I know I frequently sound like an insensitive clod, but I find this entire conversation confoundingly funny. I want to scream at all my lily white friends and relatives, “have you even tried living in the rest of the world!? It’s actually kinda nice!!”
Glenn Reynolds apologizes for saying drivers surrounded during street protest should "Run Them Down"
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I notice that the people calling other people racist here on this discussing Reginald Denny and saying that this kind of thing only happened once etc. appear to be white. Not sure where you live but if you live in a lower economic changing black neighborhood like I do there is an understanding among my neighbors black and white that they would step into a situation where someone was being hurt to stop it and to their own peril regardless of color. This was no peaceful demonstration as the news claimed. It was a riot and there are no rules in a riot. If it is a matter of survival then you gotta do what you gotta do. Stupid people taking it out on innocent others just because, means all rules of behavior go out the window. Someone approaching your car is menacing behavior and is considered assault if they touch your car. There is no excuse for attacking people - none. Idiotic white girl. Reginald Denny is a very appropriate memory to reference in a similar situation for anyone of any color.
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No. Don’t trust a user’s avatar pic. I also am not a fish.
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Don’t know about others, but what I would say is that if you feel unsafe you shouldn’t think to yourself “That dude looks sketchy, but I can only cross the street to avoid him if he’s white like me!”, because not superficially appearing to be, racist is your highest priority.
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The problem is that “being black” == “looks sketchy” for enough people that it reinforces the kind of toxic, paranoid, racism that makes it easy for cops to get away with murder. There are people who look like trouble, but skin tone’s the wrong way to make that call.
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Also jaywalking.
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True, and equally the wrong way to make the opposite call, as @milliefink and others are implying people should.
I missed that above, so I checked again, and I still don’t think that’s what they’re trying to suggest or imply.
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I disagree. Milli is pointing out a very common, pervasive bias.
The wrongness isn’t equivalent, even if neither is correct.
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Inappropriate generalization true - just sounds like something someone would say who is unaccustomed to living with and resolving racial tensions. She gives this away when she talks about toxic paranoid racism as if that is what is going on. It was a black cop. Goof balls come in all colors. Throwing rocks onto cars from an overpass is attempted murder. This is not the way to protest - this is attempted murder. Where is the rule that in a riot you can’t defend yourself? The people that walked onto the expressway are lucky to be alive. The drug war is the problem. The cops act the way they do because of the cops vs the general public drug war.
Be careful with your assumptions, they may come back to bite you. Dont willingly walk into the jaws of schadenfreude.
In the federal criminal justice system.
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Where are you from - europe? Self defense is a valid defense here in the USA. That’s why so many states allow concealed carry.
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you misspelled “Glenn Reynolds issues non-apology for saying…”
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Most legal systems include a right to self defence.
What they don’t include is a right to indiscriminately murder any black people standing nearby whenever you feel threatened.
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Notable exception: Florida
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There is also a tradition in the US of politics and law enforcement using racial pretexts for their anti-drug rhetoric. Poverty and drug use are (incorrectly) seen as chronic problems which originate with other kinds of people. There is no way to easily separate how these issues have contributed to the institutional problem of contemporary US police violence.
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Kind of the inverse. Using drugs as pretext for racial control.
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Sorry, but the problem of the militarization of the US police and the resulting standard SWAT and no knock policies and the resulting violent escalation of otherwise run of the mill policing is a direct result of the war on drugs.
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I know what you mean, but my point was that the causation is not one-way, that’s what makes threads of influence impossible to isolate. It is more like a feedback loop of factors which reenforce each other.
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California, and what @Wanderfound said. Stand your ground, castle doctrine, self defense and retaliation virtually guarantees a criminal jury trial.
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