Anyone watching the live streams of the protest in Minneapolis? They just torched a police station and burned effigies of the four officers on its doorstep - and then started setting off a lot of...
Anyone watching the live streams of the protest in Minneapolis? They just torched a police station and burned effigies of the four officers on its doorstep - and then started setting off a lot of fireworks to celebrate. The crowd is definitely not just people of color, everyone came out. Black, white, asian - it's like this crowd had to fill out a diversity quota before they started the riot. Quite a heartwarming show of solidarity amidst the chaos.
This is the most intensely American thing I've seen in a while. News tomorrow is going to be crazy.
It's a mix of everyone, the rage from the city is unlike anything I have seen. The closest comparison I can think of are the LA riots in the 90s, but I wasn't around then. The whole country is a...
It's a mix of everyone, the rage from the city is unlike anything I have seen. The closest comparison I can think of are the LA riots in the 90s, but I wasn't around then. The whole country is a powder keg because of coronavirus, and then on top of that this spate of racial killings and incidents. I wouldn't call it heartwarming because of the sorrow of the whole situation, but I do know what you mean - it feels like maybe, maybe something will change after this.
As someone that works in law enforcement(911 dispatcher) for a suburb city in the DFW Metroplex and has multiple family members who are police officers....... All I can do is shake my head....
Exemplary
As someone that works in law enforcement(911 dispatcher) for a suburb city in the DFW Metroplex and has multiple family members who are police officers.......
All I can do is shake my head.
Kaepernick tried protesting peacefully and it got him nowhere except blacklisted from the NFL.
And now here we are.
Another black man dead for no reason and another black mark on what is supposed to be a noble profession. Fortunately, the officers I work with, at least to my face, seem just as disgusted of Chauvin and his officers did and I have seen numerous agencies across the country condemn Chauvins actions.
So I sincerely hope police officers and departments across the country see this as a call to action and finally start outing the bad apples and stop worrying about that "thin blue line" that's been nothing but divisive since whoever thought it up.
Don't know if I'd go that far. I know big departments make it seem like PD's are just flush with cash but it's not true for a lot of places. My department, for example, has been massively...
Don't know if I'd go that far.
I know big departments make it seem like PD's are just flush with cash but it's not true for a lot of places.
My department, for example, has been massively shortstaffed for most of the time of my employment. I work for a city with 80k residents and I've had nights with just four officers and a supervisor.
I know of another agency, just up the road, that lost their roof to a hail storm several years ago. They moved the Dispatchers to a portable until repairs to that section of the building were made. It took them months to get the repairs done, up to code, and for the dispatchers to move back into the main building.
My dispatch console? Still running Windows 7 on outdated hardware because "there's not enough money in the budget" to get our computers upgraded to the current Windows OS and current hardware. We keep getting told we'll get new ones but they've been saying that since I was hired 3 years ago.
Our building? A renovated office building that has issues with mold, sagging ceilings, creaky floors etc
So while I don't disagree changes need to be made across the board, I'd wager most police departments across the country simply can't afford to lose out on any money.
I think @cfabbro is more on the right track. Mandatory civilian investigations for all officer involved shootings/incidents. Not internal affairs like many PDs do but outside, civilian investigations.
I think it's not just a question of overfunding / underfunding, but whether the money that's being spent is being spent on the right things. Does your department have any surplus military gear...
I think it's not just a question of overfunding / underfunding, but whether the money that's being spent is being spent on the right things.
Does your department have any surplus military gear acquired from the federal government under the 1033 program, for example?
As of 2014, 8,000 local law enforcement agencies participated in the program that has transferred $5.1 billion in military material from the Department of Defense to law enforcement agencies since 1997.
If your department doesn't currently have any surplus military hardware, but would like some, there's a helpful website set up to explain how to do it.
I'm not aware of any large, well-funded federal programs to upgrade 911 dispatch computers, or to repair hail-damaged public service buildings.
I respectfully disagree. I think it would be more beneficial to have a civilian third party that controls and approves spending so a department can't spend their budgets on new toys they'll never...
I respectfully disagree.
I think it would be more beneficial to have a civilian third party that controls and approves spending so a department can't spend their budgets on new toys they'll never use.
Defunding them is just going to result in even fewer good officers because who wants to be in a profession where you're hated, called "pig", and risk your life every day for 40k a year because of the actions of a relative few?
Less money means less body cams, less qualified officers, less training....
I'm curious, and I don't mean this facetiously, but how would recommend policing be done in the US? Based on your verbiage("Brutalize people, becauses that's their primary function""our money needs to be spent on things that positively affect our communities"), it's obvious you have a very low opinion of police officers and the job they do. So I'm genuinely curious what changes you would make to improve the situation?
None of those jobs deal with the possibility of intentionally being ambushed in a patrol car, getting shot making a traffic stop....but I wouldn’t say policing is respected anymore. A random...
None of those jobs deal with the possibility of intentionally being ambushed in a patrol car, getting shot making a traffic stop....but I wouldn’t say policing is respected anymore. A random sampling of 1500 people in 2018 may be numerically significant but I don’t see comment threads on the internet calling for the execution of truck drivers and their families like I’ve seen on Reddit. And yes, I know Reddit is a cesspool. But as the son of a police officer with 25 years on the street, it’s still highly concerning.
Those are interesting studies and I’d be curious to see them expanded across the country to see if their results with body cams are inherent across PDs. My own PD places great emphasis on their use and it’s beat into the officers heads that they’re for citizen and officer safety and are never turned off for any interactions.
Abolish the police? Definitely can’t agree there. In a country of 331 million people? I’m all for eliminating a lot of the laws that make petty, non violent crime a thing and cutting the flow that make a for profit prison industry a thing but who responds to the man beating his wife? Who responds to someone robbing a bank? Who responds to the uncle with pictures of his niece in the bathroom? These are calls my department has taken recently.
For whatever evil you think of police, they do good in a lot of ways that never gets recognized.
Don’t try to deflect. You ever listen to a child cry on the phone because his daddy is hurting his mommy? You ever hear the screams and crying? You ever hear someone get slapped so hard you can...
Don’t try to deflect.
You ever listen to a child cry on the phone because his daddy is hurting his mommy? You ever hear the screams and crying? You ever hear someone get slapped so hard you can hear it through the phone?
I have. I still hear them.
Who responds to that?
Are you actually advocating that nothing be done for it? You actually think a man like that is going to let his wife seek out help that doesn’t involve police?
Part of the reason domestic violence is such a problem is that the abused doesn’t feel like they have anywhere to go. Don’t blame the police for every shortcoming in society. There’s a lot more that can be done, across the board, for domestic violence victims but you’re blaming police for aspects they have no control over.
As such, it’s clear to me that your bias and hatred against police, and my bias for, will not allow us to find any sort of common ground. This will be my last response to you on this topic.
Do they buy these things, or are they hand-me-downs from the military? I find it somewhat mad that a police department would buy something like an MRAP.
Do they buy these things, or are they hand-me-downs from the military? I find it somewhat mad that a police department would buy something like an MRAP.
Even in the middle of this mess I'm still fully on board paying officers more, getting them better training (that they desperately need, based on Army training), and giving them tools to do the...
Even in the middle of this mess I'm still fully on board paying officers more, getting them better training (that they desperately need, based on Army training), and giving them tools to do the job they've never had (drones for surveillance should be universal).
They are going to have to show us they deserve that now, though. That discussion is tainted in this climate. It should be one of the first we get around to once we're on the other side of this mess.
The solution to Orwell's paradox in 1984 is to make sure that everyone has the cameras, not just the government. We've lucked into that thanks to the tech companies' zeal putting a camera and...
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The solution to Orwell's paradox in 1984 is to make sure that everyone has the cameras, not just the government. We've lucked into that thanks to the tech companies' zeal putting a camera and later a film studio in everyone's pocket. We all have cameras, and so should the police.
That said, you tell me what's better: large groups of armed officers on the streets, or one small drone up in the air keeping an eye on things? I'll take the drone every time, less chance of escalation. It's a public place, they've got every right to surveillance in pursuit of their mandate. The cameras keep everyone honest.
My opinion changes the instant they start attaching weapons to those drones, though.
Sure, in times of crisis, using a drone is probably better overall than a group armed to the teeth on the streets. In "peace time", I could see replacing police walking the beat with faceless...
Sure, in times of crisis, using a drone is probably better overall than a group armed to the teeth on the streets. In "peace time", I could see replacing police walking the beat with faceless drones creating a wider disconnect between them and the community.
IMO the bare minimum should be disallowing the police from investigating themselves for acts of misconduct. Nothing will change until the bad apples can actually be effectively rooted out of each...
IMO the bare minimum should be disallowing the police from investigating themselves for acts of misconduct. Nothing will change until the bad apples can actually be effectively rooted out of each department.
One such bill that was being drafted before the legislature’s pandemic pause created a statewide independent monitor program, similar to what’s in place in Denver, to review and investigate law enforcement-involved deaths across the state.
Denver is the only Colorado city that has an independent agency focused on oversight of law enforcement, though the cities of Aurora, Boulder and Colorado Springs have been exploring similar programs.
The yet-to-be-introduced bill proposes giving the Colorado Attorney General’s office authority to do “pattern-or-practices” investigations of police and sheriff’s departments in order to reform “serious patterns and practices of excessive force, biased policing and other unconstitutional practices by law enforcement.” The bill also included a grant program that would supply local communities with resources if they wished to start their own independent monitoring programs before the state-wide monitor could be established.
Yep. That's the start. Also, it might drive the point home if every time they have to pay out damages for this, it comes directly out of the department's pension fund. Let's see how many of the...
Yep. That's the start. Also, it might drive the point home if every time they have to pay out damages for this, it comes directly out of the department's pension fund. Let's see how many of the good cops want to sacrifice their retirement to protect the bad ones. Maybe that'll make them a bit more proactive.
WTF! Trump's latest tweet: https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1266231100780744704 For those unaware of the "when the looting starts, the shooting starts" reference:...
....These THUGS are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd, and I won’t let that happen. Just spoke to Governor Tim Walz and told him that the Military is with him all the way. Any difficulty and we will assume control but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts. Thank you!
Twitter has added a disclaimer above Trumps tweet now: That's a giant "fuck you" to his latest executive order, if ever I saw one. Good on twitter!
Twitter has added a disclaimer above Trumps tweet now:
This Tweet violated the Twitter Rules about glorifying violence. However, Twitter has determined that it may be in the public’s interest for the Tweet to remain accessible. Learn more
That's a giant "fuck you" to his latest executive order, if ever I saw one. Good on twitter!
This morning, presumably to try and circumvent that warning, he tweeted the same text from the official WhiteHouse account, where they put the warning on it again:...
Trump is going to see as an escalation—guaranteed. He's been conditioned his entire life to have everything his way. If he can't handle Twitter applying harm notices to his tweets, how's he going...
Trump is going to see as an escalation—guaranteed. He's been conditioned his entire life to have everything his way. If he can't handle Twitter applying harm notices to his tweets, how's he going to handle potentially losing the election? The next few months are going to be extremely interesting and tumultuous—this is on top of the COVID-19 crisis circling the U.S. and the globe.
edit: got half of the sources. in the meantime, go check out /r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut/, plenty of examples there edit: added sources. Will keep adding onto this list. Regarding rubber bullets: they are...
Exemplary
edit: got half of the sources. in the meantime, go check out /r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut/, plenty of examples there
edit: added sources. Will keep adding onto this list.
Regarding rubber bullets: they are rubber-coated bullets. It's a steel ball or cylinder coated in rubber. They are intended to be shot at the ground, so they bounce up and hit people in the legs/body. However, in the below videos/images they're also fired directly, at close range.
Non-lethal is not the best term for them since they can most definitely be lethal or cause serious damage; as an example, one reporter lost her left eye(source below) to a rubber bullet fired directly at her face.
