FBI Opens Investigation into Shooting of Michael Brown

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

Black on black crime is a huge topic in the black community. One of the ways they'd like to deal with that is getting guns out of the inner cities. The response is that more guns should be in the community. Another way is expanded education and health programs to helpend the cycle of poverty. The response is they should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.

Agree Larry and thank you for bringing this up. So many people are completely misguided on this issue. The "What about black on black crime" is lazy and misinformed, like everyone on these inner city communities thinks the fact that young black men kill each other is cool as long as Police don't do it, SMH.

Here are some facts I know from coaching in one of these communities and working with these kids away from football.

1-There are a lot of hard working, motivated kids that just need a crack in the door, not someone taking care of them, just an opportunity. As my company goes through discussion on race, it is one of the things I am trying to champion. Work with high schools in some of these communities to offer intern programs, entry level opportunities. Programs where kids that can't get college grant assistance, or can't afford to take on huge student debt have an opportunity to get their foot in the door of a potential career. Give them something to strive for outside of a menial job, or the draw of gangs to help their families survive. In other words, hope!

2-More funding for grants that reward academic performance or even consistency/commitment for those students that are not naturally gifted, but work hard.

3-Early intervention. At the HS I coach at we had a program called Little Falcons that was designed to mentor kids as early as 4 years old. Get them prepared for school and life, using student mentors from the school to serve as learning partners, role models, etc. Sadly, this program was cut due to funding. So those young school aged kids that spent time there are now home, often watched by a sibling as a single parent works, or even worse left to their own devices to be mentored by the streets.

There are other big obstacles to overcome. One thing I have heard from ex gang members and counselors working in these areas is that many of these kids are impossible to reach by the time they are 14-15. That is scary and these are people who lived in the streets, expressing fear of, and for the this generation. You can blame it on one parent homes, many of which are a result of this cycle with one/both parent(s) are/were incarcerated and can't even get a non-criminal job to provide an honest example for their kids.

Now that you get into this area, there is a ton to unpack here too. Breaking the cycle by focusing on rehabilitation of non-violent offenders. So many companies are speaking out right now, but how many are going to revise their hiring policies to give non-violent criminals a chance to pull themselves out of the cycle? A man who served 2-3 years for selling drugs of theft, shouldn't be marked with a scarlet A the rest of their damn lives. And in regards to drugs, fucking legalize marijuana and expunge the records of those incarcerated for simple possession or distribution of less than a trafficking level amount, whatever that is determined to be. Do you know how many opportunities that would provide beyond getting back in the game?

Guess what, there are some you can't save and as coach who agonizes over every wasted life I can't make a difference in it is a sad reality that I still struggle to accept. But we can still "save" a lot of these young adults and break these cycles. There is so much more beyond this, but for the "what about Chicago crowd?" What about expanding your perspective and thinking about now we have gotten here? Years of systemic oppression and racism are just not eradicated with sweep of the hand because everyone has had equal rights for 50 years now. Do you really think most of these people say I can't wait for my son to join the Rolling 60's crips or piru? This has been a fight the black community has been waging within their own communities for decades. It's okay for others to step in and lend a hand up.

[booradley]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

Agree Larry and thank you for bringing this up. So many people are completely misguided on this issue. The "What about black on black crime" is lazy and misinformed, like everyone on these inner city communities thinks the fact that young black men kill each other is cool as long as Police don't do it, SMH.

Here are some facts I know from coaching in one of these communities and working with these kids away from football.

1-There are a lot of hard working, motivated kids that just need a crack in the door, not someone taking care of them, just an opportunity. As my company goes through discussion on race, it is one of the things I am trying to champion. Work with high schools in some of these communities to offer intern programs, entry level opportunities. Programs where kids that can't get college grant assistance, or can't afford to take on huge student debt have an opportunity to get their foot in the door of a potential career. Give them something to strive for outside of a menial job, or the draw of gangs to help their families survive. In other words, hope!

2-More funding for grants that reward academic performance or even consistency/commitment for those students that are not naturally gifted, but work hard.

3-Early intervention. At the HS I coach at we had a program called Little Falcons that was designed to mentor kids as early as 4 years old. Get them prepared for school and life, using student mentors from the school to serve as learning partners, role models, etc. Sadly, this program was cut due to funding. So those young school aged kids that spent time there are now home, often watched by a sibling as a single parent works, or even worse left to their own devices to be mentored by the streets.

There are other big obstacles to overcome. One thing I have heard from ex gang members and counselors working in these areas is that many of these kids are impossible to reach by the time they are 14-15. That is scary and these are people who lived in the streets, expressing fear of, and for the this generation. You can blame it on one parent homes, many of which are a result of this cycle with one/both parent(s) are/were incarcerated and can't even get a non-criminal job to provide an honest example for their kids.

Now that you get into this area, there is a ton to unpack here too. Breaking the cycle by focusing on rehabilitation of non-violent offenders. So many companies are speaking out right now, but how many are going to revise their hiring policies to give non-violent criminals a chance to pull themselves out of the cycle? A man who served 2-3 years for selling drugs of theft, shouldn't be marked with a scarlet A the rest of their damn lives. And in regards to drugs, fucking legalize marijuana and expunge the records of those incarcerated for simple possession or distribution of less than a trafficking level amount, whatever that is determined to be. Do you know how many opportunities that would provide beyond getting back in the game?

Guess what, there are some you can't save and as coach who agonizes over every wasted life I can't make a difference in it is a sad reality that I still struggle to accept. But we can still "save" a lot of these young adults and break these cycles. There is so much more beyond this, but for the "what about Chicago crowd?" What about expanding your perspective and thinking about now we have gotten here? Years of systemic oppression and racism are just not eradicated with sweep of the hand because everyone has had equal rights for 50 years now. Do you really think most of these people say I can't wait for my son to join the Rolling 60's crips or piru? This has been a fight the black community has been waging within their own communities for decades. It's okay for others to step in and lend a hand up.

I agree - especially with the point that we need to give non-violent felons a second chance at a decent life.

