People are Individuals - recent shootings

sushilover

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 11:49 am

marina wrote:

Yes. There are very few explicit laws, policies, or practices that are blatantly racist.

That's because it's illegal, for example to have a law that says "Henceforth, people with ethnic names will only be hired if we have no other choice." Similarly, you will not find a policy handbook in any school district distinguishing between discipline outcomes for caucasians and others. That's illegal and if it existed openly like that, the federal government would pull that school district's funding and the parents would sue and win.

So instead, these patterns are unspoken and are uncovered, for example, by research and statistical comparisons. That's what systemic /institutional racism means- prejudice that happens even though it's not written down anywhere.

And before you go, plse know that there's plenty of systemic anti-semitism in America too- bigotry that is concealed but affects us nonetheless. Any frum woman who is worried about going to an interview in a tichel knows what I'm talking about, just like the frum man who wonders if he should tuck his tzitzis in.

I am familiar with the study about ethnic names not getting responses in job applications.

1) Does that mean racism? Would the name Pepijn (common Dutch name) also not get as many responses? I'm loath to link everything with racism. Racist is a vile thing to call people.

2) If I have to second guess wearing a tichel to an interview, I wouldn't automatically jump to the conclusion of anti-semitism. If I was denied a job BECAUSE of my tichel, I still wouldn't assume antisemitism. There are many reasons why someone would not want to hire a tichel wearer that have nothing to do with hatred of Jews.

3) And again, all of this is not the point of BLM. The meaning is in the name BLACK LIVES MATTER . Saying outright that in America, people are in danger because they are black. There is no proof of that. And yet people are accepting that premise blindly.

"Sadly, it's almost routine — African-American man, unarmed or lawfully armed, complying with the police, shot down, killed," Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn.

"Would this have happened if those passengers, the driver were white? I don't think it would have." Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton

These are vile accusations against cops and there is no proof that it is true.

Fox

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 11:58 am

This conversation is beginning to have "a plague on both your houses" effect on me.

I fully agree that non-whites, particularly African-Americans experience significant disadvantages in American society. Various factors determine just how much of an issue race is for each individual; some will suffer negligible effects or may even benefit from their racial identities. Others will suffer overwhelming disadvantages.

At the same time, I believe that leftist/progressive identity and victim politics are pouring tankers of gasoline onto the fire that is racism in America.

marina wrote:

This would be a good time to let you know that I put very very little stock into obviously biased media sources, including infowars, Breitbart, frontpagemag, dailymail etc.

Can we agree that all media sources are biased at this point in time? One of the great ironies of the mass media age has been the development of conservative media: for years, when people complained of the demonstrated liberal bias in mass media, they were told, "Well, start your own newspaper or TV channel, then."

Progressive bias, as represented by people like Christiane Amanpour, who has openly stated that she doesn't believe journalists should necessarily aim for objectivity, is apparently okay; Conservative bias, as represented by people like Alan Dershowitz, who writes for several of the outlets you mention, means we should "put little stock" in what they say?

For the record, I agree that it's entirely too easy to be lulled into a particular mindset by the agenda of whatever media outlets you peruse, and I do try to check in with Mother Jones regularly.

But I can almost guarantee that the posters who we feel don't sufficiently appreciate the role of racism in America would feel differently if they subscribed to Sonnie Johnson's Twitter feed or listened to some of the people associated with the Hotep movement.

Except they won't hear about Sonnie Johnson in the mainstream media, because she refuses to kowtow to everything they hold dear. Mother Jones didn't give her a platform. Breitbart did. And they for sure won't hear about Hotep, because some people associated with it are misogynist and/or homophobic. Wouldn't want black men to tell one another to take care of their families and women. That would undermine equality in gender roles!

Upthread, PAMOM asked what possible political motive there is for keeping someone victimized? Seriously? Qui bono? Public officials benefit by attempting to create a voting bloc that will keep the keys to the public treasury in their paws. Progressives and those of us who are just kind-hearted benefit by feeling bad for the victims, thus reinforcing our thoroughly unmerited opinions of ourselves as good people. Everyone wins! Except the victims themselves.

sushilover

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 12:08 pm

http://www.latimes.com/local/l......html

here's a story that you probably never heard of: In June a 19 year old unarmed white kid who was killed by cops while on the ground. Cops called it suicide by cops, but his family says it is impossible. He was a healthy, stable kid. Were the cops wrong? Could they have dealt with it better? Maybe.
But
Police reform should not. be. about. race.

