What About Black Lives Matter?
For two years the protest movement called "Black Lives Matter" has caused demonstrations all around the nation. It was triggered by the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO in August of '14. It holds that racist police are the greatest threat to young black men. This has triggered riots, and the murder or attempted murder of police and an attempt to eliminate grand juries when police use lethal force.
The U.S. Justice Department has completely disproven that Brown was merely a Gentle Giant and was shot in cold blood while trying to surrender. Even though it was shown that Brown had just stolen from and intimidated a store owner and was charging at the officer who shot him, and had attempted to get the officer's gun, he is venerated as a martyr.As a result, officers are backing off in the face of the hatred which is relentlessly directed at them on the street and in the media. As a result, violent crime is on the rise. The question becomes do the police pose the greatest threat to young black men? Or is it the far greater threat of black-on-black crime?
The U.S. Justice Department has completely disproven that Brown was merely a Gentle Giant and was shot in cold blood while trying to surrender. Even though it was shown that Brown had just stolen from and intimidated a store owner and was charging at the officer who shot him, and had attempted to get the officer's gun, he is venerated as a martyr.As a result, officers are backing off in the face of the hatred which is relentlessly directed at them on the street and in the media. As a result, violent crime is on the rise. The question becomes do the police pose the greatest threat to young black men? Or is it the far greater threat of black-on-black crime?
I find your explanation more than reasonable.I think, however, that you are more sensitive than me. When I came to the Gulch about 3 1/2 years ago, I expected to converse with Reardons, and Galts, and Roarks. To my chagrin, most of the contributors were fairly ordinary guys and gals. Not to denigrate them. They are a bright group. Certainly of greater intellectual capacity than most. Even other Objectivist -ish web sites and blogs are not better and some not as good. What I personally enjoy is the spirited banter. Certainly there'll be some nonsense, some intellectual crappiness, but also some very brilliant thoughts and writing. I'm sure you know who they are and I cannot applaud them more for the insights and out-and-out knowledge they have provided me. When I first came into the Gulch, I found myself being a grammar teacher, but I quickly dropped that. (I was an editor for a time.) Not only did it anger people, but I quickly realized that was not why I came to the Gulch.
My reason for being here parallels your and I dare say most who participate here. For every participant -- I cannot quote numbers, there are people who are absolute gems. I can learn and on rare occasions I can even teach. Over all it's a worthwhile site, and as a bonus, it actually woks to accomplish worthwhile things.
I am afraid that I will have to disappoint you.
Almost three decades ago my older son taught me something I wish I had known before. While sophomore at Columbia University, he wanted to switch from engineering to English as the major. Concerned that I might oppose that, he told me: "In order to write well, you have to be able to think well. So, if you found someone who can teach you to write well, you really have found someone who can teach you how to think well." How can anybody argue against that? In addition, at that time English department at Columbia was reputed to be the best or very close to the best in the country. I learned an important insight.
This is a long introduction, but I thought it worth explaining.
I will remain determined not to resume any conversations with Zenphamy.. He has demonstrated to me beyond reasonable doubt that he is not a carful thinker. Evidence? Just look at the first and the last sentence of his first paragraph addressed to me and the last sentence of the second paragraph.
Not so long ago, khalling, lamented that I am not participating on this site as much as I used to. I responded to her with my explanation. I find way too much superficial and not thought through arguments and almost nonsensical political tirades.
My interests here are to learn as much as I can about flawless and careful thinking and about Ayn Rand and the Objectivist philosophy. Perhaps I am deceiving myself, but my impression is that those things are rarer here than they used to be. Occasionally, the mistakes are so glaring that I have hard time resisting to point the out. I have other ways of spending the little time left to me (in a couple on months I will be 81) that help me learn what I wish to learn and understand. As always, I still get the best kicks out of learning that seems important to me (fits my values).
I am sorry to disappoint you due to my rational self-interest. One has to do what one has to do.
Stay well.
Sincerely, Maritimus
I am not sure whether you are asking me to respond somewhere below to your original post or to respond to your post which is just below. I am choosing the former.
As the article demonstrates conclusively, the police are not the greatest threat to young black men. The problem is almost suicidal.
