How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change • Hacker News Board

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#271

Post by SpicyLemonZest » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 10:58 PM UTC

HorizonXP wrote: post #210

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can't pretend to maintain a strict separation between politics and tech, but this article is nothing but a direct call to specific political action. I generally hammer the flag button on that kind of thing, even when it's a good cause; I don't think HN is or should be a space for political organizing.

This is the discussion I wanted to have, rather than being downvoted. I actually agree with you, but given that the article was posted by mwseibel, I wanted to see what everyone's thinking was. Just because he's a significant YC partner doesn't mean he knows/has authority over HN. It's a valid discussion to have. But what's the appropriate line? A hard line with no room for interpretation, even in significant events?…

It's certainly a fuzzy line. Like I said, there's no way to wall off politics from tech - many issues we discuss are inherently political, and in many cases a blanket refusal to discuss them would also be political.

This article clearly falls over that fuzzy line. It's not a discussion, or an analysis, or an evaluation of competing claims. It's not even an attempt to persuade. It's a call to action, a set of instructions from Mr. Obama on how to accomplish the political goals he presumes readers share. I do share his goals, and his instructions sound reasonable, but I don't see HN as an appropriate venue to publish them. Not every discussion forum should turn into a political action committee when there's important politics to be done.

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#272

Post by senderista » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 10:58 PM UTC

mmastrac wrote: post #22

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #15

> So let’s not excuse violence, or rationalize it, or participate in it. Taboos around violence for political are one of the crucial building blocks for a functioning democracy. If those taboos are broken, even for a good cause, you set a precedence that violence works. And the next cause won’t be as good. One only has to look at the lessons of the Roman Revolution that started with the murder of Grachus, and ended w…

I cannot condone violence nor encourage it, but you have to admit that the first few protests and property damage drastically influenced the quick arrest of an officer that may not have been arrested or even fired if it didn't happen. The non-violent protests of Colin Kaepernick were mocked and used to rally the other side and just weren't effective. The problem here is not the violence, but a policing system that is…

Civil disobedience != violence. Illegal action is sometimes justified. Violence never is.

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#273

Post by Jun8 » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

mythrwy wrote: post #127

A couple of thoughts: Racism is an issue, but I wonder in the case of police the abuse the issue could be more generally described as one of class? There was an incident a few years ago in my state were police picked a white guy up who had been convicted of methamphetamine possession a few times. I'll describe the guy as a "scraggly white guy". He was dirty, unkempt, skinny, poor spoken in an old vehicle. The cops I…

Ross Douthat's opinion piece from two days ago backs your Thought #2: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/opinion/sunday/riots-geor...

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#274

Post by Avicebron » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

syshum wrote: post #266

rayiner wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but the immediate aftermath of that showed deep disagreement about “what to do about that problem.” Leftists want to dismantle the “systems of oppression” they perceive produces that result. Libertarians want to get rid of qualified immunity and police unions. Conservatives are taken aback by the rioting and violence and for them the immediate need maintaining social order has overtaken the more long term desire…

As normal, libertarians have the correct and rational solution to the problem :)

Please explain how just dismantling unions is the correct and rational solution? I'm less inclined to believe in qualified immunity, but I can see that it is based on a legitimate concern.

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#275

Post by mc32 » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:05 PM UTC

sokoloff wrote: post #87

systemvoltage wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One big problem is that the elected after being elected, choose to not follow or dilute those promises. There is no accountability. So time and again, democracy fails as they just change their minds after being elected. There is this "damping" factor like a mechanical system, that takes the energy out of the people's hands and dampens it with lobbying, dishonesty, unaccountability and complete neglect for public inte…

I’m not sure it’s quite so simple as “they change their mind”. In a republic where deal-making has to happen, if you ran on W, X, Y, and Z, you might have to compromise on Z to get W, X, and a watered-down version of Y. Doesn’t mean you changed your mind on Z or strict-Y, but you can’t get everything you want because other Americans want other things and they can’t get everything they want either. Maybe a lesser poli…

Even dictators often can’t get what they want. In order to maintain power they have to please others that allow the dictator to persist. I mean it’s a kind of symbiotic relationship.

In a republic it’s much much harder. People run on platforms but that doesn’t mean the rest of the legislators agree with them. Often people in HOAs can’t agree on things... and that’s the lowest form of government (well regulation).

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#276

Post by D-Coder » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:09 PM UTC

throwaway894345 wrote: post #146

Consultant32452 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would agree with you except basically everyone was on the same side as soon as the video was released. Everyone, right, left, and center agreed there was a serious problem. So what are we raising awareness about?

I don't think everyone knew that everyone agreed that there was a serious problem. The media were really boosting the usual divisive narrative, but I won't speculate here as to why.

As for your first sentence, that's very true. A lot of white people think that since Obama was elected, there are no more racial problems.

