Black Lives Matter Movement

I thought I would bring this up because of a fun little event that happened a little while ago.

A few weeks ago, as I was walking downtown past the university campus, I saw a group of BLM "activists" protesting out in front of the student community center, chanting a bunch of malarkey about how white people are aiming to destroy black people in the US. Because I was bored and had time to kill, I made the unfortunate mistake of trying to talk to these people and try and knock some sense into them.

After about 5 or so minutes of back and forth "debating" (me saying actual facts and them screaming in my face calling me a white supremacist and a cracker) a lot of people started to tell me to "check my privilege", "kill yourself", and stop being such a bigot. In all actuality, I was just pointing out flaws in the "facts" they were yelling into their megaphones.

I decided to leave after I saw a few university police car roll up by the community center and let the BLM people riot amongst themselves that I inadvertently caused.

So with my little story and their recent activities to obstruct daily life for US citizens regardless of skin color, what is your opinion on the BLM movement?

 

Gotta applaud your bravery but that was probably asking for trouble huh? Of course it's not your fault, it's unfortanate with the climate we have now. Should have had me with you, maybe my hispanic origin would have shielded us from some of the "privilege" insults hurled your way. Speaking of which I am privaleged, privalaged to part of one of the greatest countries in the world. I don't have a stick up my ass all the time to not see that at least.

Don't let it get to you, those folks are clearly idiots, nuff said. It's one thing for someone to complain about inequality and so forth, but it's an instant turn off when they use race baiting language. It seems far to often to fall into that trap.

I think the old
"They cause more harm then good"
applies here

 

I think this is probably a case of your experience does not necessarily represent the average.

We also have to take into account that none of us were there and we don't know what these "facts" you were distributing actually were or in what context they were presented.

Your experience aside, the simple fact is that minorities are disadvantaged socially and evonomically. Throughout history, movements like BLM are all that have been capable of evoking change. Emancipation and the civil rights movement were not results of sitting quietly and hoping for change. Because, sadly, only in overwhelming numbers can anyone's voice be heard. Anything less and it's easy to just brush the would-be activists aside as "outliers."

By the same token, the loudest voices are often the most prominent and are often assumed to be representative of an entire group. Why? Because they simply get the most airtime.

I know I've said this before, but it's important to be objective. It doesn't matter what the cause, what the stance is. There will always be extremists, they will always be the loudest, and they will always be the subject of discussion on said group.

I think BLM is important because it is forcing us and our representatives to have a discussion about race and what role, whether intentional or the result of sub-conscious biases, it plays in our society, our government, and our day-to-day lives.

Racism isn't always so blatant as enslavement, open disenfranchisement, or even just racial slurs. Discrimination is all too often subtle, and sometimes not even intentional. But that does not mean that we should not ask ourselves hard questions, go to great lengths, and do what is necessary to root it out.

So long as anyone in our country is disproportionately disadvantaged socially, economically, or legally, the "American Dream" will remain little more than a farce.

And finally:

 

If people cannot protest peacefully and decently, I have no problem with it. I will even agree if they are reasonable. But if they wish to cause trouble enough to summon the police or cause riots, then I think otherwise.
"A blind cause."
"It means less than nothing to me."

I understand that not all protesters are like what was mentioned. Those protesters that were mentioned are the type to spur my disgust and want no part for such a cause."Black lives matter? Don't make me laugh."

