[RD] George Floyd and protesting while black

[Cloud_Strife]

Institution is the last barrier between liberal kids with asthma and rapists, murderers, drug dealers. Burn the institution to the ground is a nice slogan (maybe) that comes to mind of a 16 y. old, but unrealistic. You need these cops, while they need a job. So you’ll have to compromise, look for a solution. Or we can talk for another 20 pages how you have implicit bias against bigots. It’s getting repetitive and unproductive.

What exactly is the compromise between the police not terrorizing communities and being allowed to terrorize them? Only being able to do it half of the time? Get real man.

 

[Kyriakos]

The police is needed in any country, but clearly the US police has systemic issues which aren't that common in other "western"/european countries. Life seems to be very cheap for US policemen and they are way too scared for their own life to be able to function as protectors of the public. They seem to be more of a mercenary force of the state, which has no ties or allegiances to the actual population and is answerable only to the emperor paying its bills.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

The police is needed in any country, but clearly the US police has systemic issues which aren't that common in other "western"/european countries. Life seems to be very cheap for US policemen and they are way too scared for their own life to be able to function as protectors of the public. They seem to be more of a mercenary force of the state, which has no ties or allegiances to the actual population and is answerable only to the emperor paying its bills.

Accurate, 100%

 

[Zardnaar]

Accurate, 100%

Pretty much,our cops are fairly nice.

Interesting article earlier about militarization of the police.

Street protests probably pointless though.

 

[Cloud_Strife]

American police's origins are in returning runaway slaves, breaking up strikes and protests, keeping various groups down with the threat of violence, so is it any wonder why so many have no desire to be peaceful when it's literally baked into the job?

The tree is rotten, the basis on which cops operate is inherently flawed and discriminatory and reform simply can't change that fact

 

[Gorbles]

Institution is the last barrier between liberal kids with asthma and rapists, murderers, drug dealers. Burn the institution to the ground is a nice slogan (maybe) that comes to mind of a 16 y. old, but unrealistic. You need these cops, while they need a job. So you’ll have to compromise, look for a solution. Or we can talk for another 20 pages how you have implicit bias against bigots. It’s getting repetitive and unproductive.

This seems like a false equivalence to me. Both of the statements here, actually.

 

[Cloud_Strife]

This seems like a false equivalence to me. Both of the statements here, actually.

It's all they can do.

Cop's mace a 15 year old girl and then kick her in the face whilst she's on the floor, blinded:

https://twitter.com/JeffShafer/status/1268684973604814857

Remember; this is who they chose to defend. This is who they chose to argue for.

No humanity.

 

[Farm Boy]

This seems like a false equivalence to me. Both of the statements here, actually.

I agree, you don't really need to complicate the fact that the "burn it to the ground costs be damned" people are stupid pricks.

 

[Arwon]

There were protests in Sydney today. Social distancing was definitely not being observed, though lots of people had the fig-leaf of a mask.

The protest required authorisation. The government had granted one but attempted to revoke it when it looked like the numbers were going beyond the 500 person limit on public gatherings. The protest organisers had to go to Court to seek approval for the protest, and last night the NSW Supreme Court refused to provide authorisation. This didn't make it illegal as such - it was still perfectly legal for anyone to go outside into a public gathering of less than 10 people. But it meant that there was no exemption from the usual provisions of the criminal law which protests require in order to function, such as laws about obstructing traffic.

The protest was due to commence at 3pm today and it was clear that lots of people were going to attend. The NSW Court of Appeal overturned last night's decision at 2:30pm, and so it went ahead legally and (as far as I'm aware) without incident.

I'm ambivalent about it, to be honest, because although Australia obviously has a problem with Aboriginal incarceration and treatment by police, which is worth protesting, there is not so much a rationale here for protesting about it now. Through almost three months of severe restrictions, NSW is now at a stage where there are only 1 or 2 new coronavirus cases every day. People have missed out on weddings, funerals, and all sorts of civic activities, in order to comply with these rules. That suggests that in order to disregard those rules, there should be a pretty pressing reason. I'm not sure what the marches here achieve in an immediate sense (although the NSW government's attempt to revoke permission certainly Streisand-ed the publicity). They also risk being a magnet for lots of blame.

