41–50 of 110 posts
Another great opportunity for effective protest lost.
People have been protesting peacefully in Baltimore all last week with 0 answers from the police or elected officials. No media was talking about it, there was no Freddie Gray thread on hackernews, but now the whole world is talking about it.
"the police said some firefighters were reportedly having cinder blocks heaved at them as they responded to emergencies." That's pathetic.
More than pathetic, it proves that a subset of the protestors aren't really sympathetic to the cause - because this does nothing to solve racial tension, if anything, it exacerbates.
This is what happens when you have an above the law police force that preys on entire neighborhoods that feel like they have been cast aside.
The wards of the state aren't expected to be independent and responsible. They're given handouts in exchanges for their votes, and over time you have a whole generation that can't take care of itself. That's when the state steps in to take care of its wards "for their own good", and it's inevitable that over-corrections will happen.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
People have been protesting peacefully in Baltimore all last week with 0 answers from the police or elected officials. No media was talking about it, there was no Freddie Gray thread on hackernews, but now the whole world is talking about it.
Hm except for HN, which has 3 comments about Valve's decision to change their mod rates, for every one about Baltimore.
1. This is a community primarily for technology posts. Occasionally news makes it here but it has to be a pretty big story.
2. Although this is a relatively big story it's a US centric story when HN is a global community. Personally I've seen so many of these horrible police brutality stories from the US in the last year that they've lost my attention. I saw the Twitter hash tag a few days ago, saw it was a police brutality thing, and didn't even bother looking further. It's almost become accepted fact that police in the US are militarised, heavy handed, and criminal, and no matter what the reaction there or around the world is nobody seems to have the ability to (or want to) change things.
Did I see the Mayor of Baltimore at a press conference saying they "gave room for people that wanted to destroy"?
"the police said some firefighters were reportedly having cinder blocks heaved at them as they responded to emergencies." That's pathetic.
Unsurprisingly these places are full of immigrants.
You can pooh-pooh over how they have lousy conditions and are poor and riot because of that, but the fact is that they get everything they need from the state (food, shelter, spending money, schooling, healthcare), and also there has always been poor people in sweden and they haven't had problems with eg. cops or looting and rioting.
So it's probably some kind of cultural thing for people from some places.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the context was in order to give space for nonviolent protest, they created a space where some people would act in unproductive/violent ways. My take was it was meant in a similar spirit as our free speech protections; allowing wide berths for free speech leads to a lot of destructive speech. Preventing nonviolent protests requires militarization a la Ferguson.
While I agree in sprit, I don't think that a quote like that should be spoken at a press conference, chopped, twisted and hashed by the media and then interpreted by already irrational protestors. It's encouraging violence and destruction of others property.
It really doesn't matter how well-crafted the statement; we'll misinterpret because we're Americans and that's what we do.
My wife and I live in Baltimore, in Mt. Vernon. We were having dinner the other night in Bolton Hill (a quiet residential area), and four guys ran by the restaurant and tried to throw a chair through the window (chairs turned out to be heavier than they thought). People vandalized the Rite-Aid a few blocks from our apartment, and set fire to a building we could see out our window. Being from Bangladesh I'm not worrie…
It makes me wonder if "civilization" really exists, or if we really are just small groups of self-centered "tribes" with sets of overlapping goals...until they aren't.
Fiction writers have made extensive use of this tenuous balance as a plot point. "Under the Dome" by Stephen King comes immediately to mind as one recent example. Once the "boundary" goes up, the town's social order falls apart surprisingly fast (within days, even though power, water, food, and services are still there).
It's unfortunate that it had to come to this, but I believe the rioters were justified in their actions. If the police departments in the United States do not account for their actions, or worse, defend officers that have committed acts that show an indiscriminate disregard for the well being of those they're sworn to protect, they should be prepared to face violent resistance from the people.
Justified burning down a brand new senior community center and knocking out a cop with a brick to the head. Really?
The reality is that this happened, because of ongoing police brutality against a minority that is already feeling the pressure of racism, unemployment, incarceration, and other social disadvantages.
You can't pretend those are just all bad people waiting for a chance for thuggery. We, as Americans, have created this by the way we have structured our society to allow for ever growing inequality. And by allowing the police to become para-military in their methods.
It's obviously too late for protests. You've got civil unrest now. Is it even possible to stop it?
edit: fixed a typo