Why Not Call the Cops

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Hereā€™s two cards

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Bingo!

BINGO!

BINGO again!! Double Bingo!

BLACKOUT BINGO!!!1!

ā€¦

This game is too easy.

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There was a blackout the other night. I was so scared.

He claimed he was selling candy bars to raise money for his school marching band, but I made sure the cops choke slammed him just in case.

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I always hated selling band candy, even though nobody ever choked and/or slammed me even once when I was doing it.

More seriously, Iā€™ve mistrusted law enforcement for a long time (the institutional racism really seems undeniable), but I never really grokked how much the average schmo contributes to the dynamic of escalating violence until we started seeing all these videos of white folks calling the cops on brown people for obviously bullshit reasons.

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What are you trying to say?

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Sorry, no criticism intended. Just presenting a perspective I found interesting [1].

Apologies for any offence.

.

[1] i.e. the perception of this issue from within the Black community, and what Disco suggests about the pervasiveness of pro-cop attitudes in White culture.

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Not exactly. Mostly none of us see it up close so have a hard time imagining it properly.

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Thanks for clarifying. Iā€™ll admit I felt a little bit attacked. Not at first, but as I was working out a reply, I realized ā€œoh wait, I know this person, heā€™s that guy who posted all those interesting photos of his work sites where insects tried to murder him; but heā€™s also the guy whoā€™s got like an eight-hundred-thousand-post thread about politics and current events that Iā€™ve never read and I wonder if I just got savagely burned.ā€

I feel like this site is one of the few places online where I expect to be given the benefit of the doubt w/rt to my comments, so when I thought for a moment that maybe I wasnā€™t, I decided Iā€™d try to live up to my own expectations and just ask. And even then, I couldnā€™t help but do it in a passive-aggressive manner; my apologies for that. I wasnā€™t necessarily offended, but I was kind of hedging my bets, if that makes sense.

As to the substance of your post, itā€™s not entirely unfamiliar. I get where the guyā€™s coming from, or at least I think I do as far as Iā€™m able to. And Iā€™m usually pretty good at understanding that if the behavior described is not the sort in which Iā€™d engage, then theyā€™re probably not talking about me when they say ā€œwhite peopleā€. People are angry and frustrated and hurt, and rightfully so. Let it out, I say. Just rage that shit right out of your system, and if I catch a little blowback in the process, thatā€™s OK because itā€™s probably not going to really harm me in the long run. I get how infuriating it can be when the tide starts to turn (even if just a little bit) and people finally start noticing whatā€™s been so obvious and so painful to you all along.

At the same time, this kind of sentiment, casually expressed as some sort of fundamental truth, still bothers me:

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I hate being lumped in with these people.

The irony of a white guy being upset at being stereotyped is not lost on me, and yetā€¦ I hate it.

I hate being lumped in with the family members I no longer speak to or associate with because of their so-called ā€œpoliticalā€ views. I hate being lumped in with the redneck and frat-boy assholes I didnā€™t want to have anything to do with growing up. I hate being lumped in with the tech-bro assholes currently doing their utmost to immanentize the eschaton. And I hate, and I mean I really loathe, being lumped in with those boot-licking authoritarian pricks who think cops can do no wrong.

And at the same time, I know itā€™s not about me.

If thereā€™s one thing Iā€™ve taken away from some of the feminist narratives over the last couple years, itā€™s that I should shut up and listen. And Iā€™m fine with that. (Itā€™s why I lurk, but rarely (never?) post on the Not Feminism 101 thread). Iā€™m self-aware enough to question my own behavior and perceptions, but not so ā€œwokeā€ (if thatā€™s the right word) that Iā€™m confident of any particular outcome.

And, frankly, sometimes I outright despair at the notion that thereā€™s any correct path of action. I hear ā€œshut up and listenā€ at the same time as I hear ā€œif youā€™re not actively supporting us youā€™re against usā€ at the same time as I hear ā€œmany so-called allies are actually predators in disguiseā€. If I donā€™t say something, Iā€™m a bad person for not speaking up against injustice, but if I do say something Iā€™m either a clueless white person who thinks itā€™s all about me, or a deceptive white person whoā€™s just virtue-signalling to exploit some advantage.

I legitimately donā€™t know what Iā€™m supposed to do here.

And I feel silly for even posting any of this, since my suspicion is that social media is largely an outlet for feeling like weā€™re doing something meaningful without having to go to the trouble and expense of actually doing something. Anything.

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I find these words to be sensible regarding this sort of subject:

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My sentiments exactly. Thanks.

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The only way to win is for (everyone) not to play!

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This was very thoughtfully written, and I can imagine was difficult because you had to weigh every word.

Thanks for doing it!

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Unless weā€™re visibly ā€œother,ā€ weā€™re Schrodingerā€™s fascist. weā€™re a face-down piece that might be an enemy. people canā€™t know weā€™re not.

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We finally have a verdict.

If youā€™re not familiar with this case, you really should read it.

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White privilege beats cop privilege?

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At the margin.

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(Mohamed) Noor is a former Somalian refugee whose family moved to the US and settled in Minneapolis.

This should be enough to know why prosecution succeeded.

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