Some white lives matter group protested the shooting. And if I were a white woman (I'm half white, don't know what that's considered these days... Very Happy

) , I would never support that. I find that disgusting. Let's protest police brutality but leave race out of it

nylon

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 12:18 pm

Alan Dershowitz has historically been a liberal, not a conservative.

He is more conservative on certain topics (particularly Israel) than is currently the trend, but I would not classify him as a "conservative," even if he appears on conservative outlets. He's been strongly opposed by many conservatives for a lot of his legal work regarding civil liberties. While I don't agree with all of Dershowitz's positions on BLM, but they are actually logical extensions of a lot of his liberal beliefs when it comes to criminal justice. Conservatives may agree with him to some extent but not his underlying logic.

shoshanim999

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 12:21 pm

sushilover wrote:

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-video-shooting-dylan-noble-20160707-snap-story.html

here's a story that you probably never heard of: In June a 19 year old unarmed white kid who was killed by cops while on the ground. Cops called it suicide by cops, but his family says it is impossible. He was a healthy, stable kid. Were the cops wrong? Could they have dealt with it better? Maybe.
But
Police reform should not. be. about. race.

Some white lives matter group protested the shooting. And if I were a white woman (I'm half white, don't know what that's considered these days... Very Happy

) , I would never support that. I find that disgusting. Let's protest police brutality but leave race out of it

It's not surprising at all....When you consider that on average cops kill double the amount of white people than black people each year. You might say that of course they do, there are 5 times as many whites than blacks. But since blacks make up approximately half the crime statistics, even though they are only 13%, there really should be an equal number of whites and blacks killed by police each year. Maybe cops are racist against white people?

marina

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 12:29 pm

sushilover wrote:

3) And again, all of this is not the point of BLM. The meaning is in the name BLACK LIVES MATTER . Saying outright that in America, people are in danger because they are black. There is no proof of that. And yet people are accepting that premise blindly.

On page 12 of this thread YOU cited a study. The study authors repeat in many different ways that black pple - accounting for everything possible- are way more likely to be slapped, grabbed, pushed, peppersprayed, beaten with a baton than whites.

YOUR study says that for any violence that does not end with the victim in the morgue black pple are at a higher risk than whites, and YOUR study concludes that this is due to racism.

Yet, above, you discount all that? And conclude that people are not in danger because they're black? And there's no proof of that?

Do you mean just in danger of dying? And why is that the only thing that matters? It really doesn't matter to you that a black person is more likely to be hospitalized because of racism than a white person? You don't think that's worth anyone's concern?

Yes black lives matter. And they don't only matter if the victim is dead.

marina

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 12:34 pm

sushilover wrote:

) , I would never support that. I find that disgusting. Let's protest police brutality but leave race out of it

In other news, I know a person who got lung cancer without even smoking. Efforts to end lung cancer should not. be. about. smoking. Let's cure cancer, but leave smoking out of it.

fmt4

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 12:53 pm

shoshanim999 wrote:

https://www.washingtonpost.com.....a856a

sushilover

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 2:09 pm

marina wrote:

\

Here's the deal. I've said this before and I'll say it again. If the BLM movement was primarily about non lethal violence, I'd do my research and if the evidence clearly pointed to racism as the cause, I'd support them.
But BLM is primarily about pushing the narrative that blacks are being slaughtered by cops in America. POliticians and the press are buying it hook line and sinker., even though the evidence does NOT support that.

(Sadly, young black men are being slaughtered, though. By other black men. And somehow me saying this FACT makes me a racist according to some people. )

sushilover

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 2:23 pm

gp2.0 wrote:

I'm just devastated by the news this week and our failure, both as a society and as individuals, to recognize each human being as an individual.

Black people were shot to death, not for committing a crime or doing anything wrong, but because police officers looked at a black person and failed to see the individual, they made assumptions, lumping one black person in with all black people as a whole, that resulted in shooting innocent people for no reason.

Police officers were shot to death, not for committing a crime or doing something wrong, but because citizens looked at police officers and didn't see the individual, again making assumptions, lumping one police officer in with all police officers as a whole, which resulted in shooting innocent police officers for no reason.