I've also seen photos of other crowd control type rounds used, like beanbags and wood cylinders, which definitely do some damage if launched directly at you.
A small recap of what l've seen on social media (videos, livestreams, protester's accounts):
Peaceful protests are disrupted by police suddenly starting to throw flashbangs / fire rubber bullets; in a lot of cases, violence is initiated by police. source1source2 source3 source4; compilation video
Rubber bullets deliberately aimed at people's eyes/head. One journalist lost one of her eyes this way. This was also done in the protests in Chile where a lot of people lost their eyes. source; contains images of injuries
Police shooting at medics trying to help people & breaking up their camp; source
Cops filmed smiling/laughing, enjoying what they are doing. One even made a white power gesture and laughed at it with his buddy cop. source1source2source3
The same person linked above later shot someone with a rubber bullet at fairly close range because they said "fuck you" to him source
A city(think it was LA) Seattle announcing a curfew beyond 5pm, announced just 14 minutes prior to the start of the curfew. Good luck getting home in that little time. source
Seattle PDs turn off their bodycams, block their ID numbers with black tape; source1source2source3
Marching through the streets with overwhelming numbers and shooting paint tracers at people standing in their own doorways looking at the situation outside. source1 Or, shooting at someone who was inside their house, looking through his window. source2source3 Same for a reporter in his car. source4
Actor John Cusack tried filming a burning car but was attacked by cops with batons, hitting his bike. (Wonder if they would have hit his bike if he were black.) source.
Two people in a car got tasered while in their car, tires slashed and dragged out of their cars. On live TV. While just driving down the road (not clear if road was closed, curfew was active though). source
Edit: Just found this video of a police car driving by protesters and randomly slamming the side door into a protester.
And so on. US PDs are pulling a Hong Kong or a Chile with no regard for human life, acting like some delusional robocop fanboys with disproportionate force.
It's odd how there's not more coverage on this here, there's this one post, 2 others and barely anything covering what l've mentioned above.
The lack of many threads about this just shows the difference between the Tildes and Reddit/Facebook/Twitter mentality. We don't need 10 posts about it every hour. If it's that big, we'll set up a...
The lack of many threads about this just shows the difference between the Tildes and Reddit/Facebook/Twitter mentality. We don't need 10 posts about it every hour. If it's that big, we'll set up a scheduled topic for it and discussions can continue there, without cluttering up the page with many posts that I'm sure many people wish to avoid for good reasons (stress, not american, etc).
Meanwhile we can keep days old threads about this alive and filled with new comments and new information. Nothing really vanishes from the Tildes front page until nobody is commenting on the topic anymore, imo one of the better design choices made building this website - bringing back a little of the classic forum style.
This is an obviously important story that hasn't been discussed here much. I can't find the last Tildes census but I suspect part of the reason is there isn't a large contingent of PoC here. I'm...
This is an obviously important story that hasn't been discussed here much. I can't find the last Tildes census but I suspect part of the reason is there isn't a large contingent of PoC here. I'm not, and I don't necessarily feel it is my place to opine on this beyond sharing it.
Everyone should know about this story. But personally, the reason why I have avoided talking about it is simply because this is the most horrifying police-related death I have ever seen. It's just...
Everyone should know about this story. But personally, the reason why I have avoided talking about it is simply because this is the most horrifying police-related death I have ever seen. It's just so damn wrong that I just can't completely process it.
It seems like this is a somewhat unique issue in that it that unites pretty much everyone under the same opinion. Even Fox News hosts (Napolitano, Bongino, and even Hannity) are all saying this...
It seems like this is a somewhat unique issue in that it that unites pretty much everyone under the same opinion. Even Fox News hosts (Napolitano, Bongino, and even Hannity) are all saying this was wildly inappropriate police behavior and even suggesting murder charges (Napolitano). I can't think of any other issue in recent history that's had such broad agreement.
Call me a cynic, but a part of my thinks the reason the right wing media has uncharacteristically taken the side of minorities is because they are trying to quell further uprisings by ushering in...
Call me a cynic, but a part of my thinks the reason the right wing media has uncharacteristically taken the side of minorities is because they are trying to quell further uprisings by ushering in police reform because it gives a facade of social progress while not identifying systemic issues that are being exacerbated with the covid crisis.
Part of the rush to reopen states is to return the general populace to distraction via panem et circensus.
I hope I'm wrong and we're really just experiencing a pressure cooker's contents catalyzing into positive paradigm shifts.
I think a large part of this is because we have a very clear video of this incident showing a subdued, unarmed individual being slowly suffocated over the course of 9 minutes. There's very little...
I think a large part of this is because we have a very clear video of this incident showing a subdued, unarmed individual being slowly suffocated over the course of 9 minutes. There's very little room for he said she said. It wasn't a power struggle or a miscalculation. The footage was unobstructed and the man did not have a history of violence. The usual excuses people like to make for police violence against minorities don't stick (though some people do still try to justify the actions taken by these officers).
No matter what happened before the video started, at the end of the day, it was a uniformed officer very slowly killing man who was already down. It wasn't a heat of the moment killing like a gunshot. Very few people lack empathy to the point where they accept slowly killing a man begging for his life as justified.
Plus with President Trump siding with the victim, it would be hard for even right wing media to sell this killing as okay to their audience
Everyone I've talked to about this (as in, real life friends in person) seems to fall between ecstatic and 'it's about damn time.' I'm a bit more cynical... but I've got to admit this feels...
Everyone I've talked to about this (as in, real life friends in person) seems to fall between ecstatic and 'it's about damn time.' I'm a bit more cynical... but I've got to admit this feels different. The crowds are different.
This might be the day we cross one of Arlo's invisible lines, it might not... but we're closer. A lot closer. Protests being reported in Minneapolis, Denver, St. Paul, Louisville, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and New York. We're up to seven major cities, several of them quite literally on fire.
Tildes is largely progressive regardless of color. I don’t think a lack of PoC is the reason. As a person of color, I believe the contribution of all peoples is not only welcome but necessary.
Tildes is largely progressive regardless of color. I don’t think a lack of PoC is the reason.
As a person of color, I believe the contribution of all peoples is not only welcome but necessary.
I like being informed about this stuff. It's all very infuriating, and I feel helpless to do anything about it, but I want to know that it's happening, so thanks for sharing!
I like being informed about this stuff. It's all very infuriating, and I feel helpless to do anything about it, but I want to know that it's happening, so thanks for sharing!
Why not? Most things that are PoC-centric or -relevant seem to get little traction here beyond a few votes but if there is no discussion, or at the least no questions posed, that will never change...
I'm not, and I don't necessarily feel it is my place to opine on this beyond sharing it.
Why not? Most things that are PoC-centric or -relevant seem to get little traction here beyond a few votes but if there is no discussion, or at the least no questions posed, that will never change and Tildes will remain an echo chamber de facto.
For me, as a white male in the US, any possible question or discussion I could start regarding this would be little more than a detached, pseudo-intellectual analysis about paths forward,...
For me, as a white male in the US, any possible question or discussion I could start regarding this would be little more than a detached, pseudo-intellectual analysis about paths forward, implications, hypotheticals, or whatever, and I would undoubtedly not do justice to either the bitterness, grief, or rage felt by the black community and others over this. Not that others don't feel those same things, but I cannot honestly say that in my lived experience I can attest to the sorrow and constriction that comes from being part of a community that is unabashedly inflicted with repeated injustices.
These killings, George Floyd's and others, break my heart and make me angry. But I do not feel that I can do them justice by starting a half-hearted discussion from a vantage that fundamentally could not comprehend the experience of being black in America. I think it is important to be shared and viewed and understood to the extent possible, but I don't want to do a disservice by offering some detached discussion.
I get where you're coming from. The question I guess you or anyone should answer before anything else is, how much do you really want to know more or understand better? Even if you don't feel...
I get where you're coming from. The question I guess you or anyone should answer before anything else is, how much do you really want to know more or understand better? Even if you don't feel equipped to provide answers or commentary, that doesn't mean you don't have potentially useful questions if you're genuinely curious/interested, and you'd be surprised who may respond or what may come of it. I dunno, I'm starting to feel like I'm having to advocate for asking questions much more than I would expect on a site like this.
Just to be clear, I don't think there's anything wrong with asking questions. The more that people who are not tuned in to these issues learn about them the better, and asking thoughtful questions...
Exemplary
Just to be clear, I don't think there's anything wrong with asking questions. The more that people who are not tuned in to these issues learn about them the better, and asking thoughtful questions that get thoughtful replies can be a great way to do that.
There are a few issues I personally have with personally participating in these discussions online though that make me feel uncomfortable. The first is that, as a matter of practice, Tildes and similar sites tend to be heavily dominated by white people, and I think that questions and answers about the black experience coming from and directed towards white people are probably not super productive. At best they treat the issue far too academically for my comfort in that they can't speak to personal, lived experiences of racism. And when there are people of color on these sites, it can far too often happen that they become the de facto 'race explainer' when issues like this come up. Sometimes a black person just wants to talk about programming or whatever, but the sense I get is there is often an implicit pressure for them to speak up when they see discussions wondering about their experience or asking questions. If they want to participate obviously that is great and I'm sure welcome from all involved parties, but I'm very self-conscious about creating an environment where that is expected. "It's not their job to educate white people about racism", basically.
The second is that these killings are too visceral, too unjust, too blatant for me to feel comfortable treating them like other political topics where I'm happy to banter back and forth and type long winded comments about my opinions and justifications for those opinions. Part of the issue for me is that, again, on sites dominated by one demographic that relies on the community for voting and sorting, it is far to easy to drown out minority voices and experiences. I wouldn't want my questions or opinions to dominate the discussion.
The propensity to ask questions is usually seen as an unconditionally good trait, and it often is. But ultimately asking questions is a means towards educating yourself and not an end in and of itself, and for the reasons I mention above I am personally more comfortable pursuing other means to achieve that same end. This is all just personal and I'm not suggesting others should feel the same way. I'm happy to join discussions when they occur and ask questions therein, but I something just feels off to me about opining or analyzing this as I would other topics. It feels too much like in English class when you would get a list of discussion questions after watching a movie or reading a book or something.
Again, I understand your hesitation, and I applaud your sensitivity. The answer is not the current silence, however. The answer is dialogue, and we need to listen more than speak, seek knowledge...
Exemplary
Again, I understand your hesitation, and I applaud your sensitivity. The answer is not the current silence, however. The answer is dialogue, and we need to listen more than speak, seek knowledge more than opine. If we can couple that attitude with sincerity it will be useful in any forum, no matter the makeup, because while we will make mistakes, it's impossible to learn without making mistakes. Growth doesn't happen inside your comfort zone.
Here's an analogy that came to mind. I consider myself Tildes' resident soccer expert, at least until someone exposes my hubris. The occasional soccer story is posted in ~sports every so often, but they don't get too much activity (though, to be fair, ~sports in general isn't that active). By my guess, most users here probably have tangential exposure to and knowledge of soccer but definitely aren't rabid fans, and aren't that interested in learning more about it... otherwise there would be more comments and questions on the stuff that is posted, much of which is interesting. Therefore I have no real stimulus to get in-depth about all the stuff I know about soccer, and all the related stuff that I know through it. Soccer is the most popular sport in the world, and the typical fan passively gets exposure to language, politics, culture, music, art, and perspectives from practically every nation in the world through it. Tildes benefits from that simply in having me here, but what you are getting is a tip of the potential iceberg as compared to if there were users asking elementary questions showing interest. What's more, I'm not even unique in this regard, because there are more than enough people on here who are willing to not just explain and teach, but point others who share a sincere interest in the right direction so they can get more info from even better experts if they want it. Look at the excellent AMA@kfwyre put together with a number of other ~lgbt panelists. What reason is there to even hope for anything similar if race remains too uncomfortable a topic for people to read a posted article and say, "You know what, I'm not knowledgeable about this stuff, but I wondered XYZ?"
