"You probably heard that a bunch of Black Lives Matter thugs rioted in Milwaukee last night, looting businesses, vandalizing vehicles, attacking cops, targeting white people, and setting random fires throughout the city.
"As we've learned, some members of the Black Lives Matter community think it a wise decision to destroy their own communities in order to protest "police brutality." Because nothing says "Black lives matter" more than burning a black neighbor to the ground.
"In any case, this "protest" erupted because a black suspect had been shot and killed by cops earlier in the day. The mob of fools took to the streets without waiting for a single solitary fact to be released. They knew, quite literally, nothing. They heard that a guy was black and he was shot. That's all.
"Well, now we know a little more. We know that the dead suspect is Syville Smith. You can see his picture here, peacefully pointing a gun at the camera. He was, as you can tell from the picture, a thug with a lengthy arrest record. He was shot because he fled from the police during a traffic stop, then when pursued, he turned and pointed a loaded firearm at an officer. The officer fired. Syville was killed. The officer, by the way, is black.
"So, a black cop killed a black gangbanger who tried to shoot him. And that was enough to prompt a night of chaos across another major American city, yet again necessitating the mobilization of the National Guard.
"This is just insane. There is no logic to any of this.
"Racism? The cop was black.
"Police brutality? The guy pointed a loaded gun at the cops.
"Systematic oppression? It wasn't the system that caused Syville Smith to raise a firearm against the police.
"No, you can't look for sanity or coherence here. These are just a bunch of imbeciles looking for an excuse to burn things. Nothing more. If they start up again tonight, I hope the police arrest every last one of them.
"Enough. We have laws in this country. You can't act like an animal without consequences. Syville Smith learned that lesson yesterday."
My response:
The problem with this post is that if you look closely, you clearly see someone's child, someone's brother, someone's friend. And if you listen carefully to posts from cousin's, etc. you hear their pain, expressed in the language they know, but pain none-the-less. There is no question this is a tragedy of society, and yes the system did put that gun in his hand.... a system that intentionally maintains poverty, a system that intentionally withholds education from the poor, or mental health counseling, a system intent on sustaining anger in the poor. If we are honest with ourselves, when we look in the mirror, we will see that we all exhibit "thuggish" behavior. We are thugs to our neighbors who need us, who desperately need us. The problem with this post is that we should see our brother,... someone who belongs to us.
A response to my response:
I agree Neil, but there are some people who a just plain old bad too - and they are bad regardless whether the "system" was good or bad. Society doesn't create all of the bad people, but a system that traps them in poverty doesn't help and leads many down a bad path. Bad circumstances lead to bad choices.
So, where do these sample opinions leave us? What do we do about bad circumstances knowing that they lead to bad choices? Remember that these opinions were rendered in 2016.
We're in 2020. We are still talking about this and nothing has changed. In fact one might argue that circumstances have worsened. Shootings continue. Minorities are still in poverty. COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on our healthcare and revealed chasmic gaps in a system already rife with disparities between racies. Can you complete this essay? I can't! Perhaps a metaphor for, Where do we go next?
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