What do you mean, “never showed him”? All the news coverage of the killing, including the bodycam footage, indicates quite clearly that the guy who was killed had been waving a knife. He didn’t actually injure anyone with it, which I’d call “threatening people with a knife” rather than “attacking people with a knife”, but YMMV.
AFAICT, the protestors’ not unreasonable complaint is that the cop should not have immediately resorted to shooting dead a guy waving a knife some ten or fifteen feet away from him.
Moreover, the guy’s sister had called a non-emergency police number and a crisis intervention service to obtain help with committing her mentally ill brother who was off his meds and acting uncontrolled and incoherent, rather than calling 911 to be rescued from a violent assailant. Immediate execution by gunfire should not be law enforcement’s first resort in dealing with a known mentally ill person, even if that person is chasing somebody with a knife.
Mind you, I have every sympathy for a cop’s being scared that a knife-waving mentally ill guy might do serious damage to him or to somebody else, and I know it’s very much not easy to handle such a situation successfully. But an automatic reaction of immediately-shoot-the-guy-dead in response to any threatening situation ISTM is going too far, and I can see why people concerned about excessive use of force by cops would be upset about it.
We don’t need protests to make the point that violent criminals, of whatever race, unjustly assaulting innocent victims, of whatever race, is a bad thing.
But apparently we DO need protests to make the point that LEOs routinely using deadly force to extrajudicially execute people who aren’t posing an immediate deadly threat—and who in many cases aren’t posing any realistic threat of violence at all—is also a bad thing.
Especially if that excessive deadly force is routinely used against racial minorities much more than against white people.
I don’t approve of anyone, even mentally ill people, threatening cops with knives, and AFAICT neither BLM nor anybody else is trying to argue that it’s a good or okay thing to threaten cops with knives.
But I also don’t approve of cops tyrannically abusing their law-enforcement powers by reflexively killing people whom they might reasonably be expected to contain/disarm without killing them. If that’s such a radically utopian notion that it requires public protests in order to get people to take it seriously, well then, time to break out the posterboard.
Oh and a question for the OP- why do you assume the BLM protesters in Lancaster went there from other location? Do you have any evidence they aren’t just Lancastrians?
Where was the asshole OP when those boogaloo babies, or whatever they’re called, were shooting federal security officers in Oakland? 2020 boogaloo murders - Wikipedia
Cop lives only matter when racist thugs need rhetorical props for the greater glory of their scumbag king.
When leaving the -ic off of democrat leads to more outrage on this forum than burning, looting, and murder the shooting of a couple of cops who are probably Trump supporters anyways isn’t going to be outrageous.
Ultimately, this is the consequence of legitimizing political violence.
Decent folks should reject Trump and his administration, which directly encourages and promotes political violence, both with actions and with words. Hopefully you’ll stand with us in support of peace and against Trump.
When kneeling peacefully during a national anthem leads to more outrage than the persistent systemic racism and refusal to enforce accountability for gross misconduct that results in violence against and deaths of countless black people every year that kneeling is intended to highlight, it’s not surprising that some people will desperately try to distract from that.
Several people here have condemned the killing of these officers (as indeed do I). Democratic politicians have repeatedly condemned violence by all. Conversely, several Republican politicians, including President Trump, have openly encouraged and supported violent (or at least “extra-legal”) behavior against those they perceive to be their enemies, both by law enforcement and by their other followers. If you wish to condemn “legitimizing political violence”, make sure you’re condemning the right people.
Oh, and the OP who characterized these murders as “open hunting on police now” - but handwaved away all the evidence that the police have engaged in “open hunting on black people” since this country was founded as being just a few bad apples - is a disingenuous, morally bankrupt hypocrite.
The Republican Right is desperate to discredit the BLM movement in any and every way possible, so anything done wrong by anyone Black is tagged as BLM. Rioters? BLM. Looters? BLM.
Additionally, “justification via false equivalency” is one of their established tactics. It worked brilliantly in 2016 by convincing enough blue voters that, “Hillary Clinton is just as bad as Donald Trump, so you may as well stay home or waste your vote on Bernie.”
So, even if those few, cruel people openly yelled, “Black Lives Matter!”, it wouldn’t change the fact that the movement itself is very necessary and worthy.
Ye[quote=“eenerms, post:53, topic:920618, full:true”]
Again I’m called a racist because I don’t support BLM… I call bullshit on this Marxist, race baiting organization. They are organized leftist scum.
[/quote]
You know that you’re old when you need to resort to calling people Marxists? Too funny hahaha
There is no “manifesto” for BLM. BLM is not a centrally planned or hierarchical organization by any means. BLM is largely made up of individuals concerned about law enforcement mistreatment of black people, who protest such incidents and advocate for change and fairer treatment.
Fox News told you that, did it?
BLM was organized by three highly educated and accomplished women; Patrisse Cullors , Alicia Garza , and Opal Tometi. You can look up their highly impressive credentials and accomplishments if you wish.
“Black Lives Matter is a decentralized political and social movement advocating for non-violent civil disobedience in protest against incidents of police brutality and all racially motivated violence against black people.”
If you’re looking for someone in bed with Communists, I suggest you check the oval office.
I get that you’re being lied to all day long by your news sources and I feel sorry for you (see your misinformation about the original organizers of BLM above). However, no one called you a racist until you bizarrely denied being a racist for no reason.
I’ll give this one last try – why do you blame all of BLM for the alleged actions of a few, but you don’t blame all cops (a much more organized operation, with actual hierarchies, HR departments, promotions, etc.) for the actions of the not-few-enough?