I am heartsick at yet one more in an endless series of
police killings of black men. There is
nothing I can say that you have not already thought. And yes, I understand that from this
explosion of anger and frustration there may come the birth of a strengthened
movement for radical change. It is all
that keeps me from utter despair.
I think back to when I first learned of The Talk, that
obligatory conversation Black parents have with a young son when he reaches
twelve or thirteen years of age, and I wonder how many white Americans, even
those who are of the liberal persuasion, know about The Talk and have
really thought deeply about what it must be like to live in a country in which
such a tradition exists.
Dear God, let the protesters not contract the virus!
Yes, I know what the Talk is about.
ReplyDeleteWhat's interesting and in a sense heartening about the protest movements is that they are multiracial. It isn't just the Afro-american inner city rising up and smashing things as it was in the 60's. People are smashing things (I find that hard to condemn), but from photos I see in the media those people are black, brown and white.
That fact could be, as you say, the "birth of a strengthened movement for radical change".
A multiracial movement in this case.
I live in downtown Chicago, and I have a huge problem with people (regardless of race) smashing things and wreaking havoc. Last night, certain criminals vandalized and looted many retail stores (e.g. CVS, Walgreens, Foot Locker, Nike Town, Best Buy, Nieman Marcus, Macy's). They shattered windows, sprayed graffiti profusely, destroyed around 12 police SUVs, and even set some on fire.
ReplyDeleteI'm very liberal overall, I support most of Bernie's agenda, the video of George Floyd's death disgusted and angered me, but I completely condemn these criminal actions.
It's very easy to say, "Well, they're destroying only stuff; they're not killing anyone," when this is happening in someone else's neighborhood, not yours.
If you were teaching a class and the students started destroying the classroom and setting it on fire, what would you think?
If you want to protest George Floyd's death, do it 100% peacefully (which, admittedly, many or even the vast majority were doing) and do not antagonize the police. Better yet, get involved in community organizing or local politics. Attend your weekly community-police (CAPS) meeting. Focus on the issue at hand. Do not just use it as an excuse to destroy and loot.
I live in downtown Santiago de Chile and as you probably recall, starting last October, Chile went through over a month of at times violent protest demonstrations, looting and arson. The subway system was trashed as was the supermarket closest to my home (owned by Walmart) and a nearby pharmacy. One day the violent protests made it impossible for me to visit my cardiologist and I do have coronary problems.
ReplyDeleteHowever, it's a "which side are you on?" question. The radical struggle in many places seems to be taking the form of violent demonstrations, looting and just smashing things. You can sit on the side and condemn it all from lofty principles, but in terms of the real struggles going on, that means little or nothing. So I will not condemn people, who in spite of the fact that I personally am not comfortable with looting or smashing things are
engaged in a real struggle against oppression and racism in the form that it currently takes. It could take a non-violent form, but it doesn't and that's what's happening.
It's not that looting is justified, but yes, human life is more important than property. It's good to keep things in perspective while the power structured attempt to change the narrative.
ReplyDeleteSo while the looters may be a problem and may be guilty of certain crimes, if the focus is on that right now while it should be on the decades-long struggle of oppressed poor and minorities, for whom this latest image was just another trigger that may have unearthed untold amounts of repressed rage and sorrow, we are losing the forest from the trees.
The background of the pandemic also makes it more likely that many of these people are committing crimes of desperation...many are out of work, and out of money. Not to say they are innocent and blameless when it comes to theft, but again, the bigger picture here shouldn't be, as usual, trying to scapegoat those who are for the most part disempowered in society.
CDB, your decision to focus on property damage in this case says something about you, unfortunately.
ReplyDeleteThere is no reason whatsoever to think that the people who are protesting for change and the opportunists who would naturally emerge from the woodwork to take advantage of the distraction are the same people.
ReplyDeleteI am listening to Pete Seeger this evening. "Keep Your Hand on the Plow."
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyZVaH6YB10
When 40 million hungry and unemployed take to the streets and set banks on fire,
ReplyDeletewhat will President Biden do?
...ahem...continuing....
