2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

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clickie
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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#126 Post by clickie » Wed Jul 22, 2020 6:48 pm

The last two weeks 2 statues of the Virgin Mary in Boston, and many other churches around the country have had vandalism.
The blessed virgin wasn't a confederate and this is anti-Catholic

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#127 Post by nausearockpig » Wed Jul 22, 2020 6:52 pm

clickie wrote:
Wed Jul 22, 2020 6:48 pm
The last two weeks 2 statues of the Virgin Mary in Boston, and many other churches around the country have had vandalism.
The blessed virgin wasn't a confederate and this is anti-Catholic
fuck catholics. "A few" catholic priests love to fuck little boys, and the catholic church is well-known for treating women less than well over the centuries... oh and they helped the nazis escape to Argentina. Yeah, everyone should leave them alone.

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#128 Post by Hermann » Wed Jul 22, 2020 6:58 pm


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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#129 Post by mockbee » Thu Jul 23, 2020 5:11 am

Portland Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty slams Mayor Ted Wheeler, blames Portland police for fires being set during protests

Ooooooh......Commissioner Hardesty going full Trump, right out of his playbook here.

Coulda actually been a pretty effective strategy media wise, saying she was only suggesting and then invoking (Fred Hampton/Medger Evers/ JE Hoover etc) and put it back on Wolf re: targeting sanctuary cities/not complying with feds.......but she apologized. The end.

That's all she wrote folks.


:tiphat:


:noclue:
Portland Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty slams Mayor Ted Wheeler, blames Portland police for fires being set during protests
Updated Jul 22, 2020; Posted Jul 22, 2020
Day 51 of Portland protests


Image
Portland City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty spoke last Friday, July 17, 2020, at a candlelight vigil outside the Portland Justice Center to protest systemic racism and police brutality. Dave Killen/Staff

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By Maxine Bernstein | The Oregonian/OregonLive

Portland City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty said Wednesday she didn’t believe protesters in Portland are setting fires but that police are sending in “saboteurs” to create the strife – an unsubstantiated claim that drew immediate pushback from police and then an apology from her hours later.

She also made a not-so-oblique reference to Mayor Ted Wheeler, referencing “ignorance at the highest levels in our city government” as she participated in a national briefing sponsored by a left-leaning think tank based in Portland.

Hardesty spoke amid growing frustration in the city for the aggressive tactics of federal officers who have been firing tear gas, impact munitions and striking demonstrators with batons as larger crowds have descended this month outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse demanding that the federal officers leave town. Federal officers in camouflage fatigues also whisked away at least two people from Portland streets last week in unmarked vans for questioning.

Hardesty said she believes federal officers are targeting sanctuary cities.

“I asked the mayor, ‘Who do you think they’re grabbing off the street?’ Well, ah, ah,” she said, attempting to mimic Wheeler stammering in response to her question.

“And he says, ‘Well, a sanctuary city just means we don’t work with ICE.’ And I said, ‘well, who do you think the border patrol works with?' So we have an ignorance at the highest levels in our city government,” she said. “People who just assume that if the police say it happened, it really happened.”

Hardesty’s comments came three days after she issued a statement via Twitter, telling Wheeler that if he couldn’t control the Police Bureau, he should allow her to replace him as police commissioner. Wheeler responded that he planned to continue in the position during this “period of transformation.”

He couldn’t be reached for immediate comment on Hardesty’s latest broadside.


Her remarks were made during a video conference “Emergency National Briefing,” sponsored by the Portland-based Western States Center. She spoke after Oregon’s U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley.


Hardesty, who has been the leading voice for police reform on the City Council, blamed police for creating strife on the city’s streets by sending in provocateurs.

“I want people to know that I do not believe there’s any protesters in Portland that are setting fires, that are creating crisis. I absolutely believe it’s police action, and they’re sending saboteurs and provocateurs into peaceful crowds so they justify their inhumane treatment of people who are standing up for their rights.”

She didn’t offer any information to back up her allegations.

Officer Daryl Turner, president of the Portland rank-and-file police union, quickly responded: “Really? Really? That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”

“With statements like this, it has become completely clear that Commissioner Hardesty is part of the problem in Portland,” Turner said in a statement. “Every one of the many videos we have seen confirms that small groups of rioters are starting the fires and trying to burn down buildings. Even a quick search of Twitter shows rioters setting the fires and boldly claiming responsibility.”