On the other hand, it's worth noting that the NSW government is being quite inconsistent - a few hours after they attempted to ban the protest, it was announced that they'd approved a return of football crowds next week. There's also a whole lot of other activity that is now allowed, such as markets - there are pictures of crowded markets in lily white areas of Sydney being packed to the brim this morning. I certainly do not agree that those things should be allowed at this stage either, given there is still community transmission. The government approach certainly seems to place the protests on a lower rung of importance to economic activity.

Cops attacked a group of people at Central after corralling them into the platform space - https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...08bd75dbb62ef8#block-5edb70298f08bd75dbb62ef8

This included bystanders and passers-by, pretty nasty stuff. A first hand account here.

 

[Syno]

"Burn it all done" is a perfectly acceptable viewpoint for passionate protesters to hold. As mentioned pages and pages and pages ago, it's not their job to come up with peer-reviewed alternatives. They're doing the work of forcing change. There are others who can figure out what that change can be. These protesters aren't demanding a frivolous change; they're protesting a great injustice that's been operating nearly unchecked for decades upon decades. You don't need a studied solution to know an evil must be resisted.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

American police's origins are in returning runaway slaves, breaking up strikes and protests, keeping various groups down with the threat of violence, so is it any wonder why so many have no desire to be peaceful when it's literally baked into the job?

The tree is rotten, the basis on which cops operate is inherently flawed and discriminatory and reform simply can't change that fact

To be accurate though this is hardly unique. Cops as organ of the state operating on threat of violence was around long before there was a USA.

 

[Farm Boy]

"Burn it all done" is a perfectly acceptable viewpoint for passionate protesters to hold. As mentioned pages and pages and pages ago, it's not their job to come up with

No, it's not specifically thiers. And yes, for an idiot jackass, burn it all done is a perfectly time tested view. It's awful for the awful. But, we work with what we have.

 

[Syno]

No, it's not specifically thiers. And yes, for an idiot jackass, burn it all done is a perfectly time tested view. It's awful for the awful. But, we work with what we have.

There are very few who are literal about the phrase. Most of the ones who genuinely suggest outright abolition are children or the anarchist equivalent of a libertarian. They're angry or they're operating in an echo chamber of a book-born philosophy, or they're both. In this case, it's probably best to see the sentiment instead of the words. Law enforcement as it is cannot move forward without propping up injustice. "Burn it all down" may not work in practice, but you need to feel it to make something different possible.

But can you see a way forward which doesn't entail the dismantling of the system? Something has to replace it, and that's tricky, but the problems don't seem solvable with tweaks and sweet words.

 

[cardgame]

But have you tried just increasing the police budget without any tweaks OR sweet words?

 

[Traitorfish]

Institution is the last barrier between liberal kids with asthma and rapists, murderers, drug dealers. Burn the institution to the ground is a nice slogan (maybe) that comes to mind of a 16 y. old, but unrealistic. You need these cops, while they need a job. So you’ll have to compromise, look for a solution. Or we can talk for another 20 pages how you have implicit bias against bigots. It’s getting repetitive and unproductive.

There's an unstated leap from "you need cops" to "you need these cops"; from "you need some sort of law-enforcement" to "you need these specific police departments, staffed by these specific people". This is far from self-evident.

Far before we even touch any deeper political questions of the role of law enforcement, the option of dissolving individual police departments is absolutely on the table.

 

[H4run]

But can you see a way forward which doesn't entail the dismantling of the system? Something has to replace it, and that's tricky, but the problems don't seem solvable with tweaks and sweet words.

In order something to be replace, the object of replacement first needed to be torn down. This is the opposite of something that need to be fix, which the target can remain exist, but the question is, is it fixable?

 

[Farm Boy]

No, they're fixed, as they can be, for a little while, by gritty case by case department by department. And good efforts will wear off and need fought for again. Oversight would be a solid win. I think it's a necessary one.

Of course its as fixable as anything similar is fixable. Kind of. The proponents of past forgiveness are new world order types. They're rarely new and they're rarely for order.

 

[cardgame]

Oversight without disciplinary or criminal accountability isn't oversight, it's just a watchdog without teeth. A lot of places already have "oversight" committees and they can't do anything without the cooperation of the police chief and/or Union and/or district attorney

 

[rah]

But until they can routinely fire/punish police that have many complaints against them for excessive force there will be no fixing.
And that starts with the union.

 

[H4run]

No, they're fixed

I mean the institution is needed to "fixed" or "repaired", with adding, removing and changing some of its part, which is so far, unless I miss something, I'm not yet seeing that happening. I just read there are another 2 victim died today, one from a shot, the other from tear gas.