So much

by liberal japonicus

So much stuff happening, so hard to make sense of it all. My strategy is to usually to take a small corner of it and poke and prod at it, which I'll subject all of you too.

To lay down my cards, I'm largely in agreement with this article.

The Bucks put their season on the line. The players’ dreams of winning a championship were willingly sacrificed. And when the five other NBA teams scheduled to play Wednesday joined in not playing, they collectively threw the future of the league, and, ergo, their own personal financial futures up in the air. They deserve the benefit of the doubt that they knew exactly what they were doing. All the evidence coming out of the NBA bubble in Florida points that way. The Bucks players issued a statement Wednesday evening, asking for the police officers that shot Blake to be “held accountable” and for the Wisconsin State Legislature to reconvene and “take up meaningful measures to address issues of police accountability, brutality, and criminal justice reform.” And whether you agree with their protest and message or not, these players’ levels of sacrifice must be respected.

I wonder if this author, who dismissed George Hill's comments, would reconsider his position or hold to it. It's also a sign that history may not repeat itself, but it definitely rhymes when we consider that was 4 years ago to the day that Colin Kaepernick began his prescient protest during the National Anthem at a pre-season game.

I know we have a strange mix here with some people irretrivably in love with sports and others who just don't see the point. We also have people who might not be familiar with US sports. So I think that we might have a range of opinions on all this, but regardless what you think of the decision though, you have to acknowledge that it is unprecedented. Sports has always been something that has been held to, regardless of what else happens in the world. In fact, when John F. Kennedy was assassinated, the decision was to continue to play professional football, despite players not wanting to play.

It will be interesting to read a history of the moment of the strike. I don't think it is unsurprising that the Bucks were first to strike (strictly speaking, it is not a boycott). Milwaukee is 40 miles from Kenosha. But Milwaukee was also up 3-1 in the playoffs. Had it been a team that was losing, one can imagine people claiming it was an excuse, but you can't really claim that for the Bucks. But I'd love to know how the decision came about. Accounts say that it was a decision made totally by the players. George Hill, Bucks point guard and team leader and the recipient of a new 3 year 29 million dollar contract, has been the most vocal about how the Orlando 'bubble' has drawn the focus away from social justice. Giannis Antetokounmpo, who many are saying may be on his way to becoming an all-time great, is not American, and I often believe that outsiders can sometimes have a clearer view. But is also is, I think, a story of a team decision, they did make a team statement, but how such a momentous decision occured is something that I think historians may look at in the future.

And Milwaukee has a recent history of being at the front. They supported their teammate, Stirling Brown when this happened.

On January 26, 2018, Brown was tased and arrested inappropriately according to the Milwaukee Police Department Police Chief Alfonso Morales the following May. Brown brought suit in June 2018 after the May release of bodycam footage and alleges racial profiling occurred in the administration of a parking ticket at a Walgreens parking lot. In October 2019, Brown rejected a $400,000 settlement offer.Brown has expressed that he has rejected the offer in part due to his ability and sense of responsibility to use his platform as an NBA player to raise awareness.

The team was one of the first to protest after George Floyd's murder, happening just over the state line in Minneapolis.

After the Bucks refused to play, not only did other NBA teams also join in, but a number of other teams in different professional sports did as well. The video of this Guardian article, showing Kenny Smith stepping away from the broadcast and the comments of Chris Webber and Doc Rivers is also a sign of the solidarity. I'm sure that some will suggest that the other NBA players are being silenced by political correctness, but I don't see that.

Reportage says that the Lakers and the Clippers the teams that don't want to continue while all the other teams still in the playoffs do. That could be taken that this strike is being pushed by a small number of players on three teams out of 13 teams remaining, but looking at Five Thirty Eight's predictions, there's a 50% chance that one of those three teams would be the winner is what I take away.

It was only a few years ago that Kaepernick began what I believe was a prescient protest. This event had me find stories about the activism of Craig Hodges, former Chicago Bull and how he approached Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson on the eve of the first game of 91 Finals and asked that they consider striking for that first game as a protest.

As I said, I'm sure that there are other opinions, and looking at twitter (always a mistake) has people attacking the players. How many do they represent?

Comments

[wj]

they collectively threw the future of the league, and, ergo, their own personal financial futures up in the air.

I think what the players have done is good. If only because there are some (a lot of?) people out there who pay vastly more attention to sports than to anything else outside their immediate environment. Something like this is the 2x4 up side the head which may, may, get their attention.

But to say that the players are putting their own financial futures on the line is a bit of an overstatement. Except for any guys in their first couple of years playing professionally, most of these folks have more money already in hand than most of the rest of us will have in the bank when we retire. They may miss having the extra millions. But it's not like they will be in poverty, even if their sport shuts down permanently.

[nous]

I think professional sports will be the lunch counters of the age. All these huge media corporations and even conservative owners and coaches are over a barrel the moment that the players turn their minds to collective action. That's a systempunkt with no workaround that doesn't end up ringing completely hollow. Without the athletes the whole empire collapses.

Now pardon me, I'm going to go hunt down the latest Shannon Sharpe clips, because I know that he's going to lay this out straight with no fear.

[liberal japonicus]

I forgot to be a title, so the blog grabs the first two words. So much seems appropriate.

The question of earning and futures is an interesting one, there's a book called 40 Million Dollar Slaves by William Rhoden

https://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/23/books/review/23goldstein.html

I haven't read the book but the reviews said that it was a great study on the history of black athletes in the US. I did see some interviews with the author and they often concentrated on the idea that black athletes had chosen to eschew social justice for a big payday, so I wonder what he would say of this.

While I see your point, I think that this argument is a bit of a no win situation. Why do lower class people protest? Cause they have no money and just want to get more. Why do these athlete millionaires protest? Cause they got enough money that they don't have to worry about their future?

[nous]

Except for any guys in their first couple of years playing professionally, most of these folks have more money already in hand than most of the rest of us will have in the bank when we retire. They may miss having the extra millions. But it's not like they will be in poverty, even if their sport shuts down permanently.

