[Terez]

 QuickTidal, on 01 December 2014 - 12:55 AM, said:

I did indeed not mean it that way. I just thought he was speaking from a smart introspective place that everyone can benfit from. Internal questioning can help everyone is kind of how I saw it. Regardless of race. We all have to work together for diversity. That's how I read it.

That might be how he meant it, but white people in the US tend to see this kind of thing through the lens of the black race being the only problem that needs fixing. "Fixing Ferguson" for them means "fixing" the majority of the population there which is black, not fixing the police force which can do no wrong.

[worry]

Jay Smooth tends to be a little too youtubey for my tastes (at least his quick cuts aren't that quick), but he gets to at least some of the heart of why I distrust blanket calls for "non-violence" even if I share the ideal.

Jay Smooth said:

Riots are things that human beings do because human beings have limits.

We don’t all have the same limits. For some of us, our human limit is when our favorite team loses a game. For some of us, it’s when our favorite team wins a game.

The people of Ferguson had a different limit than that. For the people of Ferguson, a lifetime of neglect and defacto segregation and incompetence and mistreatment by every level of government was not their limit.

When that malign neglect set the stage for one of their children to be shot down and left in the street like a piece of trash… that was not their limit.

For the people of Ferguson, spending one hundred days almost entirely peacefully protesting for some measure of justice for that child and having their desire for justice treated like a joke by every local authority… was not their limit.

And then after those 100 days, when the so-called prosecutor waited until the dead of night to come out to twist that knife one last time. When he came out and confirmed once and for all that Michael Brown’s life didn’t matter…

Only then did the people of Ferguson reach their limit.

So when you look at what happened Monday night, the question you should be asking is how did these human beings last that long before they reached their human limit? How do black people in America retain such a deep well of humanity that they can be pushed so far again and again without reaching their human limit?

[amphibian]

Another factor to consider is that white riots have been big avenues for social change (mostly benefiting the whites). They were put down, but not to the point of the Tulsa bombings or demonization of the rioters that happen when black people riot.

There's a problem in how the country/media/institutions treat riots by different groups of people. It's related to all of this and not easily solvable either. It's a similar problem to how white kids can walk around with real guns at pro-gun rallies without hassles or significant police attention and stuff like that, but a couple black kids/young men with BB guns get treated far more suspiciously/murderously.

There's real exclusions of behavior/social acts/opportunities from minorities here in the US. It's not a set of problems solely confined to the US, but it's a big, amorphous and thorny thing that has been pushed and prodded at for the last 350+ years. It grew out of the takings, depowering and killings of Native Americans by European settlers and mutated into bigger and more formal things.

[Studlock]

Here's the thing I don't understand about the call of non-violence white Americans: your entire country was only ever made possible because of a violent revolution. Slavery was only dismantled because of a violent intervention. One of America's defining historical moments of pride was participating in the bloodiest war that has ever existed. Time and time again Americans have used violence as a mode of communal and personal transformation for the better and yet when blacks get uppity everyone is waiting with their own personal favourite MLK quote ignoring the fact that he shot in face despite being non-violent. Non-violent protest is good for all people if it works but yet it hasn't worked. Non-violent protest when it doesn't work favours those in power because they don't have to spend money on the disturbance created by it. They get to go on undisturbed because they don't actually effect them. In this case non-violent protest is essentially non-effective.

Edited for clarity.

This post has been edited by Studlock: 01 December 2014 - 10:17 PM

[Obdigore]

Did you just say MLK jr. was assassinated because of his non-violence?

This post has been edited by Obdigore: 01 December 2014 - 10:09 PM

[Studlock]

He was assassinated despite being non-violent. As being non-violent didn't exactly foster a deep mutual understanding between European-Americans and African-Americans.

[Obdigore]

 Studlock, on 01 December 2014 - 10:11 PM, said:

He was assassinated despite being non-violent. As being non-violent didn't exactly foster a deep mutual understanding between European-Americans and African-Americans.

Yea you missed a 'despite' in there.

[Studlock]

 Obdigore, on 01 December 2014 - 10:16 PM, said:

 Studlock, on 01 December 2014 - 10:11 PM, said:

He was assassinated despite being non-violent. As being non-violent didn't exactly foster a deep mutual understanding between European-Americans and African-Americans.

Yea you missed a 'despite' in there.

I edited it for clarity.