Video images on May 29 caught people breaking windows of the Multnomah County Justice Center in downtown Portland and throwing flares and setting a fire in a sheriff’s records office there and more recently setting fires outside the federal courthouse next door.

Two weeks earlier, Portland city officials recorded 144 fires set by people in the city since demonstrations began after the death of George Floyd on May 25 while a Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck for more than eight minutes. The fires were recorded by the Portland Fire & Rescue Bureau, which Hardesty oversees as fire commissioner, from May 29 through the morning of July 2, attributed to the civil unrest.

By Wednesday evening, Hardesty issued a statement apologizing, but referenced similar statements on fires she made to another publication, Marie Claire, not the remarks she issued during the national briefing carried live on Facebook.

“Today I let my emotions get the most of me during council and the comment I made to the press. But I’m angry , frustrated, and horrified by what has happened these past 50 days. I’m angry that even as a City Commissioner, I am coming up against countless barriers from protecting protecting Portlanders from the deluge of tear gas, pepper spray and other munitions on a nightly basis.”

She said she drew from her experience as a child of the civil rights movement that “people have been sent to infiltrate these spaces to create incidents that justify enhanced police actions...I appreciate the reminder that as a public servant I need to be careful making statements out of misinformation, and I take this to heart.”

In one of the latest cases involving an attempted fire, a 21-year-old man named Joseph James Ybarra appeared in federal court Wednesday afternoon, accused by federal prosecutors of attempted arson for allegedly throwing a Molotov cocktail at the front of the federal courthouse about 3:15 a.m. Wednesday.

According to a federal affidavit, video surveillance caught two men lighting a white wick that appeared to stick out of a glass bottle in the pre-dawn hours outside the courthouse.

One in a black sweatshirt, white shorts and carrying a bag, later identified as Ybarra, moved some of the fencing that was used to barricade an exposed opening to the courthouse, while the other person lit the wick of bottle and threw it at the courthouse, according to the affidavit.

Video surveillance images outside Mark O. Hatfield Courthouse
Federal offices say Joseph James Ybarra, wearing dark clothing, attempted to throw a lit Molotov cocktail at the courthouse about 3:15 am.. Wed., July 22, 2020.


The device appeared to fall to the ground and Ybarra picked it up and threw it twice more, wrote Nathan Miller, an agent with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in the federal affidavit. It didn’t explode, Miller said.

Ybarra, who said he lived in a tent in Southeast Portland, confirmed he was the person in video surveillance holding the device and told a federal officer he did it because he thought it was cool, the agent wrote in the affidavit. Ybarra remains in custody.

Turner, who represents rank-and-file officers, detectives and sergeants for the Portland Police Association, said he has invited elected officials to stand at the front lines with police officers during protests, but no City Council member has taken him up on it.

“Politicians bent on power, perpetuating misinformation and untruths, are just as guilty of using their privilege to hijack this movement as the rioters who are committing violent acts, burning, and looting,” he said.

Western States Center, which tracks extremist groups, hosted what it a video-based national briefing on “the Trump Administration’s misuse of armed federal agents in Portland and beyond.”

Joining Hardesty and U.S. Sen. Merkley, D-Ore., were a New York State assemblywoman, the president of the Southern Poverty Law Center and Eric K. Ward, the director of Western States Center. The center this week filed a federal suit against federal law enforcement, seeking to restrict their tactics on the city’s streets.

Hardesty’s statements about sanctuary cities arose partly in response to remarks made the day before by Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad F. Wolf, who said he was concerned about Portland city officials’ lack of cooperation and willingness to assist federal enforcement, stemming from the time City Hall restricted Portland police from helping federal immigration officers deal with a growing encampment outside their Portland field office in 2018.