True enough for the NBA. What impressed me, though, is how MLS has responded to this:

https://sports.yahoo.com/compared-to-their-millionaire-nba-and-mlb-brethren-mls-players-boycott-comes-with-added-risks-202056686.html

Starting pay for MLS player union is $56k.

[Marty]

I'm very impressed with the boycott/strike.

If someone can articulate a set of steps that can move the country past this and achieve some universal agreement then the boycott will have been a huge part of that.

Let me be clear, there is a difference between peaceful protest supporting policing reform and violent protest and assault. This seems like an effective way to use one of the most visible segments of society to rally support.

I hope they don't play any professional sports again until they force the Wisconsin legislature to create laws that everyone agrees will make a difference so those can be used as a blueprint across the country.

[russell]

I usually respond to Marty's comments here by giving him a ration of crap, so allow me the pleasure of saying thumbs up, Marty.

As well as all other comments here.

I'm not remotely a sports guy, but I recognize the presence that sports has in our culture.

So well done, Milwaukee.

[liberal japonicus]

I usually start comments to Marty with 'I don't want to pile on', but this is one I'll happily participate in. WRS²

I was just in the middle of a long comment about the stats discussion in the previous thread which I will delete unsent and leave it to everyone's imagination. Thanks from me as well Marty.

[wj]

We will now have a chorus:

What Marty said

[liberal japonicus]

Just to follow up on nous, the WNBA is amazing

Overall, the average WNBA players make around $79,000 while the maximum salary caps at $117,500. The minimum player salary for players with three or more years of service is $56,375.
https://www.blackenterprise.com/top-wnba-nba-salaries-2019/

Furthermore, just before COVID, they negotiated an increase in salary and benefits
https://nba.nbcsports.com/2020/01/14/new-wnba-cba-increases-average-salary-to-nearly-130k-maximum-salary-above-500k/

Yet they have been in the forefront of protests.

https://www.bbc.com/sport/av/basketball/53931644

and have shown they put their money where there mouth is
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/04/sports/basketball/wnba-dream-loeffler-warnock.html

[wj]

Thanks to you all for the education on sports salaries. I confess I was fixated on sports like baseball (minimum salary ~$550K for major leaguers).

[nous]

At the moment I am not paying too much attention to professional sports except for having paid a bit of attention to Bayern Munich winning the UEFA Champions League and completing another treble, and following the Colorado Avalanche in the NHL playoffs. The NHL teams postponed two sets of playoff games by player choice in response to the Kenosha shooting. Conservative fans have been pushing back hard on social media. Of course they have been pushing back hard on pride night as well and any other inclusivity promotion, so that part is not new. But the league and the teams are standing firm in their commitment to fan diversity, and that means publicly supporting social justice and giving it the same level of promotion as military appreciation night, law enforcement appreciation night, teacher appreciation night, etc.

The Avalanche are owned by Kroenke Enterprises, which means they fall under the umbrella of Sam Walton's heirs. Which is interesting, verging on potentially hopeful at least as far as our corporate overlords are concerned.

[liberal japonicus]

This is interesting

https://www.republicworld.com/sports-news/basketball-news/nba-fans-claim-bots-hijacked-twitter-to-condemn-nba-boycott.html

twitter bots or what?

[liberal japonicus]

And I'm not a particular fan of a lot of Jordan's choices through his career, but this was nice to see.

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/29754265/michael-jordan-urges-owners-meeting-listening-better-talking

[bob sykes]

The first problem that most normal people have with the protests is that in almost every case the dead black guy was a career violent criminal who was resisting arrest for yet another crime. And a few so-called killings weren't. Floyd Brown died of a fentanyl overdose.

The second problem is that the protests divert attention from the real problem, which is the mass killing of young black men by other young black men. FBI statistics show that over half of all the gun killings (including whites, hispanics, whatever) in the US are committed by young black men. Almost all the dead are black. The killers represent less than 1% of the whole population. That is your systemic racism.

If Le Bron were serious about preventing the deaths of young black men, he would use his very great influence to do something about the black gangbangers who are terrorizing black communities. Police are not the problem.

It is also important that the BLM movement has been captured by the rich, young, white radicals of Antifas. BLM is now controlled by them, and it serves their own purposes, which do not align with black needs.

[Cleek]

Speak for yourself, fabulist

[Pro Bono]

...Floyd Brown died of a fentanyl overdose

There are two autopsy reports which say otherwise.

[russell]

in almost every case the dead black guy was a career violent criminal who was resisting arrest for yet another crime

Not a strong opening.

the real problem, which is the mass killing of young black men by other young black men

That is your systemic racism.

"Real" may not be the word you're looking for here. "Statistically more common", perhaps. "Happens more often, therefore is more deserving of our attention".

Something like that.

So let's give it some attention.

Why do young black men kill each other in such diproportionate numbers?

Perhaps there are some clues there for us about how race affects people's lives.

There's more to say about how cops play into all of this than you are letting on here, IMO, but if you want to talk about young black men and homicide, it could bd a topic worth discussing.

Feel free to give it a try. Bring a useful insight or two, and you might get some good conversation.

[Girl from the North Country]

Who is this Floyd Brown, for whom I have searched in vain? Do you mean George Floyd?

[Girl from the North Country]

The first problem that most normal people have with the protests

And that bold's a problem right there. Because obviously, to this commenter, "normal" means white. Because most black people, whether they are worried about the format of the protests or not, fully understand the reason for the protests, and it's not because they think that " in almost every case the dead black guy was a career violent criminal who was resisting arrest for yet another crime".

And what does the "so-called" mean in " And a few so-called killings weren't"?

[bobbyp]

If black people were allowed, without fear of punishment, to gun down white people who commit unjust racist acts, why the number of police killings of unarmed black men would decrease to zero overnight, and the overt white racism we observe might well be reduced significantly.

Now some might argue this would be a social catastrophe, leading white people to live in fear for their lives. On the other hand, black people have pretty much lived with the opposite social policy for hundreds of years.

Somehow they managed.

