Kentucky judge shouldn't have to face racism in 2016

For the past year, Kentucky Circuit Court Judge Olu Stevens, one of the few black judges in Louisville, has had to fight through an outrageous amount of racism.
On Monday, after Stevens revoked the bond of a white man arrested on drug charges, Adam Satterly can be heard on video shouting a racist slur. As Satterly left the court, he was recorded yelling that Stevens was a "punk ass n-----."
This, it appears, is still the painful reality for an African-American judge in 2016.
Rightfully so, Stevens refused to simply let it go and ordered a deputy to bring Satterly back into the courtroom. As calm and dignified as ever, Stevens asked Satterly, "Is there something that you wish to say to me?"
Sensing he was in trouble and may have to pay a price for the words that came out of his mouth, Satterly first told the judge that he was just talking to his brother.
"No, no, no, I didn't mean it like that," Satterly stammered.
Stevens made it clear it was too late for lies and excuses.
"Oh, you didn't mean it like that?” he asked. “You don't speak those words in here. And that word particularly, you don't use that word.
“I'm going to give you 60 days for having used that word,” he added. “I'm going to hold you in contempt right now for having used it in this courtroom. It's disrespectful; don't ever do it again.”
Now silent, Satterly walked out of court with the deputy.
While I'm tempted to pump my first in the air with pride over the power and dignity Stevens displayed under the circumstances, it's fundamentally frustrating to see this judge continually stare down so much racism in the courtroom.
On two occasions in the past few months, Stevens has been reprimanded for speaking out against the use of all-white juries for African-American defendants in a city that is 25% black.
Before that, in February, Stevens came under fire when he took offense to victims of a robbery saying their child was now terrified of all black men.
Speaking to the family, Stevens said, “I'm offended by that. I'm deeply offended by that. That they would be victimized by an individual, and then express some kind of fear of all black men.
“I wonder if the perpetrator had been white, would they be in fear of white men? The answer would probably be no,” he added.
In a lot of ways, it appears what we are experiencing is just how uncomfortable a fully empowered black man on the bench as a judge makes many people. I can't quite find the words for my feelings about this, but there is something tragic about the reality that it is even newsworthy to see a black man stand up for himself or speak out against injustice.
I think our country is either so used to black men suffering abuse in silence or not even being in a position of power to do something about it that when we see Judge Stevens defend himself, it's strangely new to us.
If anything, it continues to reveal that 2016 has many more vestiges of Jim Crow than many of us ever imagined.