SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the "All-lives-matter."-President-Obama dept.
Snipers in Dallas: [5] Cops Dead; [6] More Cops Wounded
The Atlantic reports:
Two gunmen shot eleven police officers in Dallas, Texas [at 8:58 PM July 7], killing at least four of them.
[...] At a Thursday night press conference, Dallas Police Department Chief David Brown said [...] officers had one of the suspects "cornered", but did not offer further details.
"Tonight, it appears that two snipers shot ten police officers from elevated positions during the protest/rally", Brown said in an initial statement. "Three officers are deceased, two are in surgery, and three are in critical condition. An intensive search for suspect is currently underway." The police department later said an eleventh officer had also been injured and a fourth officer had been killed.
[...] The shootings occurred during a protest against police killings earlier this week in Louisiana and Minnesota. Hundreds rallied in downtown Dallas, near the corner of Main Street and Lamar Street. Local news footage captured what sounds like several gunshots being fired, and the crowd scattering.
[...] No motive has yet been established and it's unclear whether the shooting was related to the protest.
The New York Times just broke the story about the latest in the police killings of black men. It seems the tide has been turned. [Five] Dallas police officers were killed tonight at a protest in that city over these shootings.
I am not surprised, nor am I particularly shocked. No doubt there will be more to come on this topic as the evening progresses. Hopefully something good comes out of this, but I am inclined to doubt it.
takyon: Some more details: One suspect was killed by an explosion intentionally caused by a police robot. He reportedly told a negotiator that he was upset about Black Lives Matter, the recent police shootings, and wanted to kill white people, especially police officers. He said he was not affiliated with any groups and acted alone. Other suspects have been arrested, and a "person of interest" (often identified as a suspect by the news media) was arrested early in the night after he was photographed with his unloaded AR-15. He handed his weapon to an officer shortly after the shootings, and later turned himself into the police for questioning.
President Obama spoke about the shootings shortly after arriving in Poland for a NATO conference. In part, he mentioned that, "When people say 'black lives matter,' that doesn't mean blue lives don't matter, it just means all lives matter — but right now the big concern is the fact that the data shows black folks are more vulnerable to these kinds of incidents [...] This isn't a matter of us comparing the value of lives. This is recognizing that there is a particular burden that is being placed on a group of our fellow citizens. And we should care about that. And we can't dismiss it. We can't dismiss it."
(Score: 2, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @03:41PM
Sorry, when you say "Black Lives Matter" we don't think you mean "all lives" any more than we think "all lives" when someone says "Aryan Lives Matter." Why can't you say "All Lives Matter?" Nobody should have to suffer at the hands of police.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @03:45PM
The whole point of the slogan is to counter a perception/situation in which black lives don't matter. It assumes that the white/etc. lives already matter.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @04:25PM
I thought it was clear there's an implied "also" in there. "Black Lives Also Matter". However, while stating it clearly would make it a bit more difficult for racists to twist it around, I can see why it would be a very, very bad slogan for a movement like that.
It acronyms to BLAM :/
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @04:54PM
BLAM now or we will blam! later.
#dallassnippers
(Score: 5, Informative) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Friday July 08 2016, @04:27PM
Yes. Perhaps a better (but slightly less catchy) slogan would be "black lives also matter"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2016, @05:55AM
dark matter lives?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @07:03PM
Gee, as if the problems of police corruption only affects blacks.
Miss the mark by a mile.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday July 08 2016, @08:25PM
Except to the people saying it and everyone hearing it, you are correct.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Informative) by hemocyanin on Friday July 08 2016, @03:49PM
Diamond Reynolds after being released for being a witness specifically stated "all lives matter". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgxWzPVXSoc [youtube.com]
The point with Black Lives Matter is that blacks and whites are treated very differently by cops. Here are some examples: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daVhasi95c4 [youtube.com] The epidemic we have right now isn't cops killing white folk, it's cops killing black people. And while it is true that all lives matter, it is completely understandable why BLM exists and it is perfectly valid it focus on a particular issue.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @03:58PM
Sorry, it's just racism. The police need to be reigned in for everyone. Fight for accountability and justice for all instead of perpetuating racism.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Zz9zZ on Friday July 08 2016, @04:19PM
It is not racism because they aren't saying any other lives don't matter. The gp's point is quite valid, and when it comes to mobilizing people it is sometimes necessary to be a bit myopic. All that said, there are undoubtedly some people who join BLM and are racist, wanting to kill white people. There was some disturbing video I saw of a "professor" claiming that the only way forward was to kill all white people. It shows that there are extremes on both sides, but don't fall into the trap of making overly broad assumptions.