[cleek]

And what does the "so-called" mean in " And a few so-called killings weren't"?

it means bob here ain't about to start believing no MSM lies about what them black folks do. he knows the truth!

[cleek]

If black people were allowed, without fear of punishment, to gun down white people who commit unjust racist acts, why the number of police killings of unarmed black men would decrease to zero overnight

this is, precisely, the fundamental justification gun fondlers give for their guns: to present a counter to government tyranny.

funny thing about tyranny, though. it's almost always in the eye of the recipient, and never in the eye of the wielder.

[Girl from the North Country]

funny thing about tyranny, though. it's almost always in the eye of the recipient, and never in the eye of the wielder.

This is worthy of being called "cleek's law #2"

[liberal japonicus]

Search is a wonderful thing
Trump is by far the best President the US has had since Eisenhower, and maybe since Washington. His language is extreme, but truthful. The malodorous swamp in DC is slowly turning this country into a totalitarian socialist dictatorship.

The Democrat Party is an association of Biblically evil monsters, and the criminally insane neocons are their allies. The endless, unwinnable, and illegal wars we are fighting everywhere are the result of neocon subversion of our government, especially the intelligence and law agencies. We have just seen an attempt at a coup d'etat by the FBI, DOJ, CIA, and NSA.

Trump ran on a platform of ending those wars, and the neocons slapped him down. Considering her violent, war-mongering past, if the monster Hillary had won, we would undoubtedly be in the middle of WW III right now.

In 2020, if you love your children, you will vote for Trump. If you vote Democrat, you will condemn to a life of poverty and oppression. If you are white, your children will suffer genocide.
Posted by: bob sykes | August 02, 2019 at 09:06 AM
https://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2019/08/its-august-2019-do-you-know-where-your-potus-is.html

[nous]

My guess is that the storm surge pushed him out from under his bridge and into daylight.

That or wandering bands of gruff, vigilante billy goats.

[John Thullen]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floyd_Brown

He died of an overdose of Citizen's United.

Kneeling on his hung neck was merely breathing interruptus and a complication.

But it saved a bullet.

Looting and burning!:

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-assault-on-social-security-is-under-way-2020-08-28?siteid=bigcharts&dist=bigcharts

Kenosha is a campfire compared to what's coming.

Bob Sykes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4yp-XFGszw

Even his dog hates him.

[John Thullen]

I have a comment stuck in the hopper identifying Floyd Brown and Bob Sykes, and a criminal nationwide case of the looting and burning of America that is in the works.

There might be two, but please only restore the second one, if you please. Thanks.

[wj]

Mr Sykes provides a handy example of why persuasion is difficult. If two people live in entirely different universes, there's simply no way to reach agreement. Not even on the facts, let alone on the issues.

[cleek]

statistically speaking.

The Durham Police Department is investigating an incident last week in which several officers are accused of drawing their guns on three boys playing outside an east Durham apartment complex and handcuffing one of the boys.

Fifteen-year-old Jaylin Harris and 9-year-old Zakarryya Cornelius said they were playing tag with an 11-year-old friend last Friday at the Rochelle Manor Apartments complex when the officers confronted them.

"As soon as we come around the corner, we walk into five cops pointing guns at us saying, 'Freeze!' and 'Get on the ground!'" Jaylin said. "So, we were just thinking, like, what did we do? We didn’t even do anything wrong."

"I was just terrified," Zakarryya said.

...

"I’m like, 'I hope I don’t die today,'" he added. "I didn’t make any wrong movements at that time or anything like that – Just outside playing tag and walked into guns pointed at me."

Zakarryya's mother, Makeba Hoffler, said she saw the incident unfold and ran over with a 3-year-old in her arms to stop the officers.

"Even as I proceeded to run toward the officer screaming, 'They are kids,' their guns were still drawn," Hoffler said. "'I’m going to die tonight.' That’s what I was thinking because, like I said, I was not going to bury my son, and I was not going to bury none of these kids."

but you know, it would be wrong to treat black people like people because someone somewhere Marxism blahblahblah.

[John Thullen]

Thanks.

[liberal japonicus]

I just released Thullen's comment and noticed several. I think that they were rewritten and published, so I won't take them out, but fair warning, random comments do go to spam. So that witty riposte or that observation that can't wait may have to. If you find something not appearing, please let me know, but bear in mind the time difference and schedules.

[John Thullen]

The kids in cleek's link were marked as marks, not Marx.

[wj]

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy
https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2020/08/28/video-rand-paul-says-he-was-attacked-by-an-angry-mob-on-d-c-street/

[wj]

If you find something not appearing, please let me know, but bear in mind the time difference and schedules.

Sometimes I can catch them, too. (Indeed, I thought I'd freed Thullen's comment.) And that gives us non-overlapping sleep schedules most of the time.

[Girl from the North Country]

Some of the comments in the spam folder will have been mine, when I forget to use GftNC when posting links. When it's important enough to me, I redo them.

[cleek]

Lèse-majesté ain't no crime round these parts, Randy.

[wj]

For those who feel that blacks are not particularly targeted by police, I recommend this.
https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/08/22/americas-black-upper-class-and-black-lives-matter

As it may be behind a paywall, let me offer up just the last paragraph

Yet even the wealthiest align with street protesters in their fury over threats and harassment from police. Mr Knox [a wealthy Chicagoan who runs an international infrastructure-investment fund] is blunt about the risks any African-American man faces in public. Mr Graham [property lawyer from New York, and author of “Our Kind of People”, a sympathetic insider account of the habits, clubs and lifestyles of America’s wealthiest black families] recounts being stopped and hounded by a plainclothes policeman near his home, while collecting his daughter from school—even though he was the chairman of his county police board. He describes how rich black families, on moving into mostly white neighbourhoods, learn to visit local police stations to hand out photos of their families, in an effort to stave off trouble. “We have to be proactive,” he says. “It is absolutely demeaning to act in this way, but we have too many stories of what happens when you don’t. Don’t assume we’ve bought our way out of this treatment.”