[Carman Bulldog]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

There is voluminous data that blacks are stopped more, arrested more, convicted more, and sentenced longer than whites. There is a much bigger problem than just police shootings.

edit: There are a lot of specific procedural and training changes that have been proposed. It isn't about, don't profile.

Again though, as I said, you are confounding the justice system with "racist police." I agree that there are practices and procedures within the justice system that disproportionately impact those that are socially marginalized. I also agree that those should change.

Originally Posted by cuervo72

I'm missing why "factors leading to violent crime" is the key element here.

Well, if you would have been following along, you would have seen me post (and cite sources) that violent crime rates, and not race, are the driving force behind police shootings, and that police are substantially more likely to use force when making an arrest than in other interactions with the public. That is why factors leading to violent crime is the key element.

Originally Posted by cuervo72

Was George Floyd committing a violent crime? Atatiana Jefferson? Stephon Clark? Philando Castile?

Neither were Glenn Rightsell, Jonathan Salcido, Michael Renfroe, Tony Timpa, etc. What's your point? My point was that there is a correlation to violent crime rates and the number of police shootings, a correlation which does not exist for race. That does not mean that every police shooting relates to violent crime. Each is contextual and needs to be considered on it's own, although there is one factor (beyond violent crime rates) that ties many of these together which I will get to later on. Hint: it's not race.

Originally Posted by Butter

So, if I can understand the contrarian position in this thread, it is that black people are not the victims of systemic racism at the hands of police, despite the poll numbers that even whites believe they are at a 2:1 ratio. And despite overwhelming anecdotal and video evidence to the contrary.

And also that unless BLM attempts to address ALL sources of systemic racism at once, then their entire movement is invalidated.

That's one hell of a burden to impose on a movement. Some might even call it... racist.

Nope. I can't speak for others, but my position, supported by academic research, is that the basic premise of Black Lives Matters is false, that being that racist cops are killing black people at disproportionate rates. It's this false narrative that invalidates their movement.

While I am sure that you were being intentionally obtuse, I would appreciate in the future that if you require clarity, you simply ask, rather than attempting to falsely re-frame.

Originally Posted by thesloppy

You're literally telling me the historic reforms that are being made and discussed recently as a direct result of BLM protests are invalid because they should have been trying to shorten the wage gap?

Again, the problem with the BLM protests is that they are built on this false narrative about racist cops killing innocent black people that is not supported by the data. Is your argument that the ends justify the means? Is there not some sort of democratic process through which change can alternatively come about?

I fear that perpetuating the false narrative that racist cops are frequently killing unarmed black people does more harm than any reforms being discussed. Sowing this dissent and distrust is dangerous, when the research and data is not there to support it. Not to mention the divides that it creates among society, all the while BLM is failing to address the one thing that is most likely to actually reduce police shootings, and that is reducing violent crime rates.

Originally Posted by thesloppy

The irony is, of course if BLM were out in the streets protesting for gun control, race-based hiring & wage policies, government abortion funding, economic reparations and/or exclusive benefits for blacks the exact same crowd would be saying "now, hold on a second..."

Flat out wrong, but nice try attempting to project and box me in to whatever narrative your trying to put forward. I actually agree with many of the initiatives you have suggested, not to mention additional measures such as addressing hereditary wealth, which plays a significant factor in keeping those socially marginalized at the fringes of society.

In fact, I think what people should be pushing to abolish, rather than policing, is the Second Amendment. Even more than violent crime rates, I believe that the American pro-gun culture is the number one cause of civilian deaths at the hands of police. If you get rid of ubiquitous gun ownership and address factors relating to social marginalization (and in turn reduce violent crime rates), then the number of deaths at the hands of police, of all ethnic groups, will significantly drop.

But if all that one has in support of their argument that racist cops are killing innocent black people is presuppositions regarding another's political views, then you do you.

Originally Posted by rjolley

There are also studies that support Black people being shot more than White, like here and here. There's more to it than just more White people were killed by police so there's no need for BLM to focus solely on policing. (That's my overly simplified interpretation of what your position is.).

The conclusion of the first article is that "White officers are not more likely to shoot minority civilians than non-White officers. Instead, race-specific crime strongly predicts civilian race." The second one fails to adjust for variables. A disproportionate rate of males being shot by police in comparison to females does not equate to sexism, the same way that a disproportionate amount of black people being shot by police does not equal racism. Neither are evidence of racist police killing black people.

Originally Posted by RainMaker

It's just a logical fallacy used by racists who don't want to discuss the issue at hand. It's as dumb as complaining "what about prostate cancer" at a breast cancer walk.

The idea that you can't discuss police brutality until every other problem in the world is sorted out is ludicrous.

The data suggests that violent crime rates are the cause of police shooting deaths and not "racist cops." By addressing the criminogenic factors related to violent crime (which unfortunately involves a lot of black-on-black offences), then you can truly reduce the number of deaths of black people at the hands of police. So not some fallacy but rather research supported arguments to support the fact that these issues are interrelated. But it seems these days that if someone disagrees with your viewpoint and you don't want to discuss the issue at hand, they can just label them a racist.

Originally Posted by GrantDawg

I am contacting The American Cancer Society today. They can no longer have a campaign against cancer since heart disease kills more people. All cancer research needs to stop immediately, because we now know that we can only concentrate on the top killer, and just be fine with all the other ways we die.

The real equivalent would be saying that lung cancer discriminates against men because it affects more men than women and then talking about the need to reduce this discrepancy, while at the same time failing to account for the fact that men smoke more then women. And then when someone suggests addressing smoking to truly reduce this discrepancy, calling that person a sexist.

[thesloppy]

Originally Posted by Carman Bulldog

Is there not some sort of democratic process through which change can alternatively come about?

[Carman Bulldog]

This does a very nice job of expanding on my position, for those willing to do the reading (additional links in the main article)...