@Timekeeper, I am not sure how you went about debating them. I learned about different argument types. One type would have been to agree with them and see where they are coming from, and present your idea to it. I think they would have been more receptive to you and would not have rioted like that if that route was taken. Perhaps they were the type not to be reasoned, which would make them little more useless animated objects. A while back you mentioned having to "skip" a french class because a classmate and teacher did not like your singing.For that reason, I am guessing you lacked the agreeable attitude at that time and confronted the activists wrong way. And like Baconman has said, we were not sure as to what these facts were. Regardless of whether or not your facts were correct, if they are presented or used improperly or unreceptively, they would be useless.
Remember: A soft answer turns away wrath.
I will agree with you on this: [according to your words]

If they wish to make a sound argument, they should not have made the fallacy of lumping "white" people into the same group. I am light-skinned (white), so they decided to inadvertently lump me into the same group?
Also:

If you do not agree, then you are absolutely and most utterly an enemy that does not deserve to be spoken to decently. i consider those activists to have failed for taking on that way of speech.
By the way, how did they seem, generally? Aside from yelling malarkey. Were they the type that could have been reasoned with? Keep in mind, one person against many can be rather difficult when it comes to reasoning.


It makes me wonder how people can cause strife because of skin color. My best friend is dark-skinned (black) and I live in a military area, so I have gotten used to seeing people with a different skin color and thinking nothing of it.
I tend to refer to skin color with the terms "light-skinned" and "dark-skinned." After my dad got upset with me for calling someone "black", I decided to stick with those two new terms instead. Just my way of showing that there are no "black" or "white" people, just people with dark-skin or light-skin. I use the term "black" or "white" around those who are too stupid and unreceptive to my two terms. I sometimes have to keep it simple for the unreceptive.

As for Doomguy and Baconman's ideas, I find nothing disagreeable.


EDIT
PORTION OF MESSAGE WAS EDITED DUE TO MIX UP. I APOLOGIZE @Timekeeper .
REALLY, REALLY SCREWED UP RIGHT THERE.

 

By the sound of things, they were the type that want to protest just for the sake of protesting, instead of actually trying to influence a change. Let's use the Ferguson, Missouri incident as an example. Kill a black person for any reason, and it's all hell breaks loose across the country and all of a sudden "all cops are racists" even if they're black, hispanic, arabic, mixed, or just have a light pigmentation and identify as African descent. Kill a white person and no one bats an eye, except maybe those that actually knew the person or those close to the incident and the world continues to turn and shrug. I have yet to see a sound "Black Lives Matter" argument on Facebook, which really isn't surprising considering they're all just Social Justice Warrior morons who will stoop so low to call anyone who doesn't "share" or "agree" are racists, even if you're black dude calling them out. Yes, I've witnessed it, no I haven't experienced it. I just ignore the idiots and hope someday I'll actually find an intelligent argument that I can get behind (or at least agree with and try to find out more about it). But it seems that the more outspoken they are, the more unintelligent they really are and have no idea how to get the most positive reaction out of their protest. It seems to be more about getting attention and using it as an excuse for causing trouble than anything in my opinion. It also seems to be the value of the entitlement generation, the ones that think the world should bow down to their every whim regardless of whether it's a reasonable request or not and that they should be elevated to be above equality. It is those people who continue to destroy any attention that legitimate campaigns are trying to get, the very campaigns that need to be heard are being silenced by morons who flap their gums just because they can. The only sound arguments I have seen, come from people that drop the race card in their protest and use what the first piece of the comic @BaconMan8910 used. All lives matter. But I hardly see any of those posts because the "Black Lives Matter" movement has become more of a rampant tumor with all these idiots taking control of what might have started out as a good cause and turned it into a pillage your community excuse.

 

Oh gosh.. Don't even know where to start with this.. I feel like what I said earlier, "it's important to be objective", would just sum it all up. But, alright.

Let's start with this.

First, one of the key issues with what happened in Ferguson is that police killed a civilian that was UNARMED. Let's be clear, there is hardly any circumstance in which it is acceptable to shoot an unarmed civilian. Almost the entirety of your argument (rant) has been anecdotal, so I hope you don't mind if I get anecdotal for a moment.. I'm a soldier. I am trained to kill fully armed opponents with my bare hands. And you're telling me the police aren't capable of successfully defeating (if resistance is offered) and restraining an unarmed civilian? Hell, failing their own combatives training, the majority of police in the U.S. carry non-lethal methods of suppression. So why is it that firearms are often the go-to?

