#NoRightsMatter: US Postal Service, Law Enforcement Team Up To Seize 'Black Lives Matter' Facemasks
from the guaranteed-but-also-fungible-I-guess dept
In this time of coronavirus and social unrest, you’d think the government — at all levels — would engage in a little more care not to make either problem worse. Of course they haven’t. Cops are arresting journalists and tear-gassing peaceful protesters as the President himself calls for domestic military action targeting US citizens. Dystopian fiction writers have been put on notice: the usual shit just isn’t going to sell anymore. The ideas you thought wouldn’t sustain suspension of disbelief are swiftly becoming reality.
Stepping into the breach for reasons it will probably never be able to fully explain is the federal government, using nationwide protests as a reason to suspend as many rights as possible until everyone agrees the government is not an oppressive force — even when personified as a white cop strangling a black man to death by putting his knee on his neck.
Good luck with that. The government needs all the goodwill it can collect. It has apparently failed to realize the importance of harvesting goodwill in difficult times. And when the lawsuit inevitably gets filed, it will have to explain why it chose to do this massively stupid thing. Ryan Reilly reports for the Huffington Post about an apparent First/Fourth Amendment double-punch.
Law enforcement agents have seized hundreds of cloth masks that read “Stop killing Black people” and “Defund police” that a Black Lives Matter-affiliated organization sent to cities around the country to protect demonstrators against the spread of COVID-19, a disease that has had a disparate impact on Black communities.
The Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) spent tens of thousands of dollars on the masks they had planned to send all over the country. The first four boxes, each containing 500 masks, were mailed from Oakland, California, and were destined for Washington, St. Louis, New York City and Minneapolis, where on May 25 a white police officer killed George Floyd, a 46-year-old handcuffed Black man, setting off a wave of protests across the country.
Here’s the original post detailing the apparent seizure of free speech d/b/a protective face masks:
This was multiple levels of fucked up, both in terms of what happened and who was involved. It’s not clear which law enforcement agency seized the masks but it all started with the US Postal Service’s “inspection” unit (USPIS), which apparently flagged the items as somehow illegal and/or dangerous.
The masks Rene Quinonez of Oakland’s Movement Ink created never made it any further than the postal depot. The only thing unusual about the face masks — millions of which have traversed the country unmolested in recent months — were the slogans they bore.
Heads up, government agents: slogans printed on face masks are protected speech. And deciding to make off with a citizen’s personal property because you just don’t like what’s printed on it doesn’t just violate their First Amendment rights. It also violates their Fourth Amendment right to be free of unjustified molestation by the government.
“Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech…” And it hasn’t! Which makes this seizure unlawful. Lot of people who swore to uphold the Constitution are now wandering around acting like rights are privileges that can be completely suspended if stuff starts going sideways. Sure, there’s lots of executive power to throw around and everything Congress has handed itself to use during wartime, but civil unrest across the nation isn’t the bar for the suspension of guaranteed rights.
When anti-government demonstrations are widespread, it’s speech the government doesn’t like that needs the most protection. And here, the government (on a number of levels), has failed.
UPDATE: The federal government — acting incredibly strangely — has now released the masks and refunded Movement Ink’s shipping costs. Sounds like the entities involved were hoping no one would talk about this and are trying to fix things on the sly now that this bullshit has been exposed.
An organizer involved in producing the masks, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said they received a call from a USPIS employee on Friday morning, hours after HuffPost’s initial story on the seizure ran. What was strange about the call, the person said, is that they weren’t the person who mailed the boxes or the point of contact.
The organizer who received the call said the USPIS official said there would be a refund for the cost of express shipping since the boxes wouldn’t be arriving on time, which would have allowed them to be used by protesters on Thursday night and this evening.
All’s well that ends well and all that, I guess. But there’s still a civil rights lawsuit in here and Movement Ink should go after the government for its decision to violate multiple rights just because no one involved was willing to end this unconstitutional process before it could cause any harm.
Filed Under: 1st amendment, 4th amendment, asset seizure, black lives matter, covid-19, face masks, george floyd, law enforcement, seizure, uspis
Companies: movement ink
Comments on “#NoRightsMatter: US Postal Service, Law Enforcement Team Up To Seize 'Black Lives Matter' Facemasks”
Can someone sue the daylights out of them...
…maybe get the funding for a huge second run?
Those government employees probably saved hundreds of lives
Those masks could have been used in demonstrations that Trump might have seen on TV, and God knows what murderous shit he’d have come up with then next.
Morons at the USPS
The USPS needs all the goodwill it can get at the moment. Did it think that this would help it?
Pandering to the people who want to shut the USPS down isn’t going to do much in the long terms. Republicans and Trump have proven themselves to be back-stabbers and unreliable.
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Re: Morons at the USPS
Absolutely. Trump sucks. Antifa is great. I wish I could vote for them. I wish I could vote at all.
Re: Morons at the USPS
AND the USPS has to stand its ground on protections.
Its interesting that there are no federal gencies listed as stopping the package.
It was the Postal inspector.
The Post office isnt part of the Gov. only supported by the gov., While private corps WANT that job.
I asked a person Why cant other services Match how the USPS works? He said it was the Equipment they used to sort the mail…And ?? Why not make the same machines?
You would think a corp could do better. but that arnt.
What the Post office has is Lots of workers that Sort from the beginning to the End, Manually, and machines that do it at major sites. Its like the old Sorting machines used by computers.. You sort abit here, then abit here, and 1 more time and everything is done. The corps dont get it.
Re: Re: Morons at the USPS
Actually what makes the USPS successful but not necessarily profitable is the guarantee of last mile service. Offering last mile service for mail delivery, similar to broadband and other utilities, is not always profitable. But the post was such an essential form of communication that we put it in our constitution. Private competitors do a better, faster job for less money, until it comes to last mile, which just isn’t profitable enough.
Re: Re: Re: Unprofitability
This reminds me a lot of the medications that are needed but only by a small number of patients, therefore the companies don’t profit in producing them or developing them.
And yet, they save lives. It’s a situation in which it actually makes sense to socialize the science, otherwise we end up with folks like Martin Shkreli hiking the price of Thiola because capitalism.
Re: Re: Re: Morons at the USPS
The USPS is profitable, the problem is congress sticking their grubby little fingers in where they do not belong.
Re: Re: Re:2 Morons at the USPS
Actually, the problem with the USPS is that laws passed by Republicans explicitly prevent them from raising prices to cover costs, while they still have to service places deemed unprofitable by other carriers (who use them for last mile delivery anyway).
They’re doing what the government should be doing – covering gaps in access that the private sector refuse to provide – but somehow this us a problem because they don’t turn a profit. Government shouldn’t turn a profit, that’s the whole point of what they do
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Not what it seems
Antifa is behind the masks. While it is correct not to stop free speech, Antifa would like to see America be destroyed. What to do?