Can you imagine, even for an instant, a white man being stopped and hounded by a plainclothes policeman near his home, while collecting his daughter from school—even though he was the chairman of his county police board? Really? Can you imagine that?

[Marty]

What does stopped and hounded mean? Then I will answer the question.

[John Thullen]

Odd how Black Lives Matter is Marxist, but police forces around the country behave like Soviets and the Red Guard, or perhaps the early Brownshirts harassing wealthy Jews.

Perhaps the problem is not completely Democratic governance in cities and towns around the country, but rather the fact that police forces have conservative republican white supremacist agendas and may even be aligning themselves with the Trump putsch against their own cities' governments.

To what future fascist nationalistic conservative movement payoff?

We hear a lot of bullshit about how most mainstream journalists vote for Democrats.

Anyone gotta fucking problem with the fact that most cops vote for republicans?

Unless maybe it's Chicago where police brutality has pretty much been a bipartisan way of life.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

"What does stopped and hounded mean? Then I will answer the question."

Post your personal info, Marty, and we'll relay it to your local police with the note that you're a notorious Black Block Marxist working undercover for BLM.

Then you'll find out.

If the cops aren't persecuting people because of a political/racist agenda, then you'd have nothing to worry about, right?

[hairshirthedonist]

Not just Marxist, but necessarily authoritarian and dictatorial by way of Marxism. If we’re biting the hook, let’s bite the whole thing.

[Bruce Baugh]

Black people mostly shoot each other for the same reason white people mostly shoot each other: we tend to shoot the people near us (starting with ourselves; two-thirds of gun deaths are suicides and the NRA never had a damn thing to say about the risk or what to do about it), and since we're a mostly segregated society, the people around us tend to be same ethnicity as us.

(And at the risk of getting Thullen-esque, white Americans lead in committing incest, child pornography, and white-collar crime. There needs to be some viewing with concern over here.)

I'm impressed as all get out by the sports strikers. As I understand it, a lot of the dancing around about "boycotts" and such is that many leagues have no-strike provisions in their contracts. If management committed to calling them strikers, they'd be firing the bunch immediately, and they don't actually want to do that right now. Expect euphemisms strong enough to earn their own names from the National Weather Service.

[Nigel]

Hounded means stuff along these lines, I guess...?

The Police Are Pretty Sure They’re Going to Get Away With It
https://newrepublic.com/article/159142/portsmouth-virginia-police-louise-lucas-lisa-lucas-burke
... In June, protesters beheaded a few Confederate statues in Portsmouth and tore down another, which landed on and injured a demonstrator. Several months later, Portsmouth police, taking advantage of Virginia’s magistrate system, which bypasses elected prosecutors in these decisions, charged various local civil rights leaders, public defenders, and the president pro tempore of the Virginia Senate, Louise Lucas, with felony charges of conspiracy to injure a monument.

Lucas had left the scene hours before any of the statues were harmed. The charges seemed timed to interrupt a Virginia Senate special session to debate new police reform legislation. The local prosecutor was bypassed, perhaps on account of her reformist tendencies. The police named her a possible witness, in what appeared to be an attempt to remove her from the process entirely....

[cleek]

What does stopped and hounded mean? Then I will answer the question.

the hell you think it means?

i assure you zero white police board members are experience anything that could be defined as "stopped and hounded".

[liberal japonicus]

Hounded could mean something like this

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/28/jacob-blake-shackled-to-hospital-bed-father-says

Jacob Blake, the 29-year-old who was shot seven times by a Kenosha, Wisconsin, police officer on Sunday, has spent the week shackled to his hospital bed despite being unable to walk and being heavily medicated, his father revealed on Friday.

“There was the cold steel on his ankle. He is shackled to the bed, but he cannot get up, he could not get up, he is paralyzed,” Jacob Blake Sr, father of Jacob Blake Jr, told CNN, describing a hospital visit with his son two days ago.

Shackling someone who is paralyzed from the waist down seems like a definition of hounding.

In case you want other links, here you go
https://www.themarshallproject.org/records/1819-driving-while-black

I recommend this story from there
https://www.themarshallproject.org/2015/07/22/what-you-may-have-missed-in-the-sandra-bland-video

Here's National Geographic (!)
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/04/the-stop-race-police-traffic/

https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/janfeb-2014/driving-while-black/

https://www.pbs.org/black-culture/connect/talk-back/10_rules_of_survival_if_stopped_by_police/

The ACLU, which may be too Marxist for some.
https://www.aclu.org/report/driving-while-black-racial-profiling-our-nations-highways

In that one, hounding is hounding
On a hot summer afternoon in August 1998, 37-year-old U.S. Army Sergeant First Class Rossano V. Gerald and his young son Gregory drove across the Oklahoma border into a nightmare. A career soldier and a highly decorated veteran of Desert Storm and Operation United Shield in Somalia, SFC Gerald, a black man of Panamanian descent, found that he could not travel more than 30 minutes through the state without being stopped twice: first by the Roland City Police Department, and then by the Oklahoma Highway Patrol.

During the second stop, which lasted two-and-half hours, the troopers terrorized SFC Gerald's 12-year-old son with a police dog, placed both father and son in a closed car with the air conditioning off and fans blowing hot air, and warned that the dog would attack if they attempted to escape. Halfway through the episode – perhaps realizing the extent of their lawlessness – the troopers shut off the patrol car's video evidence camera.

And actual research!
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047235207000189
It is therefore important to note that even with the tentative solutions in place and even when viewed through the lens of data collected almost forty years ago, evidence of race-based disproportionality in vehicle stops by police remains.

The paper is behind a paywall, but if anyone is interested in reading it, let me know and I can send a copy to the email address you list in the comments.

The paper also notes that vehicle stops are not always recorded by police, so there may be a number of stops that research cannot see. This does seem like a textbook definition of hounding.

Now ask yourself, do you cast your lot with the Bob Sykes of the world?

[Cleek]

But tyranny

[liberal japonicus]

I thought this was posted here, but I realized it is from my facebook feed

https://www.si.com/college/2020/08/20/barry-wesley-colorado-state-antifa-daily-cover

[russell]

Stopped means stopped. You were driving, a cop pulled you over.