Secondly, race does play a role. "Oh, but race shouldn't play a role in criminal justice!" I hear you say. "The police aren't just out looking for black guys to rough up!" Here's the thing, and I said this in my last post as well, racism isn't always blatant. Racist officers, the same as racist civilians, are not necessarily racist through-and-through. You don't have to either side with BLM or the KKK. We don't live in a world of extreme dualities. They don't wake up in the morning thinking "yep, think I'll shoot a black guy, today." No. But there is centuries of racial strife and millennia of instinctual tribalism underlying our societies and our sub-conscious decision making as individuals. Does that mean you're just inherently racist? No. But does it mean that you might, unintentionally, allow race to be a factor in your decision making process? Yes.

This isn't just hot air that people are spewing to "play the victim." This is psychology, science. There is hard data to back this up. I suggest you do some research from credible sources.

The simple fact is that you are far more likely to be arrested and/or killed by the police, in America, if you are an African American male rather than a Caucasian male.

I suggest looking elsewhere than Facebook.

First: what?

Second: drawing lines in the sand is the exact opposite of the "intellectualism" that you're hoping to find.

Third: again, I'm quoting my previous post. "...it's important to be objective. It doesn't matter what the cause, what the stance is. There will always be extremists, they will always be the loudest, and they will always be the subject of discussion on said group."

There has to be logical fallacy about how previous generations look down on their successors. Surely someone has put a name to this, right?

I feel like this should be its own thread.

You know what the problem is with the argument that "All Lives Matter?" It's the same reason that there are no "Straight Pride" parades or why you don't get the Blue Shell in Mario Kart when you're already in first place..

"All Lives Matter" is nothing more than a straw man. It's but a knee-jerk reaction using shallow logic to avoid having a discussion about race and what role it plays in our country socially, economically, and legally. It does nothing but muddy the issue and shout down anyone who would raise question against the status-quo.

If you're looking for a sound argument, here it is.

"The aim of argument, or discussion, should not be victory, but progress." When you rant and rave and use terms like "SJW" or calling your opponents "idiots", you bar all simblance of civil discourse. You make progress, understanding, an impossibility.

There are many sides to every issue. It is rarely as simple as "Us VS Them." The aim should be to find common ground and to attempt to understand why your opponent holds their views, while at the same time attempting to make a case for why you hold yours.

What I'm getting at is that at the end of the day, it makes little difference whether the arguments you have seen or made have changed your mind or that of others. What does matter is that you keep an open mind, brook civil discourse, and attempt to remain objective, maintaining an open and respectful dialogue without resorting to placing people into camps like "SJWs" or "SQW/TPI" or resorting to name calling and labeling. What's important is that you make every attempt to learn from and to understand one another, agreement isn't necessary.

 

That was something that did not make too much sense for me. If I am not mistaken and I have the right case in mind, the police officer plugged the man with 12 shots.
Isn't that the clip size for some guns?
Why so many bullets?
For resisting arrest due to cigarillos?
And if the police officer absolutely, positively needed to shot, couldn't he have gone for a leg shot?
I understand all bullets hit the deceased in the front, save 2 in the right arm. Shouldn't there be charges against the police officer for excessive force? If I understand correctly, the police officer went free since it was due to self defense.

This wikipedia article was what I checked for information, not sure if it is right or not. Placing the link here, but just as a sort of proof on what my source was.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Michael_Brown

This is all I can think of for now.