Re: Not what it seems
Citation needed
Re: Not what it seems
What kind of crap is this?
Is Antifa the new boogeyman? Lock up your children, Antifa is in town?
It doesn’t matter who is behind the masks, they are a peaceful protest bearing anti-racist slogans. They were also to be donated so it is not even a money generator for whoever was behind them.
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Re: Re: Not what it seems
Right. Antifa is OK. BLM is OK. White people are NOT OK!
Re: Re: Re: "Antifa is OK. BLM is OK. White people are NOT OK!"
Strawman sarcasm?
Re: Re: Re: Not what it seems
Some white people are seriously fucked up for sure.
Re: Re: Re: Not what it seems
If you think that "maybe we should oppose fasicts" and "we should stop murdering black people" are somehow anti-white, might I suggest getting your news from factual sources rather than the white supremacists who have apparently been telling you what to think?
Re: Re: Not what it seems
"Is Antifa the new boogeyman?"
It’s not new, they’re just coming back round to it because they can’t use the Bill Gates conspiracies they’ve been using for the last couple of months to pretend the pandemic is a hoax. It’s handy for them since there’s no real central organisation so they can pretend whatever they want.
Re: Re: Not what it seems
"Is Antifa the new boogeyman? Lock up your children, Antifa is in town?"
"antifa" is not a group as much as it’s a philosophical and political standpoint that Fascism is not OK. Hence their name, derived from "Anti-Fascism". Usually you can see antifans protesting in opposition to white supremacy movements.
Fascists, including naturally white supremacists and other group inclined to worship the concept of jackbooted thuggery, have a problem with antifa. Which is why they’ve kept spinning the "antifa == terrorist" angle until even the Donald noticed it coming up on Breitbart and started parroting propaganda with its origins in white supremacy movements.
If someone mentions antifa as an organization, especially with the implied terrorist angle the odds are good you just found the white supremacist trying to peddle the idea that opposition to fascism should be considered terrorism in and of itself. Or some idiot who got his ideas about reality from a Stormfront echo chamber.
Re: Not what it seems
Assuming everything you said is true.
So what?
All you are really saying is that you don’t believe in rights.
Re: Not what it seems
Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) is antifa?
Re: Re: Not what it seems
Everything RWNJs dislike is now caused, created, orchestrated or performed by antifa. That’s their latest bogeyman. Truth is irrelevant; They want to demonize everything they dislike and declare it as terrorism to justify killing them or at least imprisoning them forever without trial.
November can’t come soon enough.
Re: Re: Re: Not what it seems
I thought it was still the "radical leftists", otherwise known as fairly conservative Democrats?
Re: Re: Re:2 Democracts vs. leftists
The DNC (and by the successful nomination of Biden, its constituents) behave to promote a very conservative status-quo-promoting platform. And even though there are many liberal ideas that are popular, universal health care, for instance, the DNC pushes no means by which to achieve such lofty goals, and so their position runs aligned with their moderate-Republican brethren.
Leftists believe in the Scary AOC agenda. (Ocasio-Cortez outlined the agenda and then Sean Hannity reported it as a scare list. I reproduced it in the second footnote here.) This list is quite radical in comparison to the position held by the US federal government right now. But it mostly echos what some EU nations are doing already that works pretty well, so it’s really just left of center and not particularly radical at all.
To the contrary, radical leftists are looking to dismantle the institutions of the United States. We regard the great experiment as a failure (on the verge of collapse after only ~250 years is not great for a society) though one we learned a lot from. So it just needs a new version and a reboot without the influence of authoritarians and hegemonists.
Radical liberals regard US institutions as not only systemically corrupt, but supporting and abetting the corruption within other institutions, for instance NSA using its massive surveillance network to detect large quantities of cash in private transport and report them to law enforcement so they can intercept and seize it, which is now a common, routine process. (I’m pretty sure — but can’t confirm — when someone is put through an extreme, abusively unreasonable search it’s because they were misflagged.)
Given the Democratic party isn’t willing to engage in the reform necessary to fix a system that (say) allows for excessive force by law enforcement — often leading to the murder of innocents — the radical left see the system needs to be dismantled entirely and rebuilt with a different paradigm, and this will probably take less time than a reformation process.
But it will be bloodier, as officials with power will use that power to defend their privilege to keep it, even at the expense of human lives.
Re: Re: Re:2 Not what it seems
"I thought it was still the "radical leftists", otherwise known as fairly conservative Democrats?"
"AntiFa" is the abbreviation for "anti-fascist". Now consider how that name would fit a liberal leftist and conservative democrat alike. Or any other decent human being, for that matter.
When someone starts bringing up the word "AntiFa" as a bogeyman pot odds are you just stumbled onto one of the Very Fine People desperate to push the narrative that people who are Against Fascism are somehow evil.
Re: Re: Re: Not what it seems
Don’t forget Communist China. ex-Communist but still authoritarian Russia is ok though. Vlad is generous with the petrodollars and golden watering cans…
Re: Re: Not what it seems
"Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) is antifa?"
Antifa meaning the political philosophy of being "anti-fascist"?
Yes, most of Black Lives Matter should be opposed to fascism. That is why white supremacists and actual fascists absolutely HATE Black Lives Matter and Antifa alike.
And that tells us a lot about the people who show up with rhetoric centered around the false assumption that being against fascism is to be "pro-terrorism". As has been found out lately a lot of white supremacy movements, such as Identity Evropa, bona fide neo-nazis, are out there right now trying to provoke more violence by pretending to be angry black men calling for cop killings and looting online.
Inevitable that a few of those would find their way here, I guess.
Re:
[citation needed]
[citation needed]
Three things.
Re: Re: Re:
Yes, ANTI-Facism, moron. Are you against facism? If you are not, then we will smash in your head and burn down your house. Do you love Hitler? We don’t love Hitler, we love each other, and we show that by all dressing in black and working together to End Facism by whatever means required!
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Re: Re: Re:
Ask yourself if you are white. If you are, there is nothing you can do about it. You’re a racist. You should contribute to BLM or suffer the consequences. Now.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
It must be so hard pretending to be a victim all the time.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
Hamilton hasn’t got over how a real Indian got scalped by a fake Indian. He weeps every day over it.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Ignoring the tone of your comment for a moment, I find this bit to be quite telling. You find it repulsive to have to decide between keeping the status quo where black people are killed regularly by the police or changing it so our police are held to a high standard of conduct.
Aren’t Americans always the ones who are supposed to take the principled higher ground? Whose heroes must always take the harder path because it is the right thing to do? Sure it’s easy to just ignore the problem, but it’s the American spirit to make sacrifices for a better tomorrow.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
"Aren’t Americans always the ones who are supposed to take the principled higher ground?"
