Minneapolis Social Injustice and Related

[Saab2000]

Hey some of you are my friends, some may even be clients, so I don’t wanna offend or alienate. But the tree we’re trying to cut down here grew from a seed planted by Chauvin and his ilk. Without his actions, the reactions of others would never be necessary.

If the police (state) speaks a language, it also has to understand it when the people use it in the same conversation.

I am neither alienated nor offended. But I have a different opinion. I certainly respect yours. Change in policing needs to happen.

It would be terrific if any law enforcement present in this forum could speak from their experience.

[mjbabcock]

It would be terrific if any law enforcement present in this forum could speak from their experience.

I think law enforcement has a pretty powerful and well understood voice. I don’t want to hear from them. I think it’s time we listened to the black voices who are telling us about the police. If I went to protest the local fire department...it would be just me. There wouldn't be thousands in the streets ready to burn it down. The response across cities in the US is telling.

[zachateseverything]

I fully support people protesting about this and even getting a little rowdy at these protests. What I don't understand is why there are so many videos of young white males with sketchy tattoos starting fires and breaking windows. especially in cities that aren't Minneapolis.

[Saab2000]

I fully support people protesting about this and even getting a little rowdy at these protests. What I don't understand is why there are so many videos of young white males with sketchy tattoos starting fires and breaking windows. especially in cities that aren't Minneapolis.

These I would guess are the white supremacists, Q conspiracy theorists, etc. inspired and egged on by the chief of their order at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

[ron l edmiston]

-- if you want to destroy someone or something --- go after your local, state and national professional politicians allowing the bad police, bad living conditions and no opportunities to exit or change...
look at the net worth of these persons relative to the day they took office and their present...
look at Chicago inner city deaths, opportunities and status today relative to past 10+ years... would you/i want to live there or raise a family? would you want to open a business or handcrafted bicycle shop?

you can't bring life into this world and say go fend for yourself --- you become prey of your environment...

tammy and i are doing our best to $ support the needs of "all persons" "all animal life" to the best of our ability...
we are blessed.., not just lip service, or finger-pointing or past subjectiveness...

"Our" World is our bottom line, God knows my past destructiveness...

the "gun shops" are lined-up and still no/nothing done by the professional politicians --- both isle sides...


with a respectful smile to all of you
ronnie

[mnoble485]

C1E3F919-545F-4E0B-BA69-D7D9A56367FA.jpg

This was MLK in 1967. At the time I was 18 and living at Ft. Knox as my father was a career officer. I can’t swear I remember this as it happened but when I read it today it brought back a flood of memories. How is it possible that what I found reprehensible in 1967 is still going on today. I feel like I have failed the test.

Mike

[caleb]

That's sort of how I feel about it. No violence. As justified as the rage is, and it is justified, violence isn't an answer for more reasons than I can list here.

Let's start with how these businesses put food on the tables of children and roofs over their heads. Do we really want hungry or homeless children because their parents' business or home is burned?

No violence. No matter what.

There seems to be a deliberate ignorance of the context where these fires are happening in the national discussion.

What you and I and everyone from Minneapolis knows, is that despite what the pictures might show, the back sides of Lake Street (29th and 31st Streets) are mostly single family homes. When you burn a building on Lake Street, you're burning directly across the alley from wood frame houses with old wooden garages that sit right on the alley line. The lots are 50-75 feet wide, usually with large trees on the lots. Once started, fire would easily go roof to roof.

There is absolutely no way you can start a large structure on fire on Lake Street with any confidence you will not commit mass murder in the process. Thousands or tens of thousands of people could realistically die. To advocate or excuse arson in this context is to do the same for potential mass murder.

I fully support any degree of force necessary to stop the arson. Stopping a direct threat on the lives of tens of thousands rightfully trumps all other concerns.

[ElvisMerckx]

What did peaceful protest get Colin Kaepernick?

A multi-million dollar deal from Nike? The better rhetorical question is, what did peaceful protest get Dr. Martin Luther King?

[Corso]

These I would guess are the white supremacists, Q conspiracy theorists, etc. inspired and egged on by the chief of their order at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

And I would guess more likely ANTIFA and their ilk, but if you feel better blaming the one who gets blamed for everything under the sun, so be it.

But neither of us knows at this moment in time, so why start pointing fingers?


I DO understand the beef with the police. What I don't understand is the riots, more law breaking, that only brings out the police, which are then taunted verbally and physically to defend themselves with the same violence your protesting. 13 states have called out the National Guard in response to the "protest". So now the protesters have upped the anti significantly.

So how will the above change anything? Protestors have just created a new level of armed authoritative response by their actions.

A bigger mess is made, and it moves further away from the few bad Police. I still believe most are good.

[mjbabcock]

Did you read the MLK quote...?

[beeatnik]

I'm ambivalent and I don't know exactly why. Maybe all my rage dissipated after I made it through my 20's alive. In that decade, I paid over $10,000 in fines ($30K in today's dollars) for minor traffic infractions, sat on many curbs while my license and registration were being run (I thought this was normal), had guns pointed at me on multiple occasions because I didn't instantly understand shouted commands. I'm ok with the dynamics of violence but I think it's problematic if organizers are coming into a city like LA and instigating.

