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Thank you for responding. I am too far away from the details and the history of the Portland police department to pretend to know what the right course of acti

Thank you for responding. I am too far away from the details and the history of the Portland police department to pretend to know what the right course of action is, but it seems to me that the "non-peaceful" part of the protest is actually making any resolution that much more difficult. That is to say it is a tactic that makes the problem worse not better. I'm also pretty mystified as to why the normal political process was not able to resolve concerns about police activities/methodologies. As far as I can tell from afar, all the Portland elected officials are ideologically aligned with those initiatives. What prevented them from responding and if there really isn't the political will to make those changes through normal peaceful means, by what right to the protesters get to force their will on the entire community?

Pfhreak 6y ago
This is a tough question. When minorities are being targeted, don't have sufficient access to resources, can't engage in political processes, etc, how do they advocate for themselves? The routes you suggest are great, but aren't available to everyone or have been set up to specifically exclude people.
- gwright 6y ago
  I feel like that it is necessary to be more specific in order to justify using force and abandoning the system. In Portland, who is targeting minorities? What does "targeting" mean? If the elected officials are sympathetic to those problems (what ever the details), what prevents them from addressing those problems? What resources are required to "participate" that aren't available? In a small city doesn't that just mean going to meetings? voting? etc. How are people being "excluded"? Is there a problem with the DAs office that they aren't prosecuting the unlawful actions against minorities? If there is really a story about elected officials ignoring or contributing to violations of individual rights, failure to ensure due process, failure to manage the police force, and so on then why isn't that story being told or reported on? If that is really the back story then the protestors have utterly failed to communicate that in an environment where it should be almost trivial to gain public visibility for those problems. Portland is even more puzzling because I believe the Mayor is also the police commissioner so there shouldn't be any problem with control of police policy as there can be in other jurisdictions where there is less direct oversight of the police.

Pfhreak 6y ago

This is a tough question. When minorities are being targeted, don't have sufficient access to resources, can't engage in political processes, etc, how do they advocate for themselves? The routes you suggest are great, but aren't available to everyone or have been set up to specifically exclude people.

gwright 6y ago
I feel like that it is necessary to be more specific in order to justify using force and abandoning the system. In Portland, who is targeting minorities? What does "targeting" mean? If the elected officials are sympathetic to those problems (what ever the details), what prevents them from addressing those problems? What resources are required to "participate" that aren't available? In a small city doesn't that just mean going to meetings? voting? etc. How are people being "excluded"? Is there a problem with the DAs office that they aren't prosecuting the unlawful actions against minorities? If there is really a story about elected officials ignoring or contributing to violations of individual rights, failure to ensure due process, failure to manage the police force, and so on then why isn't that story being told or reported on? If that is really the back story then the protestors have utterly failed to communicate that in an environment where it should be almost trivial to gain public visibility for those problems. Portland is even more puzzling because I believe the Mayor is also the police commissioner so there shouldn't be any problem with control of police policy as there can be in other jurisdictions where there is less direct oversight of the police.