We look for dimwitted dopes the world over, why not their malignant counterparts?
Like Alexander Lushenko, who, apart from being Putin’s lapdog, is keeping an opposition journalist and activist (and his girlfriend) in prison.. This has been mentioned on the Dope before now, but with the mention of journalists in prison at the Correspondent’s dinner the other night I thought it was appropriate to mention.
Do the evil MFs have to be (at least somewhat) intelligent, to distinguish them from the stupid MFs? I ask because I can see a good deal of overlap at times.
That’s a good point. I took my inspiration from the “The Republican Party is the Party of Evil” thread, where things are pointed out that are evil, but you can understand (but certainly not condone) the goal of doing them. I suppose judging dumb from evil is in the eye of the beholder.
…the lynching of Jordan Neely in New York belongs somewhere. And I suppose this thread is as good as any.
The background:
The guy who killed Neely obviously deserves a pitting.
But it’s the reaction, from everyone to the local media to the mayor and the governor that really puts the icing on the shit sandwich.
Here’s what the New York Post said on their Twitter account: (not going to link to it)
Both the Mayor and the Governor:
So Neely was murdered on a train. Surrounded by people who didn’t intervene. Held in a chokehold for 15 minutes. The guy who did it wasn’t arrested. The worst of the newspapers described the murdered man as “unhinged”. The “paper of record” talks about the death in abstract. The Democrat Mayor and Governor don’t want to comment, but it’s the homeless man that was the problem here, not the murderer. Not the “moral panic” over crime. Not the over-policing. Not the literal criminalization of homelessness.
Its about how “Neely was arrested over 40 times.” He “threatened everyone on the train.” Yet we don’t even know his murderer’s name.
There is something wrong with the world.
From the article:
Neely was a subway busker and Michael Jackson impersonator with more than 40 prior arrests and an active warrant out for his arrest from a felony assault.
So, yes, there are consequences for our actions. Sometimes the consequences, as in this case, are too severe and unfair. The marine should be charged because he went way overboard. As soon as Neely’s struggles weakened, he should have released the hold.
Nevertheless, I have a very hard time viewing Neely as a “victim”. In fact, he seemed to have carte blanche to harass and assault people simply because he was a mentally ill homeless guy. It eventually caught up to him in a tragic way. I am sorry for that but, since I firmly believe crime by its very nature should be a hazardous profession, my sympathy only goes so far.
…he was fucking lynched. If you have a hard time “seeing Neely as a victim” then there is something very fucking wrong with you.
Actually I think there is something very wrong with a society that has reached the point where crime is rampant and the rights of the criminal seem to be way more important than the rights of his many victims.
So, tell me, oh outraged one. Do you know anything about even one of his apparently many victims such as possible physical injury, emotional trauma, etc? Have you thought about the fact that many people, who are trapped into taking public transportation because of financial reasons, fear for their safety and even their lives on a daily basis? No, of course you don’t because you don’t give a damn. You are way too busy being concerned about a career criminal.
…America locks up more people per capita than anywhere else in the world. Crime isn’t actually rampant. You just choose to live your life in fear. America is a dystopian hell-hole. You’ve abandoned millions of your people. Left them to rot in the sewers, in the jails, on the subways, because you don’t give damn.
Tell me oh enlightened one. Outside of reddit rumors and Twitter rumblings can you even name a single one of these “alleged victims?”
Have you thought about Neely at all? And what circumstances put him on that train that day? What kind of fucked up society do you have there anyway? You don’t think Neely was on that train that day because of financial reasons? You don’t think Neely feared for his safety and his life on a daily basis? He was asking for food for fucks sakes.
What the fuck is wrong with you?
Incorrect.
Look at you, busy celebrating a modern-day lynching.
I compliment you for your “rabble rousing” but, if you look at my statement, I openly condemned the marine’s actions and agree he should be arrested.
We have homeless shelters, warming shelters in the winter, food pantries, etc. Many of these people don’t take advantage of those services for any number of reasons, mental illness being one of them, but some simply because of choice. In any case, that doesn’t give them the right to harass people and assault people.
“You’ve”? So, you don’t even live here! I guess that explains your above statement that could truly receive an Academy Award nomination for most dramatic performance. LOL
If Neely was arrested 40 times, then that means there were at least 40 chances for the authorities to give him the help he needed, and they failed. Our country does a shitty job of helping people who need mental health services.
To borrow from Hochul’s own words, “There’s consequences for inaction.”
