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- - baltimore (http://cellar.org/showthread.php?t=30824)

Quote:

Since 1935, nearly every so-called race riot in the United States—and there have been more than 100—has been sparked by a police incident, Muhammad says. This can be an act of brutality, or a senseless killing. But the underlying causes run much deeper. Police, because they interact in black communities every day, are often seen as the face of larger systems of inequality in the justice system, employment, education and housing.

So far the violent rioters who deserve universal condemnation have killed fewer people than were killed in the incident that immediately triggered the protest. Let alone the incidents and atmosphere that turned that incident into a trigger.

Quote:

Originally Posted by henry quirk (Post 927020)

Lamp,

What it is about being a cop that insulates him or her from a bullet to the head?
What is about being a cop that insulates his or her house from burning?
Nuthin' and nuthin'.
I suspect your respect for (or fear of) law enforcers has you thinkin'
they're better, bigger, smarter, stronger, than they are.
Cops are just people.
Just ask the families and friends of cops killed on, and off, duty.

And: I'm not the one "changing the basic issue of (my) thread".
Go back to my first post, read what follows from others, point
(and wag) your finger at them (and yourself).

Sure, cops are human beings that can be hurt/killed
... but not "Nuthin' and nuthin'"

What insulates your neighbor cop who has harmed your family is multi-fold:

1) Primarily the governmental and social structures that protect
and make each individual cop and law enforcement overall
"better, bigger, smarter, stronger" than you.

2) Your self interest of not being killed/harmed/imprisioned by other cops

3) Your self interest for your family being harmed or ostracised by society

4) Your ethics and moral code to maintain your family and property

So repeating myself in slightly different terms...
You, HQ, can not settle your grievance with this neighbor cop who
has harmed you/your family, without in some way of engaging others
who "aren't party to the insult or injury", or relying on laws/rules of society...

And now add this:
5) or, having your nephew say: "But that is crazy, Uncle"

I think I am presenting your own arguments to say the isolated individual
is impotent against the misdeeds of law enforcement.
Otherwise their action is "crazy"
... until they gain a tool or power over something of value to law enforcement.

For those without $ or political resources, this turns out to be
"breaking the peace" (riots) and destroying "sh#t".
So for them in their world, they are not being "crazy"

Spexx,

“What a bunch of a-holes, right Henry?”

I never said that (and I didn’t imply it either).

#

Happy Monkey,

“universal condemnation”

That hasn’t come from me, not directly or by implication.

#

Lamp,

“You, HQ, can not settle your grievance”

Underlining it don’t make it so.

Your laundry list of ‘why you can’t’: each, all, easily navigated (as illustrated by the number of unsolved police deaths).

“I think I am presenting your own arguments to say the isolated individual is impotent against the misdeeds of law enforcement.”

I’m sorry you feel impotent (as an individual), Lamp. Explains a lot, though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by henry quirk (Post 927012)

Toad,

“your basic philosophy”

What is my ‘basic philosophy’?

It was clear in context, which remains available for you to read harder.

Quote:

“I assure you it doesn't.”

I disagree, but: as you like.

Stated feelings are not really up for disagreement. "I'm not angry with you." "Yes you are." Well, fuck, where do we go from there? "No I'm not." "Augh, you've got me there." Nice thread we're having?

Quote:

“I think I am presenting your own arguments to say the isolated individual
is impotent against the misdeeds of law enforcement.”

I’m sorry you feel impotent (as an individual), Lamp. Explains a lot, though.

When your arguments fail, divert to non-sequiturs and ad hominems.

Toad,

"It was clear in context"

What is clear 'in context': you have no clue what I believe (you think you do, but you don't). So: be clear, state what you think my philosophy is.

And: no, I won't be stating it for you. You accuse me of incoherence based on 'my philosophy'. The burden is on you to back it up by stating what you think 'is' my philosophy.

If you can't or won't: your claim of my incoherence is null and void.

"Stated feelings are not really up for disagreement."

Of course they are. I believe you find me distasteful. You claim otherwise. I don't believe you.

We disagree.

However, there's no profit for me or you in dickin' around with it so -- as I say up thread -- 'as you like.'

Lamp,

My point: I, as individual, don't feel impotent.

You, perhaps, do.

Now, beat that drum some more.

HQ: They are burning down their own pharmacy. That is crazy.
UT: It's not their pharmacy.
HQ: In the context of what I'm saying, "their" means the pharmacy in their town.
UT: But if a pharmacy was burning in "your" neighborhood you wouldn't give a shit. That's your basic philosophy: your responsibility absolutely ends at your own self-interest.
HQ: Unless it was the only pharmacy available, in which case I would try to put out the fire, because it was in my self-interest.

