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posted by martyb on Tuesday July 07 2020, @12:48PM   Printer-friendly
from the could-just-ask-23-and-me dept.

DNA Databases in the U.S. and China Are Tools of Racial Oppression

Two major world powers, the United States and China, have both collected an enormous number of DNA samples from their citizens, the premise being that these samples will help solve crimes that might have otherwise gone unsolved. While DNA evidence can often be crucial when it comes to determining who committed a crime, researchers argue these DNA databases also pose a major threat to human rights.

In the U.S., the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has a DNA database called the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) that currently contains over 14 million DNA profiles. This database has a disproportionately high number of profiles of black men, because black Americans are arrested five times as much as white Americans. You don't even have to be convicted of a crime for law enforcement to take and store your DNA; you simply have to have been arrested as a suspect.

[...] As for China, a report that was published by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in mid-June claims that China is operating the "world's largest police-run DNA database" as part of its powerful surveillance state. Chinese authorities have collected DNA samples from possibly as many as 70 million men since 2017, and the total database is believed to contain as many as 140 million profiles. The country hopes to collect DNA from all of its male citizens, as it argues men are most likely to commit crimes.

DNA is reportedly often collected during what are represented as free physicals, and it's also being collected from children at schools. There are reports of Chinese citizens being threatened with punishment by government officials if they refuse to give a DNA sample. Much of the DNA that's been collected has been from Uighur Muslims that have been oppressed by the Chinese government and infamously forced into concentration camps in the Xinjiang province.

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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by FatPhil on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:29PM (22 children)

    by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:29PM (#1017613) Homepage
    UK cops have my fingerprints (whole hand prints) on record because my room was broken into while visiting there. OK, that's just prints rather than DNA, but given that neither is a reliable way of placing someone at the scene of most crimes it's much of a muchness.

    However, if these types of databases are tools of oppression in only 2 countries in the world, but not elsewhere, then I think we can conlude that there's nothing intrinsically wrong with such types of databases. Stop the oppression at its core, and then the tools no longer become useful for oppression.

    Am I saying that I would like the DNA of the fucker who ruined my rucksack mid-multi-hop-holiday and stole my camera to be on record, so he could be more easily found? Of course I am. I'd be an idiot not to want to shorten the path between discovery and resolution of any crime. That's not racist. That's not oppressive. That's practical. That's efficient. That's the rule of law, and part of what I get in return for my taxes.
    --
    Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
    • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:41PM (20 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:41PM (#1017624)

      >> That's not racist.

      Yes, it is. As the article says, Black people are five times as likely to commit crimes. Give up your systemic racist mindset and consider the possibility that the thief might have used your camera to launch into a career as a professional photographer. Instead, you want to see him in jail. #BLM

      • (Score: 5, Informative) by Opportunist on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:24PM (19 children)

        by Opportunist (5545) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:24PM (#1017648)

        Black people are five times more likely to be arrested, not to commit crimes. Jews were also a lot more likely to end up in a concentration camp than other Germans.

        Yes, that's hyperbole. Hey, who started it?

        • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:47PM (12 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:47PM (#1017663)

          They have a much higher crime rate than 5x relative to other groups. On a national level their homicide rate is about 1000% that of whites, similar with most other forms of violent crime. The Bureau of Justice statistics carried out a lengthy analysis available here [bjs.gov]. In a nutshell blacks make up around 12-13% of the population and commit about 53% of the homicides. Those figures are dated but the values haven't changed. You can get more recent numbers from the FBI Crime Reports. [fbi.gov] If you're going to compare groups remember that the white race includes hispanic ethnicity so you need to remove those numbers to determine e.g. non-white hispanic figures.

          It's kind of curious they *only* have a 5x higher DNA collection rate. I suspect one factor is probably recidivism. Some guy that's been imprisoned tens of times is going to account for tens of arrests (and crimes) but only 1 entry in the DNA database. And the crime rates for nonviolent crime are much more evenly distributed and so that's also going to mitigate factors a bit.

          • (Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:31PM (1 child)

            by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:31PM (#1017705)

            I would extend your remarks with the usual urban/rural disparity issues.

            Certainly Chicago has fifty blacks die every weekend after being shot by fifty other blacks so they have a regular assembly line of submitting DNA data from fifty murders per weekend for a long time.

            On the other hand rural Montana, some good ole boy has a few too many Saturday night and ends up sleeping it off in the drunk tank at jail, do the locals have the resources and motivation to even bother submitting his DNA?

            It does seem like something a "big city" would provide much more often than some random low crime burb or farm county. You expect NCIS high tech TV hollywood stuff in NYC more so than rural Maine.

            • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:12PM

              by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:12PM (#1017877)

              Do you know who else was living in rural Montana? Ted Kazincski! The Unabomber! Not to mention Henry Plummer, and Soapy Smith.

          • (Score: 5, Informative) by meustrus on Tuesday July 07 2020, @07:56PM (5 children)

            by meustrus (4961) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @07:56PM (#1017843)

            Your statements assume that race is the best lens through which to view crime rates. In fact, higher crime rates are only one of many correlations with race, and it would be ludicrous to ignore all of the other correlations.

            The most important correlation to crime is wealth and poverty. It's a simple fact that poor people commit more violent crime. And yet, seemingly nowhere in your sources has anyone bothered to analyze this correlation.

            Instead, the FBI and the DOJ are engaged in this self-fulfilling prophecy where they expect blacks to commit more crime, so they look for more black criminals, so they find more black criminals, all the while ignoring the ways in which their own enforcement activities exacerbate poverty in black communities thereby leading to more crime.

            The rational thing to do here would be to figure out how to stop crime from happening in the first place. All this obsession with race in our police system detracts from that rational response. And based on the evidence, that the USA has the highest crime rates and incarceration rates of any developed nation on Earth, this obsession is likely making crime worse. Not better.

            --
            If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
            • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:56AM

              by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:56AM (#1017951) Journal

              Please do keep pointing this out--but know the kind of person you're replying to it won't benefit, because they have a narrative, and that narrative is "dark-skinned people are innately criminal and inferior."

              The reason to keep pointing it out in reply is for anyone who might stumble on the racists' endless torrent of brain diarrhea and be swayed by it in a moment of epistemological or moral weakness. Just seeing the counterattack is enough of a memetic vaccine for anyone who isn't already a CHUD to begin with. You're doing a service!

              --
              I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
            • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:40AM (2 children)

              by fustakrakich (6150) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:40AM (#1018040) Journal

              It's a simple fact that poor people commit more violent crime.

              Yeah, a rich guy will hire somebody. Doesn't want to mess up his suit.

              Aren't most murders committed by relatives?

              --
              La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @11:14PM (1 child)

                by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @11:14PM (#1018417)
                • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday July 09 2020, @08:22AM

                  by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Thursday July 09 2020, @08:22AM (#1018592) Homepage
                  Fuck me, women must be annoying. I've always suspected it, but now I have the proof. Apparently boys can grow out of being little shits, or maybe them leaving home makes them someone else's problem?
                  --
                  Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
            • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:15PM

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:15PM (#1018219)

              The reason this isn't mentioned often is because the correlation between crime and poverty is *much* weaker than that between crime and race. In many places in the US blacks are not lowest on the socioeconomic ladder, yet they are almost invariably highest on the violent crime ladder - generally by a very wide margin. For instance NYC is rather interesting that not only hispanics but also asians are worse off than blacks. And, like everywhere, blacks top the charts for violent crime by an extremely wide margin.

              The socioeconomic argument simply does not hold up to scrutiny at all.

              This is not to say there is no correlation there, but the one that exists is pretty weak. For instance Asians almost invariably have slightly lower crime rates than Whites. But in NYC where Asians are the poorest, they have slightly high crime rates than whites. Poverty can move the rates a few percentage points. Race moves them by orders of magnitude.

          • (Score: 0, Troll) by Captival on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:45AM (3 children)

            by Captival (6866) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:45AM (#1017948)

            And as usual, facts that Liberals don't like get moderated as Troll, then they come in and try to shift the goalposts from "Blacks don't commit more crimes" to "Okay they do but what about raaaaaaaacism". Are all you SJWs completely nuts? Do you not see how ridiculous you are when you rationalize and distort this way? I know that you do, because when you get your same style of argument parroted back at you, you can't stand it.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @04:24AM

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @04:24AM (#1018061)

              Racists are like 7 times more likely to be down-modded on SoylentNews. This is not to suggest that they are unpleasant, in error, intentionally ignorant, or otherwise stupid, but you can't argue with facts.

            • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday July 09 2020, @08:31AM (1 child)

              by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Thursday July 09 2020, @08:31AM (#1018594) Homepage
              Tall people are 5 times as likely to piss standing up.

              Don't you think there might be some alternative variable to correlate with - one that gives an even stronger correlation?

              And once you've found the stronger correlation, you need to control for that when evaluating your previous statement. You might find that it evaporates into nothing, but you might even find the correlation is reversed. You won't know until you control for the appropriate other variables.
              --
              Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @02:10PM

                by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @02:10PM (#1018658)

                Do you notice when people, as yourself, go this route they never provide any figures whatsoever? The correlation between crime and poverty is real but it's generally quite weak. The most recent study I'm aware of on this is available here [sciencedirect.com]. This [sci-hub.tw] is a sci-hub link to bypass the paywall. You'd be most interested in table 2. If you're not familiar with correlation table values: 1 = there is a perfect correlation between A and B, -1 = there is a perfect inverse correlation between A and B, 0 = there is no correlation whatsoever between A and B.

