[Terez]

All over my local (MS) media on Facebook, people have been commenting that the officer who shot Rice was black. I don't know how that got started in the rumor mill but apparently all of those people now believe it. I dropped links (Timothy Loehmann); we'll see how long this rumor persists.

This post has been edited by Terez: 27 November 2014 - 11:43 AM

[HoosierDaddy]

worry, on 27 November 2014 - 12:04 AM, said:

Ta-Nehesi Coates, as usual, with some wisdom and perspective on violence and non-violence (and Obama's milquetoast Ferguson speech): http://www.theatlant...-unsaid/383212/

This reads as high-quality liberal race-baiting. Has Obama said enough? No. Is he or anyone else to blame for the fucking mess that is Ferguson? No. This reads as an encitement to violence and I think it is irresponsible and shameful.

Opinion journalists are hired to get action. They deserve none of the latter and should never get the former.

This post has been edited by HoosierDaddy: 27 November 2014 - 11:06 PM

[amphibian]

You have no idea who Ta-Nehisi Coates is, do you?

This post has been edited by amphibian: 27 November 2014 - 11:25 PM

[Terez]

One of the greatest journalists of our time. That post was just the latest installment in a longer narrative about how Obama deals with race issues. Coates is always fairly respectful of the place in which Obama finds himself. He writes about it not to judge Obama so much as to show how the election of a black president doesn't magically make us a post-racial country. Obama is constrained by his own tendency towards moderation but also by the fact that even his most milquetoast comments on race are taken as incitement a to violence by those who didn't vote for him.

[HoosierDaddy]

amphibian, on 27 November 2014 - 11:25 PM, said:

You have no idea who Ta-Nehisi Coates is, do you?

I read the article, Amph. Should I also research every journalist before commenting upon what they write? Shouldn't their articles stand by what they write if they are true columnists?

I stand by my statement.

[amphibian]

As Terez said, he's one of the great voices of our time. He's genuinely worth going through the archives and getting a handle on what his perspective is on issues.

He's not a race-baiting liberal at all.

[HoosierDaddy]

amphibian, on 28 November 2014 - 01:22 AM, said:

As Terez said, he's one of the great voices of our time. He's genuinely worth going through the archives and getting a handle on what his perspective is on issues.

He's not a race-baiting liberal at all.

Fair enough, but most people don't have the time to read through so many articles to get an actual feel for a columnist.

In addition, I'd NEVER use "liberal" as a pejorative. I'm a liberal. But, I'm going to call a cow a cow if it moos and hangs out on a farm, and that seems to be the case here.

[Tsundoku]

An example of the sort of articles we are seeing over here:

http://www.news.com....v-1227137805999

Interesting. It's obviously an abridged version though. What comes through is how widely the testimonies varied.

A good example of why witness testimonies aren't valued as highly as us laymen might think they should. I mean, you'd think a fairly short incident would produce a reasonable degree of consistency through the statements, but no. Amazing how the human mind works, especially with regard to memory.

EDIT: "the cloud" knows all, sees all, remembers all ...

http://www.news.com....v-1227137812835

EDIT2: Pharrell Williams

http://www.news.com....8-1227137651482

This post has been edited by Sombra: 28 November 2014 - 04:25 AM

[worry]

It would have been nice to see due process in the form of a trial to take all that into account. There was process, sure, but it never approached what was due.

[QuickTidal]

worry, on 28 November 2014 - 07:35 AM, said:

It would have been nice to see due process in the form of a trial to take all that into account. There was process, sure, but it never approached what was due.

Indeed!

I think that's my biggest problem with this whole thing. There is so much at play in the stories of both sides that this deserved to be scrutinized over better.

And you know what, Dorian Johnson's side of the story just sounds WAY more plausible to me. Wilson's sounds like magic bullet theory level bullshit.

[Terez]

I kind of agree with the people who think a trial would have just delayed and worsened the inevitable. Sure, due process should have returned an indictment at least; grand juries are notoriously kind to cops, and Wilson got off easier than a civilian would have. But the fact that George Zimmerman wasn't even a cop shows you how likely it is that Wilson would have been convicted; I doubt Missouri would have been any different than Florida in that respect. So we would have been focused on Mike Brown for another year or more; it would have been Trayvon Martin all over again, perhaps worse because these tensions are really starting to accumulate.