Yes, I feel fur anyone who may have suffered because of what Neely did. But if he acted the way he did because he needed help, and he didn’t receive that help, then those people were victims of the system, not one person.
It’s the exact same problem we see where cops are sent to respond to a scene where a person is having a mental health crisis, and tgey shoot the person for noncompliance, when that person is incapable of compliance. It’s providing the wrong solution to a problem. It’s essentially a case of malpractice.
If you have a hostage situation, you don’t send cops in, guns blazing. Because people will die. You send a trained negotiator who tries to de-escalate. When a person is in a mental health crisis, it’s as if they’re being held hostage by their own mind. There is such a thing as mental health first aid that can and must be done in those situations.
The mentally ill are among the most vulnerable people in our country and we stigmatize them, shun them, and murder them. All of that is justified by the fact that society doesn’t understand the mentally ill and fears them.
…you didn’t condemn shit. “The marine should be charged because he went way overboard” isn’t a condemnation. Its a “what a shame he got caught.”
Homeless shelters, warming shelters in the winter, food pantries, aren’t the solution here. They are an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff.
The salient point here is that people don’t have the right to murder people. Even if they are yelling at you.
Mass shootings. Abortion bans. Book bans. More people in jail per capita than anywhere else in the world. Billions gifted to corrupt police. Legislating trans gender people out of existence. Spend almost double what most other nations spend on healthcare and yet can’t even guarantee universal care. Its a country that was founded on white supremacy. And that legacy lives on, even here in this thread.
Hey, we’ve got issues. 
Look, since we seem to be orbiting one another like twin stars, and since it has become obvious that neither of us will ever agree, let me sum up “me” with this statement:
If you are emotionally troubled, mentally ill, impoverished, homeless, or misfortunate in a myriad of different ways, and you come to me for help, I will help you in any way that I can. I will help you with my tax money for the programs I will openly support. I will vote for people who care about the misfortunate, etc.
If you are emotionally troubled, mentally ill, impoverished, homeless, or misfortunate in a myriad of different ways, and you come to me to harass, intimidate or victimize me, you will get a beat down at best or a bullet at worst. That’s it.
Look, you want to see abject urban poverty on a mass scale? Go to a place New Delhi or Calcutta. They sleep in doorways on newspaper and shit in a river. They are also, on the whole, much better behaved than many Americans who feel that their poverty/needs give them the right to do what they want.
Why would someone who is emotionally troubled and mentally ill go to you for help?
…what the fuck even is this?
…accuracy?
To quote from the news article,
I don’t think that being mentally ill and experiencing homelessness entitle you to consequence-free behavior and a free pass to harass or harm other people. But I also don’t think you get to use physical violence on someone who isn’t trying to physically harm you. Yelling and panhandling are not offenses meriting physical violence.
Certainly not death. Annoying someone is not a capital offense.
The killer should never have used a choke hold in the first place.
He was killed by another human being. Pray tell what definition you have of victim?
As a slight tangent, I had training as a security guard. I was licensed in California to carry and use batons and firearms. Baton training was eye-opening for me - we learned in great detail and with many real-life examples just how absurdly easy it is to kill someone. We were taught only to target limbs for baton strikes - basically just lower legs and forearms. Even a strike to the upper arm or the thigh could crush an artery and kill someone. Over and over we had it drilled into us - any time you decide to physically strike a person, you are deciding that their death is an acceptable possible outcome. You are deciding that the situation warrants potentially killing somebody, so you had better be damn sure that there’s no other option.
I think about that a lot. It’s clear that few people do. That Marine was surely combat-trained to a vastly greater degree than I was as a rent-a-cop. He should have known what he was doing was potentially lethal, and he should have known it was an absurd overreaction to the situation at hand.
He was choked to death, so obviously he was a “victim” in that sense. I’m talking “victim” in the philosophical sense as in a victim of society and, as a “victim” should have carte blanche to take liberties with the law and his fellow citizens.
I see this on the news all the time when the politicians in Chicago talk about crime. I hear things like, “We have to build more multi-million dollar parks because they need something to do.” “We have to create more jobs because of poverty.” In other words, it is society’s fault that they break into stores, car jack people, shoot each other over drugs, etc. Apparently, joining the military or really looking for a job are not considered real options even though there are “help wanted” signs all over the place.
I don’t want excuses for people having no character for being criminals. My father’s family was so poor when he was born that they didn’t even central heating. He was earning spare change from the time he was 6, and his first full time job was at 13. Instead of committing crimes, he graduated high school, joined the Air Force, got training in electronics and the new age of computers, and made a life for himself.