Police arrest, attack reporters; order reporters NOT to cover protest. IN UNITED STATES.

[ktchong]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TP1qCDbCUI

 

Edited August 14, 2014 by ktchong

[ktchong]

 

[HoonDing]

Shoot, post a link to Russia Today coverage at the very least.

 

http://rt.com/usa/180168-ferguson-protesters-swat-standoff/

[Guard Dog]

So, how's that hopey changy thing working for everyone?

 

Well, at least this was the one campaign promise he did keep:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fO-usAlqak

Edited August 14, 2014 by Guard Dog

[Bryy]

What is happening in Ferguson is amazing and horrifying. It showcases the underlying racism that is pretty well sown in our society. The YouTube of that police officer begging the protestors to attack them, calling them animals. The entire situation is screwed beyond control and belief.

[Gromnir]

am far from being a cop honk, but the media is spinning multiple stories all at once. we is getting news that rioting is going on in ferguson and st. louis... oh, the horror.  situation is sounding tense.  *chuckle* we get the media hyperbole about "war zones" n' such. at the same time, reporters is complaining that they personal is being harassed by cops, cops who were asking everybody to leave an establishment. sure, the reporters weren't complying with police directions and were instead filming the action, but hey, there weren't no real need for reporters to leave.

 

we will share a Gromnir anecdote later, but until then, we believe the following video might be kinda a wave o' the future thing for cops in the US. yeah, is gonna be expensive, particular for some communities that is already operating in the red these days, but we believe the body-cam would useful even if cops would initially be resistant to the idea.

 

http://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/bestoftv/2014/08/14/pkg-police-body-cam-machado.cnn.html

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Volourn]

"What is happening in Ferguson is amazing and horrifying. It showcases the underlying racism that is pretty well sown in our society. The YouTube of that police officer begging the protestors to attack them, calling them animals. The entire situation is screwed beyond control and belief."

 

I agree. The racist (both white and black) are disgusting pieces of crap.

[Bryy]

"What is happening in Ferguson is amazing and horrifying. It showcases the underlying racism that is pretty well sown in our society. The YouTube of that police officer begging the protestors to attack them, calling them animals. The entire situation is screwed beyond control and belief."

 

I agree. The racist (both white and black) are disgusting pieces of crap.

It's just progressed so fast and so hard. It's hard to say now what is racism (well, the instigating event blatantly, obviously, transparently was) and what is the cops just trying to control the situation with as much brute force as humanely possible.

[Gromnir]

am apologizing ahead o' time for length o' the post... skip if you don't want yet another boring Gromnir story.

 

We didn’t have heart-to-heart talks with our father. We didn’t get advice about girls from him. We didn’t learn about how to fix a car or even ride a bike from our father. We didn’t learn much wisdom from our father. In fact, the few times he offered us advice, we were old enough to realize that most times he were full o’ crap. Am recalling that before we went to school in California, he warned us ‘bout not getting involved in what he perceived were the good-for-nothing lifestyle o’ his imaginary west coast… am gonna leave out the details ‘cause otherwise we just make him sound like an ignorant a$$hole. Nevertheless, the old man did give us one bit of sage advice that struck us as being valuable.

 

…

 

Am gonna give abbreviated version ‘cause our father were a proponent o’ volume and repetition and actual message we got were this multi-hour beat-down o’ our will. In any event, Gromnir, in spite o’ getting good grades at school, had a minor problem with authority. *gasp* Am guessing few obsidian boardies is shocked by this revelation.  In any event, we knew that our high school vice principal had sent a letter to our home regarding our attitude problems and so we were prepared for unpleasantness when our father, letter in hand, called us into the kitchen to have a talk.  At least he hadn't removed his belt. 

 

The discussion did not go as we expected. Our father didn’t seem much interested in altering our behavior at school. Our father were so worried enough ‘bout something else that he seeming forget or did not care ‘bout our school behavior. The old man wanted to tell us ‘bout how we should behave around cops. 

 

“Doing what the cops tell you to do does not make you a punk.”

 

The discussion our father had with us lasted literal hours as _________ repeated self into incoherence. Nevertheless, our father were clear worried that our problems with authority would translate into problems with the local constabulary.  Perhaps our surprise at not being confronted with our shortcomings at school was the reason Gromnir was a bit more attentive o’ our father’s advice regarding cops.

 

_________ shared with us some personal experiences from his days as a youth on the rez youth as well as from his time in the military. He wanted us to understand that cops were mostly good people, but it were in our best interest to assume that they were all d*#%s who were secretly trying to ruin our life. It would only take one cop who were having problems with his wife or were racist or were simply a genuine no-good a$$hole to mess our life up both short-term and long term. 

