[News] Protests Against Police Violence After Death of George Floyd

Discuss police violence, the victims of police violence (including George Floyd and Breonna Taylor), the Black-led protests against said violence, and related topics.

staygold wrote:
SallyNasty wrote:

Here is a list of breweries.

The Breweries link doesn't seem to be directing to the correct place :(

Weird! Fixed now.

JLS wrote:
trichy wrote:
farley3k wrote:

Look another person who will be looking for a job soon

Mark Esper says he doesn't support using active duty troops to quell protests, directly contradicting Trump

"The option to use active duty forces in a law enforcement role should only be used as a matter of last resort, and only in the most urgent and dire of situations. We are not in one of those situations now. I do not support invoking the Insurrection Act," he said during a briefing at the Pentagon.

The interesting pathetic think will be seeing how trumpists spin this. They can't love the military and trump it would seem. I bet they stop supporting the military.

It's worth noting that Trump has actually accomplished something I thought was 100% impossible: he's lost majority support in the military. The military has been a republican bastion for as long as I can remember, so the realization that he's slipping there is a sign that the last few months have been REALLY rough on his image.

What struck me from the article is how unpopular he is with officers, who historically are very republican.

Trump is far more popular with enlisted service members than with officers. Among the enlisted force, the recent survey showed a 43 percent favorable rating. For officers, however, only one-third responded with a positive view.

Officers are trained to see the benefits of chain of command and stability of leadership. Trump undermines that daily, and makes their job harder. The issue is, that is a temporary condition. As we transition to a full on fascist state, and loyalists are installed, chain of command and some stability will return. But that just makes undoing the fascist state harder.

As for Esper, he could either be on his way out, or he is just doing his part in distributing misinformation and propaganda. Suddenly we think we have the military, and move attention elsewhere. Mixed messages are an essential aspect of fascism. It means that no matter what they do, they can claim they are being consistent.

I hope this goes the way it should....if it doesn’t, the riots are going to intensify.

CNN wrote:

The Minnesota Attorney General's office has finished its initial review of evidence in the investigation of four former Minneapolis Police officers involved in the killing of George Floyd and has rendered a decision regarding additional charges, two law enforcement officials briefed on the state's investigation told CNN.

Hey, if you weren't scared enough already, the Washington Post reports:

“I’ve seen this kind of violence,” said Gail Helt, a former CIA analyst responsible for tracking developments in China and Southeast Asia. “This is what autocrats do. This is what happens in countries before a collapse. It really does unnerve me.”

I just saw the graphic photos of the peaceful protester - 59 year old Leslie Furcron - who was shot between the eyes with a plastic bullet. The bullet lodged and knocked her to the ground where she lay bleeding. She was hospitalized and placed in a medically induced coma. She may lose an eye.

This militant force against peaceful protesters surely needs to be reigned in by someone in authority. It cannot continue. It should never have began. What the actual #%&@!

(Mostly outrage. Mostly rant. Sorry.)

Here's a refreshingly positive image from a group in Greensboro, NC.

Some wag commented, "Who says the protesters aren't bringing guns!"

(That fellow is rather well-muscled. :D)

Also, his T-shirt says "Dad - the toughest job you'll ever love"... and he makes it look good!

Also also, a lot of people were complaining "COVID! COVID!" and they have a point, but it's still a touching image.

IMAGE(https://i.redd.it/7fu4sertzo251.jpg)

It looks like either cops are removing ID and insignia or the White House just hired mercenaries.

Paleocon wrote:

It looks like either cops are removing ID and insignia or the White House just hired mercenaries.

Well that's concerning...

Progress?

CNN wrote:

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison is increasing charges against former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin to second-degree murder in George Floyd's killing and also charging the other three officers involved in the incident, according to a tweet from US Sen. Amy Klobuchar. Ellison's official announcement is expected to come Wednesday afternoon...

RnRClown wrote:

I just saw the graphic photos of the peaceful protester - 59 year old Leslie Furcron - who was shot between the eyes with a plastic bullet. The bullet lodged and knocked her to the ground where she lay bleeding. She was hospitalized and placed in a medically induced coma. She may lose an eye.