-- Maxine Bernstein

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#130 Post by Hermann » Thu Jul 23, 2020 5:30 am


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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#131 Post by mockbee » Thu Jul 23, 2020 5:35 am

Hardest implies Feds/Police did this:

Image

In response to this:

Image


Very effective visuals. If she stuck the landing.....Trump would have been like touche.... :tiphat:

But, alas.....Dem politicians are terrible, terrible, terrible doing the theater...... Seems they would be better with the hollywood thing in their corner....
:hs:
:no:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#132 Post by clickie » Thu Jul 23, 2020 6:00 am

Oh shit all of those mom's are wearing yellow like a supposed Jane's gathering

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#133 Post by Hermann » Thu Jul 23, 2020 6:30 am


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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#134 Post by Hermann » Thu Jul 23, 2020 6:31 am


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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#135 Post by Hermann » Thu Jul 23, 2020 7:44 am

Image

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#136 Post by Xizen47 » Fri Jul 24, 2020 7:26 am

chaos wrote:
Tue Jul 21, 2020 2:23 pm
It is a dangerous game for The Administration to equate vandalism with terrorism. All of the graffiti and vandalism provide the optics needed to send in the secret police to save "a city under siege." This strategy to scare suburbanites into thinking "violent anarchists" are taking over has backfired. Trump is not getting the image he is desperately trying to paint for himself as a strong leader. The "violence" is coming from DHS and it is not just a provocation for the vandals (who should be arrested), but also the peaceful protestors/suburban moms.

Both the city of Portland and the state of Oregon do not want the DHS troops there. Let it be their responsibility to clean up the graffiti and repair the courthouse.
You saw what happened in Seattle right? Do we really want to see CHOP part 2? That's what was coming to Portland without some kind of intervention.

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#137 Post by chaos » Fri Jul 24, 2020 10:37 am

Xizen47 wrote:
Fri Jul 24, 2020 7:26 am
chaos wrote:
Tue Jul 21, 2020 2:23 pm
It is a dangerous game for The Administration to equate vandalism with terrorism. All of the graffiti and vandalism provide the optics needed to send in the secret police to save "a city under siege." This strategy to scare suburbanites into thinking "violent anarchists" are taking over has backfired. Trump is not getting the image he is desperately trying to paint for himself as a strong leader. The "violence" is coming from DHS and it is not just a provocation for the vandals (who should be arrested), but also the peaceful protestors/suburban moms.

Both the city of Portland and the state of Oregon do not want the DHS troops there. Let it be their responsibility to clean up the graffiti and repair the courthouse.
You saw what happened in Seattle right? Do we really want to see CHOP part 2? That's what was coming to Portland without some kind of intervention.

It’s the kind of intervention that is the problem. For whatever reason, Oregon has chosen not to deploy their National Guard. I think the Oregon state and local officials, and Portland law enforcement have a better sense of what they need. The National Guard can be federally mobilized for domestic purposes, but it is usually when a state requests assistance (and Posse Comitatus would still apply). It is a blatant abuse of power for Trump to unilaterally make the decision the to intefere in a state’s policing. He has sent troops from the Department of Homeland Security under the guise of protecting federal property. The Acting Secretary, Chad Wolf, is a lapdog with no qualifications for his position (which is why he will never be confirmed for a permanent position) and will do whatever DJT tells him.

The Administration is also sending DHS troops, uninvited, into Chicago. Another lapdog, Attorney General Bill Barr, has taken great pains to distinguish this deployment - “Operation Legend” - from the disaster in Portland. He has stated that the troops will focus on "classic crime-fighting."

Portland is a test case. The Administration is trying to federalize policing. I think Albuquerque, NM is next on the list. There are seven or eight states where Trump wants/plans to go uninvited, not to protect federal property, but to "tackle inner city crime."

I think Seattle and Portland are apples and oranges. I don’t think the Portland protesters are demanding to maintain some type of commune. I get protests can be ugly, long, and draining. Violence and vandelism should not be condoned. However, the officials on the ground in Portland know what they need more than either Trump or the TV viewers.

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#138 Post by mockbee » Sat Jul 25, 2020 6:17 am

Xizen47 wrote:
Fri Jul 24, 2020 7:26 am

You saw what happened in Seattle right? Do we really want to see CHOP part 2? That's what was coming to Portland without some kind of intervention.

Are you saying "times dictate"? Meaning when it's inconvenient that the constitution needs to be put aside and "temporary" measures put into place to restore order?


Then what's the point of having a constitution?

:noclue:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#139 Post by mockbee » Sat Jul 25, 2020 6:34 am

Is the safety of a building truly at the heart of the matter?