 

The neighborhood we lived in were not all that bad as far as crime were concerned. Sure, our neighborhood in Chicago were statistically horrible for violent crime, but we could avoid most difficulties simply by staying away from drugs and gangs. We were a star athlete, so some o’ our early difficulties with our fellow students in high school were lessened as we were insulated from school problems by teammates. _________ seemed surprising aware o’ our school situation and so he focused on potential issues with local cops. “Eventually, a cop will bust your chops for no other reason than that you are an Indian. Grow up and deal with that fact.”

 

__________ explained that when the day arrived when we were confronted by a racist cop, we would have choices, and those choices would be harder based on whom we were with at the time.  Our father told us that “being right is meaningless when the other guy has a gun.” One day, perhaps, Gromnir might join the military and fight for our country. One day we might take a stand on some social issue that could bring us into conflict with the cops. ___________ recognized that getting shot or ruining your life for the right reasons might be a conscious choice we would need make, but he told us we wouldn’t be doing so today, next week or for the next few years. Our first priority should be to grow up, and getting shot or arrested would make that a far tougher proposition. 

 

“The racist cop wants you to give him an excuse to arrest you, so if you want to ruin his day, be polite.” ___________ told us that being a smart-ass to a cop didn’t prove that Gromnir were tough, it proved that we were stupid. The cop with an agenda wanted us to be disrespectful. The racist cop wanted us to fail to obey instructions. The racist cop wanted us to give him an excuse to “twist” us up and drag our too-smart-for-our own-good butt down to juvenile hall where we could spend the weekend locked up with rapists, murderers and mentally unstable near-adults who outweighed us by +50 pounds and out-toughed us by a mile. 

 

Our old man knew us well enough that he could see what would be making our inevitable d#@&% cop confrontation(s) most dangerous. “You think you are funny,” he said,”but your tongue is twice as fast as your brain.” ____________ told us that the most dangerous cop encounters would be the ones that included our friends. Our father foresaw that if we were with a group o’ friends we would be far more likely to shoot our mouth off; we would mistake foolishness for bravery. “If you say anything that makes your friends laugh, apologize immediately. It may be too late at that point, but do it anyway.” 

 

We got lots more advice ‘bout cops, but most were repetitive. The stuff that stuck with us were a couple stories he shared. One such story involved an encounter with SP while he were in the navy. Our father were a bit drunk one night and he shot his gob off to some racist SPs that were looking for an excuse to arrest a minority or two. They goaded him into a confrontation and he obliged. There were words exchanged and actual some blows thrown.  __________ shared with us what fun it were to be tossed in the brig and to be thinking that his military career over and his future ruined. Our old man let us know just how scared he were and just how dumb he felt when he realized that a couple ignorant rednecks had successfully managed to ruin his life. Lucky for our father, his commanding officer, a black man, eventually stepped in and smoothed the situation over as is only possible in the military. Our father thanked his CO, but the CO claimed he hadn’t helped our father, and he made damn sure our father understood that he wouldn’t get any help in the future.  “If you can’t show me you are smarter than those idiots who dragged you in here, I don’t need you. Got it?”

 

Dunno if our father actual proved he weren’t an idiot, but he never made the same mistake.

 

As for Gromnr, years later we would have our own run-in with police. Ironically, we were in Danville, CA when we had our first serious racist cop moment, not South Chicago. Yeah, we had dealt with cops in Chicago, many times in fact, but we had always been polite and so we avoided problems. It were an affluent bay area neighborhood where our resolve actual got tested. 

 

Details ain’t all that important, but we could see almost immediately that the Danville cops were looking for an excuse, any excuse, to bust us. We were a scholarship athlete at Cal, but we weren't a star. Is not as if coaches woulda’ shown up to jail to get charges dropped for Gromnir’s sake. In point o’ fact, our authority issues had created a bit o’ a problem ‘tween us and our position coach. Am expecting the coaches woulda’ loved a chance to drop us and get their schollie back. Lose scholarship woulda’ meant we would not have been able to pay for school at Cal. We would have needed to go back home to Chicago, and we likely woulda’ had a criminal record following us. Is hard to imagine just how different our life would be today if we had given a racist cop the opportunity to destroy our world. 