Hounded generally means being subject to any of a variety of intrusive procedures that are not justified by any aspect of your behavior.

Leave the vehicle, body search, search the vehicle, lay on the ground with hands over head whild search the vehicle, all with or without threat of force.

[Girl from the North Country]

In my opinion, hounded also means frequently being stopped, for no apparent reason. I gather we (the UK) are not alone in having a satirical offense "driving while black". For the avoidance of doubt, neither I, nor anybody white I know, has ever been stopped while driving for no apparent reason. I believe this is a very frequent experience for black drivers, here and in the US, even more frequent if the black person is driving an expensive car.

[russell]

Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson talks about police stops.

Thompson is an extremely successful, multiple Grammy winning musician and producer. He produced the "Hamilton" cast album, among a long resume of other achievements as a producer. He is an outstanding drummer, a founding member of the Roots, and appears as a sideman on about a million recordings. He teaches at NYU. He works in hip-hop and R&B, but does not in any way espouse, embody, or project angry "gangsta" bullshit. He's on TV every night, as part (and leader) of the house band on Jimmy Fallon's TV show.

He is a responsible, hard-working, productive, engaged human and American citizen.

He quit driving for many years because he was disturbed by the experience of being pulled over and hassled by cops at gunpoint when he was a kid.

During that time he'd use a driver, and cops would pull his car over and comment about how he was sitting in the back "like a don".

When he got a car again, he got a Scion Xb. Intentionally. He wanted to get the most un-threatening, inoffensive car he could find. Cops pulled him over and told him it looked like he "stole some college kid's car".

So, stuff like that.

I've said here, repeatedly, that black people are treated differently than other people, and not to their advantage. Conservatives here seem to find this impossible to believe or accept, for some reason. Which astounds me.

What country are you living in?

Black people in the United States are treated differently than other people, and not to their advantage. They keep trying to tell us this, and keep asking us to cut it out, but it continues and continues and continues and continues.

And continues.

The proper role of police is to protect and serve the public. Ensure safety, enforce the law, maintain public order.

It's not clear to me how hassling people furthers those goals.

I'm not a blame the cops person, and I'm not an "all cops are bad" person. Not even close.

But policing needs a freaking reset.

[nous]

That SI story from Colorado State does not surprise me in the least. The whole Front Range is a strange contact zone between universities (Laramie, Fort Collins, Boulder, Colorado Springs) and deeply conservative cultures (ranching in the north, military in the south, radicalized evangelicals and libertarian fetishists throughout).

The libertarian streak is the only thing keeping the whole place from more open violence. I think of it as The Pot Peace.

[Girl from the North Country]

That very recent Questlove piece illustrates the problem perfectly. But I followed one of the links, to a satirical bit from John Oliver on the Daily Show in 2013, which made me laugh (while being perfectly relevant):

“If anything, stop-and-frisk doesn’t go far enough,” asserted Williams, who claimed to be reporting from “one of New York’s most crime-ridden neighborhoods.”

No, she wasn’t in East New York or Hunts Point, but rather Wall Street – or, as she called it, “The White Bronx” or “Business Harlem.”

“Frankly, John, I don’t feel safe here. And I would like to see the police do their freaking jobs and start stopping people down here,” she said angrily.

Oliver countered that Williams was unfairly calling for “the arbitrary harassment of anyone on Wall Street.”

But she clarified she was only targeting people likely to be white-collar criminals: “You know, walking around in tailored suits, slicked-back hair, always need sunscreen, if you know what I’m saying.”

“If you don’t want to be associated with white-collar crime, maybe you shouldn’t dress that way,” she added. “It’s OK, I can say that. Some of my best friends are white men in suits.”

As a white man in a suit, Oliver objected to the negative stereotyping of his demographic, but Williams stuck to her assertion that “white-collar crime is disproportionately committed by people who fit a certain profile.”

“If you are, say, a white, Upper East Side billionaire with ties to the financial community like Michael Bloomberg, you just gotta accept getting roughed up by the police every once in a while,” Williams concluded.

[cleek]

Conservatives here seem to find this impossible to believe or accept, for some reason. Which astounds me.

i expect nothing better from them, at this point.

they need to be routed around, rather than fixed.

[cleek]

Germany! thanks for helping me feel better about American C19-hoaxers.

[Hartmut]

We have our fair share of crackpots. A bit more politically diverse maybe*. Our main advantage is that we lack the gun fetish and there is no outcry when the police goes in and confiscates the illegal arsenals of RW extremists and/or organized crime. And although our police has a bad rep (not completely undeserved), it's not for excessive use of firearms.
We are a bit behind the curve on (politically active) RW extremism but, unfortunately, we seem to be closing the gap in that regard. It has to be said that we would be in a better situation, if there was no significant support from extremists in the US and (more recently) Putin's Russia.
It's telling that the RW part of yesterday's demonstration made a stop in front of the Russian embassy to hail Putin.

*a famous author of vegan cookbooks is among the ringleaders.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

"a famous author of vegan cookbooks is among the ringleaders."

I really wish those damned Vegans would just go back to Vega and leave us alone.

And yes, I'm Sirius about this.

[Hartmut]

They can't (despite their Yes Vegan motto) since precession has not progressed far enough to make Vega the polestar again. Their monodirectional launchpad accelerators are installed along the Earth axis inside the hollow Earth (with outlets at the poles only).
Maybe we can persuade them to go to Las Vegans in the meantime to spend a few wooden nickels.

[wj]

Their monodirectional launchpad accelerators are installed along the Earth axis inside the hollow Earth (with outlets at the poles only).

Ah, ha! That's why they're so big on global warming -- to clear the barrel so they can fire themselves off to their next victim.

[liberal japonicus]

Marty, I'm not really wanting to write this comment, but I have to note that it has been two days (not sure how the timestamps are in terms of timezone) since you asked

What does stopped and hounded mean? Then I will answer the question.

