Elvado
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Post by Elvado on Aug 14, 2014 8:48:26 GMT -5
Who could argue with that?
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Post by WilsonBlvdHoya on Aug 14, 2014 9:04:56 GMT -5
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TC
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Post by TC on Aug 14, 2014 9:09:48 GMT -5
tl;dr summary: Unarmed kid gets shot in broad daylight running away in the middle of the street. Militarized police force oversteps bounds in response and looting and violence occurs. Elvado thinks real issue is used-to-be-fat-guy on MSNBC.
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Elvado
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Post by Elvado on Aug 14, 2014 9:49:35 GMT -5
tl;dr summary: Unarmed kid gets shot in broad daylight running away in the middle of the street. Militarized police force oversteps bounds in response and looting and violence occurs. Elvado thinks real issue is used-to-be-fat-guy on MSNBC. Seldom right and wrong again. I think the facts and the investigations need to be fully examined without the presence of those whose stock in trade is division and discord. If the facts are as you posit them to be (and I offer no opinion on that), then the police force and officer in question should face the full extent of the law. However, here there was already an announcement of a federal investigation before Rev. Al flew out there to stir the pot of division even harder. Just help me out with what good comes out of his visit.
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hoyainspirit
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Post by hoyainspirit on Aug 14, 2014 11:57:51 GMT -5
Not the Middle East, but Ferguson, MO, USA.
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hoyainspirit
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Post by hoyainspirit on Aug 14, 2014 12:35:44 GMT -5
Or, I could wait until the facts have been developed, the posturing by police and citizenry has stopped, the federal investigation (announced prior to Rev Lardass' arrival) has been concluded and the media has forgotten and packed up its trucks and know what happened. What I do not need to wait for is to know that Al Sharpton is there for a constituency of one--Al Sharpton. Anyone familiar with the history of race and policing in the United States had to suspect from the beginning that the shooting of Michael Brown was not just a tragedy, but a crime. Yet presumption of innocence prevails and we all know that we need to wait for the conclusion of the investigation. But watching events unfold Wednesday night, there can be no doubt that what happened there was an outrage. The local authorities clearly have no idea what they're doing. I don't trust them at all. I'm glad the Feds are involved, and Rev. Al.
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Elvado
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Post by Elvado on Aug 14, 2014 12:58:24 GMT -5
This is a serious question. What positive aspect does Sharpton bring in this case where the Feds have already stepped in?
In the Martin case, the Feds did not step in until after people like Al made noise.
He is unnecessary here and only showed up for his own benefit.
As for Al's credibility and motives, just ask Stephen Pagones.
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hoyainspirit
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Post by hoyainspirit on Aug 14, 2014 13:06:35 GMT -5
Credible eyewitness reports differ markedly from police statements. The subsequent over the top response, including the use of tanks, tear gas, and the journalist arrests make it nearly impossible to trust police accounts. There is a killer loose in Ferguson, and unfortunately he's a cop. The over-the-top response just means the police in Ferguson overreact to civil unrest. It has no bearing whatsoever on the truth of the officer's account of the initial events. You could just as easily say that the protesting-turned-looting is proof that the other side is lying. Of course, that doesn't make sense either. And who are the "credible" witnesses? The kid's friend, who may have been helping him try to steal the cop's gun, isn't credible to me because he's not neutral. Strummer, perhaps you haven't followed this closely. Multiple eyewitness accounts say that Brown was killed while attempting to surrender. The kid was an estimated 35 feet from the killer cop who shot him. Eyewitness Piaget Crenshaw says that Brown's friend, Brown and the officer got into a verbal confrontation, and the officer attempted to put Brown in the police car. When Brown began to flee, she says, the officer got out of the car and started shooting at Brown. Crenshaw has photos of the shooting, which have been turned over to the police. Another eyewitness told the press that the officer was in his car when he started shooting at the kids. At least one shot was fired from the police car, an assertion the police have not denied. Brown's friend said that he and Brown started running when they heard the first shot. He told local news station KMOV that the officer shot again, and once Brown felt that shot, he turned around and put his hands in the air. He started to get down and the officer still approached with his weapon drawn and fired several more shots. No matter what happened, clearly the use of deadly force was uncalled for in this incident. The kid was 10+ yards away, unarmed, and trying to surrender. Those of us who are the parents of young Black men have nightmares that similar incidents may happen to our child. I can't describe to you how frightening is that thought. And please don't try to downplay the Ferguson police force's overreaction. That, too, is egregious and chilling. As stated in the quote posted by AvantGuardHoya, "Listen to your friends and colleagues of color about their experiences and analysis of racism in America." Perhaps you will draw different conclusions.