 

*shrug*

 

Is it fair that minorities in the US is likely to eventual deal with a racist cop at least once in their life? Nope. That being said, there is typically a chance to avoid a serious confrontation. “Doing what the cops tell you to do does not make you a punk.” Is likely the only good advice we ever got from our father, and is too bad that so few young, male minorities learn this lesson… well, unless they is asian. 

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/storyline/wp/2014/08/12/why-the-police-shooting-riots-in-ferguson-mo-had-little-to-do-with-ferguson/

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Malcador]

Shame no one will force the police to answer what the impetus for them dressing up like soldiers is. Showing up kitted like that doesn't really do much other than escalate the situation.

[Leferd]

Danville cops are a$$e$. Ultra affluent stronghold of old money complete with country club golf courses and gated communities with private security. They don't like riff-raff one bit. Think Beverly Hills Cop sans Judge Reinhold.

Edited August 15, 2014 by Leferd

[Bester]

Am never traveling to the US, decided that a long time ago. The reason is US cops.

[obyknven]

Good Old  Black Panther manual of what to do in such situations Guerella warfare.

But modern black Muricans are too pussies for this hardcore and true black panthers don't exist more (at least all true black panthers are jailed and organization transformed from international left power into some sort of black racist bogyman  for good old "divide et impera"  political games - they are just a puppets of government now).

[Bryy]

[Wrath of Dagon]

So the police are now saying the reason the shooting victim was stopped was because he had just committed a robbery in a convenience store. Looks like once again everyone has jumped to conclusions and we've been fed a narrative to advance an agenda.

[Elerond]

So the police are now saying the reason the shooting victim was stopped was because he had just committed a robbery in a convenience store. Looks like once again everyone has jumped to conclusions and we've been fed a narrative to advance an agenda.

 

I though they said victim was stopped because officer wanted ask questions about robbery that happened bit earlier that day. In police report by officer that shot victim, which was written after victim was shot he says that "After viewing brown and reviewing this video, I was able to confirm that Brown is the primary suspect in this incident,". It should also noted that authorities have previously said that a scuffle ensued after the officer asked the teens to move to the side and that witnesses of shooting tell different story to both of these narratives. 

 

So there seems to be lots of narratives about incident, but they all end to situation where armed police officer shot unarmed kid several times until he died.

[Meshugger]

Am never traveling to the US, decided that a long time ago. The reason is US cops.

 

You are sure missing something. I didn't meet one single cop on my coast to coast roadtrip. I saw some of their cars now and then though.

[Hurlshort]

There obviously needs to be an investigation here, and that is standard procedure in any shooting.  But really the way the police handled the protests is the real problem here, and it is very telling that the Governor turned that over to the Highway Patrol and suddenly the protests went back to being calm and uneventful.  I'm guessing the County Police Department is going to get raked over the coals quite a bit.

[Gromnir]

the media is predictable. some folks wanna blame slant on liberal media, but am thinking that leftist motivations is almost a negligible factor in the current situation. news reporters wanna report news.  especially nowadays when even print media is too slow for most folks, the cops/city reticence to speak makes their side o' the story less appealing for media outlets. 

 

"So the police are now saying the reason the shooting victim was stopped was because he had just committed a robbery in a convenience store. Looks like once again everyone has jumped to conclusions and we've been fed a narrative to advance an agenda."

 

keep in mind that the even if the young men were stopped 'cause o' a convenience store robbery, that won't change anything for pretty much anybody. an unarmed black man were shot by the cops. Gromnir has tried to come up with a scenario that makes the shooting reasonable, and am having difficulty doing so. for instance, lets assume that the ferguson cops did stop to talk with two robbery suspects and as one cop were exiting the car, michael brown shoved the door closed on the police officer. am gonna assume that the police officer grabbed at brown as he were forced back into the car, and brown then wrestled awkwardly with the cop through the car window.  now lets assume that brown reached for the cop's gun and there were a struggle over the weapon. heck, lets assume that the cops gun went off while brown and the cop were tussling.... though not tussling like j-lo in out of sight.

 

 

anywho, gun goes off in car.... and then what? see, assuming that both brown and dorian johnson were unarmed, how does we get from shot going off in car to unarmed brown being shot multiple times some 35' away from the police car? am trying to imagine a plausible reason for such an outcome and am having difficulty. the Best argument we can come up with that benefits cops is that brown were aggressive and assaultive and were fighting cop for his gun. the gun goes off in car. does cop loose control at that point? does cop for some reason think that brown has a weapon? as brown runs away, unarmed, is he an immediate danger to nearby citizens?  lord knows we weren't taking dorian johnson story as gospel. heck, our experience with law enforcement made us think that the most likely scenario were that brown were being an arse and combative, but that still don't get us to an explanation for brown being shot.