Fine. Board it the fuck up and let the City of Portland look like fools for allowing chaos in the streets for however many nights it takes to restore order. It's annoying and "dangerous" as anything else that happens on a yearly basis in an American city......but I assure you the Federal Govt is not about to be toppled by a couple dozen anarchists with commercial grade fireworks and some molotov cocktails.....

:bored:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#140 Post by chaos » Sat Jul 25, 2020 7:40 am

The Wall of Vets has joined The Wall of Moms.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/25/us/a ... tests.html

A ‘Wall of Vets’ Joins the Front Lines of Portland Protests
Military veterans said they banded together to protect the free speech of demonstrators.

By Mike Baker
July 25, 2020, 10:30 a.m. ET

A week after federal officers in Portland, Ore., brutally struck a Navy veteran who said he had approached them simply to ask a question, a group of military veterans on Friday joined the front lines of the city’s growing protests.

Duston Obermeyer, a Marine Corps veteran, said he and other veterans were there to make sure federal officers did not infringe on the free speech of protesters, who numbered in the thousands.

“Our veterans are here specifically to support the rights of the protesters to protest,” said Mr. Obermeyer, who said he had deployed three times during a decade in the Marines.

The group of vets lined up in front of a fence erected outside the federal courthouse. They stayed together until a cloud of tear gas scattered much of the crowd.

While President Trump and the Department of Homeland Security have repeatedly labeled the protesters in Portland as “violent anarchists,” demonstrators have banded together in groups. A “Wall of Moms” has grown to include hundreds of women in yellow shirts linking arms. A “Wall of Dads” in orange shirts has included some with leaf blowers used to push tear gas away from the crowds. Many nurses on Saturday showed up in blue scrubs.

Local officials have demanded that federal agents leave the city, saying their presence has inflamed tensions and their tactics have been outrageous. One of those concerning cases was that of Christopher J. David, a Navy veteran who said he went to the protests for the first time last weekend to ask officers whether they felt their actions violated the Constitution.

As he stood still in front of the officers, one began hitting him with a baton. Mr. David said the attack broke his fingers.

Mr. Obermeyer cited that case as one of the motivations of the “Wall of Vets.”

Another veteran, Clint Hall, said he came out to support the Black Lives Matter movement. Carrying a “Disabled Veterans 4 BLM” sign, the Army veteran said the federal presence in the city had simply increased the tension.

“Things were getting better, and then they came here and made it worse,” Mr. Hall said. “Enough is enough.”

After suffering through the tear gas that was shot into the crowd, Mr. Hall said that the tear gas was so strong that it was leaving burns on his skin. He said it felt worse than the tear gas he recalled from his time in the Army.

“Ths response from the feds is over the top,” he said.

@VetsWall
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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#141 Post by drwintercreeper » Sat Jul 25, 2020 1:51 pm

That is impressive. I have hope that we will come together sooner rather than later. This country is built on protest.... thats why a shitload of loyalists left after the Brits lost the American War of Independence. It may be unwieldy, but protesting is what makes us us.

To those that want to play the law and order card, please keep supporting federal intervention into cities. I am sure it won't backfire and turn even more voters off the repubs.
:lolol:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#142 Post by mockbee » Sun Jul 26, 2020 2:45 am

Really good article on Portland and where the movememt is going (has really always been) here.....

:tiphat:


Will make a lot of the transplant white progressive Portlanders squirm, but is totally spot on...

:thumb:



Who Gets to Be a ‘Naked Athena’?

On weirdness, whiteness and federal agents in Portland



By Mitchell S. Jackson
Mr. Jackson is a writer.

July 25, 2020

Image


A nude protester faces off against law enforcement officers during a protest against racial inequality in Portland, Ore., on July 18.


A nude protester faces off against law enforcement officers during a protest against racial inequality in Portland, Ore., on July 18.Credit...Nathan Howard/Reuters
“Naked Athena.” Have you heard of her? She’s the woman who was so christened after she strolled into a recent Portland protest — one that was ostensibly, crucially, about Black lives — stark naked, save a mask (kudos to that) and skullcap. She sat down with her legs wide, and proceeded to do some yoga poses. Some say she was putting herself between protesters and police, that she was turning the cultural sacredness of a white (or at least a white-passing) woman’s body into a shield against rubber bullets and tear gas.

