Nation's Cops Seem Determined To Demonstrate Why People Are Protesting Them | Hacker News Reader

Nation's Cops Seem Determined To Demonstrate Why People Are Protesting Them

reason.com

46 pointsmiles27 comments

Peaceful protest does not work. That is the legacy of the last 50 years since the civil rights movement. Not a lot has changed. Black men are still being lynched. What would the conversation be if it weren't for video? Even with video, the conflicting autopsy from the county makes it sound like Floyd had either a pre-existing condition or drugs in his body.

I'm pretty irritated with the media, allowing various leaders to claim that they support peaceful protests. No they do not. Not Republican leaders, who consistently impugned the peaceful protests of Colin Kaepernick. They demanded these were vile, unpatriotic, and un-American. These are not mere talking heads, but the V-POTUS, and the POTUS, among others. They do not support peaceful protest, they hate it. They hate all criticism and all protests.

America is getting exactly what it deserves. It claims a contract of freedom and equality of all before the law. And this is provably, deterministically not true. And if it is not true, then why listen to any of it? The social contract is dust. If it is not wrong to lynch black men, then it is not wrong to loot, and burn, and pillage, and create widespread chaos. That is the central problem with loss of trust of the social contract, it begs the end to civil society, when we blatantly for all to see do not have a civil society for all. The deck is stacked in favor of some, and against others. Plainly. Clearly.

The contract we really have is Amy Cooper contract. The one where a black man asks her to put her dog on a leash per the law, and then she uses her whiteness as a weapon, and his blackness as a deficit, with the threat to call the police to get her way and her revenge and assert her white superiority. And knows the force of the police will make sure only one of them has a bad day. And then demand she's not a racist, right after having perfectly demonstrated racism. Hers and the system. That is the hallmark of institutional racism.

Excuses for bad actors on American's police forces must end. Not tomorrow, not next week, not next year.

Today.

As Chris Rock put it in his widely shared comedy bit, we don't tolerate bad actors in industries such as airlines when it's a matter of life and death. We don't excuse pilots who just so happen to crash planes into mountains. Furthermore, we don't excuse surgeons who get upset during a procedure and sew the wrong body part back on out of spite.

Some professions just require zero tolerance for poor behavior. ZERO. Police officers fall under that category.

My question is how is destroying small businesses and disrupting the lives of innocent people in your own community protesting cops? If anything, they created jobs for the police. And they've caused people that otherwise would support them to not support them (except out of fear for their lives).

It's a group of people, not an amoeba, not everyone has the same motivation, so of course if you consider them as Them, then Them will have logically inconsistent behavior.

From a purely pragmatic point of view, setting fire to a small business, especially a restaurant in NYC, is an act of kindness.

All of these folks are under water and suddenly the buck stops at the re-insurers.

Sometimes the disease is worse than the cure.

In situations of institutional inequality, the bottom row considers everything above it complicit. https://i.imgur.com/vpv5anc.jpg

It's a have vs have not, opportunity vs not. A business owner is a have. It's a form of leveling a playing field by destroying what others have. Similar to the intention of the terrorists in Fight Club or Goldeneye, a reset to blow up banks and financial institutions.

I don't think the rioting mob necessary has thought it out that well, but the anger causing it, and targeting business moreso than residential is an attack on the benefactors of protection rackets, whether they be law enforcement, banks, anyone who gives some a different opportunity than others. In this case business and land owners. It's a belief that "fixing the system from the inside" has failed.

Attack's on the media are similar, because they are intrinsically linked. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politico-media_complex

The message of Fight Club was NOT to blow everything up, and that it can be fixed from the inside, but not everyone agrees.

Not all police forces are bad. And the ones that do have a higher percentage of bad apples aren’t all this bad.

But yes, there are some out there that seem bound and determined to exhibit the exact behavior that people are demonstrating against. Contrary to all logic, there it is.

If the police defends, supports or ignores unacceptable action they are just as bad themselves. One bad apple spoils the bunch.

Blaming the problem on the individual morality of police officers feels good. But the real problem, why police are getting away with crimes like murder, is something called "qualified immunity" and police unions. Until those are reformed, judging the individual morality of police officers isn't going to be enough to solve the problem.

Yes. Change incentives and behavior will change.

The "groupism" of lumping "white", "black", "cops", "Republicans", etc is just not useful. Just distracting old tribalism instincts. Take personal responsibility and expect it from others.

So social systems and institutions have no effect on the human condition, got it.

Of course they do. But to say all police (or whatever group label) are the same and have same faults is a stretch. Making similar blanket statements about minorities is racist.

Would you mind reviewing the site guidelines and following them when posting here? We'd be grateful. They include:

"Don't be snarky."

"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Note that they don't require you to change your views, just express them thoughtfully.

Unfortunately chaotic times are magnifying tribalism. It's apparent in the fabric of our discussions, even among intellectual peers in this industry. I'm finding it rather difficult to find any place to discuss things in a dry rational way. Maybe a dryly rational conversation can't exist.

You're not wrong about the importance of taking personal responsibility, but I do think there's an important distinction between 'white/black' and 'cops/republicans'.

The former is just what you are, with all that comes with it. The latter is a choice, and comes with various benefits (and to some degree drawbacks).

The exact details of how these tribal affiliations affect your character stats, so to speak, is obviously hotly debated. But 1) they're not irrelevant so useful to consider, and 2) once again not having a choice of tribal affiliation strikes me as more than just a little detail.

I’d say they’re in a pretty tough spot. I certainly wouldn’t have the patience to be the punching bag of a bunch of assholes who are so sure that if they were in charge, things would be better... I guess that’s why I’m not a cop.

It takes a pretty serious lack of patience to drive a truck into a crowd

Not if they’re banging on the windows, pulling on the doors and trying to drag you out of it.

The video showing that is pretty clear that none of that happened. They drove around a corner and into the crowd.

Maybe multiple cases are being conflated here. In the case of the cab hauling the FedEx trailers where one attacker got caught in a rear wheel, the truck had stopped, but multiple people climbed onto the cab and tried to break in while members of the crowd shouted, "set it on fire!".

Yeah, sucks for them because they seem to be blamed for a crime that they had nothing to do with

Yeah I feel bad for the folks who get so upset by the protests that they feel compelled to ram the crowds with their cars :(

How does that translate into shooting at reporters?

> a bunch of assholes who are so sure that if they were in charge, things would be better

What an astute framing of the situation. I love the way you tie in the historical context that has led to this moment.

Thanks

Yeah, sucks for them because they seem to be blamed for a crime that they had nothing to do with.

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