 

...

 

the lessons Gromnir were taught about dealing with cops is actual the opposite o' what many kids from rough neighborhoods is taught nowadays. "Don't let the cops, or anybody else, treat you like a punk." is not necessarily a race specific lesson neither as we has seen same from white, latino, samoan and other ethnic groups... but again, far less from assians. even if we assume that brown were instigator, how does he end up being shot multiple times given that he were unarmed?

 

even so am not surprised by anything we has seen outta ferguson so far. 

 

and bester not visiting US 'cause o' cops doesn't strike us as much o' a loss for him or the US. 99.9% o' all our cop interactions has been somewheres 'tween slight aggravating and very positive... and given our past job(s) and 'cause o' where we has lived, we suspect we has had 'bout 100x the contact with law enforcement than the average American has had.  

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

edit: am not sure what happened in our post, but wrath quote sudden became a non-quote dropped in the middle of our post. weirdness.

Edited August 15, 2014 by Gromnir

[NWN_babaYaga]

Your guys look like soldiers and not like police men at all anymore. From an outsider point of view i would be very worried about the excessive militarisation of your militia. What has happenend ?

 

From the good ole cop of the 80´s and 90´s to complete armored military men. I have seen or read alot of these shot first ask ... oh he´s dead already !

 

Seriously you have a problem in the US. I remember myself always wanting to visit the US. I was always a fan of the united states but honestly since that damned day your people in power went crazy and now they see you ordinary people as terrorists. or at least as a "could be a terrorist" so we use force by any means.

Edited August 15, 2014 by NWN_babaYaga

[Hurlshort]

So yeah, the police don't strut around in cammo on a regular basis.  Babayaga and Bester sound ridiculous.

 

Can we name any country where things are going to go well when you challenge law enforcement?  If you try and force a German cop back into his car, is it going to go smoothly?     

[NWN_babaYaga]

Yeah sure do we have a lot of problems here in germany and it´s good if someone from the outside points that one out. I dont feel offended when someone sees things you dont because you live in that bubble. You just have to be honest about reality! If you think it´s OK what your guys are doing then hey fine! Your thing.

 

And babayaga is cult dude! At least for people with culture....

Edited August 15, 2014 by NWN_babaYaga

[Gromnir]

Your guys look like soldiers and not like police men at all anymore. From an outsider point of view i would be very worried about the excessive militarisation of your militia. What has happenend ?

 

From the good ole cop of the 80´s and 90´s to complete armored military men. I have seen or read alot of these shot first ask ... oh he´s dead already !

 

Seriously you have a problem in the US. I remember myself always wanting to visit the US. I was always a fan of the united states but honestly since that damned day your people in power went crazy and now you are the terrorists !

wow.

 

is this an age thing again? 

 

 

so, if all pictures o' ferguson police were shown as above would you believe that once rioting started, st. louis and furgeson police would be kitted like mr. friendly from our pic? once riots start, and we get images o' swat and gas-mask bedecked stormtroopers, somehow folks thinks that is typical? you get that this is, thankfully, an extraordinary situation, yes?

 

some foreigners watch far too many movies... or is just very gullible.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps our pic is of a baltimore cop, but ferguson standard uni looks very much the same. hell, typical cop uniform virtual anywhere in US is gonna be similar. 

[Wrath of Dagon]

anywho, gun goes off in car.... and then what? see, assuming that both brown and dorian johnson were unarmed, how does we get from shot going off in car to unarmed brown being shot multiple times some 35' away from the police car? am trying to imagine a plausible reason for such an outcome and am having difficulty. the Best argument we can come up with that benefits cops is that brown were aggressive and assaultive and were fighting cop for his gun. the gun goes off in car. does cop loose control at that point? does cop for some reason think that brown has a weapon? as brown runs away, unarmed, is he an immediate danger to nearby citizens?  lord knows we weren't taking dorian johnson story as gospel. heck, our experience with law enforcement made us think that the most likely scenario were that brown were being an arse and combative, but that still don't get us to an explanation for brown being shot.

Or we could not assume and just wait for all the facts to come out. May be police used excessive force, may be they didn't. Yeah the guy was unarmed, but he's a 6'4" 290 lbs giant. You can see him assaulting the clerk in the robbery video, anyone would be scared for his life. Edited August 15, 2014 by Wrath of Dagon

[Hurlshort]

I drove 5,000 miles across the US this summer in an RV.  I didn't have a single interaction with a cop.