I keep using the word "prevent". The Watch's Search function says I have used the word 16 times in this thread. I wish I could stamp it on everyone's monitor.Zarathustra wrote:If you agree that they should be locked up, then why are you worrying about their feelings? Sure, you want to stop the rioting. But is worrying about their feelings the right way to do it? What if I *feel* I deserve your car? Is worrying about my feelings the best way to stop me from taking it? feelings are "justified?" What if I feel like society owes me? What if I see a video of someone else who looks like me getting killed and and that makes me really really mad and so I think that because I have something in common with the person in the video--like we're both bald--that I *feel* like I deserve to take your car? Should you worry about my pain?
This is madness, FF. We don't worrying about the feelings of rioters or car theives.
Prevent.
Prevent.
Prevent.
Prevent.
Prevent.
I've said it will happen again, and explained one of big reasons why. Knowing that, we can try to prevent it. Or, we can keep building the anger as much as we can, so that riots are more easily provoked the next time white police kill a black person when there is no danger to anyone. If, between now and the next Chauvin, black Americans see a few million posts on social media and interviews where someone saying something like "It's wrong for white police to kill black people when there is no danger to anyone" is answered with, "It doesn't matter, because black people kill more black people than white police do", then the next Chauvin will be a match to a powder keg.
The anger might be less if the response that people read and hear multiple times every day is along the lines of, "Yes, it is wrong for white police to kill black people when there is no danger to anyone." But that's not an option. Some here will not utter those words, and insist on repeating "It doesn't matter, because black people kill more black people than white police do." Which is true. But the response could be any one of many millions of other facts. The one that is chosen, time after time, exclusively by some, is the one that does NOT in any way invalidate the original statement, but DOES piss people off. And that's the point in saying it.
Sure, put all the rioters in jail. That doesn't prevent (There's that word again. I'm looking toward the future.) the next riot. Putting people in jail for stealing doesn't prevent future theft. Putting people in jail for murder doesn't prevent future murder. Jail is punishment. It is not prevention. Punish the criminals. But if we have a chance of preventing the next such crime, we should try.
Some here might now throw out a token "Yes, it is wrong for white police to kill black people when there is no danger to anyone", then go right back to the other topic of how many black people are killing each other. Pointing out that fact is not a sign of racism. Things that are signs of racism include: Continually trying to change every conversation about white racists into a conversation about what black people are doing wrong; Refusing to acknowledge racism by white people; Refusing to acknowledge the difficulties that black Americans have simply because they are black, and how this might make a person feel.
But, by all means, everybody go back to "The blacks are all killing each other!" It's a good way of trying to prevent the next riot AND it stops black people from killing each other. It's pure genius!