Naked Athena — whose friend describes her as a light-skinned person of color and outspoken feminist — said nada during her demonstration and hasn’t been interviewed, so I can’t know her intentions. What I can say with confidence is that what she did was aligned with the “weird” that Portland espouses in its beloved slogan: “Keep Portland Weird.” What I can say with reasonable assurance is that, were she a Black woman, she would’ve reaped a different public reaction than the ample awe and admiration I’ve seen on social media. And what I must say is that no matter her intentions, for a moment at least, she might’ve upstaged the movement, and not in a way I could discern as connected to its stated objectives.

Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate Naked Athena, and the white Navy veteran whose passivity exposed the bellicose bent of federal agents. I’m thankful for the passion and courage of other white allies during this movement.

But I’ve also been musing on the subject of weirdness — how that quality requires freedom, or at least the belief that one possesses it. How the ability to express passion and courage and weirdness is a product of that privilege; how a sense of utopianism of the sort that exists for white people in Portland, my hometown, leads to a certain audacity when it comes to both self-expression and political radicalism; how that audacity can make a city into a tempting target for a federal government that’s determined to look tough against a purported paragon of eccentric liberalism.

Let’s be clear: Oregon was intended as a white man’s Zion. And since its admission into the union, it has remained one. That isn’t intended to distract from, or in any way excuse, the ongoing state violence there; it’s just that there should be no serious discussion of my home state or what’s happening in my home city that excludes or forgets its founding ethos.

Oregon Country’s provisional government passed a law excluding Blacks from the territory and, though it voted against slavery, thanks to a member of its first provisional government — a former slave holder from Missouri — it amended this law to disallow Blacks from remaining within its borders beyond a three-year residence. You wouldn’t know unless you Sherlocked that Oregon once boasted the largest KKK chapter west of the Mississippi, that it waited over 100 years after the Civil War to ratify the 14th Amendment; it took almost 90 years to ratify the 15th.

In the years since, Oregon’s largest city has done a bang-up job of marketing itself as a bastion of lefty quirkiness as well as a place for great food, beautiful landscapes, formidable cultural scenes and, of course, Just Doing It. But the laws keeping black people out? Oregonians didn’t vote to scrub them from the state’s books ’til 2002.

Per the latest U.S. census statistics, Oregon is 86.7 percent white, and 2.2 percent Black. Portland itself is 77.1 percent white and 5.8 percent Black. That’s why the Black Lives Matter protests there look like they do — white. They have to; that’s who lives there.

But in a monolith, it’s even easier for white people to center themselves at the expense of those they claim to support. That must make it harder to know where the line is between amplifying a voice and becoming the voice, between ardent allyship and white saviorship, between the values of a cause and the culture of a city. But the difficult thing, the complicated thing, is this movement can’t afford to be distorted by “weird.”

My beloved City of Roses made a great showing at the outset of the Black Lives Matter protests; you might’ve seen them gathered in a thousands-strong die-in on the Burnside Bridge, a preponderance of white faces turned downward in an apt symbol of George Floyd, pinned and pleading, under the knee of Derek Chauvin. It made me proud to witness my city’s collective conscience over the tragic death of a Black man in far-off Minneapolis.

But I’ve felt a bit more ambivalent about the past 50-some days of protests since. A small few have employed anarchist tactics, and/or seem to have lost the vision of a unified agenda. And I’ve seen nary national coverage of the smaller marches or activism led by Blacks and other people of color out in the Numbers: what we call the part of the city that Black people were dispersed to when whites gentrified my old neighborhood.

And now, the feds are there.

When I hear Keep Portland Weird, it always sounds to me a lot like Keep Portland White. But I imagine for the 76.3 percent of Americans who still claim white alone on the census, it sounds like Keep Portland a Symbol. Portland is Portlandia. Portland is the new frontier for migrating Brooklyn hipsters. Portland is Bush Sr.’s “Little Beirut,” the same place where almost all-white Antifa activists once battled neo-fascist Proud Boys. Portland whiteness: It leans way left but stretches far right.

It’s the opposite of ironic, isn’t it? A president who has defended white supremacists and championed white-power-esque policies sent federal agents to a notable bulwark of liberal whiteness, a place engaged in brazen support of a movement pursuing Black freedom. The footage has been straight terrifying: Agents instigating violence, abducting people into unmarked cars, providing more evidence of an administration trooping double-time toward totalitarianism. Can you imagine if Trump dispatches these tactics to Chicago and Albuquerque, to blacker and browner cities elsewhere?

