OT - Making Sense of Tragedy

[AbeVigodaLive]

Well said Khans. You went right to the heart of it and what it's truly about. Brees was just another person parroting the narrative of people trying to make kneeling during the anthem a disrespect to the military when that was never what it was about. In fact, they started kneeling as to NOT disrespect the military and it was suggested by someone in the military.

When has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. CWhen has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. Can anyone think of a single example prior to this?

Isn't this said every time before the national anthem is played? "Ladies and gentleman, please rise as (so and so) performs our star spangled banner". I don't know how the act of rising to our feet began, but we've been asked to do it for a century.

So I take that as you have no other example then? Cool.

PS: Your response is obviously beside the point. After all this is America where we have freedoms and there's no law saying you have to even recognize the anthem. So again I ask, can you come up with a single other instance where kneeling is seen as anything, but respectful?

I'm not trying to be confrontational here. I'm just saying that you are always asked to stand for the national anthem. So if you do something other than stand, at a minimum you're being disrespectful to the PA announcer. But no, kneeling in and of itself is not normally disrespectful, in fact it's most often the opposite. I'm sure we can figure out when it's intent is one or the other.

I'd much rather see the peaceful disrespect of a guy kneeling when it's inappropriate over massive rioting and looting.

The tricky thing is when the guy kneeling is ostracized (in part) for doing so... and the story is about him kneeling and not the injustice he was kneeling for...

So that when people really do want justice... they look back and think "Kneeling? Fuck that. That didn't work. So here's how we're going to get their attention."

And in the ironic twist... many of the same people who ripped that kneeling man now implore the looters... "Why can't you protest peacefully?"

Rinse. Repeat.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

Well said Khans. You went right to the heart of it and what it's truly about. Brees was just another person parroting the narrative of people trying to make kneeling during the anthem a disrespect to the military when that was never what it was about. In fact, they started kneeling as to NOT disrespect the military and it was suggested by someone in the military.

When has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. CWhen has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. Can anyone think of a single example prior to this?

Isn't this said every time before the national anthem is played? "Ladies and gentleman, please rise as (so and so) performs our star spangled banner". I don't know how the act of rising to our feet began, but we've been asked to do it for a century.

So I take that as you have no other example then? Cool.

PS: Your response is obviously beside the point. After all this is America where we have freedoms and there's no law saying you have to even recognize the anthem. So again I ask, can you come up with a single other instance where kneeling is seen as anything, but respectful?

I'm not trying to be confrontational here. I'm just saying that you are always asked to stand for the national anthem. So if you do something other than stand, at a minimum you're being disrespectful to the PA announcer. But no, kneeling in and of itself is not normally disrespectful, in fact it's most often the opposite. I'm sure we can figure out when it's intent is one or the other.

I'd much rather see the peaceful disrespect of a guy kneeling when it's inappropriate over massive rioting and looting.

The tricky thing is when the guy kneeling is ostracized (in part) for doing so... and the story is about him kneeling and not the injustice he was kneeling for...

So that when people really do want justice... they look back and think "Kneeling? Fuck that. That didn't work. So here's how we're going to get their attention."

And in the ironic twist... many of the same people who ripped that kneeling man now implore the looters... "Why can't you protest peacefully?"

Rinse. Repeat.

The "injustice" he was kneeling for was a bullshit narrative that painted Michael Brown out to be an innocent, law-abiding citizen when that wasn't the case when all the evidence came together. So, yeah, it's twice as hard to rally around a guy kneeling for the national anthem especially when he's uniformed -- and wrong -- in doing so.

[AbeVigodaLive]

Well said Khans. You went right to the heart of it and what it's truly about. Brees was just another person parroting the narrative of people trying to make kneeling during the anthem a disrespect to the military when that was never what it was about. In fact, they started kneeling as to NOT disrespect the military and it was suggested by someone in the military.

When has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. CWhen has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. Can anyone think of a single example prior to this?

Isn't this said every time before the national anthem is played? "Ladies and gentleman, please rise as (so and so) performs our star spangled banner". I don't know how the act of rising to our feet began, but we've been asked to do it for a century.

So I take that as you have no other example then? Cool.

PS: Your response is obviously beside the point. After all this is America where we have freedoms and there's no law saying you have to even recognize the anthem. So again I ask, can you come up with a single other instance where kneeling is seen as anything, but respectful?

I'm not trying to be confrontational here. I'm just saying that you are always asked to stand for the national anthem. So if you do something other than stand, at a minimum you're being disrespectful to the PA announcer. But no, kneeling in and of itself is not normally disrespectful, in fact it's most often the opposite. I'm sure we can figure out when it's intent is one or the other.

I'd much rather see the peaceful disrespect of a guy kneeling when it's inappropriate over massive rioting and looting.