This militant force against peaceful protesters surely needs to be reigned in by someone in authority. It cannot continue. It should never have began. What the actual #%&@!

(Mostly outrage. Mostly rant. Sorry.)

Deliberately shooting protestors in the eyes with rubber bullets was a practice taken up by Chilean police, and it's spread globally since then. It's usually non-lethal but maiming and can easily be brushed off as an unfortunate accident.

What kind of training are police getting? "Warrior" training. And the police unions are making sure that reforms are fought tooth and nail.

BuzzFeed wrote:

More than a year before a Minneapolis police officer, Derek Chauvin, pinned George Floyd to the ground in a knee chokehold, Mayor Jacob Frey banned “warrior” training for the city’s police force.

Private trainers across the country host seminars, frequently at taxpayer expense, teaching “killology” and pushing the notion that if officers aren’t willing to “snuff out a life” then they should “consider another line of work.” Frey explained that this type of training — which has accompanied the increasing militarization of the police over the last few decades — undermined the community-based policing he wanted the city to adopt after a string of high-profile killings in the region.

But then the police union stepped in.

The Police Officers Federation of Minneapolis worked out a deal with a company to offer warrior training. For free. For as long as Frey was mayor.

Hey Clock, I know we're both playing through Spider-Man right now. Just reached the part where NYC mayor hires the mercenaries. This is getting eerie as hell. Felt a weird tingle up my spine.

The similarities to fiction is staggering.

White house uses MLK to push peaceful protests

I mean really? Didn't they order the attack on peaceful protesters yesterday for a photo op?

Vector wrote:

Hey Clock, I know we're both playing through Spider-Man right now. Just reached the part where NYC mayor hires the mercenaries. This is getting eerie as hell. Felt a weird tingle up my spine.

The similarities to fiction is staggering.

Yeah, it got to be a bit much for me. I've switched over to Xenoblade for the time being, but I won't rule out the possibility of an existential invasion by sentient machines by the end of 2020 to make that game also feel too real.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
RnRClown wrote:

I just saw the graphic photos of the peaceful protester - 59 year old Leslie Furcron - who was shot between the eyes with a plastic bullet. The bullet lodged and knocked her to the ground where she lay bleeding. She was hospitalized and placed in a medically induced coma. She may lose an eye.

This militant force against peaceful protesters surely needs to be reigned in by someone in authority. It cannot continue. It should never have began. What the actual #%&@!

(Mostly outrage. Mostly rant. Sorry.)

Deliberately shooting protestors in the eyes with rubber bullets was a practice taken up by Chilean police, and it's spread globally since then. It's usually non-lethal but maiming and can easily be brushed off as an unfortunate accident.

Being completely pedantic, it dates back to the 70s' in Northern Ireland. The British developed the weapon and handed it over to the RUC. The RUC would have had some parallels with modern day US police forces (heavily militarised and not exactly evenhanded).

Of course, it's been disbanded now and has been reformed with huge over sight into the PSNI. The PSNI is viewed so favourably on this Island that the current Garda Commissioner is Drew Harris who was the Deputy Chief Constable of the PSNI and is the first non-Irish citizen to hold the role.

Curious, RnRClown you're up in Belfast? What's the general consensus on the RUC to PSNI reforms been like. We down here in Dublin tend to few have a favourable view and I don't see a lot to abuse myself of that notion. But always good to hear even anecdotes to add context. On a wider front, it seems those reforms are a template for what has to happen in quite a number of US states.

Axon wrote:

Being completely pedantic, it dates back to the 70s' in Northern Ireland. The British developed the weapon and handed it over to the RUC. The RUC would have had some parallels with modern day US police forces (heavily militarised and not exactly evenhanded).

Thanks for the info! I didn't realize that rubber bullets were meant to be shot at the ground in front of protestors. I had heard about Chilean forces deliberately aiming at protestors' heads to try to blind them, but it sounds like that was happening in Northern Ireland, as well.