                So let's look at the correlates of murder:

                Income: -40%
                Life Expectancy: -61%
                IQ: -64%
                Skin Color (black): 84%

                Income is, by a wide margin, one of weaker correlations with murder. By contrast race is invariably one of, if not the single strongest, correlates. So strong is the correlation that it can create spurious correlations of the type you probably think are significant. In any variable where blacks are over-represented (which includes poverty) you'll see disproportionately high violent crime rates. So e.g. if I wanted to be a bad social scientist I could research the correlation between music tastes and murder rates only to 'discover' that 'rap music has an extremely strong association with murder'. Time to ban rap music! Due to Poe's Law, let me emphasize that that suggestion is sarcastic.

        • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:58PM (5 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:58PM (#1017676)

          Black people are five times more likely to be arrested, not to commit crimes

          True, they're only around 3 times more likely to commit violent crimes. [whiteprivilegeisntreal.org] IIRC the arrest rate is around 2.5 times higher overall in the US while the linked article seems to only look at a limited number of jurisdictions.

          • (Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:45PM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:45PM (#1017715)

            Two things:

            1) You are making a common statistical mistake based on their data. Imagine 50% of people commit 100% of crime. How much more likely is that 50% to commit crime than the rest of society? It's obviously not (percent_of_crime_committed / percent_of_population) because that'd lead you to believe that they're only twice as likely to commit crime when compared to the other 50% of people who are committing 0 crime!

            So how do you calculate the proper number? Break it down into ratios. Imagine 10% of people commit 50% of crime. The ratio there is 50% crimes per 10% population = 50/10. The rest of society would be 50% with 90% of remaining crimes = 50/90. So the first group has a relative rate of (50/10) / (50/90) = 9 meaning they are 900% more likely to commit crime. In our earlier example of 50% committing 100% you get: (100 / 50) / (0 / 50) = 2 / 0 = infinity. The point of this is that 10% of people committing 30% of crime are engaging in crime at a much higher relative rate than 3x.

            2) That site made a critical mistake. They said violent crimes but they're looking at *all* crimes. Here [fbi.gov] is the table they linked to. You can confirm that it includes arrests for drug violations, DUI, vandalism, etc. The violent crime ratio is about 10x higher for blacks compared to non-hispanic whites.

            • (Score: 0, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:55PM

              by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:55PM (#1017788)

              Ha! The racist trolls just love downmodding everyone who argues with them, but dare downmod a racist post and they cry oppression.

              Truly they are the most pathetic users around here.

          • (Score: 5, Interesting) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday July 07 2020, @08:49PM (2 children)

            by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @08:49PM (#1017872)

            Did you just unironically link to a site called "whiteprivilegeisntreal.org" and expect people to accept it as a reliable source?

            You've been modded Flamebait, but maybe Funny would be more appropriate.

            • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday July 09 2020, @08:33AM (1 child)

              by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Thursday July 09 2020, @08:33AM (#1018595) Homepage
              "I don't like the look of the source, therefore the source is false" is a classic logical fallacy - you're playing into their hands.
              --
              Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
    • (Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:41PM

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:41PM (#1017625) Journal

      However, if these types of databases are tools of oppression in only 2 countries in the world, but not elsewhere, then I think we can conlude that there's nothing intrinsically wrong with such types of databases. Stop the oppression at its core, and then the tools no longer become useful for oppression.

      Additional countries are mentioned in the related stories.

      Clearly, we need the full genomes of every single citizen to be stored in order to shorten the path between discovery and resolution of any crime. Then someone can hack the database and leak the genomes of the celebrities and supermodels, for perverted purposes, framing people [slashdot.org], or whatever.

      --
      [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:38PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:38PM (#1017622)

    In the U.S., the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has a DNA database called the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) that currently contains over 14 million DNA profiles. This database has a disproportionately high number of profiles of black men, because black Americans are arrested five times as much as white Americans. You don't even have to be convicted of a crime for law enforcement to take and store your DNA; you simply have to have been arrested as a suspect.

    So, if they just did what China is doing, it would be better? Why is this together?

    [...] As for China, a report that was published by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in mid-June claims that China is operating the "world's largest police-run DNA database" as part of its powerful surveillance state. Chinese authorities have collected DNA samples from possibly as many as 70 million men since 2017, and the total database is believed to contain as many as 140 million profiles. The country hopes to collect DNA from all of its male citizens, as it argues men are most likely to commit crimes.

    No, it's not collecting male DNA because "most likely to commit crimes". They collect it because once you have it, then you can find the family of the suspect in question. You don't have their DNA, but you have someone close. Maybe their uncle or father or brother. You don't need female DNA if you have their brother or father or son or even just related.

    To me it seems China wants total oversight over everyone while in US it's the "shit applies don't fall far from shit trees" mentality.

    Anyway ... Big Data. The number of the beast is your DNA and you can't change it.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:57PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:57PM (#1017674)

      The thing you miss is recidivism. In the US there are quite a lot of people living lives of crime. They go into prison, get out, engage in crime, go to prison, repeat until they escalate to something that gets them locked away indefinitely. In China recidivism is far less for a variety of reasons. So I think it's more like what you said for China, whereas for the US it's simply getting ready to reel in the exact same fish over and over again.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by meustrus on Tuesday July 07 2020, @08:03PM

        by meustrus (4961) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @08:03PM (#1017847)

        Looks like somebody longs for Communist dictators to take over and enforce the One True Culture over all those awful people over there. The ones in the news.

        Yup, definitely nothing dangerous about being an average Chinese person in Communist China. At least as long as you're not one of those awful people over there. Isn't it great when the government tells us who is bad and arrests and re-educates them at scale?

        --
        If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:39PM (4 children)

    s/ Racial//
    FTFY

    --
    My rights don't end where your fear begins.
    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:13PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:13PM (#1017687)

      Indeed! Omitting the " Racial" leaves a statement which is rather obvious and less inflamitory .

      Of course, nearly anything can be employed as as a tool of oppression by those who have a will to oppress.

      If only we knew which genomes determine the content of character, then we could discover oppressors using DNA tests and lock them up before they become a menace to society. I mean, turnabout is fair play, no?

    • (Score: 2) by OrugTor on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:36PM (1 child)

      by OrugTor (5147) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:36PM (#1017710)

      One of the most elegant lines of code ever. Having said that, I find it disturbing when I agree with TMB. Damn, I hate getting old.

  • (Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:41PM (46 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:41PM (#1017626)

    "This database has a disproportionately high number of profiles of black men, because black Americans are arrested five times as much as white Americans."

    Is the database disproportionate because it contains 5x as many black americans as white americans? Or did they conveniently leave out the fact that it *might* be exactly proportional? I didn't bother checking myself - I just highlight biased propaganda. (It's biased if it presents facts for one view but completely neglects facts from the other view that should support the claim)

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:53PM (23 children)

      Agreed but you're not going to get anywhere by using logic and reason with the people of the opposing viewpoint. They're already aware of this and have no problem whatsoever with calling night day and day a `76 Buick if that's what it takes to keep them from having to reevaluate their position.

      --
      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
      • (Score: 2, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:44PM (22 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:44PM (#1017780)

        Finally we see TMB's true form, he is a "just the facts" racist.

        Woopsie, years of claiming otherwise down the drain :(

        • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @06:11PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @06:11PM (#1017799)

          :( LOOK :( AT :( ME! I AM ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF HISTORY SO THIS MAKES ME SO SAD RIGHT NOW :(
          YOU JUST 100% PROVED YOU ARE A RACIST MEANIE :( ALL THOSE YEARS DOWN THE DRAIN YOU ABSOLUTE SCUM SUCKING CHAMELEON :(
          BEING SO RIGHT ALL THE TIME IS HARD BUT I DO MY BEST TO BE THE ADULT IN THE ROOM :(
          MEH, BACK TO PROTESTING I GUESS. ACAB :)

        • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday July 07 2020, @06:32PM (20 children)

          by DeathMonkey (1380) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @06:32PM (#1017812) Journal

          Facts? All I saw was content-less namecalling.

          • (Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:12PM (19 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:12PM (#1017878)

            Yeah that was the point. I'm just happy to trigger thst all-caps dipshit. They have nothing left, their motives have been laid bare, all that is left is the wild thrashings of their ego trying to preserve their outdated world view.

            They claim to only support the facts yet they ignore every bit that goes against their narrative. I thought BuzzyBoy was just an idiot, but it appears he is just another alt-right jackass trying to hide his prejudice and twist it into 'objective fact.'

            The site continues to roll downhill, eventually it'll shift enough for the moderste users to become disgusted as well and realize the problem is more than just a few racist trolls.

            • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:59AM (18 children)

              by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:59AM (#1017952) Journal

              > Yeah that was the point. I'm just happy to trigger thst all-caps dipshit. They have nothing left, their motives have been laid bare, all that is left is the wild thrashings of their ego trying to preserve their outdated world view.
              > They claim to only support the facts yet they ignore every bit that goes against their narrative. I thought BuzzyBoy was just an idiot, but it appears he is just another alt-right jackass trying to hide his prejudice and twist it into 'objective fact.'
              > The site continues to roll downhill, eventually it'll shift enough for the moderste users to become disgusted as well and realize the problem is more than just a few racist trolls.

