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Apparently, a lot of NYPD cops don鈥檛 like working the West Indian Day Parade in Brooklyn, and they vented their disdain for the annual event in a deeply insulting and racist Facebook rant.

, officers called parade-goers 鈥渁nimals,鈥� 鈥渟avages鈥� and 鈥渇ilth鈥� in a lengthy series of offensive posts. 鈥淒rop a bomb and wipe them all out,鈥� one commenter suggested of the revelers, who largely hail from nearby neighborhoods of color.

This is appalling stuff. It鈥檚 shocking that police officers would spew such hateful bile about the people they are supposed to protect and serve. Naturally, news of the Facebook diatribe angry calls for an investigation and stern discipline of the officers involved.

While we condemn the content of the officers鈥� speech, the First Amendment gives cops, like all public employees, the right to speak freely in their private lives, even when their speech is disgusting. But they do not get to be racists on the job, and these postings indicate that the NYPD has a lot of work to do to address race issues within its ranks.

The Department鈥檚 race issues extend far beyond the racist online rant. For years, the NYPD has championed that do more to undermine trust between police and residents than an ugly Facebook post ever could.

The NYPD treats all residents of low-income communities of color as potential criminal suspects. Nothing demonstrates this disturbing fact more clearly than the Department鈥檚 aggressive stop-and-frisk practices.

Since 2004, NYPD officers have stopped, questioned and frisked more . About 9 in 10 of those stopped were completely innocent of any wrongdoing. More than 8 in 10 were black or Latino.

According to the of the NYPD鈥檚 latest stop-and-frisk report, all five precincts with the fewest stop-and-frisk encounters during the third quarter of 2011 are concentrated below 59th Street in Manhattan and are majority white. Neighborhoods with the highest number of stop/frisk interrogations included Inwood/Washington Heights, Central Brooklyn, Far Rockaway, Eastern Queens and the North Shore of Staten Island 鈥� all low-income neighborhoods of color.

For residents of these neighborhoods, a simple trip to the corner store or to pick up their children at school carries substantial risk that they will be confronted by police. Essentially, these communities have become Constitution-free zones.

When police do make arrests or issue citations, it鈥檚 often for low-level offenses like disorderly conduct, riding bicycles on the sidewalk, and violations of the open container law. In 2010, misdemeanors accounted for 9 of the 10 most frequently charged offenses at arraignment.

This crackdown on petty offenses drives residents of the city鈥檚 most vulnerable neighborhoods into the criminal justice system. It costs people their jobs, public housing benefits or disrupts their education. It deepens the rights between the NYPD and the communities it is supposed to serve.

Tellingly, an provides a concrete example of the NYPD鈥檚 racially biased policing. City Council member Jumaane Williams and Kirsten John Foy, an aide to New York City Public Advocate Bill DeBlasio, both black men, were roughed up and arrested by police officers as they attempted to cross into a barricaded area reserved for public officials 鈥� an area they had permission to enter.

The officers refused to acknowledge the public officials鈥� credentials. Williams was shoved and Foy was forced to ground. Both were handcuffed and detained for about an hour before police released them.

Last month, NYPD鈥檚 Internal Affairs Bureau that three officers involved in the incident would disciplined.

While this was welcome news, you shouldn鈥檛 have to be a public official to expect police officers guilty of mistreating you to be disciplined. Every day, black and brown New Yorkers suffer indignities at the hands of the NYPD. Who speaks for them?

This issue is bigger than the transgressions of a few individual officers, just as it鈥檚 bigger than the offensive Facebook posts. If the NYPD is to truly address it, then it must abandon its racially biased policing practices and instruct officers to treat all the city鈥檚 residents respectfully.

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