ReplyDeleteI hate to say it but do you know what the powerful do when there are massive but very peaceful protests, protests that respect curfews, police...and PROPERTY? They yawn.
There was a phrase used by the Professor that stuck in my mind (one of many) and for the life of me, I can't find it. But I'm pretty sure it had to do with the execution of Louis XVI. The pithy, dare I say boffo, phrase was something to the effect that "when his head fell into a basket"...it got their (meaning the elites of Europe) attention. Great line and right on the money. As Piven has argued, the power of the subjugated comes through disruption. My guess is that right now, business leaders and mayors across America are pressuring whomever to arrest and charge the other three cops...at minimum, lest this whole thing puts capital on trial. Dozens of cities ablaze has got their attention...AND...did you see the size of the solidarity protest in New Zealand? NEW ZEALAND!! https://bit.ly/2Av9Llz
For what it's worth, I tend to heavily discount "solidarity" protests in places like New Zealand in cases like this. New Zealand has a "race" problem that has many similarities to the one in the US in relation to Maori people, who are vastly more likely to be poor, to use heavy drugs or abuse alcohol, to go to prison, to be under educated, etc. It's persistent and long standing. But, engaging in protests like this about the US allows people in New Zealand to feel like they are good non racists, unlike those bad people in the US. Of course, this makes it easier to go along with things as normal at home. After all, they can't be racists! Didn't we see there moving sympathy protest?
ReplyDeleteInteresting point, Matt.
ReplyDelete"The rage of the disesteemed is personally fruitless, but it is also absolutely inevitable; this rage, so generally discounted, so little understood even among the people whose daily bread it is, is one of the things that makes history. Rage can only with difficulty, and never entirely, be brought under the domination of the intelligence and is therefore not susceptible to any arguments whatever."
ReplyDeleteJames Baldwin, "Stranger in the Village"
I have to say I find Matt’s comment (at 7:48 AM) quite disturbing—although he begins by just tending to heavily discount, he seems to me to go on to be dismissive of the New Zealand demonstrators as moral grandstanders and hypocrites.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn’t reject the notion that the NZ demonstrators—like demonstrators elsewhere, like human beings generally in almost all their actions—are motivated by many different, not always compossible things. But that surely doesn’t mean their actions should be discounted? Surely it just means that one has to try to understand the complexity of what they’re doing. (I’d apply that too to those who comment on this blog who express outrage about what happened to George Floyd or who have expressed their outrage about so many other things done in our world.)
But back to the NZ demonstrators: what makes Matt so sure that many of these demonstrators are not outraged by the condition and treatment of the Maoris or the Islanders or the Muslim immigrants in, e.g., Christchurch? And what makes him overlook the possibility that many of these NZ demonstrators have not in the past publicly expressed their outrage about grave injustices and will not do so again?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_protests_in_New_Zealand
Finally, like all of us, New Zealanders have surely been subjected to years of propaganda about liberal universalism and economic, social, and cultural globalisation. So it wouldn’t be at all surprising that they—like so many others around the world—take the blatant murder in far away Minneapolis somewhat personally, an attack on the sort of world they want to live in.
Well, ok, that wasn’t really my final word because I want to inject a personal disappointment. Many years ago, in March 1996, when the Dunblane school massacre occurred, I was deeply saddened by the fact that not a single one of my Midwestern colleagues, who never tired of making remarks about my Scottishness, ever said a word about that tragic event to me. I still wish they had not been so insular. I’m glad the New Zealanders on their far away islands are not as insular as that.
Hey Man: you know virtually nothing about me. Yet you make a snarky, ad hominem remark instead of attempting a rational rebuttal.
ReplyDeleteS Wallerstein: I’m sorry to hear about your coronary issue and I wish you well. I enjoy reading your many comments (especially about “intellectual hygiene”), though I may disagree at times.
You may be willing to tolerate widespread looting and destruction but I am not. Yes, black lives matter, as do white, Hispanic, Asian, LGBTQ, etc. lives. But property matters too, whether you have only $1,000 in wealth, $10K, $100K, $500K, or more. Indeed, if you have minimal private property (e.g. your small house or apartment, clothes, personal effects, and a small amount of money in your bank account), it’s extremely important to preserve and protect what you do have.