There are no easy solutions but it's just so devastating to me that across the board, the failure to keep an open mind, to treat people as individuals, to judge people based on who they are instead of what they look like, can lead to so many lost innocent lives.

My main issue is with the entire premise of this thread, saying that Sterling and Castile were killed because they were black. What evidence do you have to prove that?
The cops who were killed, were killed because they were cops and because they were white. How do I know this ? Because the shooter said it.

Conflating the two is wrong and disingenuous. There is no proof that Sterling and Castille were killed because of racism. There is clear proof that the Dallas shooting was because of racism.

gold21

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 2:25 pm

sushilover wrote:

I totally agree with your thinking, SushiLover.

PinkFridge

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 2:50 pm

sushilover wrote:

There is a lot I find disconcerting about BLM. But yeah, black people have to put up with a lot. Yesterday I heard a caller on Michael Medved's show and I have heard his story repeatedly this week. He's a black professional and when he gets pulled over - which has and will happen - he knows he has to make a conscious effort to stay calm and not let things escalate. Not that he's hot-tempered, but he has to be very careful to be completely calm. As he said, why should things escalating even be on his radar as decent, law-abiding citizen?

Sure, we have "the talk" with our kids, that it's an imperfect world out there, antithetical to our values, be very careful when you go outside, stranger danger, all sorts of talks we have with our children. But b"H at this point in time, unlike just before my great-grandparents left Europe, we don't have to worry for our lives more than the typical citizen because we're different. I'm not saying that blacks are being targeted and killed indiscriminately, just that they have to be on some sort of extra alert "not to let things escalate." It's a chaval.

sushilover

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 2:58 pm

fmt4 wrote:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/07/11/arent-more-white-people-than-black-people-killed-by-police-yes-but-no/?utm_term=.b67ba14a856a
Please read this article. It is not so clear cut.

The article is ~~good~~ interesting. I have so much to say about it and not enough patience Very Happy

The most important thing (in my opinion) the Post's data shows is that unarmed black men are more likely to be killed by a cop than an unarmed white guy.
But the "unarmed" label also includes people who were reaching for the officer's gun, or attacking the officer with his own equipment. This study also counts people who were tragically accidentally shot or were not the officer's intended targets. Racism could not have played a role in these killings.

Last edited by sushilover on Tue, Jul 12 2016, 3:10 pm; edited 1 time in total

PinkFridge

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 3:02 pm

As a registered Republican who has issues with President Obama, I'd like to give him a Salut

and

for what I'm hearing so far of his speech in Dallas.

ETA: I was tremendously annoyed by Hannity's dredging up other things the president said. Today's speech should be based on its own merit and the president endorsed for what he might get right today and as I said, I heard a good snip. However since then I heard more, am not enamored and am much more impressed by the snips I heard of Mr. Bush.

2nd and likely last ETA: I'm not sure if I was totally fair. I thought it should stay with a memorial, which was the first and eloquent soundbite I heard. But I guess it would have been weird not to mention the 2 earlier deaths at all. On the whole, it wasn't bad.

Last edited by PinkFridge on Tue, Jul 12 2016, 9:39 pm; edited 2 times in total

sushilover

Tue, Jul 12 2016, 5:47 pm

PinkFridge wrote:

As a registered Republican who has issues with President Obama, I'd like to give him a Salut

and

for what I'm hearing so far of his speech in Dallas.

I didn't hear the whole speech, but I did disagree with some of things he said.

He stated that blacks are convicted at higher rates and given longer sentences than whites for the same crime.

Fact: Black prison rates results from crime, not racism.
1994 Justice Department survey in 75 of the largest urban areas actually found lower felony prosecution rates for blacks than whites.
Sentencing also depends on priors and other legal issues, none of which are accounted for in studies that show blacks are convicted at a higher rate than whites.

And most importantly:
Study after study has found parity between the race of assailants in victim identification and in arrests. Why would crime victims be biased in their reports? They would just want to identify the real suspect.

I also heard Obama say something about America not being divided.
I have to say that America has only become more divided since his election.
When Obama took office, 66% of Americans felt that race relations were good.
Currently only 37% feel the same way.

BTW, agree with me or not, I urge you to read the works of Heather Mac Donald- a brilliant woman who only uses logic and facts in her arguments.