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Elvado
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Post by Elvado on Aug 14, 2014 13:18:15 GMT -5
And if those are the facts, there is not a hot enough place in Hell for the cop and anyone who tries to cover this up.
That said, I am still waiting for the upside to Rsv. Al's presence.
The last thing this fire needs is his kind of gasoline.
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AvantGuardHoya
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Post by AvantGuardHoya on Aug 14, 2014 13:42:31 GMT -5
And if those are the facts, there is not a hot enough place in Hell for the cop and anyone who tries to cover this up. That said, I am still waiting for the upside to Rsv. Al's presence. The last thing this fire needs is his kind of gasoline. I would speculate that Michael Brown's family may have reached out to Rev. Sharpton. Their motivation would be that his involvement would help ensure that Brown's death gets the kind of scrutiny they feel is warranted -- a perspective that may be lost on many. Reject it if you will, but the long, sad American history of similar encounters between the police and people of color is rife with instances where relative short shrift was given to such cases, if they were truly investigated at all. The Brown family likely wants to make certain that justice is done. If it requires engaging a firebrand like Sharpton, then so be it.
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Elvado
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Post by Elvado on Aug 14, 2014 13:55:25 GMT -5
He is the worst kind of representative for them. Where are the leaders who come without the baggage of Brawley, Crown Heights and the Harlem Interloper incident?
Surely this family could have reached out to someone better than this race-baiting self promoter.
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hoyainspirit
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Post by hoyainspirit on Aug 14, 2014 13:59:43 GMT -5
And if those are the facts, there is not a hot enough place in Hell for the cop and anyone who tries to cover this up. Elvado, I agree 1000% with this!
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AvantGuardHoya
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Post by AvantGuardHoya on Aug 14, 2014 14:26:53 GMT -5
He is the worst kind of representative for them. Where are the leaders who come without the baggage of Brawley, Crown Heights and the Harlem Interloper incident? Surely this family could have reached out to someone better than this race-baiting self promoter. No, Elvado, he's the worst kind of representative to YOU. Your definition of who would be better clearly differs GREATLY from what many in certain communities feel they need. Perish the thought, bro, but you need to walk in the Browns' shoes. Your eyes would be opened.
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Elvado
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Post by Elvado on Aug 14, 2014 14:36:49 GMT -5
And are you wearing their shoes or are you just that much more enlightened?
Sharpton is not there to help those folks; he has a track record a mile long of being a self-promoter and an agent of negative energy.
Being involved with Sharpton is just one more injury for a family already suffering.
The secondary tragedy here is that people feel compelled to engage this type of charlatan in times of trouble.
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AvantGuardHoya
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Post by AvantGuardHoya on Aug 14, 2014 14:52:16 GMT -5
And are you wearing their shoes or are you just that much more enlightened? Sharpton is not there to help those folks; he has a track record a mile long of being a self-promoter and an agent of negative energy. Being involved with Sharpton is just one more injury for a family already suffering. The secondary tragedy here is that people feel compelled to engage this type of charlatan in times of trouble. I don't pretend to be anymore enlightened than the next fallible human being. I am, however, a person of color and have personal knowledge of what I've shared. Your opinion of Sharpton is really beside the point. All you see in him is negative. I guarantee you that is NOT a view that is held by a number of people in the African American community. Dat's da reality. It ain't gonna change anytime soon.