That was Old America. The one around 1940 when to be an american was to stand against tyranny and, yes, fascists.
This is New America where to be an american, according to all too many, is all about sitting in a basement and whining about black people oppressing white people by demanding equal rights.
Or squawking in hysteric falsetto over the Bad Black Man who cheated white americans by being…elected…as president.
To be an american today, according to those "worthies" is about being centered around the rallying cry of The Great Injustice; "But Obama!"
Dunno about you, but americans appear to have shrunk considerably from when I was a child. And I don’t mean just in the same way as how I remember that ice cream cones seemed a lot larger when I was 7. It’s like they all withered into raisins.
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Re: Re: Re:
Antifa is for antifascism like the patriot act was for patriotism or SESTA was about sex trafficking. Your Orwellian new speak comprehension seems lacking.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
The ad thing is, you’re intelligent enough to know you’re being lied to, but you choose to side with the liars because you deep down agree with the fascists.
Re: Antifa
Antifa is extremist, but it’s also sorted into cells most of which have no agenda beyond crushing fascism. But they are determined to prevent or curb fascist movements and states and organizations that engage in behavior that is fascist or promotes a fascist uprising. This means Antifa is not interested in your right to speech or property or life if you are fascist. It is an Antifa creed that fascism is such a threat to human society that it is worth killing and burning to stop.
They have a lot of historical evidence on which to argue this point, even if some of us thing fascists should be allowed to at least say their piece.
But this means yes, in the US they will attack fascist demonstrations even when they are legal. legality is a grey thing in twenty-first century US. The public generally doesn’t like white supremacists, neo-nazis and white nationalists demonstrating, but the police do, and the police side with them against Antifa commonly when there’s an encounter.
But now that the police have shown most of its colors, it seems expected in hindsight.
Saying Antifa would like to see America be destroyed is a bit of a stretch. Hypothetically, if having to choose between the rise of a fascist, dictatorial United States or a dissolved United States, Antifa would unquestionably choose the latter, especially at the point certain people are being declared unlawful, stripped of rights and detained (as is happening right now).
But, again, hypothetically if it were possible to prevent the US from becoming fascist or to force it (say through reform at swordpoint) toward a system that was no longer fascist, then Antifa would favor that option. They really don’t want to kill everybody who supports a fascist regime if they can simply change the regime they support to one that isn’t fascist.
However…
The United States is openly a police state, now. Law enforcement personnel have been demonstrated by stacks of precedent to be subject to a different set of laws and privileges than the rest of us. They are allowed to engage in violence and murder, often with impunity and with a community that will not check their own or cooperate with outside watchdogs.
Failure to show restraint with the power of force has been observed at all levels of the institution (from the local precincts to the federal departments) and the courts are eager to excuse them if they can do so without looking too suspect.
Law enforcement departments within the US enforce agendas of officers within the departments (sometimes by consensus) and fail to enforce the law of the land.
And they have a long record of escalating violence on minorities and marginalized groups disproportionately.
That sounds like fascism.
At least it is in service of a regime that wants to be Fascist really badly. Trump continues to push to escalate the use of force, and to disregard Blacks (among many groups) as lowlifes and losers to be dominated. So yes, it’s looking like we might exist in a fascist state after all.
In that case, the United States is exactly the sort of target Antifa would (according to its own creed) be justified in razing to the ground, and annihilating to its last defender, so that fascism does not rise and fuel an institution that processes human beings into soot. (They’ll start with trying to work them to death, or expose them to plagues or deporting them into hazardous zones where they’re easily trafficked, but that will become too inefficient. The next step is gunning them down in mass graves, but that’s hard on the executioners. Eventually it will move towards touchless death factories, where no-one has to pull a trigger, or look at faces as they clean them up.)
But they’re not interested in fighting the people of the United States, rather they’d attack US institutions, specifically those that provide infrastructure and support to the militarized law enforcement troopers.
But again, that’s attacking US institutions not attacking its people. In fact, Antifa seeks to support its people, especially those that are routinely scapegoated by the police to establish its order. So yes, Antifa will choose sides in a civil war, but that’s not to say it wants to destroy all of America, just the part that is fascist.
Antifa wants to save America, at least the non-fascist part of the US from the fascism, or from the fascist parts.
Re: Re: Antifa
Antfa has become a right wing scare story and misdirection, or so this report would suggest
Re: Re: Re:
The problem with this scare tactic is simple: Nothing that any militant left-wing group has ever done in the United States matches up to what militant right-wing assholes have done. I’m loathe to say “militant left-wingers have never committed any politically motivated murders” or whatever. But I’m also coming up short on any politically motivated crime done by militant left-wing groups/individuals that exceeds (or even matches) the violence of the Oklahoma City bombing, Eric Rudolph’s serial bombings, or even the occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge by Ammon Bundy and his crew.
And therein lies the rub: The “militant left-wingers” thing is more projection than fact. “Antifa” is less of a threat to the United States than White supremacist and militant right-wing groups. They’re waiting for a race war or a civil war or…well, basically a good excuse to murder their “enemies” in the name of the United States, but without the hassle of going to jail for it.
Re: Re: Re:2 Militant Left Wingers
Antifa isn’t really militant left wing as it is militant anti-right-wing-extremist. But then I give the right wing the benefit of doubt in assuming that only the extremes are anti-pluralist enough to outlaw those that do not fit in by race or religion.
Granted, much of left-wing platform policy comes from taking the principles of equality and liberty and following them to their logical conclusions.
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Re: Re: Re:3 Militant Left Wingers
Right, Logical Consclusions. Just like you said. Equality means that black people have been oppressed, and now white people will be oppressed. Equality means that reparations for black people are reasonable, white people should pay, with 200 years interest. Equality means you should GET DOWN ON YOUR KNEES and pay respect to the MASTERS of America, black people are MORE EQUAL THAN YOU if you’re white and you KNOW IT!
Re: Re: Re:4
Yes, yes, we get it — you’re a racist piece of shit. Got anything new? ????
Re: Re: Re:4 Militant Left Wingers
Shhhhhhh. Adults are talking.
Re: Re: Re:4 Militant Left Wingers
Most leftists (including blacks) that I know or know of aren’t so radical. Nothing about oppressing whites or paying reparations or anything like that.
That said, to the ones who were previously favored in the old regime, moving towards equality may feel like oppression. That’s not because it actually is oppression; it’s just that the disfavored will have more rights than previously but not more rights than the favored, and the favored will have some rights removed than they had before but none that the disfavored did or will have.
Re: Re: Re:4 Militant Left Wingers
" Equality means that black people have been oppressed, and now white people will be oppressed."
Damn son, the fact that a black man became president really left a scar, didn’t it?