EYE ON THE NEWS
Stories and Data
Reflections on race, riots, and police
Coleman Hughes
June 14, 2020

The brutal death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers has sparked protests and riots around the United States. We have witnessed humanity at its finest and at its ugliest. Citizens of faraway nations have expressed solidarity with black Americans; police officers have marched alongside protesters; protesters have defended businesses against looting and destruction. At the same time, rioters have burned down buildings and looted businesses; protesters have been pepper-sprayed and beaten; cops have been shot and run over with cars.

At the root of the unrest is the Black Lives Matter movement, which began with the acquittal of George Zimmerman in 2013 and rose to national prominence in the wake of Michael Brown’s death in 2014. My view of BLM is mixed. On the one hand, I agree that police departments too often have tolerated and even enabled corruption. Rather than relying on impartial third parties, departments often decide whether to discipline their own officers; the legal doctrine of qualified immunity sets what many say is an unreasonably high bar for civilians bringing civil-rights lawsuits against police officers. Bodycams (which increase transparency, to the benefit of both wrongly treated police suspects and wrongly accused police) are not yet universal. In the face of police unions that oppose even reasonable reforms, Black Lives Matter seems a force for positive change.

On the other hand, the basic premise of Black Lives Matter—that racist cops are killing unarmed black people—is false. There was a time when I believed it. I was one year younger than Trayvon Martin when he was killed in 2012, and like many black men, I felt like he could have been me. I was the same age as Michael Brown when he was killed in 2014, and like so many others, I shared the BLM hashtag on social media to express solidarity. By 2015, when the now-familiar list had grown to include Tamir Rice, Laquan McDonald, Sandra Bland, Freddie Gray, and Walter Scott, I began wearing a shirt with all their names on it. It became my favorite shirt. It seemed plain to me that these were not just tragedies, but racist tragedies. Any suggestion to the contrary struck me as at best, ignorant, and at worst, bigoted.

My opinion has slowly changed. I still believe that racism exists and must be condemned in the strongest possible terms; I still believe that, on average, police officers are quicker to rough up a black or Hispanic suspect; and I still believe that police misconduct happens far too often and routinely goes unpunished. But I no longer believe that the cops disproportionately kill unarmed black Americans.

Two things changed my mind: stories and data.

First, the stories. Each story in this paragraph involves a police officer killing an unarmed white person. (To demonstrate how commonly this happens, I have taken all of them from a single year, 2015, chosen at random). Timothy Smith was killed by a police officer who mistakenly thought he was reaching into his waistband to grab a gun; the shooting was ruled justified. William Lemmon was killed after he allegedly failed to show his hands upon request; the shooting was ruled justified. Ryan Bolinger was shot dead by a cop who said he was moving strangely and walking toward her; the shooting was ruled justified. Derek Cruice was shot in the face after he opened the door for police officers serving a warrant for a drug arrest; the cops recovered marijuana from the property, and the shooting was ruled justified. Daniel Elrod robbed a dollar store, and, when confronted by police, allegedly failed to raise his hands upon request (though his widow, who witnessed the event, insists otherwise); he was shot dead. No criminal charges were filed. Ralph Willis was shot dead when officers mistakenly thought that he was reaching for a gun. David Cassick was shot twice in the back by a police officer while lying face down on the ground. Six-year-old Jeremy Mardis was killed by a police officer while sitting in the passenger seat of a car; the officer’s intended target was Jeremy’s father, who was sitting in the driver’s seat with his hands raised out the window. Autumn Steele was shot dead when a police officer, startled by her German shepherd, immediately fired his weapon at the animal, catching her in the crossfire. Shortly after he killed her, bodycam footage revealed the officer’s despair: “I’m f------ going to prison,” he says. The officer was not disciplined.

For brevity’s sake, I will stop here. But the list goes on.

For every black person killed by the police, there is at least one white person (usually many) killed in a similar way. The day before cops in Louisville barged into Breanna Taylor’s home and killed her, cops barged into the home of a white man named Duncan Lemp, killed him, and wounded his girlfriend (who was sleeping beside him). Even George Floyd, whose death was particularly brutal, has a white counterpart: Tony Timpa. Timpa was killed in 2016 by a Dallas police officer who used his knee to pin Timpa to the ground (face down) for 13 minutes. In the video, you can hear Timpa whimpering and begging to be let go. After he lets out his final breaths, the officers begin cracking jokes about him. Criminal charges initially brought against them were later dropped.

At a gut level, it is hard for most people to feel the same level of outrage when the cops kill a white person. Perhaps that is as it should be. After all, for most of American history, it was white suffering that provoked more outrage. But I would submit that if this new “anti-racist” bias is justified—if we now have a moral obligation to care more about certain lives than others based on skin color, or based on racial-historical bloodguilt—then everything that I thought I knew about basic morality, and everything that the world’s philosophical and religious traditions have been saying about common humanity, revenge, and forgiveness since antiquity, should be thrown out the window.

You might agree that the police kill plenty of unarmed white people, but object that they are more likely to kill unarmed black people, relative to their share of the population. That’s where the data comes in. The objection is true as far as it goes; but it’s also misleading. To demonstrate the existence of a racial bias, it’s not enough to cite the fact that black people comprise 14 percent of the population but about 35 percent of unarmed Americans shot dead by police. (By that logic, you could prove that police shootings were extremely sexist by pointing out that men comprise 50 percent of the population but 93 percent of unarmed Americans shot by cops.)

Instead, you must do what all good social scientists do: control for confounding variables to isolate the effect that one variable has upon another (in this case, the effect of a suspect’s race on a cop’s decision to pull the trigger). At least four careful studies have done this—one by Harvard economist Roland Fryer, one by a group of public-health researchers, one by economist Sendhil Mullainathan, and one by David Johnson, et al. None of these studies has found a racial bias in deadly shootings. Of course, that hardly settles the issue for all time; as always, more research is needed. But given the studies already done, it seems unlikely that future work will uncover anything close to the amount of racial bias that BLM protesters in America and around the world believe exists.

All of which makes my view of Black Lives Matter complicated. If not for BLM, we probably would not be talking about ending qualified immunity, making bodycams universal, increasing police accountability, and so forth—at least not to the same extent. In fact, we might not even have a careful national database on police shootings. At the same time, the core premise of the movement is false. And if not for the dissemination of this falsehood, social relations between blacks and whites would be less tense, trust in police would be higher, and businesses all across America might have been spared the looting and destruction that we have seen in recent weeks.

