Baltimore (AKA, civil unrest continues in USA)

[TheLeviathan]

 

Those police officers in Baltimore very likely would have not been indicted without this kind of attention. Leaders didn't do that. 

 

As far as the "few bad apples" about black urban youth, no one could seriously maintain that there are only a few bad apples. There is widespread crime and drug use in that population. I am not a libertarian about freedom, however, I think people are mainly conditioned by both internal and external factors. The same would apply to police officers--I am not sure what compels so many to completely abuse their authority.

 

And that's a key difference. Urban youth are not here to protect and serve. There has to be a different standard for police.

 

Also, again, the rioting on Monday was provoked by police officers waiting for those teenage kids to get off of their buses. Teachers in Baltimore attest to this.

 

On your first point, it's speculation.  There were riots in Ferguson and there was no indictment, but that was largely because the whole situation was a fabrication of events.  We'll have to see who the evidence played out, but I would hope the decision to indict or not indict isn't dependent upon the number of nursing homes or gas stations burned down but on the actual facts of the situation and the desire to bring justice.  One of the core issues in all of this is injustice, it's foolish and hypocritical to demand indictments that are undeserved.  Hopefully this prosecutor did her job, not succumb to intimidation.

 

On your second point - I commend you for your willingness to say that.  Many liberals (and conservatives on the flip side) are unwilling to acknowledge both sides of this.  What I find so frustrating about the left (the right is just dumb on this, so let's just agree to that and focus on people who can be helped to help the situation) is that they say there are external factors hurting black communities and that have been hurting them for generations, but yet when we talk about the consequences of that leading to a culture/reality for young black men and women that is harmful to society that becomes racist.  Those external factors are real and have desperately needed to be changed for decades, but that they haven't been has caused real and lasting effects to the black community.  We have to fix those external factors but we also have to acknowledge that there will have to be a sea change within many black neighborhoods to make those changes matter.  

 

You can build a new school and hire the best teachers...but if education isn't important, will it change much?  I could rattle off a lot of other examples, but the solution to this has to come from solutions that fix both the internal and external factors.  Virtually everyone talking nationally on the issue is entirely focused on one and entirely ignoring the other.

[Hosken Bombo Disco]

Curious...do you think the same of urban black youth? One could argue you are using the same logic that would be ok to say "yes" to that.

(And I'm not even saying "yes" is wrong, but rarely find anyone with the gumption to say it)

I seriously doubt black youth are any more or less incorrigible than rural youth or white youth or any other.

 

And then we are supposed to compare those youth to some predominantly white police departments (who are adults) who have perverted their mission so much that they still have "nickel rides," planting of evidence, lying on the record, donor cop programs like the Oklahoma one, the list goes on. I hope these types of police departments are very, very rare. They are a much bigger menace than youth race gangs. You mentioned some work experience with troubled youth so I will concede you might know about some data that the rest of don't. The broader picture looks pretty clear to me, though. There is no bad apples comparison to draw here.

[formerly33]

Why does everyone focus on the good blacks and the bad cops or the bad blacks and the good cops instead of looking at the whole picture? I think it's time to take off some blinders and try to be reasonable. Why does it have to be, "The blacks are all screwed up" or else "The cops are all screwed up" when neither are true? Also, there's a lot more going on than what people want to look at. There are issues with police being jerks but not racist, and there are issues with blacks that have nothing to do with police, but everyone wants to cram anything connected to the two down everyone else's throats just because that's what's trending right now.

 

Boy does the media have the whole show in their hands.

[gunnarthor]

 

 I wonder if that made the brat like protestors any better.

You know that was fake, right?  That picture has been on the internet for over a year. 

[TheLeviathan]

 

I seriously doubt black youth are any more or less incorrigible than rural youth or white youth or any other.

They are a much bigger menace than youth race gangs. 

 

You are wrong on both points.  I've worked in social services, youth corrections, and group homes in the Chicagoland area.  You are really, really wrong about this.  I have stories I could tell that you wouldn't believe.  And those stories are more commonplace then you'd ever accept via anecdote because they defy your sense of humanity.