Let me back up: This ain’t me arguing that whiteness always leads to weirdness; that weirdness is necessarily connected to anarchy, and, hell, even anarchists don’t excuse fascism. People ringing the alarm about what’s happening in Portland are right. But Portland’s racial dynamics aren’t a distraction from the real story of what’s happening there; they’re at the heart of it. And what bothers me is that, amid the naked woman, the brave white veterans, the heroic wall of lullabying white moms, the tear-gassed mayor, and the unidentified federal agents, we’ve once again stopped discussing the fight against institutional racism and state-sponsored violence against Black people in this country.

Those objectives were on my mind in mid-June when my homeboy forwarded me a clip of Portland protesters toppling a statue of Thomas Jefferson at his eponymous high school — the Oregon high school with the largest share of Black students, and where I graduated in 1993 (One time for the Demos!). Go figure, white men were part of the small crowd that cheered and tugged the statue on the ground and bashed it.

And peep this: I must’ve passed that statue a hundred-plus times over the years, and not a once did it occur to me that I could do a damn thing about its flagrance.

Amen that it did to those audacious few. These decades hence, I’ve realized that, though born and raised in the Rose City, it has never been my utopia, and in truth was never meant to be. It’s only ever been a home: where whiteness hovers over us Black folk, as perennial as old Jefferson’s duplicitous self-evident truth.



Mitchell S. Jackson is the author of The Residue Years and Survival Math. His next novel John of Watts is forthcoming. He teaches creative writing at the University of Chicago.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/25/opin ... e=Homepage

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#143 Post by mockbee » Mon Jul 27, 2020 10:33 am

This.




And if anyone is surprised that a black dude who lives in Portland within the protest zone with an American flag walking around talking to people is called every racial slur in the book by the protesters, isn't paying attention. Yes, anarchists. But it is also NW white "progressives" problem. That just goes to show these nightly "protests" have NOTHING to do with BLM and racial equality. Absolutely nothing. It has to do with Anarchists, Fed response to Anarchists and progressive liberal frustrations. All those grievances are actually understandable. A lot of the tactics are shit, either violent or ineffective, and always the narrative is completely messed up.

Just google what the crowd called Marissa Johnson at the Sanders rally in Seattle in 2015, and take a look at the thousands of comments from the "progressives." They don't care about BLM and still don't. Stop using their name and let them speak for themselves and listen to what they are saying. There are weekly speeches and small rallys around the country, including in Portland, that BLM organizes. The problem is, hardly anyone attends. BLM has intelligent things to say and specific demands. Nothing has changed, just no white people are comfortable enough to address it. NONE OF THEM.



It's complicated, yes.

And the one sure thing is that we all lap up the story we want to hear and we get served that story by the source that knows what we demand to hear.

None of the media is addressing the real problems.

:noclue:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#144 Post by mockbee » Mon Jul 27, 2020 11:01 am

Takes 27 minutes to watch this.

Highly recommended.





:gh:


:nyrexall:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#145 Post by mockbee » Mon Jul 27, 2020 11:39 am

I rode my bike down to the Federal Building in downtown Portland yesterday during the day to see what the hell is going on down there.

There was hardly anyone within a 10 block radius about 2pm, but 10 square city blocks looked absolutely terrible. You could smell and feel the tear gas in your eyes and throat, left over from nightly deployments. EVERYTHING was boarded up. ALL of downtown looks like an 80s dystopian urban scene from a cheesy movie. Shitty scrawled graffiti everywhere. Mostly Anarchists symbols, ACAB, "F the police" etc. No BLM supporting graffiti. The national news on Portland has NOTHING to do with BLM. It has everything to do with Anarchists, Fed response to Anarchists and frustrated progressive liberals who don't like Trump. Nothing to do with Black lives.