"Equality means you should GET DOWN ON YOUR KNEES and pay respect to the MASTERS of America…"
Not the best turn of phrase considering how a white cop "honored" George Floyd by taking a knee…but I guess I expect no better from such a Very Fine Person as yourself than the argument that white cops not murdering black people is tantamount to white people kneeling at the feet of black people.
Let me wager an offhand guess the fact Facebook and Twitter tends not to allow rants like that is your personal evidence of their "anti-conservative bias"?
Re: Re: Re:5 Militant Left Wingers
"Not the best turn of phrase considering how a white cop "honored" George Floyd by taking a knee.."
Remember the position of these guys. Football player chooses to kneel down in the most peaceful and unobtrusive gesture possible? Months of outrage including direct attacks from the president and vice president aiming to get you fired. Kneel on someone in a way that slowly kills them in public view? Full support from the White House.
Re: Re: Re:6 Militant Left Wingers
"Remember the position of these guys."
Oh, yes. I remember many years ago when i actually read scattered copies of the old "Der Stürmer" just to see what could propel a nation to such hatred.
Today when I read the comments entered by the scattered white supremacists around I’m struck how similar they are to the mob Ernst Röhm marched around. And the rhetoric is the exact same, with just a few keywords exchanged.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
And are directly involved in turning some of the current protests violent, to advance their own agenda.
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Re: Re: Antifa
Riiiight. Tell me something, you young idiot, did you fight in WW II, the Big One? I think not. Let me tell you what really happened, and who AntiFa Really Is. I was there. After Stalin and Hitler split up, Hitler had his brown shirts, and Stalin needed his own form of social control via brutality. THAT was AntiFa, it was fucking Stalin’s AntiFa. It was the communists’ response to Hitler’s betray COMMUNISTS! You are defending a Communist organization that brutalized Russians in the name of Stalin while denouncing the Nazis. You are a communist, obviously, and go fuck yourself and your twisted anti-American value system. Just GET THE FUCK OUT OF AMERICA, you and your AntiFa friends.
Re: Re: Re: Antifa
Anyone who states that Stalin was AntiFa have no clue what they are talking about.
If AntiFa existed during WWII in Soviet, Stalin would have rounded them up and shot them as quickly as possible. AntiFa are by their very nature dissidents and if there’s one thing Stalin hated it was dissidents for the simple reason that they could threaten his control of the population.
It’s amazing how dishonest some people can be trying to spread their false narrative.
Re: Re: Re: Antifa
Anti-conservative is not anti-America. America, as a concept, has no ties to whatever the current government is. America is all about righting the wrongs of an oppressive government and returning power to the people. Read up on your American history.
Re: Re: Re:2 Antifa
"Anti-conservative is not anti-America."
True, but antifa means "anti-fascist" not anti-conservative.
The issue comes from that particular AC thinking that fascism and conservative values are one and the same.
Re: Re: Re: My "twisted anti-American value system"
This developed into this which splintered into this.. Now read and don’t stop until you get smart.
And yes, having grown up saying the pledge of allegiance and having been taught about liberty and justice for all I happen to believe in such principles and are really sore that they were all lies (or rather ideals we had no way of achieving, and thought the kids would manage it in their time).
So if, by calling out my twisted anti-American value system you are saying I am against the brutal police state that depends on torture, surveillance and robbing its own people to persist. Guilty as fucking charged.
Re: Re: Re: Antifa
"THAT was AntiFa, it was fucking Stalin’s AntiFa."
So…your argument is that Iosef Vissarionovitch Stalin, the fascist dictator of the soviet union, would have created an…organization of anti-fascists?
What’s next, you prove Hitler travelled through time to set up the Simon Wiesenthal center?
"Just GET THE FUCK OUT OF AMERICA, you and your AntiFa friends."
The call for "anti-fascism" was one of the rallying cries of the US army back in the day. I’m not sure you asking the US army to get the fsck out of the US is all that sane.
But I guess if you’re the kind of guy who wants fascism protected and thinks anyone opposing it is unamerican that already tells us where you’re coming from. And now I suggest you go back to Stormfront where you’ll find your views on anti-fascists shared.
Re: Re: Antifa
What’s amusing is that antifa are far left, and are being called fascist for demanding equal rights and equal treatment, and some people also claim they are also anarchist, who want to impose communism or socialism, which cannot happen without a state to enforce it!
At the same time, a new paranoia is growing over boogaloo, who are mostly just gun enthusiasts who fantasize about civil war and apocalypse scenarios, and using those guns against an oppresive government. And yet they are considered far right.
Kinda seems to me that aside from some of the accelerationist fragments eager for blood, these people probably are just various forms of Libertarians. Both see the government as corrupt, inept, having far more power than it should and ultimately unsustainable. Neither likes the croneyism that we call capitalism. Both want freedom and generally to be left alone by the government. Of course neither group would is comfortable admitting they have anything in common, and will keep making the other into the boogyman.
Re: Re: Re: Antifa
Apparently one of those gun enthusiasts who fantasize about civil war and apocalypse scenarios, and using those guns against an oppresive government. thought it would be a good idea to run over pedestrians with a vehicle, get out of vehicle and shoot pedestrians with a weapon.
Those pedestrians do not look like an oppressive government.
Re: Re: Re: Antifa
"…boogaloo, who are mostly just gun enthusiasts who fantasize about civil war and apocalypse scenarios, and using those guns against an oppresive government. And yet they are considered far right."
Well, yes. Most of the visible boogaloo groups are openly white supremacist or go the full nine yards into neo-nazism.
Between Antifa and Boogaloo I think I’d rather see antifa activists showing up. Heavily armed apocalypse cultists is a lot more intimidating than activists who aren’t usually packing guns and tend to mainly pick on the Very Fine People who are marching down the street singing Die Fahne Hoch.
Re: Not what it seems
Antifa isn’t even an actual organisation. It’s just an umbrella term given to many different groups that have little or nothing to do with each other.
Trump want to designate Antifa a terrorist organisation? Well, good luck with that because "Antifa" as an organization doesn’t exist.
Re: Re: Not what it seems
But when Trump starts a war with ANTIFA, you can bet that anyone who has an opposing view or disagrees with Trump will be claimed to be part of ANTIFA and killed on site with no trial.
This is right after Martial Law starts, and suddenly all those who disagree will be the ‘enemy force’ that he will have the Military eliminate.
You think it couldn’t happen in America, but look around did anyone really see any of this current round of shit coming? If so why didn’t someone try to stop it?
Re: Re: Re: Not what it seems
"But when Trump starts a war with ANTIFA, you can bet that anyone who has an opposing view or disagrees with Trump will be claimed to be part of ANTIFA and killed on site with no trial."