 

I had to stop working in those areas because exposure to it was jeopardizing MY humanity.

[PseudoSABR]

 

Why does everyone focus on the good blacks and the bad cops or the bad blacks and the good cops instead of looking at the whole picture? I think it's time to take off some blinders and try to be reasonable. Why does it have to be, "The blacks are all screwed up" or else "The cops are all screwed up" when neither are true? Also, there's a lot more going on than what people want to look at. There are issues with police being jerks but not racist, and there are issues with blacks that have nothing to do with police, but everyone wants to cram anything connected to the two down everyone else's throats just because that's what's trending right now.

 

Boy does the media have the whole show in their hands.

The whole picture is this: these aren't isolated bad cops or poorly behaving Black people.  The problem is systemic--we have a social and police structure that allows for this kind brutality to consistently happen without impunity.  I don't know how anyone can deny the racial component of the police brutality--no needs media to cram that down our throats, reality should have done it long ago (one wonders why not?).  

 

Police are representative of the rule of law and the authority of our society in general; when the police fail--so consistently--to rid their ranks and their policies that disproportionately affects a certain population--well that population isn't going to put much onus in the rule of law or authority in general.

 

When the police--whose role should be a noble one--abuse their authority, break the law, and undercut our constitution the penalties need to be far more severe than they are for a regular citizen, because the opportunity and authority to cover it up is widespread, and the social costs of that abuse are very, very severe.  

 

The media--of course--sensationalizes the reality unhelpfully, but the media is what it is.  The fact that we are all paying attention to police brutality is a good thing.  The alternative, where the media has been silent for so long, cannot be the preferred course. 

 

I think some of the worse things we can be saying is "Not all cops are bad" or "Not all Black people are discriminated against"--that just serves to disguise the reality that too many cops are bad, and too many Black people are discriminated against.   These contentions have already been dominant in our culture to the point that we've ignored the issue; bringing them to the forefront only will erode what effort we have to reform.  

[ashbury]

Curious...do you think the same of urban black youth? One could argue you are using the same logic that would be ok to say "yes" to that.

 

(And I'm not even saying "yes" is wrong, but rarely find anyone with the gumption to say it)

Using the "same logic" to discuss the population as a whole, versus a portion hired to protect the rest (or to do any specific job for that matter), probably isn't going to work.

[TheLeviathan]

 

Using the "same logic" to discuss the population as a whole, versus a portion hired to protect the rest (or to do any specific job for that matter), probably isn't going to work.

 

It's the notion of generalizing, if it's good for the goose it ought to be good for the gander.  And neither side indulges that.  Generalizing is only ok for one view and not the other, when in truth - it's right in both cases.

[Mike Sixel]

It's hard to think of many situations around the world, where a people were widely repressed, and violence was not the answer to cause change.....riots are a natural consequence of systemic violence and repression. It is inevitable, even. 

 

I'd suggest that anyone that is surprised or even opposed to this....well, imo, you are wrong. Nothing is going to change for the poor of this nation w/o a revolution. I believe one of our founding fathers even predicted we'd have to have another revolution some day.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

Bad things need to happen before it gets better? You have to be kidding me! Look at MLK, he was one of the best leaders the USA has ever had, and he was never violent. When things like this happen the people only hurt themselves, they destroy their community, and it doesn't do good. Look, the people who are out being violent could be shot, and then it will all be over for them; would that be good? I don't think it would really benefit them.

MLK wasn't the only influential black man during the 1960s and not all of them advocated peaceful protest.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

But I stick firm to everything I've said. These riots aren't going to accomplish anything good.

They already have. Several Baltimore police officers are being tried for the death of a young black man. That probably wouldn't have happened without the pent up outrage that has boiled over in the past several years, most notably Ferguson.

 

You're looking at these events as isolated and a symptom of singular events. They're not. They're the result of anger and mistreatment that has been going on since the inception of this country. People have been protesting this kind of police mistreatment for decades but you've never noticed... You want to know why? Because the media ignores peaceful protest and sheltered white society continues to back-slap itself and say "I no longer use the N-word and we have a black President (even if I hate him with a passion and secretly pass around photos of his face on a chimpanzee body). Mission accomplished, everybody! Racism is OVER!"

