The Killing of Michael Brown and the Ferguson Protests
I keep almost posting Michael Brown stories, but there are just so many and there are so many things wrong and horrible about it I don't know which ones, but this one addresses a lot of them:
There's also that video I don't feel like looking for, where some shitty white boys were driving around shouting disgusting racist shit at protestors, and the worst thing about it is that they sound so young.
Fergusson, round up, (Lisapea already got to a few of these).
Twitter reports that riot police have been removing their badges before attacking to hide their identities. Speaking of Identities the police have refused to release the name of the officer or autopsy report.
I also wouldn't be surprised if a good portion of the reported looting was by cops or people paid by cops. It's funny that they have enough arms to start a small war yet never seem to be able to catch or arrest looters, who just magically disappear into the darkness. Something similar happened in Occupy Oakland protests, those causing violence seemed to appear, wreck some havoc and then disappear even though the cops often had the camp and protests surrounded.
The insane militarization of the police is why I often laugh at 2nd amendment supporter's claims of the right to defend themselves against the Gov, as if they think that owning a few guns will actually protect them from an armored troop transport with grenade launchers rolling down their block. Of course if they are white they get negotiators and kid gloves, like the bundy ranch.
The same goes for white people and violence against woman. People inherently want to believe everyone is good, especially when it's someone they identify with or have been taught is good, so they come up with reasons/excuses to keep from believing that people can do bad or evil things. Unfortunately the system knows this and plays to it, it spends its time hiding the bad to keep the illusion up all the while feeding people possible options for excuses, which they readily accept because they were already looking for them so they wouldn't have to accept the scarier truth. That America is extremely racist and the police are just a white gang.
The thing that always gets to me is how many white people, like people in my cohort who have kids who are teens and older, can look at these kids and see some sort of other.
Because when I see teenaged boys murdered in the street for jaywalking or wearing a hoody or goofing around, I see my own son. He's done all those things and worse. All young people do, so if you're finding real solace in the fact that your own child isn't in the subset of young people who are murdered for it, you are a shit person.
If you care about anything or anyone at all, especially as a parent concerned at all about your kids' future, you should be fighting this, not excusing it.
You should go look through pictures of your own children and decide which one the media would run:
In the wake of last weekend's fatal police shooting of 18-year old Michael Brown, Ferguson Mayor James Knowles was asked about the diversity of his police department: 53 officers, just three of them African-American in a community that's 67 percent African-American, according to 2010 Census data.
Quote:
The 2013 racial profiling statistics provided by the state of Missouri show a disproportionate number of stops, searches and arrests of blacks. Of 5,384 police stops in Ferguson, 686 were white citizens, 4,632 were black citizens. Of 611 searches, 47 were white, 562 were black. Of 521 arrests in Ferguson in 2013, 36 were white, 483 were black.
Police are firing rubber bullets and tear gas into completely peaceful and motionless crowds. They have busted in and raided peaceful McDonalds and arrest two reporters charging their equipment "Because they don't want witnesses." They have also gassed news trucks. Ferguson Disgrace: Police Fire on Unarmed Crowds, Attack News Trucks
To anyone involved in Occupy these tactics are nothing new, hopefully this time the public will actually listen that they only have pretend rights, that vanish as soon as you try and use them.
IMO the general situation of abuse is only going to end by either a complete restructuring of police forces or a revolution. As far as the police are concerned, we are at war and the enemy is any citizen that stands up against them.
Exactly. That's why people elsewhere are seeing a familiar situation:
Quote:
The issues plaguing Ferguson have even reached overseas. Palestinian activists began posting suggestions to Twitter on how protesters can deal with tear gas.
IMO the general situation of abuse is only going to end by either a complete restructuring of police forces or a revolution. As far as the police are concerned, we are at war and the enemy is any citizen that stands up against them.
Interesting, should the citizens of Ferguson arm themselves like those protesters at the Bundy ranch?
__________________
What a man believes upon grossly insufficient evidence is an index into his desires -- desires of which he himself is often unconscious. ... The origin of myths is explained in this way.
Veterans on Ferguson
"I leveled my weapon twice overseas. Leveled. Not fired. I had legit threats and went through proper EOF. Stop fucking up, Ferguson PD."
"The gentleman on the left has more personal body armor and weaponry than I did while invading Iraq."
Photos of looting in Ferguson,
In some actual good news, it looks like the St Louis County police have been pulled from their duties and may actually be investigated. Good news unless whoever replaces them is just as militarized. http://rt.com/usa/180360-police-loui...cing-ferguson/
__________________
"freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order."
- Justice Robert Jackson, West Virginia State Board of Ed. v. Barnette
I attended the National Moment of Silence in SF, a decent sized crowd for only a day to organize. It was good and peaceful and by that I mean there were no cops. It sounds like the NY rally was less peaceful, in other words the cops showed up to cause trouble.
One of the many people that spoke. She's been at this for 8 years now after her Son shouted run to a friend and the cops unloaded 14 rounds into him. He was of course unarmed.
...and all but three of Ferguson's 53 police officers are white, so no, there can't possibly be an element of racism in a community that is 67% black. Anyway, isn't the US a post racist society now?
__________________
"freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order."
- Justice Robert Jackson, West Virginia State Board of Ed. v. Barnette
And YouTube being YouTube, the comments are predictably stuffed to the brim with useful information. Only through the comments do we discover that Crazy Lady entering unhinged racist rage monkey mode was entirely the fault of the guy with the camera.
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"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." ~ Louis D. Brandeis
"Psychos do not explode when sunlight hits them, I don't give a fuck how crazy they are." ~ S. Gecko
I see all sorts of code words on other forums I visit.
"Of course they're rioting and looting, they're entitlement people"
"They should just wipe out all those thugs out on the streets holding signs"
BLAH F'N BLAH
It's not the fact that you can't go to work without getting stopped, can't go to the store without getting stopped, can't walk down the street without getting stopped, can't stand on your property without being questioned (or tear gassed), etc., etc. times 50 years.
This Brown guy may not have been the most innocent person out there to get shot, but part of the reaction is just people being tired. If the guy was shot twice and trying to give up then shot while getting on the ground, well what do those people think now, "We can't go outside and can't even surrender to the police, so what's left."
Then you get these helpful people Darren Wilson supporters black-splaining it for the coloreds. (Edit to add, or is it white-splaining? I'm trademarking both).
Quote:
"If you do what the police tell you do -- if you're not doing anything wrong, and the cops ask you to do something, then you're not going to have nothing to worry about," said Michael Bates, 33.
When asked why the pro-Wilson rally didn't have many African-American attendees, John Newshaw, a retired St. Louis County police officer, said, "This sounds wrong, but I don't think the black community understands the system. Again, there's a process. They're screaming about, why isn't he [Wilson] arrested, why isn't he in jail? Well, without the investigation being done, you can't go and apply for a warrant."
Newshaw criticized the Missouri Highway Patrol for "doing exactly what the violent protesters want" and trying to use more communication and less force.
"They're going to keep pushing the envelope," he said of demonstrators who've gotten violent during protests in Ferguson. "There's no reason to stop. ... It's as simple as training your dog. If you don't tell them stop biting, guess what, he's going to continue to bite."
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Build a man a fire and he'll be warm for the night. Light a man on fire and he'll be warm the rest of his life.