I get it. I wish this take wasn't controversial. Just gotta realize that it all depends on the person in power and how much clout the aggrieved party has in the system. Timing is everything. I've seen disgusting posts about blaming everything dealing w/ police violence on "black culture" but we as Americans have a bigger culture on being "tough on crime" where the toughness mostly ends up targeting blacks or illegal-looking people. White collar crime is looting and putting more people on the streets than anything BLM has touched or influenced. The power police have is enough to end your life. It goes beyond a bad day ticket where you eat 80-300 bucks on a bullshit driving course. So yeah, "people with rap sheets" are going to end up symbolic figures when the system and we as Americans have looked away from corrupt and systemic racism for an incredibly long time. Longer than I've been alive. Again, I get it. We all have our different scales of tolerating "bad behavior". No one's gonna say "I'm ok with 3 buildings burned, but once the 5th building is burned, all bets are off!" But it's there. But consider this on the flipside. Black Americans have tolerated how many recorded incidences of police brutality since Obama? I'd ask to look beyond but there wasn't any proof beyond the police's word back then... There are A LOT of saints. It's on the record. Philandro Castile. Elijah McClain. It's off the record when you count the lawsuits settled and the ones without evidence. Don't discount the criminals with a rapsheet, and I won't discount the fact the 5th building burnt was the local chapter of a racist biker gang or Cracker Barrel...
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/23/us/breonna-taylor-decision-verdict.html What a sad horrible thing that has happened. There is no excuse for that. When I think of ways it could have been prevented, my thoughts go to the many times before people have cried out or justice and reform. Had it been heeded prior to his people would still be alive. Depending on which outcry had been heeded and what reforms were enacted, Taylor might still be alive. Sadly inaction has horrible consequences. It is good for nobody. We could take action to reform police training, and get rid of the horrible bad-apple cops. We could start making changes to hold officers that are wrong in their assessment of life and death accountable. It could prevent lives from being taken needlessly and murders from happening. But my guess is that instead we will continue to spend more energy on treating the symptoms and divisiveness will increase. I wish we had a leader with actual leadership abilities. I wish we had more voters willing to focus on these issues instead of the non-existent threat from supposed Socialist policies. This isn't the election to try and punish Democrats for whatever you think they've done wrong. Our nation demands otherwise.
Why does everybody assume racism? George Floyd aggressively resisted police for 21 minutes, and had multiple illegal drugs in his system. Breonna was dealing with Jamarcus Glover and his drug dealers, the police announced themselves, and her boyfriend shot first. why does everybody jump to racism first?
I wish it was less about racism too, that way the racist white people could finally admit police have issues and changes need to be made. Instead, they have to side with the police, even though they don't really like them either.
This is a good point. It could also hopefully break the cycle of many black people distrusting the police, then aggressively resisting them, and then getting hurt and/or shot. Right now many are in a viscous cycle that causes worse and worse behavior and attitudes towards the police.
I don't know how many times it needs to be said. Resisting Arrest <> Death Drugs in System <> Death George Floyd might not have been cooperating but he also was handcuffed and had his legs restrained. For that matter Chauvin continued to kneel on him for minutes after he had lost conscious and most likely was dead already. Daniel Prude was handcuffed on the ground with a bag on his head. Breonna Taylor was in her own apartment and not the subject of arrest.
That's quite a one sided view. Resisting arrest and taking drugs certainly increases your chances of trouble. It also tends to enrage and scare police officers.
So an LEO getting enraged is the suspect putting the LEO's life in danger? Also how much can a suspect both cuffed and with leg restraints threaten an LEO?
I have no problem with the police officers that defended themselves in this situation. The ones that really need to be punished are the ones that signed the warrant without any clue as to what they were getting into. Those people put these officers (and Taylor, an innocent victim) into a terrible situation.
"Thousands turned out for largely peaceful protests " guardian quote from article talking about two officers shot during protests. insanity
If a concert had multiple police officers shot and in hospital, no one would call the concert peaceful. It's insanity. Common sense helps and not massive bias.
