Says a lot that some of us are more outraged over riots than black people dying.

[Drunken Irishman]

[Cali_Democrat]

1. Yep

Suddenly folks are so concerned about Baltimore.

Where were these people when Freddie Gray's spine was severed by cops?

It seems some people are more concerned about private property than human beings.

[laundry_queen]

8. I think it's disgusting

but not surprising. Really, what else can you expect from a culture that constantly puts profits over people?

ETA - I think it's disgusting that people are more worried about private property. Just to be clear. I re-read my post right after yours and it sounded weird in reply. It's been a long day.

[jeff47]

9. We mustn't upset capital!

Clearly this just called for a nice weekend holding a sign, and then returning to business as usual.

So unbecoming to be so upset by a murder.

[LovingA2andMI]

42. Riots is the Language of the Unheard....

And Marching in unison and signing Kumbaya did not stop Freddie Gray's Murder or any other suspected murder of any Young Black Men by the Baltimore Police over the past two years.

Violence breeds violence.

[TheKentuckian]

2. Always, it seems. Lives matter a whole lot less than property or inconvenience to some.

[Scootaloo]

3. You noticed that, too?

Great exercise? Take their usernames, pair it with "Freddie Gray" - quotes included - and run it through DU's search function.

It's illuminating. Like literally, you can read in a dark room, with all the white space that will be on your screen.

[Dream Girl]

6. Are you clutching your pearls again RFU?

You don't have a clue what their lives are like. The powerlessness. You are so worried about people getting "free stuff" the thugs! they're STEALING!!!!!! I'll get your smelling salts.

[realFedUp]

11. I think I have more experience on this one

Thieves are criminals. Agree?

[Cali_Democrat]

18. What kind of experience do you have on this?

Do tell.....

[Dream Girl]

24. so are murderers

Which is worse?

[Yallow]

49. No

Some people have to steal to survive.

40 acres and a mule.

No land.

No mule.

No rights.

Nothing.

Anyone got uppity they got hung for 150 years.

Now just go away and shut up colored folks?

It seems some people may one day thing that if they cause enough trouble
they may have a better opportunity for their family someday.

Doing nothing hasn't done much good.

[Joe Chi Minh]

74. Roman Catholic teaching expressly condones theft to avoid

starvation.

[840high]

75. I saw looters with toilet paper rolls and bags of chips.

[Joe Chi Minh]

79. Shame on them ! But, seriously, I wasn't implying that they

were starving. Just that in the ultimate, runaway capitalist country, the US, many would hold that even the starvation of fellow-citizens would not be a matter of significance, whatsoever. I believe a Republican politician has been campaigning to reduce eligibility for access to food banks. Anything to preserve their own money. And possibly that the food banks have been 'downsized'. I may be wrong on that.

However, the tendency is for the rich right-wing to demonize the poor, impugning their reliance on food-banks, casting them, in effect, as food-banksters, and worse than Wall Street's finest, the banksters of the financial world.

[Brickbat]

5. "For those who blame black America for black poverty, riots are distinguished not by their

contingency or their spontaneity or their political cast, but by their irrationality. On this misreading of history, civil resistance has nothing to do with the underlying conditions that make it rational to rebel, or with the relations of power that make other avenues of action unavailable to the urban poor."

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/01/when-rioting-is-rational-ferguson

[jwirr]

46. The unspoken message finally got through tonight. We seldom speak about the anger of poverty.

But tonight we are seeing the results. Wake up congress and look at the future.

[jeff47]

7. Very much. (nt)

[brooklynite]

10. Am I to understand you can't be outraged at both?

The Mayor (black) and the Police Chief (black) are investigating the police violence situation. What would you like to have happen in the meantime?

[Egnever]

12. Clearly not

[Bonx]

13. Was there a poll I missed ?

[cwydro]

16. Exactly.

But don't interfere with single minded agenda folks now.

[gollygee]

22. It doesn't say you can't be outraged at both

just that African Americans being killed over and over again, in city after city, by police officers who are very often not held responsible and even have groups raise funds for them, is a worse situation than angry fed-up people acting angry and fed up. The rioters are also in the wrong. That isn't part of the question. The question is only which people are more outraged by. The assumption seems to be that there would be some level of outrage about both, not that it's an either/or thing.