 

All of this is long overdue. I wish it didn't have to go down this way (and Levi is right, if real permanent change is going to come from this, charismatic leaders will need to emerge from the chaos to organize the movement) but these riots (and Ferguson) have everybody's attention. We're listening now. It's up to the black community to keep us listening and it's up to us to make sure we don't forget.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

I think some of the worse things we can be saying is "Not all cops are bad" or "Not all Black people are discriminated against"--that just serves to disguise the reality that too many cops are bad, and too many Black people are discriminated against.   These contentions have already been dominant in our culture to the point that we've ignored the issue; bringing them to the forefront only will erode what effort we have to reform.  

#NotAllMen

 

It's the same asinine argument. Yeah, obviously not all black people are upstanding citizens and not all police officers are degenerates. It's a simplistic, stupid way to look at the problem.

 

As you said, this is systemic. All parties involved have contributed to this mess.

 

At the core of the problem, we need to find ways to break through the nihilism and hopelessness of the inner city communities, particularly the black community (but let's not pretend that black people are the only ones having this problem, they're just the easiest to point out). As Levi said, you can only go so far with a community if they don't care about education. But they don't care about education because it hasn't worked for so many that tried to escape through education. They don't end up with better jobs or at least not enough better to matter. They've been beaten down for generations. They don't feel there's any possible chance of a better life because they have **** jobs, **** housing, and they get arrested and beaten for jay-walking on a regular basis.

 

It's a horrible, convoluted situation and there's no easy way out of it. I wish I had even an inkling of an idea how to fix it but it's well beyond my scope of understanding. I feel hopeless just thinking about how to solve the problem. I can't imagine how it must feel to be on the other side of the coin.

[formerly33]

 

They already have. Several Baltimore police officers are being tried for the death of a young black man. That probably wouldn't have happened without the pent up outrage that has boiled over in the past several years, most notably Ferguson.

 

You're looking at these events as isolated and a symptom of singular events. They're not. They're the result of anger and mistreatment that has been going on since the inception of this country. People have been protesting this kind of police mistreatment for decades but you've never noticed... You want to know why? Because the media ignores peaceful protest and sheltered white society continues to back-slap itself and say "I no longer use the N-word and we have a black President (even if I hate him with a passion and secretly pass around photos of his face on a chimpanzee body). Mission accomplished, everybody! Racism is OVER!"

 

All of this is long overdue. I wish it didn't have to go down this way (and Levi is right, if real permanent change is going to come from this, charismatic leaders will need to emerge from the chaos to organize the movement) but these riots (and Ferguson) have everybody's attention. We're listening now. It's up to the black community to keep us listening and it's up to us to make sure we don't forget.

Now you are the one being unreasonable. I would never say that racism is over. Also, I would never send pictures of the President with his face on a chimpanzee body around to anyone. I take no pleasure in such immaturity. If I hated Obama, it would be because I didn't agree with him, not because of the color of his skin. But the fact of the matter is that I do not hate him. I simply do not agree with him. He is the leader of the United States, and that is a very respectable office to hold. I respect him. I'm not a radical in the sense you would like to view me in. I am a conservative. There is a huge difference.

 

Also, I have known about police mistreatment for many years, and I am aware that it is not just isolated to the black world. If you think that I didn't know about it before, that must be because you're basing your opinions of me on your own experiences. If you had known about this issue before the rioting began, you would know that it isn't rooted in discrimination.

[formerly33]

 

They don't end up with better jobs or at least not enough better to matter. They've been beaten down for generations. They don't feel there's any possible chance of a better life because they have **** jobs, **** housing, and they get arrested and beaten for jay-walking on a regular basis.

As for your comment about jay-walking, I'd like to remind you that Mike Brown was not beaten, and his death was not based on the fact that he had a complete disregard of common traffic courtesy. But it's useless arguing with somebody who doesn't think that Barack Obama's job is one that matters.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

As for your comment about jay-walking, I'd like to remind you that Mike Brown was not beaten, and his death was not based on the fact that he had a complete disregard of common traffic courtesy. But it's useless arguing with somebody who doesn't think that Barack Obama's job is one that matters.

