Riots are popping up all over the country now.
I was a big fan of Killer Mike both musically but also from the various press interviews and tv segments i had seen him host. I think this was a great speech that he made regarding the riots in Atlanta, and all over the country:
I think this is a great speech from Killer Mike on the subject: Killer Mike - Atlanta - Mayor's Press Conference #georgefloyd - YouTube
It was a good speech. I respect him.
I’m of mixed feelings regarding the riots. I’ve been in peaceful protests before to try to protect my people and the things we care about, and it doesn’t always work. I’ve had water cannons and rubber pellets shot at me for standing, holding signs, and singing, and in the end we were shut down. Sometimes peaceful protesting isn’t enough to bring change, and I think there’s examples of that around the entire world, not just in the U.S.
There are definitely people out there taking advantage of the riots and doing things that do nothing to honor George Floyd or any of the other people who have been killed, but not all. If you believe that not all cops are bad (which I do) then not all protestors are bad. There’s good and bad on both sides, and while I don’t respect the people I’ve seen on video breaking into cash registers of looted stores, I’ve seen a lot of cops treat my family and friends of color differently throughout my life and I don’t respect that either.
Some blacks kill blacks, some blacks can be racist towards whites and other races, some cops are great people, some white cops are great people, some whites are not racist to anyone, etc. I don’t group people together based on the actions of a few, but in this particular case I think the cop who killed Floyd should be in prison. Floyd may or may not have been a horrible guy and may or may not have given the cops a lot of trouble when they approached him, but you had 4 cops with guns and one handcuffed guy on his stomach on the street. Kneeling on his neck seems unnecessary, let alone for long enough to kill him.
I don’t know…@Californiagrown did you want a discussion of the entire event or just Killer Mike’s speech? I’m sorry if I’ve gone in a different direction of what you wanted - I can remove my post.
MLK accomplished more than every race riot combined. Peaceful protests look forward while riots look back. It’s no wonder that where there have been violent “protests”, things were worse after.
From the outside looking in, I’m not going to begin explaining why I’m sure I can’t understand the racial and civic divides in the US.
However, it does appear as though the US political establishment’s first port of call to accusations of institutional or societal racism, or even bias, is a knee-jerk denial that any problem exists, which doesn’t help keep things peaceful.
Ballot or bullet, simple as. A number of peaceful protests (taking a knee comes to mind) have been met with the same flat denial. People don’t riot without grievance, no matter how many times they’re told they don’t have one. If they’re not listened to, they speak another language.
This isn’t to deny that there are clearly some opportunistic criminals propagating the worst of the violence, but to ignore the complicity of the federal and state leadership in allowing conditions to deteriorate to this state is a mistake.
I’m really relieved and glad to see that there hasn’t any interracial violence, like after Rodney King. Or any kind of violent militia vigilante-ism.
Not to condone or cheer on destruction, looting or arson.
Where was the outrage then?
If people want to discuss better screening/training for cops that is great. Fight against police brutality/ excessive force no problem but, this BS about racism is just a cover to divide the nation and build racial tension. What is the goal? Civil war? Martial Law?
I’m not entirely sure that you can quantify this. (EDIT: I take this back. I agree.) I think MLK was a great guy, and I’m sure that if he was alive today he’d be disappointed in what many protestors are doing, but how long are people supposed to be peaceful?
Like @cynical_stu said, people got mad over someone kneeling. Is that’s not okay, what is?
My great grandmother and her fellow AIM members stormed the BIA office in D.C. and occupied it after being ignored on the reservations they were left to. There was destruction, but it was contained to one building, that I’m sure was insured. They occupied Alcatraz, and they occupied a tiny church in a tiny town in South Dakota, where the government spent $500k+ for the miltary to surround them and shoot at them. My grandmother has the bullet scars on her body that she received for sitting in a church.
They’d spent 500 years having thing after thing taken from them. They were fed up. Peaceful protests didn’t help them and when we tried again in 2016, we were attacked. I’m not saying you’re wrong, but I really don’t know that peaceful protesting will always be the solution.
I saw a picture on CNN (I think), and my family in Minneapolis confirmed, that there are plenty of (white) dudes walking around with guns. I don’t think they’ve so far killed anyone (I think only one protestor has died? I believe a store owner killed him, could be wrong), but I wouldn’t put it past an angry or intoxicated redneck with a grudge and a gun.
