"You should have listened to the peaceful part"

[StarfishSaver]

[sheshe2]

1. +1000

[Bernardo de La Paz]

10. JFK

From a post I saw by RAB910:

[sheshe2]

12. Well said, Mr President.

[crickets]

19. Wise words. nt

[hughee99]

2. Why do you think the local government in Minneapolis, for example, didn't listen to this protest?

Why do you think the state government in Minnesota didn't either?

[StarfishSaver]

3. Probably for the same reason local and state governments around the country,

as well as the federal government, not to mention a whole hell of a lot of white people all over America, ignored it.

[hughee99]

4. The problem here, though, wasn't a problem caused by white people all over the country.

If you've got racism, violence and excessive force on a police force, the responsibility is for the local governments to address the issue. Why do you think the local government of Minneapolis, for example, didn't do anything about this before?

[StarfishSaver]

5. The cops aren't operating in a vacuum. There are indeed white people all over the country

who are complicit in this.

This isn't just a Minneapolis/Minnesota problem. It's happening all over the country. Please don't try to change the subject.

[hughee99]

6. Change the subject? The issue here is the behavior of police officers. I'm discussing Minneapolis,

but we can talk about police forces all over the country if you want. When police officers don't act right, it's an issue for the government. It comes down to the selection of the officers in the first place, the way they're taught and managed, and the way they're dealt with when they don't follow the rules, all of which are functions of the local and state governments. Kaepernick's issue was that the police weren't doing the right things, and no one was holding them accountable, or doing anything about it. I'm not changing the subject, this IS the subject.

[StarfishSaver]

7. You're changing the subject by acting as if Minneapolis is unique

[hughee99]

8. Nope, not at all. As I said above, the problem is happening all over the country, Minneapolis is an

example. If we look at the issue on a case-by-case basis, think we'll notice a recurring pattern. If we speak in generalities about how it happens everywhere, we won't get a look at the core issues. It's hard to diagnose a problem from 10,000 feet.

IN GENERAL, is the issue of police brutality one that should, but isn't, being addressed by local and state officials?
If you think so, IN GENERAL, why do you think it hasn't been?

[Nasruddin]

11. A couple hypotheses

It's a somewhat random, local culture issue. A local police agency has its own culture, & people are hired that fit in. If your culture hires bent people, you get a crooked group; sadists, you get what happened in Mpls. Corollary: people are made by the group they're in. If you hire altar boys to a racist, violent agency, some of them will be molded into violent racists.

We're mostly good, peace & love people, but we need these vicious types on the payroll to keep the bad element at bay (& it's a way of keeping them at bay, too)

It's the shadow of our own culture

Are there others?

I'm coming around to the 3rd from what I'm seeing in Minnesota - it's not just the city cops but the state & National Guard that are behaving badly there. But it doesn't matter that much - it's a matter of feedback & management. Minneapolis city and/or Henn Co had ample time - decades - to clean up its act knee or no knee with at least one of the officers in question, & chose not to.

[hughee99]

13. This is sort of what I'm getting at.

If you have bad people on the force, either they were bad when you hired them, you trained them to become bad, or they became bad on their own and you did nothing to weed them out.

I get that no screening process is perfect, and the way officers are trained needs to be looked at, but when people aren't acting appropriately, and the management (local officials and police departments) don't take appropriate action, it tells everyone that what happened isn't a big deal.

All of these issues are things that should be addressed by the local political structure, and in many cases all over the country, the locals, at best, only seem interested in appearing to address the problems, not actually trying to fix the problem. For example, some places say they're using body cameras now. While I don't have a problem with this, and it's not a bad idea, even with the cameras, this is still happening. Maybe the camera wasn't on, maybe it was, and the local politicians didn't press any charges, or the police force didn't punish someone. In any case, incidents like this happen over and over and politicians keep pretending like they're doing everything they can, when they're clearly not.

[PaulRevere08]

14. One element that often overlooked is the police union

And the continued enablement and protection of rogue cops.

[pazzyanne]

16. Yes!

And, the president of the Mpls police is Bob Krull. Enough said. When the investigation into the Mpls police force starts, and it will, the first person out should be Bob Krull.

[hughee99]

17. Absolutely. If issues like this aren't being addressed, we need to ask why. It's not even just the

union, it can be local officials and even a complacent (or complicit) local press as well.

[secondwind]

15. The FBI warned us 10 years ago that white supremacists were infiltrating

our polices forces all around the country. They are everywhere now.

[hughee99]

18. And the people in the best position to fight this haven't responsded.

"You should have listened to the peaceful part". That's the title of the thread and the theme. I'm pointing out who I think "YOU" is in this context and asking why they didn't do anything (or nearly enough ) to address a problem which is clearly ongoing.

[Leith]

9. Now THAT is a good message

When "The Knee" was all the rage, I could not for the life of me figure out why some people had such a problem with it.

They should have listened. They didn't.

[CrispyQ]

20. Powerful message. -nt