Last season of Showtime's The Chi featured no cops, on purpose. In addition to a major storyline being to trash the police, even when a young black woman had disappeared, because the residents could take care of that all on their own, the Chicago PD be damned. In its fourth season, though, the Chicago PD has played a major part in both episodes so far. May 30’s episode of “Cooley High” takes place not long after last week's episode of "Soul Food," when a 15-year old was assaulted by a racist police officer.
The closing scene of last week’s episode was of Trig (Luke James) exacting revenge on Officer Reeves, the racist police officer who assaulted his 15-year old brother, Jake (Michael Epps). Although Trig repeatedly strikes the officer with a sharp object, he’s not dead, but he has been hospitalized. Mayor Otis ‘Douda’ Perry (Curtiss Cook), who is as corrupt as you’d expect the mayor of Chicago to be, shows up to fire this Officer Reeves.
Reeves: Jake Taylor attacked me.
Douda: Define ‘attacked.’
Reeves: I asked him to get on the ground, put his hands where I could see them. He refused.
Douda: So that's why he had a black eye and a busted lip.
Reeves: I asked him for his ID.
Douda: Why?
Reeves: It's procedure.
Douda: I don't think it is.
Reeves: I like to know who I'm talking to.
Douda: Judging from the tape, you wasn't doing too much talking. I got your file here. Looks like you have a lot of run-ins with young black boys just minding their own business.
Reeves: I've been on the force for 18 years. Of course I'm gonna have a few complaints.
Douda: More than a few. At this point, it's looking more like a pattern. Are you a bad cop, Officer Reeves?
Reeves: What?
Douda: Are you a bad cop?
Reeves: I'm a war vet that fought for my country. I got a wife and four boys. Every time I leave the house, they don't know if I'm coming home.
Douda: Yeah. Well, I know the feeling.
[Protesters chant 'What do we want?' 'Justice.' When do we want it?' 'Now.']
Reporter: Mayor Perry. Mayor Perry. What do you think about the bodycam footage of Officer Reeves and Jake Taylor?
Reporter: The black community is calling you arrest the cops that assaulted him -- would you like to comment?
Reporter: How do you feel about the looting?
Douda: People are more valuable than property. As of today, Officer Reeves will no longer be a member of the Chicago Police Department.
[Crowd cheers]
Douda: Racist cops will not be tolerated on my watch.
[Crowd cheering]
[Protestors chant]
If you've heard that "people are more important than property" before, it's because Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) tweeted that very line on May 31, 2020.
Douda, who has Trig working for him doing his more illegal projects, has always been about craving and acting on power. He acts how he wants and he doesn’t care who says otherwise. But, the scene also highlights the tragedy of leftist leaders and showrunners, who actually approve of looting. It isn’t merely Gov. Cooper who has used his platform to argue such a point, but many in the mainstream media, as well.
In another scene which shows Douda doesn’t care what anyone else says or thinks, he calls a press conference without telling his wife or other aides, which is where he defunds the police.
Roselyn Perry: You can't just call an impromptu press conference.
Douda: Says who?
Reporter: Okay, okay, there he is.
Douda: There's a war going on outside. The police are on one side, and the Black community is on the other. And right now the Black community is losing. I'm tired of us feeling like our lives don't matter. We can't walk to school. We can't go for a jog. We can't babysit our nieces and nephews. We can't even sleep in our own beds. The definition of "crazy" is doing the same thing again and again and expecting things to change. I'm done waiting. Today I'm gonna change our city forever. I've decided to defund the police...
Reporter: Have you spoken to the chief of police?
Reporter: That's our lead.
Douda: Effective immediately. We spend $1.9 billion on CPD, and we barely see anything back in return. It's time to do things differently. Thank you.
Reporter: Is this in retaliation to what happened to Jake Taylor?
Reporter: How do you plan to handle the backlash from the CPD?
Douda: I know you guys have a lot of questions, but I'm not prepared to answer them right now. We'll figure this out. Until then, God bless you, and God bless the city of Chicago.
One of the closing scenes of the episode shows the police about to yet again antagonize a black man doing nothing wrong. This time, Trig and others in the crowd get the police to back away, as Trig calls on everyone there to take out their cell phones to record.
“See, this is exactly why we don't want you motherfuckers. We don't need y'all here,” Trig says as he tells the officers off. Yeah, he’s shown them, especially when his city continues to fare poorly.
