RACE IN AMERICA
Racially Profi led Black Gay Birder Speaks Out
Christian Cooper refl ects on how a dispute over an unleashed dog turned ugly
BY PAUL SCHINDLER
Two days after a routine
visit to Central Park to
engage in his passionate
hobby of birding, Christian
Cooper appeared on Manhattan
Neighborhood Network’s “Gay
USA” and refl ected on his feelings
about how an encounter with a
woman who wouldn’t leash her dog
turned into a global news story.
“It’s stressful,” the out gay African
American man, who sits on
the board of Audubon New York
City, told “Gay USA” hosts Ann
Northrop and Andy Humm.
“I was a bit rattled,” he added
about the confrontation that blew
up in the park.
On the morning of May 25, Cooper
was in the park’s Ramble when
he ran into Amy Cooper, an investment
banker with Franklin Templeton,
who had her dog off leash.
When Christian pointed to a sign
stating that dogs must always be
leashed in that ecologically sensitive
part of the park, the confrontation
quickly escalated to the
point where Amy called the police
to make the false report that “an
African-American man is threatening
me and my dog.” Using his
iPhone, Christian fi lmed Amy as
she warned she would call the cops
and then proceeded to do so.
He stopped fi lming when Amy
leashed the dog, and then Christian
continued on his way, never
seeing if the police responded to
Amy’s call. A day later, after Christian’s
video clip appeared online,
Amy had to surrender the dog, who
was a rescue, to Abandoned Angels
Cocker Spaniel Rescue, and she
was fi red by Franklin Templeton.
In a tweet, the company said,
“Following our internal review of
the incident in Central Park yesterday,
we have made the decision to
terminate the employee involved,
effective immediately. We do not
tolerate racism of any kind.”
In Christian’s appearance on
“Gay USA,” he explained that disputes
between birders and dog
owners who don’t follow the park’s
leash rules are common. What he
Christian Cooper, in a typical pose bird watching.
Amy Cooper calling the police in response to Christian Cooper’s request that she leash her dog.
didn’t expect, he said, was the “racist
turn” the encounter took.
Christian, who was among the
subjects featured in the 2012 HBO
documentary “Birders: The Central
Park Effect,” explained that as
birds migrate north in the spring,
Central Park beckons them as an
oasis of green amidst a concrete
and glass island.
“Central Park aggregates the
birds,” he said. “People come from
all over the world to bird-watch.
The Ramble is a top herding spot.”
The Ramble, in particular, he explained,
is “such a sensitive area”
as a bird habitat given the array of
plantings that are there — plantings
that can easily be disturbed
by dogs romping through them.
In Christian’s recounting, he advised
Amy to take her dog to another
part of the park and “let him
run off leash all you want.”
Amy responded, “It’s too dangerous.”
FACEBOOK/ CHRISTIAN COOPER
TWITTER/ AMY COOPER
At that point, Christian said,
“Look, if you’re going to do what
you want, I’m going to do what I
want, but you’re not going to like
it,” and Amy responded, “What’s
that?”
Christian explained that he
next did what he does whenever he
encounters “such intransigence”
about dogs off leash: he took out
treats to lure the animal over to
him. At that point, Amy said, “Don’t
touch my dog,” and Christian began
recording with his phone.
“I decided to videotape her intransigent
behavior,” he said, explaining
that birders often encourage
each other to record evidence
of non-compliance by dog owners
in order to prevail on park offi cials
to enforce their own rules. “This
has been going on for years.”
He added, “Up until then it was
confl ict between a bird watcher
and a dog walker with their dog off
leash.”
But Amy approachedChristian,
telling him to stop fi lming, and he
responded by asking that she not
break social distancing rules.
It was at this point that Amy,
having moved well away from
Christian, said, “I’m going to call
the cops. I’m going to tell them
there’s an African-American man
threatening my life.”
And, in a brief call with 911,
Amy, in ever more frantic tones,
said that an African-American
man was threatening her and her
dog. While she was still on the line,
she fi nally got the leash on her dog,
and Christian said, “Thank you,”
and stop recording.
Christian’s sister, Melody Cooper,
posted the video recording,
which lasted just over a minute, on
Twitter early in the afternoon that
same day. The Internet exploded,
and as of May 27 the clip has been
viewed nearly 42 million times.
“Her life went from normal to
collapsed in about 60 seconds,”
Christian said on “Gay USA.” “For
a lapse of judgment, a serious
lapse of judgment, one that turned
racist.”
Cooper — who was also a board
member at GLAAD many years ago
in its grassroots, New York-focused
days, was engaged as an activist
for years trying to fl ip control of
the New York State Senate to the
Democrats, and, while at Marvel
Comics two decades ago, created
the fi rst gay character in the “Star
Trek” comic series — refl ected on
how the whole ugly incident has
turned out.
“I have very mixed feelings about
the consequences for her, whether
it’s proportional,” he told Northrop
and Humm. “I imagine she was
trying to get a leg up in the confrontation…
But she went to a racist
place.”
But beyond the actions by and
consequences for Amy Cooper,
Christian Cooper looked to the bigger
question at hand.
“How do we start to address
the underlying issues that led her
there?,” he asked.
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