The Issue of Racism in America

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Michael Brown's actions directly led to his death; had he not stolen the cigars, he'd be alive today. He was a free man. He had choice. He chose poorly.

He'd be alive if a police officer used non-lethal force like he should have.

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To bring up a favorite subject of Ambler's: star war!

For those unaware, the upcoming sequel trilogy is supposedly setting up the new main protagonist that will be played by John Boyega (the black actor who pops up in a Stormtrooper outfit), who Luke Skywalker will pass down the lightsaber to. Well, apparently there's a group of fans who are not happy about that. Then a fan edit trailer has been circling around, with the description:

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Edited Version of the new trailer to remove the illogical and evil things and bring it up to standards with what a good star wars movie could be.

So guess who's IMMEDIATELY not in this 'logical' cut of the teaser?

Must say, I look forward to seeing how many j7's pop out of the woodwork. Especially when Boyega's character is supposedly in a romantic relationship with Daisy Ridley's character, who is white. Oh, I hope it's true. Not for the sake of PC, but just to see how many racists lose their minds over this and have a good laugh at their foolishness.

Jack Wade wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Michael Brown's actions directly led to his death; had he not stolen the cigars, he'd be alive today. He was a free man. He had choice. He chose poorly.

He'd be alive if a police officer used non-lethal force like he should have.

Don't totally disagree with that. I think the police officer should have waited for back-up. It *WAS* just a box of cigars, after all. Either they need more police officers or they need different training. Certainly Officer Wilson had to be aware of his surroundings and knew what kind of a neighborhood he was in; he probably should have gotten back up.

But every bad decision made by both parties came after the theft and snowballed from there.

There's an argument to be made that police are becoming too quick to pull their triggers; that there is a trend of authority shooting first and asking questions later. The Michael Brown case was the wrong case to try and make that point, and it was certainly not helped by having Al Sharpton hired to rep the family. But the following two cases do show that cops appear to be shooting upon sight (zero tolerance) and in both cases, the people shot dead had air guns:

John Crawford shot in Wal Mart:



Tamir Rice shot in Cleveland:

Makeshift Python wrote:

Must say, I look forward to seeing how many j7's pop out of the woodwork. Especially when Boyega's character is supposedly in a romantic relationship with Daisy Ridley's character, who is white. Oh, I hope it's true. Not for the sake of PC, but just to see how many racists lose their minds over this and have a good laugh at their foolishness.

Could not agree with you more. I can't wait to hear or read the comments of black women in the media complaining that, even in a galaxy far, far away, a "brother" chose a white girl over a "sistah".



http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19980510&slug=2749773



.....More notable, though, have been the cries of protest from African-American women rather than from sports businessmen. "Denzel, NO," one woman screamed when actor Denzel Washington appeared in an onscreen love scene with white actress Milla Jovovich.

"Denzel, YOU PROMISED," another female voice yelled.

The New York movie theater, to put it mildly, was in an uproar. After the lights went up, the offended black women added specifics to their protest. "Denzel Washington is the leading black American actor in the world today," one said, "and he's been publicized as being against doing love scenes. Then, in this film, directed by Spike, of all people, he makes love to a white woman. It's a bit much to take."

"I can see your face is bent out of shape," Lee said to a female black reporter the next day when approached on the subject - even though she claimed she only spoke for the "other" women in the audience. "This is the plot of a movie. I figured African-American woman might be upset. So what? This is the way I feel this character would behave. Because a love scene was cut out of `Pelican Brief,' am I going to censor myself? I'm sorry if black women think Denzel should not go to bed with white women, but what has that got to do with my movie?"

(Love scenes between Julia Roberts and Denzel Washington were reportedly cut out of the hit thriller "The Pelican Brief." Washington himself denies that any such scenes were in the script.)

Can't say much more beyond what's already been said about the Brown case. The question is, would Brown still be alive if he had been white? Seems at least likely. Also what business has a patrolman trying to hold a suspect ath the window of his car? Is that considered standard practice? Because it certainly leaves the officer open to a much nastier accusation I've read now several times. The injuries this officer claimed he got from the fight with the victim to me do not at all look severe enough to fit his tale. On balance I'd certainly have expected this would have to be investigated publicly in a courtroom. May it would if things were different.