On top of that, I want to emphasize that race and racism affects white people in the USA just as much as black, yellow, or any other flavor of people, albeit in different ways. Minorities don't have the luxury of choosing not to wrangle with it, and our society overcoming it requires white people to engage with it with the same thick skin that minorities have to develop to survive. I don't think we're going to solve racism here but at the very least our baby steps can do better than feeling bad and sitting on the sidelines. Maybe I'm being naive but I'd trust Tildes users to at least attempt such conversations in good faith, and on a platform specifically dedicated to thoughtful, high-quality discussion, there's no telling how much good can come of it.
I appreciate your point of view on this. I ruminated on them for a few days and almost opted to not respond on this. Here are my experiences. Please note that this only applies to online...
I appreciate your point of view on this. I ruminated on them for a few days and almost opted to not respond on this.
Here are my experiences. Please note that this only applies to online interactions; in person interactions are very different for me.
when I say something on twitter about this, if it gets attention, I will be told to shut the fuck up because I am white
I've been told uncountable times that I'm the enemy, both in general, non-targeted messages directed to all white people and specific, targeted messages directed to me personally
if I try to explain a personal connection to racism (my wife and children are all people of colour) that doesn't matter
I applaud you for encouraging people to speak up and I hope that I can take it to heart, but I, along with many other people, opt for silence on these matters because it is too difficult to wade into, and obviously causes distress - not distress to me, but distress to the people in the groups who directly experience the issue. It is difficult and exhausting to try to be a vocal ally, so instead of bringing things up and asking questions, I seek out the answers to the questions that I have, and I stay silent.
This goes for other issues as well - I don't tend to weigh in on issues that effect people who are LGBTQ+, people who are women, or other groups of which I am not a member. My words often causes distress, and I understand that it's not needed; we need more voices of people in the groups that are experiencing the problems.
I also don't talk about issues that uniquely effect white cishet males, other than to occasionally note that these are the lowest priority problems to address.
This doesn't even address the hate that one receives from the awful actual racists that are the root cause of the problem. By speaking up, it's easy to become the enemy of everyone online, and to make yourself a target. So I refrain from wading into online discussions; I read a lot of things that are written, and I'll talk about them in real life with people face to face, but I leave the online arguments for other people, so that there's one less white dude talking about his point of view. I have been doing this more across all topics; I have tended towards only very casual or very personal interactions for a while.
I understand where you're coming from. It's not the exact example you used, but I'm a gay guy, and it grinds my gears when I see queer people on reddit, Twitter, or elsewhere talk about "the...
Exemplary
I understand where you're coming from. It's not the exact example you used, but I'm a gay guy, and it grinds my gears when I see queer people on reddit, Twitter, or elsewhere talk about "the straights" or "cishets" as if they're subhuman. I owe my life to the people who supported me in the toxic environment I came out in, and almost every single one of them is straight. To have someone denigrate them for who they are is an attack on me and spits in the face of all the allies who have ever gone out of their way to stand alongside us. Furthermore, it continues the exact kind of identity-based supremacy that was so debilating to me as a gay person, only with a different target. The systematic injustices I face as a gay person will not be solved by making heteros the enemy, and inverting the hierarchy to flip discrimination back onto them is still a type of supremacist thinking.
I see a lot of leftist people in particular eager to "punch up" without ever considering that the punching itself they're doing could be abusive. I see a lot of people knowing that this is abusive but reducing their targets down to only their privilege so that the punching can be seen as "deserved" and that their abuse, not backed by systemic discrimination, is therefore not "real". I see a lot of leftist concepts being twisted and contorted to explain or permit abusive behavior as if it is instead justice. I see a lot of collateral damage where people direct their anger at people who are already supportive and sympathetic to them -- their potential allies -- instead of the people who are most deserving -- their oppressors. These are all things I don't talk about online because doing so tends to only beget more abuse.
Yes, some of it is about us not being so fragile, especially when someone is speaking from the pain of their discrimination and oppression, but there are lines where that paradigm moves into abuse, and I too readily see that explained away rather than identified for what it is.
Abusive rhetoric is sadly endemic online, and I think one of the biggest hurdles we have to face on the left is excising it from our actions and not permitting it in our communities. There are a million reasons why we can be tempted to engage in it or excuse it, especially when everyone else is doing it, but it is not right, not just, and not a goal we should work towards nor an ideal we should uphold.
I just keep reading this whole thing because it's such a good comment. Regarding this part: At 40, I'm still somewhat of an idealist, but I still think that what is needed is familiarity. My, and...
I just keep reading this whole thing because it's such a good comment.
Regarding this part:
The systematic injustices I face as a gay person will not be solved by making heteros the enemy, and inverting the hierarchy to flip discrimination back onto them is still a type of supremacist thinking.
At 40, I'm still somewhat of an idealist, but I still think that what is needed is familiarity. My, and my siblings', gay friends have done more to open up my boomer parents' eyes than any amount of reading things online. My parents have never been overtly racist, but having a family filled with various shades of grandchildren makes it impossible to dislike people of those colours. Love really can defeat hate, and all it takes is opening yourself up to loving people.
Some people aren't capable of opening themselves up to that way of thinking, though. Those people aren't the enemy either; it's pitiable to me that people can close themselves off from knowing and loving other people based on things that make no sense at all.
Please note, I was very specifically referring to Tildes in encouraging discussion. The backlash that you face elsewhere is symptomatic of issues practically endemic to online communication at...
Please note, I was very specifically referring to Tildes in encouraging discussion. The backlash that you face elsewhere is symptomatic of issues practically endemic to online communication at large nowadays; they're not peculiar to discussions about race, which is why your in-person interactions go differently. Do not use the internet as your barometer for people, least of all Twitter. I'd encourage anyone interested in talking about race to talk to folks face to face, not online.
There is more I could say, but I'm curious to know how your wife and her family/friends (and possibly your children, if they're old enough) advise you to handle it.
Tildes is a great site, but it's not sufficiently inured to the problems that I'm generally comfortable to talk about these topics. The same general guidelines that I follow on other sites are the...
I was very specifically referring to Tildes in encouraging discussion.
Tildes is a great site, but it's not sufficiently inured to the problems that I'm generally comfortable to talk about these topics. The same general guidelines that I follow on other sites are the ones I follow here. I chose twitter as an example, but you could choose any social interactivity online - youtube, facebook, twitter, tildes, github, lobsters, discord, etc - and I'll be trying to follow the same guidelines (say very little other than expressing support). One minor notable exception is on reddit where I am a moderator and remove any instance of hate-based speech, though even that is a variation of "say very little, express support".
I don't use the internet as my barometer for people, which I felt was clear from what I wrote ("Please note that this only applies to online interactions; in person interactions are very different for me.")
I'm curious to know how your wife and her family/friends (and possibly your children, if they're old enough) advise you to handle it.
In this case, I think you have to be more specific about what "it" is. If you're asking how they advise me to handle interacting online, my wife generally asks me for my advice, not the other way around, mostly due to the fact that I've been dealing with social media for much longer than she has - she used to entirely eschew social media. She's certainly an advocate for people being encouraged to speak for themselves. For example, she was recently asked to take part in an interview regarding people with disabilities, as someone who does research in that field. She advocated strongly for the interviewer to actually interview people with disabilities, because what the internet didn't need more of was people who are not disabled speaking up for people who are.
I understand that you want to see more discussion here on this topic, and I appreciate that point of view. I also understand that being able to remain silent is a privilege, and that I'm living life in easy mode. However, I also don't think that my asking questions online is particularly fruitful - as you've said, the internet is not a good barometer of people. I would rather have the discussion in person, or in a way where I actually know to whom I'm speaking.
All I'm asking is recognition of the fact that us on Tildes not asking questions doesn't mean that we don't care - lots of things get no discussion that are important to lots of people. Tildes is a small community, and we don't all use it for the same thing.
It's not even that I want more discussion on it per se, it's simply conspicuous in its absence. More than anything, I was just trying to challenge the assumption that anyone needs to be so scared...
It's not even that I want more discussion on it per se, it's simply conspicuous in its absence. More than anything, I was just trying to challenge the assumption that anyone needs to be so scared here in the first place - as you say, Tildes is still a small community.
I think that you see more of a distinction between Tildes and other communities than I do. For me, this is another site (albeit a very good one) in a long list of sites, BBs, chatrooms that I've...
I think that you see more of a distinction between Tildes and other communities than I do. For me, this is another site (albeit a very good one) in a long list of sites, BBs, chatrooms that I've taken part in over several decades. The behaviours that I've learned from my long experience tell me to act in a particular way:
Listen. Read. Learn. Amplify Black voices. Donate (where possible).
At its core, that's all I am trying to do, here or in other places. That's a consistent message that we receive, and when a place that is primarily white males complies with that, it sounds like we are not talking about things at all.
I'm not the person you asked, but I feel similarly to what they shared. For me, it's a matter of wanting to make room for the voices of people of color and not wanting to overshadow their...
I'm not the person you asked, but I feel similarly to what they shared.
For me, it's a matter of wanting to make room for the voices of people of color and not wanting to overshadow their advocacy. It's not uncommon for racial conversations to unfairly gravitate towards white feelings, paradigms, and disclosure. I don't want to perpetuate that and be yet another white guy that talks over people of color. I consider it more important that I listen than speak on these issues.
That said, as pointed out, there is often little discussion when these topics come up, and I get how that can come across as dismissive or even hostile to people of color here. The last thing I want them to think is that we don't care or that we're complicit in downplaying or whitewashing these issues. Perhaps I need to do more to show support and care, which is undoubtedly better than silence.
Thanks for commenting. I hadn't heard about the Denver protests elsewhere. It seems like things are peaceful here in Chicago, I haven't heart otherwise.
Thanks for commenting. I hadn't heard about the Denver protests elsewhere. It seems like things are peaceful here in Chicago, I haven't heart otherwise.
Claiming they couldn't confirm them as press when there's video evidence of CNN crew confirming they were press is a bold move. Sow Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt, I guess.
Claiming they couldn't confirm them as press when there's video evidence of CNN crew confirming they were press is a bold move. Sow Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt, I guess.
Not surprised by this at all. US police brutality against people of color has been going on for decades. If you fail to provide justice or change, even after repeated protests, riots will happen....
Not surprised by this at all. US police brutality against people of color has been going on for decades. If you fail to provide justice or change, even after repeated protests, riots will happen.
People always say it's just a few bad apples, but it really feels systemic. It's sad to see.
Police scanner for Saint Paul: https://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/13544 Edit: Been listening for the past two hours. I have heard: The tobacco store employees are armed and everything is...
Edit: Been listening for the past two hours. I have heard:
The tobacco store employees are armed and everything is okay there.
Recurring hotspots are Target (looters on roof), FootLocker, Verizon, the Vitamin Shoppe, Discount Tire (squad car destroyed?), Autozone, TJ Maxx (was set on fire)
A noodle store owner was being held against his will
Absolutely bizarre to me that some of the takes that I have seen on Twitter is that these riots are a force of chaotic good. Even takes saying the looters own all the stuff they are taking.
So I agree in the short term riots and looting have a negative effect, both on the community and on the progress towards justice (in that they reinforce racist stereotypes). But I also think riots...
Absolutely bizarre to me that some of the takes that I have seen on Twitter is that these riots are a force of chaotic good. Even takes saying the looters own all the stuff they are taking.