But isn’t this the price of progress? Isn’t there a long tradition of using violence to throw off the shackles of white supremacy, going back to the Haitian revolution and the American Civil War? Didn’t the urban riots of the late 1960s wake Americans up to the fact that racism did not end with the Civil Rights Act of 1965?

To start, any analogy to slave rebellions or justified revolutions can be dismissed immediately. Taking up arms directly against those enslaving you is one thing. Looting clothing stores or destroying grocery stores is something else entirely. We must be careful not to confuse the protesters with the rioters. The former are committed to nonviolence. The latter are simply criminals and should be treated as such.

As for the riots of the late 1960s, progressives should not praise them for shocking Americans into action without also noting that they helped elect Richard Nixon president, which progressives certainly did not intend; that they directly decreased the wealth of inner-city black homeowners; and that they scared capital away from inner cities for decades, worsening the very conditions of poverty and unemployment that the rioters were supposedly protesting.

What’s more, the case for violence rests on the false notion that without it, little progress can be made. Recent history tells a different story. In 2018, the NYPD killed five people, down from 93 people in 1971. Since 2001, the national incarceration rate for black men ages 18-29 has gone down by more than half. Put simply, we know progress through normal democratic means is possible because we have already done it.

In a perfect world, I would like to see the yearly number of unarmed Americans killed by police decrease from 55 (the number in 2019) to zero. But the more I think about how we would achieve this, the less optimistic I am. At a glance, copying the policies of nations with very few police shootings seems like a promising path. But on closer inspection, one realizes how uniquely challenging the American situation is.

First, America is a huge country—the third largest in the world by population. That means that extremely low-probability events (such as police shootings) will happen much more frequently here than they do elsewhere. For instance, if America were the size of Canada, but otherwise identical, about six unarmed people would have been killed by police last year, not 55.

Second, America is a gun country, which makes policing in America fundamentally different than policing in other nations. When cops pull someone over in the United Kingdom, where the rate of gun ownership is less than one-twentieth the American rate, they have almost no reason to fear that the person they’ve stopped has a pistol hidden in the glove compartment. That’s not true in America, where a cop gets shot just about every day. So long as we are a gun country, American police will always be liable to mistake a suspect’s wallet or smartphone for a gun. And we will not be able to legislate that fact away—at least not completely.

A third factor (not unique to America) is that we live in the smartphone age. Which means that there are millions of cameras at the ready to ensure that the next police shooting goes viral. Overall, this is a good thing. It means that cops can no longer reliably get away with lying about their misbehavior to escape punishment. (And that the claims of those accusing police in such situations will face objective video scrutiny.) But it also means that our news feeds are perpetually filled with outlier events presented to us as if they were the norm. In other words, we could cut the rate of deadly shootings by 99 percent, but if the remaining 1 percent are filmed, then the public perception will be that shootings have remained steady. And it is the public perception, more than the underlying reality, that provokes riots.

Combine all three of these observations and one arrives at a grim conclusion: as long as we have a non-zero rate of deadly shootings (a virtual certainty), and as long as some shootings are filmed and go viral (also a virtual certainty), then we may live in perpetual fear of urban unrest for the foreseeable future.

The only way out of this conundrum, it seems to me, is for millions of Americans on the left to realize that deadly police shootings happen to blacks and whites alike. As long as a critical mass of people view this as a race issue, they will see every new video of a black person being killed as yet another injustice in a long chain dating back to the Middle Passage. That sentiment, when it is felt deeply and earnestly, will reliably produce large protests and destructive riots.

The political Right has a role to play as well. For too long, “All Lives Matter” has been a slogan used only as a clapback to Black Lives Matter. What it should have been, and still could be, is a true movement to reduce the number of Americans shot by the police on a race-neutral basis. If the challenge for the Left is to accept that the real problem with the police is not racism, the challenge for the Right is to accept that there are real problems with the police.

If the level of discourse among our public officials stays where it currently is—partisan and shallow—then there is not much hope. In a worst-case scenario, we may see a repeat of the George Floyd riots every few years. But if we can elevate the national discourse, if we can actually have that honest and uncomfortable conversation about race that people have been claiming to want for years, then we might have a chance.

[cuervo72]

Originally Posted by thesloppy

Yeah fuck this, he's going with Edward.

[cuervo72]

Anyway, the City Journal is produced by the Manhattan Institute.

The institute publishes theCity Journal, a quarterly magazine on politics and culture whose ideas were once praised by the neoconservative writer John Podhoretz for having made New York "a civilized place again."[3] It convenes a "Young Leaders" circle for "young professionals in the New York metropolitan area interested in free-market ideas and public policy." It organizes evening lectures and cocktail parties with "such leading thinkers as David Brooks, Shelby Steele, William Kristol, and Steve Forbes" for aspiring young conservatives.[4] It also operates a special "Inter-American Policy Exchange" designed to export its ideas to Latin America.[5]

Much of Manhattan's work addresses New York's racial divides. According to Right Wing Watch, "Many of the Center's writers attribute the socio-economic problems of the black community to an overriding sense of victimization, a reliance on government social programs, and a culture adverse to education and individualist social advancement. Accordingly, they contend that government programs such as welfare and affirmative action reinforce the community's sense of dependence and victimization." Many of the Institute's fellows also oppose "government programs intended to accommodate immigrant concerns, such as bi-lingual education."[6]

The institute is well known for advocating the "broken windows" theory of crime and public order, an approach to crime prevention developed by senior fellow George Kelling that relies heavily on an intense police presence. Many institute fellows have strongly supported the New York Police Department's (NYPD) controversial "stop and frisk" policy, which critics and even a federal judge have argued unfairly targets non-white New Yorkers for police harassment. Institute fellow Heather Mac Donald, for example, has credited the policy with "saving lives," charging critics with ignoring "black-on-black crime" and arguing that if anything, "The stop rate for blacks is actually lower than their violent crime rate would predict."[7]

[Radii]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

To the contrary, I consider it one of the worst things posted in the entirety of this thread. If we can't agree that racist language is racist no matter who uses it, and are going to intentionally hold black and white people (or for that matter, any two groups of people regardless of how we define them) to different standards, then nothing else we are talking about in this thread even matters.

