Comment by marricks | Hacker News Reader

Comment by marricks | Hacker News Reader

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Pretty sure police officers nightly beating of protestors, pulling off masks and pepper spraying their eyes and assaulting reporters is a very direct attempt at quelling protestors.

If you followed the nightly protests in Portland OR with any closeness it'd be abundantly clear. Examples just in the past 20 days:

- police pulling down mask to pepper spray protestor in the eyes while pinned to the ground: https://twitter.com/_WhatRiot/status/1292012255714787330

- police randomly puncturing a support vans tires, they have done this on multiple occasions for no real reason: https://twitter.com/ScottHech/status/1291711270903844867

- police beating and kicking an unresisting protestor: https://twitter.com/1misanthrophile/status/12959623991035453...

- more police jabbing protestor with batons: https://twitter.com/danielvmedia/status/1292228819588452359

You see enough of these videos and you appreciate the cops and just vindictive and angry at the prospect of losing "power". It doesn't matter what protestors do (and they most they've done to directly threaten officers is thrown water bottles and apples and flares into an empty police building), police will use any reason (or none) to beat protestors.

* As far as I know these videos have resulted in NO reprimands to officers, might as well be standard operating procedure as it continues to happen nightly

From further down in the thread:

> Today I watched a police officer in kenosha wisconsin get knocked unconscious with a brick. The fellow police officers picked him up and dragged him away - while the crowd changed "Fuck the police" and recorded it.

The idea that the worst the protesters have done is throw apples at the police is so crazy I don't even know how you could be that deep in a bubble

I'm directly talking about Portland, where plenty of protestors have been knocked unconscious by police. People get pepper sprayed in the eyes for no reason besides cops are angry.

If you want to conflate places to strengthen a case then you need to dive in to what happened at Kenosha and the lack of police response to that tragedy or any of the others.

If you want to bring up how "protestors were asking for it" by showing up to protests then we got to ask if police are asking for mass nation wide protests by actively resisting change and harming black lives.

> I'm directly talking about Portland, where

Portland where there’s been continuously rioting, looting and attack on civilians for three months now.

The police’s job is to provide law, order and security for the people, something Portland currently lacks, and which the police needs to restore.

When anarchists are obstructing that job, they can’t expect not to be handled appropriately.

Do you even live in Portland? I do and I live a mile away from the Justice Center where protests centered. There was looting the first night but not much at all since. Also, it's been normal COVID times business as usual in the surrounding area during business hours. If you want to make up narratives choose a different city.

Also, if you think police can just beat people senseless because they feel challenged then you're just a short step away from text book fascism.

Also, it's been normal COVID times business as usual in the surrounding area during business hours.

That seems like a massive deflection. Sure, business as usual during the day, but what's happening every evening?

I believe the commonly used term for this is "largely peaceful".

Sure. They're largely peaceful, except when attacking and almost killing civilians[1]. And it's not even intended as a joke. There's some crazy levels of cognitive dissonance going on.

[1] https://twitter.com/RationalTheory/status/129536995058932531...

Yep, one night protestors were just as brutal as police, mistaken identity and tensions high from the other night when a car almost ran protesters over.

You have one example versus dozens of examples of police violence. And it's Andy Ngo, who once again didn't actually take the video footage.

You're the one with cognitive dissonance claiming all nights are violently attacking civilians when you have one example. Somehow though most nights police beat protestors or use tear gas and that’s ok by you?

You need to learn what a dispersal order is and why it’s not optional.

The purpose of using tear gas is to disperse a disorderly crowd before they can begin attacking people.

Are you being willfully dishonest or just naive? Portland is not doing this to protesters. They are rioting. They do this after giving half a dozen warnings. They say that anyone who does not vacate the riot will be subject to crowd control measures and arrest. The rioters remain and continue to be violent and to intentionally shield those committing the most egregious acts. It’s disgusting. The police must respond to the nightly attempts to burn down buildings and attacks on them from projectiles, laser blinding attempts, incendiary devices, and more.

There is no justification for it whatsoever. There is no legitimate cause behind any of it.

Watch the hour long interview with the Portland cop that was going around. It’s good perspective.

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