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Elvado
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Post by Elvado on Aug 14, 2014 15:09:14 GMT -5
I understand your point and will never profess to know what it means to be a person of color in the Unites States.
That said, I still believe it to be a crying shame (and perhaps indicative of how far we still have to go in this country) that Al Sharpton is where folks go for assistance.
The underlying facts here are abhorrent. Al's presence is, in my humble and fallible opinion, not a good thing.
I of course reserve the right to be wrong.
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Post by rustyshackleford on Aug 14, 2014 16:46:14 GMT -5
Even in the most charitable scenario to the cops it looks like what happened to Michael Brown was a crime. Even if you assume that he resisted arrest and got in a scuffle with a cop and even hit the guy it makes no sense whey he would be shot at while running away - and that's the most charitable scenario to the cops. Al Sharpton being there (despicable as he is - and I don't care if he's trusted by a community when he's shown blatant racism, prejudice and incitement to violence in the past - the fact that one community trusts him doesn't excuse his actions towards others) is irrelevant. The community absolutely needs to bring attention to this potential crime in order to make sure this isn't just covered up and just handled by some IA dept where the people in charge have lunch daily with the accused.
People forget cops are human and that nearly an equal proportion of them compared to the general public are just not good people. The job makes it worse - a good day for many cops is a day where he/she merely has to deal with a bunch of law breakers blazing 30 mph above speed limits while on their phone and then having the temerity to act like they're being persecuted when they get stopped. A bad day is Moncton or worse. In NY it's been crazy for me to see good friends who're cops who've spent too much time dealing with in east ny or brownsville who've become racists (and my hometown is not white). Policing areas like that consistently even if you're reassigned to other places periodically seems to put too much psychological pressure on somebody who's merely human - all of a sudden you have a tinder box where the exact people who're supposed adjudicate right and wrong on a daily basis are incapable of doing so because all the stuff they've had to deal w/. It's not clear to me there's an easy answer to this or even a marginal way to improve this past having the community more involved with policing, improving the underlying conditions in a community and having a police force that reflects the community. In the meantime a young black kid who's merely acting like an idiot is far more likely to pay with his life than a hispanic or white kid who's doing exactly the same. That should be a national issue.
The police response to riots, not merely protests, has been poor and has trampled civil rights in some cases. However, there needs to be a response when people are shot in the head, beaten by vigilante mobs, people are shooting at police and entire sections of a town is scorched. It's easy to embed with protestors and say 'well all the people I were with were peaceful'. There are no reporter embeds with those committing drive by's, shooting at cops or looters. So we're getting a completely distorted view of what the cops have had to deal with - which IS a war zone. The problem is that these cops aren't prepared for that even if somebody's given them the military gear to supposedly equip them. I don't know that even the national guard or military will be able to return the peace to Ferguson at night without seemingly harsh tactics.