[Major Hogwash]

33. Well, if one starts 14 threads bragging that the Mayor of Baltimore is black, . . .

. . . and then agrees with the Mayor that the riot is being perpetrated by thugs, that person just might not come across as being all that outraged that black men are being murdered in America by white cops every single day of the year!!

This, after spending almost a week reading how Cornel West was thought of as such a paragon of virtue and truth, mostly supported at the DU by white people posting here, after West said disparaging remarks about President Obama's supporters, Melissa Harris-Perry and Michael Dyson.

[gollygee]

34. Yeah I saw that

Can't disagree with you.

Throw in some making fun of the mayor's makeup.

[mimi85]

62. Oh spare me...

I seriously think that's being overly dramatic. I'm an older white woman and I have never, ever posted in a thread in support of Cornel West. Granted, I have a biracial grandson which definitely has opened my eyes to racism, some real and some purely ignorance, however I've been a so-called bleeding heart since I was a kid.

In fact, I recently made contact on FB with an elementary school friend who was the only Jewish kid in our lily-white Orange County school. She was bullied constantly and we went together to to the principal's office to try and get some help. We didn't call it bullying back in the day, but that's what it was.

We had ONE black kid in our high school in the four years I was there. Poor kid dyed his hair blonde to try and fit in and didn't last the whole year. We did have a very, very few middle-class Hispanics. My husband went by our school a few years ago and it's now mostly Asian-American kids. Although that fact doesn't mean "shit to a tree" (courtesy of the Jefferson Airplane song Eskimo Blue Day).

Sorry to go on a rant, however hearing that it's mainly white people on DU supporting Cornel West hit a raw nerve. What a bunch of hogwash!

[Major Hogwash]

63. "I'm an older white woman . . . "

and I have never, ever posted in a thread in support of Cornel West.

Sorry to go on a rant, however hearing that it's mainly white people on DU supporting Cornel West hit a raw nerve

Why would telling the truth about DU hit a raw nerve with an older white woman?

That doesn't make any sense.

[CAG]

61. Evidently you have to support riots and looting or you clearly want to increase

the amount of police brutality.... or something.

Talk about a strawman argument; if you say anything against rioting now, evidently you don't care about people who have been killed by a policeman. I don't get it. Better arguments have been made by freepers in their parents basements.

[qwlauren35]

66. Not fast enough.

They should have started the investigation when they discovered his severed spine, and then maybe we'd know something now.

And the cops are suspended WITH PAY!!!

I can't blame people for being pissed about that.

[rhett o rick]

69. You are good at asking questions. How are you at providing answers. What would you like to

see happen?

I think that both the Mayor and Police Chief should be fired by the people that expect to be safe from them.

[Vattel]

113. The mayor and the police commissioner have been improving the police dept.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026587567

[Rex]

99. 'are more outraged' does not equal 'can't be outraged' and you probably knew that before posting.

[Skittles]

109. yes; it is called black and white thinking

[cwydro]

14. That's just nonsense.

And you know it.

[heaven05]

81. Nonsense?

not really, if you have to live the life of DWB, LWB, BWB, RBWB, owing child support WB, playing with a toy gun with other children in a public park WB, walking in the street WB, selling 'unlicensed cigarettes WB, walking though ones own neighborhood WB, looking at a toy gun in Walshit WB, living as a woman WB, and on and on..........no nonsense here. Amerikkkan police culture is reaping what it sows.

[Logical]

15. Maybe the dumbest post tonight. Quiet a deep thinker I see. nt

[heaven05]

82. I wouldn't say something like that

unless your deep thinking is showing. Sadly, it is not.

[barbtries]

17. yep.

i was just ranting at my son about that because my niece put something on fb about it. i wanted to respond but she's getting married in July and I am so looking forward to being with family members I haven't seen in ages that i don't want to stir the pot. so instead i posted this that i ganked off of DU:

[malaise]

19. National guard general just said to protect property

and people - in that order

[procon]

20. Spot on! The Maryland National Guard leader just said

they will be deployed to protect property. People, you're on you're on folks. Good luck to all.

[jwirr]

45. Property has always been the priority. We only realize it when something like the present day

happens.