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 3, Troll) by edIII on Friday July 08 2016, @09:30PM
While not explicitly racist, it is stupid and divisive. Cops are killing innocent people regardless of race. The original civil rights movement was inclusive with people of all races marching. Why should I feel included to join their movement? Why should I feel that they would even accept a non-black person in their movement? Do they think I feel safe being white any more than they do being black WRT officers conduct? I don't feel safe and I don't feel that I have a movement to join either as I'm not black, therefore my life isn't being fought for. That pisses me off because Kelly Thomas was brutally murdered and deserves their support.
This guy said he was upset about Black Lives Matters, and then said he specifically wanted to kill white people. While I know the BLM movement doesn't stand for that, I'm still forced to wonder if the movement was called 'All Lives Matters' or 'Cops Are Murdering Us' would this guy have specifically gone after white cops?
The name and the movement itself is divisive. While the causes of their movement are laudable, and their genesis understandable, their divisiveness is not.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Friday July 08 2016, @11:59PM
Totally agree, definitely a double edged sword. I would like the name to be All Lives Matter, and at this point it probably would be better for their cause, but they would also probably have lost / never gained a lot of their user base with All Lives Matter. Wouldn't have much changed the more extreme members in any case. Perhaps now would be a GREAT time for them to make the change :)
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2016, @06:33AM
But that would put BLM in uncomfortable company of people who were disgusted by Ruby Ridge or Waco.
Can't cross the streams.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday July 08 2016, @08:26PM
Is it racist to point out that blacks commit crimes several times more often than any other ethnic group in the US? Damn you, you racist facts!
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Friday July 08 2016, @10:02PM
Is it foolish to conflate socio-economic status with a racial propensity for violence? Of course it is.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday July 09 2016, @02:23AM
Did I say it was racial? It's not. It's cultural. Black culture in the US is as self-destructive as it is possible for a culture to be without outright passing everyone poisoned kool-aid.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2016, @03:14PM
I wonder if there might be any reason for their culture to be different. Something in their past? Maybe something in the present where they are treated differently by society. No, being targeted by the cops and killed on a daily basis isn't it, thats just a symptom.
Why do poor repressed people have a different culture to the privileged elite? I guess we will never know.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 10 2016, @10:36AM
It most definitely is a symptom. It didn't exist during the entire latter half of the last century until we started approaching 2k. Similarly that is precisely when black culture decided that black fathers should abandon their children, drug dealing was a glamorous occupation to be sought after, and that the world owed them something.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2016, @11:35AM
LOLOL Try just a little further back in history... :)
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 10 2016, @12:19PM
Irrelevant. The cause of "further back in history" is gone. Today black people are treated like criminals because so many of them are criminals.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 14 2016, @12:11AM
Because as we all know, anything that is further back in history than your own birth cannot have any affect on you.
You sound like one of those people who claims they never benefited at all from society, did everything on their own.
People born into poor families must just be what God wanted for them. Lucky he had better things planned for you...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday July 14 2016, @10:31AM
Nothing that happened before you were born does have any bearing on your life except in the "well, isn't that interesting" sense. And, sweety, I was born into a poor family. Then I watched my father take us from foodstamps to comfortably middle-class and back down to the upper end of poor and back up to quite well off. And I learned from that that your position in society is really entirely up to you. If you have valuable skills and market yourself well, you will not be poor for long except by choice. If you don't, well, that's a choice as well.
Let's put it in a simpler way though. If you think your car should be nicer than your house, your stupid ass is always going to be poor. And you deserve to be.
Not being poor is as simple as looking around, seeing what well off people do for a living, learning that skill, and getting that job. It's not instant but it is all but guaranteed to work.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday July 09 2016, @07:23PM
Is it racist to point out that blacks commit crimes several times more often than any other ethnic group in the US?
