#BlackLivesMatter

[GrayMatterWife]

I wasn't trying to say that at all! I'm sorry if it came across that way.

I didn't take it as if you were saying that to me, personally. I thought it was more generic. I just responded from a personal point of view, because that is the only experience I can speak to.

I was interested in your viewpoint. In your view, how does responding to the BLM movement by noting that all lives matter harken to racism? I don't see it, personally. But I would like to see your view.

[MAPPLEBUM]

I understand what you're saying but haven't incidents like the slaughter via sniper of police officers always made national news (as well it should)? I feel like there's no lack of outpouring when these horrific things happen to police officers and I don't want that to change. I've witnessed the incredible outpouring of support for the police in Baltimore 14 years ago in a similar incident.

What is only NOW getting attention is the BLM movement.

To be clear, I'm 100% pro cop and pro BLM. I'm just so disturbed that a man who is legally in possession of a gun can be killed in front of a child. I cannot imagine being a parent to a black child or married to a black man because I would be TERRIFIED every time they left the house. When I see sirens behind me, all I think is "crap, they caught me speeding"...I simply cannot fathom how terrifying it would be to have to think "I hope I survive this routine police stop". We have a neighbor who has given up running in our neighborhood because he was repeatedly stopped for running in a hoodie and sweatpants in the winter because people thought he was "suspicious"...for working out in his own neighborhood in seasonably appropriate clothes that my DH would never think twice about wearing. That is just so horrifically unfair.

I can't do substantive posts via phone. I totally agree with what you're saying.

[L.Jane]

I didn't take it as if you were saying that to me, personally. I thought it was more generic. I just responded from a personal point of view, because that is the only experience I can speak to.

I was interested in your viewpoint. In your view, how does responding to the BLM movement by noting that all lives matter harken to racism? I don't see it, personally. But I would like to see your view.

People say that saying white lives matter in response to BLM is racist because you are overriding the message they are trying to send. They are not saying, ONLY black lives matter, they are saying, Black lives matter just as much as everyone else. But to respond to that, White lives matter is saying you aren't listening to them and how they are feeling, that they feel that their lives are treated as less. One of the analogies I have seen is below:

In Florida, panthers are endangered. So every so often I'll see a sign on the road that says: SAVE THE PANTHERS.

We also have dolphins in Florida. We love our dolphins as much as we love our panthers. But we don’t have SAVE THE DOLPHINS signs on the streets. Because in this moment in time: FEWER PEOPLE ARE SHOOTING OUR DOLPHINS.

So nobody stands next to the Save the Panthers signs yelling: WAIT! IF YOU WANT TO SAVE THE PANTHERS THAT MUST MEAN YOU DON’T CARE ABOUT DOLPHINS! WHAT ABOUT THE DOLPHINS???? ALL ANIMAL LIVES MATTER!

We don’t do that in Florida. Because we understand that since every life is equally precious- we must hold up endangered lives and demand that we FOCUS UP until they are safe and free. We understand and honor this simple concept when it comes to animals.

Then why don’t we understand Black Lives Matter?

Because we don't truly understand that black lives matter.

[OrionGrad]

I didn't take it as if you were saying that to me, personally. I thought it was more generic. I just responded from a personal point of view, because that is the only experience I can speak to.

I was interested in your viewpoint. In your view, how does responding to the BLM movement by noting that all lives matter harken to racism? I don't see it, personally. But I would like to see your view.

I never said that responding to BLM by saying All Lives Matter is racist. (I didn't even mention the word.) From my perspective, it's basically just missing the point of the movement.

[GrayMatterWife]

People say that saying white lives matter in response to BLM is racist because you are overriding the message they are trying to send. They are not saying, ONLY black lives matter, they are saying, Black lives matter just as much as everyone else. But to respond to that, White lives matter is saying you aren't listening to them and how they are feeling, that they feel that their lives are treated as less. One of the analogies I have seen is below:

In Florida, panthers are endangered. So every so often I'll see a sign on the road that says: SAVE THE PANTHERS.

We also have dolphins in Florida. We love our dolphins as much as we love our panthers. But we don’t have SAVE THE DOLPHINS signs on the streets. Because in this moment in time: FEWER PEOPLE ARE SHOOTING OUR DOLPHINS.

So nobody stands next to the Save the Panthers signs yelling: WAIT! IF YOU WANT TO SAVE THE PANTHERS THAT MUST MEAN YOU DON’T CARE ABOUT DOLPHINS! WHAT ABOUT THE DOLPHINS???? ALL ANIMAL LIVES MATTER!

We don’t do that in Florida. Because we understand that since every life is equally precious- we must hold up endangered lives and demand that we FOCUS UP until they are safe and free. We understand and honor this simple concept when it comes to animals.

Then why don’t we understand Black Lives Matter?

Because we don't truly understand that black lives matter.

Ah. Ok. I will have to respectfully disagree with that logic.

[GrayMatterWife]

I never said that responding to BLM by saying All Lives Matter is racist. (I didn't even mention the word.) From my perspective, it's basically just missing the point of the movement.

The point of the movement appears to be to make others recognize their own inability to recognize that black lives matter. Which necessarily has the built-in presumption that people do not recognize that black lives matter.

[poky]

I thought this was an interesting read: http://m.imgur.com/a/YkDVQ

[rufflesanddots]

Glad you put that up, [MENTION=1049]poky[/MENTION]!

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

[Vanquisher]

I agree with poky, rufflesandots, and tulipsandsunscreen, l.jane, and mapplebum.

[rufflesanddots]

Devil's advocate...how would you feel if you replaced "police officer" with "doctor?" What if there were entire movements against doctors that might have good intentions, but painted a profession--ultimately dedicated to helping people and requires a ton of personal sacrifice--with the same broad, ugly brush that law enforcement has been painted with? It's not in the realm of impossible. I wouldn't be surprised if we get there someday.

