In the wake of the police killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, Daily Show host Trevor Noah had one point to make on Thursday: It’s possible to be both pro-cop and pro-black.
"It always feels like in America, it’s like, if you take a stand for something, you automatically are against something else," Noah said. "You shouldn’t have to choose between the police and the citizens that they are sworn to protect."
Noah’s plea comes after what’s unfortunately become standard routine after these painful, lethal instances of police brutality: When some want accountability and acknowledgement that black lives matter, others hear it as an attack on police.
The segment also goes into the videos of both Sterling and Castile’s deaths and how people will be skeptical.
"You can’t deny the racism," Noah said.
At one point he bracingly compares the current responses to the reaction around Harambe, the gorilla that was killed earlier this summer when a child got into his enclosure. (It should be noted that the child is black, and there was a racist response directed at the child’s family.) In that instance, Noah believes, people — including law enforcement — empathized with the gorilla, and more action was taken to fix the systemic problems in that instance than there has been in the deaths of Sterling, Castile, and the black children, men, and women before them.
"We shouldn’t be afraid to say it: America has a problem within its police force," Noah said. "And although the problem disproportionately affects black people, it’s not just a black problem; it’s an American problem."
On the night Noah’s segment aired, at least 14 people were shot and five police officers were killed in Dallas.
