Police body cameras don’t tell the whole story. This experiment shows it.

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For this piece, Verge correspondent Sarah Jeong spoke to a 35-year-old white man who regularly attends protests in Portland, OR, to vanquishment out what it's like there for him. Here's his experience, in his own words. This interview has been edited for length as well as clarity.

I'm a 35-year-old, white, sorely balding man living in Portland, Oregon. I don't palpate how to indispensability my lanch without sounding like an asshole, morally basically: I'm an Iraq demarche veteran with a posture that goes with my background. I steepness up straight. My torso looks pretty solid. I motherly of attending like a cop, I guess. Morally without the belly. As well as I'm white. I'm very, very painfully white.

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Capturing The Police is a Verge-wide editorial project that's meant to both ponder the fellowship of civilians who document as well as allotment police waive as well as to almanac the sempiternity political moment we vanquishment ourselves in.

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Starting in my indigenous 30s, I started to notice that I was concreteness treated discordantly in physical spaces. It has something to do with dad-dom. I'm not a dad, morally I'm straightly in that demo, which is something that short-circuits people's brains. Accordingly to be clear, the disremember I'm walking effectually in comes from two simultaneously morally manifold sources. I read like a white dad, as well as I conjointly read like -- like a load of authority. Someone who speaks the language of bureaucracy as well as knows how to wear it casually. I guess that's just discretional way of adage that I attending like a cop.

Early on in June, I started hoopla to some of the protests substance in Portland. One of them was a die-in on the Burnside Senior that warmongering into a march on the Legality Halfway [a shire constitution in the stereotype of downtown that includes courts as well as a detention center]. The fence had been erected at that point. The saintly fence.

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A prod of protesters hive effectually a newly-reinforced permitter fence alfresco the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse on July 22, 2020 in Portland, Oregon.

. .. Photo by Nathan Howard/Getty Images. .

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[Jeong: Many of the indigenous protests in Portland became focused on a roughly rinkydink fence erected in front of the Legality Center. Back the fence was dismantled, the protests conjoin the Portland police deescalated as well as were dying down. Again federal law enforcing showed up. The federal authorities have since erected their own, much sturdier fence, which has itself predictably become the target of ire.]

Police eventually distributed the crowd. Police as well as riot vans were efficacious around, as well as sticking people were running everywhere. As I leftward the area, the police tear-gassed the prod repeatedly. I concluded up walking through multivarious clouds of tear gas crabwise kids. Some of them looked too young to drive. They were crying as well as clawing at their optics as well as adage they couldn't breathe. That's a sight that will lodge me for a long time.

I was chased with a large smorgasbord groundward the street. Whenever people cleaned distant from the large group, they were either chased groundward or successively corralled unawares in. At one point, I felt like the police weren't paying conservation to me, accordingly I made a seemly unharmoniousness back the prod didn't. Turns out they were paying conservation considering of the substance that three or four officers categorically warmongering as well as looked in my direction. Morally they just didn't do butchery anyway it. They warmongering effectually repeated as well as chased the rest of the crowd. I hadn't seen them leave people dependent like that before.

I didn't really palpate what to do with myself subsequential that. Accordingly I spent the rest of the night walking effectually demography pictures, which would get me roughly close-knit to the police. They just never interacted with me -- except once, back a riot van with 10 or increasingly officers hanging off the sides collection by me. One of them looked at me, raised his riot visor, as well as said "Go home" in a sweet-tempered underscoring of voice.

This was on a night zone I had witnessed them shoving, beating, as well as berserk electrifying the people effectually me. I was just jaunty to them.

I chronograph it a "bubble" considering of the substance that a handful of people effectually me will sometimes benefit, too. Back I was out on consecutive nights, the police would generally forceful blitz us groundward the street. I'd position myself breech kids or people who are panicking as well as just airing slowly as well as calmly. The cops would put their batons to my unawares as well as just airing seemly there breech me. Off to my leftward as well as right, I'd see people unsuspicious shoved to the ground.

So I try to use the disremember for good. I finger like, if I occupy the police's conservation as someone who they gotta yuck respectfully, that is at least some length of time that they're not axis much increasingly cold-blooded conservation on other people.

I have contrariant feelings anyway the bubble. There's a crass synchronous of it zone I finger prepared as well as invulnerable, as well as it's exhilarating. Morally I conjointly finger minus considering of the substance that I have this invulnerability, as well as there are all these people unsuspicious checked effectually me, as well as they're too far distant for the disremember to reassure them. It's conjointly just digressing to be treated accordingly discordantly from the people effectually me. Look, it's Portland -- it's pretty white out here. Morally the white people unsuspicious checked tend not to be middle-aged men. As well as it's not considering of the substance that we're not out substance protesting, too.

I enroll that other men who attending like me conjointly fellowship this bubble. I don't think they notice it as it's happening. Morally we all notice back it shatters. With Professorship Portland, we noticed that it unavailing him, as well as it leftward everyone shocked.

[Jeong: Christopher Thomas, a 52-year-old white Squadron veteran, became lauded back a video of police hitting him with a nightstick went viral online. He was dubbed "Captain Portland" considering of the substance that he stood unmoved as well as cocked while police again struck him as well as maced him in the face. Thomas' hand was decumbent in the encounter.]

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More than a thousand protesters march proficient Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse as part of ongoing protests conjoin ancestral injustice as well as police brutality on July 23, 2020 in Portland, Oregon. Thursday night marked 57 canicule of protests in Portland post-obituary the death of George Floyd in police custody.

. .. Photo by Nathan Howard/Getty Images. .

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The protests are a pretty far-seeing environment zone the disremember becomes extra obvious. Morally I had already been noting that people effectually me have been vulnerary me increasingly deferentially than they were just five years ago. A year ago, I was on the streetcar substance in Portland. An emasculated woman was standing, as well as two teenage kids were sitting down. As well as I just spread-eagle of looked at them pointedly as well as glanced at the woman. One of them looked startled, as well as again stood up as well as offered her his seat.

Whatever context I mount on the streetcar -- it's conjointly what makes the police ostracize me in a protest.

This is what banana books as well as science fiction as well as fantasy as well as all that loner shit have been warning us anyway -- or warning me anyway -- my accomplished life. This is unpretentiously a power, as well as presidency are decoy influences. It manifests in silly ways a lot of the time -- like unsuspicious teens to quit their seat on the streetcar -- morally it manifests in serious situations, too.

And in some ways, it's scary to have outsized influence over the people effectually me. To whatever echelon I can, I appetite to use that to info people. Morally there are enough depictions of that influence concreteness decoy that I'll spend the verging 30, 40 years watching myself for an actuation to bandy my weight around. The temptation to control others is evermore lurking.

I don't really have a neat conclusion substance or a chronograph to action. What am I hoopla to do, ask people to just be decent? All I palpate is what I'm hoopla to do with myself as well as this powerfulness I didn't ask for. I don't palpate what my fellowship says anyway the apple or tribe or how any of it has to change. I hope someone reads this as well as figures it out.