So I agree in the short term riots and looting have a negative effect, both on the community and on the progress towards justice (in that they reinforce racist stereotypes). But I also think riots and the threat of civil unrest can have a positive force in that they are one of the few things that can push the state towards actually holding the institution of the police accountable for the systemic injustices they tend to perpetuate. Sadly, people tend to pay attention much more to images of burning buildings than they do to black men being killed. In his speech "The Other America", MLK addressed the role and purpose of riots in America:
So these conditions, existence of widespread poverty, slums, and of tragic conniptions in schools and other areas of life, all of these things have brought about a great deal of despair, and a great deal of desperation. A great deal of disappointment and even bitterness in the Negro communities. And today all of our cities confront huge problems. All of our cities are potentially powder kegs as a result of the continued existence of these conditions. Many in moments of anger, many in moments of deep bitterness engage in riots.
Let me say as I've always said, and I will always continue to say, that riots are socially destructive and self-defeating. I'm still convinced that nonviolence is the most potent weapon available to oppressed people in their struggle for freedom and justice. I feel that violence will only create more social problems than they will solve. That in a real sense it is impracticable for the Negro to even think of mounting a violent revolution in the United States. So I will continue to condemn riots, and continue to say to my brothers and sisters that this is not the way. And continue to affirm that there is another way.
But at the same time, it is as necessary for me to be as vigorous in condemning the conditions which cause persons to feel that they must engage in riotous activities as it is for me to condemn riots. I think America must see that riots do not develop out of thin air. Certain conditions continue to exist in our society which must be condemned as vigorously as we condemn riots. But in the final analysis, a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it that America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the plight of the Negro poor has worsened over the last few years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice, equality, and humanity. And so in a real sense our nation's summers of riots are caused by our nation's winters of delay. And as long as America postpones justice, we stand in the position of having these recurrences of violence and riots over and over again. Social justice and progress are the absolute guarantors of riot prevention.
Riots are a loud shout that bring attention to conditions that those in power frequently, and often deliberately, ignore.
I agree that in the long run they can potentially help a cause move forward, but I think the bizarre thing to me is the lack of condemnation that Twitter activists are taking, even to the point of...
I agree that in the long run they can potentially help a cause move forward, but I think the bizarre thing to me is the lack of condemnation that Twitter activists are taking, even to the point of calling any condemnation of the rioting a racist act in and of itself. Not trying to straw man or anything, just when I read those types of takes, it kind of unnerves me. I can understand why things happen the way they do, but I wouldn't use that understanding to justify actions that demonstrably hurt innocent bystanders.
I think there is a lot of bitterness on Twitter and elsewhere that there seems to be a lot more concern over the riots than the original killing. Certainly on Twitter plenty of people were voicing...
I think there is a lot of bitterness on Twitter and elsewhere that there seems to be a lot more concern over the riots than the original killing. Certainly on Twitter plenty of people were voicing their opinion on whether or not the riots were justified while they had been silent on this killing and others. Obviously not everyone, but a lot. And many of the takes regarding the riots adopt the framing that "people shouldn't riot because it decreases support/leads to backlash/is self-defeating". MLK addresses this in the same speech actually:
And this leads me to say something about another discussion that we hear a great deal, and that is the so-called "white backlash". I would like to honestly say to you that the white backlash is merely a new name for an old phenomenon. It's not something that just came into being because of shouts of Black Power, or because Negroes engaged in riots in Watts, for instance. The fact is that the state of California voted a Fair Housing bill out of existence before anybody shouted Black Power, or before anybody rioted in Watts.
It may well be that shouts of Black Power and riots in Watts and the Harlems and the other areas, are the consequences of the white backlash rather than the cause of them. What it is necessary to see is that there has never been a single solid monistic determined commitment on the part of the vast majority of white Americans on the whole question of Civil Rights and on the whole question of racial equality. This is something that truth impels all men of good will to admit.
The fact is, any protest of police brutality invariably gets condemned by large swaths of the country (kneeling during the national anthem, for example). For my part, I have a hard time getting worked up over the destruction of property in the face of such blatant and widespread destruction of life these days.
I feel you there. It's the taxpayer's police station, they built it, and if they want to burn it down, that's their decision. They'll end up paying for the next one to be built too. Everything is...
I feel you there. It's the taxpayer's police station, they built it, and if they want to burn it down, that's their decision. They'll end up paying for the next one to be built too. Everything is falling apart in this country, has been for quite some time. Odds are the old one wasn't up to code anyway. :P
There was a small business burned down in my city under very similar circumstances. Nothing happened. Unless you want to count racist dog whistling on the local conservative talk shows?
There was a small business burned down in my city under very similar circumstances. Nothing happened. Unless you want to count racist dog whistling on the local conservative talk shows?
Thinking of donating to some fund about all this with my first paycheck but I’m not too sure which one... I think the funerary one is already fully payed for, any tips? I’m absolutely heartbroken...
Thinking of donating to some fund about all this with my first paycheck but I’m not too sure which one... I think the funerary one is already fully payed for, any tips? I’m absolutely heartbroken by all of this and I want to do the best I can as a white Canadian.
I donated to the Minnesota Freedom Fund, but I also saw tons of people doing so online so maybe it would be better to choose another one to spread the wealth around a bit.
I donated to the Minnesota Freedom Fund, but I also saw tons of people doing so online so maybe it would be better to choose another one to spread the wealth around a bit.
There was a protest in Omaha last night at the busiest intersection in Nebraska. It started out like many other protests I've been to, with people on the sidewalks with signs and chanting, but it...
There was a protest in Omaha last night at the busiest intersection in Nebraska. It started out like many other protests I've been to, with people on the sidewalks with signs and chanting, but it got tense when the cops showed up and people started blocking the street. I don't know which order those happened in, but I was worried about it turning into another Charlottesville situation where someone would get run over. There were two police helicopters circling and apparently the dispatcher had to talk the cops down from getting their dogs. They were clearly itching for a fight, they used tear gas multiple times when the protest hadn't been violent. After it got dark there were apparently some windows broken at the Target along that road, but everything that I'm hearing that happened after dark I'm taking with a grain of salt.
Some interesting related stories: Wife Of Charged Ex-MPD Officer Derek Chauvin Files For Divorce Minneapolis Public Schools board members have written a resolution terminating the school...
Clear as day in the video this time, you can see one officer commit slow, casual murder while three more stand around listening to the man beg for his life - for the crime of selling cigarettes...
Clear as day in the video this time, you can see one officer commit slow, casual murder while three more stand around listening to the man beg for his life - for the crime of selling cigarettes (which is not a crime in the minds of the overwhelming majority of Americans regardless of the law). There is absolutely no room at all for selective interpretation and no way to make even the most pathetic excuses for what happened. That's why the officers were immediately fired instead of being suspended, but it wasn't enough. Now we know the officer that committed this murder had 18 complaints against him and his department has a similar pattern of suspicious behavior.
Normally I wouldn't expect this to escalate again, but seeing as how every single person in this country is one kind of pissed off or another over the economic recovery being bungled repeatedly at the expense of blue collar workers, and all of us being cooped up because of the virus, fuses are short. Probably the shortest they've been in five or six generations.
No new television, no new sports, no new movies, no new distractions other than fighting for toilet paper at the supermarket. More people out of work than people who are working. All of the talking heads on TV reduced to the same job as your average youtuber - which, when compared side by side, they come off almost universally worse than without the studio audience propping up their lame ass jokes.
Basically, people are pissed, out of work, and have a lot of time on their hands they can't easily fill with the same kind of mediocre entertainment or dead end job that's been keeping our version of bread and circuses going. But hey, there are riots on the internet, and we're all going to be watching them because we haven't got anything else to do, and we love a good riot (watching it, not being in it).
That's how I see it, anyway. This is as bad a situation as we've seen since the labor day riots.
The riots I saw did not seem to be spoiling for a fight. Most of them were relatively peaceful other than the fires and broken windows, and who is breaking those windows and setting those fires is a matter of subjective interpretation. The sheer stupidity of sabotaging a peaceful protest always gives me pause - it's as if the cops are daring people to go rogue and giving them permission. If you're going to be painted as violent no matter what, there is far less reason not to use violence. This country does not honor peaceful protests. They do nothing. The media barely covers them.
Those mobs won't remain peaceful if the response to those riots is armed escalation. All it'll take is a couple more dead people tonight and it could escalate rapidly into a country-wide shitshow. If the mobs burn down the wrong kinds of infrastructure during this pandemic, we're looking at food shortages, lack of hospital care, out of control covid cases with no way to track or treat them, and generally, a collapse of order in the affected areas (mostly, cities). That's your worst case scenario.
Honestly I worry a lot less about what happens in the USA than I do what happens outside of the USA if we end up distracted. If I were Russia or China I'd be taking advantage of that lapse of global oversight the instant the window of opportunity opens. Russia wants Ukraine back, China wants Hong Kong and Taiwan under their heel. If we blink, they'll move.
Edit: News is now reporting that the officer responsible for starting this mess has been taken into custody. That's good, it certainly lessens the likelihood of further escalation.
Small correction: You're thinking of Eric Garner, another black man that was choked to death at the hands of a police officer (who got off scot-free). George Floyd was killed while being arrested...
Small correction:
for the crime of selling cigarettes
You're thinking of Eric Garner, another black man that was choked to death at the hands of a police officer (who got off scot-free). George Floyd was killed while being arrested for allegedly using a counterfeit $20 bill.
Of all the infuriating things about this story...this part doesn't get mentioned enough. If you pay for something using a single counterfeit $20, it's just as likely that you're a victim of the...
George Floyd was killed while being arrested for allegedly using a counterfeit $20 bill.
Of all the infuriating things about this story...this part doesn't get mentioned enough.
If you pay for something using a single counterfeit $20, it's just as likely that you're a victim of the crime of counterfeiting money as you are the perpetrator of that crime.
Even if the story about George Floyd paying with counterfeit money is true, it could simply mean that someone paid him for something using that counterfeit money, and Floyd had no reason to suspect it as counterfeit until a convenience store clerk used one of those counterfeit-detection pens on it. There is no reason to jump to the conclusion that Floyd himself is a counterfeiter.
Hell, there's no reason to point a gun at him at all, over an alleged $20 crime. According to the charging documents, that was the very first thing they did, before the 8 minutes and 46 seconds of kneeling:
As Officer Lane began speaking with Mr. Floyd, he pulled his gun out and pointed it at Mr. Floyd's open window and directed Mr. Floyd to show his hands.
Since we have many Tildes users from outside the US - this is known as the "American Police Bullshit" dialect of English. Allow me to translate.
As the officer began speaking with the suspect, he pulled his gun out
The officer pulled out his gun and started shouting.
and pointed it at Mr. Floyd's open window
He pointed it at Mr. Floyd, through his open car window.
The reason why this type of counterfeit detector is not reliable is because it is extremely simple for counterfeiters to replicate bills on the cotton fiber paper used to print real currency. They can either get a genuine dollar bill, bleach it and use it to print a higher denomination, or a less common way is to get their hands on actual currency paper provided by foreign governments unfriendly to the U.S.
Hold on, what the fuck? Four cops showed up for a dude with a fake 20? I had to report a fake 100 at work a few months ago. The cop took three hours to get there and he didn't know why he was...
Hold on, what the fuck? Four cops showed up for a dude with a fake 20?
I had to report a fake 100 at work a few months ago. The cop took three hours to get there and he didn't know why he was there when he showed up.
An interesting detail - a friend who couldn't sleep read live tweets of support from Libanese protestors all night and suggestions for tactics and how to stay safe - while also acknowledging that...
An interesting detail - a friend who couldn't sleep read live tweets of support from Libanese protestors all night and suggestions for tactics and how to stay safe - while also acknowledging that they have been given these tips and tricks from Hong Kong protestors as a show of support in the same way.
He tried. Tweets aren’t policy directives though. I’m sure they’ll step up procedural harassment against antifa and BLM and any aligned movements. That’ll be stuff like auditing them to death or...