I’m wondering if my last line in my 5:51 PM comment was over the top. Bob Sykes, who seems to be an old white guy with a lot of time on his hands, pops over here every 6 months or so, post comments like that and leave. I hope that my last line doesn't end up having you behave in the same way as he does.

If my last line made you feel bad, my apologies, it was not intended to.

[Marty]

lj,

I'm thinking none of the examples provided applied to the guy referenced. I have been pulled over and "hounded" so it matters what that means. A 1998 harassment of a guy and his daughter for 2.5 hours is awful, but not close to a regular occurrence.

russell has said I dont accept that black people are treated differently, that's not quite correct. I pointed out the statistics to question whether black people are treated differently systemically.

But actually I find the discussion requires more nuance than I believe can be achieved here. Over my lifetime there have been lots of new laws on civil rights, and lots of back and forth on policing.

The conversation has turned to, as most things today, you believe blacks are systemically mistreated or its the black peoples fault.

I think the answer is that there are enough anecdotal data points to support the conclusion that there is widespread individual racist profiling incidents among the 700000 law enforcement individuals in this country. These are intermixed with a very small number of deaths that are mostly more questionable than criminal to create a narrative that is fed to black children to create mostly misplaced fear of police generally.

This ultimately creates an atmosphere where every traffic stop is frightening and every interaction with police is considered unwarranted and racially based. Conversely the high percentage of violent crimes concentrated in the black community creates a higher level of fear among law enforcement professionals when engaged with calls in those communities.

Shorter me, you don't legislate that mutual fear out of existence. So the solutions are being looked for in the wrong place.

We have gotten to the place where there is much wider acceptance of the police part in these issues, we need a willing partner in the black community to deescalate the tensions on a broader basis.

In the meantime. police violence in general should be looked at, but that only helps if it is reduced across the board. It can't be racially targeted, that level of nuance in the way police function is impossible to standardize.

But, I suspect a torrent of criticism and name calling on these points which I certainly will not be willing to engage with.

[russell]

hey Marty -

Thanks for your thoughtful reply here. I always appreciate the things you have to say when you go for the long form, although I understand that it's not always convenient.

Regarding this:

I pointed out the statistics to question whether black people are treated differently systemically.

I'm never clear on what is meant by "systematic". So I'm not sure what to say about this.

What I observe is that black people being treated differently happens a hell of a lot, across all kinds of other social categories (wealth, geography, etc.).

By "a hell of a lot" I mean it's more or less ubiquitous. Not that everybody does it, but that somebody or other is probably doing it, anywhere you want to go.

This, I think, is a potentially fruitful point for discussion:

So the solutions are being looked for in the wrong place.

This part I'm less persuaded by:

It can't be racially targeted, that level of nuance in the way police function is impossible to standardize.

If there are policing policies that single out people of color (and there are, and have been), then it seems like policing reforms that are racially targeted are not out of the question.

[Marty]

My understanding russell is there are, at this point, very few if any policing policies that differentiate levels of violence acceptable based on race. So, to reduce violence across the board should be the goal.

If anyone finds an actual policy approving higher levels of violence against blacks, or greater latitude in deciding based on race then they should simply be publicized and revoked.

[John Thullen]

"These are intermixed with a very small number of deaths that are mostly more questionable than criminal to create a narrative that is fed to black children to create mostly misplaced fear of police generally."

"But, I suspect a torrent of criticism and name calling on these points which I certainly will not be willing to engage with."

I'll accept this juxtaposition as acknowledgment that commenting at OBWI is not unlike a series of abusive traffic stops for black citizens across the country and/or any number of abusive trump tweets aimed at the Other, for which you have empathy for the victims.

[russell]

there are, at this point, very few if any policing policies that differentiate levels of violence acceptable based on race.

I'm thinking not so much of policies that differentiate levels of violence by race, but polices that single out particular races for policing in general.

Bloomberg's profiling program is an example.

[Nigel]

Conversely the high percentage of violent crimes concentrated in the black community creates a higher level of fear among law enforcement professionals when engaged with calls in those communities.

Communities like the US diplomatic corps ?

I Was a U.S. Diplomat. Customs and Border Protection Only Cared That I Was Black.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/08/30/black-us-diplomat-customs-border-protection-cbp-detained-harassed-325676

[John Thullen]

https://washingtonmonthly.com/2020/08/28/the-republicans-newest-plan-to-derail-voting-rights/

This is Soviet-quality election theft.

[wj]

Communities like the US diplomatic corps ?

Well, the parts appointed by Trump, yeah. Far more likely to be criminals than the average citizen.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/20/uk/anne-sacoolas-charged-harry-dunn-intl-gbr/index.html

[John Thullen]

Meanwhile, this black-ops subhuman crosses borders and subverts American government policy at will:

https://digbysblog.net/2020/08/what-was-the-matter-with-kushs-background-check/

Can't think why.

[russell]

Also... metro areas with the highest crime rates.

[wj]

Well, since Trump has a Top Secret clearance, how much more damage could Kushner do?

Answer, perhaps, unlike Trump, he actually reads. If so, he would know more stuff he could pass along / spill.

[Marty]

Also - https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2018/crime-in-the-u.s.-2018/topic-pages/tables/table-43

[Nigel]

Thoughtful article about the background to the Rittenhouse shooting, and an illustration of how reality gets distorted.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/08/kyle-rittenhouse-kenosha-and-sheepdog-mentality/615805/
... But the videos themselves are insidious. Most people in the United States, allowing for wild variation in race, class, and education, are victims of violence only very rarely. Watching the videos, however, invites you to simulate violence at an extraordinary rate, much higher than we are mentally equipped to manage. (Correia himself has seen tens of thousands of them, and he posts a new one to his channel about once or twice a day.) The effect of these videos is to habituate viewers to that violence, to train them to imagine themselves in it. Training yourself to imagine something makes it seem more likely to happen, and primes your instincts to react to it—and, I suspect, initiate that violent reaction and overdo it when circumstances could be resolved more peacefully...