[Major Hogwash]

21. DU started to go downhill after Trayvon Martin was murdered.

When many of Zimmerman's apologists crawled out from under the rocks they were hiding under in order to tell us how wrong we were!!

[DonCoquixote]

23. Oh yes

and they also show when we ask if Hillary will ever apolgize for letting Bill run wild with the racist dog whistles in the 2008 election. It would be easy and costless, save to Bill's ego.

[LiberalElite]

43. and, Hillary's camp in 2007 originated the "Hussein"

anti-Muslim innuendo.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/12/17/422238/-Clinton-Ally-Kerrey-Obama-Muslim-Obama-Hussein

[Major Hogwash]

25. Black people aren't just dying, they're being murdered by white cops!!

Gray had a long life ahead of him until he met up with those cops!!

[nxylas]

104. "He had choices"

If I had a dollar for every time I've seen those words on Facebook tonight....

[appalachiablue]

28. That must have been really something, I can only imagine. Crawling out from under rocks

sounds about right.

[heaven05]

83. +10000

[LWolf]

26. Who are the "us" you refer to?

[heaven05]

84. really?

[LWolf]

111. Yes, really.

I'm wondering if it's a universal "us," or more specific on DU. I'm working 80 hours this week. I check in waiting for my first cup of coffee, and am here for less than 2 minutes...I haven't been following hot topics here.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

27. Yes, SPARE ME your "concern"over a CVS store or a few jobs, all of a sudden some people care about

this community?

my ass

good OP, BTW

when will white privileged assholes figure out THEY will be properly blamed if this gets worse?


when I say "your" in main section here i am not talking about you, of course

[undergroundpanther]

39. I don't give a rats ass about mondawmin mall either

When There is a genocide against black people,native Americans and the mentally ill going on right under our noses done by cops and other"officials",mass incarcerations,etc. this is more important than AnyProperty.property can be remade,people cannot.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

40. It doesnt seem to be important to some around here though...genocide vs stolen tissues

[heaven05]

85. +1000

so true!!!!!!

[heaven05]

112. according to some

the 'peace officers' bent Mr. Gray like he was origami sculpture after having knees on his windpipe and spine. Inexcusable doesn't even begin to explain the viciousness of this murder.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

115. It is time the damage that appears to NEED to be done, none bodily injury property damage

should be done OUTSIDE of their community.

They cant destroy their own stuff, how about destroying the stuff the rich, white privileged folks rely on?

I do not condone breaking the law, but then I dont kill black people for being black, either

[Thespian2]

29. K & R, hugely

[blkmusclmachine]

30. "Says a lot that some of us are more outraged over riots than black people dying."

That's "centrism" for you...

[onecaliberal]

31. This is what happens when you oppress and kill people.

I don't feel sorry for CVS, or the cops or their fucking cars. Until the policing in this country undergoes systemic change from top to bottom this is what they'll get and rightly so.

[TexasMommaWithAHat]

36. I feel very sorry for the elderly who were going to use that senior center

that is burning to ground. That was part of a larger public/private revitalization project. That church community is in shock right now.

http://southernbaptistchurch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13&Itemid=20

It's hard to revitalize an area if you burn down new construction.

[onecaliberal]

38. As am I.

[heaven05]

86. really???

I don't feel you........

[TexasMommaWithAHat]

106. Nor I you.

You are nothing to me but a pair of rolling eyes on a little green face.

[1StrongBlackMan]

32. I wonder when/if folks who are largely unaffected by the proximate cause of the upset ...

will ever stop telling those who are, the proper way to express their upset?

[phil89]

77. If you think

Burning down senior centers and pharmacies is a proper way to express upset, you're clueless. This will be harmful in the long run. Wise people can see this.

[1StrongBlackMan]

93. Okay. n/t

[Phlem]

35. yep.

[ibegurpard]

37. Stop killing black people

Is it really that fucking difficult???

[Yallow]

52. Actually You Have To Stop Arresting Them Too

And provide jobs, and a future for them and their kids.

Pushing millions of poor into America's wasteland inner cities
isn't gonna solve anything. Not with a $400 a month welfare
check and food stamps.

The war has started.

A few families have more wealth than all the black folks in
America combined.

And most of these families never worked a day in their lives, and
pay next to nothing in taxes.