He tried. Tweets aren’t policy directives though. I’m sure they’ll step up procedural harassment against antifa and BLM and any aligned movements. That’ll be stuff like auditing them to death or slow rolling paperwork so they have trouble collecting donations, spending money, or getting permits for things. But I don’t expect it to go much further than that just yet.
, I am sure this is not provable, but some people are contending that at least one of the people who started the looting / arson is a police officer:...
I'm not sure of how provable this is, I am sure this is not provable, but some people are contending that at least one of the people who started the looting / arson is a police officer: https://twitter.com/GypsyEyedBeauty/status/1266162964727562240
According to this article, St. Paul police are claiming that person was not one of their officers. https://www.inquisitr.com/6080600/jacob-pederson-st-paul-protest/ Is it true? I'm not sure.
I think that a lot of people are claiming certainty that it is the same person; I don't think that there's actually enough information present to try to make a decision. It was an interesting (to...
I think that a lot of people are claiming certainty that it is the same person; I don't think that there's actually enough information present to try to make a decision. It was an interesting (to me) subthread though, and reminded me of when Quebec police went undercover as protesters during a riot in Montebello Quebec.
I don't doubt that police have disguised themselves before and provoke protesters. I've heard tales that they pretended to be protestors during the various Occupy movements. Other examples: Not a...
I don't doubt that police have disguised themselves before and provoke protesters. I've heard tales that they pretended to be protestors during the various Occupy movements.
Not a U.S. example but, numerous examples during the Hong Kong protests. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-49324822
I've also seen pictures/videos of them in ambulances in order to round up or arrest protestors but am not finding any articles at the moment, so I'm not completely sure if they actually are or if it is taken out of context.
I agree fully that there is sparse evidence, and noted when I brought this up that this is not something that could be proved. However, I don't think it is fair to say that this is "another story...
I agree fully that there is sparse evidence, and noted when I brought this up that this is not something that could be proved.
However, I don't think it is fair to say that this is "another story of internet justice gone wrong" as Toler wrote. This isn't throwing an innocent person under the bus of internet scrutiny; this is a smear on an already fully smeared police department that literally murdered a guy just days ago. It's not the same as many other incidents of internet justice. The specific officer that is mentioned may be innocent of this specific crime that he is being accused of, but this is not going to incite more people to be angry at him than already are, and it's mostly going to be used to try to incite action against the department.
Protests here in Seattle have gotten violent. About 15 minutes ago, I got an "emergency alert" notification pushed to my phone that they're imposing an immediate curfew on downtown. edit: several...
edit: several cop cars were set on fire. one of the rioters grabbed an AR-15 from the back of a squad car and was almost immediately disarmed by an undercover cop.
I think I'm more pissed off right now than I can ever remember being. Official Seattle PD policy is that officials must turn off their bodycams at protests. and also, carrying enough batteries to...
I think I'm more pissed off right now than I can ever remember being.
They still seem to be escalating. Just check out maps.snapchat.com and click anywhere you see heat on the map. Tons of protest snaps minutes old in damn near every single city I click on. The news...
They still seem to be escalating.
Just check out maps.snapchat.com and click anywhere you see heat on the map. Tons of protest snaps minutes old in damn near every single city I click on. The news is reporting this as if it's just a handful of cities. It's much bigger than that.
Americans haven't rioted in this scale as a reaction to something in a while. That's a pretty big deal. This will also bring counter protestors of people like the alt-right to the fray. The worst...
Americans haven't rioted in this scale as a reaction to something in a while. That's a pretty big deal. This will also bring counter protestors of people like the alt-right to the fray. The worst of the US will show itself a few months before the 2020 elections and if those elections go to shit this could happen again, but worse.
Our news outlets are very keen to dissect and scrutinize whatever trump says, But I've heard little to nothing about these riots, just some protest is going on in Minneapolis. I wonder why.
Americans haven't rioted in this scale as a reaction to something in a while.
Our news outlets are very keen to dissect and scrutinize whatever trump says, But I've heard little to nothing about these riots, just some protest is going on in Minneapolis. I wonder why.
Well, you've got riots a few months before very important elections. This could go one of many ways, from blowing up big time (a much more divided society), to fizzling out and keeping the...
Well, you've got riots a few months before very important elections. This could go one of many ways, from blowing up big time (a much more divided society), to fizzling out and keeping the injustices in the US in place, to leading to systemic change for the better.
Right now? Wait and see. I suppose right now it's mostly national news and once it gets bigger you'll hear about it.
Racism and institutional structures of oppression are not unique to the US, so I guess so. But this is largely an internal affair and probably won’t affect your life as a non-American. That being...
Racism and institutional structures of oppression are not unique to the US, so I guess so. But this is largely an internal affair and probably won’t affect your life as a non-American. That being said, I think I’m general people should care enough about injustices anywhere to at least be aware of them, even if you don’t feel the need to participate.
What are these protesters trying achieve? Is there any demand, or is it just a demonstration? Its not that I don't care about injustices, I have a habit of getting into unnecessary fights with...
What are these protesters trying achieve? Is there any demand, or is it just a demonstration? Its not that I don't care about injustices, I have a habit of getting into unnecessary fights with people on internet, so I thought its best I just ignore the provocative news atleast for a while. I would've supported them in the real world if I could, Its just not worth it for me to get into fight with internet vigilantes.
It's coming to a head following a decade (for privileged folks) of public debate over unnecessary force used by police across the nation. I suppose the demand would be "indict those police...
It's coming to a head following a decade (for privileged folks) of public debate over unnecessary force used by police across the nation. I suppose the demand would be "indict those police officers", but in general, many people want systemic changes to prevent these legal murders in the future.
The recurring notion I am seeing is that everyone wants external elected personnel in charge of investigating police and keeping them significantly more in check than the current system with...
The recurring notion I am seeing is that everyone wants external elected personnel in charge of investigating police and keeping them significantly more in check than the current system with Internal Affairs, lenient prosecutors and lenient judgement sentences. The hope is to weed out more of the overly aggressive asshole officers before they get several more chances to abuse their power. Which the current officer who killed George Floyd was an overly aggressive asshole with multiple complaints (18 or 19) and has been involved in a killing in the past.
Not really. I mean it IS relevant as news and all love to the protestors but - as a fellow non-American who spent a day reading up on it on US news sites I can say it was a rabbit hole that...
Not really. I mean it IS relevant as news and all love to the protestors but - as a fellow non-American who spent a day reading up on it on US news sites I can say it was a rabbit hole that perhaps wasn't worth it to that extent.
It's a riot due to systemic racism in the US (systemic racism exist elsewhere too ofc) and being along US racism lines (black v white etc) and a protest against it.
Hopefully the protestors make good headway
I also worry about all of those issues including Modi getting more approval from people despite his actions. The thing is I worried/cared too much it affected my sanity and day to day life, I...
I also worry about all of those issues including Modi getting more approval from people despite his actions. The thing is I worried/cared too much it affected my sanity and day to day life, I couldn't focus on anything, that's why I am trying to reduce political news. I dont mean any disrespect..
Anyone watching the live streams of the protest in Minneapolis? They just torched a police station and burned effigies of the four officers on its doorstep - and then started setting off a lot of fireworks to celebrate. The crowd is definitely not just people of color, everyone came out. Black, white, asian - it's like this crowd had to fill out a diversity quota before they started the riot. Quite a heartwarming show of solidarity amidst the chaos.
This is the most intensely American thing I've seen in a while. News tomorrow is going to be crazy.
It's a mix of everyone, the rage from the city is unlike anything I have seen. The closest comparison I can think of are the LA riots in the 90s, but I wasn't around then. The whole country is a powder keg because of coronavirus, and then on top of that this spate of racial killings and incidents. I wouldn't call it heartwarming because of the sorrow of the whole situation, but I do know what you mean - it feels like maybe, maybe something will change after this.
As someone that works in law enforcement(911 dispatcher) for a suburb city in the DFW Metroplex and has multiple family members who are police officers.......
All I can do is shake my head.
Kaepernick tried protesting peacefully and it got him nowhere except blacklisted from the NFL.
And now here we are.
Another black man dead for no reason and another black mark on what is supposed to be a noble profession. Fortunately, the officers I work with, at least to my face, seem just as disgusted of Chauvin and his officers did and I have seen numerous agencies across the country condemn Chauvins actions.
So I sincerely hope police officers and departments across the country see this as a call to action and finally start outing the bad apples and stop worrying about that "thin blue line" that's been nothing but divisive since whoever thought it up.
Don't know if I'd go that far.
I know big departments make it seem like PD's are just flush with cash but it's not true for a lot of places.
My department, for example, has been massively shortstaffed for most of the time of my employment. I work for a city with 80k residents and I've had nights with just four officers and a supervisor.
I know of another agency, just up the road, that lost their roof to a hail storm several years ago. They moved the Dispatchers to a portable until repairs to that section of the building were made. It took them months to get the repairs done, up to code, and for the dispatchers to move back into the main building.
My dispatch console? Still running Windows 7 on outdated hardware because "there's not enough money in the budget" to get our computers upgraded to the current Windows OS and current hardware. We keep getting told we'll get new ones but they've been saying that since I was hired 3 years ago.
Our building? A renovated office building that has issues with mold, sagging ceilings, creaky floors etc
So while I don't disagree changes need to be made across the board, I'd wager most police departments across the country simply can't afford to lose out on any money.
I think @cfabbro is more on the right track. Mandatory civilian investigations for all officer involved shootings/incidents. Not internal affairs like many PDs do but outside, civilian investigations.
I think it's not just a question of overfunding / underfunding, but whether the money that's being spent is being spent on the right things.
Does your department have any surplus military gear acquired from the federal government under the 1033 program, for example?
If your department doesn't currently have any surplus military hardware, but would like some, there's a helpful website set up to explain how to do it.
I'm not aware of any large, well-funded federal programs to upgrade 911 dispatch computers, or to repair hail-damaged public service buildings.
I respectfully disagree.
I think it would be more beneficial to have a civilian third party that controls and approves spending so a department can't spend their budgets on new toys they'll never use.
Defunding them is just going to result in even fewer good officers because who wants to be in a profession where you're hated, called "pig", and risk your life every day for 40k a year because of the actions of a relative few?
Less money means less body cams, less qualified officers, less training....
I'm curious, and I don't mean this facetiously, but how would recommend policing be done in the US? Based on your verbiage("Brutalize people, becauses that's their primary function""our money needs to be spent on things that positively affect our communities"), it's obvious you have a very low opinion of police officers and the job they do. So I'm genuinely curious what changes you would make to improve the situation?
None of those jobs deal with the possibility of intentionally being ambushed in a patrol car, getting shot making a traffic stop....but I wouldn’t say policing is respected anymore. A random sampling of 1500 people in 2018 may be numerically significant but I don’t see comment threads on the internet calling for the execution of truck drivers and their families like I’ve seen on Reddit. And yes, I know Reddit is a cesspool. But as the son of a police officer with 25 years on the street, it’s still highly concerning.
Those are interesting studies and I’d be curious to see them expanded across the country to see if their results with body cams are inherent across PDs. My own PD places great emphasis on their use and it’s beat into the officers heads that they’re for citizen and officer safety and are never turned off for any interactions.
Abolish the police? Definitely can’t agree there. In a country of 331 million people? I’m all for eliminating a lot of the laws that make petty, non violent crime a thing and cutting the flow that make a for profit prison industry a thing but who responds to the man beating his wife? Who responds to someone robbing a bank? Who responds to the uncle with pictures of his niece in the bathroom? These are calls my department has taken recently.
For whatever evil you think of police, they do good in a lot of ways that never gets recognized.
Don’t try to deflect.
You ever listen to a child cry on the phone because his daddy is hurting his mommy? You ever hear the screams and crying? You ever hear someone get slapped so hard you can hear it through the phone?