Sadly, I think that’s the point. He pinned everything on being a strong leader and good for the economy, and he has utterly failed. Even when he tried being strong on law and order, he does stupid shit like gassing peaceful protestors for a photo op. So, plan B – he attacks the validity of the postal votes that will inevitably happen due to his incompetence, claims a conspiracy and when people protest he labels them antifa and has them removed.
I hope the US pulls through, but such obvious fascism driven by an idiot who seems to believe Twitter conspiracies and Fox/OANN over his own advisors (who he fires when they expose his ignorance) doesn’t bode well.
Re: Re: Not what it seems
"Antifa isn’t even an actual organisation. It’s just an umbrella term given to many different groups that have little or nothing to do with each other."
Even if it were an organisation, it’s genuinely grass roots like BLM or OWS. Any non-centralised organisation will have genuine disagreements between factions that cannot be easily resolved, because even if group 1 decides violence is the answer and group 2 decries it, the actions of #1 will be used to attack #2. Guilt by association is now enough to destroy you.
This should be what the libertarians and constitutionalists get worried about, because in this situation all Trump has to do is decide that the label is all that matters and you will get your rights removed because someone who claims to be be you is a terrorist. They should be opposed to this on a fundamental level according to their own stated beliefs. Yet, they’re all walking in lockstep behind him.
Re: Not what it seems
Only if Murikkka is a fascist state. Is it ?
Re: Not what it seems
"Antifa is behind the masks. While it is correct not to stop free speech, Antifa would like to see America be destroyed."
Ah, the AntiFa which turned out to mainly be white supremacists from such charming organizations as Identity Evropa who saw the riots as a great way to provoke some violence and blame black people?
Or the "AntiFa" who are the abbreviation for "Anti-fascist" notable members of which historically included the US armed forces?
I’m not sure why you’d think anti-fascists would like to see the US destroyed unless….oohh…
…you’re one of the Very Fine People, aren’t you.
Re: Re: Not what it seems
Have some backup links:
White Supremacists setting up fake ‘antifa’ accounts to encourage violence
White rioters tagging a Starbucks, running away when confronted by peaceful protesters
Cops are slashing everyone’s tires in several locations
White dude smashing windows with his skateboard, stopped by peaceful protesters
Multiple eyewitness reports of white people being the ones smashing things and assultng cops to provoke violence at otherwise-peaceful gatherings
LAPD coaching white girl on how to tag a building with "FTP," "BLM," and "Floyd"
Re: Re: Re: Not what it seems
Thank you. Not that the AC above cares – his position is quite clear, he gives not a single shit about facts, as long as he can vent some hatred.
But everyone else reading this thread might appreciate a few facts.
I am guessing that to a certain segment of the population that being Anti Fascist is a bad thing.
Well, as the person playing the role of president has said, "There are good people on both sides." Never thought that there was ever a good fascist, but we live in interesting times.
Re:
We call them “Republicans” and “Trump voters”.
Re: Re: Re:
"We call them “Republicans” and “Trump voters”."
Or, lately, Very Fine People.
hearsay?
… well, this is just empty hearsay as presented — though the story could be true.
Why so little detail? How can we be confident it’s accurate?
If ‘Rene Quinonez of Movement Ink in Oakland’ openly originated this account as THE first hand source — there should of been a lot more detail.
Did he get his masks back from the local Post Office? A refund?
Did he ever get to talk to a USPIS official? Did he file a formal complaint? did he seek any legal advice?
Re:
Check the update.
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Re: Re: hearsay
Nope — that supposed "update" is even less credible than the original story.
That update cites an anonymous-source phone call to another anonymous-source who somehow got it into internet print somewhere.
Do you see the problem with all this loose, unverifiable rumor on the internet?
Your either for our authoritarianism, or your a traitor.
I wonder what was said to the USPIS person to get them to perform this seizure, and who said it? Then, what was that USPIS agent thinking that this was OK. One would think that inspectors would have a better grasp of the laws than say delivery persons?
However, I suspect that the ‘government’ will claim that it is classified due to their actions being all about putting down an insurrection, and it is need to know, and that the people suing them have no need to know as they were the people putting on the insurrection. It won’t be the first case to find out how heavy handed the government will play this, but I think it might be an important one.
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Re: Your either for our authoritarianism, or your a traitor.
Yeah, I think the government should be defunded, right after the police.
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Now I am gone, killed outside the business of my friend. Killed by lawless rioters. My life doesn’t matter.
murderdoesntmatter if yo’re a rioter
BLMselectivememory
Forgotten on purpose. Mostly peaceful protests have killed a lot of people.
Re:
No, violence that takes place adjacent to peaceful protests have killed people. Learn the difference between a protest and a riot. Also: Cops have killed a hell of a lot of people, but I don’t see you saying shit about that.
Re: Re:
I don’t think you understand the definitions of “peaceful protest” or “lawless rioters”. By definition, a peaceful protest can’t kill anyone. A riot that coincides with a peaceful protest is not actually part of the peaceful protest.
Also, if you were killed, how are you typing?
Re: Re: Re:
"I don’t think you understand the definitions of “peaceful protest” or “lawless rioters”."
I think he does. I also think he doesn’t give much of a shit. After all, his work, above, tells us all we need to know about where he’s coming from. Just one more of the alt-right asshats of the Very Fine People who are incensed that a white cop brutally murdering a peaceful black man caused a riot.
Well of course the masks are "dangerous" – they represent a viewpoint that anyone sympathetic or supportive of the officers who killed George Floyd or otherwise pine for the Confederacy absolutely HATES.
It seems very unwise for the executive in Florida and the White House to attack the First Amendment rights of citizens under the Constitution whilst, at the very same time, reminding citizens of their rights under the Second Amendment.
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Re: Re:
Well, the "executive" has white privilege. Not like the last executive. He was perfect. Clean, articulate, nothing like other black people. I mean the usual black qualities of being dirty just weren’t there, with him. He was one of a kind. Unusual.
Re: Re:
The rightwing base is better armed than the First Amendment supporters. Look for a change in attitude on the part of the executive when large numbers of Blacks start carrying AR-15s (much as California suddenly developed interest in arms control when Black Panthers started open carrying weapons).
Re: Re: Re:
"The rightwing base is better armed than the First Amendment supporters"
Are they, or are they just more likely to use them as penis compensation tools in public compared to those who only use them when peaceful rights have been denied? I see a lot of stuff from "leftists" to suggest they’re not necessarily worse armed, they’re just less likely to wave them around while they go shopping.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
This ^
I’m prepared to deal with morons driving around neighborhoods in pickups flying the union jack and shooting anything or anyone whose skin is less white than their own. Or police who finally step into full-on military-style suppression mode. Are you? (question aimed at everyone, not PaulT specifically)
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
"Union Jack", huh?
It’s a good thing you’re too stupid to be a serious threat to real Americans.
Game Ever More Lost
"…a white cop strangling a black man to death by putting his knee on his neck."