Yes, it is, because it is always done without understanding and with racist intent.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 10 2016, @10:28AM
Interesting that you can read minds from so far away. You must teach the rest of us this power.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Funny) by aristarchus on Sunday July 10 2016, @10:47AM
First, you must live through more than two millennia, then it becomes rather easy to spot the racist intents, whether from Greeks thinking they are better than Barbarians, Romans thinking they were better than Greeks, Jews thinking they are better than everyone, Egyptians thinking they are gods, Bush family members and the Clintons, Chotaws thinking they are better than Creeks and Cherokee. It never ends, really, and is rather tiring. I am sorry, Mighty Buzzard, you are too young to be able to learn this. Come back in a thousand years, or after several reincarnations.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @04:18PM
3/4 of people killed by police are white. If there's an epidemic, it's black people killing black people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @04:22PM
3/4 of people killed by police are white
Reference?
black people killing black people
True, but why would people protest against the police for that?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday July 08 2016, @04:24PM
"Butbutbut MUH BLACK ON BLACK CRIME!!!!!!111eleventyone" is the standard racist rebuttal. It's a bait and switch. Don't fall for it; keep the light shining on what's being discussed here.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday July 08 2016, @04:33PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday July 08 2016, @08:30PM
You know, there's a direct correlation between being a criminal and getting shot by the police. No, it's not 1:1 but it is extremely strong nonetheless. Might this go some way to explain why blacks are shot by police more than any other racial group?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by https on Saturday July 09 2016, @01:35AM
Nope. I was going to say that you cannot possibly be that stupid, but then I realized you can if you want to be. Stick to coding, where you have skill.
Offended and laughing about it.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 09 2016, @04:16AM
Jesus Christ, Uzzard, I actually felt several dozen neurons commit suicide after reading that. You cannot be that stupid. Your other discourse, while vile, does not admit of enough lack of knowledge and logic to commit a fallacy like that by accident. I can therefore only conclude you know fucking well what you did there and went and did it anyway. May your blood be on your own head.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday July 09 2016, @09:05AM
Point out the fallacy then. All I did was state related facts in a sarcastic manner.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday July 10 2016, @05:29AM
The fallacy, you dogwhistling bootlicking cryptofascist fuckstain, is that being shot by the police == criminality. You don't stop and think "gee, are there any confounders here?" No, fuck that, to hell with actual thought; shut off your brain and go right to "Hurr hurr well Dundu Nuffin' over here musta deserved it, 'cause ain't never been a guy what got shot by the cops what didn't deserve it."
Again: you know goddamned well the above is true, and you decided to drop trou and lay that stinking road apple on us anyway. There is blood on your heads, if only at two degrees' remove. They'll be waiting for you in hell...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 10 2016, @10:27AM
Silly rabbit, can you not read? I said there was a correlation and not a 1:1 one at that. Back to grade school with you.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday July 10 2016, @08:01PM
It's what you didn't say but intended to make people think that I'm pointing out, and no one says it needs to be 1:1 either.
Do you think we're all that stupid? You do, don't you? You really think everyone else here is dumber than you and no one will ever cotton on to what it is you're trying to do with the specific wording you choose to use. I would be offended, but at this point it's down to you having a terminal case of Stage 4 Dunning-Krugeitis.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 10 2016, @09:31PM
No, only the ones who think they can win an argument by making it about me rather than refuting presented facts.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday July 10 2016, @10:59PM
And the FACT is, you're attempting to preload certain ideas into the readers' minds with what you post, and the lack of context around what you post. What you don't say is as important as what you do say.
Don't try this game with me, Uzzard. I won't let you do this to the others without pointing it out so they can see what you're doing.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 10 2016, @11:24PM
Pfft, as one of we others, I don't need you to be my crusader in shining armor; we're presumed to be adults with minds of our own, thankyouverymuch. The only pointing in your posts as of late pertain to fingers and the postpubescent equivalent of calling someone a big, smelly poo-poo head. [soylentnews.org]
If you want your ideas to compete in the marketplace of the mind, your stated goal of "not letting Uzzard do this to the others" would have a better chance of succeeding if you would describe why you think his ideas are crap, rather than just slinging crap and building/reinforcing a reputation for yourself as a fact-free crapslinger. You've got facts which back up your opinions? Great! Post those and let the reader make up their own mind.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday July 10 2016, @11:38PM
I already did. Pay attention. The problem in this case is his post which equates being shot by the police with criminality. When called out on this, he disingenuously slimes "ohhhh but I didn't say it's a 1:1 correlation!"