              I'd been warning people about them for years, Uzzard especially, and it's taken until now for people to start waking up. There are times I seriously wonder if this site would be better off gone...

              --
              I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
              • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:11AM (1 child)

                by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:11AM (#1017995)

                I never saw TMB actually go racist so I figured he was just a selfish libertarian conservative type.

                I am disappointed to see him join the "blacks are criminals just teh FAX" bruhgade :( Of course this comment section devolved into racist bullshit instead of anger at the authoritarian surveillance state. Shows the priorities of these freedom loving individuals.

                • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:50PM

                  by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:50PM (#1018167) Journal

                  It's all over his post history if you know where to look. Coded dogwhistles everywhere. He spends his time *not* saying "nigger" as loud as he can, if you catch my meaning. It's hidden behind code phrases like his particular childish idea of what "freedom" actually is.

                  --
                  I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @09:02AM (15 children)

                by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @09:02AM (#1018111)

                Yeah, you could bail. Some of us aren't trolls though, including you, and we non-trolls do try to have meaningful exchanges still.

                Agreed that there's a handful of nicks and a substantial portion of ACs who seem to be pushing - with excruciatingly low quality argumentation! - some specific low-quality ideas of the alt-right. IDK what to do about them any more than I would know what to do, as an individual, against a flock of seagulls mobbing me.

                • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:48PM (14 children)

                  by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:48PM (#1018165) Journal

                  Sometimes I wonder if dropping their dox is the right thing to do. Most of them have utterly shit opsec (Runaway is likely the worst offender, as he is about as old as his nick suggests...) and the problem with places like this is there's no real accountability.

                  He and a few others have been flirting with if not outright advocating domestic terrorism. It may be wise to alert the FBI or a related agency if they keep it up. At this point I don't even care; they'll have it coming to them and if this site refuses to wipe its own ass maybe it deserves to disappear.

                  --
                  I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @05:03PM (13 children)

                    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @05:03PM (#1018269)

                    You are a paradoxical example of echo chambers. I say paradoxical since this site obviously is not an echo chamber, though some would prefer to turn it into one. But in general in November of 2016 about 66 million people voted for Clinton, about 63 million for Trump. The voting age population in the US in 2016 was about 250 million [wikipedia.org]. This can help give us a general overview of politics in the US:

                    ~25% republican
                    ~25% democrat
                    ~50% none of the above

                    And I think in general public settings where there's otherwise no significant political bias, you'll find this distribution matches up pretty well to reality. But perhaps more interestingly is that you'll find you'll find the 75% in general are pretty far away from where you are. Your perception of increasingly radicalism is because you yourself have become increasingly radicalized. Whoever you were a decade ago, I doubt you would have been the type to declare people "racist" for stating statistics that involve race. The whole idea to declare facts as racist is something very much out of 1984 and I think that's pushing more and more of that 50% towards the right.

                    Let me give the most softball example of this. Last month George Floyd was murdered. Protests and riots followed shortly thereafter nationwide. It's unclear how many people protested, but there were more than 14,000 rioters were arrested and they presumably they were a relatively small percentage of all protesters. So it's fairly safe to say, in total, it was easily in the hundreds of thousands and maybe even into the millions. And many of the protesters engaged in no real pandemic protection. There was no social distancing possible, even if people did desire it, and masks were frequently not worn or of insufficient quality to have much effect.

                    Today, we have seen an otherwise inexplicable massive increase in COVID infections with 50,000+ new cases a day, and rising. Why? Well when I turn to the New York Times front page, they're trying to claim it's because of churches. [nytimes.com] CNN? They want to blame the reopening of the economy. [cnn.com] I assume you can see there's a rather giant pink elephant in the room they're all trying to pretend doesn't exist. But the thing is, the vast majority of people see exactly what's up. And this divides society. Because when somebody claims things like CNN or New York Times are fake news you immediately jump to 'omg omg that's what trump said so he must be a trump supporter'. It's dumb. I'm liberal, but anti-democrat - as I find *many* are.

                    And the reason is this. You honestly think some guy like Runaway or Buzzard are threats to society? I don't think you're dumb by any means of the word, but I do believe you have a very poor ability to judge the character and motivation of people - probably driven in large part by political radicalization.

                    • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday July 09 2020, @12:55AM (12 children)

                      by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Thursday July 09 2020, @12:55AM (#1018447) Journal

                      That is a lot of words to say "No U."

                      Now listen and listen good: statistics say what they say, and that is all that they say. Most significantly, they do NOT mention the process of their own collection (i.e., sampling biases), nor do they hold explanations for themselves. *And this is the key sleight of hand the "just the facts hurr hurr" racists count on you not seeing them pulling.*

                      Do you get it? The statistics they quote are always just bait; they are towing along an unspoken narrative hook, usually "$GROUP are inherently criminal," and most insidiously, they are implying it rather than saying it outright so when someone points it out, they can pretend to be all offended that their "objectivity" is being impugned, wring their hands, clutch their pearls, and go "well, them's the numbers."

                      --
                      I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @03:36AM

                        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @03:36AM (#1018520)

                        As you said before, read between the lines of that post you replied to. Yet another self-described liberal pushing rightwing points. Either confused or just another of the assholes trying to radicalize and disenfranchise others.

                      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @04:35AM (10 children)

                        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @04:35AM (#1018534)

                        Then perhaps you should respond and provide clear fact based evidence of any such bias in sampling instead of simply trying to call facts racist? The general conversation goes something like this:

                        1) Blacks commit violent crime at about 10x the rate whites do.
                        2) 'That's biased. Blacks are poor, and poor people commit more crime in general.
                        3) If the bias was economic then in the increasingly large number of areas where blacks are not the poorest group, they would also not be the most violent. This is not what we observe.
                        4) I'm not listening! Racist Racist Racist!

                        It's like if unless you refuse to accept reality, then you must be a racist in our 1984 driven world.

                        But what I'd also emphasize is that this whole 'racism' thing is just one component of the entire issue. So many agendas being pushed by the DNC just require refusing to accept reality. The recent protests have driven the infection of what will be somewhere between tens of thousands and millions of people (you need to count indirect infections). And these infections will, in turn, see the deaths of thousands to hundreds of thousands. So 'protesting police violence' is something that's going to effectively result in causing the deaths of far more people than police have ever killed in their entire existence. Again, this makes no sense at all - unless you just turn off your brain.

                        • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday July 10 2020, @01:35AM (9 children)

                          by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Friday July 10 2020, @01:35AM (#1018925) Journal

                          I doubt you were intending to illustrate my point for me, but thanks for doing it, anyway :)

                          Regarding your first point...the statistics say black people commit, per capita, ~10x the violent crime white people do. So...how good are the data? How do you know you've accounted for every single violent crime committed by every single black person vs every single white person? Until you have very near perfect sampling, you need to qualify that statement in big, bold letters.

                          See, there's always a question of sampling bias, as I pointed out above. I am definitely willing to believe black people have a higher rate of violent crime than whites based on my own experiences and observations, and this leads us into the next question: *Why is this?*

                          Now the answer you and your kind *want* people to automatically jump to is "because they're inherently violent hurr hurr hurr." Again: the stats say what they say, and that's all that they say. You're making an assumption that every single person is on an even footing here. What are the correlates and causes of violent crime? What is the specific breakdown of each type of violent crime, stratified by age, wealth, location, health status, etc etc?

                          "Black people" (and "white people" for that matter) is a huge group, consisting of people from birth to over 100 years old, people of both sexes and every gender, from homeless to blasphemously wealthy, living in all sorts of different environments, hammered on the anvils of tens of millions of different experiences (although there is some *heavy* systemic skewing going on there...).

                          And did you notice something? We've gone far afield of statistics and are now into such diverse-yet-overlapping subjects as epidemiology, urban planning, sociology, law, and even the very definition of what a crime is and its distinction with moral good and evil. Next to all this, the data are almost uninteresting.

                          But you? No, no, no, you and your buddies don't want anyone thinking about all that stuff! Hell no! You want people to see the numbers you present, turn off their brains, and go "black folks are inherently criminal." Fuck you sideways for insulting everyone's intelligence *and* human decency.

                          --
                          I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                          • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 10 2020, @05:03AM (8 children)

                            by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 10 2020, @05:03AM (#1018963)

                            My response here got a whole lot longer than I intended so I'm going to flip it around. At the top I'm going to hit on the issue of why black folks may have more issues on average, and on the bottom I'll hit on your questions.