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Post by strummer8526 on Aug 14, 2014 17:50:11 GMT -5
The over-the-top response just means the police in Ferguson overreact to civil unrest. It has no bearing whatsoever on the truth of the officer's account of the initial events. You could just as easily say that the protesting-turned-looting is proof that the other side is lying. Of course, that doesn't make sense either. And who are the "credible" witnesses? The kid's friend, who may have been helping him try to steal the cop's gun, isn't credible to me because he's not neutral. Strummer, perhaps you haven't followed this closely. Multiple eyewitness accounts say that Brown was killed while attempting to surrender. The kid was an estimated 35 feet from the killer cop who shot him. Eyewitness Piaget Crenshaw says that Brown's friend, Brown and the officer got into a verbal confrontation, and the officer attempted to put Brown in the police car. When Brown began to flee, she says, the officer got out of the car and started shooting at Brown. Crenshaw has photos of the shooting, which have been turned over to the police. Another eyewitness told the press that the officer was in his car when he started shooting at the kids. At least one shot was fired from the police car, an assertion the police have not denied. Brown's friend said that he and Brown started running when they heard the first shot. He told local news station KMOV that the officer shot again, and once Brown felt that shot, he turned around and put his hands in the air. He started to get down and the officer still approached with his weapon drawn and fired several more shots. No matter what happened, clearly the use of deadly force was uncalled for in this incident. The kid was 10+ yards away, unarmed, and trying to surrender. Those of us who are the parents of young Black men have nightmares that similar incidents may happen to our child. I can't describe to you how frightening is that thought. And please don't try to downplay the Ferguson police force's overreaction. That, too, is egregious and chilling. As stated in the quote posted by AvantGuardHoya, "Listen to your friends and colleagues of color about their experiences and analysis of racism in America." Perhaps you will draw different conclusions. You're right, I have not followed all that closely, which is why my first post started with a question. If events played out as you say, then outrage is a justifiable response, and the cop should lose his freedom for a long long time--perhaps the rest of his life. I just worry that there is a widespread, baseless, and frankly dangerous perception that the cops are ALWAYS wrong. This cop may well have been horribly wrong in this case. But I don't believe that every citizen of Ferguson who took to the streets really had any idea what went on, other than through wild hearsay that reinforced an existing anti-law enforcement bias. And forget all the keyboard commandos sharing Tweets and blog posts before a single shred of investigation had been completed. What could anyone really have known? "Cop Shoots Unarmed Black Teen"? Ok, but was the teen trying to wrestle a gun from from the officer? Was the teen reaching for some other weapon? Was he about to push someone into traffic? Was he throwing punches at another officer? In this case, it looks like the answer to all of those is no. But shouldn't everyone be a little more sure about the answers before protesting or looting (or condoning the same)? Bottom line: The judgment to which everyone rushed may prove correct in this case. But the rush to judgment itself still troubles me as much as the PR-tone-deaf reaction by the police.
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nathanhm
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Post by nathanhm on Aug 14, 2014 18:40:59 GMT -5
Strummer, perhaps you haven't followed this closely. Multiple eyewitness accounts say that Brown was killed while attempting to surrender. The kid was an estimated 35 feet from the killer cop who shot him. Eyewitness Piaget Crenshaw says that Brown's friend, Brown and the officer got into a verbal confrontation, and the officer attempted to put Brown in the police car. When Brown began to flee, she says, the officer got out of the car and started shooting at Brown. Crenshaw has photos of the shooting, which have been turned over to the police. Another eyewitness told the press that the officer was in his car when he started shooting at the kids. At least one shot was fired from the police car, an assertion the police have not denied. Brown's friend said that he and Brown started running when they heard the first shot. He told local news station KMOV that the officer shot again, and once Brown felt that shot, he turned around and put his hands in the air. He started to get down and the officer still approached with his weapon drawn and fired several more shots. No matter what happened, clearly the use of deadly force was uncalled for in this incident. The kid was 10+ yards away, unarmed, and trying to surrender. Those of us who are the parents of young Black men have nightmares that similar incidents may happen to our child. I can't describe to you how frightening is that thought. And please don't try to downplay the Ferguson police force's overreaction. That, too, is egregious and chilling. As stated in the quote posted by AvantGuardHoya, "Listen to your friends and colleagues of color about their experiences and analysis of racism in America." Perhaps you will draw different conclusions. You're right, I have not followed all that closely, which is why my first post started