In that case, we're not even aiming at racial equality, colorblindness, etc. We're not even trying to judge people by the content of their character standard. This is not, as ISsidiqui averred, anything to do with priviledge. It's about logic and equality at the most basic, definitional level. It's 2+2=4 territory.

All of which makes me very sad. I was literally physically ill last thinking about this discussion, because I do very much want solutions. I don't want the cycle the continue. I would desire to be an 'ally' or whatever the latest term-du-jour is. But even here in a group of people that, it has been observed many times is probably quite a bit more well-meaning overall than the general population, we can't even come to a consensus to call a spade a spade? That just makes it so obvious and unavoidable how little hope there is. It certainly means there's no point in continuing to spar verbally with people of disparate views who are misrepresenting my statements far too often for it to merely unintentional in some cases, when we aren't even remotely aiming at the same just outcome.

I'm sorry you find this upsetting. We've been talking around each other forever in countless threads and never agree on much. I shared all of this with a couple different friends of mine at different points in activism and work on racial issues because I wanted to make sure I took it back if I was told I made a mis-step in my choice of words or in the offensiveness of the descriptions that you used vs the twitter line. I found nothing but agreement, usually with much stronger judgement than the one I made. I 100% stand by what I said, I believe it is 100% true and accurately represents the situation.


You don't get to "punch down" is basically it. If there is equality, true equality, then all of these things are off limits. But there is not. One group is the oppressor. One group is the oppressed. The oppressor gets called out for punching down at the oppressed. The oppressed group may take words that have been used to belittle them and take ownership of them to try to build and form an identity to help fight against their oppressors. Simple as that.


I feel a deep sympathy for where you are coming from in feeling so bad about this, I truly do. But I do honestly believe that your description of what should happen comes entirely from a place of privilege, and if I stick around this forum, it will likely be to actively take a role in calling out racism and to try to share resources as I understand them. I imagine that might not go over well with some. Feel free to block me.

[Radii]

A little while ago a member of a New Mexico militia group shot a protester who was part of a group trying to take down a statue of a spanish colonizer.

One man shot during protest in Old Town Albuquerque » Albuquerque Journal

[Carman Bulldog]

Originally Posted by cuervo72

Yeah fuck this, he's going with Edward.

That's right, whenever anyone challenges your hypotheses, rather than engage in productive discourse, best just to block them. How else are you going to create that perfect echo chamber?

[Carman Bulldog]

Originally Posted by cuervo72

Anyway, the City Journal is produced by the Manhattan Institute.

What's your point? Is there anything there that factually is incorrect? What assertions specifically do you take issue with? Or is this the real problem...

Originally Posted by cuervo72

"I'm not going to consider words from a black man who might challenge my opinions."

[ISiddiqui]

I will also note, as I linked above, the Fryer study, when the data was rereviewed by other studies (it wasn't originally peer reviewed), was found to have errors in it's data tabulation and understated racial biases.

I mean due to these new studies that author will re visit his opinion on the matter as he said he would, right? Not to mention there have been other studies that have shown racial disparity in shootings, and those four he indicates aren't the only studies of police shootings on racial grounds.

Sent from my Pixel 4 XL using Tapatalk

[rjolley]

Carmen: So, is your position that the efforts of BLM are just but the initial premise is not? Or is it that none of it is valid and there shouldn't be any reform?

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by Carman Bulldog

That's right, whenever anyone challenges your hypotheses, rather than engage in productive discourse, best just to block them. How else are you going to create that perfect echo chamber?

Don't mind him, it's only a few extremists here. It's an instinctive woe-is-me defensive mechanism ... safe place when they play the race/racist card. For the ones that get personal, feel free to tease them back and watch them get self-righteous and hypocritically offended.

Most other liberals here tend to be thoughtful. This is a good forum to engage, learn different POVs so just ignore the radical extremists.

[thesloppy]

Defining police racism & brutality according to a narrow focus on police shooting statistics from a 5-year period also conveniently & entirely ignores how many of these incidents that have been on public display over our entire lives involve absolutely zero shooting.

How many times was George Floyd shot?

[RainMaker]

It goes beyond police shootings. It's an unequal justice system. Sentencing for similar crimes. The way some communities are policed versus others. Routine civil rights violations gone unchecked.

And that doesn't eve touch on the perverted focus on certain crimes over others. We have a war on drugs that requires searches of vehicles that smell like weed but have made it legal to push highly addictive opiates as long as you are incorporated. A justice system that treats shoplifting as more serious than $50 billion in wage theft.

It isn't about just police shootings and brutality. It's about two justice systems.

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

Your second link makes a horrible argument, the first appears to be broken, and in the third I'm not going to read an entire book for this discussion. The whole impetus in the useful link for the discussion is the omission of Africa, which is decidedly not a colorblind approach. As someone who has a considerable interest in history, I can also tell you that it's totally unserious to create a 'timeline of civilization' and completely omit Africa. A lot of really important events happened there. That's not colorblindness; that's terrible history from someone who needs to learn it before they can teach it.

Actually, the first link worked fine it is the message board that shows that on some links). Those where the first three of thousands of auricles and papers from a 5 second google search that shows the fallacy of "colorblindness" when it comes to race. Just a few tidbits from the article you didn't even open (from Psychology Today):
Problems with the colorblind approach

Racism? Strong words, yes, but let's look the issue straight in its partially unseeing eye. In a colorblind society, white people, who are unlikely to experience disadvantages due to race, can effectively ignore racism in American life, justify the current social order, and feel more comfortable with their relatively privileged standing in society (Fryberg, 2010). Most minorities, however, who regularly encounter difficulties due to race, experience colorblind ideologies quite differently. Colorblindness creates a society that denies their negative racial experiences, rejects their cultural heritage, and invalidates their unique perspectives.
Let's break it down into simple terms: Colorblind = "People of color—we don't see you (at least not that bad ‘colored' part)." As a person of color, I like who I am, and I don't want any aspect of that to be unseen or invisible. The need for colorblindness implies there is something shameful about the way God made me and the culture I was born into that we shouldn't talk about. Thus, colorblindness has helped make race into a taboo topic that polite people cannot openly discuss. And if you can't talk about it, you can't understand it, much less fix the racial problems that plague our society.