Yet, with no context, and given some of this site's audience, that was a pure dogwhistle and nothing more. Maybe you didn't notice, Mr. Adult With a Mind of Your Own, but this place is swimming in self-proclaimed "neo-reactionaries." You may be powerful enough not to be swayed, but the unwary are vulnerable to having their subconscious manipulated; most people do not have what I am assuming is your well-maintained mental firewall. For those people, it is helpful to have a loudly opposing viewpoint which specifically points out the sneaky psy-ops being engaged in here. Congratulations on being a paragon of mental and ideological integrity; most people are not, and they outnumber you.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2016, @02:58AM
Go back and read again the post you're complaining about [soylentnews.org]. What your quote above claims is false. Buzzard drew a correlation between criminality and being shot by police, and in the next phrase of the same post noted that there are exceptions. I'm likely more in agreement with you than Buzzard on the matter of abhorrent police conduct (tho for me, it's largely due to the understanding that the overwhelmingly vast majority of laws being enforced by police are illegal laws). Yet by making false claims and slinging copious insults, you come across as a hysterical screaming harpy and are not likely to be nearly as effective as you apparently think you are.
The patronizing tone you take in regards to other SN readers in defense of your crap-slinging ad hominem attacks is also tremendously off-putting.
Words to live by. Have you tried it yourself?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday July 11 2016, @03:13AM
Normally I'd say I don't need white knighted either but that was just funny.
I wouldn't put money on it. I'm no more a fan of bullshit laws or police acting illegally than I am an actual avian. I'm not going to blame everything on the cops when a specific culture is hell bent on destroying itself either though.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 11 2016, @02:58PM
You were only incidental, and my goal was not to defend you. My goal was to prompt Azuma to be accurate with the facts (e.g. the timing of your 1:1 comment) and to use reason instead of invective so that I as an otherwise disinterested SN reader (presumably along with others) could follow the thread of ideas and decide who was presenting the better ones. I assume Asuma has a reason for flinging so many insults, and would prefer to read about that instead of just the insults themselves, as most posts containing just insults belong at -1. Even the guy who seems to be MikeeUSA posts his reasons - I've been able to think about his reasoning, identify specific aspects of it which are fatally flawed, and reject his arguments as inferior... all because reason was used to at least some degree. There are still other viewpoints that deserve to be considered, even if the majority doesn't think they are the best ones: "individual greater than society" and vice versa are a key examples, and proponents of both would do well to understand the opponents' reasoning.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday July 11 2016, @04:08PM
My reasons are very simple: I have seen, many many times, and I suspect in other bodies (yes, I believe in reincarnation--wish I didn't but I have memories that don't belong to me...) what happens when that kind of ignorance and hate reaches a certain saturation threshold.
As a country, not to say as a planet, we are on the brink of a major disaster. Every time this cycle loops around we have more and more powerful force multipliers (world travel, worldwide communication, new weapon types and delivery methods etc) and fewer and fewer stopgaps in place. And we have less and less in our natural resource base to rebuild from should we well and truly fuck up and blow ourselves back to the Bronze Age; the easy petroleum is already used up, our aquifers are mostly drained, we've degraded our topsoil and acidified our oceans and mulched our tropical forests beyond repair, and so forth. If we lose our current high technological civilization, we aren't ever going to get another one.
When the avalanche is in motion, the pebbles don't get to point fingers. I am trying my absolute damndest to secure that slope in my own little way, and the reason I'm being deliberately inflammatory and insulting is that ridicule produces a subconscious bias against the ideas that are being ridiculed. No, it's not fair, but the majority of people operate mainly on their emotions rather than their reasons, and if I am to be effective I have to tailor my approach to my audience.
