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No we are not. In this thread we are talking about a criminal who was shot by a Ferguson police officer, and said officers actions were reviewed up to and by the Feds and his actions were found to be justified. In return, now two police officers have been shot. That is what we are talking about.
No. I don't have the critical thinking skills of a 5 year old and I understand that this is a complex problem created from a variety of different factors, none of which can be solved with a silver bullet. Eliminating obvious problems like those mentioned from police departments is low hanging fruit and an easy first step and, I would argue, is an expectation we should have of our police departments regardless of any other factor (but that's a whole other thread).
Throughout our nation's history we've cruised along heartily because enough of the public has been convinced that this basic premise was true, because for the "traditional" American family (read: white) it mostly was. They had good access to affordable education, higher wealth than non-whites, and far better connections for jobs. Only now with the rise of corporate and elite power (a situation eerily similar to Teddy Roosevelt's America) are those white families experiencing what black and other minority families have lived as their normal life. Less opportunity, unaffordable education, and a very real perception of their lack of political power to change their station.
When we absolve people of the need to take responsibility for their own actions the new rationale becomes much, much more complex.
You just (1) referred to protesting as criminal behavior, and (2) assumed all the protestors were the same race. Get rid of both of those errant assumptions and the post isn't really problematic. Especially once you realize that analogy and a comparison are not the same thing.
I agree 100 % our police departments should treat everybody the same. I'm fairly certain in most cases they do. Yes there are bad cops but they are few compared to the overall. The underlying problem has to be fixed from within that community. Parents need to teach their children the value of education, hard work, pride. They need to teach them to obey the law and not commit criminal acts. The only thing holding back the black community in this day and age is the black community and people who make excuses for the black community. You all have conditioned them to believe they don't stand a chance and won't get a fair shake. We have a black president (2 terms). If the black community can't see now that they can be whoever they are willing to work hard to be, they may never see it. Let's take Ferguson, majority black community yet they have no black elected officials within their local government, why, who is to blame.
Are you two really that obtuse? No one is absolving them of responsibility for their actions. Those who actually want to fix the problem try to understand why its a problem, rather than just ascribing all the negatives of this situation to the inherent immorality and evil of an entire class of people.
Sorry was referring to the protesters/shooters who fired upon, and struck multiple officers (as well as the protesters who were looting - which is illegal - which, in part, is what Pinky meant when saying "things are so bad there"). Last I checked, shooting at police officers is in fact a "criminal behavior". Maybe I'm jumping the gun here a bit (pardon the pun), but it's likely a safe bet on the race of those who fired the shots.
I agree that there are different types of criminals and not all of them are immoral (and certainly not evil), but in cases where a criminal (or group of criminals) ambush and try to kill police officers I think it's important to at least start with personal responsibility. Ultimately, we may find that society has failed them and it wasn't really their fault.
Did you actually read anything between the two parts of my post that you bolded? We're not even disagreeing about what is needed to produce a good community in America. You're just being willfully blind to the fact that those ideals don't hold true for most people anymore regardless of race. Education is more expensive than it ever has been, with the average student coming out of college with debt loads that would have paid for a car and a down payment on a house 30 years ago and coming in to a job market that has a low wage job in retail or fast food waiting for their efforts.
I agree with this, but the last 10 or so years the police have really lightened up on enforcing marijuana laws. Any drug harder than that and the police need to crack down (pun intended). Hard drugs not only #### up your own life, but also everyone else around you. I've said for 30 years now - legalize pot and make it clear that anything else is off limits.
Apathy.....They could actually rule that town and call all the shots. They could turn that police department upside down by just simply running for office and voting.PinkydaPimp said:
This was thoroughly examined during the riots. They don't go out and vote. That's it. They aren't all ex-felons, they aren't all on parole. If blacks in Ferguson voted at a rate even remotely close to non-blacks they could elect whoever they wanted.If people are too apathetic to show up on uneven election years that's on them. That's the most absurd excuse I have ever heard.
Well, lucky for the local LE that so many black people were willing to help out by breaking laws for which they could be ticketed or incarcerated. Or is it your contention that a significant number of these black folks were completely innocent of what they were stopped for/charged with?