[GrantDawg]

Also, in the attacking the second article, it was an expansion on one example. But for the record my World History in high school was taught the exact same way as what she was describing. It went from the Greeks to Roman to Middle ages in Europe to North America. It was like Africa and Asia didn't exist. Hopefully, schools would do a better job today. There is a sort a white-centric approach to history that has been around for a long time.

[miami_fan]

As a person who has read and/or listen to a great deal of Coleman Hughes's work, I would say that this is pretty consistent with his worldview. I agree with some, I disagree with some. The discussion of the quantity and quality of research has already been had. So I will address some other parts of his article.

At a gut level, it is hard for most people to feel the same level of outrage when the cops kill a white person. Perhaps that is as it should be. After all, for most of American history, it was white suffering that provoked more outrage. But I would submit that if this new “anti-racist” bias is justified—if we now have a moral obligation to care more about certain lives than others based on skin color, or based on racial-historical bloodguilt—then everything that I thought I knew about basic morality, and everything that the world’s philosophical and religious traditions have been saying about common humanity, revenge, and forgiveness since antiquity, should be thrown out the window.

I would argue that if we were living with basic morality and following what the world's philosophical and religious traditions have been saying about common humanity, revenge, and forgiveness since antiquity, the interactions of both whites AND blacks with the police would be completely different. Those things have been thrown out of the window a long time ago when it come to policing IMO. That being said, I don't believe BLM care any less about a white person getting killed by the cops, I do believe that the BLM movement believes that they are the only ones who care when a black person is killed by the cops.

At the same time, the core premise of the movement is false. And if not for the dissemination of this falsehood, social relations between blacks and whites would be less tense, trust in police would be higher, and businesses all across America might have been spared the looting and destruction that we have seen in recent weeks.

Given his desire for quantitative evidence, I wonder where the evidence is to back up this statement. I disagree here.

The only way out of this conundrum, it seems to me, is for millions of Americans on the left to realize that deadly police shootings happen to blacks and whites alike. As long as a critical mass of people view this as a race issue, they will see every new video of a black person being killed as yet another injustice in a long chain dating back to the Middle Passage. That sentiment, when it is felt deeply and earnestly, will reliably produce large protests and destructive riots.

The political Right has a role to play as well. For too long, “All Lives Matter” has been a slogan used only as a clapback to Black Lives Matter. What it should have been, and still could be, is a true movement to reduce the number of Americans shot by the police on a race-neutral basis. If the challenge for the Left is to accept that the real problem with the police is not racism, the challenge for the Right is to accept that there are real problems with the police.

If the level of discourse among our public officials stays where it currently is—partisan and shallow—then there is not much hope. In a worst-case scenario, we may see a repeat of the George Floyd riots every few years. But if we can elevate the national discourse, if we can actually have that honest and uncomfortable conversation about race that people have been claiming to want for years, then we might have a chan

This is the part that I am in the most agreement with him but of course is the hardest part. It is not just the deaths that are being protested but the general interactions that blacks have with the police that is at the heart of the protest. I can not speak for all black people but I have talked to enough to feel comfortable saying that our general interactions with the police are different that our white counterparts. I have been present for and have talked to enough of my white counterparts about their interactions with the police to confirm to me that those interactions are not the same as mine. I know that last part is a sample size of one. I don't know if anyone saw the video of the guy who ripped the taser out of his body and chased the cop around. At the end of that clip, one of the voices said something to the effect of "He would have been shot if he was black." I can't prove that it would be different. I can't prove it would not be either.

[ISiddiqui]

What I found the most ridiculous is that without BLM, trust in police would be higher. As far as I can remember blacks have had very little trust with police forces. Civil Rights leaders in the 50s and 60s mentioned it, and it goes even before then. To say BLM did this is foolishness. Maybe it lowered trust in policing among whites? But even then, the 20somethings I hang out with don't seem to trust the police all that much anyways (I think the drug war did a number on that trust)

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[Jukeman]

https://www.instagram.com/tv/CBfp8VH...=1bm44hklcpzwa

Must be nice...


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[RainMaker]

Bullshit stunt by the NYPD last night.

[Jukeman]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

What I found the most ridiculous is that without BLM, trust in police would be higher. As far as I can remember blacks have had very little trust with police forces. Civil Rights leaders in the 50s and 60s mentioned it, and it goes even before then. To say BLM did this is foolishness. Maybe it lowered trust in policing among whites? But even then, the 20somethings I hang out with don't seem to trust the police all that much anyways (I think the drug war did a number on that trust)

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I think it’s also ignorant to ignore that BLM was sprung up as originally a hashtags about racial injustice. Not exclusively about police...

BLM started during Zimmerman who is not a cop.

Another hijacked narrative imo. Whether it’s agents spraying BLM on buildings, being funded by Sorus, or the narrative about cops. It’s hijacked...

[CU Tiger]

Have we collectively, both as a society at large and as FOFC as a specific, lost the concept of nuance?
Everything isnt a silver bullet. The solution is multi-faceted and the problem is multi-factored.

I know "Its complicated" isnt fun, or sexy but its true.

In this very thread we have people with tons in common shouting past each other and not even listening to someone who should be very similar to them. To me its the trickle down of our dichotomous political landscape.

Personally the whole data arguments just ring hollow to me. Data doesnt tell us the whole story for either side and it never will until we can quantify the unknown. (How many crimes are committed that arent caught and why arent they caught) Otherwise they are just fake bullets in a pretend gun.
I believe we ABOSLUTELY need police reform.
We need demilitarization of the police.
We need swift, decisive and exceptional punishment for LEOs who act inappropriately. They must understand they are held to a higher standard than the people they serve.
By the same token we need to accept actions have consequences.
We need to stop glorifying criminal behavior, to stop promoting antagonizing police into reaction.