This is the problem.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

57. For these guys?

Yeah.

But only because they were only given clubs.

BTW: Where are the "millions of guns on the streets" we keep hearing about?

The Bundy Ranch?

[cali]

41. I sympathize with the rage and pain

but I refuse to laud those looting and burning as many here are. I am by no means more outraged over the riots than the murders by cops. I am saddened by them though because I believe they're terribly counterproductive.

[cali]

60. wrong and a steaming pile of bullshit wrong

[heaven05]

88. really????

expected.....

[stone space]

90. Protest is counterproductive?

Peacefully demonstrating until the next
police murder, now that is counterproductive.

Seriously???

[kacekwl]

56. Hard to disagree

with you . Also hard to read how many here seem to condone the rioting. Seems to be the easy way out , instead of demonstrations and other ways to get the message across long term.

[heaven05]

89. been demonstrating for respect

of life for 50 years, the disrespect of POC, by the PTB and their badge wearing, gun toting agents, just gets worse. Seems your indignant tripe has no basis in reality.

[CAG]

64. +1000

I hate this simplistic 2 dimensional crap argument that if you don't like the riots you condone or don't care about murders by cops. You would expect this type of argument by the simpleton freepers in their parent's basements.

[heaven05]

91. I hate simplistic

talk of the need of black people to deny their feelings of frustration and rage at the behavior of amerikkkan police culture. To always be trying to tell people how to feel and act toward those who would murder them in cold blood is simplistic one dimensional thinking and shows a lack of understanding of the dynamic of white racism and privilege that is creating situations such as now happening in Baltimore. Period.

[MisterP]

97. yeah, 'cuz half the Greatest Threads and Trending Now on the frontpage

are either "go riots" or "who else wants to start a DU vanpool to smash a CVS" threads

oh, wait, they're not

[jwirr]

44. I can't say that I am outraged. More sad that there is violence. IMO Dr. King would be down

there trying to bring it to an end. Doesn't mean that we are outraged. Just that we think non-violent is more effective.

[ChiciB1]

47. Pretty Sickening... This Is How THEY Roll!

Unfortunately some rose up, but it's NOT the true picture! I'm white and I'm beginning to feel a need to apologize to people of color I meet! We're having a new AC installed and the owner and his right hand man are from Haiti and when they came into my house they saw my protest stickers on fridge, AND some other things. I live in a "white bread" community and you don't run into many people of color, so they were surprised by what they saw. We talked a long time with my husband & I explaining how we felt and how what we're seeing is so disgusting! Of course they know the "story" well, but finding liberals like us is something they don't see all that much.

At least I got a chance to convey my thoughts to them and hope they see there are people who care AND understand!

[Spitfire of ATJ]

48. I noticed one place they hit was one of those payday loan places...

I hope they wiped out all the local debt.

[kacekwl]

50. Unfortunately

those who are rioting will delete any peaceful protests here and across the country. Certainly not doing themselves any favor and just making a case for the police.

[valerief]

54. Better tell the government to stop their agitators then. nt

[heaven05]

92. No they won't

period. Deleted in your mind maybe. Did Freddie get deleted? YES!!!!!!

[redruddyred]

51. got in a discussion w/ my local cop abt the fucking ASSAULT WEAPON he kept in his vehicle

'do you know what's happening out there?' he asked.
'yes, cops wearing assault weapons and shooting dark people'.
and I live in a part of the world where ppl don't even bother to lock their doors.
what a waste of taxpayer money.

[Joe Chi Minh]

78. Yes. As the Italian saying goes: 'Fish rot from the head'.

St Augustine once shrewdly observed : 'When justice leaves a society, what are its leaders but mighty bands of robbers.' It is also true that the less a sense of personal responsibility exists in a society, the more expensive it becomes to govern. Put the two together and you get a madhouse.

[valerief]

53. Kick!

[okaawhatever]

58. The two aren't mutually exclusive. People of color are being hurt by BOTH the white police and their

fellow people of color in their own neighborhood. Joy Reid just commented on the Liberty City riots in Miami. She said that neighborhood never was rebuilt. Who won? What did those riots accomplish? The chain stores will be able to collect their insurance and rebuild. It's the local businesses (minority owned) that won't have adequate coverage. Oh, and black people may also die when they can't get an ambulance tonight.

