Of course the story is about the looters.
What are we supposed to do? Not mention the rioting because… racism, or something?
For you to call people looting and rioting “victims” is off base, even if an innocent kid got shot. That doesn’t justify burning down stores and theft.
Pretty much everyone interviewed on local news – family and friends of the victim, Ferguson inhabitants – are convinced that the rioters and looters were outsiders to the community who used the killing as a pretext for greed. They didn’t riot because they wanted to protest the police; they rioted because they wanted to steal stuff.
The victim’s family is annoyed/angry that the riot has taken the focus entirely off the actual killing. So they’re none too happy about it.
Ferguson police reaction has been kinda odd to the whole thing, too; they’ve had the FAA impose a No-Fly zone over all of Ferguson until Thursday for… reasons.
Young black men are getting shot and killed by the police for the same reason that they got lynched back in the Jim Crow days and were enslaved for centuries before then.
Racism has never made sense, so stop trying to rationalize this shit away.
That is kind of odd. I hadn’t heard that. I guess they don’t want media helicopters getting in the way of police helicopters or something?
In a couple articles I read, it was reported that the officer shot Brown as he was running away. But I don’t know if that is known for sure at this point.
ETA: Ah, I just read the MSN article linked above. If it’s accurate, well, shit.
Wow, no. That’s absolutely not human nature to think that. If that’s how you find yourself thinking, you should seriously consider counseling.
The local news stations have reported that a police helicopter came under fire at least once during the rioting. Maybe the Ferguson police are trying to keep news choppers from being shot at, as well? Also Ferguson lies just east of Lambert-St. Louis airport. It would be a million-to-one chance of a stray bullet hitting a plane on aproach or takeoff, but I can see the authorities wanting to minimize even that small risk.
There is that “someone” thing.
Would YOU loot and set fire to stores “out of anger”?
So - it is possible that you would loot and set buildings on fire, out of anger at police?
So it’s just racism, plain and simple, and the black community and young black men are totally innocent of ever doing anything that antagonizes cops or causes undue scrutiny?
I don’t buy that for a moment. I’m not saying it’s their fault, but I"m saying that where there are two sides to every coin, and that looking at it dispassionately, it would appear that there’s more going on than simple racism on the part of asshole cops. If it was simple racism, you’d see it happening similarly to hispanic males, white males (by minority cops), asian males, middle eastern males and anyone else.
But it seems to happen disproportionately to young black men, which leads me to believe that there’s more than just racism going on here, and that just attributing it to that without acknowledging that there may be factors beyond that is not helping solve the problem because it deflects all responsibility and blame onto one side of the equation.
Nobody looted and torched a convenience store out of anger. They looted and torched them because the police were busy, and it served as a convenient excuse.
Duh, looters exploit riots. In other news, dog bites man in Idaho. Duh. What a bunch of dolts some of you are.
That you pretend I called the looters victims shows how much your head is stuck up your ass.
Cops in Antioch, Calif. brutalize a mentally ill man.
In New York City, an unarmed man is choked to death by cops for selling cigarettes.
Near Los Angeles, a cop brutalizes a homeless woman for jaywalking.
These are just a few recent stories that showed up quickly with Google.
Yet the take-away lesson by some Dopers is about looting, and, I suppose, the need for more police brutality to combat looting.
Sheeeez.
It’s almost like there was something ingrained in American history, whereby black men were treated differently than Hispanic men, Asian men, Middle Eastern men, or other minorities, isn’t it? Whatever could that be…
How did it not make sense in the past? Makes perfect sense if you think about it. What is a European supposed to think when he encounters Africans or Native Americans who have no sophisticated civilization, do not have gun powder, do not have sophisticated armor, do not have well made steel weapons, do not have the ability to travel the oceans etc. On top of that these same Europeans have been taught that Christianity is unassailable in its correctness, that God/Christ’s message and belief in it is the only thing redeeming them as human beings and that anyone who doesn’t buy into it is a heathen worthy of little more than being put to the sword.
Racial equality does not make sense given available evidence in the past. It took a lot of biology, understanding of anthropology, history etc to get us to the point where a reasonable person wouldn’t be racist. I remember a thread about Kant in which he was criticized based on his views of blacks–but Kant lived in the 1700s and almost certainly never met a black person. When all he has to go on are traveler accounts in which they are described as basically cave people, I’m not sure what conclusions a smart guy like Kant is supposed to come to on his own.
Racism isn’t often wanting to kill other races so that your “team” will “win.” Racism is more commonly believing the common stereotypes about different races. It’s believing that black men are thugs, Asian men are nerdy, middle eastern men are terrorists, etc.
The media/mainstream racist view of black men is that they are threatening and violent. A black guy doing something will be seen as more threatening than a white guy doing the same thing by many racists. Police officers tend to react violently towards people they view as threatening, so the stereotype of violent black men leads to more police violence against black men than against other races.
Looting only hurts people who had nothing to do with the incident. It’s nonsensical.
Looting mentality: “I’m furious at the cops! How will I express my anger? By attacking some unrelated small business!”
One particular black kid does not share in the “responsibility and blame” for race relations in America.
Most of the protesters probably did not loot or do anything violent. It’s always a small percentage of bad-actors in cases like this.
Agree, but it’s still nonsensical. Person A is angry at Person B, therefore he attacks Person C.
Hey, you said this:
Who were you referring to with the “victims” if not the looters?
It’s pretty clear that the rioters and looters are in the wrong. There is an ongoing investigation about the shooting and I’m not sure it’s clear that there was wrongdoing there.
What are they supposed to cover - we’re waiting for more facts on the ongoing investigation, but ignore the people going batshit crazy over there.