[worry]

I wouldn't say non-violence doesn't/hasn't worked, but I'd never say that of violence either. But I will say that calls for non-violence should be treated suspect when they come from outside or above because they 1) elide the violence that is already happening (and favor privileged lives or even property over non-privileged lives); 2) ignore (deliberately or not) the metaphor, particularly when focusing solely on the practical questions (problem-solving; "progress") and overemphasis of damaging "your own community" (I'd wager there's major overlap with people who don't 'get' graffiti either); 3) re-frame the situation so that all responsibility falls on the victimized, glossing over the injustice so we (the important "we", the only ones that really matter) can get to the healing part already. It's the "slavery was a long time ago" spiel in miniature.

Anyway, Do the Right Thing should be required viewing near the end of the year in every US History class.

[Studlock]

I wouldn't say non-violence never works either but I think in the case of African-Americans it hasn't worked, hence the current situation. I think for non-violence protest to work their has to some sort of respect given to those protesting and I think for the wider American community there isn't. It's as you said, they seem to value the opinion of privileged commentators, or things more than the continued suffering of those protesting. I think it really trivializes the experiences of African-Americans when European-Americans call for non-violent protest despite violence being committed against them by the state. It's already a non-violent affair, the time of non-violence has long passed, at least for one 'side' of this debate.

[worry]

I wouldn't say it hasn't worked there either, though it all involves complicated definitions of violence (which seemingly ranges from 'causing serious injury' to 'being visibly angry that you were shot by rubber bullets for protesting' to 'existing') and even what "working" looks like. And it's been piecemeal, patchwork, spotty, and opposed every inch of the way. I'm 51/49 split on the arc of history bending toward justice, but I am wholly convinced that the well-meaning liberal assurances of "if we just wait, the racist generations will die off, and we'll be set" -- while kinda-sorta true to an extent I guess -- isn't as reassuring as they think it is to a lot of people.

[worry]

Btw, glad we're being so open about things we wouldn't say, everybody.

[Inane Babble]

 worry, on 01 December 2014 - 11:40 PM, said:

Btw, glad we're being so open about things we wouldn't say, everybody.

Do not be apprehensive for there is no reason to be. Your opinions and extremist views are not being recorded in an NSA datacloud. Your comments and co-conspirators are not being monitored as prelude to active investigation. Go about your day crimina citizen.

[Terez]

 worry, on 01 December 2014 - 11:40 PM, said:

Btw, glad we're being so open about things we wouldn't say, everybody.

What does this even mean? The statement seems to contradict itself.

I had never seen Do the Right Thing so I watched it. I don't know that the statement of the movie was particularly powerful. Maybe that's just because it's so dated? Everything was such a caricature: the black people, the Latinos, the Koreans, the Italians. There was too much comedy for the tragedy to really come through.

[Grief]

 Terez, on 02 December 2014 - 05:25 AM, said:

 worry, on 01 December 2014 - 11:40 PM, said:

Btw, glad we're being so open about things we wouldn't say, everybody.

What does this even mean? The statement seems to contradict itself.

I wouldn't say that you're wrong, but re-reading the few posts prior to the post you quoted for context woudn't go amiss.

[Terez]

 Grief, on 02 December 2014 - 05:48 AM, said:

I wouldn't say that you're wrong, but re-reading the few posts prior to the post you quoted for context woudn't go amiss.

I actually had to do that three times before I got it. It's the skimmer in me; I tend to skip right over the clichés to get to the substance of the argument.

[worry]

Well, I can't convince you to like a movie you didn't like, but I think it's timeless rather than dated in the same way In The Heat of the Night or Night of the Living Dead are (it's 25 years old and steeped in the same conversations we are having now, and which most people still refuse to even acknowledge we need to have). I think the film artfully navigates between deep character work and exploring archetypes (not stereotypes) rubbing against one another. It's deliberately microcosmic, so it's necessary for characters to represent types at times, and force them to crash into each other. Because forcing the conversation is part of the point. Personally, while I laugh plenty while watching it, I don't think the comedy is so divorced from the tragedy.

Anyways, different strokes and all that. I'd still say there's plenty of value in explicating it for people who don't particularly like it. Plenty of people might find The Scarlet Letter or Lord of the Flies or To Kill A Mockingbird dated or stylistically unpalatable, but I'd still knock everybody over the head with them.

[Terez]

I didn't say I didn't like it, just that I didn't find the message to be particularly strong.

[EmperorMagus]

Is this true? I don't know how reputable that source is but ...

[Terez]

That website is an anti-government website, and not typically very reputable, but the story is true. It's been reported in several media outlets.