None of these points should be controversial.Of course we need to reduce black on black crime. We also need to reduce police on black crime. Its not either or.
I do think BLM has an identity problem. Until 2 weeks ago I couldn't have told you BLM was a police brutality movement. Perhaps that's my failure.
So when I read the words Black Lives Matter, I think talking about all manner of causes of death of Black people matters. (Do we open the pandoras box that is inequal healthcare and higher incidence and death rates due to heart disease, diabetes and other preventable diseases).
Now, today, I realize BLM is an anti-police brutality racial equality police movement. In retrospect a better name may have served the message better but its what we have and here we are.

I dont know. The whole argument makes me sad. Its just another divide among us. It bothers me to see the same people arguing with each other just change the topic at hand.

I cant be the only person in the world who is:
Anti Trump
Anti ACA
(strongly) Pro 2A
Anti police force/blue mob mentality/militarization
Anti drug criminalization.

And on down the line.
I read something a while back I cant attribute (wish I could) that said
"I aint right wing and I aint left wing - both of those wings are attached to the same bird and its a damn vulture"

Anyway...I'll see myself out. Ive got nothing meaningful to add.
I love you guys. All of you. Yes, even you Rainmaker(jk).

[Carman Bulldog]

If you have an open mind on this issue, and have two hours to spare, I strongly encourage anyone (regardless of political affiliation) to listen to Sam Harris' most recent podcast. I believe that he completely hits the nail on the head with everything. For those that think that Coleman Hughes writing for a conservative think-tank renders his views illegitimate, you'll be happy to know that Harris is a registered Democrat and self-described Liberal who has a strong disdain for Trump.

Although the whole episode is about this issue, he really starts getting into the George Floyd incident, the protests, and allegations of police racism around the 43 minute mark. But again, if you have time, listen to the whole episode.

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

(Do we open the pandoras box that is inequal healthcare and higher incidence and death rates due to heart disease, diabetes and other preventable diseases).

Good post, CT. I agree with you on almost all points. I just want to answer your rhetorical here. Yes. It is part of and hand in hand with the overall problem. You can follow the line with police brutality and tie it in with lack of educational opportunities and tie that in with poor healthcare and tie all that in with wealth discrepancies and tie that in with drug culture and on and on and on. There is no silver bullet. It is many different buttons that have to be pushed and pulled in different ways.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I cant be the only person in the world who is:
Anti Trump
Anti ACA
Pro 2A
Anti police force/blue mob mentality/militarization
Anti drug criminalization.
.

I am pretty much this, with the exception I support ACA, just done much better than the last time. And, pro 2nd amendment with the caveat that we need to close some loopholes, but I enjoy the security of owning a gun.

i think there are a lot of people out there that align with ideology like this that crosses party lines.

[Arles]

If you have 13 minutes and want to know about the area I grew up in, I recommend checking this video out. I went to Signal Hill (K-8) in the 80s and Belleville West in the early 90s. I witnessed many of my black friends being treated like second class citizens and it made a pretty big mark. It's one of the main reasons I wanted out and wanted to come to Arizona.

While this was from 1993, I think a lot of areas (esp in the midwest/south) still have the attitude of the Belleville police chief in the video. You can't just snap a finger and have the biases ingrained into the kids of these people in the 90s just disappear. I was fortunate not only to be white, but also that my parents were very aware of this and taught me it was wrong to treat people the way Belleville treated black kids. A number of my schoolmates are now policemen who grew up in this environment - we have to put in systemic changes to root out this racism and not just hope/think it will get better over time:

[JPhillips]

The NYPD Sargeant's union retweeting Jeff Sessions on Confederate monuments isn't a good look.

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

The NYPD Sargeant's union retweeting Jeff Sessions on Confederate monuments isn't a good look.

But it is on-brand.

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by Arles

If you have 13 minutes and want to know about the area I grew up in, I recommend checking this video out. I went to Signal Hill (K-8) in the 80s and Belleville West in the early 90s. I witnessed many of my black friends being treated like second class citizens and it made a pretty big mark. It's one of the main reasons I wanted out and wanted to come to Arizona.

While this was from 1993, I think a lot of areas (esp in the midwest/south) still have the attitude of the Belleville police chief in the video. You can't just snap a finger and have the biases ingrained into the kids of these people in the 90s just disappear. I was fortunate not only to be white, but also that my parents were very aware of this and taught me it was wrong to treat people the way Belleville treated black kids. A number of my schoolmates are now policemen who grew up in this environment - we have to put in systemic changes to root out this racism and not just hope/think it will get better over time:

Interesting. As for me, I am the grandson of Klansman. My dad wasn't as extreme as his father, but he wasn't that far off. I just never understood how they could hate people like that, and claim Christ? My grandfather was a minister. It was like teach love on Sunday, burn crosses on Monday. We would sing "Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight", and then live as "as long as they are not in my neighborhood.

IDK. I just have seen so much ugliness, and I still see it every day.
As an example. I can take you to three prominent local business men, and a current judge, who have black lawn jockey's eating watermelon out side the back of their houses.

[rjolley]

I'm with you, CU. Except for anti-ACA. I support most of it. I'm pro 2A with some restrictions.

The last 4 months have been extremely tiring. Do you know it's possible to believe Black lives matter, law enforcement lives matter, and all lives matter? You can support them all. This day of hyper simplistic, singular-focused politics is ridiculous.

I've been bouncing back and forth about posting in the mental health thread because, honestly, I'm just tired.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I cant be the only person in the world who is:
Anti Trump
Anti ACA
(strongly) Pro 2A
Anti police force/blue mob mentality/militarization
Anti drug criminalization.

Interestingly, I have a friend that checks every one of these boxes and you can add strongly anti-abortion as well. He considers himself a far left democratic socialist and is a huge fan of AOC, though.