[liberal japonicus]

like russell, I appreciate the longer form. I don't know what the fbi line serves to show and I'm not sure what sort of evidence would be needed to have you change your mind about this, the examples in the aclu link seem to me to be exactly what you express has happening to you, which also gives background in how this all arose. Just because it happened to you doesn't negate the fact that it seems to anecdotally happen to African Americans much more often.

Shorter me, you don't legislate that mutual fear out of existence. So the solutions are being looked for in the wrong place.

However, you do prevent poor behavior (and I hope you'd agree that stories like those listed in the aclu link are cops behaving badly) by making the general populace turn against it. If cops were forced to be on better behavior for African Americans, do you believe the cops would then take it out on others? I don't things work that way. A general distaste for that sort of behavior, rather than an assumption that African-Americans represent a criminal element, would be a step in the right direction.

[nous]

Stop broken windows policing. Legalize marijuana. Stop pulling people over for windshield cracks, broken tail lights, and the like and just send notice for those things in the mail. Take away the constant need to find pretexts to stop and search and frisk to drive up arrest metrics and make the department look proactive. If those things go away, so will many of these killings. Also, crime rates will drop in black neighborhoods and the narrative of black criminality will start to fade.

[wj]

Isn't there a law about "inciting to riot"? Sounds like Portland's mayor would like to invoke it.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/514354-trump-fires-back-at-portland-mayor-as-wheeler-blames-trump-for-rise

The Biden campaign is making similar comments.

[russell]

the high percentage of violent crimes concentrated in the black community creates a higher level of fear among law enforcement professionals

I want to push back on this.

Black vs white, or poor vs not poor?

And if poor vs not poor, why are black people disproportionately poor?

The above is for *non-fatal* violent crime, and so does not address disproportions in the murder rate.

The actual number of policemen killed in the line of duty in the US is surprisingly (to me, anyway) low. Not to dismiss the risk of policing, but does the actual risk support the idea of a higher level of fear among cops working in black neighborhoods vs white neighborhoods with similar socio-economic profiles?

The general direction of your comment above seems to be that the perception within the black community that they are treated unfairly by police is out of proportion to the statistical reality.

That may be so. I don't know if the statistical unlikelihood is, or should be, sufficient to dispel a sense of being targeted, but let's say that the perception of risk is greater than the actual risk.

I'll also stipulate your sense that cops have a greater fear of harm working in black communities than in white ones. I don't know if that's so, but I'll stipulate it for the sake of this discussion.

What do we do to walk that back? I mean both sides of this - black people's perception that cops are targeting them, and cop's perception that interacting with the black community is more dangerous than interacting with white communities.

You call for a "willing partner in the black community". What should that person do?

What would that person's counter-party in the law enforcement community do?

Can we also get some willing partners from the white community, to perhaps dispel the notion that black people are a threat to them? Some kind of anti-Karen?

FWIW, I may check out of online discussion for a couple of days. This mess is getting inside my head, and not in a good way, and I may just step away for a bit.

So if you don't hear from me, I'm not ignoring anybody, I'm just taking a holiday from all of it for a bit.

[liberal japonicus]

Here are another list of links that I hope Marty considers when he argues about what 'hounding' means:

https://eji.org/news/south-carolina-civil-forfeiture-disproportionately-targets-black-men/

Black men are targeted the most, the report found. They comprise 13 percent of South Carolina’s population, but make up 65 percent of those targeted for civil forfeiture. White people are twice as likely as Black people to get their money back, the report says.

[...]

Excluding known traffic stops, police in South Carolina (which is 69 percent white) seized money from Black people in two-thirds of all cases compared with one-third for whites, the data analysis shows.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10439460802457578?journalCode=gpas20

In one recent communication with a police detective from a large western city it was argued that different areas in the city are highly segregated by race and that different groups exhibit varying patterns of drug use. One implication that followed from the officer's reasoning was that places known for crack use and sales would be likely to be targeted with heightened policing while areas that are characterised by use and sales of less serious drugs would get reduced attention by law enforcement agents. If so, it may be that African Americans, who according to this police source are more likely to be involved in crack offenses, should face a higher likelihood of coming into contact with police. When linked with the issue of African American economic deprivation, one logical inference follows: where African Americans make up a sizable proportion of the population, per capita forfeiture dollar values should be reduced. This claim does not contradict the recurring finding in the literature that black citizens are disproportionately targeted with arrest.

https://digitalcommons.lasalle.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=ecf_capstones
However, according to the data made available, the Civil Asset Forfeiture program is currently not being used as it was originally intended. Sales and manufacturing trends have barely dropped since 1990 while the Forfeiture Fund value has skyrocketed. The Asset Forfeiture program is inaccurately seizing assets from low level drug offenders and in lower amounts than originally intended; around $192 in some cities (Kelly, 2015, p. 10). The Asset Forfeiture program is also marginalizing and unfairly subjecting racial minorities and lower earning individuals to having their assets seized. Encompassing national traffic data, African
Americans and Hispanics are more likely to be stopped and have their vehicles searched than Caucasians (BJS, 2011). Without addressing the issues at hand, the actual use of the program as well as the subjectivity to racial and lower earning groups will go unchanged.

https://www.splcenter.org/20171030/civil-asset-forfeiture-unfair-undemocratic-and-un-american

https://oklahomawatch.org/2015/10/07/most-police-seizures-of-cash-come-from-blacks-hispanics/

https://www.ij.org/images/pdf_folder/other_pubs/assetforfeituretoemail.pdf

[cleek]

My understanding russell is there are, at this point, very few if any policing policies that differentiate levels of violence acceptable based on race. So, to reduce violence across the board should be the goal.

maybe the problem isn't the policies; maybe the problem is the racists who implement the policies in ways that create racially-disparate outcomes?

[CharlesWT]

The actual number of policemen killed in the line of duty in the US is surprisingly (to me, anyway) low.

Policemen have about the tenth most dangerous job. But, given that their risk is less predictable and manageable, the perception of the level of risk and the resulting stress is likely to be higher than it is for more dangerous jobs.