In reality, there are probably just as many bad doctors out there as bad cops.

FWIW, I don't think this is just an "institutionalized racism" problem. Have you heard of the horrific taser case out of Kansas City that involved the teenage son of a white cop? Or this case below? I heard about it because he was from our area, but it didn't make national news.

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

I don't think there has necessarily been a significant spike in incidents either. I DO think excessive police force and racial profiling isn't a new problem and is just now getting more attention because it fits into the current rhetoric around race/income. That, and social media has brought incidents to the forefront that probably wouldn't have been there before. In general, I think that is a good thing. I also think that the same forces (current rhetoric and social media) have allowed it to take on a very ugly side that has gone relatively unchecked and if the deaths last night help in toning it down, then at least something good will have come of such an awful event.

I think I understand what you're trying to get at with your Devil's advocate question. I would, of course, be frustrated and feel like my family was being personally attacked.

I say "of course" because my father was a police officer for 30 years. I know what it feels like because I grew up with some of my friends and classmates really fearing and hating cops. I went on ride-a-longs with his partners where we'd show up to a call and I'd hear mother's pull their young kids back into their homes because "that cop is going to take you away." My university had a huge social justice focus and I majored in Legal Studies, so I spent four years listening to critiques of police forces and racial profiling while also learning about the concepts of white privilege and institutional racism. That was a tough pill to swallow for me because I'd always felt safe and respected around police. I trusted them, implicitly. I felt defensive and resentful, like my professors and classmates were grateful for the sacrifices made by officers and their families (my dad worked nights for most of my childhood so I only saw him briefly in the afternoon or on weekends sometimes. I don't have a lot of memories of him before I was 10). It took a lot of willingness on my part to set aside the defensiveness and resentment and really absorb what I was reading and hearing, and then wrestle with it on my own. The result, obviously being, that police officers can provide a valuable and essential service and blacks/minorities can be disproportionately targeted. Or most cops are "good" but there are bad cops out there and the risk of bad cops continuing to work is that they model and encourage terrible behavior, and people, even good people, will be pressured into following their lead.

My dad and I had some tough and awkward conversations. I believe my dad was a "good" cop. He worked the same communities for decades. He protected his informants, he was trusted. He took my less-fortunate friends (often minorities) under his wing. He stepped into the "dad" role for many, many young people. He also got pushed out towards the end of his career because he would criticize bad policing. He would question leadership on crappy decision. I know that it is hard to speak out in LEO environments, but obviously it can and should be done. The police chief from our city was just arrested a DV charge and my dad isn't minimizing it--he says the guy must be fired. FWIW, he also believes the officers involved in Sterling and Castile were wrong. He knows there's a huge problem.

Anyway, to answer your question, I would feel a lot of the same feelings but I'd also expect myself to listen, like I referenced above. Where is the common ground? What sort of education and information can be provided to assuage some of these fears? And also, I would expect myself and my husband to SPEAK OUT. Yes, there are terrible doctors out there. And not even "terrible" like unskilled, terrible like Tuskegee syphilis experiment terrible (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskeg...lis_experiment). Terrible like the Eugenics board of NC terrible (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugeni...North_Carolina). I would be failing my community if I let my personal feelings get in the way of acknowledging there is a real and dangerous problem occurring. I would be failing my community if I chose to feel attacked instead of choosing to speak up.

[TulipsAndSunscreen]

I really appreciate that we can have this discussion. It's really interesting.

I don't really care about the "BLM" vs "ALM"...I think it's probably an oversensitivity. But it's usually deployed by white people so I get why the BLM people question whether people have really thought about the point of the BLM statement.

The fact is that black people are not treated equally in our criminal justice system. White and black people with the same crimes get different sentences. That's not the way it's supposed to work. And, it appears that they are often the subject of pretrial violence at the hands of police officers before they've even been found guilty. Again, not how it's supposed to work.

Criminals should be arrested and prosecuted and serve their time. Regardless of color. It's just that the black people who allegedly commit crimes don't seem to be making it to the court...they sometimes die on the way. And that's not how justice works.

[rufflesanddots]

^Agreed, T&S. And when they do make it they often cannot afford representation and are appointed PDs, who we all know cannot provide the same kind of attention to their cases as a private criminal defense attorney.

In addition to the criminal justice system we see issues with food deserts, health care, mortgage lending, and gerrymandering that directly or indirectly discriminate against black people/POC.

Food deserts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_d...ic_disparities
Health care disparities: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4274585/
Mortgage discrimination: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortgage_discrimination
Gerrymandering: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...will-ever-see/

I thought this wiki on institutional racism was a good jumping point, too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutional_racism

So, yes, it's great that most people aren't running around yelling the N-word at black people and that we can all use whatever water fountain we want, but the issues above show that racism and prejudice are still pervasive issues. It's unfortunately not enough that people stopped using hateful words. When laws are enforced unequally or when a minority population is silenced in the voting process, racial disparities persist.

[bokelley]

#BlackLivesMatter

I believe that the subconscious level of racism is part of the equation as well. Our minds have been shown to regardless of what we do or how we act there is a level of racism there that we may not even be aware of. This is even shown in black people to black people. There have been lots of studies that show black people get less pains meds and less imaging. ( even with the same level of insurance coverage) I don't think anyone is being out right racist in the hospital but on a subconscious level it is there.

[GrayMatterWife]

I thought Guiliani's comment yesterday was dead-on.

[TulipsAndSunscreen]

I thought Guiliani's comment yesterday was dead-on.

What was that?