Yeah- Trump isn't going to like that it doesn't state, "answers to Trump" anywhere on it and there are multiple instances where it states the exact opposite.

Charges-

(CNN)The former Minneapolis Police officer who pressed his knee into George Floyd's neck was charged with second-degree murder and the three other officers on scene during his killing were charged with aiding and abetting, according to court documents.

Now they need to stick....

Paleocon wrote:

It looks like either cops are removing ID and insignia or the White House just hired mercenaries.

Reading down that thread, it appears they are Bureau of Prisons Disturbance Control Team members. I seriously doubt they have any authority to police DC streets, but Barr has been given carte blanche, so he’s gonna toss whoever he wants out there with guns and riot gear.

Any day now we’re going to see the Trump Youth parading around out there.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, not Secretary of Defense. Technically the highest-ranking officer in the US military and appointed from those ranks. So Trump would need to at least find a toady with an officer's rank.

JC wrote:

Charges-

(CNN)The former Minneapolis Police officer who pressed his knee into George Floyd's neck was charged with second-degree murder and the three other officers on scene during his killing were charged with aiding and abetting, according to court documents.

Now they need to stick....

I saw a sign that summed it up well: "Imagine what the protests will look like when he's acquitted."

ClockworkHouse wrote:

What kind of training are police getting? "Warrior" training. And the police unions are making sure that reforms are fought tooth and nail.

There is a common saying among officers of, "Better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6," the meaning of which is it's better to come home safe from your shift and risk someone second-guessing your judgement call in the heat of the moment than to bleed out on the sidewalk. That type of mindset has consequences (us/them) that drive many of the problems with US policing.

For a deeper look into a broader perspective on what policing looks like, here is a write-up on a cop who saw the consequences of our strategies in the Middle East and is concerned about their application to our cities.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2...

Former SecDef James Mattis denounces Trump:

James Mattis wrote:

Instructions given by the military departments to our troops before the Normandy invasion reminded soldiers that “The Nazi slogan for destroying us…was ‘Divide and Conquer.’ Our American answer is ‘In Union there is Strength.’” We must summon that unity to surmount this crisis—confident that we are better than our politics.

Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership. We can unite without him, drawing on the strengths inherent in our civil society. This will not be easy, as the past few days have shown, but we owe it to our fellow citizens; to past generations that bled to defend our promise; and to our children.

Paleocon wrote:

It looks like either cops are removing ID and insignia or the White House just hired mercenaries.

Various folks on Twitter have identified them as being Special Operations and Response Teams (SORT) from the Bureau of Prisons, most likely from Texas.

They do riot control in prisons and have the ominous nickname "boppers." They aren't real law enforcement and certainly haven't been trained to deal with civilians. Their training is all about going into prisons and smashing sh*t.

Not to derail from the protests entirely....

How the hell can the judicial system hope to find an impartial jury for these cases???

JC wrote:

Not to derail from the protests entirely....

How the hell can the judicial system hope to find an impartial jury for these cases???

As I mentioned in the other thread, by moving the trials to the whitest county they can find.

James Mattis wrote:

Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership.

I'm happy for you, Mattis, and I'mma let you finish, but you were his Secretary of Defense for two years. You were a part of those three years without mature leadership. You were a part of that "deliberate effort". If he was a clear and present danger to the Constitution and unfit for office, you shoulda f*cking said something about it before now.

Rat Boy wrote:
JC wrote:

Not to derail from the protests entirely....

How the hell can the judicial system hope to find an impartial jury for these cases???

As I mentioned in the other thread, by moving the trials to the whitest county they can find.

If they end up moving the trial and you read the words "Stearns county", start planning your exit from the country.

So the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff did a pretty quick turnabout considering he just walked with Trump in combat uniform to St. John's Episcopal Church in his combat uniform. His letter might be a total snow job. Or maybe we're in for a coup! Who knows.

IMAGE(https://media.tenor.com/images/214284ba3834f8985d2d17b5782de178/tenor.gif)