As a follow-up...

[johnny9fingers]

...to luzribeiro's post: talkpolitics.dreamwidth.org/2202094.html

May I present this: twitter.com/hashtag/PoliceBrutalityPandemic

For some time I have opined that the places to put your true-believing-chaps are in the Police, the Armed Forces, and the Media.

So... now the big question; have the true-believers shot their bolt rather prematurely? Have they enough folk in place? OK they now have SCOTUS and POTUS and AG etc but do they have a critical majority in the Police Forces, Army, and on Social Media like FB and Twitter as well as MSM... Oops.

Oh well.

Do folk know just how fucked-up things are about to become?

Will the Don manage to turn this into his own private Kristallnacht? I hope not... but with the media behind him folk had better get organised and prepared.

Comments

[dewline]

Twitter management is actively resisting. Facebook, we're not sure about. Our hosts here on Dreamwidth, based on their performance to date, are with us.

Those letters from serving generals and admirals reasserting that their oaths are to the US Constitution, and not to any specific president, may be a very good warning to the officer corps and the ranks and ratings to be careful what they do.

Do you want a rundown on Canadian media?

[johnny9fingers]

I think your media will be better than the US or UK's in terms of the number of "true-believers" in place; but no doubt, given the demographic breakdown of folk in the media... Canada won't be perfect.

[dewline]

We've had at least two high-profile spankings of cover-providers this past week or so. Rex Murphy got into trouble with a denialist column he wrote for the National Post and Stockwell Day has been motivated to "find the exit door" from his position as a panelist on CBC News Network's Power and Politics show after similar comments on air two days ago.

[mahnmut]

Damn. And I was getting concerned I might start getting the wrong impression from watching too much CNN. It's the Apocalypse knocking at the door if you believe those guys.

[asthfghl]

Why in the world would someone watch CNN...

[mahnmut]

Damned if I know.

[oportet]

It may get slightly worse - but we always move on to something else. Hell, just a week or so ago there was a highly contagious deadly virus going around. C something...Casablanca virus? Nah that'd be racist...

Police reform would be a smart platform to run on, one that many from both sides of the political spectrum see as necessary. As far as I know, Joe still doesn't have a cause. If he needs a cause, he could do worse. He'll likely do worse.

Probably wouldn't work for Don, I see a few ways he could spin this in his favor, but too much of a turn against police could be disastrous. I suspect he'll lay low (by his standards, dont go gettin your hopes up)

[mikeyxw]

Naw, the riots are something we do every five or ten years. The cops at riots are kinda brutal and when you've got a couple hundred thousand of them across all your major cities doing riot duty for a week, you'll get some highlights. These are worse than the recent ones, but if everyone had cell phones during the Rodney King riots, I'm pretty sure those would have looked much worse.

The big difference is that the cops are actually being held accountable these days, which is very new. It will probably mean less police brutality and less aggressive policing. This might have some unintended consequences, after the Freddie Gray riots in Baltimore, the cops were much less aggressive. Ever since, there have been about 100 extra murders per year, earning Baltimore 11th place on the list of the world's most dangerous cities.

[johnny9fingers]

This might have some unintended consequences, after the Freddie Gray riots in Baltimore, the cops were much less aggressive. Ever since, there have been about 100 extra murders per year, earning Baltimore 11th place on the list of the world's most dangerous cities.

Interesting. Any other factors contributing to the stats differences? (I'm assuming the stats are correct here.) If true, barring other correlations, this implies that your police forces can't actually function efficiently without a significant level of random brutality.

I'd suggest that this is indicative of other systemic policing and social problems; on top of the more obvious and immediate racism, obvs.

[mikeyxw]

Here's some analysis:
https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2018/07/12/baltimore-police-not-noticing-crime-after-freddie-gray-wave-killings-followed/744741002/

I know it's USAToday, but it's actually pretty good. They did some research into what seems to be an overlooked topic. Of course there were other factors, a city's murder rate is due to a lot of things, many not related to policing, such as poverty, racism, and unemployment. However, it does seem like a measurable change in policing was followed a few weeks later with a measurable change to the homicide rate. Of course this isn't some kind of scientific proof, that would require this to be repeated in other cities and see if they see the same kind of increase in homicide rates, which would be a bit unethical.

"this implies that your police forces can't actually function efficiently without a significant level of random brutality"

There were some huge problems with corruption in the Baltimore PD that needed to be fixed and random brutality probably is more about poor leadership than anything. That said, groups of young men hanging out on the corner are probably just hanging out but they might be selling drugs. You can leave them be to avoid hassling innocent young men of color or you can hassle them and maybe catch someone dealing drugs. It'd be silly to think there aren't different implications for each approach.

My take is that the pendulum is about to swing back, in the late 80's and early 90's, we had a huge increase in violent crime in the US. That crime bill of 1994 which everyone thinks of as racist these days was supported by the Black Congressional Caucus and passed mostly on party lines, supported by the democrats and opposed by the republicans. This was because people were a lot more concerned about crime and murders than police brutality. These days, crime isn't as bad, at least by US standards, and people are now tired of being hassled by the cops.

[johnny9fingers]

Dealing drugs (or liquor during prohibition) is part of the American dream.

My Irish great uncle was one of Joe Kennedy’s drivers during prohibition. He later ran a bar in Providence. "Dealing drugs" put Kennedy’s son in the WH.

Kennedy’s folk though, were almost white; unlike the Sicilian mobs. And Kennedy’s chaps didn’t get caught as much. There were lots of Irish chaps in the RI, Mass, and NY police forces at the time too. Who’d have thunk it?

[johnny9fingers]

Also, it isn't just me:

https://bylinetimes.com/2020/06/01/is-the-united-states-on-the-brink-of-another-civil-war/

It isn't going to be a civil war; though you guys have been predicting it for a few years - even the comic books and movies - however it could well get very fucked up quickly, and then it becomes more difficult to predict.

You need someone to unite the nation; but I think the Don will find that he prefers a more militarised imposition of his opinions, and most of the heavily-armed private citizens agree with him. As do most of the folk in the armed forces and police forces. Even if, added to his overall supporters' demographic, that totals only 30% of the total population, it's the 30% with all the power and most of the weapons; and backed by most of the wealth.

It has happened before. Can we live with what will be done if it runs the full course?