Riots in America.... Again...

[Artisan]

Hey people,

So once again some kid got shot in America, and once again, the entire town is supposedly shocked and in grief, with ton's of people "demonstrating".

Personally I think the more news I see coming from the US, the more I feel like I'm watching a nation that is well off its rockers, and it only gets worse year by year...

What do you think causes these people to resort to Rioting and looting instead of genuine protests like the majority of the world?

How come it is only an issue if a person of African-American decent is shot (even if it is done by a police officer of similar decent)? And what is up with the athletes on their damn knees as protests?

I swear, the more news coming from the US the more I feel like I'm watching southpark...

 

[Wyote]

Well there are a lot of reasons things have boiled up to this point. SJWs have instigated most of it. Instead of correctly understanding and teaching economics and history and other such things, the media just polarizes everything.

The US has drastically fallen off charts. After 9/11 and then the blow to the economy in '08 we have just become a broken nation holistically and economically. Feminism, classism and racism have all been sources of division instead of unification.

The microscope that is the Internet just constantly adds fuel to the fire because people don't generally know how to interpret and judge what they see appropriately. People don't yet value the importance of context.

We all desperately and deeply want some level of fairness and equinimity in an unfair and unbalanced system.

Most of the followers/rioters are just morons with nothing better to do though. We just need to get these idiots in a cubicle. Maybe a concrete one.

I watched the video of this white female cop killing the older black gentleman. It is not fair. It was probably a mistake on her part. Cops make mistakes that end lives but we've only recently had such full access to these things. You don't see the white(cop) on white killings that are more frequent because it doesn't fit the media's divisive narrative.

Turn your news feeds off and go hug your fellow humans.

 

[invisible]

(Just not those humans who are proponents of feminisms or other philosophies to do with agitating for social change.)

 

[Sandie33]

the more I feel like I'm watching southpark...

the media just polarizes everything.

we have just become a broken nation holistically and economically.

And, divided like shattered glass in some ways :-[

Turn your news feeds off and go hug your fellow humans.

:-D this is the best advice I've heard yet! Can we get tee shirts and billboards made with this as the slogan...and delivered across the country?

 

[brightmoon]

Feminism, classism and racism have all been sources of division instead of unification.

The idea here is that people should stop being divisive and just accept things as they are or were. When we talk about "Making America great again" what are we talking about? The America where everyone knew their place and all Americans were united, I suppose, that vision of mid-20th century America where everyone lived in peace and harmony. Sorry but we can't go back to that America and even if could, it was fine for the people at the top, but not so great for the people at the bottom.

You don't see the white(cop) on white killings that are more frequent because it doesn't fit the media's divisive narrative.

Oh I see, so the media is making America more divisive. Sorry but no-- I don't buy it. Racism among police forces, especially smaller/ mid-size cites (notice a lot of the problems are happening in mid size and small cites like Charlotte, Baton Rouge and Baltimore and not in Chicago, LA, or NYC-- these larger cities have done the work to address systematic racism and have made their police more diverse) is real and not some media creation. There is obvious work to be done in these other cities to address long standing systematic problems and the sooner people face reality the sooner race relations will improve. Ignoring it or dismissing it is a recipe for disaster.

 

[Wyote]

agitating for social change

It's an important distinction that people in the US have lost. Agitation is not aggression. Advocacy is not violence.
I love agitators. I am an agitator. I'm agitating right now.

 

[brightmoon]

 

[Wyote]

Oh I see, so the media is making America more divisive. Sorry but no-- I don't buy it. Racism among police forces, especially smaller/ mid-size cites (notice a lot of the problems are happening in mid size and small cites like Charlotte, Baton Rouge and Baltimore and not in Chicago, LA, or NYC-- these larger cities have done the work to address systematic racism and have made their police more diverse) is real and not some media creation. There is obvious work to be done in these other cities to address long standing systematic problems and the sooner people face reality the sooner race relations will improve. Ignoring it or dismissing it is a recipe for disaster.

100% on board with you my friend. I was merely expressing one facet of a complicated issue. The media does play a role. Not a singular one.

 

[invisible]

I don't know whether they have lost it or not. If people are protesting, maybe some of them are angry, maybe some of them are frightened, I don't know, but I doubt that what they're doing is without distinctions for them, either as a group who have developed a contempt for law, or as individuals who are trying to achieve something in the midst of it all. It's obviously a messed up situation with a lot of things involved.

 

[Eventhorizon]

Release the video. Cops need to know they are being watched and will be held accountable for their actions.

As for the people getting shot, tbey need to know they simply need to do what they are told to do by the police. If you are told to stop, stop etc.