I have. I still hear them.
Who responds to that?
Are you actually advocating that nothing be done for it? You actually think a man like that is going to let his wife seek out help that doesn’t involve police?
Part of the reason domestic violence is such a problem is that the abused doesn’t feel like they have anywhere to go. Don’t blame the police for every shortcoming in society. There’s a lot more that can be done, across the board, for domestic violence victims but you’re blaming police for aspects they have no control over.
As such, it’s clear to me that your bias and hatred against police, and my bias for, will not allow us to find any sort of common ground. This will be my last response to you on this topic.
Do they buy these things, or are they hand-me-downs from the military? I find it somewhat mad that a police department would buy something like an MRAP.
Even in the middle of this mess I'm still fully on board paying officers more, getting them better training (that they desperately need, based on Army training), and giving them tools to do the job they've never had (drones for surveillance should be universal).
They are going to have to show us they deserve that now, though. That discussion is tainted in this climate. It should be one of the first we get around to once we're on the other side of this mess.
I'm really curious to know your reasoning on this. What could we possibly gain by enabling more surveillance by the police?
The solution to Orwell's paradox in 1984 is to make sure that everyone has the cameras, not just the government. We've lucked into that thanks to the tech companies' zeal putting a camera and later a film studio in everyone's pocket. We all have cameras, and so should the police.
That said, you tell me what's better: large groups of armed officers on the streets, or one small drone up in the air keeping an eye on things? I'll take the drone every time, less chance of escalation. It's a public place, they've got every right to surveillance in pursuit of their mandate. The cameras keep everyone honest.
My opinion changes the instant they start attaching weapons to those drones, though.
Sure, in times of crisis, using a drone is probably better overall than a group armed to the teeth on the streets. In "peace time", I could see replacing police walking the beat with faceless drones creating a wider disconnect between them and the community.
IMO the bare minimum should be disallowing the police from investigating themselves for acts of misconduct. Nothing will change until the bad apples can actually be effectively rooted out of each department.
https://coloradosun.com/2020/05/29/colorado-police-death-investigations-george-floyd/
edit: spelling
Yep. That's the start. Also, it might drive the point home if every time they have to pay out damages for this, it comes directly out of the department's pension fund. Let's see how many of the good cops want to sacrifice their retirement to protect the bad ones. Maybe that'll make them a bit more proactive.
I can't imagine that would help. That would mean less training, fewer officers and a more stressed work environment.
WTF! Trump's latest tweet:
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1266231100780744704
For those unaware of the "when the looting starts, the shooting starts" reference:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/08/07/how-three-violent-days-gripped-a-black-miami-neighborhood-as-nixon-was-nominated-in-1968/
Twitter has added a disclaimer above Trumps tweet now:
That's a giant "fuck you" to his latest executive order, if ever I saw one. Good on twitter!
This morning, presumably to try and circumvent that warning, he tweeted the same text from the official WhiteHouse account, where they put the warning on it again: https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1266342941649506304
Then a couple hours later WhiteHouse posted a screenshot of a Khamenei tweet from last week, complaining that it didn't get the warning: https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1266367168603721728
The current top reply to that tweet:
Trump is going to see as an escalation—guaranteed. He's been conditioned his entire life to have everything his way. If he can't handle Twitter applying harm notices to his tweets, how's he going to handle potentially losing the election? The next few months are going to be extremely interesting and tumultuous—this is on top of the COVID-19 crisis circling the U.S. and the globe.
It's important to note that the tweet also can't be liked, retweeted or shared. Quote retweets were left on for some reason though.
Proving once again there is no situation he can't instantly make ten times worse.
Biden Reacts: ‘I’m furious and you should be too’: Biden condemns Trump tweet ‘glorifying violence’
edit: got half of the sources. in the meantime, go check out /r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut/, plenty of examples there
edit: added sources. Will keep adding onto this list.
Regarding rubber bullets: they are rubber-coated bullets. It's a steel ball or cylinder coated in rubber. They are intended to be shot at the ground, so they bounce up and hit people in the legs/body. However, in the below videos/images they're also fired directly, at close range.
Non-lethal is not the best term for them since they can most definitely be lethal or cause serious damage; as an example, one reporter lost her left eye(source below) to a rubber bullet fired directly at her face.
I've also seen photos of other crowd control type rounds used, like beanbags and wood cylinders, which definitely do some damage if launched directly at you.
A small recap of what l've seen on social media (videos, livestreams, protester's accounts):
source3
source4; compilation video
A journalist's camera got shot; note that this is likely less than 1' away from his face. Imagine if they missed. Or maybe they did miss and they were aiming for his head, like many others?
source3;
source4; more journalists under fire
source5; flashbangs lobbed at journalists walking away
A city(think it was LA)Seattle announcing a curfew beyond 5pm, announced just 14 minutes prior to the start of the curfew. Good luck getting home in that little time. sourceAnd so on. US PDs are pulling a Hong Kong or a Chile with no regard for human life, acting like some delusional robocop fanboys with disproportionate force.
It's odd how there's not more coverage on this here, there's this one post, 2 others and barely anything covering what l've mentioned above.
The lack of many threads about this just shows the difference between the Tildes and Reddit/Facebook/Twitter mentality. We don't need 10 posts about it every hour. If it's that big, we'll set up a scheduled topic for it and discussions can continue there, without cluttering up the page with many posts that I'm sure many people wish to avoid for good reasons (stress, not american, etc).
Meanwhile we can keep days old threads about this alive and filled with new comments and new information. Nothing really vanishes from the Tildes front page until nobody is commenting on the topic anymore, imo one of the better design choices made building this website - bringing back a little of the classic forum style.
Any sources for this? I believe you, but it'd be nice have something to show others who may not.
Added.
You might want to check out this comment on reddit.
It's bigger than yours. ;)
size doesn't matter ;)
but thanks, another good info source!
This is an obviously important story that hasn't been discussed here much. I can't find the last Tildes census but I suspect part of the reason is there isn't a large contingent of PoC here. I'm not, and I don't necessarily feel it is my place to opine on this beyond sharing it.
Everyone should know about this story. But personally, the reason why I have avoided talking about it is simply because this is the most horrifying police-related death I have ever seen. It's just so damn wrong that I just can't completely process it.
It seems like this is a somewhat unique issue in that it that unites pretty much everyone under the same opinion. Even Fox News hosts (Napolitano, Bongino, and even Hannity) are all saying this was wildly inappropriate police behavior and even suggesting murder charges (Napolitano). I can't think of any other issue in recent history that's had such broad agreement.
Call me a cynic, but a part of my thinks the reason the right wing media has uncharacteristically taken the side of minorities is because they are trying to quell further uprisings by ushering in police reform because it gives a facade of social progress while not identifying systemic issues that are being exacerbated with the covid crisis.
Part of the rush to reopen states is to return the general populace to distraction via panem et circensus.
I hope I'm wrong and we're really just experiencing a pressure cooker's contents catalyzing into positive paradigm shifts.
I think a large part of this is because we have a very clear video of this incident showing a subdued, unarmed individual being slowly suffocated over the course of 9 minutes. There's very little room for he said she said. It wasn't a power struggle or a miscalculation. The footage was unobstructed and the man did not have a history of violence. The usual excuses people like to make for police violence against minorities don't stick (though some people do still try to justify the actions taken by these officers).
No matter what happened before the video started, at the end of the day, it was a uniformed officer very slowly killing man who was already down. It wasn't a heat of the moment killing like a gunshot. Very few people lack empathy to the point where they accept slowly killing a man begging for his life as justified.
Plus with President Trump siding with the victim, it would be hard for even right wing media to sell this killing as okay to their audience
Everyone I've talked to about this (as in, real life friends in person) seems to fall between ecstatic and 'it's about damn time.' I'm a bit more cynical... but I've got to admit this feels different. The crowds are different.
This might be the day we cross one of Arlo's invisible lines, it might not... but we're closer. A lot closer. Protests being reported in Minneapolis, Denver, St. Paul, Louisville, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and New York. We're up to seven major cities, several of them quite literally on fire.
inb4 napolitano fired for wrongthink
Tildes is largely progressive regardless of color. I don’t think a lack of PoC is the reason.
As a person of color, I believe the contribution of all peoples is not only welcome but necessary.
I like being informed about this stuff. It's all very infuriating, and I feel helpless to do anything about it, but I want to know that it's happening, so thanks for sharing!
Why not? Most things that are PoC-centric or -relevant seem to get little traction here beyond a few votes but if there is no discussion, or at the least no questions posed, that will never change and Tildes will remain an echo chamber de facto.
For me, as a white male in the US, any possible question or discussion I could start regarding this would be little more than a detached, pseudo-intellectual analysis about paths forward, implications, hypotheticals, or whatever, and I would undoubtedly not do justice to either the bitterness, grief, or rage felt by the black community and others over this. Not that others don't feel those same things, but I cannot honestly say that in my lived experience I can attest to the sorrow and constriction that comes from being part of a community that is unabashedly inflicted with repeated injustices.
These killings, George Floyd's and others, break my heart and make me angry. But I do not feel that I can do them justice by starting a half-hearted discussion from a vantage that fundamentally could not comprehend the experience of being black in America. I think it is important to be shared and viewed and understood to the extent possible, but I don't want to do a disservice by offering some detached discussion.
I get where you're coming from. The question I guess you or anyone should answer before anything else is, how much do you really want to know more or understand better? Even if you don't feel equipped to provide answers or commentary, that doesn't mean you don't have potentially useful questions if you're genuinely curious/interested, and you'd be surprised who may respond or what may come of it. I dunno, I'm starting to feel like I'm having to advocate for asking questions much more than I would expect on a site like this.
@kfwyre
Just to be clear, I don't think there's anything wrong with asking questions. The more that people who are not tuned in to these issues learn about them the better, and asking thoughtful questions that get thoughtful replies can be a great way to do that.
There are a few issues I personally have with personally participating in these discussions online though that make me feel uncomfortable. The first is that, as a matter of practice, Tildes and similar sites tend to be heavily dominated by white people, and I think that questions and answers about the black experience coming from and directed towards white people are probably not super productive. At best they treat the issue far too academically for my comfort in that they can't speak to personal, lived experiences of racism. And when there are people of color on these sites, it can far too often happen that they become the de facto 'race explainer' when issues like this come up. Sometimes a black person just wants to talk about programming or whatever, but the sense I get is there is often an implicit pressure for them to speak up when they see discussions wondering about their experience or asking questions. If they want to participate obviously that is great and I'm sure welcome from all involved parties, but I'm very self-conscious about creating an environment where that is expected. "It's not their job to educate white people about racism", basically.
The second is that these killings are too visceral, too unjust, too blatant for me to feel comfortable treating them like other political topics where I'm happy to banter back and forth and type long winded comments about my opinions and justifications for those opinions. Part of the issue for me is that, again, on sites dominated by one demographic that relies on the community for voting and sorting, it is far to easy to drown out minority voices and experiences. I wouldn't want my questions or opinions to dominate the discussion.
The propensity to ask questions is usually seen as an unconditionally good trait, and it often is. But ultimately asking questions is a means towards educating yourself and not an end in and of itself, and for the reasons I mention above I am personally more comfortable pursuing other means to achieve that same end. This is all just personal and I'm not suggesting others should feel the same way. I'm happy to join discussions when they occur and ask questions therein, but I something just feels off to me about opining or analyzing this as I would other topics. It feels too much like in English class when you would get a list of discussion questions after watching a movie or reading a book or something.
Again, I understand your hesitation, and I applaud your sensitivity. The answer is not the current silence, however. The answer is dialogue, and we need to listen more than speak, seek knowledge more than opine. If we can couple that attitude with sincerity it will be useful in any forum, no matter the makeup, because while we will make mistakes, it's impossible to learn without making mistakes. Growth doesn't happen inside your comfort zone.