                            In this thread somebody was trying to create an argument that slavery was holding people back (and thus the root cause of this all) by invoking the fact that Dave Chapelle's great grandmother was a slave. It was his great grandfather [wikipedia.org], but their point remains... right? William Chapelle, after the emancipation proclomation, would go on to become the president and chairman of a university. He also took the time to become a bishop in his church. One of his sons would become equally renowned - becoming a physician and surgeon who opened up an all-inclusive practice at a time when segregation still made it difficult for some blacks to access healthcare. Dave Chapelle's own father was a statistician who later went on to become a professor. And Dave Chapelle is Dave Chapelle - he played a fool for a career but is one of the most intelligent and eloquent individuals there is when you actually read (or listen) to him as a person - probably why he pulled a Bobby Fischer on comedy and a $50million contract. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

                            The "problem" in Africa is that, relative to our basic needs, it's a paradise. Have you seen what places like Liberia look like? Go search from some pictures now if you haven't. It's just amazingly beautiful rich lands as far as the eye can see. And that is Africa in general excepting the Sahara. If not for the violent crime issue I'd love to live in Africa. Why is this 'utopia' a problem? As you get further away from the equator, IQs and incomes increase, violence decreases, and a million other ultra positive correlations. The reason is that you start entering into areas that are the real 'shit holes' as far as human needs are concerned. Scandinavia? If you're not smart enough to prepare for the winter and work together towards it - you're gonna die. By contrast in most parts of Africa, you can live off the land from the day you're capable til the day you die with no need of anything other than basic knowledge. Africa never had a filter for things like intelligence or civility like other places in the world did. This doesn't mean all Africans are dumb, there are plenty of brilliant Africans, but their distribution is much worse than among other groups whose lineage had more 'pruning'.

                            As a hot take I expect the same thing that happened to Africa is now gradually starting to happen to the entire world. Life has become comfortable and easy for most of everybody (speaking, as always, relatively). And so there's no longer any filter for competence. And thus we're beginning to see global IQ's decline. [wikipedia.org] When you have no filter, it just ends up being a reproduction contest. And who's reproducing the fastest? Well, their genes are the genes of the future. Fun times ahead!

                            ---

                            As for your arguments, don't you see you're just throwing out a large number of arguments but without putting any effort into actually seeing if anything is valid? Many of these questions can be pretty easily answered if you actually wanted to answer them. For instance, murder is one of the easiest to look at because there's near perfect sampling of all cases. How? Missing/dead people tend to get reported, one way or the other. Now of course not all murders are solved, but even this gives us some very workable information. The reason is that the *vast* majority of murders that are not solved are in murder capitals like St. Louis and Baltimore. And in these places nearly all murder is black on black. You could try to argue that the unsolved cases are some white guys running into Baltimore and killing a bunch of black guys, but I think that'd be a very bad faith argument. The missing data suggest very strongly that the 'real' murder rate difference is actually much higher than 10:1 from the data (solved crimes) that we have available.

                            And as for the correlates of violent crime there have been plenty of studies, though not so much recently. The reason is they all end up showing the exact same thing. The most recent and comprehensive I'm aware of is available here [sciencedirect.com]. Here's [sci-hub.tw] a sci-hub link to sidestep the paywall. Table 2 is what you're after. The studied a large number of variables across all 50 states to see what correlated with what. If you're not familiar with a correlation table, 100% = perfect correlation between A and B, -100% = perfect inverse correlation between A and B, 0 = no correlation whatsoever between A and B.

                            Here are correlates of murder:

                            Income: -40%
                            Life Expectancy: -61%
                            IQ: -64%
                            Skin Color (black): 84%

                            Skin color is invariably the strongest correlate to violent crime when you actually look at the data. This correlation alone is likely what drives other correlations. Blacks for instance are over-represented in low income and low IQ groups, and so they alone will substantially drag up the violent crime rates of those groups. It should be clear that things like poverty itself does not inherently drive violent crime. Look at places like China or even India. Both are/were deeply impoverished nations with extreme income inequality, yet they also both have very negligible violent crime rates - a handful of high visibility cases from the latter notwithstanding.

                            • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday July 10 2020, @06:10AM (7 children)

                              by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Friday July 10 2020, @06:10AM (#1018977) Journal

                              Where are you going with this? That's what I want to know. What is your solution to this problem? The "just the facts" types are oddly reticent on that.

                              See, what I'm taking from this here is a lot of eugenics. You're dancing around it, but what you're saying in way too many words is that old discredited trope that people from the tropics are infantile and are never going to "grow up" as a group because there were never any dangers, nope, no, none, in the tropical regions compared to where the Ubermenschen Nordic people live.

                              Hasn't it occurred to you that you're undercutting your genetics-based argument here by explicitly focusing on what is a matter of culture? Need I remind you that the entire human race *came from Africa?* For a species as intelligent as H. sapiens, culture trumps instinct and breeding, and does it about a zillion times quicker, geologically and biologically speaking. There was not enough time for people to evolve from "suited for the tropics" to "suited for the northlands;" that is entirely culture, tool use, and creativity.

                              I'm not even angry. The self-own here is so comprehensive, so unwitting, so completely naive, it's actually hilarious. Kipling called and he wants the white man's burden back.

                              As a final rejoinder: given that these *are* cultural and educational problems, a very liberal, wide-reaching social safety net with a heavy focus on education and healthcare is the fastest possible way to solve the issues you're bringing up :)

                              --
                              I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 12 2020, @04:25PM (6 children)

                                by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 12 2020, @04:25PM (#1019883)

                                Ahh! But you are provably wrong in this case. First off, consider that cats also share about 90% of their genes with the human race, chimps upwards of 96%. Genetic similarity is a rather misguiding metric because the smallest of things can yield huge differences. One of the most interesting genes is MAO-A - 'the warrior gene'. It's responsible for an enzyme that has a rather curious effect. When production of the said enzyme is dysfunctional, the resultant animal will become vastly and measurably more violent.

                                Literally you can take a healthy mouse, impair the MAO-A gene, and its offspring will be measurably more violent than normal for the species. And the exact same is true in humans. We do not engage on these type of genetic experiments yet when you take a sampling of violent criminals and compare it against society at large, again you see widespread MAO-A malfunction. And guess what race in particular has a rate of MAO-A malfunction generally magnitudes higher than other races? And of course this is just one tiny aspect of genetics. Most groups have filtered out impaired MAO-A genes. Africa has not. Why? Well now you can get into cultural answers. The various personal characteristics that make for success in one region vs another are radically different and thus the people that ended up thriving became radically different.

                                As for where am I going with this? Very simple:

                                1) Equality of opportunity, not equality of result. The latter is not possible unless you gave Brave New World where you lobotomize the top the reach the ineptitude of the bottom.

                                2) Assisting people based on their real needs and not the needs you project on them. If we run this world 1000 times, Mike Tyson is probably dead or in prison right now in about 990 of them. But because his talent for fighting was uncovered quickly - he's instead a legend, even if an infamous one, in our timeline. Trying to turn everybody into e.g. a computer scientist is stupid. If somebody wants to fight, teach them to fight as well as to weld or operate heavy machinery. If somebody wants to be a social media guy - teach them to influence and charm, as well as teaching them to work in public relations. So forth and so on. Same reason when teaching somebody to be a computer scientist, you should also teach them to be a teach support guy.

                                3) Research and find out what makes certain people of various conditions succeed while others fail. Not everybody with an impaired MAO-A gene is a violent criminal. And similarly not all violent criminals have MAO-A genes. Why? And how can we use this information to create a better society for everybody? Right now this sort of research is as taboo as it possibly could be because it doesn't go for this blank slate nonsense you're talking about.

                                • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday July 13 2020, @12:10AM (5 children)

                                  by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Monday July 13 2020, @12:10AM (#1020094) Journal

                                  Ah, someone else who knows about the monoamine oxidase type-A gene! I was beginning to think I was alone on here...

                                  You know that every post you're making is actually in agreement with me, right? I know very well what it is to start with genetic disadvantages: I'm horribly deaf, have even worse vision, and am probably predisposed to depressive disorders. What helped? A supportive early home environment (after "early" not so much but eh...), access to glasses and hearing aids (...sometimes...), and recognition of my strengths as well as weaknesses.

                                  All of those are pretty high up Maszlow's pyramid, did you notice? Can't really focus on improving yourself when you can't eat right or sleep soundly, or when the water's full of lead (speaking of things that interact badly with MAO-A mutations).

                                  You're so close, so, so, so, so close, to having the proverbial "come to Jesus" moment. If you really, truly care about these people, if you truly care for "equality of opportunity," *you have to support a widespread social program that has enough capacity for everyone AND can be tailored to individual needs.*

                                  Somehow, though, I can only hear this odd, high-pitched whistling noise. It's making the dogs go nuts, which is bizarre since it sounds like "blacks are inherently violent" and dogs don't speak a human language. Hmmm...

                                  --
                                  I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @05:24AM

                                    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @05:24AM (#1020157)

                                    I don't understand why you think such things would be controversial to me. If you simply asked me whether or not I believe blacks are, as a group (not as individuals), genetically more inclined towards violence than most other groups then of course I would say yes. The over representation of malfunctioning MAO-A genes is, by itself, sufficient to justify that claim. And I don't view it as an inherently bad thing. Most kids get into a fight at some point or another. One kid runs to a teacher crying, one kid instead punches back. I have always been the latter and would be absolutely ashamed if my kid was the former. However, I'd also be ashamed if he threw the first punch. Never throw the first punch, always throw the last one. The capacity for violence is important lest society give way to the first evil with such a penchant, but it requires self discipline and restraint lest you turn into that evil yourself.