In the grand scheme of things, people like JMorris are small potatoes. But, again, small things add up over time. It only takes a little lowering of consciousness here, a patter of small injustices there, and before you know it, people are tearing each others' throats out.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2016, @03:29AM
Nothing in your post indicates that we are unable to communicate with each other using reason, even though I may not (and do not) hold all the same viewpoints as you. I agree with you that ignorance is a severe problem in USian society, and rather than outright "hate", I see the initiation of violence as a terrible crime that is widespread and near the root of most causes of conflict between private people and government agents (and indeed among many private people themselves).
If I may be so bold as to paraphrase your views on the use of insults: it seems to me that, even if your goals appear noble, you are attempting to use deceit in the form of attempting to manipulate the subconcious thoughts of readers through use of wanton invective. The only use for myself that I can currently find for deceit is in all-out war. (While it does appear that armies are gathering for war, I do not yet believe that I am a specific war target, or at least, not currently targetted by an enemy with capabilities that possess a threat greater than I can reasonably counter without resorting to deceit.) Free civilization is built on trust. Absent trust, society quickly (from a historical perspective, at least) falls apart. If you and I both own shoe stores, and I steal my inventory instead of paying for it like you do, you will soon be put out of business as you cannot afford to match the prices I can set on my stolen inventory. On a societal scale, this translates to unpunished fraud and theft quickly destroying the foundations of said society (fellow USians, does this not sound familiar?). Thus, I prefer to use honest reason whenever possible. I propose it is the best approach for everyone interested in a strong, peaceful, stable society.
If you and I don't view dishonesty similarly, then perhaps I can dissuade you from voluminous insults by appealing to your stated dislike of hatred? What is the expected result of being exposed to a constant barrage of insults from another person if not dislike, annoyance, and certainly in some cases, hatred of the insult-slinger? If there are only insults, no reason is apparent, no ideas are being exchanged, no actual communication is occurring, and thus no improvement in relations can be expected. Ultimately, the product of a constant stream of insults is likely to be hatred, one of the two things you've stated as wanting to avoid, at least to saturation.
As anecdotal evidence to support my assertion, may I ask you what you believe your response to me as a faceless AC would have been should my first reply to you have been filled with angry insults and nothing else? We've currently arrived at the point where we are sharing overviews of core viewpoints with each other - could that have been an expected result if I were merely trying to negatively influence your readers' subconcious while you were trying to do the same to mine?
Ignorance is curable, within a human being's finite limitations in a near-infinite universe, and this is where I see as the most valuable use of my time: educating others and being educated by others. I find that I can only tenuously grasp the basics of most subjects and am therefore not well suited to educating others in such regards. The few areas where I do believe I can be useful as an educational source are those which I can distill the essence into a clear and concise message fpr the listener, even if it results in the listener rejecting my information. If I cannot easily explain the subject because it is "too complicated", I usually find that it is my own lack of sufficient understanding of the subject that is the barrier, rather than a fault with my audience. The downside to this viewpoint is that I am limited in the subjects I can seriously engage in because I am ignorant about a great many subjects and am not fond of wildly airing assertions to all corners of the Internet which I cannot soundly back up.
In closing, I hope that you will decide that the best approach for dealing with someone who seems to claim that all people shot by cops are crooks would be something along the lines of attacking the flawed premise with counter-examples or even rhetoric:
It takes more time, but the effect can still be abrasive, yet reasoned and persuasive to those interested in learning about the topic without needlessly generating more hate.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday July 12 2016, @05:14AM
Uh...who are you?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2016, @06:01AM
No one of consequence.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday July 12 2016, @06:09AM
You're making some good points, but I'm out of patience with these particular people. There is such a thing as wearing out another person's good will. More to the point, when I tried this approach, nothing changed...so why bother? It's like giving medicine to a corpse.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 12 2016, @08:49AM
I deeply empathize with your frustration, as should most people who have interacted with other humans on teh internets. It can be helpful to keep in mind that ideas, like seeds, sometimes take time to show signs of growth. (I'm a living example of someone who had an idea planted in mind a decade before it actually sprouted to the point of changing my worldview.)
