Does anyone seriously think that six Baltimore policemen would have been charged with murder without the riots?
I believe that violence breeds violence but that the violence began with the police. This lead to the riots. Not the one act of violence, but the entire pattern of violence against blacks–and sometime others. With these arrests and the one in South Carolina, maybe this culture of impunity towards cops will begin to change. One can only hope.
Now I put my arms over my head and let the opprobrium rain down.
Well, there you go. If democracy doesn’t go your way, just start causing destruction and terror until everyone is so afraid of you that they give you what you want.
I guess the Tea Party was right about Second Amendment solutions after all.
You won’t convince me that the riots accomplished anything productive. The protests may have been a contributing factor and they are certainly within people’s rights regardless.
However, I’d like to remind the world in general and the 24-hr news stations in particular that nothing happens overnight in the legal system. Investigations take time. Statements cannot be made during an investigation and evidence cannot be released to the public. If a month of investigation was going to be conducted before bringing any charges, and then there’s a month of riots before charges are brought…
The only people who make up their mind about guilt or innocence overnight are… dare we say it?.. prejudging things.
I have to agree with the OP. The sad reality is a peaceful march down the street might get a paragraph on page 6 in the local paper. It takes something more to get noticed. A less destructive way to protest such as blocking traffic is obviously better, but even that pisses people off. But a protest simply won’t be noticed unless people’s lives are disrupted (with rare exceptions).
That said, the violence in Baltimore was caused by the build-up of years of frustration, not an intent to get noticed.
Clearly, it’s a proud American tradition and the only way to get those in power to hear your voice in a system that’s stacked against a minority group like yours.
If you’re asking about what you should do, then I’d have to say no, you should not. It’s generally wrong to destroy something even if it’s effective in getting you what you want.
If all you’re asking is if it would work, then I’d first have to know your goal. I can pretty much guarantee that you will get more news coverage burning down the store than you will bitching about it on a message board. I don’t think either approach is likely to cause a post-election change in the results, but additional coverage might rally more people to your side.
If Baltimore were a different country on a faraway continent, we would have called the violent protests “uprisings” or “citizen unrest”.
If the protesters had been protesting the outcome of a soccer match, their violence would have been senseless and insane. But if you have good reason to believe the arm of the state is heavy-handed and unjust, and your calmly expressed complaints have gone unnoticed for years,then it is not senseless or insane for you to explode in rage.
The efficacy of violence in changing state policy is well appreciated, particularly by war-hawk conservatives. People seem to think that government should be free to use violence to control citizens. Why shouldn’t citizens wield that same power when it is clear the government is out of control?
Violence works, therefore, everyone should be more violent.
Riots and terrorism works, therefore, there is no longer any reason to protest peacefully.
And yes, I believe charges would have been brought without the riots. CVS, homeowners, landlords, residents, a new nursing home project, etc. were just acceptable casualties to the violent thugs who burned and looted Baltimore.
Your comparison would be sensible if rioters burned down the police station and other government buildings instead of drugstores and elderly affordable-housing centers.
What worked is the demonstrations. If the violence never happened the demonstrations would have generated enough local publicity to force the prosecutor to indict.
However, neither the violence nor the demonstrations will be enough to secure convictions. There just is not enough evidence. The only witness besides the cops, the other gentleman being transferred to prison, is reported as say Gray was intentionally throwing himself into the sides of the van. If this is true, then the only thing the cops are on the hook for is failure to restrain, and that is not a crime. Baltimore will waste millions on a trial that will result in at most a slap on the wrist for the accused.
Meanwhile, as a result of the rioting, insurance rates will go up, and businesses will be more reluctant to move into Baltimore. Thus there will be fewer jobs, and consumer goods will be more expensive. These rioters have hurt their communities for at best a trial that will likely have an outcome they won’t like.
The real reason there was rioting was not for a purpose but because rioting is fun, and the demonstrations gave rioters a cover and made the police reluctant to stop the rioting.
Let’s call a spade a spade. The cops lied. They put bullshit in their report to cover their asses.
Regarding the OP, I think peaceful protests (hard as those are to pull off when tensions are so high) would have led to the same result.
They would have to be real risk-your-neck protests, and consistent, and in the establishment’s face (not just a march in the part of town where the protesters live but the affluent don’t give a fuck about), but they could have worked.
Funny how rioters are “thugs” when everyone just yawns at riots over sporting events and makes no judgments about those involved.
Funny how some people think property is more important than the lives and safety of an entire race of people.
Funny how violence is the answer to taxes and 9/11, but not the systematic murder of an entire people by those in authority.
… Or so say progressives/minorities I’ve read online. And I have to say, I have some sympathy to that point of view.
Additional thought: I’ve been guessing that many, if not most, of those who think the riots were an unjustifiable response probably think so because they don’t believe that police treatment of minorities is a major problem. I wonder if that’s actually so.
We have solid evidence that cops lie on a regular basis. Blacks and in many cases whites and others have been abused by cops for years and thy get away with it. It is sad that it takes violent protests to get some action, it seems this is the only way. The violence is always wrong but it is even more wrong that it seems to require violence.