Here's an analogy that came to mind. I consider myself Tildes' resident soccer expert, at least until someone exposes my hubris. The occasional soccer story is posted in ~sports every so often, but they don't get too much activity (though, to be fair, ~sports in general isn't that active). By my guess, most users here probably have tangential exposure to and knowledge of soccer but definitely aren't rabid fans, and aren't that interested in learning more about it... otherwise there would be more comments and questions on the stuff that is posted, much of which is interesting. Therefore I have no real stimulus to get in-depth about all the stuff I know about soccer, and all the related stuff that I know through it. Soccer is the most popular sport in the world, and the typical fan passively gets exposure to language, politics, culture, music, art, and perspectives from practically every nation in the world through it. Tildes benefits from that simply in having me here, but what you are getting is a tip of the potential iceberg as compared to if there were users asking elementary questions showing interest. What's more, I'm not even unique in this regard, because there are more than enough people on here who are willing to not just explain and teach, but point others who share a sincere interest in the right direction so they can get more info from even better experts if they want it. Look at the excellent AMA @kfwyre put together with a number of other ~lgbt panelists. What reason is there to even hope for anything similar if race remains too uncomfortable a topic for people to read a posted article and say, "You know what, I'm not knowledgeable about this stuff, but I wondered XYZ?"
On top of that, I want to emphasize that race and racism affects white people in the USA just as much as black, yellow, or any other flavor of people, albeit in different ways. Minorities don't have the luxury of choosing not to wrangle with it, and our society overcoming it requires white people to engage with it with the same thick skin that minorities have to develop to survive. I don't think we're going to solve racism here but at the very least our baby steps can do better than feeling bad and sitting on the sidelines. Maybe I'm being naive but I'd trust Tildes users to at least attempt such conversations in good faith, and on a platform specifically dedicated to thoughtful, high-quality discussion, there's no telling how much good can come of it.
I appreciate your point of view on this. I ruminated on them for a few days and almost opted to not respond on this.
Here are my experiences. Please note that this only applies to online interactions; in person interactions are very different for me.
I applaud you for encouraging people to speak up and I hope that I can take it to heart, but I, along with many other people, opt for silence on these matters because it is too difficult to wade into, and obviously causes distress - not distress to me, but distress to the people in the groups who directly experience the issue. It is difficult and exhausting to try to be a vocal ally, so instead of bringing things up and asking questions, I seek out the answers to the questions that I have, and I stay silent.
This goes for other issues as well - I don't tend to weigh in on issues that effect people who are LGBTQ+, people who are women, or other groups of which I am not a member. My words often causes distress, and I understand that it's not needed; we need more voices of people in the groups that are experiencing the problems.
I also don't talk about issues that uniquely effect white cishet males, other than to occasionally note that these are the lowest priority problems to address.
This doesn't even address the hate that one receives from the awful actual racists that are the root cause of the problem. By speaking up, it's easy to become the enemy of everyone online, and to make yourself a target. So I refrain from wading into online discussions; I read a lot of things that are written, and I'll talk about them in real life with people face to face, but I leave the online arguments for other people, so that there's one less white dude talking about his point of view. I have been doing this more across all topics; I have tended towards only very casual or very personal interactions for a while.
I understand where you're coming from. It's not the exact example you used, but I'm a gay guy, and it grinds my gears when I see queer people on reddit, Twitter, or elsewhere talk about "the straights" or "cishets" as if they're subhuman. I owe my life to the people who supported me in the toxic environment I came out in, and almost every single one of them is straight. To have someone denigrate them for who they are is an attack on me and spits in the face of all the allies who have ever gone out of their way to stand alongside us. Furthermore, it continues the exact kind of identity-based supremacy that was so debilating to me as a gay person, only with a different target. The systematic injustices I face as a gay person will not be solved by making heteros the enemy, and inverting the hierarchy to flip discrimination back onto them is still a type of supremacist thinking.
I see a lot of leftist people in particular eager to "punch up" without ever considering that the punching itself they're doing could be abusive. I see a lot of people knowing that this is abusive but reducing their targets down to only their privilege so that the punching can be seen as "deserved" and that their abuse, not backed by systemic discrimination, is therefore not "real". I see a lot of leftist concepts being twisted and contorted to explain or permit abusive behavior as if it is instead justice. I see a lot of collateral damage where people direct their anger at people who are already supportive and sympathetic to them -- their potential allies -- instead of the people who are most deserving -- their oppressors. These are all things I don't talk about online because doing so tends to only beget more abuse.
Yes, some of it is about us not being so fragile, especially when someone is speaking from the pain of their discrimination and oppression, but there are lines where that paradigm moves into abuse, and I too readily see that explained away rather than identified for what it is.
Abusive rhetoric is sadly endemic online, and I think one of the biggest hurdles we have to face on the left is excising it from our actions and not permitting it in our communities. There are a million reasons why we can be tempted to engage in it or excuse it, especially when everyone else is doing it, but it is not right, not just, and not a goal we should work towards nor an ideal we should uphold.
I just keep reading this whole thing because it's such a good comment.
Regarding this part:
At 40, I'm still somewhat of an idealist, but I still think that what is needed is familiarity. My, and my siblings', gay friends have done more to open up my boomer parents' eyes than any amount of reading things online. My parents have never been overtly racist, but having a family filled with various shades of grandchildren makes it impossible to dislike people of those colours. Love really can defeat hate, and all it takes is opening yourself up to loving people.
Some people aren't capable of opening themselves up to that way of thinking, though. Those people aren't the enemy either; it's pitiable to me that people can close themselves off from knowing and loving other people based on things that make no sense at all.
Please note, I was very specifically referring to Tildes in encouraging discussion. The backlash that you face elsewhere is symptomatic of issues practically endemic to online communication at large nowadays; they're not peculiar to discussions about race, which is why your in-person interactions go differently. Do not use the internet as your barometer for people, least of all Twitter. I'd encourage anyone interested in talking about race to talk to folks face to face, not online.
There is more I could say, but I'm curious to know how your wife and her family/friends (and possibly your children, if they're old enough) advise you to handle it.
Tildes is a great site, but it's not sufficiently inured to the problems that I'm generally comfortable to talk about these topics. The same general guidelines that I follow on other sites are the ones I follow here. I chose twitter as an example, but you could choose any social interactivity online - youtube, facebook, twitter, tildes, github, lobsters, discord, etc - and I'll be trying to follow the same guidelines (say very little other than expressing support). One minor notable exception is on reddit where I am a moderator and remove any instance of hate-based speech, though even that is a variation of "say very little, express support".
I don't use the internet as my barometer for people, which I felt was clear from what I wrote ("Please note that this only applies to online interactions; in person interactions are very different for me.")
In this case, I think you have to be more specific about what "it" is. If you're asking how they advise me to handle interacting online, my wife generally asks me for my advice, not the other way around, mostly due to the fact that I've been dealing with social media for much longer than she has - she used to entirely eschew social media. She's certainly an advocate for people being encouraged to speak for themselves. For example, she was recently asked to take part in an interview regarding people with disabilities, as someone who does research in that field. She advocated strongly for the interviewer to actually interview people with disabilities, because what the internet didn't need more of was people who are not disabled speaking up for people who are.
I understand that you want to see more discussion here on this topic, and I appreciate that point of view. I also understand that being able to remain silent is a privilege, and that I'm living life in easy mode. However, I also don't think that my asking questions online is particularly fruitful - as you've said, the internet is not a good barometer of people. I would rather have the discussion in person, or in a way where I actually know to whom I'm speaking.
All I'm asking is recognition of the fact that us on Tildes not asking questions doesn't mean that we don't care - lots of things get no discussion that are important to lots of people. Tildes is a small community, and we don't all use it for the same thing.
It's not even that I want more discussion on it per se, it's simply conspicuous in its absence. More than anything, I was just trying to challenge the assumption that anyone needs to be so scared here in the first place - as you say, Tildes is still a small community.
I think that you see more of a distinction between Tildes and other communities than I do. For me, this is another site (albeit a very good one) in a long list of sites, BBs, chatrooms that I've taken part in over several decades. The behaviours that I've learned from my long experience tell me to act in a particular way:
source
At its core, that's all I am trying to do, here or in other places. That's a consistent message that we receive, and when a place that is primarily white males complies with that, it sounds like we are not talking about things at all.
I'm not the person you asked, but I feel similarly to what they shared.
For me, it's a matter of wanting to make room for the voices of people of color and not wanting to overshadow their advocacy. It's not uncommon for racial conversations to unfairly gravitate towards white feelings, paradigms, and disclosure. I don't want to perpetuate that and be yet another white guy that talks over people of color. I consider it more important that I listen than speak on these issues.
That said, as pointed out, there is often little discussion when these topics come up, and I get how that can come across as dismissive or even hostile to people of color here. The last thing I want them to think is that we don't care or that we're complicit in downplaying or whitewashing these issues. Perhaps I need to do more to show support and care, which is undoubtedly better than silence.
It is wild out here in Denver. Protesters being shot at and run over. The interstate has been shit down. Tear gas, riot gear, the works.
https://twitter.com/bellers03/status/1266174838374313992?s=12
https://twitter.com/Joshuajered/status/1266200623306817536
Thanks for commenting. I hadn't heard about the Denver protests elsewhere. It seems like things are peaceful here in Chicago, I haven't heart otherwise.
A CNN crew has been arrested while covering Minneapolis protests, and the governor has apologized
(make sure to watch the video too)
Claiming they couldn't confirm them as press when there's video evidence of CNN crew confirming they were press is a bold move. Sow Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt, I guess.
Not surprised by this at all. US police brutality against people of color has been going on for decades. If you fail to provide justice or change, even after repeated protests, riots will happen.
People always say it's just a few bad apples, but it really feels systemic. It's sad to see.
It is systemic. It doesn’t matter if the majority of cops are good people (which they likely are) when the institution itself is so problematic.
Police scanner for Saint Paul:
https://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/13544
Edit: Been listening for the past two hours. I have heard:
Absolutely bizarre to me that some of the takes that I have seen on Twitter is that these riots are a force of chaotic good. Even takes saying the looters own all the stuff they are taking.
So I agree in the short term riots and looting have a negative effect, both on the community and on the progress towards justice (in that they reinforce racist stereotypes). But I also think riots and the threat of civil unrest can have a positive force in that they are one of the few things that can push the state towards actually holding the institution of the police accountable for the systemic injustices they tend to perpetuate. Sadly, people tend to pay attention much more to images of burning buildings than they do to black men being killed. In his speech "The Other America", MLK addressed the role and purpose of riots in America:
Riots are a loud shout that bring attention to conditions that those in power frequently, and often deliberately, ignore.
In the words of Kwame Toure, "In order for nonviolence to work, your opponent has to have a conscience. The United States has no conscience."
I agree that in the long run they can potentially help a cause move forward, but I think the bizarre thing to me is the lack of condemnation that Twitter activists are taking, even to the point of calling any condemnation of the rioting a racist act in and of itself. Not trying to straw man or anything, just when I read those types of takes, it kind of unnerves me. I can understand why things happen the way they do, but I wouldn't use that understanding to justify actions that demonstrably hurt innocent bystanders.
I should probably spend an afternoon reading about the different riots that have occurred in the US over the years and see what sort of outcomes resulted from them.
I think there is a lot of bitterness on Twitter and elsewhere that there seems to be a lot more concern over the riots than the original killing. Certainly on Twitter plenty of people were voicing their opinion on whether or not the riots were justified while they had been silent on this killing and others. Obviously not everyone, but a lot. And many of the takes regarding the riots adopt the framing that "people shouldn't riot because it decreases support/leads to backlash/is self-defeating". MLK addresses this in the same speech actually:
The fact is, any protest of police brutality invariably gets condemned by large swaths of the country (kneeling during the national anthem, for example). For my part, I have a hard time getting worked up over the destruction of property in the face of such blatant and widespread destruction of life these days.
