Ferguson discussion thread (FERGUDISHU)

[Joe in PNG]

As mentioned earlier, history tends to show that the end effect of shooting rioters is less "respect mah authoratuh!!" and more "time to get a new government".
Ponder just how many revolutions have been kicked off by rioters being shot down, our own included.

[RoyGBiv]

This is the key issue to me. The media and community leaders' argument is based on the idea that the grand jury ignored the real facts and ignored their responsibility to the law; and in response, those community leaders push people to ignore the real facts and ignore their responsibility to the law.

The "2 Wrongs" plan.

[Malamute]

Or......totally ignore those communities that want a culture of lawlessness and disorder. My new mantra is "tolerance". I am tolerant of the community in which robbery is acceptable, drug use is acceptable, shooting each other is acceptable, wedlock children are the norm, and education is frowned up is fine if some folks want to live like this...

...We have people all over this country rallying for a felon, and an expectation of cops to simply take the beating, assault, or death.......or to have them run away at the first sign of trouble. Well folks policing is often a mirror...

Saw this, made me think of this post and some of GardoneVT's.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f0mVn0HH6U

[Chuck Haggard]

I'll point out that many of the folks protesting the actions of Off. Wilson are of the same mentality of folks who think an armed robber getting shot is unjustified.

We had a local case, one that mirrored many across the US, where an 18 year old robber with a very real gun was shot dead in a liquor store, and some folks locally thought it was wrong for the store owner to "shoot that child over some liquor". Some people believe that if you are getting robbed it's all OK and the robber is entitled to the victim's property, and the robber should in no way be endangered during said robbery because "it's just some money/liquor/whatever", especially if they are, I dunno, under 30 years old or so.

[45dotACP]

"Some Looting" and "Some Rioting" encompass crimes like arson, assault, and so forth. Dead perpetrators of violent crime strikes me as progressive enough, whether its a solo activity or a group project .

Gunning down peaceful protests is unacceptable morally-but what happened in Ferguson was decidedly NOT peaceful, press reports notwithstanding.

True, what happened in Ferguson was not peaceful. Even the enlightened CNN reporter who took a rock to the head would agree. But to have the police (or a bunch of guys with AR15's guarding their store) go weapons free on the crowd in Ferguson would accomplish nothing. It would not soothe tensions, and it would ABSOLUTELY NOT calm down the situation. I think the police have the right idea with tear gas and riot gear, because blowing a guy out of his socks because he had a brick in his hand and he threw it at a cop would require an investigation into the shooting, and this whole carnival would start over again, only with even more furious hippies coming out of the woodwork.

And let's not forget this: As a sometime protester myself (not of this business, but I do go to the occasional protest, as is my right to be disobedient) I can guarantee you all that not every single person in the protest is hostile, and you're doing a disservice to yourself by lumping them all together and saying they're all the same and that they all warrant being shot.

[David Armstrong]

Does anyone think that if a body camera existed that showed the event unfolding as Officer Wilson described things would be any better?

Yes. It would not address the issues of everyone, but it certainly could addresss some of the issues for many people out there who are questioning the way the event went down. I've seen it happen more than once with car video, no reason to think that a body cam would be any different.

[David Armstrong]

As mentioned earlier, history tends to show that the end effect of shooting rioters is less "respect mah authoratuh!!" and more "time to get a new government".
Ponder just how many revolutions have been kicked off by rioters being shot down, our own included.

IIRC, the Boston Tea Party and the Boston Massacre were both riots.

[Dagga Boy]

Saw this, made me think of this post and some of GardoneVT's.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f0mVn0HH6U

That is why I gave up caring at all. If I said that, I would just be another racist. I guarantee I have saved more black teens either incarcerating them before they got killed, or protecting the ones who happened to live amongst a bunch of drug dealing gangsters who wanted to go to college, speak "white" and had high hopes for bright futures and to leave their ghetto behind with hard work at school. In one incident my partner and I interrupted a in progress gang shooting just before it started between two rival Crip sets over drug territory. We made 15 arrests with 11 handguns recovered.......by ourselves. It was actually funny when one of the out of town Crips got up off the ground and tried to go through me....(sound familiar..charging the guy with gun, daring you to shoot him). One of our local guys said "don't do it, he'll f*ck you up". He didn't listen. He ate a Maglite. Our guys knew my partner and I, and wouldn't challenge us. In that one incident, how many young black lives did two white cops save. How many little black kids playing in front of the TV in their apartment weren't killed when 11 handguns (including a very nice .44 mag Redhawk) were not being fired indiscriminately. When the "racist" white cops who do nothing but arrest black criminals in black neighborhoods just give up, who suffers? I know I no longer care. Rev. Al can fix it now.

[BaiHu]

Slow clap.

[MDS]

And let's not forget this: As a sometime protester myself (not of this business, but I do go to the occasional protest, as is my right to be disobedient) I can guarantee you all that not every single person in the protest is hostile, and you're doing a disservice to yourself by lumping them all together and saying they're all the same and that they all warrant being shot.

This reminds me. I was at a protest about a year and a half ago. Tensions were very high due to perceived systemic government injustice. There was a large crowd, over 5,000 people showed up, angry about overzealous officials trampling civil rights and ignoring very visible citizen protests against the injustice. Many or most of the protesters were armed and there was a lot of gearing up with spare magazines and etc. The protesters even had air assets circling the area. But no one was hurt, no property was vandalized or stolen - as far as I know, not a single law was broken.

MSM coverage about MagPul's Farewell to Arms, the capstone of their Boulder Airlift campaign, was generally not favorable, however. Maybe if reporters were pelted with rocks, the media would have been more sympathetic?