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Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Back to The Gentle Giant....if poverty was a factor in his life, why wasn't he caught stealing milk, bread, or rice so there would be food on the table? Was he stealing water? Fuel to get to his job? Critically needed medical supplies? If you need help, there are plenty of instutions willing to provide a free meal, transportation, job training. Instead, he stole Swisher Cigars which he planned to use to smoke some righteous Mary Jane. That's a poverty of values, not a poverty of money or a poverty of food, so please spare me the poverty-card or the race-card or the white privilege card.

I did dumb things at 18, but  I never, ever stole from anybody and I never, ever assaulted somebody in order take what I wanted. My first job was bagging groceries for minimum wage and I earned everything I ever got from that point forward.

Michael Brown's actions directly led to his death; had he not stolen the cigars, he'd be alive today. He was a free man. He had choice. He chose poorly.

Just to clear this up, Wilson testified that he was not aware Brown was a robbery suspect at the time they scuffled. He stopped Brown because he was jaywalking.

Largo's Shark wrote:

What I don't get is, why 12 shots? Why did Officer Wilson shoot Michael Brown 7 times? It sounds the actions of someone in a panic-stricken, irrational state of mind.

What I don't get is why there were any gunshots at all. I'm assuming Wilson had other means necessary to subdue Brown without murdering him.

There's definitely an issue with cops in this country going over the line. It's gotten so rotten that just asking for a complaint form is enough to get police so riled up.




That's why I hope the use of mini-cameras in glasses/badges become widespread because that not only protects good officers from being falsely accused but it also changes the behavior of them and anyone they contact with. A suspect is less likely to be confrontational when that person knows there's a recording that could be used against him/her.

Jack Wade wrote:

Just to clear this up, Wilson testified that he was not aware Brown was a robbery suspect at the time they scuffled. He stopped Brown because he was jaywalking.

He testified that his initial interaction with Michael Brown was over the jaywalking incident. Even Dorian Johnson admits that Wilson told them to get out of the middle of the street and kept on going. Then Wilson hears about the theft and the description of the suspects, turns the car around and re-approaches them. From that point on the stories diverge, merge, then diverge yet again.

Wilson's story that Brown lunged after him and slammed the door shut on him as he was trying to get out IS not totally unbelievable if you accept two things: #1 the pot he smoked earlier in the day clouded his judgement and made him think more of his abilities than he really had and/or #2 knowing that we have already seen Brown forcibly grab a box of cigars and shove a store clerk several times and threaten him with more physical violence knowing FULL WELL THE WHOLE THING WAS CAUGHT ON STORE CAMERAS, it's not that big of a logical leap to credibly believe Brown had no qualms about attacking an officer. He's already attacked a store clerk minutes before without any provocation, so as far as I'm concerned, nothing is off the table.

That doesn't mean I believe everything Wilson said either. Wilson's account almost makes himself seem like an English gentleman, kindly suggesting that these two innocent lads would be more safe on the sidewalk than in the street. Somehow, Dorian Johnson's allegation that Wilson told them to 'Get the f*** out of the street' sound more plausible. But I digress.

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What I don't get is why there were any gunshots at all. I'm assuming Wilson had other means necessary to subdue Brown without murdering him.

Inside the car he didn't want to grab the mace because he could end up getting it in his own eyes since their fight was in such close proximity; I get that. Outside of the car....I'm not sure why he didn't use it. Then again, I've seen a police officer use mace and clubs on a suspect that was high on drugs and it had no impact on the suspect until several other officers had to come in and help beat the suspect into submission. I've seen it take several cops to subdue a woman. Wilson had no back up. He might've thought mace would not work on Brown, and I believe he said he either didn't have the taser with him or it wasn't charged.

Tasers were, in large part, a response to allegations of police brutality years ago. When police departments started getting successfully sued for wrongful death, they started coming out with tasers. Then you had people dying from being tased. You can kill a suspect with a chokehold...you can blind someone with a bean bag...

I'm usually not one to Monday-morning quarterback the police, but I find Wilson's lack of severe facial injuries problematic.

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Having lived in Europe for extended periods during my adult life, I know there are a lot of black men and boys in and around London who labor under many of the same stereotypes that exist here in the United States. But there is an important difference in their life experience: It is rare for the police to shoot anyone in Britain, even in teeming, multicultural greater London.

Shortly after the Ferguson shooting, The Economist reported that police in England and Wales fired their weapons a total of four times during the past two years. Four times —meaning in two years they discharged fewer bullets policing 57 million people than were discharged into Michael Brown’s body on one afternoon.