Some of the businesses destroyed this weekend were small, family-owned businesses. For example, a 120-year-old camera store (Central Camera) was set on fire and burnt down, and now the third-generation, 72-year-old owner must rebuild anew, in the middle of a pandemic and a severe recession or depression.
In addition, a family-owned jewelry store (Wedding Bands and Co.) was completely looted, the family has had zero income the past three months due to the pandemic, and now they have lost a substantial part of their wealth. They too must rebuild anew, in the middle of a pandemic and a severe recession.
If you were these owners, how would you feel?
Once again, if you were teaching a class and the students started destroying the classroom and setting it on fire, how would you feel?
If a violent revolution were unfolding and if one of those revolutionaries robbed, assaulted, or raped you (or a family member or friend) or burnt down your home, then how would you feel?
If a revolutionary mob decided to raid a retirement community or assisted living center in which you lived because “that’s where the wealthy, bourgeois, white senior citizens live, the retired professors, doctors, lawyers, middle managers, and executives who effectively support the power structure,” then how would you feel?
I would feel righteous indignation and want the perpetrators arrested, prosecuted, and convicted. And that is consistent with being outraged by the death of George Floyd (among others) and wanting serious police reform.
Chicago’s mayor (Lori Lightfoot), the Chicago police superintendent (David Brown), and the Cook County state’s attorney (Kim Foxx) are all black reformists, and they all oppose the mayhem and vow to hold criminals accountable. Lightfoot even called in the Illinois National Guard.
Even George Floyd’s own brother is telling people to stop looting and destroying.
Doesn't the Logos work for Cave Co?
ReplyDeleteCDB,
ReplyDeleteI have a friend, Roberto, who is a lifelong activist married to a lawyer who has dedicated her career to good progressive causes. Roberto was brutally tortured during the Pinochet dictatorship for his activism. Years ago they bought (with a mortgage) an apartment in the Plaza Italia, in downtown Santiago, which became the center of protest activities during the protest movement which began in October 2019.
A molotov cocktail was thrown by protesters into his building, which may represent luxury to some people, although is by no means a luxurious building by Santiago standards. The small shops in the plaza were looted and some burned. Police gas made it difficult to breathe at times in their apartment and his wife suffers from asthma. The shouts of the protesters often kept them up all night. Some of the windows of their apartment were broken by rocks thrown by protesters, others by "rubber" bullets fired by the cops.
Finally, their teenage daughter could take it no more and went to live with her grandmother in a quieter section of the city. Roberto and his wife eventually rented an apartment in another part of town, but since an apartment in the plaza Italia is impossible to rent at present due to the protest movements which probably will begin again as soon as the quarantine ends, they still have to meet the mortgage payments and they are not rich by any means.
When I asked Roberto whether so much personal inconvenience has changed his view of the protest movement, he calmly answered: "no, I have a lifelong commitment to radical social change and my personal situation will not change that".
I'm a lot more skeptical, ambivalent and even cynical than Roberto is in general, but I might well react as he did, with less certainty, but with as much certainty as I generally have towards my convictions, which are never wholly convictions.
Sounds like Roberto is of the mentality where you need to break some eggs to make an omelet.
ReplyDeleteIt does seem like some of the looting and rioting is taking a nasty turn in certain cities. It has degenerated into complete chaos, and one 'mistake' made by either side could send the country into a full-on race war it feels like. The national discourse and 'leadership' is only helping to throw fuel onto the fire. It's a dangerous situation on top an already dangerous situation. Hopefully calm minds and open hearts will prevail.
I'm having ice cream. Its my philosophical position.
