Killer Cop Walks Free After Eric Garner Verdict

[Clayton]

ITT: People who can't be assed to provide support to their arguments getting butthurt when people call them out on it

 

[Raydo]

Honestly, correct me if I misinterpret you, but you're basically saying that every white person is racist by default, at the very least passively racist. The only way for a white person not be racist is call every other white person a racist, and even then they are probably are internally . The is the same thing as me saying after black person is a criminal because there is a persistent system of the glorification of crimes and a criminal lifestyle (Which is not what I am saying AT ALL, but only to make a point).

For someone to be racist they must either act or live in such a way that shows they believe that their race is superior than that of others. Slavery was racist, as it was a system that stated that black individuals where physically, and mentally inferior to those of white descent. This then led the system of oppression, disenfranchisement, and marginalization and eventually being treated as property.

 

[Kaeb]

That is the most butthurt post I think I've read on this forum in years.

 

[Raydo]

That is the most butthurt post I think I've read on this forum in years.

I was under the impression this Sub-Forum was made to discuss and debate current affair topics. I am doing nothing more and nothing less. I have not said anything negative towards anyone personally. Just showing a difference of opinion than that of the OP and somewhat of Brandon. That is the point of all this, no?

 

[Kaeb]

Not if you refuse to recognize the clarity and truth in another person's remarks, which you have not, you keep (either intentionally or unintentionally) twisting the rhetoric to suit this warped narrative that somehow white's are being oppressed through a dictatorship of language, which they are not.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

Honestly, correct me if I misinterpret you, but you're basically saying that every white person is racist by default, at the very least passively racist.

No, I'm not saying that all white people are racist by default. I am, however, saying the painfully obvious fact that all white people benefit from that racism (white privilege), and white people who can't acknowledge that are part of the problem.

One of the issues with this debate, I think, is that a lot of white people get defensive (as I alluded to before). That defensiveness always seems to come from a place of thinking they’re being called a bad person, or just not understanding the overall issue - both of which I would say are illustrated in you assuming that I was calling all white people racist (though to your credit, you acknowledged you could be wrong).

This country isn’t going to progress on racial issues until white people can admit to the fact that they have privileges and easier life experiences than minorities, particularly African Americans. For example, since #CrimingWhileWhite was a popular hashtag last night, a few months ago I was pulled over by the cops. My car’s registration had expired, which I didn’t realize. That means I did something illegal. Then, when I was pulled over, I was looking for an up-to-date registration card in my car (this was before the officer told me that he had looked up my plates and knew for a fact the registration expired). Without any warning, I reached into the glove compartment to look for a registration card.

I did not get shot as a result.

Now, you may be thinking "what?" On face value, that seems like a silly story. Of course I didn't get shot. But if I was black, my odds of being killed or injured because of that would have gone up dramatically, because there's an insidious bias that assumes black men are dangerous. It was a white privilege that the cop didn't even flinch when I suddenly reached over to the glove compartment, where there could very well have been a gun. And with the expired registration, he simply gave me a ticket and sent me on my way, rather than assuming it was a stolen car.

There's plenty of other white privileges we benefit from too. White people don't have to grow up being taught that the police are likely to assume they're up to no good based on the color of their skin. White people don't have to be taught not to put their hands in their pockets in stores for fear of people thinking they were shoplifting. White people don't have to be taught that certain clothes might make people think they're a thug. White people don't have to worry about what people would think if they are with a group of white friends, and how people might perceive that group. In general, white people don't have to be taught to be cognizant of their race and its societal implications, period.

I don't usually like quoting things in these threads, because more often than not it comes across like a meaningless platitude, but I do think this Martin Luther King quote, from his letter in the Birmingham jail, is relevant and important:

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice... Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

It's about recognizing the problem, recognizing that you benefit from a racist system, and figuring out how you can be part of the solution. Refusing to acknowledge the problem makes you part of the problem.

 

[Raydo]

Brandon, while I do not believe you and Sovereign (Whose comment originally convinced me to post) are not using the same definition of the word, and he used it as a direct attack on individual's character, Your last post actually made a lot of sense to me. I still can not agree that a person has been called a racist, and it was not meant to insinuate at least some negative quality of the person's character or behavior. I can agree that the system as whole contributes to problems in people life, and needs improvement.

As a side note, its still a bad idea to reach for anything in a glove box with permission while being pulled over, regardless or your skin color : p

And as for Kaeb's comments, I neither "butthurt" or saying I believe white people are oppressed as a whole. I really have nothing left to say regarding your comment.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

Brandon, while I do not believe you and Sovereign (Whose comment originally convinced me to post) are not using the same definition of the word, and he used it as a direct attack on individual's character, Your last post actually made a lot of sense to me. I still can not agree that a person has been called a racist, and it was not meant to insinuate at least some negative quality of the person's character or behavior. I can agree that the system as whole contributes to problems in people life, and needs improvement.

I can't speak for Sovereign. I can only speak for myself.

As a side note, its still a bad idea to reach for anything in a glove box with permission while being pulled over, regardless or your skin color : p

Oh for sure. It was a terrible idea, and I realized later I was an idiot. I was just fortunate to have been white.

 

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The people committing the worst attacks on someone's character are the people keening about how they dun been wronged by someone on the internet whilst A MAN HAS DIED. Some of you folks don't seem to need any help to look like terrible human beings.

I mean, did you watch the video? Eric Garner was essentially lynched. He had his hands up. He wasn't resisting. He begged for leniency and had the life choked out of him. What was his crime? Being a large black man who sold cigarettes on a street corner. We don't even have the fig leaf here of prior "violent" or "thug" behavior. He wasn't hurting anyone. He was just a person like you or me. And his murderer, a man with previous incidents like this marring his record wasn't even put on trial.