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#277

Post by testbot123 » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:11 PM UTC

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #267

testbot123 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Racist violence is political violence. It is agents of the state enforcing a racial order which is inextricable from (and perpetuated by) the politics of the state. > And, "it hasn't kill anyone yet" is a pretty weak counter to the claim that arson can be violence. In fact, people do die from arson. The fact that nobody has - yet - in these protests does not change that whatsoever. Okay, but then people are more like…

> Racist violence is political violence. It is agents of the state enforcing a racial order which is inextricable from (and perpetuated by) the politics of the state. Boloney. It is individuals, even if in positions of authority (and even if far too many of them), carrying out their own warped agenda, not that of the state. > Okay, but then people are more likely to be killed by a police officer than by arson. So why…

> Boloney. It is individuals, even if in positions of authority (and even if far too many of them), carrying out their own warped agenda, not that of the state.

We'll have to agree to disagree. I believe that the justice system in the US is inextricably tied to systematic, institutionalized racism, and that the justice system and its roots cannot be divorced from those who are enforcing its laws. Minorities in this country are arrested, prosecuted, and sentenced differently from their white counterparts because of that institutionalized racism.

> Why should I choose? I oppose violence (or even excessive force) by police officers, and I oppose arson by rioters. And I oppose both for the same reason.

Fair enough.

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#278

Post by syshum » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:12 PM UTC

Avicebron wrote: post #274

syshum wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As normal, libertarians have the correct and rational solution to the problem :)

Please explain how just dismantling unions is the correct and rational solution? I'm less inclined to believe in qualified immunity, but I can see that it is based on a legitimate concern.

1. police union contracts in major cities routinely include provisions that erase disciplinary records and obstruct meaningful discipline (let alone prosecution) of police officers who abuse their authority. [1]

2. the strong majority of these 656 contracts have a similar disciplinary appeals process. Around 73% provide for appeal to an arbitrator or comparable procedure and nearly 70% provide that an arbitrator or comparable third party makes a final binding decision. About 54% of the contracts give officers or unions the power to select that arbitrator. About 70% of the jurisdictions give these arbitrators extensive review power, including the ability to revisit disciplinary matters with little or no deference to the decisions made by supervisors, civilian review boards or politically accountable officials. [2]

3. We look at the roll-out of collective bargaining rights for police officers at the state level from the 1950s to the 1980s. The introduction of access to collective bargaining drives a modest decline in policy employment and increase in compensation with no meaningful impacts on total crime, violent crime, property crime or officers killed in the line of duty. What does change? We find a substantial increase in police killings of civilians over the medium to long run (likely after unions are established) with an additional 0.026 to 0.029 civilians killed in a county each year of whom the overwhelming majority are non-white. [3]

4. Recent academic research further demonstrates that police disciplinary procedures established through union contracts obstruct accountability and (as I noted in this post) collective bargaining for police officers appears to increase police misconduct. This is not surprising. Through collective bargaining, police unions demand protections from disciplinary procedures that would not otherwise be approved, oppose consent decrees and other measures to increase police accountability, and (given the power of police unions in state and local politics) they receive relatively little pushback. [4]

[1] https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-poli...

[2] https://crim.jotwell.com/the-power-of-police-unions/

[3] https://twitter.com/robgillezeau/status/1266834185055956997

[4] https://reason.com/2020/05/30/police-unions-and-the-problem-...

I could provide more as well, that was just a real quick look up of my bookmarks

Edit: 1 more source for good measure

[5] https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article...

  This  Article  empirically  demonstrates  that  police  departments’  internal   disciplinary   procedures,   often   established   through   the   collective   bargaining   process,   can   serve   as   barriers   to   officer   accountability.

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#279

Post by randyrand » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:16 PM UTC

Police brutality is a real issue. It's less clear that racial bias in policing is a statistically significant issue, however, when accounting for obvious things. If someone has numbers that tell a different story I am all ears. Here are mine when I attempted to find it for myself:

    black arrests (all crimes) a year: 2.2 million
    white arrests (all crimes) a year: 5.6 million

https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2017/crime-in-the-u.s.-...

    black deaths by police: 4.5 per 100k
    white deaths by police: 1.5 per 100k

https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793

    USA black population: 13%
    USA white population: 75%

Given a black committing an average black crime, and a white committing an avg white crime, the black person is 16% more likely to die in a police altercation. Whether or not this is statistical error or a real difference is harder to tell, but this difference is not nearly as large as most media outlets lead people to believe.

Again, If someone has numbers that tell a different story I am all ears

Re: How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change

#280

Post by manfredo » Mon, Jun 01, 2020, 11:16 PM UTC

freeone3000 wrote: post #176

throwaway894345 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Voting? Anyway, there's pretty broad agreement that the riots are opportunistic violence, not connected to or motivated by a concern for justice.

Voting hasn't worked. Oakland PD still has half of its budget to brutality complaints. It's been 7 years since the movement started and 66 years since voting was allowed for Black people. Voting isn't going to change anything. "Broad agreement" by who, exactly? I keep seeing videos of cops smashing windows then blaming it on protestors, cops attacking crowds with tear gas and less-lethal rounds, and now a shooting of…

> Voting hasn't worked. Oakland PD still has half of its budget to brutality complaints. It's been 7 years since the movement started and 66 years since voting was allowed for Black people. Voting isn't going to change anything.

Really, honestly, think about this rationale and think about what it would look like if people with different views than you applied this line of reasoning. Would you be okay with anti-abortion activists employed direct action and did to clinics what these protestors did to police stations?