~

UT: Look on television, HQ is simply letting his pharmacy burn.
HQ's nephew: Why would he do that? That is crazy.*
UT: I don't know Beast, but by his own definition, it's HIS pharmacy, in HIS town, and he's letting it burn.
HQ's nephew: That is crazy.
UT: You know what's crazier? HQ has described you as HIS child.
HQ's nephew: Oh no! Would Uncle allow me to burn?
UT: It appears so, if you were not in his self-interest.
HQ's nephew: Gosh!** How can I stay in his self-interest?
UT: I guess you should remain the only child available.

*HQ's nephew does not use contractions.
**HQ's nephew is from a 1950s family TV comedy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by henry quirk (Post 927033)

Lamp,
My point: I, as individual, don't feel impotent....

I feel you are, but won't realize (or admit to) it.
We disagree.

Quote:

Stated feelings are not really up for disagreement.
"I'm not angry with you." "Yes you are." Well, fuck, where do we go from there?
"No I'm not." "Augh, you've got me there." Nice thread we're having?

'nouf said

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spexxvet (Post 927023)

They rioted, and 5 were killed by authorities. Then they entered a business and destroyed goods that were intended for them to buy. Then they violently attacked the authorities.

What a bunch of a-holes, right Henry?

Quote:

Originally Posted by henry quirk (Post 927027)

Spexx,

“What a bunch of a-holes, right Henry?”

I never said that (and I didn’t imply it either).

"'But that's crazy, Uncle!'

'Yes, Beast, it is.'"

That's crazy, right Henry?

Today in history... April 29, 1992

In 1992, rioting resulting in 55 deaths erupted in Los Angeles after a jury in Simi Valley, California,
acquitted four Los Angeles police officers of almost all state charges in the videotaped beating of Rodney King.

.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce (Post 927066)

God Damn Right.

TL;DR: White Americans have a different relationship with the police than black Americans do. So however glib your comment and that captioned picture are there's some merit to the idea. We ask the police to solve too many of our societal problems.

Ta-Nehisi Coates, again and always:

Quote:

There are many problems with expecting people trained in crime-fighting to be social workers. In the black community, there is a problem of legitimacy. In his 1953 book The Quest For Community, conservative Robert Nisbet distinguishes between "power" and "authority." Authority, claims Nisbet, is a matter of relationships, allegiances, and association and is "based ultimately upon the consent of those under it." Power, on the other hand, is "external" and "based upon force." Power exists where allegiances have decayed or never existed at all. "Power arises," writes Nesbit, "only when authority breaks down."

African Americans, for most of our history, have lived under the power of the criminal-justice system, not its authority. The dominant feature in the relationship between African Americans and their country is plunder, and plunder has made police authority an impossibility, and police power a necessity. The skepticism of Officer Darren Wilson's account in the shooting of Michael Brown, for instance, emerges out of lack of police authority—which is to say it comes from a belief that the police are as likely to lie as any other citizen. When African American parents give their children "The Talk," they do not urge them to make no sudden movements in the presence of police out of a profound respect for the democratic ideal, but out of the knowledge that police can, and will, kill them.

But for most Americans, the police—and the criminal-justice system—are figures of authority. The badge does not merely represent rule via lethal force, but rule through consent and legitimacy rooted in nobility. This is why whenever a liberal politician offers even the mildest criticism of the police, they must add that "the majority of officers are good, noble people." Taken at face value this is not much of a defense—like a restaurant claiming that on most nights, there really are no rats in the dining room. But interpreted less literally the line is not meant to defend police officers, but to communicate the message that the speaker is not questioning police authority, which is to say the authority of our justice system, which is to say—in a democracy—the authority of the people themselves.

full article:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/...reform/390057/

Quote:

Originally Posted by gvidas (Post 927087)

Your mistake is thinking I was being glib. If you followed the thread, reading for comprehension, you would know better. Everyone of those punks should have their mother slap them upside the head.

Quote:

There are many problems with expecting people trained in crime-fighting to be social workers.

I don't want them to be social workers. I want them to serve and protect the public, not bad cops who take the law as rules for others, because they know their fellow cops will lie, cheat and steal, to cover for them. In extreme cases the cops are getting away with murder, but the effect on society from those murders is a piss-hole in the snow bank, compared to the millions of lives they ruin with their terroristic behavior.