When compared to its neighboring communities, Ferguson has a fairly low violent crime rate, and crime rates across the country have been dropping for many years. Despite all this, Officer Darren Wilson, who initially was inside of his police cruiser, felt so threatened by a physical interaction with Michael Brown, who was outside of the vehicle, that he shot at him twice. When Brown fled the scene, he chose to give chase and felt threatened enough again to shoot 10 more times. I have to believe that similar situations occur with some frequency in London, but guns are not fired and nobody dies.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/11/26/ferguson-puts-spotlight-what-need-change/dwjEbQP2MrdivnEXDCBIxN/story.html

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/12/18/1352704/-4-things-that-should-happen-now-that-we-know-the-truth-about-witness-40-a-white-supremacist#

At the very least, this woman should be charged with perjury.

Very classy: http://thegrio.com/2014/12/24/lapd-michael-brown-song/



Cops in this country want to understand why people are upset with the law enforcement, it's garbage like this. Despite how often they claim the killing is regrettable and unavoidable, they sure seem express that in the strangest ways.

Makeshift Python wrote:

Very classy: http://thegrio.com/2014/12/24/lapd-michael-brown-song/



Cops in this country want to understand why people are upset with the law enforcement, it's garbage like this. Despite how often they claim the killing is regrettable and unavoidable, they sure seem express that in the strangest ways.

One of the responses to the song on youtube was this. And the cycle continues. Won't ever end.

Im not prejudice with white people, but majority of white people are dumb. I mean, if they don't like black people and other people of color then go back where you came from aka Europe with the rest of the whites. And white people have a lot of nerve to make fun of black people when you whites look like monkeys, pigs, birds, horses, gorillas, frogs, trolls and deformed creatures from God know what. You guys take a bath/shower every few hundred year which is why your ancestors created the virus in the first place. You whites treat Mexicans and other indigenous Latinos as dirty when their ancestor have live in this country way more than white people did. Let not forget the fact that white people are descended from incest which would explain the mentality they have today. And white people would be drinking urine, eating shit and people, and allowing dogs to lick the inside of their mouths which is disgusting and white people will actually justify it by saying "But dogs' mouths are more cleaner than human's mouth."  wrote:

It's not shocking to see comments like that on YouTube. That site is plagued with them. That charity event by the cops however... Inexcusable. They should uphold a higher standard than your typical YouTube commenter.

Makeshift Python wrote:

It's not shocking to see comments like that on YouTube. That site is plagued with them.

Yep, surprisingly, some of them log in with their Facebook or something and you see their pics next to their remarks.

Racism will never end unless there's divine intervention. The card will always be played.

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It doubtless is murder, yes.

Dude is running away. Cop just guns him down.

The similarities with the Michael Brown case are interesting.
The obvious difference being the presence of video evidence.
Does anyone have a shred of doubt as to how this would have ended if not for the citizen who recorded it?

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And if that video was not taken, this is basically how the media would have only been able to report it according to local sources: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/08/walter-scott-shooting-without-video_n_7024404.html?utm_hp_ref=tw

I think this is less of a racial issue and more of the cops in our country being trained to be bullies. They're all trained to have a thin skin, that their life is always in danger, and that they should always take harsh action whenever their authority is disrespected in the slightest (like simply running away from a cop) which is what looks like to me on that video. It's also a fact that pleny of people who join the force aren't interested in protecting people and serving justice, they're just interested in the power and using it. I've seen a policeman run a red light here. It didn't appear to be anything urgent as the sirens weren't going off and he wasn't speeding his way to something, the red light just seemed to be a mere inconvenience. I wouldn't make a big deal over that particular bit, but it does shed light into the mentality that the police have, that they think they're above the law.

Makes you wonder how much policemen abused their authority years ago when there were no cameras to capture their actions.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Salomé wrote:

 
Does anyone have a shred of doubt as to how this would have ended if not for the citizen who recorded it?

It would still be hard to explain how a man running away and with shots in his back represented a clear and present danger to the policeman. That said, there's no doubt that the video evidence is the reason the police department has acted so quickly in firing its employee.

Isn't that exactly what happened in the Michael Brown shooting?

What is shocking about the video is the seeming routine nature of the actions, right down to "planting" the taser. To the point where you have to ask if this is standard practice within that police force.

c