                                    What I do view as a bad thing is creating solutions based upon the assumption of a blank slate hypothesis. When that hypothesis is invalid, so too are our solutions. Most don't realize that the US already spends more per capita than most of anywhere on the world in things such as education and even social spending. [oecd.org] Remember to swap from % GDP to $/capita. We spend more per capita than, for instance, both the UK and Canada.

                                    So why do our programs suck? Because they're completely misguided. Inner schools having problems? Throw money at the problem which is generally used to upgrade the computers, buy new textbooks, and just generally wasted. Lo and behold, it achieves nothing. By contrast, start boxing/wrestling classes alongside shop (lumberworking/metalworking/etc) classes and you'd see huge dividends. But it doesn't fit the cultural narrative we're trying to impose that 'everybody needs to be a feminist (if not effeminate) computer scientist and the only reason that's not happening is [insert identity politics].'

                                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:05AM (3 children)

                                    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 13 2020, @07:05AM (#1020167)

                                    I just realized something I never thought about for some reason. Most of what I've said is actually a testable hypothesis. We do have one program that focuses on physical discipline and training over 'become a computer scientist' in schools. What is it? ROTC and junior ROTC programs and the military itself. To be clear, I'm not especially fond of the US military but I am fond of the sort of physical and mental training that the military entails. Anyhow, I decided to look up economic outcomes for veterans on average. Turns out Pew recently did an extensive survey [pewresearch.org] of the data.

                                    The results were incredibly surprising given the usual narrative about starving veterans:

                                    In 2017, the median incomes of non-Hispanic black and Hispanic veteran households were more than $20,000 greater than those of black and Hispanic non-veteran households. Among non-Hispanic whites, by comparison, the gap in median income between households headed by veterans and non-veterans was only about $5,100.

                                    Income differences between veteran and non-veteran households are also large when examined by education level. The median income is roughly $20,000 higher for households headed by a veteran with a high school diploma, compared with non-veteran households with the same level of education.

                                    Veteran households also fare better than non-veteran households when looking at other economic measures, including poverty. In 2017, the poverty rate for non-veteran households was 6.4 percentage points higher than the rate for veteran households (13.0% vs. 6.6%).

                                    In 2017, black veteran households had a poverty rate of 9.6%, versus 23.2% for black non-veteran households, a difference of 13.7 percentage points. The rate for Hispanic veteran households was 7.6%, compared with 18.6% for Hispanic non-veteran households. The difference was less stark between households headed by white veterans and white non-veterans: 5.8% vs. 9.4%, respectively.

                                    Those numbers are just huge and I do think offer at least a workable existential argument in favor of the logical position on the emphasis of physical training and discipline in lieu of simply 'everybody must be a computer scientist.'

                                    • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday July 14 2020, @12:36AM (2 children)

                                      by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Tuesday July 14 2020, @12:36AM (#1020858) Journal

                                      "Starship Troopers" was still built on a shit premise, Mr. Heinlein.

                                      Again...every time you post, you further support the central thesis I've been pushing, that human behavior is *far* more influenced by culture than genetics. No, I don't believe that tabula rasa stuff (and no one seriously has since the 70s so shove it), but I am capable of observation. If you want to blunt the effects of "bad" genes, *culture is key and education is how.*

                                      Your veterans are getting an education in their own parameters, limits, and thought processes, do you get it? I would rather push for encouraging introspection, critical thought, emotional intelligence, and a thorough grounding in basic predicate logic starting in elementary school than the soldier-sucking compulsory military service you seem to be hinting at. And your disdain for "computer scientists" is a bit odd on a site like this. Even someone like me can program just a tiny bit and has run Gentoo since the mid-noughties :)

                                      --
                                      I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                                      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 14 2020, @03:37PM (1 child)

                                        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 14 2020, @03:37PM (#1021287)

                                        I don't know how you got any of from what I said.

                                        The point of the military example was to show that all of our current ideas about education, solving poverty, and everything amount to *much* less than 2 years in the military *on average*. Why? Because all of our ideas we are *currently* implementing are actively based around pushing people down paths that they're unsuited for. I have no disdain for computer science, I make a living from software and absolutely love it. However it's a horrible path for the vast majority for people. And vice versa for the military. It's going to be a bad fit for some, yet it's somehow clearly *much* more effective at producing better outcomes than what we're *currently* doing.

                                        The idea is simple: you don't push people in any direction. You find out what they're good at and you work from there. Take your emotional intelligence idea. I could not care less about the feelings of others besides my loved ones, and I strive to even nullify my own emotions. And I view these things as values worth pursuing. So any education in "emotional intelligence" is going to be a disaster with me in your class - and I would end up, even if unintentionally, actively antagonizing the rest of the class. The exact same thing is *currently* happening today as we put people in math classes where they simply have 0 interest (or perhaps ability in some cases) of learning. Yes, becoming highly capable at mathematics would give these people a far better chance at a better life, but you ultimately cannot force people to do anything they don't want to. That effort to force people simply results in them disrupting the class for those who would want to learn it and wasting the time of the non-learner. So, again, instead find out what people are good at and pursue that.

                                        Essentially, I believe that general education has been a failure. What can we do to improve it? I'd look in the other direction - specialized education, no longer just for the short bus.

                                        • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 15 2020, @12:57AM

                                          by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 15 2020, @12:57AM (#1021594) Journal

                                          Somehow you managed to gag yourself on Heinlein's rotting dick *and* run straight into his "Specialization is for insects" snark at the same time. Amazing. Where the hell are you *going* with all this?

                                          --
                                          I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
    • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:02PM (21 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:02PM (#1017635)

      In either case it is biased propaganda. The context that is always missing whenever racial disproportionality is brought up is the rate of violent crime.

      This is in the same line of thought as San Francisco no longer releasing mug shots in an attempt to "stop fueling racial bias" [nbcnews.com] Ironic. Can't look the people being arrested because the people getting arrested might reinforce a stereotype that those people get arrested.

      This is a very childish way to handle social issues. It's infantilization of an entire group of people through an Orwellian memory hole for emotional reasons.

      • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:09PM (14 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:09PM (#1017684)

        It also ensures that progress is never possible. The politically correct nonsense is to try to assume that everybody is identical and thus any differences are solely a result of other some form if discrimination/bias/etc or some environmental factor. The problem with this is simple. Most of all evidence we have indicates that there are differences between groups. By embracing these differences society can help create better outcomes for everybody. But by assuming a falsehood, any action you take is almost certainly doomed to failure before it even begins. Of course the motivation for the politically correct is people going full eugenics again, but that's hyperbolic. There's a rather large gulf of possibilities between 'stick your head in the sand and insist 2+2=5' and 'all but the master race must be genocided'.

        • (Score: 1, Flamebait) by VLM on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:37PM (8 children)

          by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:37PM (#1017711)

          everybody is identical

          Non-Christian creationism.

          If a Christian says Jesus said love thy neighbor that's evil Christians being hateful as usual by not admitting their white privilege and giving "love" instead of retribution payments and all that nonsense.

          If a Jewish woman in the legacy media says race doesn't exist and if it did its only skin deep and genetics doesn't exist and if it did then science is racist anyway, then that's being holier than thou and we have to agree with her style of devout creationist beliefs or be cancelled.

          Because all religions are treated freely and equally, right?

          • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:01AM (7 children)

            by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:01AM (#1017954) Journal

            Buddhism predates Christianity by over 500 years and has superior ethics. "Love thy neighbor" is not Christian or even Abrahamic in origin. And have you noticed that the louder a self-proclaimed Christian is the more he or she sucks pickled monkey balls at doing what Jesus said to do?

            --
            I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
            • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:58AM (1 child)

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:58AM (#1017988)

              superior ethics? [jchronlettsci.org]

              • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:44PM

                by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:44PM (#1018162) Journal

                Yes, superior ethics, because nowhere in any mainstream Buddhism that I know of does the idea of someone suffering infinite punishment for finite crimes committed by a finite mind in finite time with finite powers exist. That alone seals the deal. Nice try. I'm not a Buddhist myself, I just know evil when I see it.

                --
                I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
            • (Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:29PM

              by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:29PM (#1018156)

              On the other hand, despite the claim of being older and better, Buddhists in practice usually don't have the holier than thou problem the Abrahamic religions seem to suffer from.

            • (Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:31PM (3 children)

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:31PM (#1018224)

              Are you familiar with the myth of the noble savage? That really does, in many ways, sum of modern liberalism. I live in a Buddest country, so you get to see what religions turn into in practice. And it's not pretty. In Buddhism the fundamental tenant is that if you do good things in this life then you'll be rewarded with better things in the next life. How could that go wrong? Humans and self righteousness is how.

              One of the weirdest experiences I had came with a family I was living with at the time. They were incredibly nice and friendly people who did genuinely seem to genuinely try to follow the teachings of Buddhism - even had a little Buddha temple thing setup at our place where they'd leave offerings daily. Well one day they were driving my wife and I around. And there was this crippled beggar walking overly bow-legged. The wife of the family couldn't stop laughing - like it was the most hilarious thing she ever saw. It essentially came down to 'lol poor [person of other nationality]'. After talking a bit and trying not to be some sort of SJW type, we found out what was up.

