F is for Fascism (Ferguson MO)

[PhDeac]

Above post keeping in mind that the State was constructed over centuries to support and preserve the interests of white citizens, so many of its extensions (including the Law) reflect this racialized support. (see: anti-racist reading lists)

It’s a simple concept backed by even the most rudimentary understanding of history yet some people struggle with it.

 

[RJKarl]

Sen. Doug Jones (AL) is trying to change the name of the Edmund Pettus (Confederate general and supported of slavery) Bridge to the John Lewis Bridge. This should be the no brainer of all no brainers whether it is federal or state issue.

 

[deacdiggler]

tag: let rj announce no brains

 

[TownieDeac]

Junebug: Good use of the Justice Dept or no?

https://theintercept.com/2020/06/12/fbi-jttf-protests-activists-cookeville-tennessee/

AFTER BARR ORDERED FBI TO “IDENTIFY CRIMINAL ORGANIZERS,” ACTIVISTS WERE INTIMIDATED AT HOME AND AT WORK

“I’VE NEVER HAD any run-ins with the cops before. I’ve never been to jail and have no criminal record, so when the FBI showed up to my workplace, it scared the piss out of me,” says Katy, a 22-year-old who works for a custodial services company in Cookeville, a small college town in middle Tennessee. “I really thought I was going to lose my job. The whole experience was terrifying.”

Moved by the video of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Katy — who requested she only be identified by her first name — and a friend had created a Facebook event for a Black Lives Matter rally in Cookeville’s public square on Saturday, June 6. She soon connected with several other Cookeville locals who wanted to help with planning the event, and enthusiasm grew as word of the rally spread.

“I’ve never organized a rally before, I was just winging it,” Katy said. “I didn’t expect a lot of people to show up, but overnight 600 people had RSVP’d on Facebook.”

 

[deacdiggler]

You are routinely "the only one" here taking your positions. Wrong then, wrong now.

Just like you were wrong about being "threatened" when the truth was you were getting played and punked.

if you'd stop bringing up old situations and pretending that you were "playing" people, our institutional memory of these situations would fade

 

[PhDeac]

Here's another thread of singular anecdotes not adding up to anything

Excellent thread. Yet somehow we have a lawyer who doesn’t understand that the criminal justice system decides what is a crime and what isn’t.


https://twitter.com/KristaVernoff/status/1272561185183789056

 

[Deacon923]

The EU has about .16 guns per person. In the US, that number is about 1.2.

We can't disarm the police and let them rely on non-lethal weapons only. That would be like sending soldiers off to war with BB guns.

I certainly agree that the US has way, way too many guns. It is relevant that the actual percentage of households with a gun has been declining steadily over time, and the 1.2 number is driven way up by all the people who own 5+ guns.

But let's put that aside, and also put aside the problematic assertion that we're sending police officers to war instead of to serve and protect. This post just basically shows a lack of ability or willingness to imagine a change in the status quo. If we just posit that cops will do everything they do now, only without a gun, then yeah maybe we would be putting them at greater danger. But that's not what any serious police reform advocate is saying. Reformers are starting to call for a rethink of how, what, and who gets policed. We have to change the paradigm from warrior cop who needs to dominate the battlespace and coerce compliance with on-the-spot force back to serving and protecting the overall good of the community. Among other things, that means that people who are in crisis are not approached by a LEO in the first place; face-to-face traffic stops can be greatly curtailed and replaced with technology; and the expectation for non-violent crimes changes from apprehend and jail to document and cite. If the expected outcome of an encounter with police is forcible apprehension and immediate jailing, then yeah of course they need guns because a lot of people don't make good decisions in a stressful moment like that especially when intoxicants are involved. But if the expected outcome is delivery of assistance with accountability coming later, the paradigm changes.

 

[Kory]

It’s a simple concept backed by even the most rudimentary understanding of history yet some people struggle with it.

In fairness, there's a hell of a lot of incentive for whites to keep their head down or even attack those that seek to learn about this past ("are the humanities worth it??").

Conversations with kids about a lot of this is vital, I think. Rare for someone to get exposure to this until they're out of high school. The textbooks don't track much of this, iirc.

 

[thatguy2016]

I can state what ever I want as many times as I like but that doesn't make it true. Do you have a link to the data? That's what I was asking for and I should have been more clear.

Can you clarify how saying that treatment for drug abuse is probably a more effective way for reducing DWI frequency than putative punishments as a deterrence is the same argument the NRA makes against gun control?

This data doesn't track increased enforcement, but it does show the declining percentage of traffic fatalities caused by alcohol from 1985 (around the time the drinking age started going up to 21) to present day

 

[birdman]

This data doesn't track increased enforcement, but it does show the declining percentage of traffic fatalities caused by alcohol from 1985 (around the time the drinking age started going up to 21) to present day

Doesn’t MADD and it’s offspring group SADD have a huge out reach and education component to it? Can we tease apart and attribute the reduced incidents and fatalities due to out reach and education vs legislation and enforcement?

 

[Deacon923]

Doesn’t MADD and it’s offspring group SADD have a huge out reach and education component to it? Can we tease apart and attribute the reduced incidents and fatalities due to out reach and education vs legislation and enforcement?

Greatly improved automobile safety technology plays a role too. I think it would be hard to tease out all the contributing factors, just like it is very hard to tease out all the contributing factors that have led to the overall dramatic drop in crime between 1970 and now.