Its my contention that due to the systemic bias in the police and legal systems in Ferguson, the number of black people caught up in the legal system is much larger when compared to their counterparts. It also doesn't help that there are other systemic issues that affect the educational system and hiring practices for example that also contribute to preventing the upward mobility of these communities(this is why the police force demographic doesnt represent the community). This type of oppression, especially over long periods of time has a strong effect on people. I dont expect someone who has never experienced this to understand, and i get why most people who havent say "just stop committing crime" but it truly isn't that simple. And if you want to help break this cycle that keeps these people in these communities and fosters the type of behavior that occurs in these communities, then we need to address the systemic issues first and foremost. The people also need to make changes as well. However, we need to at least give them a chance (or at least make them feel like they have a chance).
There's no reason to conflate protestors with shooters (is there more than one shooter?), or for that matter protestors with looters. The shots supposedly came from a distance, but even if it came from right in the middle of a crowd of protestors that doesn't mean you can group them together. And the same thing goes for referring to the "protestors who were looting." You wouldn't do it in any other context. For example your politics seem to lean right, as do those of many of our country's outspoken bigots- would you have a problem if I referred to everyone on that side of the political spectrum as conservatives/bigots?
Ahh, but the shooters and looters are a subset of the broader group we call "protesters". Your analogy works as well: outspoken conservative bigots are a subset of the broader group of people who lean to the political right.
Black voter turnout in Ferguson was weak relative to white voter turnout (as a percentage if not in an absolute basis). The idea that incarceration (based on revenue generaion) has anything other than an infinitessimal effect is crazy. You don't incarcerate people for jaywalking or parking violations.
Pinky was talking about it "being so bad there". It's not bad there because of peaceful protest, it's bad there because people are looting and shooting police officers. I think you know that. And no, not all protesters are shooters, obviously; but yes all shooters are protesting.
That's not really true- the shots came from a distance rather than as part of the protests, and most reports indicated that the looters were mostly late arrivals looking to take advantage of the chaos rather than people participating in protests who just randomly decided they needed to bust up a convenience store.
Your first paragraph: I knew you'd bring up the shooter from a distance angle. Fine. Although I'm pretty sure there were shots fired during earlier riots, even though nobody got hurt. The looters being late arrivals thing: again, fine if you want to nit pick on that, but it doesn't change the fact that over the course of an evening in Ferguson, we have peaceful protesters and we have looters. I think its fair to group those two together in certain context, without saying that they're all the same. In fact, I agree they are vastly different groups with different motivations, yet they share a common outrage against the police.
So an analogy is a comparison?
I know this is really easy to say. And right in concept.
Actually, there was an extensive washington post article on just this thing about a month ago. And yes, it turns out that there are a significant percentage of people incarcerated for what started as routine traffic violations, that turned into "failure to appear" or something similar. I can try and dig up the article if you are interested.
I think it's a very well established fact that the older you are, the more likely you are to vote. If you are female, it's the same. If you're black, you are less likely to vote than if you are white. So does it make me a bigot to say that in large older white women vote far more than younger black men?
You think people in this community have money for an attorney? They use court appointed attorneys which as you know based on the statement give you a lesser chance in court. Regardless of innocence.
Ok, fair enough. So where are they trying to stop this - both now with the current situation, as well as with all the situations that lead up to this? Why do we only hear about the outrage that they have against Wilson (or Zimmerman vs Martin) but you rarely if ever hear of the outrage of black on black crime? Maybe it's all the black on black, and honestly black on non-black crime which initially is causing much of the escalated tensions and contributes to "the sense that they're being treated poorly"?So an analogy is a comparison?
Sure, why not. A specific type of comparison, I guess. Score one for you, negative one internet point for me.
Anyway, the reason conflating protestors with shooters or looters bugs me is that in this particular case I think it's contributing to the downward spiral. The largely black protestors, most of whom are behaving responsibly, all of a sudden find themselves accountable for the behavior of other people with whom they have almost nothing in common other than skin color. And that makes them angrier, which escalates tensions and results in police coming out in riot gear with guns drawn, which in turn makes the protestors more upset and contributes to the sense that they're being treated poorly, and so on.
Yet, despite this fear of the man out to get them, how many young black males are out in plain sight doing knucklehead #### that gives the cops all the justification they need to confront them?