 

I'm just going to leave this here:
http://www.youngcons.com/teen-thugs-brutally-assault-marine-while-eating-then-rob-him/

And you wonder why I find it hard to believe the BLM movement, why I used the Ferguson as an example to show why I don't take the BLM movement seriously? Why I pointed out corruption within the BLM movement? Why I compared it to a rampant tumor? It's because hooligans like that claiming to be part of a movement, snatch up the spotlight for real campaign efforts and the mainstream media blows it off and calls it any crime against a white person a "random" crime, but anytime it's the reverse, it's like they're trying to claim it's the end of the world. This is another reason I said "entitlement generation." These hooligans that are corrupting these movements believe they are owed everything, that people should bow before them, else you're automatically a racist. It's hard to be objective about something, when the media covers up what's really going on with the extremists and always make it look like the campaign is nothing but a bed roses without any thorns attached to it, that there's no such thing as a racist black person trying to further their own agenda using the movement as an excuse. I called the people who act like that on Facebook (in my post here) "Social Justice Warrior morons" because in the end, they're all talk and nothing else. When people act like idiots, what else am I supposed to call them? All these names I give to people were never about the honest ones. They are about the ones who are completely destroying the movement that used to be an innocent attempt to raise an issue. I'm talking about the punks who rally behind something, just to hide their real intentions and ruin the movement for the rest who really do want equality.

Don't give me any bull crap about the "All Lives Matter" being nothing more than a straw man. It's not dodging an issue, it's addressing that everyone matters, not just a handful of special snowflakes. The "All Lives Matter" phrase is showing that everyone should be equal, that everyone of all colors can move together as a united People under the same banner. Anymore, all I hear from the excessively vocal "BLM" people are that all whites are racists, not some, ALL. Tell me I'm wrong, tell me there aren't racist blacks, Latinos, Asians, etc. Tell me that Caucasians are the only ones who are racist. Go ahead and tell me that this BLM movement isn't a growing tumor because of so many incidents of people using it as a means to justify their crimes, sometimes as far as doing hate crimes against someone who disagrees or ignores them.

 

I hate doing these things of taking parts of long posts from people but I have to say this

He was well in the justification of protecting himself. It's what the government ended up finding despite their best efforts to pin the cop as a racial killer.

I understand that sometimes racial tensions could influence a person's decision. I don't know if that was the case here, a big black man making aggressive moves towards you? Who can really say what went through the cops mind? Did a deep racial fear cause the cop to shoot? Would it be appropriate to say if it was a white man who was being arrested this wouldn't have happened?

I don't have to make that kind of assumption based on what cleared the officer. It was self defense. The suspect made an aggressive move towards the officer (and apparently his gun). That's a big no-no. White, Black, Asian, whatever. You don't F around when a cop is threatening to shoot you. End of story.

You can complain that cops treat black folks different all you want. It's important to improve relations between a community and it's police officers. We should always strive to make those protectors the very best a community could offer. They should be scrutinized and held to the highest standards. I assume that is what many people want to talk about. However...

Those issues should have nothing to do with this. You don't make moves towards an officer and his gun ever.

It's important to remember it's difficult to tell whether or not the shots you are firing are actually hitting the target and if they are actually doing anything. Getting hit by bullets isn't an exact science, some people immediately show pain and others don't show any signs. Based on the wiki (which could of course be wrong), he was shot six times. The only time excessive force could be argued is if he shot him *after* the initial defending yourself part.

And that's really tricky to determine unless you actually have an eyewitness that saw it.

Well I think I said my piece. All in all, whatever message BLM initially tried to say has been completely wiped away. I don't understand what they are saying these days, it seems to me a thing to say when a white person has something a black person does not. At least that's all I ever seem to hear.

 

Pillaging your community in an outrage over the results doesn't help the BLM cause either. It just proves themselves to be criminals instead of civil protesters. Which was the whole point of bringing up Ferguson, Missouri in the first place. We'll never know if it was racially motivated, but we do know that 1) the civilian was aggressive and 2) the officer believed his life to be in danger when the civilian reached for the officer's weapon.

If people really want equality, they need to stop being complete criminals or stop being complete fools when doing so. No one will take them seriously and those that are trying to get things changed peacefully, won't be able so with idiots like the ones who pillaged a community tarnishing their cause.

 

Look, if there's anything we agree on, it's that the media is full of sh*t. Although, maybe for different reasons.