Oy. I wasn't attacking you or your views but those views exist in 2015 America and my statement was that they exist, not that you hold them. I've seen the emails. I've seen reports of other emails. Our very own politicians have sent those emails.

 

FTR, I don't think Obama is a particularly good President but that's irrelevant to the conversation at hand. You're the one who brought up evidence that America having a black President is indicative of something, not me.

 

As for Mike Brown, again, you are looking at specific instances instead of the bigger picture. I lived in Long Beach for a decade and saw black people get roughed up by the police while white people (myself included) walked by without incident. This is a nationwide problem and focusing on specific instances where that didn't happen is missing the point entirely. People aren't rioting because of Mike Brown, they're rioting because Mike Brown was the straw that broke the camel's back.

 

This is a real thing that happens far more regularly than anyone reasonable would like. Sure, maybe specific incidents aren't the best instances over which to riot but if you're a black person who has been harassed and demeaned by authority for your entire life, chances are you're not going to pick the *perfect* time to completely lose your **** and riot over a life of unfair treatment.

 

Instead of picking apart why people are rioting over a specific incident, I think you should spend a little more time examining why entire communities around America are boiling over at the same time. They're not doing it because it's fun. They're angry and they've been angry for a long time. Let's work toward figuring out why they're so angry and fixing the disease instead of saying "even though you're really angry, you shouldn't burn down buildings". Obviously, no one wants to burn down buildings as a first step but when a group continues to be marginalized and ignored, drastic measures will be taken at some point and this is that point. Again.

[Brock Beauchamp]

To go completely anecdotal, not five days ago a police car followed me several blocks on my motorcycle. I pulled into the alley behind my house and they slowed (I didn't realize they were following me until they slowed and stopped to watch what I was doing in the alley). I stopped and the moment I pulled off my helmet (ie. the moment they realized I was white), they dismissed anything I was doing as suspect and sped away. I was no longer of interest to them.

 

Think about that for a moment and let it soak in just how ****ed up that is. And it's not the first time I've had similar experiences with cops... I can't even count those kinds of situations at this point, especially from my days back in Long Beach (though North Minneapolis is nicer than where I lived for most of my time in Long Beach, it has similar problems). As a white man, I am nearly invisible to police officers. I had *one* bad experience with police in Long Beach. I stopped counting how many of my non-white friends had incidents because they were rather commonplace. I probably didn't even hear about most of them.

 

That's the kind of pervasive, subconscious racism that plagues this country today.

[Willihammer]

To go completely anecdotal, not five days ago a police car followed me several blocks on my motorcycle. I pulled into the alley behind my house and they slowed (I didn't realize they were following me until they slowed and stopped to watch what I was doing in the alley). I stopped and the moment I pulled off my helmet (ie. the moment they realized I was white), they dismissed anything I was doing as suspect and sped away. I was no longer of interest to them.

You think you might be making a leap there? Maybe the cops had a report of a black suspect who took your bike (or a similar looking one). Perhaps the cops had a suspect description of a white male with a different hair color, etc.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

You think you might be making a leap there? Maybe the cops had a report of a black suspect who took your bike (or a similar looking one). Perhaps the cops had a suspect description of a white male with a different hair color, etc.

As I said, it's not the first time I've had it happen. I can't even count how many times that has happened to me on a motorcycle. Not a single police officer has done anything but speed away the moment I take off my helmet, at least not as far as I can remember.

 

Once, yeah, okay. Twice, well, that's a little odd. Ten times? 20 times? At what point do I take notice of this being a thing that happens?

 

Couple that with the fact that I've spent most of the past 15 years living in non-white neighborhoods and ride motorcycles that are very popular with the black community and the trend becomes disturbing. Why are so many police officers following me and why do they suddenly lose interest?

 

A few times back in the day, I just pulled into parking lots and took off my helmet so the damned cop would stop bugging me or I'd joke with my then-girlfriend "another cop escorted me to the driveway today".