              What's the corollary of 'if you do good things in this life, you'll find yourself in a better place in the next life'? Yip. If you're in a shit place in this life, it's because you were a super shit person in your past life. And so all of the sudden some poor guy from an even poorer country whose crippled beyond belief is just supposed to be hilarious because you're looking at an awful person being punished for unimaginably bad deeds. Yay - self righteousness. An amusing thing as well. In the country Christianity is revered. Good people see what Buddhist monks do, how Buddhist people act, and realize it's all just a shit show. But they very rarely see Christians and so they have this idealized version of Christianity in their minds, exactly like you have this idealized version of Buddhism in your mind.

              • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday July 09 2020, @01:01AM (2 children)

                by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Thursday July 09 2020, @01:01AM (#1018449) Journal

                Please don't insult my intelligence. I'm not some dillettante who watched a video of a Tibetan retreat and thinks that's the entirety of Buddhism. I am well aware of where its faults and flaws lie, and the problem you're describing here is one it inherited from Hinduism--remember, Buddha himself, like Jesus, was not intending to start a new religion so much as purify an existing one, and Buddha less so than Jesus in my estimation.

                People suck no matter what. The value I see in Buddhism is that it appears to be the world's first serious attempt at an understanding of the mind. Some of the texts sound almost clinical, such as the ones describing the chain of events between perception and suffering. If you are introspective enough to make use of it, you can figure out how to start debugging your own mind.

                The key insight is that there is nothing special about your ego, the "self," vis-a-vis the rest of reality. It's just another emergent phenomenon. Once you understand this, there is a great letting-go, and an amazing sense of continuity and one-ness with everything else. This in turn lets you stop taking your own existence so seriously, which lets you act a bit more dispassionately when analyzing your own circumstances, thoughts, habits, and goals.

                --
                I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @05:44AM (1 child)

                  by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 09 2020, @05:44AM (#1018555)

                  I don't disagree. The thing I took note of was you taking an existential interpretation of one religion, and a personal one of another. Your quote above, "have you noticed that the louder a self-proclaimed Christian is the more he or she sucks pickled monkey balls at doing what Jesus said to do?" is equally accurate should one substitute in Buddhist and Buddha. Many who live in the Western world don't really realize this because they aren't generally exposed to what the mass adoption of Buddhism looks like, which is similar to the mass adoption of Christianity. People and self righteousness are a recipe for dystopia.

                  However, while I do think Buddhism adopts a much more Stoic value system (which to me is more precisely of what you find so appealing in Buddhism - perhaps look into Marcus Aurelius' Meditations? [dailystoic.com]) you can find a similar worldview in Christianity in that it emphasizes the distinction between the worldly world and the one after, with the former lacking ultimate relevance. This is a recurring theme in all major religions since for a religion to achieve mass adoption it quite tautologically needed to appeal to the masses. And the masses generally lived less than pleasant lives. A way to reconcile their existence of today for something better tomorrow is where the appeal of religion came from. This is also why today as we live mostly *relatively* pleasant lives, the mass adoption of religion is dying except for in areas where life remains unpleasant.

                  I suspect this is also why Stoicism never received the same adoption. The Stoics rejected any notion of a knowable afterlife. And so the virtue espoused within Stoicism is not for some greater reward or outward signaling, but simply to gain mastery of oneself. This is one of the many reasons that Aurelius' writings are so interesting. Those are the writings of the most powerful and wealthy man in the world - who could have had anything he ever wanted, not writing for an audience or some grand cause - but simply writing for himself. Clearly it's not always the case that absolutely power corrupts absolutely.

                  • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday July 10 2020, @01:21AM

                    by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Friday July 10 2020, @01:21AM (#1018921) Journal

                    I know little of Stoicism but have been very impressed by what I've seen so far.

                    --
                    I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:11PM (3 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:11PM (#1017735)

          Don't worry, they've already started working on the next step. 1984, Brave New World and Fahrenheit 451 have all been implemented, and they've started working on the Harrison Bergeron stage. If everyone can't be equally any other way, they'll force the matter.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:39PM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:39PM (#1017889)

            Where is my soma ?

          • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday July 09 2020, @01:02AM

            by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Thursday July 09 2020, @01:02AM (#1018450) Journal

            You think you're one of the ones who'll get muzzled or weighted down, no doubt. You may be in for a rude shock... :D

            --
            I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @11:32PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @11:32PM (#1017920)

          There are statistical differences between groups. Individuals should be judged on their own merits, without being subject to prejudice, whether it's detrimental or in their favor. Sadly, prejudice and xenophobia are instinctual reactions, so they are unlikely to ever disappear as traits of human societies.

      • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:10PM (4 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:10PM (#1017686)

        Because someone of the same color as them, who died many generations ago, that they don't know, was traded by their african tribal chiefs for slavery in exchange for pretty trinkets.
        That my friends is "truth"

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @07:49PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @07:49PM (#1017839)

          Because someone of the same color as them, who died many generations ago, that they don't know, was traded by their african Irish tribal chiefs for slavery in exchange for pretty trinkets.

          FTFY, and your historical perspective seems, er, a bit racist?

          Angles and Saxons are almost useless as slaves, though. They malinger, lie, steal, and rape the livestock. Francs or Iberians are much better.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @05:41PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @05:41PM (#1018295)

            What he's referring to is the fact that the slave trade in Africa was already thriving long before foreigners arrived. It's the main reason that Africans ended up being the final slaves. Europe, Asia, and the Mideast saw the rise of massive, powerful, and relatively technologically sophisticated empires. And within these empires slavery was generally restricted if not banned against other 'in group' types. So in Europe the in group was religion - the church forbade Christians from enslaving other Christians.

            By contrast Africa was still a completely divided continent with vast numbers of tribes using primitive equipment and a thriving domestic slave market. Their lack of development and unification left them very vulnerable. This is part of the reason I suspect the future belongs to China now a days, with India coming up the rear. Multiculturalism seems to have been a failed experiment simply because you can basically halt any and all progress in the nation by invoking claims of racism. And the only way that would not be true is if everybody was completely equal which will never true. So the only way to ever proceed cooperatively is if nobody ever decides to start race baiting but that's just never going to be the case - even in a world with 0 racism.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @08:04AM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @08:04AM (#1018102)

          Many in the "one, two, many" sense? Ie. five generations? Dave Chappelle's great grandma was a slave.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @06:23PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @06:23PM (#1018321)

            You mean his great grandfather, William Chappelle [wikipedia.org]. William Chappelle was born into slavery and became the president and chairman of a university, as well as also taking the time to become a bishop in his church. One of his sons would go on to become a physician and surgeon opening a significant practice. Chapelle's dad was a statistician who became a professor.

            If you want to know why some people end up thugs and others end up as 'Chapelles' (of any generation!) it's not because of where they came from, but because of who they are. And in some ways the two are related. Genetics is real. And if you stick two idiots together, guess what's usually going to come out. Of course stupid people have the right to breed as much as anybody else, so there's no good solution. But blaming people's failure to achieve on "racism" is getting dumb and not really doing much besides dividing America.

      • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:25PM

        Financial reason not emotional. Ultimately anyway. A lot of people make a lot of money off selling victimhood.

        --
        My rights don't end where your fear begins.
  • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:55PM (40 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @01:55PM (#1017633)

    The logic of the Left leads to not going after criminals because they don't want to "oppress" them. Criminals get rights over the victims of their crimes. We have been seeing the consequences over the past month or so. More innocent people including small children die. More BLACK people die. We ALL suffer while the mob is given free reign. THAT is the true injustice.

    Note that this has all happened before (60s - 70s especially, and also 80s - early 90s).

    • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:07PM (3 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:07PM (#1017638)

      And if you dare try to defend yourself with a gun from a mob while wearing a pink polo. You are the problem and will be investigated. Not the mob that trespasses and destroys property.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:03PM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:03PM (#1017767)

        One thing these ongoing riots and killings have demonstrated, is that apparently, a certain group NEEDS more policing.

        • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:14PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:14PM (#1017879)

          Not even dog whistling anymore? Fucking neo nazi shits, go back to Russia where you can stomp your boots on plenty of necks. Assuming you can catch them you fat slob.

        • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:03AM

          by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:03AM (#1017955) Journal

          Yeah, the white supremacists are fucking insidious...but they're not gonna GET "more policing" because they've infiltrated the policing apparatus. If anything, you could argue they were there from the start. Hell of a problem.

          --
          I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
    • (Score: 2) by legont on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:11PM (4 children)

      by legont (4179) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:11PM (#1017643)

      Police are looking for two White people who painted over a Black Lives Matter mural

      https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/06/us/black-lives-matter-mural-painted-over-trnd/index.html [cnn.com]

      No comment.

      --
      "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
      • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday July 07 2020, @06:34PM

        by DeathMonkey (1380) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @06:34PM (#1017813) Journal

        And? I thought vandalism matters?

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @04:33AM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @04:33AM (#1018064)

        They got them [thesun.co.uk]. Charged with painting a street without a permit. (The BLM, being law-abiding Americans, had a permit.)

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @08:55AM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @08:55AM (#1018108)

          Score: 0 for you though. Shame reality has such a leftist bias, like you seem to.

          Shame nobody cares enough about facts to vote for you. Maybe they blew all their mod points voting up the trolls. :(

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:08PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:08PM (#1018152)

            A less than zero AC! Racist! Now, get back to towing that line.

