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I never said violent revolution isn't a possibly effective means of enacting political change. History in fact demonstrates that quite vividly. But violent rev

I never said violent revolution isn't a possibly effective means of enacting political change. History in fact demonstrates that quite vividly. But violent revolution is also not, in the aggregate, a net benefit in the immediate term. Not even for black people. Believing otherwise represents a failure to anticipate 2nd/3rd order consequences and beyond. In the best case, you might experience a lot of suffering today to benefit people in the far future. I don't think we'll see that best case play out with the current rioting. We've been here before, many times (e.g. Rodney King). It doesn't work. Take a look at Hong Kong. They got rid of Carrie Lam and just a few days ago lost their special trading status with the United States. Stay tuned for more consequences. The flaw in MLK's logic and the reason that black people still encounter systemic mistreatment 60 years later is that it fails to account for economic conditions (where do stereotypes come from? vivid, sticky ideas that trigger fear, like violent crime; where does violent crime come from? economic disenfranchisment) and the glacial pace of cultural change (relatedly, the 'hearts and minds problem'; sometimes you just need to wait for enough bigots to be better educated, achieve empathy by actually knowing black people personally, or die out).

fzeroracer 6y ago
When you have the police state escalating the violence against you, you either get violent in return or you get the knee to your neck. The reason why things have gotten violent is as I mentioned in a prior post is self-defense. People don't trust the police at all, and why should they? We've seen them attack journalists multiple times, we've seen them assault people who were protesting peacefully and increasingly it looks like they're employing agent provocateurs to give themselves a reason to get violent. Who is going to hold them accountable when the system refuses to hold them accountable?
- realtalk_sp 6y ago
  I'd be careful to generalize from the almost certainly distorted view you have of the "facts on the ground". Also keep in mind the irony of weaponizing sweeping generalizations against a particular group of people. You should naturally expect some amount of badness in almost any sample of humans, including the police. It might also help to empathize with a cop on the ground in this situation when police stations have literally been blown up.
  - fzeroracer 6y ago
    A few things: First, I didn't realize blue was a race now. Or are we not allowed to criticize the police state? Does your 'sweeping generalization' rule also apply when we criticize things like the Chinese government because 'I'm sure some of the politicians are good people'? Second, you don't say. The problem is that the police have zero accountability. They get away with murder and assault like in [1] or [2] or [3] and for what? Can you tell me what laws they violated? Are you personally going to go out there and hold those cops accountable for what they did? It sounds like you should go outside and get the real view of what's happening on the ground. [1] https://twitter.com/imactuallynina/status/1266912627193774080?s=20 https://twitter.com/imactuallynina/status/126691262719377408... [2] https://www.businessinsider.com/nypd-officer-shoves-woman-george-floyd-protests-video-2020-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/nypd-officer-shoves-woman-ge... [3] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/us/minneapolis-protests-press.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/us/minneapolis-protests-p...
  - fzeroracer 6y ago
    Here's another one for you: Police shooting at a woman on her own property [1]. Are all of those cops the bad ones? Should I empathize with them assaulting someone on their own property? [1] https://twitter.com/tkerssen/status/1266921821653385225 https://twitter.com/tkerssen/status/1266921821653385225
  - scarface74 6y ago
    Why in the hell should I “empathize” with a police department that tried to cover it up until video was shown? You should naturally expect some amount of badness in almost any sample of humans, including the police. And the “badness” seems to only affect people who look like me... But as Chris Rock said... Well, it’s not most cops. It’s just a few bad apples. It’s just a few bad apples.” Bad apple? That’s a lovely name for murderer. That almost sounds nice. I’ve had a bad apple. It was tart, but it didn’t choke me out. Here’s the thing....But some jobs can’t have bad apples. Some jobs, everybody gotta be good. Like … pilots. Ya know, American Airlines can’t be like, “Most of our pilots like to land. We just got a few bad apples that like to crash into mountains. Please bear with us.”
  - wpietri 6y ago
- selfdefencely 6y ago
  Are you really saying that setting fire to a police station was self-defense?
scarface74 6y ago
We've been here before, many times (e.g. Rodney King). It doesn't work. It caused an overhaul of the LAPD. Do you really think the Bush administration would have charged the cops otherwise? The flaw in MLK's logic and the reason that black people still encounter systemic mistreatment 60 years later is that it fails to account for economic conditions The Poor People’s Campaign. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poor_People%27s_Campaign https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poor_People%27s_Campaign
wpietri 6y ago
This will not fly: > the reason that black people still encounter systemic mistreatment 60 years later The reason that black people encounter systemic mistreatment is white racism. Full stop. It's not due to a "flaw in MLK's logic". Also, MLK was not advocating "violent revolution", so I think the flawed logic here is yours. Especially your notion that we just have to keep waiting for bigots to improve. It's two full generations since MLK walked the earth. Waiting doesn't work.