I know this what Mr. Floyd hollered out. I entirely accept the propositions than ex-officer Chauvin’s (still trying to wrap my head around the irony in THAT name in THIS context) actions were the precipitating cause of Mr. Floyd’s dead. However, I doubt Chauvin’s conviction much less incarceration. The cop powers-that-be (officials and unions) have already begun laying the groundwork by looking for underlying medical conditions, drug use that might compromise health, etc. Then comes the unfortunate choice of journalists and protesters of focusing on the expression, "I can’t breathe." Anyone who is able recite "I can’t breathe" and utter other pleas for help CAN breathe. The outflow of air required to make the statement demonstrates the effective expiration of the lungs. The capacity to repeat these pleas verifies effective inspiration. Possibly, Mr. Floyd was struggling effectively to breathe, employing the last of fading strength for a few minutes, but later succumbed to the pressure of Chauvin’s weight. Chauvin’s defense will still play the card, "People who can’t breathe don’t continue to speak for minutes."
Thus, far, only the medical examiner has autopsied Mr. Floyd’s body, and he reported no signs of an impaired airway. I suspect that’s accurate, but he has shown no interest in further examinations to find the true cause of death. He has not speculated how the knee-on-neck hold might have progressively fatally impaired breathing without leaving obvious signs. The ME has simply latched onto "I can’t breath" and certified there’s no indication of an obstructed airway. Every day the autopsy goes unextended and people clench "I can’t breathe" to their chests, the defense of Chauvin and his gang moves further toward their goal line. By failing to demand credible, complete, medical explanations and conclusions as to of the cause of death, the public gives the defense what they need to excuse yet another murderously, vicious cop and cronies.
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Re: Game Ever More Lost
Yeah, and those cops who died the last few days had it COMING! ALL OF ‘EM. Cops are VICIOUS and MURDEROUS and we are PEACEFUL and BLACK and if you don’t agree we will LOOT and BURN and SHOOT and STAB everyone and THEN YOU WILL UNDERSTAND what it feels like to be BLACK in America.
Re: Re:
[citation needed, you racist prick]
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
Racist = the prime anti-White slur.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
"Racist = the prime anti-White slur."
…except that it’s somehow never applied to more than 90% of all white people.
…and except that "racist" is a descriptor, not a slur. No matter how much you want to claim that you calling a black man the N-word is about as offensive as you later on being called a "racist" because of it that’s NOT how it works
Did you have anything to bring to the debate other than outing yourself as someone who’d very much like to get to keep thinking and treating black people as if they were still bought and sold?
Re: Re: Game Ever More Lost
I’m sorry, but you seem to be assuming that everyone is either pro-BLM, for killing cops, and pro-rioting or none of those things. The majority of the people in the majority of the protests have been peaceful, but while I understand the rioters’ frustrations, I don’t condone their behavior. I also don’t support killing cops because of the incident, though I do understand why people may do so. I support BLM, but not every cop should be painted with the same brush.
Re: Re: Re: Game Ever More Lost
If you have an encounter with a policeman you have no way to predict whether it will go well or horribly wrong. Are you willing to take that chance? I know I’m not.
Paint them all with exactly the same brush until police brutality becomes an extremely rare event and carries extreme punishment for the cop.
Re: Re: Re:2 Game Ever More Lost
I don’t believe the members of any group should all be painted with the same brush, period.
I’m not saying that many cops aren’t bad cops or that the far too many not-so-bad cops’ failing to do anything about the bad ones is excusable (at least not per se). I’m not saying either way about how many cops fall into each category (I don’t have any statistics to say anything on that). However, I know that there are at least some cops who fall into neither category and are genuinely good cops. Maybe they’re the exception and not the rule, but that doesn’t mean they don’t matter or don’t exist.
As for caution, I am fairly cautious when talking to anyone I don’t know in-person or on the phone, especially when they have a gun, and honestly, when it comes to dealing with authority, as long as there’s a non-zero chance of it coming back to bite me, I’ll keep silent as any lawyer would advise. I will still obey any lawful order, of course.
I’m not saying that everyone does or should feel the same as me. So long as you have a reasonable basis for your opinion and it’s not dangerous, I’m okay with others’ disagreement. My point in bringing up my opinion here was to add nuance, not to persuade anyone to agree with me.
Re: Re: Re:3 Game Ever More Lost
The reason you are getting push back to your statement is more to with how others have used similar rhetoric to dismiss the BLM movement. We keep hearing things like "not all cops" and "a few bad apples" as a means to argue against any change.
If there were police officers speaking out against the problems in their own departments that would be one thing, but if they are all going to stand together, then of course they are going to be painted with the same brush. It’s not that they don’t matter – it’s that they don’t make a difference. It’s the system that is killing people, and so it’s the system that is being painted. If the bad apples had been pruned decades ago, we wouldn’t be having this current outcry, and good cops wouldn’t be dealing with the danger they now have to. Blame the bad cops, the bad chiefs, and the bad unions who support them for the situation that good cops are currently in. The protests are merely a symptom of the rot that no one in power has felt like dealing all this time.
Re: Re: Re:4 Game Ever More Lost
For the record, I 100% agree. I do find it unfortunate that “not all cops” is being used to defend the system, as opposed to individuals or to argue against all individuals being painted the same, but I totally understand why that is.
I condemn the riots as actions, not necessarily the people doing them. I blame the bad cops, bad chiefs, bad unions, and the interlopers who provoke riots for the situation.
Re: Re: Re:5 Game Ever More Lost
"I condemn the riots as actions, not necessarily the people doing them. I blame the bad cops, bad chiefs, bad unions, and the interlopers who provoke riots for the situation."
There was a commenter around here who put it very well. He condemned the riots, the loss of life, the upheaval. and then said "And it’s all on US".
The people currently complaining about the riots are the same "peaceful" community who have quietly and steadfastly allowed or often encouraged the police unions and opportunistic politicians to turn the police – who are the watchdogs of the community into a pack of rabid animals biting people at random.
If your dog bites someone, who gets to pay? You do.
The community whose police has gone murderous and thuggish gets to pay for their police going murderous and thuggish. It’s their dog. Their agency. Their employees. Paid for with their money.
And communities have been informed for well over half a century or more that their dog has been out biting people to death. The current riots? Yeah, that’s what happens when instead of disciplining that dog you defend it.
Re: Re: Re: Game Ever More Lost
"while I understand the rioters’ frustrations, I don’t condone their behavior"
Also, you have to remember that quite often when these things devolve into rioting, it’s because of things that happen on the ground, not something they set out to do. Outside agitators, or a badly managed police response, seem to be a common theme in things that turn that way. Sure, those who turn up to riot deserve scorn, but if the riot is in response to peaceful protests being met with beating, rubber bullets and tear gas, it’s not hard to see why things turn that way.