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by DannyB on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:15PM (24 children)

      by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:15PM (#1017647) Journal

      The logic of the Left leads to not going after criminals because they don't want to "oppress" them. Criminals get rights over the victims of their crimes.

      The logic of the Right. Black person is victim of crime. Calls police. Police arrive and before any questions, handcuff black caller before questing white criminal to begin their "investigation" of why they were called here.

      --
      People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:39PM (14 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:39PM (#1017657)

        Link?

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:53PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:53PM (#1017668)

          That Australian lady who called the pigs in Minneapolis a few years back to report a crime and got gunned down. She was Black, right?

        • (Score: 3, Touché) by DannyB on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:55PM

          by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:55PM (#1017672) Journal

          I provided as many links as the post to which I replied. But you can find some on YouTube.

          --
          People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
        • (Score: -1, Troll) by VLM on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:04PM (3 children)

          by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:04PM (#1017682)

          Link?

          The problem with leftist politics in practice is it tries to implement macro-scale cultural-level policy based on microscale rare essentially irrelevant anecdotes or outright imaginary stuff or occasionally outright fabrications.

          It doesn't really matter if it happened at all or if in a HUGE nation of 330 million people it happened once or even 10K times, we're all gonna be subjected to the result of the imaginary belief that it happens all the time to everyone.

          • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:38PM (2 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @03:38PM (#1017713)

            outright imaginary stuff or occasionally outright fabrications.

            No finer example than the white, BLM Seattle "they" that promoted themselves from gender fluid to fender fluid by partially blocking the interstate with vehicles and then standing behind the vehicles dressed in black at 1AM. There are leftists insisting this was a "white supremacist" attack even after the arrest of the black driver. Anti-psychotics are useless against this level of delusional.

            • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:23PM

              by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:23PM (#1017777)

              >> Anti-psychotics are useless against this level of delusional.

              It's a shame they emptied out the state mental hospitals in the 50s and 60s. Society used to have a place to take care of these poor damaged souls. Now they're hire as grade school teachers.

            • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:19AM

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:19AM (#1017940)

              That's some systemic racism on your part right there by making assumptions based on the color of his skin. Who says that the Black driver wasn't a white supremacist?

        • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:07PM (7 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:07PM (#1017729)
          • (Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:14PM (6 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:14PM (#1017736)

            Ah, the one where the guy likes to hang out in the park and bait people into calling the cops on him, then film them, conveniently leaving out the provocation? Which he did this time by threatening to poison her dog?

            • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:57PM (3 children)

              by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @05:57PM (#1017791) Journal

              . . . in the basement of a Washington DC pizza shop . . . right?

              --
              People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
              • (Score: 2, Offtopic) by Captival on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:48AM (2 children)

                by Captival (6866) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:48AM (#1017950)

                Bill Clinton
                Anthony Weiner
                Burns Strider
                Jeff Epstein
                Harvey Weinstein
                Tony Podesta

                Is there any male acquaintance of Hillary's who is NOT a sex creep/rapist/pedo? And you guys still want to pretend the whole thing is made up. That makes you culpable.

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:25AM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:25AM (#1018004)

                  Yeah. That basement at Comet Ping Pong is completely real.

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @09:06AM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @09:06AM (#1018112)

                  Most women in N.America have been sexually assaulted or harassed.

                  Many men have assaulted.

                  Doesn't mean every assaulter realized it, btw.

                  you guys still want to pretend the whole thing is made up

                  No, #metoo is kinda about not pretending it was made up. Epstein was going to stand trial. Now more of his cronies - from whatever walk of life or political stripe - will, with M.G. flipping.

                  If you see it being ignored, you're only listening to fools or strawmen; sorry.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:29AM

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:29AM (#1018005)

              Ah, the one where the guy likes to hang out in the park and watch birds, notices a dog off the leash (despite prominent signs requiring the contrary), gets annoyed because the unleashed dog is scaring the birds away, asks the dog's owner to leash her dog, then films her as she has a meltdown culminating in a false claim that *her life* is being threatened by a (gasp!) black man.

              There. FTFY.

              Damn. You just have to go with bald-faced lies don't you? Well, for a troll like yourself, I suppose that's not surprising.

              Toodles!

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:41AM

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:41AM (#1018017)
      • (Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:54PM (8 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:54PM (#1017669)

        Logic of the Right: End all government worker unions. That way if you get police that are doing a bad job they can be fired. If you get teachers that doesn't give a shit, get rid of them. Address multiple problems that affect inner city communities with one policy change.

        VS.

        Logic of the Left: Defund the police. Some of the first civil rights issues after the Civil War was a lack of policing in black communities. Those black communities took up arms to defend themselves. Gun control started to become popular after that. We are full circle with democrat logic. For the decades democrats have controlled the inner city communities they have made zero progress in actually solving any of the problems.

        Tough sell.

        • (Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:25PM (6 children)

          by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @09:25PM (#1017884)

          Logic of the Right:

          Use race as a distraction so that poor whites have an enemy to focus on so they can justify in their own minds voting for a party that acts against their interest. See: Southern Strategy [wikipedia.org] ,War on drugs. [wikipedia.org]

          Logic of the Left:

          The US has no left, so the right needs to pretend the other right wing party is a bunch of "Radical Marxists" or whatever.

          The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

          — John Ehrlichman, to Dan Baum[45][46][47] for Harper's Magazine[48] in 1994, about President Richard Nixon's war on drugs, declared in 1971.[49]

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @10:08PM (5 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @10:08PM (#1017900)

            The US has no left

            Sane people keep the far-left and far-right as far from mainstream politics as possible.

            Uncanny parallels between Weather Underground / Black Panthers & Antifa / Black Lives Matter. The emerging threat in the late '60s was targeted for a reason [fbi.gov] and it's a stain on history that Huey P. Newton is remembered as anything other than a sociopathic murderer, rapist and junkie.

            • (Score: 1, Troll) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday July 07 2020, @11:20PM (4 children)

              by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Tuesday July 07 2020, @11:20PM (#1017915)

              Weather Underground / Black Panthers & Antifa / Black Lives Matter.

              Antifa does not really exist except as another imaginary enemy for the right to use to scare the hard-of-thinking with.

              It seems to be working too.

              The Black Panthers were heroes, and ought to be celebrated as such by the second amendment people, because that is one of the rights they fought for for.

              It worked until Ronald Reagan decided guns were only for white people.

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:00AM (3 children)

                by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @12:00AM (#1017926)

                Antifa does not really exist

                LOL [discoverthenetworks.org] The development of modern Antifa is described in chapter 2 of "Antifa" - Mark Bray's anti-fascist handbook. [archive.org]

                The Black Panthers were heroes, and ought to be celebrated as such by the second amendment people, because that is one of the rights they fought for for.

                What the fuck does the second amendment have to do with murder? [salon.com] Why are so many leftist "heroes" murderers?

                • (Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:43AM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:43AM (#1018018)

                  What the fuck does the second amendment have to do with murder? [salon.com] Why are so many leftist "heroes" murderers?

                  Dylann Roof is an American hero!

                  #MAGA

                • (Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:51AM (1 child)

                  by PartTimeZombie (4827) on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:51AM (#1018047)

                  I love your links.

                  You try to prove your point by linking to some weirdo far right propaganda and think it helps your case? Hilarious.

                  David Horowitz? Jesus.

                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:23PM

                    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @01:23PM (#1018182)

                    weirdo far right propaganda

                    I'm not sure Mark Bray would appreciate that characterization of his work.

                    David Horowitz? Jesus.

                    Horowitz is a former editor of radical Marxist rag Ramparts - the magazine of the 60s new left. He began distancing himself from the left after his friend was murdered. [wikipedia.org] I'm not sure Jesus had much to say on the evils of Marxism although there may be parallels to the millions of innocent people murdered after struggle sessions with the sociopathic scumbags rallying behind the "Marxist cause".

                    If you want to give a link some love, how about this by Ken Kelley? [archive.org] Former White Panther, editor of Ann Arbor Argus, [wikipedia.org] The Berkeley Barb [wikipedia.org] and Sundance magazine? Not so well known as Jesus but a verifiable contemporary and confidant of the murderous, crack-addled sociopath Huey P. Newton.

        • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @10:09PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @10:09PM (#1017901)

          Only to the alt-right infestation is that a tough sell, everyone else with a brain capable of empathy has no problem.

    • (Score: 2) by choose another one on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:59PM (5 children)

      by choose another one (515) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 07 2020, @02:59PM (#1017678)

      > Note that this has all happened before (60s - 70s especially, and also 80s - early 90s).

      Most things, in terms of government and the mob, have in fact happened before. Those who want to cancel history and tear down the reminders of it are in fact doomed to repeat it, they know that, that is why they want to remove knowledge of history so that everyone else cannot know it in future.

      Seattle CHOP / CHAZ apparently had racially segregated zones, presumably they think that if they topple enough statues people will not know about Jim Crow Laws or Apartheid and will believe this is a good thing.