I'm repeating myself, again, but one of the key reasons why so many questions are raised when crimes are committed against minorities, especially by police, is because of how many crimes have been racially motivated. And because, again, you are far more likely to be killed by, arrested by, or die in the custody of the police as an African American male as opposed to a Caucasian male. Seriously, look it up.

Again, "...it's important to be objective. It doesn't matter what the cause, what the stance is. There will always be extremists, they will always be the loudest, and they will always be the subject of discussion on said group."

Ergo, it makes little sense to judge the many by the actions of the few. No matter how loud they are.

It is hard to be objective. And the media, corporations, and government officials know that. They know that fighting off logical fallacies and cognitive biases is difficult, and they think that you're stupid enough to just eat up anything they try to feed you. But you're better than that. We all are. Or, at least have the potential to be.

So, I think it's worth not getting up in arms. I think it's worth "thinking twice before speaking once." And I think that it's worth reserving judgement on whole groups and ideas simply based on your individual experience.

All I'm saying is that it's not helpful for the discussion. You know, I have the compulsion to call people idiots quite a lot. But it's been proven that the more you insult a person, the more they dig in. Whether they're right or not doesn't matter. And I think that's important to note. Because it's something that I struggle with. There are people who are anti-vaccine, who deny climate change, who think the Earth is flat and I just want to write them off as idiots. Because, their ideas might be (are) idiotic. But, when we start assigning people to camps, drawing lines, putting up walls, and writing them off, we only encourage the spread of anti-intellectualism. Because a stupid, wrong-headed, misguided, ignorant, or even malevolent idea won't go away on its own. It seeks to replicate itself in one's peers and create more ideas of the like. And it's only enemies are reason and, what's more difficult, understanding.

I'm not trying to be a dick, but I think you're missing the point.

It is a straw man. Here's how. Movements like BLM spring up because of disproportionate disadvantages experienced by minorities. When you are far more likely to be killed by a police officer, when there are far more African Americans in prison, that should raise some red flags. That should tell us that there must be a reason for this. And we need to think further than "oh, well I guess they just commit more crimes." Because there's really no evidence for that, at least not so far as to create the massive discrepancy that exists.

So, at that point, it's hard not to feel like "black lives don't matter", if you will. Hence the name of the movement. And this is where we get into hot water. And where the point of the comic I posted, earlier, comes in. When you say it's wrong to have a BLM movement and that it should be "All Lives Matter", you suddenly take the attention away from the issues at hand. When there needs to be a discussion about how African Americans are disproportionately disadvantaged, suddenly you take attention away from that issue by crying foul. "It's not fair to focus on the issues of this one race, All Lives Matter!" Never mind the fact that, again, this particular race is disproportionately disadvantaged in comparison to their Caucasian counterparts.

When we take the time to focus on these discrepancies and ensure that everyone is truly equal, by working to make those that are currently unequal equal, then we can truly claim that all lives matter.

No one is saying that this is definitely the case. But, read what I wrote earlier in this post. When you are far more likely to be killed by police as an African American male, it's only natural to investigate a potential racial factor.

But that's the thing, he shouldn't have drawn his weapon to start with.

I'm assuming the police, by in-large, receive some form of hand-to-hand combatives training. If not, then why not? And, again, failing that, nearly all police carry some form of non-lethal suppression. There is no good reason why a police officer should not be able to apprehend an unarmed civilian without the use of firearms.

The first part of this paragraph and the latter part seem contradictory to me.

We absolutely need Community Policing and need to provide better, more intelligent, more informed training to our officers. But the fact that African Americans are (statistically) treated differently (often with catastrophic consequences) by a great margin is something that needs to be investigated, understood, and addressed if our officers are to act fairly and effectively perform their duties.

See above.

Agreed.

You don't draw and/or discharge your weapon against an unarmed civilian without exhausting all other avenues, first. Ever.

