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Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

propublica.org

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Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#31

Post by rhacker »

war1025 wrote: post #5
vore wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe the fact that everyone is suddenly all for mass protests suggests that police brutality is a horrible forever unaddressed injustice that doesn't care if there's a pandemic or not?

> doesn't care if there's a pandemic or not There are many people that don't care if there is a pandemic of not. They were forcibly kept away from their jobs and families for three months.

That's my theory too. Floyd was a catalyst but not the full reason for the riots.

Total aside: Also what's our country's obsession with masks that are designed to make people look creepy - like a dead skeleton. And same truck window art, like skulls with bullets for teeth or something. I don't understand are these people just murdering thousands of people daily or something?

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#32

Post by tenpies »

aphextron wrote: post #18
koheripbal wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Police Brutality isn't a new problem. They should have waited until covid-19 was gone. Now we're likely to see a 2nd peak because of these protests.

>Police Brutality isn't a new problem. They should have waited until covid-19 was gone. This wouldn't be happening in a world with 4% unemployment. But 20 million Americans are now out of work, stuck at home, and pissed off. Not to mention without the usual distractions of sports or live entertainment. When the bread and circuses break down, this is the result.

Yes, although I would argue that it's amplified by foreign and internal actors. It is their election year after all and 99% of US media has spend the last 4 years doing its best to destabilize the country.

The other alarming aspect for other countries should be that this is quite likely a preview of what other countries will see. The unemployment numbers are awful everywhere and as the programs enacted come to a halt things are probably not going to get better.

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#33

Post by stronglikedan »

rhacker wrote: post #31
war1025 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> doesn't care if there's a pandemic or not There are many people that don't care if there is a pandemic of not. They were forcibly kept away from their jobs and families for three months.

That's my theory too. Floyd was a catalyst but not the full reason for the riots. Total aside: Also what's our country's obsession with masks that are designed to make people look creepy - like a dead skeleton. And same truck window art, like skulls with bullets for teeth or something. I don't understand are these people just murdering thousands of people daily or something?

Some people just like to use non-verbal queues to keep others at arm's length.

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#34

Post by csharptwdec19 »

plutonorm wrote: post #23
aphextron wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Police Brutality isn't a new problem. They should have waited until covid-19 was gone. This wouldn't be happening in a world with 4% unemployment. But 20 million Americans are now out of work, stuck at home, and pissed off. Not to mention without the usual distractions of sports or live entertainment. When the bread and circuses break down, this is the result.

This is the first time I’ve heard this obvious point. There are riots now because people just don’t have the energy left to protest while surviving in hyper capitalism. They’ve got plenty of entertainment at home. This is bout energy and time. Employment supresses protest because it takes time and saps energy.

> Employment supresses protest because it takes time and saps energy.

Also protesting in some cases risks employment. A decent portion of these people likely no longer have that as a concern.

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#35

Post by closeparen »

vore wrote: post #4
war1025 wrote: post #2

> Especially During COVID Public gatherings are supposedly extremely dangerous right now. The fact that everyone is suddenly all for mass protests suggests we got the severity of Coronavirus wrong and people are using this as a convenient out for backing off shelter in place orders without losing face. In February the "Philly had a parade, St Louis Stayed home" article was being shared by here and everywhere else. Fr…

Or maybe the fact that everyone is suddenly all for mass protests suggests that police brutality is a horrible forever unaddressed injustice that doesn't care if there's a pandemic or not?

Then where were the protests when similar incidents happened dozens of times before COVID? Has there been anything on this scale since Rodney King?

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#36

Post by minikites »

colechristensen wrote: post #19
war1025 wrote: post #2

> Especially During COVID Public gatherings are supposedly extremely dangerous right now. The fact that everyone is suddenly all for mass protests suggests we got the severity of Coronavirus wrong and people are using this as a convenient out for backing off shelter in place orders without losing face. In February the "Philly had a parade, St Louis Stayed home" article was being shared by here and everywhere else. Fr…

Or, people aren't rational and do whatever feels most right to them at any specific moment.

Someone should tell the economists.

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#37

Post by alpha_squared »

koheripbal wrote: post #16
JadeNB wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that 'forcibly' is a bad choice of words for a legal order that people could, and some did, ignore without serious consequence, and definitely without response by force—witness the 'liberate' protests—when compared to the literal and illegal use of force that the current protests are addressing, which have themselves been met in many places with force (as, for example, this very article discusses).

Businesses were shut down, by law. Some that stayed open in defiance of the law were fined and shuttered by the government. It most certainly was not optional.

And the defiance cost them fines, sometimes, not their lives. The protests are addressing compliance resulting in death for a select portion of the population that has been systematically singled out for centuries because of the pigment of their skin.

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#38

Post by jolmg »

war1025 wrote: post #26
jolmg wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> issue is that ordering was different No, it's not. The ones that are protesting are also being ordered to disperse and go back home. The reason they're not is because they're disobeying. For those that aren't explicitly ordered, it's because it's pointless, given that civil disobedience is in the nature of protests.

Good luck disobeying if you are small business owner who was told you can no longer legally do business. On a more personal note, my 98 year old Grandma has been confined to her room at the nursing home for three months. Good luck to her civil disobeying orders.

> Good luck disobeying if you are small business owner who was told you can no longer legally do business.

Exactly. The fact that you can't effectively do a sizeable protest around that so goes to show how the population in general prioritizes these issues.

> On a more personal note, my 98 year old Grandma has been confined to her room at the nursing home for three months. Good luck to her civil disobeying orders.

Yeah, public support for your grandma risking getting sick is going to be even less.

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#39

Post by stefan_ »

war1025 wrote: post #2

> Especially During COVID Public gatherings are supposedly extremely dangerous right now. The fact that everyone is suddenly all for mass protests suggests we got the severity of Coronavirus wrong and people are using this as a convenient out for backing off shelter in place orders without losing face. In February the "Philly had a parade, St Louis Stayed home" article was being shared by here and everywhere else. Fr…

Is this peak HN? People are protesting outside at great risk to themselves because they secretly hated Coronavirus restrictions and want to party?

What level of deranged unawareness would ever make you say that?

Re: Tear Gas Is Way More Dangerous Than Police Let On - Especially During COVID

#40

Post by a_bonobo »

closeparen wrote: post #35
vore wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe the fact that everyone is suddenly all for mass protests suggests that police brutality is a horrible forever unaddressed injustice that doesn't care if there's a pandemic or not?

Then where were the protests when similar incidents happened dozens of times before COVID? Has there been anything on this scale since Rodney King?

People were busy with their lives. Now that there's mass unemployment (=time and anger), a generally hated administration, and even more videos of police brutality all over the place it's all bubbling up.
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