 

But hey, maybe cops just hate motorcycles that are in operation but become blind to them the moment they stop running, like some kind of invisibility cloak from Dungeons and Dragons.

[Willihammer]

As I said, it's not the first time I've had it happen. I can't even count how many times that has happened to me on a motorcycle. Not a single police officer has done anything but speed away the moment I take off my helmet, at least not as far as I can remember.

 

Once, yeah, okay. Twice, well, that's a little odd. Ten times? 20 times?

 

Couple that with the fact that I've spent most of the past 15 years living in non-white neighborhoods and ride motorcycles that are very popular with the black community and the trend becomes disturbing.

If you are the minority race in your neighborhood, wouldn't that make it even less likely that the cops would be looking for a white suspect? That is on top of the criminal stats which are already racially slanted.

[Willihammer]

I know the cops are out of line in a lot of places but I do sympathize with the difficulty of their job with respect to racial profiling. I work at the U of MN. You may have heard that President Kaler recently asked the police department to stop including racial descriptions in its crime reports which are sent to every student, faculty and staff. This is because literally 9/10 reports had a description of 18-25 year old black male, often dressed in black, but not much else. These are victim-provided descriptions. If you're a cop - forget that. If you are a male human, and the overwhelming majority of suspect descriptions are your basic, Type A1 male, that is going to creep into your brain at a subconscious level and impact your decisionmaking. It isn't fair but I believe its motivated more by the crime reports, and less by racial prejudice these people bring to the job.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

I know the cops are out of line in a lot of places but I do sympathize with the difficulty of their job with respect to racial profiling. I work at the U of MN. You may have heard that President Kaler recently asked the police department to stop including racial descriptions in its crime reports which are sent to every student, faculty and staff. This is because literally 9/10 reports had a description of 18-25 year old black male, often dressed in black, but not much else. These are victim-provided descriptions. If you're a cop - forget that. If you are a male human, and the overwhelming majority of suspect descriptions are your basic, Type A1 male, that is going to creep into your brain at a subconscious level and impact your decisionmaking. It isn't fair but I believe its motivated more by the crime reports, and less by racial prejudice these people bring to the job.

Absolutely. I'm not saying cops are bad people for falling prey to the occasional stereotype and I'm sure lots of them work hard to avoid falling into bad habits. To an extent, it has been boiled into police brains permanently because lots of black people are poor and lots of poor people commit violent crime. The overlap there creates unfortunate tendencies to associate being black with crime.

 

But it's a real thing and it really sucks for the vast majority of black people who obey the law yet get harassed by cops on a regular basis for nothing other than being black.

 

My experiences with the motorcycle story are trying to shine light on that from the other side. All I ever had to do was reveal my whiteness and I was left alone. Imagine how infuriating that must be to people of color. I can't.

 

To rattle off another story that some might find interesting, one of my best friends in high school became a cop after moving out of state. He later moved back after college so we reconnected and played poker a few times. He was a reasonable guy in high school; not bright but not dumb. He was a typical guy. Upon seeing him for the second or third time after reconnecting, we started talking about his job. At one point, he said:

 

"When we're behind on our ticket quota, we just pull over white people. We don't have time to process arrests when we're under our quota so we just pull over white people, particularly women, because they never have arrest warrants. When we're just cruising normally, we pull over lots of black people so our arrest numbers look good."

 

We weren't friends for much longer after that point but holy ****, he actually said that out loud to another human being and didn't hesitate to do it.

 

Crikey.

[TheLeviathan]

 

It's hard to think of many situations around the world, where a people were widely repressed, and violence was not the answer to cause change.....riots are a natural consequence of systemic violence and repression. It is inevitable, even. 

 

I'd suggest that anyone that is surprised or even opposed to this....well, imo, you are wrong. Nothing is going to change for the poor of this nation w/o a revolution. I believe one of our founding fathers even predicted we'd have to have another revolution some day.

 

I think your point is too ham-handed.  I think violence, rioting, and revolutionary type movements happen as a part of change, but as an actual effector of change they are meaningless.  Often worse than that.