"I support BLM, but not every cop should be painted with the same brush."
Yes, but the question is – where is the line. The reason why things have got to where they are is not because the "bad cops" do the things they do, but that the other cops in the system try to protect them from consequences.
Re: Re: Re:2 The other cops protect bad cops
Also district attorneys and judges like to protect bad cops. It’s really not just law enforcement that are bad but the entire system.
It doesn’t help that I can point at the Federalist Five in SCOTUS, all of whom have pushed precedents to diminish rights against unreasonable persecution by law enforcement, and all of whom will toe the Federalist Society line on command.
Re: Re: Re:2 Game Ever More Lost
Oh, absolutely! No arguments here!
The line is that, at some point, there’s clearly a systemic issue, as it is here. I still don’t judge all cops the same way, but I do judge many of the departments, the current state of the law, hesitant prosecutors, and bias from many jurors and some judges, as well as the bad actors themselves.
Re: Re: Re:3 Game Ever More Lost
"The line is that, at some point, there’s clearly a systemic issue, as it is here."
If you’re at Auschwitz and the system tells you to support what’s going on and you don’t speak up even though you disagree, you’re still going to have a problem at Nuremberg.
There is absolutely a systemic issue, but you have to be a special kind of stupid to sign up to join that system and expect to not be judged by that standard if you follow those rules. I have sympathy for military guys who sign up to fight in a just war and end up defending Exxon’s profits instead, as they didn’t choose where to deploy. But, a cop who signed up under the system that been well documented in their own city? No excuses, unless they intended to help fix the system. In which case, they don’t defend murderers.
If I’m reading the story correctly, two of the guys standing around watching Floyd’s slow murder were rookies, and they didn’t speak up. They’re accomplices who signed on for this.
Re: Re: Game Ever More Lost
"Cops are VICIOUS and MURDEROUS and we are PEACEFUL and BLACK…"
You do realize the game is up? The fact that white supremacists are out in force doing their damndest to pretend to being angry black men online to get more violence running has already been revealed.
I mean, I always knew that racists are a bit slow on the uptake, but you’re going beyond "pathetic" territory fast.
Re: Game Ever More Lost
The full report from the medical examiner had been out for three days by the time you wrote this comment. Thanks for explaining how little you care.
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Chris, Antifa Fight Instructor: “If you get a good liver or kidney shot, it’s pretty much crippling them. They’re going to be doubled over and in a lot of pain. If you break one of the floating ribs, which are small and right down here. Those are also very painful, it’s hard to move after that, to catch a breath. So, one good body shot could potentially give you all the time in the world to run away while they’re doubled over in pain, or really put a beating on them after that if you really want to make it personal.”
Chris, Antifa Fight Instructor: “We just kind of wanted to, in this space, reframe the idea of self-defense as not simply, you’re being acted upon by an aggressor. But it’s kind of a decision you make to fight back. In a lot of ways to say, I am human, and I occupy this space and I will not be f**ked with.”
Chris, Antifa Fight Instructor: “Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, if that doesn’t knock them out, then yeah. The nose, the eyes, poke the eyes… Absolutely.”
Chris, Antifa Fight Instructor: “We call this a safe space to practice aggression. Not aggression against one another, but really just a space that, if you want to or if you want to challenge yourself, to kind of work on harnessing that kind of energy.”
Attorney General William Barr said Thursay: “There are extremist agitators who are hijacking the protests to pursue their own separate and violent agenda.”
No shit, Sherlock.
Re: Re:
And the correct label for them is fascists, who are taking an opportunity to bring trouble to those they hate.
Re: Re:
If there is a Chris, and if he said these things (we just have to take your word for it, as you cite no sources) I dont see how that leads to a conclusion that "there are agitators who are hijacking the protests…" and even less of an implication that those agitators are antifa.
Your thesis seems to be if someone says something violent, they are guilty of such interference, if you feel that way (I don’t) then I recommend you visit https://www.plainviewproject.org/ to view what police officers have been saying, perhaps some of them have a "violent agenda"?
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Re: Re: Re:
https://www.projectveritas.com/news/breaking-new-york-antifa-members-train-for-violence-so-if-that-doesnt-knock/
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Are you really citing Project Veritas as a reputable source? Hahahaha…
Perhaps learn some critical thinking and reject the lies and half.truths you are being spoon-fed by site like Project Veritas.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
project veritas is not a valid or trustworthy news source
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Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
Neither are you.
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
nor are they trying to be
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
No.. you!
Strange how people who try to pretend that PV are a factual source resort to playground games when challenged to back them up. Almost as if they secretly know the truth….
Re: Re: Re: Re:
That’s cool.
Do you have any factual information to offer? Known fraudsters are not reliable sources.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
All the PV article does is quote those points in the above comment, no sources and frankly no comments about them. It’s basically no substance – and that’s before I take into account that PV is a laughable source based on its reputation.
That being said, these quotes are hardly damning. Reading through them they seem extremely familiar – from self-defense seminars. Almost every single self-defense talk I’ve witnessed has pointed out that the kidneys and eyes are weak spots that should be targeted, most also include the groin. The first quoted point even says that the goal is to give the defender time to escape. Sure it also mentions it can be used to deliver more pain to the attacker, but AntiFa is not a peaceful ideology. Utilizing anger or fear to fight back is common in these seminars as well – emotions can affect physical performance, adrenaline makes you stronger and faster when needed.
Are these points more aggressive than most self-defense seminars? Sure, we all know AntiFa isn’t a friendly book club. But it’s not some smoking gun that you seem to think it is.
Re: Re:
So, this mythical Chris, who exists nowhere but in the imagination of the white supremacist eager to invent a fictional terrorist organization out of…anti-fascists…?
No one’s going to believe the increasingly obvious white supremacist when he starts saying that the mob of anti-fascists who tend to show up and disturb white supremacy marches are somehow "un-american terrorists".
Except, of course, fascists, and the Very Fine People. Important stuff needs saying twice, after all.
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Can you, the bastion of truthfulness, please start telling the truth? George Floyd was not strangled to death by a cop’s knee on his neck. No human has ever been strangled by pressure on the back of the neck absent an opposing object on the front — our anatomy doesn’t work that way. The way Chauvin’s knee was placed would not result in strangulation – it was more likely to result in a broken neck than strangulation.
George Floyd was killed by being forced into heart failure, not strangulation. That is a very different thing and leads to a very different image, which in turn leads to a very different dialog. You inflame the rhetoric when you repeat this falsehood that he was strangled. There is no good which comes from inflaming the rhetoric, because all that happens is denial that strangulation didn’t happen, so all the other tactics were fine.
They were not.