I feel you there. It's the taxpayer's police station, they built it, and if they want to burn it down, that's their decision. They'll end up paying for the next one to be built too. Everything is falling apart in this country, has been for quite some time. Odds are the old one wasn't up to code anyway. :P
There was a small business burned down in my city under very similar circumstances. Nothing happened. Unless you want to count racist dog whistling on the local conservative talk shows?
Thinking of donating to some fund about all this with my first paycheck but I’m not too sure which one... I think the funerary one is already fully payed for, any tips? I’m absolutely heartbroken by all of this and I want to do the best I can as a white Canadian.
I donated to the Minnesota Freedom Fund, but I also saw tons of people doing so online so maybe it would be better to choose another one to spread the wealth around a bit.
There was a protest in Omaha last night at the busiest intersection in Nebraska. It started out like many other protests I've been to, with people on the sidewalks with signs and chanting, but it got tense when the cops showed up and people started blocking the street. I don't know which order those happened in, but I was worried about it turning into another Charlottesville situation where someone would get run over. There were two police helicopters circling and apparently the dispatcher had to talk the cops down from getting their dogs. They were clearly itching for a fight, they used tear gas multiple times when the protest hadn't been violent. After it got dark there were apparently some windows broken at the Target along that road, but everything that I'm hearing that happened after dark I'm taking with a grain of salt.
Some interesting related stories:
Wife Of Charged Ex-MPD Officer Derek Chauvin Files For Divorce
Minneapolis Public Schools board members have written a resolution terminating the school district's contract with the Minneapolis Police Department.
Clear as day in the video this time, you can see one officer commit slow, casual murder while three more stand around listening to the man beg for his life - for the crime of selling cigarettes (which is not a crime in the minds of the overwhelming majority of Americans regardless of the law). There is absolutely no room at all for selective interpretation and no way to make even the most pathetic excuses for what happened. That's why the officers were immediately fired instead of being suspended, but it wasn't enough. Now we know the officer that committed this murder had 18 complaints against him and his department has a similar pattern of suspicious behavior.
Normally I wouldn't expect this to escalate again, but seeing as how every single person in this country is one kind of pissed off or another over the economic recovery being bungled repeatedly at the expense of blue collar workers, and all of us being cooped up because of the virus, fuses are short. Probably the shortest they've been in five or six generations.
No new television, no new sports, no new movies, no new distractions other than fighting for toilet paper at the supermarket. More people out of work than people who are working. All of the talking heads on TV reduced to the same job as your average youtuber - which, when compared side by side, they come off almost universally worse than without the studio audience propping up their lame ass jokes.
Basically, people are pissed, out of work, and have a lot of time on their hands they can't easily fill with the same kind of mediocre entertainment or dead end job that's been keeping our version of bread and circuses going. But hey, there are riots on the internet, and we're all going to be watching them because we haven't got anything else to do, and we love a good riot (watching it, not being in it).
That's how I see it, anyway. This is as bad a situation as we've seen since the labor day riots.
The riots I saw did not seem to be spoiling for a fight. Most of them were relatively peaceful other than the fires and broken windows, and who is breaking those windows and setting those fires is a matter of subjective interpretation. The sheer stupidity of sabotaging a peaceful protest always gives me pause - it's as if the cops are daring people to go rogue and giving them permission. If you're going to be painted as violent no matter what, there is far less reason not to use violence. This country does not honor peaceful protests. They do nothing. The media barely covers them.
Those mobs won't remain peaceful if the response to those riots is armed escalation. All it'll take is a couple more dead people tonight and it could escalate rapidly into a country-wide shitshow. If the mobs burn down the wrong kinds of infrastructure during this pandemic, we're looking at food shortages, lack of hospital care, out of control covid cases with no way to track or treat them, and generally, a collapse of order in the affected areas (mostly, cities). That's your worst case scenario.
Honestly I worry a lot less about what happens in the USA than I do what happens outside of the USA if we end up distracted. If I were Russia or China I'd be taking advantage of that lapse of global oversight the instant the window of opportunity opens. Russia wants Ukraine back, China wants Hong Kong and Taiwan under their heel. If we blink, they'll move.
Edit: News is now reporting that the officer responsible for starting this mess has been taken into custody. That's good, it certainly lessens the likelihood of further escalation.
Small correction:
You're thinking of Eric Garner, another black man that was choked to death at the hands of a police officer (who got off scot-free). George Floyd was killed while being arrested for allegedly using a counterfeit $20 bill.
Of all the infuriating things about this story...this part doesn't get mentioned enough.
If you pay for something using a single counterfeit $20, it's just as likely that you're a victim of the crime of counterfeiting money as you are the perpetrator of that crime.
Even if the story about George Floyd paying with counterfeit money is true, it could simply mean that someone paid him for something using that counterfeit money, and Floyd had no reason to suspect it as counterfeit until a convenience store clerk used one of those counterfeit-detection pens on it. There is no reason to jump to the conclusion that Floyd himself is a counterfeiter.
Hell, there's no reason to point a gun at him at all, over an alleged $20 crime. According to the charging documents, that was the very first thing they did, before the 8 minutes and 46 seconds of kneeling:
Since we have many Tildes users from outside the US - this is known as the "American Police Bullshit" dialect of English. Allow me to translate.
The officer pulled out his gun and started shouting.
He pointed it at Mr. Floyd, through his open car window.
He shouted "SHOWMEYOURHANDS" and other commands.
Additionally, as I understand it, those counterfeit-detection pens are also bullshit. They don't actually detect anything useful:
Ah, you're right, I was conflating them. Thanks for the correction!
Hold on, what the fuck? Four cops showed up for a dude with a fake 20?
I had to report a fake 100 at work a few months ago. The cop took three hours to get there and he didn't know why he was there when he showed up.
Customs and Border Protection is flying an (unarmed) Predator drone over Minneapolis
An interesting detail - a friend who couldn't sleep read live tweets of support from Libanese protestors all night and suggestions for tactics and how to stay safe - while also acknowledging that they have been given these tips and tricks from Hong Kong protestors as a show of support in the same way.
Did Trump just designate anti fascists as terrorists? Holy shit...
He tried. Tweets aren’t policy directives though. I’m sure they’ll step up procedural harassment against antifa and BLM and any aligned movements. That’ll be stuff like auditing them to death or slow rolling paperwork so they have trouble collecting donations, spending money, or getting permits for things. But I don’t expect it to go much further than that just yet.
I'm not sure of how provable this is, I am sure this is not provable, but some people are contending that at least one of the people who started the looting / arson is a police officer: https://twitter.com/GypsyEyedBeauty/status/1266162964727562240According to this article, St. Paul police are claiming that person was not one of their officers. https://www.inquisitr.com/6080600/jacob-pederson-st-paul-protest/
Is it true? I'm not sure.
I think that a lot of people are claiming certainty that it is the same person; I don't think that there's actually enough information present to try to make a decision. It was an interesting (to me) subthread though, and reminded me of when Quebec police went undercover as protesters during a riot in Montebello Quebec.
I don't doubt that police have disguised themselves before and provoke protesters. I've heard tales that they pretended to be protestors during the various Occupy movements.
Other examples:
I've also seen pictures/videos of them in ambulances in order to round up or arrest protestors but am not finding any articles at the moment, so I'm not completely sure if they actually are or if it is taken out of context.
I agree fully that there is sparse evidence, and noted when I brought this up that this is not something that could be proved.
However, I don't think it is fair to say that this is "another story of internet justice gone wrong" as Toler wrote. This isn't throwing an innocent person under the bus of internet scrutiny; this is a smear on an already fully smeared police department that literally murdered a guy just days ago. It's not the same as many other incidents of internet justice. The specific officer that is mentioned may be innocent of this specific crime that he is being accused of, but this is not going to incite more people to be angry at him than already are, and it's mostly going to be used to try to incite action against the department.
Protests here in Seattle have gotten violent.
About 15 minutes ago, I got an "emergency alert" notification pushed to my phone that they're imposing an immediate curfew on downtown.
edit: several cop cars were set on fire. one of the rioters grabbed an AR-15 from the back of a squad car and was almost immediately disarmed by an undercover cop.
Speaking of, saw this on /r/Seattle earlier (linked to article with video since the original tweet was deleted):
https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2020/05/30/43799417/kid-at-seattle-protest-was-allegedly-maced-by-cop
edit: Another crazy video from Seattle:
https://old.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/gtoibp/a_man_undercover_cop_disarms_a_rioter_that_took_a/
(apparently the man who disarmed the protestor was not a cop but was security for Q13 (local news station)
I think I'm more pissed off right now than I can ever remember being.
Official Seattle PD policy is that officials must turn off their bodycams at protests.
and also, carrying enough batteries to keep those bodycams running would be hard.
badge numbers covered up with tape
They still seem to be escalating.
Just check out maps.snapchat.com and click anywhere you see heat on the map. Tons of protest snaps minutes old in damn near every single city I click on. The news is reporting this as if it's just a handful of cities. It's much bigger than that.
Is this something a non - American should care about? I am trying to stay away from politics and similar provocative contents.
Americans haven't rioted in this scale as a reaction to something in a while. That's a pretty big deal. This will also bring counter protestors of people like the alt-right to the fray. The worst of the US will show itself a few months before the 2020 elections and if those elections go to shit this could happen again, but worse.
Our news outlets are very keen to dissect and scrutinize whatever trump says, But I've heard little to nothing about these riots, just some protest is going on in Minneapolis. I wonder why.
Well, you've got riots a few months before very important elections. This could go one of many ways, from blowing up big time (a much more divided society), to fizzling out and keeping the injustices in the US in place, to leading to systemic change for the better.
Right now? Wait and see. I suppose right now it's mostly national news and once it gets bigger you'll hear about it.
Racism and institutional structures of oppression are not unique to the US, so I guess so. But this is largely an internal affair and probably won’t affect your life as a non-American. That being said, I think I’m general people should care enough about injustices anywhere to at least be aware of them, even if you don’t feel the need to participate.
What are these protesters trying achieve? Is there any demand, or is it just a demonstration? Its not that I don't care about injustices, I have a habit of getting into unnecessary fights with people on internet, so I thought its best I just ignore the provocative news atleast for a while. I would've supported them in the real world if I could, Its just not worth it for me to get into fight with internet vigilantes.
It's coming to a head following a decade (for privileged folks) of public debate over unnecessary force used by police across the nation. I suppose the demand would be "indict those police officers", but in general, many people want systemic changes to prevent these legal murders in the future.
The recurring notion I am seeing is that everyone wants external elected personnel in charge of investigating police and keeping them significantly more in check than the current system with Internal Affairs, lenient prosecutors and lenient judgement sentences. The hope is to weed out more of the overly aggressive asshole officers before they get several more chances to abuse their power. Which the current officer who killed George Floyd was an overly aggressive asshole with multiple complaints (18 or 19) and has been involved in a killing in the past.
Not really. I mean it IS relevant as news and all love to the protestors but - as a fellow non-American who spent a day reading up on it on US news sites I can say it was a rabbit hole that perhaps wasn't worth it to that extent.
It's a riot due to systemic racism in the US (systemic racism exist elsewhere too ofc) and being along US racism lines (black v white etc) and a protest against it.
Hopefully the protestors make good headway
India
I also worry about all of those issues including Modi getting more approval from people despite his actions. The thing is I worried/cared too much it affected my sanity and day to day life, I couldn't focus on anything, that's why I am trying to reduce political news. I dont mean any disrespect..
Louisville, KY according to: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/7-shot-during-protests-louisville-police-say-n1217576. Not Ohio.