Ok - so again, stop breaking the law. If you want to have your day in court for a fair and just verdict, show up.
Unless your contention is that there are enough people with warrants out due to "failure to appear" to overcome the poor voter turnout I don't believe it matters much. Not for this argument anyway.
Agree. If I were in a place where I was constantly worried about people hating/distrusting/fearing me I would get the heck out of there pronto.
Plenty of protestors have said and done things to discourage looting or violence, so you can dismiss that complaint immediately. Here's a bunch of images and tweets from reporters and others if you don't believe me and don't feel like googling it.Ok, fair enough. So where are they trying to stop this - both now with the current situation, as well as with all the situations that lead up to this? Why do we only hear about the outrage that they have against Wilson (or Zimmerman vs Martin) but you rarely if ever hear of the outrage of black on black crime? Maybe it's all the black on black, and honestly black on non-black crime which initially is causing much of the escalated tensions and contributes to "the sense that they're being treated poorly"?So an analogy is a comparison?
Sure, why not. A specific type of comparison, I guess. Score one for you, negative one internet point for me.
Anyway, the reason conflating protestors with shooters or looters bugs me is that in this particular case I think it's contributing to the downward spiral. The largely black protestors, most of whom are behaving responsibly, all of a sudden find themselves accountable for the behavior of other people with whom they have almost nothing in common other than skin color. And that makes them angrier, which escalates tensions and results in police coming out in riot gear with guns drawn, which in turn makes the protestors more upset and contributes to the sense that they're being treated poorly, and so on.
Alright. As a percentage of stops how many people are assaulted by police during that stop? You seem to be implying it's a very large number. It would probably be a good idea to start looking at the actual statistics.
It's borderline racist to talk about black on black crime now?Plenty of protestors have said and done things to discourage looting or violence, so you can dismiss that complaint immediately. Here's a bunch of images and tweets from reporters and others if you don't believe me and don't feel like googling it.Ok, fair enough. So where are they trying to stop this - both now with the current situation, as well as with all the situations that lead up to this? Why do we only hear about the outrage that they have against Wilson (or Zimmerman vs Martin) but you rarely if ever hear of the outrage of black on black crime? Maybe it's all the black on black, and honestly black on non-black crime which initially is causing much of the escalated tensions and contributes to "the sense that they're being treated poorly"?So an analogy is a comparison?
Sure, why not. A specific type of comparison, I guess. Score one for you, negative one internet point for me.
Anyway, the reason conflating protestors with shooters or looters bugs me is that in this particular case I think it's contributing to the downward spiral. The largely black protestors, most of whom are behaving responsibly, all of a sudden find themselves accountable for the behavior of other people with whom they have almost nothing in common other than skin color. And that makes them angrier, which escalates tensions and results in police coming out in riot gear with guns drawn, which in turn makes the protestors more upset and contributes to the sense that they're being treated poorly, and so on.
The black on black crime thing is a nonsense and borderline racist argument, for at least two reasons.
One, nobody talks about white on white crime even though most violent crimes against white people are committed by other white people. That actually ties perfectly to what I said in the previous post- people make "the black community" responsible for the actions of others in the community in a way they don't do elsewhere, which is part of the problem and part of the reason for the anger. Here's Larry Wilmore taking that approach to critiquing the "black on black crime" argument.
Two, they do talk about it. Here's a litany of examples from Te-Nehisi Coates. Here's more from him on the subject. White people just assume they don't because ... well, I'm not quite sure why.
. Everybody that brings up a counterpoint to something is a racist or bigot for doing so. It's a nice bubble you've built there.More excuses. The community can be part of the problem or part of the solution. It is their choice. Unfortunately they are taking the easy way out of blaming others instead of taking responsibility for themselves. Here is a solution, somebody knows who shot those police officers, step forward and do the right thing. They want respect and good relations, that would be a good start on their part.
So you're not denying these people are actually guilty as charged. Just saying white people get away with doing the same thing?
Oh my God, you are really going to compare American police to Mexico, Liberia, Cambodia and Columbia? Is there a profiling issue in this country where black people get targeted for routine stops more than white people? Absolutely. Are the police indiscriminately killing black people in this country for no reason? No.
Newspapers, television and internet down?