The tricky thing is when the guy kneeling is ostracized (in part) for doing so... and the story is about him kneeling and not the injustice he was kneeling for...

So that when people really do want justice... they look back and think "Kneeling? Fuck that. That didn't work. So here's how we're going to get their attention."

And in the ironic twist... many of the same people who ripped that kneeling man now implore the looters... "Why can't you protest peacefully?"

Rinse. Repeat.

The "injustice" he was kneeling for was a bullshit narrative that painted Michael Brown out to be an innocent, law-abiding citizen when that wasn't the case when all the evidence came together. So, yeah, it's twice as hard to rally around a guy kneeling for the national anthem especially when he's uniformed -- and wrong -- in doing so.

I see where Michael Brown was ONE of SEVERAL names Kaepernick cited.

"Oscar Grant, Rekia Boyd, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice," he said, ticking off names of people killed by police in recent years. "Laquan McDonald, Sandra Bland, Freddie Gray. The Panthers' demands are still alive today because the police are still killing us today."

And then there's this article...

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/colin-kaepernick-reveals-specific-police-shooting-led-him-kneel-n1044306

Referencing Mario Woods as the catalyst event.

[TheGrey08]

Isn't this said every time before the national anthem is played? "Ladies and gentleman, please rise as (so and so) performs our star spangled banner". I don't know how the act of rising to our feet began, but we've been asked to do it for a century.

So I take that as you have no other example then? Cool.

PS: Your response is obviously beside the point. After all this is America where we have freedoms and there's no law saying you have to even recognize the anthem. So again I ask, can you come up with a single other instance where kneeling is seen as anything, but respectful?

I'm not trying to be confrontational here. I'm just saying that you are always asked to stand for the national anthem. So if you do something other than stand, at a minimum you're being disrespectful to the PA announcer. But no, kneeling in and of itself is not normally disrespectful, in fact it's most often the opposite. I'm sure we can figure out when it's intent is one or the other.

That's the point though dude. They chose a middle ground in the way they were protesting. Instead of sitting on the bench and not participating in it at all, they chose to do something that is pretty much always done with respect to someone/something, instead of just sitting back on the bench.

Think about that for a minute. A group of protesters who took some form of middle ground in the way they protested. That kinda goes against even the notion of what a protest is. To me, that was amazing to see. And sure, a guy in the military contacted Kap, but they talked, he listened and decided kneeling was the better way and still allowed them to show respect to the military in their eyes.

[TheGrey08]

What are people's thoughts on the Democrats proposed "Justice in Policing Act"? I'd do a link but I'll let people google it and pick what links to click. =)

It sounds decent from what I briefly read.

Does anyone live in Minneapolis on this board?

Yep, I live about as far North as you can get in MPLS.

[TheGrey08]

I'd much rather see the peaceful disrespect of a guy kneeling when it's inappropriate over massive rioting and looting.

The tricky thing is when the guy kneeling is ostracized (in part) for doing so... and the story is about him kneeling and not the injustice he was kneeling for...

So that when people really do want justice... they look back and think "Kneeling? Fuck that. That didn't work. So here's how we're going to get their attention."

And in the ironic twist... many of the same people who ripped that kneeling man now implore the looters... "Why can't you protest peacefully?"

Rinse. Repeat.

The "injustice" he was kneeling for was a bullshit narrative that painted Michael Brown out to be an innocent, law-abiding citizen when that wasn't the case when all the evidence came together. So, yeah, it's twice as hard to rally around a guy kneeling for the national anthem especially when he's uniformed -- and wrong -- in doing so.

Dude.. duuuude.. do you seriously think it was about that? C'mon man. There's no way you are as short sighted as that viewpoint. I've always viewed you and almost everyone else on here to be a pretty open minded group (that doesn't mean no one ever puts their foot in the ground refusing to budge on a stance or point from time to time haha).

This is and has always been about way way WAY more than a single murder incident. Here, I implore everyone here to watch this 90 sec clip at the timestamp. You can see/hear the pain, sadness, exhaustion and anger resonating within her. It's one of the most intense speeches I've ever seen. I barely kept myself from crying man. This woman is not alone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wf4cea5oObY&feature=youtu.be&t=1905
(this whole ep is pretty good actually and it touches briefly on the whole disbanding of a police department and how it works. Like in Camden NJ)

Here's another great video (only 9.5 min), this one from Emmanuel Acho (former NFL LB). He respectfully touches on a lot of issues that are at the core of what these protest are about. It's one of the best things I've seen on this topic. Again I implore everyone to give it a watch.
https://twitter.com/thEMANacho/status/1267609472589090816?s=20

PS: I was going to post both of these links in the thread already. Not trying to just come at you lol

[TheGrey08]

Regarding the disbanding of MPD that has been talked about.