I don't know what to expect with the Rice case; I don't know if the focus will shift there, or not. There's been very little focus on the guy shot in the Ohio Walmart; I can't even remember the victim's name. But perhaps focus will shift to Ohio now. We will see. Has there been any protest in Cleveland?

[amphibian]

There's reports that the ADA gave an illegal jury instruction about the legality of shooting a fleeing suspect (Supreme Court overturned that law).

The lawyer work here really seems lacking.

[Terez]

That's because only the prosecutor has access to the grand jury hearings. And the prosecutor was pretty unabashed about doing this in a manner which would protect Wilson. He didn't even recommend a charge to the jury, forcing them to take a crash course in the differences between the various available options, distinctions which give even law students major headaches.

[QuickTidal]

Relevant and poignantly put. Well said young man! Warning: language.

[worry]

I'm afraid that sounds like new age-y nonsense to me. He might as well have said "find your inner child." Notice it was posted on September 1, so what exactly is it addressing anyway? Who is he talking to?

[QuickTidal]

He's addressing the Michael Brown shooting. Since it occured in August.


I think that sort of thought process is important to change. Getting inside the very nature of what we've all been born into. The conditions that we accept as status quo. I don't think that's new age...it's someone who is at least able to recognize that the main issue everyone has is inside them and how we perceieve. That's a key thing, and I don't think it a bad thing to look inwards as well as outwards.

Just my opinion.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 30 November 2014 - 10:14 PM

[worry]

I know, QT. I'm not being dismissive despite the short post above. I don't disagree with the part about analyzing conditioned thoughts or a few other things. I just think this particular video is a recitation of borrowed wisdom and truisms (some of which may actually be true, granted) that ends up sounding like Chicken Soup for the Soul. Like I don't hate people who rock the COEXIST bumper sticker or anything, but I do think it's an empty gesture. I suppose a well-meaning empty gesture is better than a neutral or destructive empty gesture, and maybe they add up to something good, I dunno. But I also think telling Mike Brown's neighbors, friends, and family to STOP and use his death as an opportunity for self-reflection to find their true selves is, at best, condescending.

And again, the video was posted September 1st. So what does it have to do with fixing Ferguson, which to that point had been: 1) a mostly black neighborhood policed mostly by whites, where warrants literally outnumbered residents because court fines are a major source of revenue (http://www.aol.com/a...-2-to/20952288/), which means the black populace has literally been plundered by a white elite whose public face is the police; 2) area police forces are partly made up of a Jennings, Missouri police force that was so corrupt and racist that it had to be disbanded by the city council and started again from scratch; Darren Wilson was part of that disbanded police force; 3) Michael Brown was killed (murdered) in the middle of the day for at worst sassing Wilson after jaywalking and then trying to escape his clutches when Wilson's ego was bruised; 4) the police force conducting a deliberately shoddy, minimal investigation of the aftermath (including no real incident report from Wilson) followed by a character assassination of Brown, silence from and no arrest of Wilson; 5) largely peaceful protests of the handling of the case that were met with fully militarized police oppression including tear gas and bullets both rubber and not-so-rubber, and including being fired at people standing in their own personal yards.

All that is to say, again, who is this guy talking to?

[worry]

Meanwhile, if you tell the newly resigned Darren Wilson to find himself, what he will most likely find is a millionaire: http://www.bustle.co...are-probably-in

[Terez]

He's talking to black people. And that's all well and good, of course, no matter how helpful he might or might not be. What bothers me is when white people celebrate these kinds of videos in times of racial tension, and by these kinds of videos, I mean the kind where a black person is saying that black people need to take personal responsibility for racism, and other kinds of things that racist white people like to hear.

I think QT probably didn't mean it that way; Canada has a different racial landscape.

[QuickTidal]

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.

Thanks for the qualifier though Terez. I'm only recently learning the racial landscape in Canada is quite different from the US. We still have lots of our own problems though up here.

Like coming to accept the level of my own priveledge isn't something I ever truly thought about before, and now that I am I find it's forcing me to see things in a wholly different light.