Who is your audience; more to the point: who do you want your audience to be? I'll assume for the moment that your primary audience when dealing with posters you find frustrating are bystanding readers and not particularly the parent poster themselves. (If your audience is the poster, the "corpse", then why bother responding to them at all if they're "dead" unless it's to blow off steam at the expense of bystanders' eyeballs, eyeballs which may have mod points?) We as the bystanders are only likely to have the immediate thread in front of us as context for the entire argument, and if Poster A is calmly and cooly posting assertions that seem reasonable, and Poster B is raging at Poster A by calling them every name in the book without apparent cause and using nothing but insults as a counter to Poster A's assertions, I strongly suspect that most readers not already in solid opposition to Poster A's views will view Poster B as the "bad guy".
If you can present a clear, concise example of a fatal flaw in the other's post, you not only have a chance of swaying the audience to your view, but for authors who value fact and reason, you also have a chance at changing their viewpoint as well, as in my own example above. (Posters that are blatant trolls or liars I do tend to directly label as such, preferably with one or two links to examples from their own posting history.) Even if you both don't come to an agreement, you at least have a much better shot at coming to an understanding of each other's viewpont, along with a historical thread to reference in the future, where future disagreements on worldviews can be summed up with, for example, "that guy just thinks drug users should be dragged into the street and shot", with a link to the relevant thread containing the poster's own words.
It also seems critically important to at least consider the possibility that one or more of your positions may be erroneous. If my mace has a big 'ol crack in the handle, I'd prefer to find out about it quickly and get it fixed before I find out in the middle of a fight and am forced to fall back on something like the Private Frost method [youtube.com]. Testing one's ideas in the open marketplace tends to shape them and make them stronger (assuming they don't get killed outright).
Is it even ultimately desirable to have an audience whose favor was only gained by calling someone else the rough equivalent of a "stinky-face"...?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday July 13 2016, @08:28PM
When you tried a semi-rational approach in IRC we had a reasonably interesting discussion. Here your words are the verbal equivalent of a monkey flinging its own shit. If you really think anyone is dissuaded by unbacked insults here, you have vastly underestimated this community. We're the pros from Dover when it comes to arguments and know weakass ones when we see them.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 13 2016, @08:36PM
Except that the insults, dear Uzzard, are dessert after the meal of the main argument. I know your patterns here: I watch what parts of my posts get quoted and replied to. Lies of omission combined with strawmen and misdirection.
Sorry, but you're not going to mess with my head so easily. I've spent an unfortunate amount of time dealing with actual psychopaths; someone like you, who is merely evil and willfully uninformed, is small potatoes.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday July 14 2016, @10:12AM
Exactly, twit. Except you're all dessert and no argument. You're Soylent's Trump.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday July 14 2016, @04:19PM
Wow. I'm actually impressed with the sheer amount of gall it must have taken to type that. Anyone who decides to research both our post histories will see 1) that isn't even close to true and 2) it would be far better said of you, if Ethanol-Fueled weren't a better candidate for the position on account of actually being funny sometimes.
No, I'm a bit more like the lovechild of H. L. Mencken and George Carlin with two X chromosomes. As to you...no one comes to mind immediately, but I've got an image of someone with a confederate flag and more toes than teeth.
You've just insulted every single reader of this site who's smart enough to make even a cursory effort to browse peoples' post histories. Keep digging that hole, Uzzard; the more you run your idiot trap, the worse you make yourself look.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday July 14 2016, @09:29PM
Thank you for making my point for me. If you're just gonna troll, we demand better round these parts. You should take lessons or something.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday July 15 2016, @02:28AM
I am not getting through to you, am I?