There are bad cops that need to be removed. More often than not though we find no wrong doing on their part. No one in this country is going to be given a pass to commit crime. Except maybe in Chicago were the police have pulled back and said, hey you want to kill each other so be it.

Liberal run cities like Chicago, Detroit, Baltimore are the result of liberal policy. It is why they are failing, it is why they are falling and splitting apart. The entire country needs to know this because it will go a long way toward solving the problem.

 

[Asa]

"She was asked what she had learned from the Holocaust, and she said that 10 percent of any population is cruel, no matter what, and that 10 percent is merciful, no matter what, and that the remaining 80 percent could be moved in either direction."
- Kurt Vonnegut about Susan Sontag

Welcome to the USA's 80%.

 

[brightmoon]

Liberal run cities like Chicago, Detroit, Baltimore are the result of liberal policy. It is why they are failing, it is why they are falling and splitting apart. The entire country needs to know this because it will go a long way toward solving the problem.

Totally wrong, that's not the reason for the riots and unrest. The reason is racism which can't be blamed on liberals. Is Ferguson run by liberals?
Remember Rodney King and the LA riots in 1991? That caused changes in the way policing was done in that city which is why we are not seeing a repeat of Rodney King in LA. LA is mostly run by Democrats BTW.

 

[Eventhorizon]

Totally wrong, that's not the reason for the riots and unrest. The reason is racism which can't be blamed on liberals. Is Ferguson run by liberals?
Remember Rodney King and the LA riots in 1991? That caused changes in the way policing was done in that city which is why we are not seeing a repeat of Rodney King in LA. LA is mostly run by Democrats BTW.

Shortsighted and wrong as normal. But I really expect nothing less from you at this point. Views like yours will simply be ignored so that real solutions can be found. If not today than in the future.
Best of luck.

 

[brightmoon]

@Eventhorizon My views will be be ignored by whom? Lots of thinking Americans share them. Profligate posting doesn't make your arguments stronger than mine. I grieve for your country because so many Americans actually share your views shaped by Faux News and Breitbart. Shortsighted? Sounds like you are the one who can't see at all! Racism is real and alive and well, and the sooner white Americans face reality the sooner the problem gets solved.

 

[Milktoast Bandit]

Turn your news feeds off and go hug your fellow humans

So much this.

 

[Artisan]

Release the video. Cops need to know they are being watched and will be held accountable for their actions.

Whilst on some level I agree with you, I also know very well that some clever editing and a cut at the right moment can make even someone doing an act of kindness seem like a serial killer from the right angle.

I've seen a lot of videos of people claiming they were assaulted and such only to see the same video from a different angle and see the supposed victim beating or kicking the shit out of an innocent person who than retaliates. Of course the video that gets around only shows the retaliation.

There is little doubt in my mind that the police video may appear to show things that it doesn't or the other way around.

Recently on CNN there was a video of some guy who they thought cooperated with the police by putting his hands up and walking back to his car when he got shot, it was used as an example of videos that prove that resisting arrest is not always the case. What the video did not record was the orders the police had given the man. As such the whole thing was open to interpretation. If the police yelled to said man: Put your hands up, get on your knees, lie belly down to the ground. and said person responded by keeping his hands in the air and retreating to the car, than that is not cooperation, its attempted escape.

So yeah I agree that releasing the video might tell a story and blow things over but for all we know the angle and perhaps a lack of sound will put the cop in an unfavorable light whilst he was in his right. Or it might be the exact opposite, that the cop is shown in a favorable light whilst completely abusing the hell out of the victim. Such things are far more likely to occur in videos who dont record the sound.

If you don't think it is possible, grab a friend and record a couple of videos where you "accidentally" put sand in someones food or seem to help someone when really your the cause of it. Video evidence is not infallible. It rarely is and rarely will be. It is usually just from a single angle, and rarely is shown as anything other than a clip of the whole ordeal. With enough know how, you could use it to frame entirely innocent people for things they did not do.

So yeah whilst I agree on the release the video thing as it would show whether the supposed victim in this case had a book or a gun, or perhaps held a book in a manner that made it look like a gun, there is very little else we could gleam from it with absolute certainty.

 

[Wyote]

Uhhh "release the video?" The problem is it has been and that they ARE released with regularity, and people lack proper judgment of them in most circumstances.

People generally feel that no death is justified so seeing any death immediately causes outrage. This coupled with the history(and continuing) of poor treatment by white cops against blacks in the US adds an extra layer of fuel every single time a white cop does anything questionable against a black person.

 

[Artisan]

Looks like they got body cam and dash cam footage, and will include the details of what lead to approaching the guy.
With a little luck they got some good microphone recordings, preferably starting from the moment the officer got the call.