The very same thing happened in Camden NJ. The former Camden police chief spoke about it. (he was the chief when it happened) They were treated like brand new employees that had to apply, take psych evals, etc. "The opportunity that really provided to us was the ability to build culture as opposed to changing it" After doing this they saw a 70%+ reduction in murders and 46%+ reduction in violent crime. Sounds like MPLS has a good template to go off.

https://twitter.com/igorvolsky/status/1270111875586555907?s=20

[mrhockey89]

TheGrey, you said
"People have also stated that they've seen inciters randomly come up and start throwing shit at police to get them to react violently, multiple instances where police all of a sudden reacted aggressively to a crowd unprovoked, numerous instances where squads shoot pepper spray on protesters not even on the roadway (my sis was walking on the grass on the side of an on ramp getting away from the 35W bridge when squads came down it spraying mace at them), so lets seriously stop trying to depict protesters as being violent and cops "just protecting themselves" because it's quite frankly bullshit."

Are you talking about right after the tanker truck came through? If so, the police stated they didn't know the intent of the truck driver at that point and were concerned the truck had the potential to explode, which seems to fit the scenario pretty well, and I'd like to think that had the truck exploded, the protesters would have appreciated being forcefully pushed away as opposed to the "hey guys, would you all get far away" option that wouldn't have moved too many people very fast. If it's another incident then maybe I missed it, but if that's the one, then I'm not feeling sorry for anyone.

[mrhockey89]

I'll be honest, I wasn't offended by Kaepernick's kneeling in the least, but I did think it was a terrible place for him to make that protest, because the very people that he's needing to appeal to are the very people he's offending by taking the knee. And when he loses their ears before his message can even be discussed, it's a loss.

For me personally, I was just annoyed that we couldn't even watch anything sports related without bringing politics/social issues into the the discussion. Sports is one of the few things where people can get away from the real world and rally together, and when the focal point changes to a social issue (or politics) rather than the game itself, it devalues the game itself. Some people believe that social issues and politics should be in every part of everyone's lives, but I'm not one of those people.

[mrhockey89]

Well said Khans. You went right to the heart of it and what it's truly about. Brees was just another person parroting the narrative of people trying to make kneeling during the anthem a disrespect to the military when that was never what it was about. In fact, they started kneeling as to NOT disrespect the military and it was suggested by someone in the military.

When has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. CWhen has kneeling EVER been considered a negative or disrespectful act before the anthem kneeling happened? I honestly cannot think of any other example where kneeling was seeing as anything but respectful. Can anyone think of a single example prior to this?

Isn't this said every time before the national anthem is played? "Ladies and gentleman, please rise as (so and so) performs our star spangled banner". I don't know how the act of rising to our feet began, but we've been asked to do it for a century.

So I take that as you have no other example then? Cool.

PS: Your response is obviously beside the point. After all this is America where we have freedoms and there's no law saying you have to even recognize the anthem. So again I ask, can you come up with a single other instance where kneeling is seen as anything, but respectful?

I'm not trying to be confrontational here. I'm just saying that you are always asked to stand for the national anthem. So if you do something other than stand, at a minimum you're being disrespectful to the PA announcer. But no, kneeling in and of itself is not normally disrespectful, in fact it's most often the opposite. I'm sure we can figure out when it's intent is one or the other.

I'd much rather see the peaceful disrespect of a guy kneeling when it's inappropriate over massive rioting and looting.

The tricky thing is when the guy kneeling is ostracized (in part) for doing so... and the story is about him kneeling and not the injustice he was kneeling for...

So that when people really do want justice... they look back and think "Kneeling? Fuck that. That didn't work. So here's how we're going to get their attention."

And in the ironic twist... many of the same people who ripped that kneeling man now implore the looters... "Why can't you protest peacefully?"

Rinse. Repeat.

The "injustice" he was kneeling for was a bullshit narrative that painted Michael Brown out to be an innocent, law-abiding citizen when that wasn't the case when all the evidence came together. So, yeah, it's twice as hard to rally around a guy kneeling for the national anthem especially when he's uniformed -- and wrong -- in doing so.

I see where Michael Brown was ONE of SEVERAL names Kaepernick cited.

"Oscar Grant, Rekia Boyd, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice," he said, ticking off names of people killed by police in recent years. "Laquan McDonald, Sandra Bland, Freddie Gray. The Panthers' demands are still alive today because the police are still killing us today."

And then there's this article...

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/colin-kaepernick-reveals-specific-police-shooting-led-him-kneel-n1044306

Referencing Mario Woods as the catalyst event.

You forgot one, Fidel Castro, when he wore the "Like minds think alike" Fidel Castro t-shirt. Seems a bit hypocritical to simultaneously become the main champion for equal rights, while simultaneously promoting one of the biggest oppressive leaders in recent world history. To me it's akin to someone saying "I support equal rights" while wearing a t-shirt of David Duke.