Man, binary thinkers sure make me tired. I guess this needs to be explained again. Yall have GOT to stop mindlessly taking sides on every issue on a purely cultural basis or on the basis of what your echo chamber is telling you, and start thinking for yourself. Until my friends with a leftward bent acknowledge that the unrest over the Brown case was never about justice, but was instead about revenge or an excuse to act out (details below); and my friends with a rightward bent acknowledge that it was much more about straws breaking the camels back than it was about one person (details below) and stop thinking they are accomplishing something by making smart ass remarks about pulling up pants and getting a job; they will continue to talk right past each other, and the real problem (details below) will never be addressed. Why do I say the reaction to the grand jury decision was never about justice? The violence and looting, and the stupid statements from the professional race baiters such the Congressional Black Caucus, took place before anyone even had an chance to analyze the document dump from the grand jury. So, how did they know that the decision was unfair? They rioted, and made their stupid statements, simply because they didnt get their pound of flesh, or because they were looking for an excuse to act out (in the case of the rioters) or say we told you so (in the case of the race baiters). Since my own admittedly limited analysis puts the odds of Wilson being acquitted if he had been indicted at over 95% (no way the State makes a case beyond reasonable doubt and get a conviction with that much ambiguous and contradictory evidence), Wilson was still going to walk. It was a question of when, and not if. The riots were therefore a question of when and not if. The prosecutor declines to bring a case due to inadequate proof? Riots. A grand jury is impaneled and fails to indict? Riots. Wilson goes to trial and is acquitted? Riots. As for the you on the other side of the fence, you are absolutely right that Brown makes for a HORRIBLE poster boy. But, so what? Thats completely missing the point. Posting pictures of him acting like a gangsta for his Facebook page , or his arrest record, or video of him roughing up a store clerk, are not going to change the central facts of the case. The only thing that matters is whether Wilson was justified in pulling the trigger at the moment he decided, and your memes are completely irrelevant in that regard. Finally, whats the real problem? 1. The increasing paramilitarization of police forces. 2. Their increasing tendency to needlessly create situations with the potential for violence and unhappy outcomes. SWAT Teams were originally formed to deal with hostage situations and barricaded suspects. Deployments are up from about 3,000/yr a decade ago to over 50,000/yr now, and its not due to a spike in hostage situations. Dynamic entry (modeled after Special Forces close quarters battle tactics) in full military gear is now the tactic of choice for serving warrants for non violent crimes, to people with no history of violence. Its a recipe for eventual tragedy such as the toddler who was critically injured by a flashbang landing in his crib. 3. Their increasing tendency to shoot first and ask questions later. The emphasis on officer safety and the mindset of viewing every civilian (see, they even use military lingo) as a potential threat is creating some itchy finger fingers. This mindset persists despite the fact that the number of police killed by criminals goes down every year, and the number of civilians killed by police goes up every year. See the 12 yo who was just gunned down by police as a much better example of a poster boy than Michael Brown. 4. Couple all of that with the fact that municipalities are now getting upwards of three quarters of their revenue from fines and fees levied by enforcement arms (the laws of supply and demand work in this case just as well as they do in the private sector), which pushes cops to spend more time looking out for sources of revenue (ticket quotas, etc) than in protecting the community. That kind of behavior is eventually going to irritate all citizens (even the law abiding), setting up an adversarial relationship between police and the communities they serve. You add up all of those factors, and you have a time bomb just ticking away. Race is just the icing on the cake, although it is some pretty thick icing, since a young black male is about 20 times as likely to be killed by the police as a young white male. Dont get caught up in the superficial.
Posted on: Fri, 28 Nov 2014 13:32:54 +0000
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