The overall incident was wrongly executed, and if you don’t get people to focus on THAT, nothing of any meaning will change. Just saying ‘don’t strangle people’ means they are still going to get dragged out of their cars without proper cause just because they’re black. It means that there will still be disparity in the application of law, but gee, we won’t use chokeholds anymore.
And no, that isn’t a start. The start is looking at the cause, not the effect and changing THAT.
Focusing solely on the end is incomplete, justifies the narrative whereby it is acceptable to commit OTHER crimes in the name of ‘justice’ and doesn’t actually focus on where the real problem lies — attitudes and inherent thinking, poor training and the militarization of the group of people who are supposed to be focused on protecting the rights of those who do NOT have a gun and badge so we can all live peaceably.
It is awful that Mr. Floyd is dead, but mis-reporting how he died to sound sympathetic or outraged or whatever is driving that behavior doesn’t help the situation, it only hurts. Saying he died of heart failure doesn’t diminish his death or blame him. He was killed. That’s fine to say, but don’t keep promoting this image of a white man with his hands around a black man’s throat. It’s disingenuous.
Re: Re:
Choking someone is one definition of strangulation, but the definition of strangulation also contains ‘to obstruct seriously or fatally stifle the normal breathing’ – which what was happened.
So I’m afraid your indignation is based on your misunderstanding of the definition for strangulation.
Re:
Of all the things to be concerned about with this entire situation, you’re saying that semantics over what to call a cop kneeling on a man’s neck for nine minutes — long enough to unequivocally cause that man’s death — is something we should be caring about? Seriously, you sound like the kind of person who would go “Tamir Rice was killed by massive blood loss and catastrophic organ failure after several bullets somehow penetrated his body”.
You’re playing the game that cops and district attorneys and medical examiners play all the time. It’s called “find a way to say this that clears the cop(s)”. Worry far less about the way we refer to how George Floyd died and worry far fucking more about the fact that a cop murdered George Floyd with an unapproved chokehold for the crime of being accused of using a counterfeit $20 bill (possibly without knowing it was fake). Unless, of course, you like the taste of leather on your tongue.
Re: Re: Re:
He has one point:
Whether the cause of death was the windpipe or the carotid artery is meaningless. The man would not be dead without the cop kneeling on his neck. But what brought that on is an important point, and getting to that nitty gritty won’t be easy. We can point to the police administrators that don’t hold their officers accountable, we can point to the police unions that keep bad officers on the force, we can point to theoretically ‘good’ officers who should stop bad officers from doing bad things but don’t, we can point to the supposed ‘law and order’ prosecutors who don’t manage to get convictions on officers who finally get charged with crimes, and etc.. We could go on and on. But what is the root cause?
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
The quality of life of a Chinese peasant is better than ours. The
Chinese have free and adequate health care, a meaningful political education,
productive work, a place to live, something to eat and each has a sense of her
or himself as part of a whole people’s shared historical purpose. We may eat
more and have more access to gadgets, but we are constantly driven by
competition, insecurity, uncertainty and fear. Work is wasteful and
meaningless and other people are frightening and. hateful. This is no way to
live.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
"The quality of life of a Chinese peasant is better than ours. "
A bit subjective, but ok – whatever floats your boat.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
"The Chinese have free and adequate health care, a meaningful political education, productive work, a place to live, something to eat and each has a sense of her or himself as part of a whole people’s shared historical purpose."
And when the peasant questions authority the peasant goes to jail for five years and ends up becoming an undesirable.
That’s not exactly ideal either. At least in the US you can criticize Trump for being an asshat without being disappeared.
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
I have no idea who Bill Ayers is, but he seems to be the new bogeyman for Hamilton alongside Obama. Hamilton also seems to have picked up a strange formatting method where he has inexplicable line breaks. You know… just in case he wasn’t already easily identifiable with the other tells.
Re: Re: Re:4 Re:
"I have no idea who Bill Ayers is, but he seems to be the new bogeyman for Hamilton alongside Obama."
After the hundreds of posts where Baghdad Bob/Hamilton has tried to blame The Bad Black Man for everything from littering to, eating your children, and confuisingly, garbage disposal, he may finally have realized that just shouting "But Obama!" in hysterical falsetto isn’t selling the argument well.
So now his "But Obama!" sometimes comes with garnish and a side salad. I’m guessing it must be an acquired taste.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
And if you think being Chinese means that you’re free of competition, insecurity, uncertainty and fear, I don’t know what the fuck you’re smoking.
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
"And if you think being Chinese means that you’re free of competition, insecurity, uncertainty and fear, I don’t know what the fuck you’re smoking."
Arguably China is more capitalist than the US. Competition is cutthroat in a way you wouldn’t easily find outside of a well-choreographed battle from one of the "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies.
If you think that peasant has it easy you aren’t smoking anything. You’re shooting really hard drugs.
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Not when it is a metaphor for how society treats treats black people.
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It’s telling when someone is more offended by the image of innocent people being murdered than they are by innocents being murdered… and yes, a man who is murdered without being afforded due process is murdered. Judge Dredd was a satire, not a goal.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Funnily enough(though not the good kind of funny) Judge Dredd is also vastly better than the current crop of cops in the US, because while both can kill you Dredd at least wouldn’t do it simply because he can and/or because he doesn’t like you.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
True. Cops have become violent and unpredictable. Whatever situation I find myself in I am unlikely to ever call in the police and just deal with my situation myself. Police will only make the situation worse.
And if they’re that useless, why are we paying for them? We should abolish police and replace them with a wholly new department. Let’s call it the Community Support Department. Staff it with people who are properly trained in deescalation, social intervention and non-fatal subduction techniques. Arm them only with batons and leave guns back at the office as a last resort. Require every one of them to wear a body camera and impose steep penalties for "forgetting" to turn the camera on when interfacing with the public. Legally prevent them from having any protections that the general public does not also have thus exposing them to lawsuits and charges for wrongdoing. Hold them 100% accountable. Pay them well but don’t coddle them.
sigh A man can dream, I guess…
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
You do realise that what you’re describing is the police in many other countries, right?
That’s the issue. While cops elsewhere are trained in such things, cops in the US are taught to fear everything around them and overreact with deadly force using hardware most armies don’t even have.
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Wait… wasn’t he on the ground? Wouldn’t that be an opposing object on the front?
Movement Ink needs to get a huge shark lawyer to go after these people.
Drag them through the courts. earn millions. give it to black lives charities which the government HATES with a passion, and wishes all black people would just lie down and die like good little slaves
To Citizens Wearing Medical Masks: You're Whacko Conspiracy Theo
To Citizens Wearing Medical Masks: You’re Whacko Conspiracy Theorists https://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/op-ed-citizens-wearing-medical-masks-youre-whacko-conspiracy-theorists Mask wearers of the world, take them off–you have nothing to lose but your insanity…
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Your boy Trump lost. Get over it.