 

[birdman]

Greatly improved automobile safety technology plays a role too. I think it would be hard to tease out all the contributing factors, just like it is very hard to tease out all the contributing factors that have led to the overall dramatic drop in crime between 1970 and now.

Yeah, so there are a lot of people here touting the certainty that punishment for DUI policing serves as a deterrent but I am not sure there is a certain, quantifiable relationship.

 

[Kory]

Would need data on prevalence of repeat offenders over time, no?

 

[DeaconBrews]

Yeah, so there are a lot of people here touting the certainty that punishment for DUI policing serves as a deterrent but I am not sure there is a certain, quantifiable relationship.

There was definitely a cultural shift about DUIs that started when M.A.D.D & similar orgs started popping up in the late 70's. I think the fear of getting a DUI and the well-known consequences are a deterrent for many, but it can't be backed up by stats. We do know that overall deaths per year have gone down by almost half.

 

[Colonel Angus]

You keep citing data to argue against people who are telling you why that data is inherently biased.

Translation: We (The Tunnels Left) only like data that supports our narrative. All other data is inherently biased and should be discarded. But data that proves our point is unbiased, correct, and if you disagree you are a fascist Nazi racist.

 

[Milhouse]

you know what's awesome? ignoring rj's posts.

 

[thatguy2016]

Doesn’t MADD and it’s offspring group SADD have a huge out reach and education component to it? Can we tease apart and attribute the reduced incidents and fatalities due to out reach and education vs legislation and enforcement?

One of MADD's primary functions over the years has been lobbying with law enforcement for harsher penalties for DUI, roadblocks, etc - so MADD seems to support it

Vehicle safety has improved, (while the population has increased, and registered vehicles have increased more than 25% since 1990) but note the percentage of traffic deaths related to alcohol has declined

 

[PhDeac]

In fairness, there's a hell of a lot of incentive for whites to keep their head down or even attack those that seek to learn about this past ("are the humanities worth it??").

Conversations with kids about a lot of this is vital, I think. Rare for someone to get exposure to this until they're out of high school. The textbooks don't track much of this, iirc.

Which is why conservatives don't like higher education. But they think it's the elitist professors, but much of it is the exposure to other young people who are learning about the world at the same time.

Your post reminds me of something a professor friend of mine posted on Facebook today. She's a white woman about my age. She told a story about a new dean who attended a campus event on discrimination and inequality. He later came to her about and expressed that he was uncomfortable with students of color talking about white supremacy. She explained it and then at the next campus event, he raised his hand and was free talking about white supremacy. Then she told a story about being on the other end of that:

Not as many years ago, a very brilliant student in my racial strat class was giving a presentation on John Edgar Wideman's "Brothers and Keepers" (still one of the greatest books I've ever read) about racial disparities in the criminal justice system. She keeps using the phrase, "prison abolition." I think, "what the hell does that mean? There is no way that would EVER happen. That's not even possible." I THINK. But I don't SAY. Instead, I read. And add a few follows on Twitter that help a lot. And it turns out, it's entirely consistent with what I have been teaching for years, on non-violent mass incarceration and massive disinvestment in public and social services. Glad I kept my mouth shut. Lots of my students know more than me on lots of things but I can always learn.


You don't have to know everything. But you shouldn't have strong opinions about things you know nothing about. And even if you do, you don't have to share them. I don't understand white people's obsession with their ancestry. I have good reasons. But I don't have to be mad about it. You can choose what you say and how you respond to your "I don't knows." You can choose.

Teenagers nowadays know a whole lot more about these things than they used to. I can see a distinct difference in the last few years. I told my racial and ethnic relations course back in Fall 2016 before and after the election. Then I didn't teach it again until Fall 2019 and this past semester. My students now are much more aware of system racism. I had students in that Fall class who could have been in the race and ethnicity grad course I taught that semester. In fact, I had my grad students guest teach in my undergrad class and they were blown away by how much my students knew. I had a grad student from China come in and teach on how racism is perpetuated through technology. The first question he got was from a white male student who asked a very detailed question about the Chinese government detention of Uyghurs.

One of the correspondents on last week's 1A Friday roundup said something like this. "Young people today want to know how things work and they're very interested in addressing problems from the top down." I've been thinking that and saying it for awhile and it's good to see someone in media recognize that. With all the protests, high schoolers are going to be even more aware.

 

[myDeaconmyhand]

Translation: We (The Tunnels Left) only like data that supports our narrative. All other data is inherently biased and should be discarded. But data that proves our point is unbiased, correct, and if you disagree you are a fascist Nazi racist.

Secondary data analysis is meaningless absent context, and quite obviously the context being discussed on this thread is very subjective. Data coming from law enforcement and criminal justice systems is highly biased and very often incomplete. Historically most police departments haven't even kept records on how many people have died in their custody.

 

[PhDeac]

Yeah, so there are a lot of people here touting the certainty that punishment for DUI policing serves as a deterrent but I am not sure there is a certain, quantifiable relationship.

It would be difficult to separate actual punishment from various aspects of the social stigma around DUI including the threat of punishment (whether it actually happens or not), the mainstreaming of the designated driver, ad campaigns, etc through the rise of Uber/Lyft/etc.