 

THIS GOT ANGRY FAST. I support BLM as an idea because I do believe that there are countless stories of black people suffering injustice (Tamir Rice, Sandra Bland, Laquan McDonald), but I think a lot of the protesters are losing sight of the very clear easily digestible message, by stating in ideas that traditionally have not worked exceptionally well. If you ask the world why they keep killing your people when they so much as raise their voices, the world wonders and may change. When you accuse the entire world of collusion, you close the ears of the people who would be your ally. They never hear the part where the collusion is simply in subconscious biases we all have. I don't get into trouble with cops, so if you stopped making a fuss, maybe they'd stop bothering you. So I ignore the tragedies because you clearly brought it on yourself. But that's the thing, excessive force isn't something that people bring on themselves, it's just something that happens when people lose sight of the threat. If you think you see a knife, you're not going to attempt to tackle them. If you think this muscular dude is going to beat your eyes shut, you don't think about whether the taser is the more appropriate response. You're going to fire your gun, and if the first shot doesn't remove the threat, the second shot is almost nothing in your mind. It's not anything until the person is lying on the ground, and you can reflect on what it is. I don't vilify the police officers, so much as I just wish that they wouldn't destroy so easily, to kill because a guy is struggling on the ground as he can't breathe. Police officers aren't monsters, they just think of their job and how to do it. Sometimes people die when the job says that's the most efficient way. It's Sartre's nightmare.
Privilege (the idea that most BLM people attempt to communicate) is a thing that exists, but by god it doesn't make people see your point of view, it makes you sound entitled. It makes you sound like you think I have such an easy life, that the world just hands me every luxury. If Jane Austen wrote a sequel to Pride and Prejudice, it would be called Pride, Prejudice, and Privilege. But I'm not just off the set of Downton Abbey, about to go play polo. It is a farcical word that makes the speaker sound upset and avaricious of the world, that no amount of pride is yours, but due to your background. Not due to your action, but due to your fate. It is a word that insults as it seeks to edify, and thus only serves to insult. Yes, it's meant to demonstrate the clear societal barriers in place to black people's success and livelihoods, but it strikes as "white people have it so easy, my god, if I was you, I'd love every day of my life".
I don't want to respond to people per se because I get angry just like anyone else and I don't think that's constructive, but feel free to try to get me to talk further. It probably just won't work.

 

Did it? I feel like it's been, mostly, civil.

I think we all understand the how and the why of it. The issue is that it occurs with such regularity.

You know, police and soldiers are of a similar mindset. We both have very specific jobs with very specific means to handle certain situations. And, we spend countless hours of not only practical training but mental conditioning to perform as is expected under pressure, regardless of the danger presented.

It is not impossible nor impractical to expect police to be able to respond to perceived threats in the correct manner. There's a reason they're armed with tasers and mace to begin with.

It is instinctual to use your firearm to defend yourself against any perceived threat? Yes. But through appropriate training and conditioning that can be overcome. And it has to be. We understand completely how and why things are the way they are, but that doesn't mean that they can't or shouldn't change.

Btw, I'm not trying to get you to respond. Just sharing my thoughts and using your post for context.

 

Eh, I think there was a lot of rhetorical posturing that read as anger. And I agree. It's all a matter of trying to defuse situations. People get caught in their mindsets and thus lose their radical freedom (thus my Sartre quip).

 

BLM is a bit of a conundrum for me, because while on the one hand I agree with their core message that blacks are unfairly discriminated against by law enforcement, their behavior in presenting this message has been self-destructive and alienating. Shutting down Bernie Sanders' speech was completely uncalled for, especially when you're targeting someone who has long been fighting for your rights probably before you were born. It's hard for me to feel sympathy for you when you bite the hand that feeds.

 

This is an example of why sometimes protesters cannot be taken seriously. It's the way they protest, which undercuts any message they have. All lives do matter, White, Black, hispanic, Asian. The only strawman argument comes from things like this: