Unarmed black man killed by cops.
Riot follows.
Cue hand-wringing about riots being bad and how can we stop them.
Another unarmed black man killed by cops.
Riot follows.
Cue hand-wringing about riots being bad and how can we stop them.
Another unarmed black man killed by cops.
Riot follows.
Cue hand-wringing about riots being bad and how can we stop them.
I feel like I’m in frickin’ Groundhog Day.
Here’s a hint, people: If there’s always a riot after an unarmed black man is killed by cops, then the way to stop the riots is to *stop killing unarmed black men*. Gee whiz. You’d think some people flunked cause and effect in freshman Science class.
— Badtux the Snarky Penguin
But whatever you do don’t “disrespect” America, the flag and shit by kneeling on the sidelines at a football game. That is not allowed.
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coloradoblue, but you can probably get R approval to kneel on a black male, during the anthem, at an NFL game.
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What if you kneel on the neck of a black guy who’s wearing a T-shirt with an Amerikkkan flag on it? Republispectful or dis?
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Let’s see…kneeing, while displaying the flag, while repressing a minority…that’s traditional. Probably best if the flag is either the circle 13 version or the stars and bars of the Army of Northern Virginia, for extra points, but respectful by their opinion.
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Given the size of the country, and the number of police, deaths caused by them are going to happen. While we could hope that cops would take more care than the ordinary citizen to avoid murdering people, cops are, after all, human, and on occasion stupid, careless, and brutish.
What then happens is that the cops tend to feel that they are being criticized for doing their job, and a lot of them react by not being all that eager to do their job. So they turn a blind eye to petty crimes. Which encourages the petty criminals, and pretty quick you have protesters by the thousands, and mixed in with them, rampaging youth looting and burning.
At which point the cops are overwhelmed and now they are incapable of acting.
Like an avalanche, there are no means of stopping an avalanche once it gets going well. All you can do is either prevent them from happening (which, statistically and in light of human nature is virtually impossible) get out of the way quickly when you see them starting, or you can remove the build-up of conditions that cause them.
Such as, in the present instance, taking away the police’ right to immunity for their actions in almost every case. Such as being a lot faster to charge them when they break laws. And of course, while we’re fantasizing, tearing down the accumulated racism and bigotry in a lot of the police forces around the country.
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“What then happens is that the cops tend to feel that they are being criticized for doing their job, and a lot of them react by not being all that eager to do their job. “
Also known as a “police strike.” Which Baltimore cops did after they copped flak for rough-riding Freddy Grey to death. “Hey — if we can’t kill anyone we want, then we just won’t do our fucking job at all!”
Remember why James Bond and other selected agents in Her Madjester’s Secret Service had the “00” designation? They were the only ones authorised to kill with no repercussions against them. In SovokAmerika, EVERY police officer is a Double-0 agent…
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Saw a video today of a line of captured/abandoned police cars on a city street, in broad daylight, with another cruiser being pushed into the collection. All cars seemed to have damage. Some of the video showed people calmly stripping all the equipment out of a trunk of one.
My brother in law on FB complained about who was going to pay for all this. (Of course… no doubt all that equipment will be replaced immediately, at great cost.)
And that’s where I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. People, even cops, are very, very close to making the connection: Riots = Tax money… I pay taxes… executing black men costs ME money!
I am in favor of destroyed police equipment (and safe cops.). I wish the rioters would damage expensive property, though. Not their local shops. Rich people will see the “Hey! This costs ME money!” connection faster than the rest.
Okay, America? Hating and murdering blacks is an EXPENSIVE hobby. Can you afford it?
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“Rich people will see the “Hey! This costs ME money!” connection faster than the rest.”
That gets to the heart of why I didn’t stay in the Unravelling States of Amerika to try and change things. Both my ex-wives and I were peaceful-demonstrating hippie types. Taking part in anti-pollution groups, writing letters to politicians, carrying signs against war… For literally decades (I started in the late 1980s after I married the first X; but both of them were original hippies from the 1960s — older than me, I might add — and they used to agitate against the ‘Nam debacle.) The 60s protests had some impact, but by Reagan’s time, the Reich had learned that it could just ignore non-violent marchers. The fascists had the power, so what did they care if the peasants shouted?
It’s only burning shit down and blowing shit up that makes the Overseers pay attention. 100,000 proles dead in a plague? Ho-hum to the 1%. They weren’t too happy about it getting in the way of profit flow, but the already-rich get even MORE powerful in a deflationary collapse. However, when their buildings and inventory turn into flame, that gets right up their arses.
I’m not a killer. Haven’t owned a gun in my life (in part that’s because I DO have a temper, and I reckoned that if I didn’t have a firearm, I wouldn’t be able to murder someone in a fit of rage.) However, I AM a sneaky, vengeful person. I have no moral objections to lighting up non-living things, like Mall-Warts. I am afraid that if I had stayed in SovokAmerika, I would have started torching Mercedes, or McMansions, or malls. That’s the only thing the richpigges pay attention to. And because I’m not as clever as I think I am, I’d get busted and my life would be pissed away. It’s not worth my freedom to fight for a failing state. Easier and happier to emigrate.
When I see what’s happening in the Firelighted States, I am reminded of the JFK quote: “Those who make peaceful change impossible make violent rebellion inevitable.” He was talking about the communist empire, of course. Who would have thought, in the early 60s, that that would apply to the USSA? And that the Soviet Bloc (aside from Rumania) would bobsled through its collapse in a less destructive way than Amerikkka’s downfall?
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While your post about pigs behaving badly still stands at the top of the Tux, I thought I’d mention an interesting Twit-take I tripped across, in relation to the notion of defunding police departments. The Tweeter said that if that’s done, the defunders had better take a lesson from the de-Baathification in Iraq after Saddam Hussein was overthrown. All those unemployed gun-toting violent men had nothing else to support themselves, so they turned terrorist. (“Resisters to the invaders” is a better term.)
I could easily see a lot of jobless cops turning into crims. Maybe not all, perhaps not even half. But there are plenty of bent coppers who do business with the Mob, drug dealers, whoever, even in good times when the “lawmen” are sucking at the public tit. Toss ’em into the street — what would be the effect if even 10% went bad? They’d know the best cracks in the law enforcement system, so they’d be super-criminals. The police force system selects for sociopaths, so it would a fertile ground for producing predators. Ditto for the military men who join the po-po. Amerika is going to see its own manned weapons turned against it, just like it has turned them against so many less-powerful countries. Karma’s coming, kop-karma…
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