What angle do I need to turn this at to get it through your head, Uzzard? You are fooling no one, except possibly yourself. And you're not being clever by responding to everything with "hurr durr that's a troll." Keep digging...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday July 15 2016, @09:38AM
You're not arguing, sweety. You're just flinging shit. Not even skillfully. My 12 year old nephew trolls better and he thinks copy pastaing "kill yourself" thirty times is witty.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday July 15 2016, @04:54PM
You can say this as much as you want, but you may as well try and put out the sun by drawing the shades and scribbling "night" on the walls in your own feces. The record speaks for itself.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by dry on Saturday July 09 2016, @05:21AM
Of course when everyone is a criminal, there is a direct 1:1 correlation with cops killing criminals. The question is why are certain criminals killed more then other criminals? I've had a broken tail light before, which makes me a criminal, but never even worried about the police shooting me for it. I'm pretty sure that you're a criminal as well, as it is close to impossible to not be a criminal but you haven't been shot either.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by q.kontinuum on Saturday July 09 2016, @09:12AM
there's a direct correlation between being a criminal and getting shot by the police. No, it's not 1:1
Actually, I think it is quite close to 1:1 (exact 1:1 if you exclude potential cases of baby-murder or killing people certifiably insane or others that by definition can't be criminal). Everyone [telegraph.co.uk] (else) is [kottke.org] a [cnn.com] criminal [cato.org]. This is not by mistake.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 0, Offtopic) by Fauxlosopher on Saturday July 09 2016, @11:21AM
Agreed, it was not a mistake. The question we commoners would do well to ask ourselves is: "are all laws in the law books valid?" If they are, then we're no better off than under feudalism, since the law-makers can in effect declare that 2+2=5 and demand obedience at gunpoint. However, if there is indeed such a concept as an invalid law within the USA, the question is begged: "how do we determine which laws are valid?" No, the answer is not with the US' Supreme Court, even though said court attempted to usurp that power for itself in 1803. A law is only valid if it reflects something that a single person has the authority to do, such as apprehend a burglar, stop a rapist, kill in self-defense a would-be murderer, etc. If a single person doesn't have authority to do a given thing, neither can it be delegated... such as to a government.
If this is of further interest, I've written two short [soylentnews.org] journals [soylentnews.org] on the topic I am still waiting for someone to find a fatal flaw in.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 09 2016, @03:20PM
Thats the entire point you simpleton... Innocent Blacks are being indiscriminately killed much more often, because other black people may have committed more crimes. White people sitting in their car are given the benefit of the doubt, Blacks are just executed.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 10 2016, @10:30AM
Good, glad to hear we agree.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by curunir_wolf on Friday July 08 2016, @07:41PM
Statistics about how many people are shot and/or killed by police are notoriously hard to come by. Many police departments do not release such information. And even though the Justice Department was tasked with collecting the numbers back in 1994, they have never actually done so, either because they don't wan the information known, or because there is no reporting requirement placed on law enforcement agencies (although there are many other types of reporting required). It's easy to find out how many police are injured or killed, however.
On study done by the CDC on data in 2008 from 16 states (not comprehensive, but based on available data) does indeed show that just 29 percent of those shot were black [cdc.gov], but they only make up about 13% of the total population. There could be a number of reasons for that, but based on lots of other studies it's safe to say that blacks generally get harsher treatment by the justice system as a whole.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 5, Informative) by hemocyanin on Friday July 08 2016, @04:42PM
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/dec/31/the-counted-police-killings-2015-young-black-men [theguardian.com]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday July 08 2016, @08:34PM
http://scholar.harvard.edu/files/brucewestern/files/western_asr.pdf [harvard.edu]
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Osamabobama on Friday July 08 2016, @08:17PM
I confess that I made it this far down the comments before I connected "BLM" with Black Lives Matter. I seriously thought the previous references were referring to the Bureau of Land Management, who had a couple of armed standoffs with the Bundy clan. I was confused as to how the Dallas event related to the previous land use disagreements.
I suppose that makes me an idiot...
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Friday July 08 2016, @10:11PM
There's a quadrangle. Two points with the Federal BLM in Oregon and Nevada, a largely white group of people toting guns was left largely unmolested for weeks at a time (although there was the one guy who blew through a roadblock with a deadly weapon (full size pickup at speed) and ended up shot, though I'm not totally clear on whether he reached for a gun or not). Then you have another corner in Baton Rouge where a guy on his back with two cops sitting on him gets shot. Then you have the Minnesota case where you can't even bring up an at-the-time-unknown criminal history -- they guy had a concealed carry license which means he had the whole background check thing done.
So when cops are dealing with Federal BLM stuff, people with weapons face no consequences for long time periods, but the BLM-protest movement shows cops exercising instantaneous kill instincts in any circumstance if the victim is black.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @06:05PM
"Black Lives Matter" is the rare double dog whistle slogan.
