TheGrey08 wrote:mrhockey89 wrote: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.
I was speaking about all the numerous incidents caught on video of physical conflict between protesters and police.
As for the Truck incident, yeah they didn't know if it was a full tanker, was a terrorist attack or what. My sister was maybe 4 feet from being hit when he went into the crowd. The tanker was shown heading toward the bridge live and my mom frantically tried to get a hold of my sister to warn her. Shortly after he stopped some protesters screamed that it was a tanker and people needed to get the hell away from it. Protesters made their way up the Washington Ave exit ramp (walking in the grass) and police drove down the ramp spraying the protesters (my sister was hit by it when the first wave of patrol came through). The below vid is likely the 2nd wave of patrol that came through there:
https://twitter.com/chadloder/status/1268955152750264320?s=20
Fair enough. Not to make an excuse, but I'm sure they're told going into these that they can't put on their kid gloves for these 'missions'. That said, I can see people being upset by them (tough to tell if anyone did anything from those distances, but I'll give the protestors the benefit of the doubt).
I think most people agree that police reform is needed from a use of force standpoint. I don't even think that's a racial lines discussion. I also think it's likely fair to say that there are certain disadvantages inherently affecting African Americans. I think the discussions right now in the world is clearly making all of that a big focus on all policies that disadvantage people of color. I think every PD in America, many large businesses in America (maybe I'm bias since our VP and head of HR has put out several video messages/emails on the subject), cities, counties, states, and at the federal level (legislative) are all going to be looking internally at "what should we be doing that we are not." I still maintain that everyone is terrified to talk about the culture that is also a factor in some of these bias. For those who disagree on that point, I guess we'll know soon whether all these other changes make things look fair. I say until that's also addressed, things will get better but will still have a long ways to go, and will somewhat push back some of the policies. There's a lot of chicken or egg discussion, but I don't think it matters which was first because what matters is now, and what will fix things going forward. While this is a human race, there are differences in cultures inherently as well. Individually, there can be a 7'6" Chinese man, but the average height of a Chinese man is between 5'6" and 5'9". Individually you can have a Christian McCaffrey (or Ed McCaffrey for that matter) in an athletic skill position in the NFL, but there's also a reason that he's in the minorities of white players at the position. Asian cultures value collectivism, Western cultures value individualism. Look at careers even within America and you'll see different types of cultural demographics dominating various types of careers. To say black culture is more violent than other cultures isn't racist, it's what the numbers say. If you're convinced that's just the systematic oppression fine, but I think you're blinding yourself from that particular aspect to ignore it when looking for conditions to improve.
Let me give another example... I saw a cartoon about 5 years ago...a parent, a child, and a teacher in a meeting. The 1st drawing had the parent pointing at the child saying "Explain these bad grades" and like 1995 as the year. The 2nd drawing had the parents looking at the teacher saying "Explain these bad grades" and like 2015 or so as the year. Accountability in this age seems like a thing of the past. Everyone wants to blame others. While it's completely reasonable to say there needs to be more police accountability, as well a better system (and both will be changing now), we still sit here with the problem that people always want to blame the system for everything. Let me be very clear here, the system does need to improve, but the lack of accountability within today's society is also equally concerning.