So yeah, people of all shapes and sizes can fall anywhere on the political spectrum.

[Edward64]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I cant be the only person in the world who is:
Anti Trump
Anti ACA
(strongly) Pro 2A
Anti police force/blue mob mentality/militarization
Anti drug criminalization.

Anti Trump
Pro ACA - not perfect but I'm for the concept of increased degree of socialized medicine and not against single-payer ala Canada)
Pro 2A - but okay with more controls & restrictions
Pro Police - but let's get rid of the 5% bad apples and increase sensitivity training
TBD anti drug criminalization - I don't know what this really means and think proponents of this run the gamut. No problem with legalizing marijuana, stopping stop-and-frisk but do have problem with harder drugs.

[ISiddiqui]

I just saw this:

https://www.latimes.com/california/s...ederal-officer

The two cops killed in Oakland were killed by far right Boogaloo members who wanted to pin it on the protests (they also apparently want a second American Civil War and hate cops). So we're have this nonsense to deal with as well, unfortunately.


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[RainMaker]

Wasn't that Manson's idea?

[JPhillips]

Tim McVeigh's plan, too.

[Arles]

I also needed this today:

My man was pulled over.

I needed this... pic.twitter.com/gAjkE5z8Fr

— Rex Chapman���� (@RexChapman) June 17, 2020

[Drake]

I guess the thing that bothers me in these cases of police violence has less to do with race than it does with this:

Management of Institutional Data: Policies: University Policies: Indiana University

or this:

A knowing, intentional, or reckless disclosure of an SSN in violation of the new law is a felony, which carries up to 3 years' jail time and up to $10,000 in fines. A negligent disclosure is an "infraction," which carries up to 1 year jail time and up to $5,000 in fines.

Similarly, any violation of the data disposal law is a misdemeanor carrying up to 60 days' jail time and up to $500 in fines; if the violation involves the data of more than 100 persons or is a second violation, then the penalties increase to up to 1 year jail time and up to $5,000 in fines.

Finally, there is the possibility that violations of these laws may result in lawsuits filed against IU and/or individual personnel involved in the violations, see below.

Source: Indiana Data Protection Laws FAQ:*Protecting Data:*Online Safety & Security:*Protect IU:*Indiana University

See, I'm a web developer and data analyst/programmer for the university. Every year, I sign a document related to this policy reminding me that in the event that I might negligently expose sensitive student data in my regular duties -- perhaps something as simple as throwing a spreadsheet with a combination of student names and sequentially generated university id numbers for those students into an email as an attachment -- I can be held personally liable for the consequences, both financially and criminally (because by exposing that data, I've violated the students' rights under FERPA).

If I write an app and it gets hacked or the server I'm hosting it on gets hacked, I can be held personally responsible.

Sure, in an ideal world, the university would do its best to defend me -- especially if I wasn't being negligent or malicious -- but they make damned sure I know that I'm potentially on the hook if I fuck something up.

Or maybe all I'd have to say is that I felt in fear for my life and it would all be okay?

[CU Tiger]

I just wanted to chime back in here as I was riding around jobsites earlier and it occurred to me.
I hope no one took my post and random list of "ideals" as me suggesting those are the only or "correct" beliefs. Of course I think they are, thats why they are mine, but my intent wasnt to get agreement. Rather my intent was to show that not everyone fits into a neat box.

[AlexB]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I just wanted to chime back in here as I was riding around jobsites earlier and it occurred to me.
I hope no one took my post and random list of "ideals" as me suggesting those are the only or "correct" beliefs. Of course I think they are, thats why they are mine, but my intent wasnt to get agreement. Rather my intent was to show that not everyone fits into a neat box.

I think most people here are savvy enough (old enough?) to know that trying to convince anyone of anything over the internet is a futile exercise

But at least here we can mostly have a decent discussion around ideas, unlike other media outlets.

FWIW I completely agree with you though on the fact that it’s a multi layered issue, as is pretty much everything, although I don’t agree with all your standpoints.

IMHO a lot of the problems stem from people focussing too much on a single assumed cause or result, and actively attacking a broader view.

Moving the goalposts is an issue, acknowledging the size of the field (sorry, that’s the best I can come up atm!) is not.

[Ben E Lou]

The DA's office in Atlanta is holding a presser, about to announce charges. He's been going a good 10 minutes explaining everything the officers did wrong. It's so much detail it's like he's trying the case. Seems odd. Makes it seem like he's going for murder...

[Ben E Lou]

DA just said that one of the officers kicked Brooks after he was shot, and there's a law requiring him to provide first aid.

[Ben E Lou]

"We have concluded that the officer was aware that the taser was fired twice, so he knew it couldn't be fired again."

[Ben E Lou]

Whoa....


The other office has turned state's evidence.

[Ben E Lou]

Felony murder

[GrantDawg]

Originally Posted by Ben E Lou

Whoa....


The other office has turned state's evidence.

I am shocked. I knew the shooting officer would get charged, but I really didn't think the second officer would. I had no idea they continued to beat on him after he was shot. The early reports where they did provide aid. Just crazy.

[sterlingice]

Not a lawyer, but I'm thinking that's not a "light charge" like third degree

SI

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by CU Tiger

I cant be the only person in the world who is:
Anti Trump
Anti ACA
(strongly) Pro 2A
Anti police force/blue mob mentality/militarization
Anti drug criminalization.

And on down the line.
I read something a while back I cant attribute (wish I could) that said
"I aint right wing and I aint left wing - both of those wings are attached to the same bird and its a damn vulture"

Just wanted to add, as I get older, this quote becomes more and more true. I believe the media tries to put us into two boxes because it is easier to put everyone at odds and get more people to buy stories, articles, etc. The parties like everything in a we vs. they because it makes it easier for them to retain power and distill arguments. If you introduce a third party, now you have room for nuance. They can be a swing block. Its hard to account for that. The media can't paint everything as black and white, there's room for gray. If it is gray, its not as scary, etc.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by sterlingice

Not a lawyer, but I'm thinking that's not a "light charge" like third degree

SI

The DA said it's life without parole or death.