[GrantM]

I am sorry that on occasion Law Enforcement gets it wrong. They should be and usually are punished. My experience with them has always been positive unless I am doing something I am not supposed to be doing. And that's the point of my little story here is that if people are doing what they are supposed to be doing very little of this kind of thing occurs. That's what I taught my son, to do what he was supposed to. And that's the way I live my life to the best of my ability.

I don't think the view that "occasionally" this goes wrong accurately characterizes the problem with policing.
These examples keep happening in low income neighbourhoods of colour for a reason - failed police policy.
We don't see cops choking out white pot-heads in rich gated communities.

Have a read of Matt Taibbi's book "i can't breathe", about the Eric Garner case of choking in NYC.
I Can't Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street - Wikipedia

He spent 3 years riding with cops, and getting deep into the systematic problems of police policy that lead to these events.
While there is a certain amount of personal responsibility on the part of the officers that commit these terrible behaviours
in minority communities, the much larger points are the systematic failings and unscientific policing methods that
send the police into neighbourhoods of colour to criminalize poverty and harass the citizens to make arrest quotas.

The fact that a police officer and victim meet at the crossroads of one of these terrible events is predictable,
and it keeps happening because of failed policing policy. This is why it's so dangerous to believe, as you suggest,
that "minding your own business" is going to keep you out of the crosshairs of bad police action, because there
needs to be significant changes to the way police interact with citizens if you live in a poor community.

-g

[vertical_doug]

Ironic today is the 99th Anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre.

My daughter and I are going to watch Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing. It feels worse now than in the 80's when that movie was made.

[theflashunc]

And I would guess more likely ANTIFA and their ilk, but if you feel better blaming the one who gets blamed for everything under the sun, so be it.

But neither of us knows at this moment in time, so why start pointing fingers?


I DO understand the beef with the police. What I don't understand is the riots, more law breaking, that only brings out the police, which are then taunted verbally and physically to defend themselves with the same violence your protesting. 13 states have called out the National Guard in response to the "protest". So now the protesters have upped the anti significantly.

So how will the above change anything? Protestors have just created a new level of armed authoritative response by their actions.

A bigger mess is made, and it moves further away from the few bad Police. I still believe most are good.

And yet armed white protestors stormed the state capitol in Michigan not even a month ago, forcing the state legislature to end session and leave the building, and yet no tear gas fired, no riot shields were brought out. No "riot" was quelled by police.

Only one real difference between the groups in Detroit and the groups in Minneapolis.

Want to slow down the riots? Arrest all four of those fuckers for starters. Minny PD was arresting journalists covering the protests before they even arrested the asshole who is on film murdering a defenseless man.

And if we're tossing King quotes around, this is one that I find most applicable from Trayvon Martin on down:

I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

[vertical_doug]

53 yrs later, this still rings completely true. Nothing is new.

[jjmstang]

And yet armed white protestors stormed the state capitol in Michigan not even a month ago, forcing the state legislature to end session and leave the building, and yet no tear gas fired, no riot shields were brought out. No "riot" was quelled by police.

Only one real difference between the groups in Detroit and the groups in Minneapolis.

Want to slow down the riots? Arrest all four of those fuckers for starters. Minny PD was arresting journalists covering the protests before they even arrested the asshole who is on film murdering a defenseless man.

And if we're tossing King quotes around, this is one that I find most applicable from Trayvon Martin on down:

Yes they stormed the capital ? YES
Did they destroy anything ? NO
Did they loot anything ? NO
Did they light anything on fire and burn it down ? NO

What they did was for cause and effect only.

They didn't burn their own neighbor to the ground ? NO

VERY BIG DIFFERENCE

[htwoopup]

This may not be the place (perhaps the other thread is)...but I respectfully ask that you read this article and try to imagine yourself in her shoes. It makes me sad for this country that a large number of folks don’t get it.

Just imagine walking in those shoes...or more appropriately with that skin...

Living Abroad Is My Way of Prolonging My Black Son’s Life - The New York Times

[e-RICHIE]

Yes they stormed the capital ? YES
Did they destroy anything ? NO
Did they loot anything ? NO
Did they light anything on fire and burn it down ? NO

What they did was for cause and effect only.

They didn't burn their own neighbor to the ground ? NO

VERY BIG DIFFERENCE

Wait. How sure are you, here, that what happened in Minneapolis was caused by folks from Minneapolis? The reports I read said that 80% of those arrested were from out of state.

[Sbti]

Antifa: This weekend's dogwhistle and talking point of StateTV, resident and Billy(Roy Cohn)Barr.

[Corso]

My daughter lives in Raleigh, NC. A good friend of hers just had her family owned restaurant totally destroyed. Rioters smashed windows, got in, turned on the gas stoves and set the place on fire. Another restaurant owner (who was guarding his place across the street) witnessed the break in, ran into the place - smelled gas, and knew how to find and activate the emergency cut-off. There are apartments above the restaurant, a gas explosion may have taken out more than just one place. As it is, many are out of their homes.

After seeing the family fight to stay in business during Covid, my daughter is heartbroken. It's all gone now.

They did nothing to deserve this. I honestly can't believe some think this is somehow "good" and is going to help with the core problem.