If you are not racist you hear "Black Lives Matter Too."
If you are racist you hear "Only Black Lives Matter."
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @07:00PM
Or you see how the activist conduct themselves and write off the whole thing as race-baiting.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by curunir_wolf on Friday July 08 2016, @07:46PM
It's worse than that. You check out where the funding is coming from and you realize it's just another tentacle in the George Soros web of political activism.
I am a crackpot
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @08:26PM
You know? I'm okay with Soros spending his money to promote a point of view and won't cast him as a puppet-master like the left does with the Koch brothers. Change the channel if you don't like the message.
What is beyond pale is that you have corruption at all levels of law enforcement, from parallel construction to questionable search justifications (and the treatment of blacks by police is also a facet), and you have some useful idiot pegs you as racist because your view of problems with police is a bit more all-encompassing.
Sensitivity training for police doesn't end these issues as much as put a happy-face on mass incarceration. Your life is just as much over. A bullet is just much quicker.
But ending police corruption is something most people can get behind. Instead we get glib reading of how deep the rot goes.
Keep telling yourself it's just racism and not that police powers have increased 10 fold.
What a self-serving bunch of asses.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @08:28PM
Who modded that informative?
What would be informative is a citation to back it up.
Well, a citation from a source that's not on a website with articles about how Obummer was born in Kenya.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday July 08 2016, @10:36PM
Here, I duckduckgoed it (duckducked?). The first few results were funny. TheConservativeTreeHouse.com: Yes it is! The Daily Beast: No it's isn't! The Daily Fail: Yes it is! Personally, I think it would be morbidly hilarious if it were true at face value because it'd fit right into my lizard person conspiracy theory.
Here's Snopes [snopes.com]:
TRUE: A grantmaking network founded by George Soros provided funding to some groups that engaged in Ferguson-related protest activities.
FALSE: George Soros gave money to various groups for the express purpose of promoting Ferguson-related protests and riots.
(Score: 2) by curunir_wolf on Sunday July 10 2016, @04:37PM
Snopes is not a credible source, not any more. They may have had a good track record in the past, but they have revealed themselves to have a political agenda, and provide cover for the far left. As another example, they said that Obama's comment that "You can buy a gun online without a background check" as "mostly true" based purely on the fact that he did NOT say you could do that legally. In other words, you can go online and find an illegal way to buy a gun without a background check. The statement was something Obama said during a press conference in which he was proposing more laws to fix loopholes. So Snopes was completely disingenuous to insert "illegally" into his statement in order to claim it was "mostly true". So they have NO credibility.
Soros funds LOTS of groups, that in turn fund other groups, and they all have other sources of funding as well, but it's all based on a Soros (and similar elitists') agenda. So it's difficult to draw all the lines that show the funding coming from that web of groups. I've seen them through various sources (not the ones you found, though), and I'm not inclined to draw them all out for your edification, but I did find that the Washington Times [washingtontimes.com] drew some of the connections to Ferguson protests. They sourced OpenSecrets and other political funding tracking sites. So Snopes in this case simply started with an agenda (to claim Soros money was not involved in BLM and other protest organizations), and then simply ignored all the evidence to the contrary to support their preconceived conclusion.
What we do know:
The ladies that started #BlackLivesMatter have been involved in community organizing for a long time: Patrisse Cullors, Opal Tometi, and Alicia Garza. Organizations they have been involved with have also been funded by Soros' organizations.
I am a crackpot
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 08 2016, @08:15PM
Stop sympathizing with the terrorist NIGGER lives matter people.
These Niggers want whites dead.
These niggers want cops to die instead of stopping nigger crime.
These niggers want to live in a lawless hellhole.
These niggers need to dealt with.
FUCK NIGGERS!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by butthurt on Friday July 08 2016, @07:43PM
The name, I think, is intended to convey the idea that there's racial disparity in the way police violence is deal outt: that black people are more likely to become victims of it.
White people are free to object to police violence, and can name their groups whatever they please. Why bother objecting to the name of someone else's group, particularly when your exact recommendation has been made ad nauseum?