From a sheer human standpoint, it boggles my mind that the first reaction to seeing someone's cold-blooded murder in one of the most brutal and primal ways imaginable on a public street in one of the biggest cities in the world is... to whine about dictionaries.

I reiterate. We know that white supremacy is alive and well when reactionary white people still get the privilege of holding the racial discourse hostage with their hurt fee-fees whilst actual flesh-and-blood black and brown people (and kids especially) die ignominious deaths.

P.S.

For someone to be racist they must either act or live in such a way that shows they believe that their race is superior than that of others

Blacks lost more wealth proportionally speaking than whites during the last financial crisis. Do you know why? Because they were targets of a racist and systematic program of subprime loans which kept them away from white neighborhoods spearheaded by the greatest loci of white power in the United States today: the law firms and the banks.

We live in a society in which to be white is to take advantage of this system. And I say this as a wealthy white lawyer. So I'm not claiming moral superiority or any of that nonsense here. We have a problem and it's going to take as many people as possible conscious of what their roles are in that immorality play if we're ever going to make progress.

 

[jpchewy01]

I'm the whitest black guy ever and I'm still deathly afraid of cops.

 

[Kaeb]

I punched a police officer in the throat once and all that happened was a stern conversation and a warning. Now, if a non-national had done that, I can safely say they'd have endured a very different treatment.

 

[TWD26]

And I didn't call Relent a racist. I will, however, point out defensive white people, or a defensive white culture, and how that contributes to a racist system. Which is passively racist.

i agree

 

[Cailst]

I punched a police officer in the throat once and all that happened was a stern conversation and a warning. Now, if a non-national had done that, I can safely say they'd have endured a very different treatment.

What's up with Irish police? I don't think even my white privilege extends that far.

 

[Brandon Rhea]

What's up with Irish police? I don't think even my white privilege extends that far.

It does in some cases. Every once and awhile you see cases where white people can get into altercations with the cops and they may get tazed, or just wrestled to the ground. Basically, the same kind of situational de-escalation that people want to see afforded to African Americans as well.

 

[Andrewza]

How can you not see a pattern? How many black people need to die before you recognize that there might be a problem with policing in America?

The question was rhetorical, by the way. You're clearly racist, so I'm not expecting you to use logic/empathy.

A disripoeted number of black Americans are arrested in the USA. Hell the ration in the US prison by race is similar to the ratio in South African prisons. Only in SA Blacks are the majority not a minority. This indicts that something is very wrong and yes there is a problem in the USA but it is not has bad the problem in SA. And in SA it is not racial ay all, just violent cops.


Of course they nice to me, I have yet to meat a cop that is not nice. Cops just don't see white people has a threat, sort of a Racial profiling and I am talking about black cops here. Witch is strange is a white guy is more likely to be armed than a black guy at least in SA and. So I just think Cops fear blacks thus tend to over react more.

 

[Andrewza]

How can you not see a pattern? How many black people need to die before you recognize that there might be a problem with policing in America?

The question was rhetorical, by the way. You're clearly racist, so I'm not expecting you to use logic/empathy.

A disripoeted number of black Americans are arrested in the USA. Hell the ration in the US prison by race is similar to the ratio in South African prisons. Only in SA Blacks are the majority not a minority. This indicts that something is very wrong and yes there is a problem in the USA but it is not has bad the problem in SA. And in SA it is not racial ay all, just violent cops.


Of course they nice to me, I have yet to meat a cop that is not nice. Cops just don't see white people has a threat, sort of a Racial profiling and I am talking about black cops here. Witch is strange is a white guy is more likely to be armed than a black guy at least in SA and. So I just think Cops fear blacks thus tend to over react more.

 

[Nor'baal]

I punched a police officer in the throat once and all that happened was a stern conversation and a warning. Now, if a non-national had done that, I can safely say they'd have endured a very different treatment.

You should have been arrested, to me this just reeks of laxity in the Police Force.

Any Police Officer who kills someone during their operations should be put in front of an enquiry - run by the Judicial System (Courts) not the Police - and regardless of colour, ethnicity, gender, age etc etc they should be tried fairly, and the ethnicity etc etc of the person then killed should not be a factor.

Killing people, is wrong - a fact we can all agree on - in this case the Police Officer should go to jail for a very very long time, however, in a case in which the apprehended individual was acting in a way that could have caused serious harm to others, or the Police, and that results in the Police killing them, then I do not think that the Police Officer(s) should be punished.

In this case however, it was in my eyes Murder.

 

[Kaeb]

What's up with Irish police? I don't think even my white privilege extends that far.

The same problem with many police forces mate, their views and approach to their job is distorted by the state and the media to the point that it instills a narrative upon them that causes them to profile the people they're dealing with in far dumber ways, like racially profiling them and using that to influence how they interact with them in dumb ways.

It does in some cases. Every once and awhile you see cases where white people can get into altercations with the cops and they may get tazed, or just wrestled to the ground. Basically, the same kind of situational de-escalation that people want to see afforded to African Americans as well.

^

You should have been arrested, to me this just reeks of laxity in the Police Force.

He'd pushed a young girl out of a line into a gig so hard that she was thrust to the ground and nearly broke her ankle, he then went to go for her while roaring at her and in doing so, he pushed someone else to the ground, I thought he was a danger to everyone else so me and two others confronted him. When all was finished, he was still left in charge of the scene (not exactly protocol) and all he did was walk away.

If it had been a group of black guys who accosted him?

I can safely say the scenario would have been very different.