In my opinion, the two by far the greatest threats to young black men, and many non-blacks, are:
1. Lousy education that they are given.
2. Virtually non-existent families.
It is hard to say which is worse. If I had the power, I would drastically reduce or eliminate payments to able-bodied people who do not work and spend all the savings on the "special needs" programs for family-less kids conducted exclusively by non-union teachers who volunteered for those jobs. If a kid is brought into life by a non-existent family, the only potentials worth saving are his life and mind. All the rest has already been irretrievably lost.
Does this satisfy your request?
I'm hoping that you'll response to my post below.
I see valid points on both sides, and also emotional responses which almost negate the rational ones. Not wanting to be Dr. Phil (in any sense) I won't deal with the emotions. Based upon what I've learned about most colleges and universities, Hillsdale stands out like a beacon of rational thought to the point where you can excuse the religiosity. You are not coerced into taking any religion there and will still get your degree based on your work. As to profanity, I must say that a bit of it for color or emphasis is not objectionable to me. Unless you are using it like a rapper, which is not true in this case. Something I can see that neither of you may be able because you both are so pissed off is that you are more in agreement than not.
Pace in terram guys.
1. How possibly can you know what I did or did not understand from your comment, when I just suggested for your attention a collection of statistical facts?
2. I deeply resent vulgarities in communications from anybody, including you.
3. The truth is that, proportionally, vast majority (notice another "ity"!) of instances of initiating use of force is blacks doing it to blacks. No racism there.
4. From Wikipedia: "... Hillsdale no longer has any denominational affiliation, and Hillsdale Free Will Baptist College in Oklahoma was founded after the college disaffiliated itself with the denomination. However, Hillsdale is still considered a Christian institution, with students expected to follow moral tenets of Christianity as commonly understood in the Christian tradition...
As an Objectivist, I prefer that people obey the 10 commandments as a foundation of their outdated philosophy over the morally disoriented political correctness worshipers and their collectivist brethren. Unfortunately, very few people study philosophy a bit, most of them none.
5. The source I gave you is a journalistic reporter and editor. She just happens to have collected a lot of those statistical facts and had the benefit of my being aware of her presentation. I made no philosophical statement whatsoever in my comments and I resent your implying otherwise.
6. Your statement "If blacks want to kill themselves in inordinate numbers, that's their problem." I find offensive. I believe that all citizens of this country are Americans. The divisive efforts of many are at the root of much of what is wrong here and now, in my opinion. You could not sound more divisive. Draw your own conclusions.
7. I will not let you teach me about Ayn Rand and Objectivism. You have disqualified yourself from even remotely fitting such a role. The evidence is in plain sight.
8. As a result, I will refuse to engage in any further debate with you. This is it.
Goodbye.
P.S. It occurs to me that a pseudonym like "Inphamy" might fit better ;-)
Police have one job and one license from the public. That is to apprehend those that have initiated force or fraud against another and bring them before a court. That is the totality of the job. It's what they are hired to do, trained, and equipped to do. That's it. They are not given the authority to kill American residents.
If blacks want to kill themselves in inordinate numbers, that's their problem. The police's job is to find those killers, apprehend them, and bring them before a court. If they exceed that mandate, they should face the exact same consequences as an everyday resident of this country that acts in their own self defense. Police are not hired and licensed executioners of "probable" perpetrators based on selling a cigarette, having a broken tail light, or any other pick-a-yuny misdeamor.
And on a website primarily dedicated to AR and Objectivist philosophy, all you can present is a lecture from a religious, so called university, You should be able to do better than that.
Excuse me, you're a supporter of NAACP and the National Society of Black Engineers. Will that distract you from conducting your duties as head of a student body? Pardon me, you belong to Korean Christians Club and you have a lot of stock in Samsung. Can you represent the students of our school? Well, you are a member of the Chicano Movement at UCLA and yet you are a Republican. How is it so? Once and again, it creeps. We see that under the mask of "inclusive" liberalism hides a totalitarian with more insidious ambitions.
I live in Las Vegas, which has a LOT of hispanics. They speak spanish mostly. The signs are in spanish in a lot of places, and I would say they dont try to fit into the american culture, but rather try to change our culture to what they came from. If they liked their culture so much, why didnt they just stay there?? If I wanted to move to Mexico, I would learn spanish and try to mix in with their culture, otherwise I would just stay right here.
All totalitarian governments have them and it's why Obama had the current military careerist leader ship running scared. He already stated he wanted to turn DHS in to a formation with more power than the military. Waffen SS and SA/SD. by any other name.
Back to arrest with no civil rights under suspicion of supporting terrorism.
Eight months left if he abdicates.
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