Friday, December 05, 2014
The mistake of conflating Ferguson and Eric Garner
Everybody seems to do this, it's become generic trademark commentary on race. Civil rights activists act like a white cop in Missouri decided one day to shoot an unarmed black teen with his hands up and some (but not all) right-wingers see Eric Garner the same way they see Michael Brown (my God the guy was a criminal selling those loosies). My view: the grand jurors in Ferguson did not come up with an unreasonable decision though I might disagree with it whereas in Staten Island the grand jurors did come up with a perfectly unreasonable decision. I take these cases one by one as they come up which is the best way. In the case of Eric Garner it would be far easier and more productive for conservatives to simply admit this cop did wrong, admit it, learn from it and move on instead of hunkering down as they always do in defense of the cops and smearing those who disagree as somehow being anti-cop. It seems grand juries these days are reluctant to indict the men and women in blue. Righties will point out that they hear reams of more evidence than we ever get to hear but I think it goes deeper than this. It's a cozy-and-toasty emotionalism on the part of those hand-picked from society to become jurors that ultimately gives the police officer the bennie of the doubt. So far the NYC protests are far more civilized than what went down in St. Louis, a social model for proper but passionate protest. The ME in NYC says Garner died from a police chokehold, Det. Daniel Pantaleo said to the jurors he was using a technique he learned at the police academy. All I can say is God help us!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
The 'choke hold' is taught in police academies as a method of subduing a resistor,
ReplyDeletethe idea being to subdue or render unconscious. It is an old Judo concept, one that
permits a smaller person to deal with a larger person. To continue the hold until a
person is dead, is like shooting them until they are dead: the similarity in the two cases. The job of the police is to apprehend, not kill, so we are seeing some awful misjudgements at best here...the debate, I guess is whether such is egregious to the extent of murder. Which would be the case regardless of race, IMO. A couple years back some 70 year old guy robbed a local bank, ran down the street to a pond where
he pulled a gun and received 7 police rounds. And survived to serve a jail term. Then we see the taser deaths. We seem to be a violent society. IMO, a start would be decent jobs for everyone that provide a decent living and family support, but then
we run into the private vs government as problem solver and nothing at all gets done.
In your 'labels' we note justice and law, and I continue to reiterate; they are often not
the same thing.
One protestor I saw had the best sign. It was simple, that no life is worth 75 cents the cents being the tax on one cigarette.
ReplyDeleteThe NY state tax on a pack is $4.35 and the B-Apple adds another $1.50.
DeleteWhich leads to a couple of observations-
1. Missouri has the lowest state tax. $0.17/pack, which explains the B-Apple
black market (although we see MO has some mean cops, too.
2. A study in 2012 found that "In a study conducted on behalf of the New York State Department of Health, it revealed that low-income smokers (those in households making under $30,000), spent an average of 23.6% of their annual household income on cigarettes, compared to 2.2% for smokers in households making over $60,000. Not sure whether the idea is to tax smoking out of existance, or raise a lot of state $$$. Seems obvious if they tax it out of existence and lose the big $$$$, you will be paying a heck of a lot more for your cronuts. If Mr. Garner had Prince Albert, I'd have
been a regular customer, BTW.
You make a good point about chokeholds. What was striking about the Garner video is that Pantaleo still had him in this chokehold when he was on the ground. Also did the cop team not realize how close they came to shattering that large storefront window? Meanwhile everything upsets Pat Lynch.
ReplyDeleteA columnist in the NY Post wrote imo the most perceptive piece on the Garner case yet to wit legislators keep passing laws making this and that a crime and so cops have to enforce more laws and so this leads to more confrontations. So basically the libertarians may be on to something.
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, in the heartland....
ReplyDeleteI've heard it said by knowledgeable people that parts of the Quran are problematic but to take it to those lengths shows not only an immature citizen but an evil and dark mind.
DeleteThe statistics still stand that a black person of either sex is vastly more likely to be arrested, detained, brutalized or killed by a cop than a white person, EVEN IF that white person is pointing a gun at them; Michael Brown could have been shot in the leg just as easily as a fatal bullet; he could have been effectively immobilized and apprehended and never had to die. I understand that the NYPD itself was outraged that a chokehold was used as apparently that's a prohibited move. However, this cop apparently has a history of going overboard and has been in court over it a couple of times. There is a video of a cop out west somewhere choking a white kid. That cop was fired within 24 hours. The kid is still walking around. What gets me are people who continue to claim we're postracial. The only people who say that shit are the people who benefit from centuries of ingrained white privelege and all that comes with it.
ReplyDeleteI don't fully disagree with you here. If Eric Garner were the same height and build but white would Pantaleo have had him on the ground like he was wrestling an alligator?
DeleteAnd by the way, there's plenty of problematic parts in the Bible as well. Do you REALLY want me to start in on that, Cotton Mather?
ReplyDeleteI never said that. So why don't we address both instead of always sweeping things under the divine rug?
DeleteWe try. And then the right wing explodes and Bill O'Reilly goes into rants about Christian Persecution, and pastors talk about how Christians are going to be executed (in America, right) and so on and so forth calling down the Apocalypse because someone dared to offer some scholastic-historical or even plain literary criticism of the Bible. It's like how you can't criticize Israel (no matter how genocidal they are or how many war crimes they commit) in America. You cannot point out logical fallacies, inconsistencies, or anything whatsoever that might be negative about the Bible. You can't talk about the human sacrifices, or how Lot offered his daughters up to be gang raped, or how David had however many hundreds of concubines, or how a woman drove a nail through a man's skull, or any of that. It just isn't allowed.
ReplyDeleteBut that goes right to my point in a way. It's respectable to point out the bad things in the Bible but it's politically incorrect to point out the bad things in the Quran. The growing number of literal-minded jihadists are taking those Surahs about cutting off the heads of the infidels quite seriously. I would think this warrants discussion.
DeleteThere is a preacher who takes literally . We assume modern peer pressure will
Deleteovercome his religiousity
He and I refer to Leviticus 20:13 - 'If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.' Considering
Delete"Scholars are practically unanimous that the book had a long period of growth, that it includes some material of considerable antiquity, and that it reached its present form in the Persian period (538–332 BCE) that the practiced existed at one time in ancient Israel, continuing "In the year 390, the Christian emperors Valentinian II, Theodosius I and Arcadius denounced males "acting the part of a woman", condemning those who were guilty of such acts to be publicly burned" etc & etc. Now it comes up again at the end of 2014. Muslims also read and revere the OT, and
the 'people of the book', and has been noted in the literature, still take
the issue literally (and lethally)
I've been going to church for weeks, months, years now. Many many readings, love, kindness, Christ Jesus and all that good stuff so that to all those churchgoers the bad parts of the Good Book don't even exist. Stay tuned for Leviticus and gays next week, well someday.
DeleteThis is a bit odd. Any idea of the motive ?
ReplyDeleteTo sell for drugs?
ReplyDeleteFence a 5 ft crucifix?
DeleteThey say they got away with it because to parishioners it looked like a renovation. Happened here, two car thieves looked like they were working on a disabled car in a library parking lot and just stole the dang thing in broad daylight with a cop nearby.
DeleteApparently it's been returned. Parishioners saw a man trying to hawk it on the street and angrily surrounded him and here I thought professionals pulled it off.
DeleteWhat was it worth in bitcoin?
DeleteIf you are into fine art, they have a new use for your nightly brandy .
ReplyDelete