[Marty]

Maybe

[liberal japonicus]

But, given that their risk is less predictable and manageable, the perception of the level of risk and the resulting stress is likely to be higher than it is for more dangerous jobs.

Gee, I wonder if this could apply to the folks who are having to deal with the police as well?

[cleek]

this probably happens to white people worth $18M all the time.

right?

[cleek]

Policemen have about the tenth most dangerous job.

they can quit, they can take off the uniform. they can walk around in civilian clothes and nobody will treat them like a policeman.

[Hartmut]

Not sure of that cleek. People will recognize him as an ex-cop unless he moves elesewhere and may well take his clothes for a disguise. Not even considering the 'once a cop, always a cop' trope here.

[Donald]

Crooked Timber has been debating “ white privilege”.

https://crookedtimber.org/2020/08/30/white-privilege-and-class-a-reply-to-chris-bertram-by-kenan-malik/#more-47847

[hairshirthedonist]

nous’ suggestion regarding needless traffic stops would reduce the risk of police officers getting hit by cars, which is not at all an uncommon cause of on-duty deaths and serious injuries. (Not to mention that things like broken taillights are more likely for people with less money, who are stressed enough without being pulled over and having their time needlessly wasted.)

[Donald]

Old fashioned racism/ fascism in the Border patrol.

https://twitter.com/DanielLarison/status/1300084409501126661

[wj]

this probably happens to white people worth $18M all the time.

right?

Time was, if you were a non-Italian white driving an expensive car, you were rich and got deference. If you were an Italian in an expensive car you were, presumptively, a Mafioso and treated accordingly.

Today, substitute black (or Hispanic) and rhe behavior is the same. The only difference is, it's easier when you can work off skin color, rather than having to wait until you see a last name.

P.S. the tweet link isn't working.

[Donald]

My tweet link worked for me just now. But here is a direct link to the Politico article that Larison endorsed. It is about racist treatment of an American diplomat.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/08/30/black-us-diplomat-customs-border-protection-cbp-detained-harassed-325676

[wj]

Sorry, Donald. That was a reference to cleek's link at 10:42

[cleek]

P.S. the tweet link isn't working.

how could a <br/> become part of the URL - and where would that come from since the link isn't even at the end of a line?

[cleek]

People will recognize him as an ex-cop unless he moves elesewhere

people who know me as a programmer will recognize me as such, even if i stop doing it.

skin color isn't like that.

in other words: "blue lives matter" is bullshit. there is no "blue" life. it's a job, a career. it's not genetic.

[wj]

In the new year, assuming (please God!) Trump is gone, this should probably by published in every newspaper (and magazine) published rom the Appalachians to the Cascades.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/middle-america-cannot-be-forgotten-unless-it-first-forgets-itself/2020/08/28/ad87e416-e95e-11ea-970a-64c73a1c2392_story.html

Somewhere along the way, we’ve gotten the wrong idea about the middle of America. Worse, the heartland has gotten the wrong idea about itself. Quiet, conservative, flyover country; the place one leaves behind; small-minded, nostalgic, “dying/ With a little patience,” to borrow from T.S. Eliot, born in St. Louis, in a poem that shook the world.

Twentieth-century American art and industry is unimaginable without the fertile ground of the Midwest, the Illinois of Ernest Hemingway and Gwendolyn Brooks, the Minnesota of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Bob Dylan and Prince, the Nebraska of Willa Cather and Johnny Carson, the Iowa of Grant Wood and John Wayne, the Colorado of Damon Runyon and Harold Ross, the Michigan of Henry Ford and Aretha Franklin, the Oklahoma of Will Rogers and Woody Guthrie. This list is just a morsel to suggest the banquet, omitting much more than it includes.
...
[This] is a good time for Middle America to rediscover its true nature: home to genius, incubator of audacity, wellspring of ideas. The heartland cannot be forgotten unless it first forgets itself.

With luck, the "victims" might take it to heart.

[cleek]

but what about the $$?

there's a multi-billion-dollar industry built around selling 'conservatives' the fear that they are set-upon. setting the coastal cities up as the antagonist and making the rest feel like the victim is a big part of the sale.

[Hartmut]

skin color isn't like that.

That is correct but being a cop is a bit more sticky than being a programmer since it is a publicly visible job. Plus, retired cops are a favorite reserve for voter intimidation thugs to be legally deployed (active cops even off-duty ones are banned from that by law).
So, on the one hand people that have bad experiences with cops will be still wary of people that once wore the uniform and on the other an ex-cop may well be worried about becoming a target himself of retaliation (a fear deliberately stoked by the GOP and constantly used as an argument for giving cops anonymity, in particular those that are guilty of abuse).

[hairshirthedonist]

You're still far less recognizable as a cop if you're not wearing a uniform. (Thus the concept of being under cover aka "plain-clothes cop.") The main point being that you don't have to be a cop if it's so f**king bad.

[Girl from the North Country]

This mess is getting inside my head, and not in a good way, and I may just step away for a bit.

These are really hard times for kind, reasonable, humane moderates who try to keep an open mind about the essential decency of most people. Anybody who wants to take a break makes sense to me. I hope it helps.

[CharlesWT]

The main point being that you don't have to be a cop if it's so f**king bad.

More than a few of them shouldn't be given that police combined with firefighters, corrections workers, other protective service occupations have the sixth-highest suicide rate at 31 per 100,000.

[cleek]

i'm liking this guy:

I liken the Republican Party to the subprime mortgage crisis in 2007. How it's going to end is more obvious than how long it will take. The future of the Republican Party is pretty clear. It's California. California was the beating heart of the Republican Party. It was the electoral citadel, and now we're in third place. Not second — third. That's what's going to happen to the Republican Party. It's inevitable.

[wj]

Pretty much what I've been saying here right along. The GOP nationwide is looking to go the way of the California GOP: strong in a few backwaters, but overall irrelevant. And powerless when it comes to government.

In other words, they are on course to achieve the kind of irrelevance that they have been complaining of. No doubt they will fail to recognize it when that reality hits. Let alone their own part in achieving it.