiatives that would support police officers in stopping young black men in the problem areas where we have the guns and guns violence," said Councillor Michael Thompson (Scarborough-Centre).

"I want to think outside the box to get the police in to stop young men and ask questions like they do in the United States where police can pull over people and pat them down for weapons."

"We know in these communities that the overwhelming number of young black men being killed in these communities are being killed by other black men. Do we not want to find ways and means to affect the problems more than what is being done now?"

Thompson was denounced for expressing this view by the mayor, the police chief and other critics who were, ironically, overwhelmingly white. Thompson, who no longer supports this view, said at the time he was expressing his frustration over young blacks dying in gun violence.

They're dying in far greater numbers now, along with innocent bystanders ,while politicians advocate useless policies like 'banning guns' and putting more restrictions on legal gun owners --ineffective because 82% of handguns used in crime are illegally smuggled in from the US.

Then Toronto police chief Bill Blair, developed an effective strategy to combat gun violence combining a special squad to fight gang violence -- the Toronto Anti-Violence Intervention strategy and street checks (aka carding).

For nine years, from 2006 to 2014 gun crime steadily dropped in Toronto until both TAVIS and street checks were banned due to allegations they were racist in disproportionately targeting Blacks. Since then, gun crime has skyrocketed to record levels, far worse than in 2005.

If TAVIS and street checks were racist then the politicians who scrapped them have an obligation to develop a real strategy to fight gun crime. They haven't. That's another form of racism, because it holds the lives of Blacks -- the vast majority of whom are law-abiding, cheap.