ReplyDeleteR McD - you might be right. I don't claim to be certain about these issues. But, in many cases, I'm made to think of Lewis Carroll's story of the Walrus and the Carpenter from Through the Looking Glass. You can find it here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43914/the-walrus-and-the-carpenter-56d222cbc80a9
ReplyDeleteIn it, a walrus and a carpenter lead some poor unsuspecting oysters away from the sea, and eat them. One of them (the walrus, I think) cries while he does it, and dabs his eyes with his handkerchief to dry his tears. This makes Alice think that he was better - at least he cried while he was doing this. But, in fact, he was using his handkerchief to hide the fact that he was eating more oysters than the carpenter. In cases where people protest or demonstrate about bad acts far away, by people they are very unlikely to influence, and especially ones where they are likely to feel like they are righteous in relation to, I am skeptical. Too often it seems to me to be a way to allow them to go on doing what they wanted to do anyway, without feeling bad about it. Of course, this isn't always so, and doesn't mean that, say, people in NZ or Australia (where I live) shouldn't criticize the US (or that people in the US shouldn't, say, criticize China for its policy against the Uighurs or whatever) But, I do think it's a case where we should be very careful and realize that there is lots of room for self-deception and moral grandstanding that's not really justified.
I’m sorry, Matt, but with your borrowed story of the walrus and the carpenter you seem to me to be sinking even deeper into the well of cynicism.
ReplyDeleteYour response (at 4:02 AM) prompts me to pose a couple of questions:
1. When you say, “in many cases, I’m made to think of Lewis Carroll’s story . . .,” could you point to some cases that actually make you think of that?
2. If it is actually the case that people are unlikely to influence far away matters and are unlikely to be acting in good faith when they try to do so, how should your intervention on this predominantly American blog be evaluated? (NB. I’m not saying you shouldn’t say what you want to say here, but it seems to me the logic of your own stated position should prevent you from doing so.)
R McD,
ReplyDeleteI don't want to turn this in to a fight. (I'm not interested in fighting with people on this blog, most of whom I think of as well meaning and mostly after the right things, even if we disagree often enough on detail or tactics.) But, I think you're wrong on both cases.
As for 1, the protests in NZ were exactly such a case - by protesting racists acts in the US, it helps people think they are not racist, and so go along as they were before. In Australia, where I live now, I would include the ritualistic invocation of the "traditional owners of the land" that is done all the time, including in cases where there are no aboriginal people present. (This is common in Victoria, in particular, as there are very few aboriginal people there.) This makes people feel good, as if they are doing something for aboriginal people. But - as far as I can tell, it's _purely_ symbolic, doing nothing of substance, therefore allowing people to go on as before while feeling better about themselves - crying about eating the oysters, so as to be able to eat more -. I feel the same about things like, say, switching one's facebook photo to a black screen, as many people are doing today.
2. I'm not trying to influence events in any way. I'm trying to have a discussion about how to understand them. (I am also an American, though I live and work in Australia now.) So, this reply is just a nonsequitor)
In any case, this is the last I'll say about it. I accept that I might be wrong for many, perhaps most of the people involved. But, I am skeptical, and wanted to register the reason for it.
«I am heartsick at yet one more in an endless series of police killings of black men. There is nothing I can say that you have not already thought.»
ReplyDeletePerhaps if you looked at the statistics you could discover that black men killing of other black men are much, much, much more common than police killing of black men, and for actually existing black people they are a much, much, much bigger problem than police killings: not many black families have had someone killed by the police (however unjustly, brutally, cowardly), but a much, much, much larger percentage of them had someone killed by some other black people.
That nearly all black people who are killed are killed by other black people does not excuse the much smaller number of police killings of black people, but it is a tragedy in itself.
And that tragedy happens because the police (and most SJWs) ignore crimes committed against black people by other black people, because white taxpayers don't want to pay more taxes to fund a fight against crime that does not affect them (and because most white and black SJWs are hypocrites).
Most ordinary black people would love for the police, as long as it were less prejudiced against them, to protect them against other black people, That existing police don't do that is a far bigger issue than the far less common yet of course nasty, racist killings of black people by the police.
For most ordinary black people the racism of the police that has the biggest negative consequences is that they don't care about black-black crime, they care almost only when the victim is "respectable" (and that does not mean "white", but "middle class" or "upper class").