      • (Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:08PM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @04:08PM (#1017730)

        It is so weird that democratic ideology does seem to be gradually headed towards 'separate but equal' all over again. I mean do people not understand that this is exactly what something like a 'racially segregated safe space' is? Does really feel like the politically correct nonsense is just an effort to do the same dumb ideas as we tried in the past and pretend it might yield a different result.

        I kind of feel like we're gradually seeing another role reversal. The republican party of Lincoln was obviously a far cry from the republican party of the early to mid/late 20th century. Yet today the democratic party aiming for racial categorization if not segregation, muzzling of free speech, equality of result, and actively working to inflame racial and social tensions at any opportunity is obviously already a far cry from the democratic party of the sixties which aimed for free speech and equality of opportunity. Democrats in California are currently trying to get rid of proposition 209. [wikipedia.org] Proposition 209 is the "Prohibition Against Discrimination or Preferential. Treatment by State and Other Public Entities. Initiative Constitutional Amendment." Here is its ballot summary:

        - Prohibits the state, local governments, districts, public universities, colleges, and schools, and other government instrumentalities from discriminating against or giving preferential treatment to any individual or group in public employment, public education, or public contracting on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin.
          - Does not prohibit reasonably necessary, bona fide qualifications based on sex and actions necessary for receipt of federal funds.
          - Mandates enforcement to extent permitted by federal law.
          - Requires uniform remedies for violations. Provides for severability of provisions if invalid.

        They are literally trying to roll back discrimination protections. The democratic party is becoming such a messed up institution.

        • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:52AM (2 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:52AM (#1018022)

          democratic ideology

          You should actually look at what that ideology is. It's not what you think.
          https://democrats.org/where-we-stand/party-platform/ [democrats.org]

          DNC Platform [wikipedia.org]:

          Economic positions

          Equal economic opportunity and a base social safety net provided by the welfare state and strong labor unions have historically been at the heart of Democratic economic policy.[8] The party pursues a mixed economy, albeit with more government intervention and regulation in the economy.[13] Democrats generally support a progressive tax system, higher minimum wages, social security, universal health care, public education, and public housing.[8] They also support infrastructure development and government-sponsored employment programs in an effort to achieve economic development and job creation, while stimulating private sector job creation.[14] Also, however, since the 1990s, the party has occasionally supported centrist economic reforms, which cut the size of government and reduced market regulations.[15] The party has continuously rejected laissez-faire economics instead favoring a Social Market Economy to ensure a true Free Market and equality of opportunity

          Minimum wage
          See also: United States minimum wage

          Democrats favor raising the minimum wage and believe that all Americans have the right to a fair wage. They call for a $15.00/hour national minimum wage and believe that the minimum wage should be adjusted regularly.[21] The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 was an early component of the party's agenda during the 110th Congress. In 2006, Democrats supported six state ballot initiatives to increase the minimum wage; all six initiatives passed.[22]

          Health care

          Democrats call for "affordable and quality health care," and many advocate on expanding government intervention in this area. They favor a movement toward universal health care in a variety of forms to address the rising costs of modern health insurance. Democratic politicians like Representatives John Conyers and John Dingell have called for a single-payer program or Medicare for All. The Progressive Democrats of America, a group operating inside the Democratic Party, has made single-payer universal health care one of their primary policy goals.[23] The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010, has been one of the most significant pushes for universal health care to become a reality. As of April 2014, more than 10 million Americans have enrolled in healthcare coverage since the Affordable Care Act was launched.[24]

          Education

          Democrats favor improving public education by raising school standards and reforming the head start program. They also support universal preschool and expanding access to primary education (some Democrats who support this through charter schools). They call for slashes in student loan debt and support reforms to force down tuition fees.[25] Other proposed reforms have included nationwide universal preschool education, tuition-free or reduced-tuition college, and reforms of standardized testing. Democrats have the long-term aim of having low-cost, publicly funded college education with low tuition fees (like in much of Europe and Canada), which should be available to every eligible American student. Alternatively, they encourage expanding access to post-secondary education by increasing state funding for student financial aid such as Pell Grants and college tuition tax deductions.[26]

          Democrats tend to support the Common Core State Standards and oppose school choice.

          Environment
          Main article: Environmental policy of the United States

          Democrats believe that the government should protect the environment and have a history of environmentalism. In more recent years, this stance has had as its emphasis alternative energy generation as the basis for an improved economy, greater national security, and general environmental benefits.[27]

          The Democratic Party also favors expanding conservation lands, and it encourages open space and rail travel to relieve highway and airport congestion and improve air quality and economy; it "believe[s] that communities, environmental interests, and government should work together to protect resources while ensuring the vitality of local economies. Once Americans were led to believe they had to make a choice between the economy and the environment. They now know this is a false choice."[28]

          The Democratic Party's most important environmental concern is climate change. Democrats, most notably former Vice President Al Gore, have pressed for stern regulation of greenhouse gases. On October 15, 2007, Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to build greater knowledge about man-made climate change and laying the foundations for the measures needed to counteract these changes asserting that "the climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity."[29] A 2017 study by the Center for American Progress Action Fund of climate change denial in the U.S. Congress found that 180 members deny the science behind climate change, all Republicans, and that no Democratic members of Congress publicly denied climate change.[30][31]

          Renewable energy and fossil fuels

          Democrats support increased domestic renewable energy development, including wind and solar power farms, in an effort to reduce carbon pollution. The party's platform calls for an "all of the above" energy policy including clean energy, natural gas, and domestic oil, while wanting to become energy independent.[22] The party has supported higher taxes on oil companies and increased regulations on coal power plants, favoring a policy of reducing long-term reliance on fossil fuels.[32][33] Additionally, the party supports stricter fuel emissions standards to prevent air pollution.

          Trade agreements

          The 2012 Democratic Party platform endorses fair and free trade, the KORUS FTA, the TPP, the Panama–United States Trade Promotion Agreement, the CTPA, and the Interagency Trade Enforcement Center.[34]

          Social issues

          The modern Democratic party emphasizes egalitarianism, social equality, protecting the environment, and strengthening the social safety net through liberalism. They support voting rights and minority rights, including LGBT rights, multiculturalism, and religious secularism. A longstanding social policy is upholding civil rights, which affect ethnic and racial minorities and includes voting rights, equal opportunity, and racial equality. The party championed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which for the first time outlawed segregation. Democrats made civil rights and anti-racism a core party philosophy. Carmines and Stimson say, "the Democratic Party appropriated racial liberalism and assumed federal responsibility for ending racial discrimination."[35][36][37]

          Ideological social elements in the party include cultural liberalism, civil libertarianism, and feminism. Other Democratic social policies are internationalism, open immigration, electoral reform, and women's reproductive rights.

          There's more. But I know you won't try to educate yourself. Do you get decent wifi under your bridge?

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:39PM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @03:39PM (#1018226)

            Here [wikipedia.org] is the 'Fascist Manifesto'. It was the stated principles upon which Mussolini's fascist party claimed to stand for.

            You might find something interesting. You probably agree with just about everything in it. And that's okay. They're generally good ideals. The point is that what a party claims to stand for and how that party acts are two very different things. I couldn't care less what a politician says, let alone a political group - I care how they act. And in modern times the DNC is becoming one hell of a scary organization. I tend to agree with their ideals on paper, but in practice I absolutely abhor what the DNC has turned into.

            • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday July 09 2020, @01:06AM

              by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Thursday July 09 2020, @01:06AM (#1018452) Journal

              > but in practice I absolutely abhor what the DNC has turned into.

              Reagan Republicans, yeah. I'm with you on that.

              --
              I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 10 2020, @05:21AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 10 2020, @05:21AM (#1018969)

        This is nuanced, more so than either side acknowledges. The Confederacy existed for the purpose of supporting and perpetuating slavery, the right of a white person to own black people as property. This is not defensible.

        George Washington and Thomas Jefferson owned slaves. Jefferson publicly criticized slavery as being terribly wrong, yet he lacked the conviction to even refuse to personally partake in the evil. This is also not defensible.

        For a particular monument, we need to consider its purpose. This is where it gets complicated. We don't memorialize Washington or Jefferson because of their support for slavery. We memorialize them in spite of their support for slavery. Jefferson's ownership of slaves is a "hideous blot" on his character. The same can be said of Washington. We should acknowledge that Washington and Jefferson willingly participated in morally evil acts, that they are deeply flawed. But we should recognize their contributions, too, in rebelling against British rule and establishing the governing framework of the United States.

        Many monuments of people like Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis do not exist to acknowledge positive contributions from these people in spite of their role in the Confederacy. Neither do they stand to be grim reminders of a past we should never repeat, which is why some concentration camps like Dachau are preserved in Germany. Instead, many of these monuments were erected to portray the Confederacy positively, to encourage people to sympathize their their cause, which was the enslavement of black people by white people. Monuments supporting the Confederacy do not belong on public property. This is wrong.

        Nancy Pelosi ordered the removal of four portraits of former Speakers of the House from the Capital because they served in the Confederacy. This is also wrong. Those portraits are not displayed to support the Confederacy. Removing those portraits really is whitewashing history. We should conspicuously acknowledge that these four men served in the Confederacy, which was wrong. But we should not remove their portraits from being displayed along with those of all the Speakers of the House. Doing so is to deny history, which is a mistake.

        History is messy. People are messy. We need to be thoughtful in our decisions to remove or not remove monuments.

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