I hope it doesn’t happen though.
The problem I have is with the people who riot is that they haven’t even let the legal system take its course. Maybe because they are just looking for an excuse to justify bad behaviour, robbing and looting, and violence. It could be anything that allows them to satisfy their lust for violence and anarchy, these troublemakers aren’t interested in peaceful protest, or meaningful change.
No, I agree, the violence mars the very legitimate grievance of this case, and then there’s always the argument that such furore over a pending case will prejudice the inevitable court appearance. The violence may end up hurting the very cause it’s protesting for.
However, even then it seems like the authorities were largely inactive until public pressure raised the profile of the case.
I think, if anything, it’s this inaction which fuels the main grievance and ties into the narrative of “killer cops”. This community has seen inaction before and believe that only public outrage will lead to (delayed) justice. Which goes back to my point that this powder keg has been created by state and federal authorities and their abysmal (deliberate or unintentional) public messaging.
No, it has been created by SJW’s and the medias selective reporting.
When they take several days to even charge anyone and then it will be months (or even years with all the backlog due to COVID shutdowns) before he gets to trial you can’t really blame people for getting upset and lashing out in some way. It is a problem when they start looting stores and stuff like that because it becomes counterproductive to the original point of protesting, attacking the police station or the cop’s house makes a lot more sense.
The other thing is that right now due to the shutdowns you have more people than ever unemployed, broke, hopeless, and with little left to lose, plus it’s easy to get bail and in most of North America they let a large proportion of prisoners out of jail. There has never been a better time for rioting and looting.
This among many, many other articles would counterpoint: Police Shootings: Black Americans Disproportionately Affected [Infographic]
Heck, that second article you posted shows that twice as many white folks where killed by police as black folks. Black folks account for 13% of the population while white folks account for 72%. This shows that black folks are disproportionally affected by police shootings.
The goal of this unrest and riots etc is to demonstrate how fed up people are with a seemingly cavalier attitude of cops towards the safety and health of anyone they arrest. Many, many people have experienced or seen abuses from cops in the past go unpunished and can sympathize. Cops hold an incredible power, and consequently responsibility, within our society and have a history of systemic racism in many areas yet they seemingly have little oversight and a culture of protecting your own, protecting the badge, thin blue line, etc.
I think a lot of progress has been made towards police oversight (mandatory body cams is huge), and changing the insular culture, but i think a lot more needs to be done as well because of the power they hold.
Ah of course, I forgot, it was CNN killed a black man in custody, and the Huffington Post who did nothing about it until community pressure got too much.
And you’re absolutely right, federal authorities have handled it sublimely! Lord praise Donald Trump for his stoic leadership! God knows how bad this could have gone without his semi-coherent calls to unleash the military on US civilians.
I know Americans sometimes struggle with British sarcasm but there were some free examples. If you haven’t got anything better to contribute than vague and baseless “SJWs” and “MSM” did it, leave the discussion.
I just read that something like only 20% of protestors arrested are even from Minneapolis. Almost 80% aren’t even from Minnesota.
The authorities are hamstrung by their own PC policies and influence from leftist politicians. I think all this pandering to minorities, bending over backwards to placate them for some usually perceived injustice, fuels disunity in society. Sure address real grievances, but keep one law for everyone, no special treatment.
You don’t see Asian American or European Americans behave this way when someone from their race is the subject of excessive force, or unjustly killed by Police. Not just in America but all over the western world.
You have grievous systemic cover ups by Politicians, Police, and the legal system, and the media of muslim rape gangs in Britain over 20 years. Yet you still don’t see rioting.
Justine Damond a white woman, whp commited absolutely no crime, was shot and killed in the very same state, Minnesota a few years ago without reason by a local cop, former African refugee. He was psychologically unsuited to being a cop, but was no doubt hired to look good for PC quotas. No riots, due process was taken and the perpetrator was found guilty, and jailed.
You don’t think there is a connection between those things?
When the other side has the power, you have no choice. You won’t scare them into submission but you might do something better: get them to change their minds.
These are explanations, but they are not valid justifications. If the rest of society behaved like this there would be no society left, just anarchy.
Dude, you just said that white people do nothing when their women get gang raped by muslims or killed by cops, but black folks riot when a black person is subject to excessive force or unjust killing.
But you have a problem with the reactions of black folks? wtf?