When I rode up from the riverfront park, three blocks, I could see a couple independent welder contractor trucks at the metal fence barricade. They were working on putting the fence back together from the toppling the night before. No police where in sight, no Feds with guns were in sight. Just the contractor working on the fence totally exposed. The only people were in the park with a couple dozen tents eating and watching the guy put the fence back up. There was Riot Ribs grilling up meat and serving it to about a dozen people. It was festive. I have no idea how they could stand the residual stench of pepper spray and tear gas. I was gasping for air and had to get out of there. Pretty much just a violent game here between the anarchists and the Feds/police. People were just probably sleeping in the several dozen tents and relaxing, waiting for nightfall. There was literally zero police/Fed presence during the day.

Have a lot more I could say, but don't want to waste my time here if i'm just talking to myself.

Need to go out for a ride anyways before it hits 100 deg F......

:wave:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#146 Post by Larry B. » Mon Jul 27, 2020 3:18 pm

I'm interested in reading, if that's worth anything. I'm not commenting much here, but I do read.

I find it a bit sad how predictable this all is. When we had the protests here last year, I might have even predicted that this would happen in the US, and that the police would use the exact same tactics... and how the press would react, and what sides people would take. And it's 100% predictable. The same discourse of "anarchists/terrorists" to describe people who do graffiti or throw stones at armed policemen or businesses; policemen/mercenaries downright kidnapping people in unmarked cars; policemen murdering protesters or severely injuring them; and a long list of disgusting acts of violence towards civilians who are basically demanding their human rights be respected.

And of course, many civilians aligning with that discourse.

It saddens me.

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guysmiley
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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#147 Post by guysmiley » Mon Jul 27, 2020 6:26 pm

I agree with everything you said mockbee. I tried to avoid watching everything, but I eventually couldn't avoid it. I'm sad for my old city. I saw it changing over the last few years. Influx rich young dummies moving in and rent hikes. I know it's complicated. I get marching in the daytime, but no good will come hanging around at night. i just can't believe a leader of any kind hasn't stood up and stopped it all. FEDs and everyone should go home. Half my FB friends are semi-radical at this point. Everything is left or right and no middle ground. People really need to step back and evacuate some of their own bias and thinking. We are all flawed.

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#148 Post by mockbee » Mon Jul 27, 2020 8:36 pm

Larry B. wrote:
Mon Jul 27, 2020 3:18 pm
I'm interested in reading, if that's worth anything. I'm not commenting much here, but I do read.

I find it a bit sad how predictable this all is. When we had the protests here last year, I might have even predicted that this would happen in the US, and that the police would use the exact same tactics... and how the press would react, and what sides people would take. And it's 100% predictable. The same discourse of "anarchists/terrorists" to describe people who do graffiti or throw stones at armed policemen or businesses; policemen/mercenaries downright kidnapping people in unmarked cars; policemen murdering protesters or severely injuring them; and a long list of disgusting acts of violence towards civilians who are basically demanding their human rights be respected.

And of course, many civilians aligning with that discourse.

It saddens me.
Thanks Larry. :bigrin:

I still remember reading all your updates with the Santiago protests. Riveting stuff and really gave a lot of depth to the events.

:wave:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#149 Post by mockbee » Mon Jul 27, 2020 8:42 pm

guysmiley wrote:
Mon Jul 27, 2020 6:26 pm
I agree with everything you said mockbee. I tried to avoid watching everything, but I eventually couldn't avoid it. I'm sad for my old city. I saw it changing over the last few years. Influx rich young dummies moving in and rent hikes. I know it's complicated. I get marching in the daytime, but no good will come hanging around at night. i just can't believe a leader of any kind hasn't stood up and stopped it all. FEDs and everyone should go home. Half my FB friends are semi-radical at this point. Everything is left or right and no middle ground. People really need to step back and evacuate some of their own bias and thinking. We are all flawed.

I understand trying to avoid it. It's tough. I really didn't want to go down there and be angry at everything and everybody. But I had to. I wanted to see for myself what this is and gain my own perspective instead of it being filtered through the media. It really illuminated some thoughts that I have been having after watching videos and reading different articles on the events. I feel much more clear about where I stand with what is going on. It's not good, not good at all, but at least I have some more clarity.

:wavesad:

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Re: 2020 US Racial/Political Protests and Riots

#150 Post by Artemis » Tue Jul 28, 2020 4:52 am

I too read your posts with interest, mockbee. I don't usually comment but I read. Getting a first hand account or perspective from someone who lives there is more trustworthy, imo. Same as Larry's experiences in Santiago.

Keep sharing, guys!

:wave:

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