 

Lots of violent riots and uprisings happen with nothing coming from it.  You want change?  You need figureheads and a movement that actually CHANGE MINDS.  Otherwise the status quo persists.  The powerful are powerful because they're powerful.  You don't rattle their cage with the people willing to riot.  

 

You rattle their cage when they see the average citizen on board with the movement.  These riots didn't accomplish that and nor has this movement generally.  That problem is with leadership within the movement.  There are no bridge builders on either side, just people wanting to complain loudest about their version of the events.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

You rattle their cage when they see the average citizen on board with the movement.  These riots didn't accomplish that and nor has this movement generally.  That problem is with leadership within the movement.  There are no bridge builders on either side, just people wanting to complain loudest about their version of the events.

Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson!

 

The black community so badly needs leaders who haven't fallen prey to the self-serving levels of grandstanding that those two commit on a near-daily basis. I roll my eyes any time either one of them appears on television, which is far too often for my liking.

 

As for the "other side" of the bridge-building equation, based on the right's treatment of Obama, I think there's about a zero chance of anything productive coming from that side of things.

 

In short, we're pretty much screwed.

[TheLeviathan]

The overlap there creates unfortunate tendencies to associate being black with crime.

 

 

This was my experience with cops and corrections officers.  Well meaning people (often black - it was Chicago after all) started associating "these blacks" with the general black population as little more than violent and inhuman.  And, in many cases, that wasn't that far off from the truth.  The problem is those repeated experiences start to alter your perspective on young black men in really harmful ways.  You start to lose hope in their basic humanity.  It is a very insidious thing that is very difficult to avoid even if you are cognizant of it happening.  Again, "Soul of a Black Cop" - the guy has the same thing happen to him.  These aren't born racists, it's often their experiences that sour their perspectives.

 

That's a real thing that most people who have never worked in the field would struggle to wrap their head around.  And if someone has the courage to say it, they get blasted for being a racist and no amount of anecdotal evidence is going to change some minds about that.  But I'm telling you, if you spend 5 our of every 7 days hearing out of the mouth of a young black male that he thinks anyone who isn't part of his gang is worth less than the spit in his mouth - and then see the heinous deeds and the total indifference about them to back it up - it has an effect.  And it is cumulative.  Black and white cops will tell you that.  Black cops will just stop thinking of these young black males as black, but more as animals.  It's incredibly sad, but again, a reality of the situation.

 

As Brock has said a few times, this is a systemic failure that has to be attacked from both sides to be fixed.  We need to invest in real change in these communities and then we have to have the courage to call those communities to step up to the challenge when the opportunity presents itself.  I just really struggle to see a coalition of reasonable people willing to cross political lines to accomplish that very painful, difficult task.

[Willihammer]

"When we're behind on our ticket quota, we just pull over white people. We don't have time to process arrests when we're under our quota so we just pull over white people, particularly women, because they never have arrest warrants. When we're just cruising normally, we pull over lots of black people so our arrest numbers look good."

 

We weren't friends for much longer after that point but holy ****, he actually said that out loud to another human being and didn't hesitate to do it.

 

Crikey.

Actually that just shows how much more difficult, if not impossible, it must be to be a color blind cop. On top of handling crime reports that are skewed heavily towards black males, they are charged with arrest quotas. Its no wonder some - a guy looking to climb the ladder maybe, would play the odds. That is not to excuse pulling people over with out cause or excessive force or anything else illegal, obviously.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

Actually that just shows how much more difficult, if not impossible, it must be to be a color blind cop. On top of handling crime reports that are skewed heavily towards black males, they are charged with arrest quotas. Its no wonder some - a guy looking to climb the ladder maybe, would play the odds. That is not to excuse pulling people over with out cause or excessive force or anything else illegal, obviously.

I don't fault him for realizing that tendency exists.

 

What I do fault him for is being brazen about it and making zero effort to overcome what is an obviously biased view of race.