fzeroracer 6y ago

When you have the police state escalating the violence against you, you either get violent in return or you get the knee to your neck. The reason why things have gotten violent is as I mentioned in a prior post is self-defense. People don't trust the police at all, and why should they? We've seen them attack journalists multiple times, we've seen them assault people who were protesting peacefully and increasingly it looks like they're employing agent provocateurs to give themselves a reason to get violent. Who is going to hold them accountable when the system refuses to hold them accountable?

realtalk_sp 6y ago
I'd be careful to generalize from the almost certainly distorted view you have of the "facts on the ground". Also keep in mind the irony of weaponizing sweeping generalizations against a particular group of people. You should naturally expect some amount of badness in almost any sample of humans, including the police. It might also help to empathize with a cop on the ground in this situation when police stations have literally been blown up.
- fzeroracer 6y ago
  A few things: First, I didn't realize blue was a race now. Or are we not allowed to criticize the police state? Does your 'sweeping generalization' rule also apply when we criticize things like the Chinese government because 'I'm sure some of the politicians are good people'? Second, you don't say. The problem is that the police have zero accountability. They get away with murder and assault like in [1] or [2] or [3] and for what? Can you tell me what laws they violated? Are you personally going to go out there and hold those cops accountable for what they did? It sounds like you should go outside and get the real view of what's happening on the ground. [1] https://twitter.com/imactuallynina/status/1266912627193774080?s=20 https://twitter.com/imactuallynina/status/126691262719377408... [2] https://www.businessinsider.com/nypd-officer-shoves-woman-george-floyd-protests-video-2020-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/nypd-officer-shoves-woman-ge... [3] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/us/minneapolis-protests-press.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/us/minneapolis-protests-p...
- fzeroracer 6y ago
  Here's another one for you: Police shooting at a woman on her own property [1]. Are all of those cops the bad ones? Should I empathize with them assaulting someone on their own property? [1] https://twitter.com/tkerssen/status/1266921821653385225 https://twitter.com/tkerssen/status/1266921821653385225
- scarface74 6y ago
  Why in the hell should I “empathize” with a police department that tried to cover it up until video was shown? You should naturally expect some amount of badness in almost any sample of humans, including the police. And the “badness” seems to only affect people who look like me... But as Chris Rock said... Well, it’s not most cops. It’s just a few bad apples. It’s just a few bad apples.” Bad apple? That’s a lovely name for murderer. That almost sounds nice. I’ve had a bad apple. It was tart, but it didn’t choke me out. Here’s the thing....But some jobs can’t have bad apples. Some jobs, everybody gotta be good. Like … pilots. Ya know, American Airlines can’t be like, “Most of our pilots like to land. We just got a few bad apples that like to crash into mountains. Please bear with us.”
- wpietri 6y ago
selfdefencely 6y ago
Are you really saying that setting fire to a police station was self-defense?

scarface74 6y ago

We've been here before, many times (e.g. Rodney King). It doesn't work. It caused an overhaul of the LAPD. Do you really think the Bush administration would have charged the cops otherwise? The flaw in MLK's logic and the reason that black people still encounter systemic mistreatment 60 years later is that it fails to account for economic conditions The Poor People’s Campaign. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poor_People%27s_Campaign https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poor_People%27s_Campaign

wpietri 6y ago

This will not fly: > the reason that black people still encounter systemic mistreatment 60 years later The reason that black people encounter systemic mistreatment is white racism. Full stop. It's not due to a "flaw in MLK's logic". Also, MLK was not advocating "violent revolution", so I think the flawed logic here is yours. Especially your notion that we just have to keep waiting for bigots to improve. It's two full generations since MLK walked the earth. Waiting doesn't work.