Same here. Consider the outrage over the Rodney King verdict some years ago. From Wikipedia:
By the time the police, the US Army, the Marines and the National Guard restored order, the casualties included 53 deaths, 2,383 injuries, more than 7,000 fires, damages to 3,100 businesses, and nearly $1 billion in financial losses.
This time, we’re talking about the possibility of the first black president, not some construction worker that got beat up by the cops. If he loses, despite positive polling through Election Day, the fallout won’t be pretty.
The police - right wingers of course - have been fairly brutal to the left, such as it is. And it’s not the left that kills people who disagree with it in this country.
What planet are you from ? Conservative is just fine; it’s “liberal” that’s been demonized.
The left is nearly nonexistent. We have the Right ( Obama ), and the Far Right ( McCain ).
The polling numbers are still very close, and in most of the key up-for-grab states are still within the margin of error range. It ain’t over 'till it’s over.
What concerns me is that the contentions of voter disenfranchisement, election-stealing, and insidious plots by the DieBold Corporation have undermined the public’s trust in the fairness of the system to such a point that a McCain victory, no matter how legitimate, will be rejected by a substantial portion of the population as a right-wing coup.
I hear what you’re saying. And I think that any city police chief who doesn’t have an action plan in place is being grossly negligent.
But I’m sick of people using hand-wringing over “riots” as a tool to remind people that BLACK PEOPLE ARE DIFFERENT THAN WHITE PEOPLE.
White people cry into their Chardonnay.
Black people break windows.
White people challenge the election results in courts of law.
Black people loot and light fires.
White people proceed to their homes in an orderly fashion when asked to by the police.
Black people tell the cops to fuck off.
And the whole thing plays on so many black stereotypes. And not just the “blacks are violent” one. That one’s easy 'cause it’s right out there on the surface. But what about the other ones?
One of the most potent arguments in favor of slavery was the idea that blacks are essentially “juvenile” and not able to take care of themselves without a paternalistic white person looking out for them. And what is a riot but a gigantic multi-person temper tantrum? Little kids are not able to channel their anger and frustrations into constructive action. Nor are they able to keep it to themselves. They yell and they scream and they kick their legs and they break stuff. Normal adults don’t do this. And normal adults don’t openly take stuff that doesn’t belong to them, either. But kids will. And rioters will.
I dunno. All this “but they might riot!” stuff is like saying “you just can’t trust them to behave themselves.” Like they were a bunch of 6 year olds. And by tarring black people with that brush, you’re tarring Obama. It’s just an excuse to bring up nasty old stereotypes.
And while I think appleciders offense at the “young people might riot too” meme is quite reasonable, now that I’ve achieved the ripe old age of 37, I can say with confidence that college-age folks tend to be quite a bit more impulsive than fogeys like me. So it’s not a totally out-there thing. But nevertheless, these references to the “young people” read as pure tokenism to me. “See, I’m not a racist. I’m afraid of the college kids too!”
Given the behavior of some sports victories in the past there is a good chance there will be riots in Chicago if Obama wins, and massive riotes if he loses.
If Obama loses fair and square, what exactly should the left do except take it? Regroup and try harder next time is all I can think of. You sound dangerously close to suggesting illegal activity.
Or blow up federal buildings, or shoot doctors who perform abortions, or put on a police uniform and beat on “lefties” and minorities, or tell the military to invade someone. If anything, the distinction is that the thug segment of the black subculture aren’t as organized or directed or powerful about their violence.
When your history teaches you the courts and the law are biased against you, you don’t go to them.
Or for the vast majority of folks throught the majority of human history, you know, when slavery was common and widespread.
In the US, the slavery issue and the racial thoughts that enforced it held on a bit longer, and we are still dealing with the repercussions of that today.
But to think that the folks that believed the stereotypes of the day were idiots and scum is just foolishness.
And we’ll probably have several more threads on this subject before the end of the election (or the world if you are a Republican). I agree completely with you here. My question though is…the mods actually allowed a poster to name themselves ‘poker in the rear’??
I think that some other poster should adopt the alternative, and then you coordinate to ensure that both of you posts to the same threads…just for effect…
No . . . The institution of black slavery in the New World was the first form of slavery to be based on perceived racial differences, including the purported mental inferiority of negroes. That was a new thing. Classical slavery was considered a matter of individual luck and fate; master and slave were as likely as not to be of the same racial group however defined.