 

We're all racists to an extent. I found that after not having been around black people for many months while living in Michigan, I became slightly on-edge when immersed into a predominantly black neighborhood again. Upon realizing this had happened to me, I became extremely embarrassed and started actively working on changing my perception of the world around me. I still have flaws based around race. As I uncover them, I work to stop my bad behavior and change how I think about things. It's a never-ending process. As old bad traits fade away, new ones replace them and the cycle continues.

 

And that's why I'm no longer friends with that person. We all have flaws but I have no time for someone who is so disinterested in realizing those flaws and overcoming them. Doubly so for a person whose job has such an impact on the daily lives of people of color. I find it disgusting, really.

[formerly33]

I've been frustrated with arrest quotas for a long time. Come on, they're asking for problems.

 

But Brock, if you had experiences like that, why did you do nothing about it? Why didn't you shout the news from the rooftops, why didn't you search until you found someone in authority to whom you could bring the problem to light? Why didn't you make phone call after phone call until something happened? Why didn't you start a political career, or encourage somebody who had time for that to do so?

 

When you see a problem, you've got to do something about it, not wait until it's such a big problem the whole world feels the aftermath. But seeing you didn't do anything, please don't get mad at me about this happening. I never had those experiences.

 

Well, actually I did once...but it wasn't racist. We do have some instances in our area when police go on searches with helicopters, etc. Usually it's older people who wandered away from care homes. I don't know if this was the case at the time (and by the way - this just popped into my head, and I want to save you from the time of bringing it up - I know that people who fun away from nursing homes don't ride motorcycles - hopefully), but late one night (in fact, I remember the date) I took my young dog outside one last time before I went to bed. It was somewhere around when May 27th changes to May 28th, 2012. A police car pulled up, and a huge cop got out and turned a flashlight full on my face. The moment the light turned on, I couldn't see anything because it was so bright, but I stared back in a kind of idiotic attempt to show that I wasn't going to be intimidated by anything. After maybe five seconds he turned it off and got on his radio. I couldn't hear what he said since he got back in his car. I went inside and after maybe five minutes he pulled into our driveway, turned around, and drove away. I'm sure I didn't fit the description of the suspect. And I'm sure he wasn't just wandering around in the dark until he found a black person to harass.

 

But I'm not saying that your police aren't racist, Brock. Just sharing my experiences.

[Mike Sixel]

 

I think your point is too ham-handed.  I think violence, rioting, and revolutionary type movements happen as a part of change, but as an actual effector of change they are meaningless.  Often worse than that.

 

Lots of violent riots and uprisings happen with nothing coming from it.  You want change?  You need figureheads and a movement that actually CHANGE MINDS.  Otherwise the status quo persists.  The powerful are powerful because they're powerful.  You don't rattle their cage with the people willing to riot.  

 

You rattle their cage when they see the average citizen on board with the movement.  These riots didn't accomplish that and nor has this movement generally.  That problem is with leadership within the movement.  There are no bridge builders on either side, just people wanting to complain loudest about their version of the events.

 

These riots haven't accomplished much, YET, being the word you left out.

 

This is history. People rebel against oppressors century after century. Even "noble" democracies eventually fall this way. Without the "elite", whomever they might be, changing how much they take and how they present themselves, it happens over and over.

 

See the labor "movement" in the middle of US history.....filled with violence at first. Violence comes before level headedness. 

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

But Brock, if you had experiences like that, why did you do nothing about it? Why didn't you shout the news from the rooftops, why didn't you search until you found someone in authority to whom you could bring the problem to light? Why didn't you make phone call after phone call until something happened? Why didn't you start a political career, or encourage somebody who had time for that to do so?

Because it's not on me to fix all of the world's ills. When many of these incidents occurred, I literally would have had to "shout from the rooftops" for anyone to hear me. Social media did not exist in any meaningful capacity.

 

But I recognized - and continue to recognize - that a problem exists and try to vote for politicians who also realize that a problem exists.

[TheLeviathan]

See the labor "movement" in the middle of US history.....filled with violence at first. Violence comes before level headedness.

 

I agree it is almost always part of the process, that does not mean it leads to any solutions. That's the leap you are making that I find dubious.