with a question. If events played out as you say, then outrage is a justifiable response, and the cop should lose his freedom for a long long time--perhaps the rest of his life. I just worry that there is a widespread, baseless, and frankly dangerous perception that the cops are ALWAYS wrong. This cop may well have been horribly wrong in this case. But I don't believe that every citizen of Ferguson who took to the streets really had any idea what went on, other than through wild hearsay that reinforced an existing anti-law enforcement bias. And forget all the keyboard commandos sharing Tweets and blog posts before a single shred of investigation had been completed. What could anyone really have known? "Cop Shoots Unarmed Black Teen"? Ok, but was the teen trying to wrestle a gun from from the officer? Was the teen reaching for some other weapon? Was he about to push someone into traffic? Was he throwing punches at another officer? In this case, it looks like the answer to all of those is no. But shouldn't everyone be a little more sure about the answers before protesting or looting (or condoning the same)? Bottom line: The judgment to which everyone rushed may prove correct in this case. But the rush to judgment itself still troubles me as much as the PR-tone-deaf reaction by the police. I think you'll find in communities like Feeguson that the rush to judgement is reflection of experiences they have had with their local police and thus it doesn't surprise them of the accusations. I've always lived in wealthy communities but I've has enough negative interactions with police to generally be wary of interacting with them. And this is coming from someone with no criminal record, homeowner, married, father, minivan driving, working professional but with light brown skin. I don't address law enforcement with a raised voice or attitude either. With that being said I can only imagine the grief younger black men get especially if they look the way cops don't like.
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tashoya
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Post by tashoya on Aug 14, 2014 20:38:43 GMT -5
You're right, I have not followed all that closely, which is why my first post started with a question. If events played out as you say, then outrage is a justifiable response, and the cop should lose his freedom for a long long time--perhaps the rest of his life. I just worry that there is a widespread, baseless, and frankly dangerous perception that the cops are ALWAYS wrong. This cop may well have been horribly wrong in this case. But I don't believe that every citizen of Ferguson who took to the streets really had any idea what went on, other than through wild hearsay that reinforced an existing anti-law enforcement bias. And forget all the keyboard commandos sharing Tweets and blog posts before a single shred of investigation had been completed. What could anyone really have known? "Cop Shoots Unarmed Black Teen"? Ok, but was the teen trying to wrestle a gun from from the officer? Was the teen reaching for some other weapon? Was he about to push someone into traffic? Was he throwing punches at another officer? In this case, it looks like the answer to all of those is no. But shouldn't everyone be a little more sure about the answers before protesting or looting (or condoning the same)? Bottom line: The judgment to which everyone rushed may prove correct in this case. But the rush to judgment itself still troubles me as much as the PR-tone-deaf reaction by the police. I think you'll find in communities like Feeguson that the rush to judgement is reflection of experiences they have had with their local police and thus it doesn't surprise them of the accusations. I've always lived in wealthy communities but I've has enough negative interactions with police to generally be wary of interacting with them. And this is coming from someone with no criminal record, homeowner, married, father, minivan driving, working professional but with light brown skin. I don't address law enforcement with a raised voice or attitude either. With that being said I can only imagine the grief younger black men get especially if they look the way cops don't like. Add to that that it's mostly only the cops acting criminally or poorly that makes news. You don't often see the "officer so-and-so did a heck of a job" stories though they are out there too. They just don't draw viewership. That doesn't help the general perception or level of trust either. I have a healthy respect/fear of cops and it's for no good reason in terms of ever having had a bad experience. I have a couple of friends that are cops and family members that are cops and that still hasn't made me feel any more warm and fuzzy toward them as a group. That's probably a personal issue but, having never been in a criminal situation, it's fairly odd and, I think, probably not entirely atypical. I can't imagine the feelings of those that have personal or close proximity to actual poor/criminal treatment from law enforcement over any length of time. I agree with those that have said that bringing attention to what happened is a good thing. And I can see the point of AVGHoya with regard to the feelings of some about Rev. Sharpton. But I also understand where Elvado is coming from. Some of those whose attention is being drawn and is needed too have very different views of him and it's not as though those views don't have grounds to back them up as well. I wish there was a better go-to guy is all. There's no denying, however, that having a guy/gal at all is a necessity.
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