[heaven05]

94. my, how balanced

black people are already dying and because the ambulance shows up LATER or not at all. Plus if you want to get real, a LARGE percentage of minority owned stores are not owned by black people in the black communities. Period.

[captainarizona]

59. republicans are evil and using this.

Faux news has this black sheriff from milwaukee on blaming democrats, he should be charged with incitement to riot and faux news also for inciting rioting. This republican punk governor hogan is attacking the african-american woman mayor for waiting to call out the national guard as she doesn't want the guard shooting down young black men in the streets as they have done in past uprisings.

[qwlauren35]

65. For the people IN BALTIMORE

There is not so much outrage over the rioting as concern for those civilians who might get hurt. This is not unexpected. If the mayor and police commissioner were moving faster to seek justice for Gray's death, this probably wouldn't have happened.

How does a man die in a van and the ones responsible are suspended WITH PAY???????????????

[Inkfreak]

67. I don't get it. What does it say a lot of?

I think it says a lot that the vast majority of DUers stand WITH the protesters. And that's far more important to me as a member here than a few posters posting about the rioting.

[JoeOtterbein]

68. Instant Media: Broken windows are wrong!...

...But if we are asking about broken spines, then we must potentially "wait for proof", because the police must be considered "innocent before found guilty in court".

I agree with that principle, but then we should allow that fact the Freddie, also as any other man, should have been considered "innocent before found guilty in court" before he was tossed and road-around in an unsecured vehicle.

As the old folk song asks, "when will WE ever learn?" (WE means "Whites Everywhere," including me!)

[uponit7771]

70. People have to justify the horrid actions of the police

[The CCC]

71. Says a lot that some of us are more outraged over riots than black people dying.

You have every right to be disgusted by both. You have no right to riot because of either.

[heaven05]

95. ?????

no right? Always trying to tell people how to feel and react to CENTURIES of injustice and murder. That amazes me to no end.

[Joe Chi Minh]

72. You got it. It's clear that they don't even see

how disgraceful their lack of a sense of proportion is in this context; such a disproportion, indeed, that in this matter of life and death for black males, inevitably driven to utter desperation, they can blether about financial losses incurred by individuals, as a result of the riots, as trumping the central issue of the daily capital crimes of the - no don't laugh - 'the Untouchables'!

[heaven05]

73. Not surprised at all

Was expecting these types of responses. I wasn't disappointed. Typical of a lot of alleged progressives and/or liberals. DINO's really.

[jberryhill]

76. So if I opposed the Iraq war, it means I approved of Saddam Hussein?

Ummmmm.... no.

[trace]

80. violence not the answer

Hi out there, new to the forum. I agree as much as anyone that the treatment of Freddy Gray was inexcusable but this is not the way to stop it. It just makes everyone look like what many view them as. I think heads will roll because of the treatment of this human being and through the law is the way to work on the problem. Thanks.

[ann---]

102. Agree 100%

but a lot of people won't like our view.

[gopiscrap]

110. Welcome to DU

[marlakay]

87. My thought as a white person is I am not surprised by the riots

but sickened by what is happening to the black people. If I could change things I would. I was talk we are all the same inside and colors don't matter.

[Damansarajaya]

96. Damn right! The Cons are the first ones to say,

"actions have consequences" when an unarmed African American runs from the police or and is shot in the back or a 12 year is playing with a toy gun and is gunned down without warning.

Strangely, they don't use that same metric when the community rises up in anger at the injustice.

Actions do indeed have consequences. One would think that the police might change their behavior as a result of the consequences.

[Dont call me Shirley]

98. My concern is black people being beaten and murdered. I'm working on ignoring the riot coverage.

Cops are supposed to serve and protect, not play Grand Theft Auto in real life.

[Rex]

100. Wow! It is as if you said something offensive to a certain type of person!

Well played!

[ann---]

101. Not an equal analogy

There is plenty of outrage at the deaths of blacks (or anyone)
at the hands of the cops. That outrage should not translate into
looting and setting cop cars on fire. That will make people care
less about the injustice when Freddie Gray's memory and Freddie
Gray's parents are disrespected by this horrible behavior of SOME
protesters.

Some cops are bad - some protesters are, too.

[raven mad]

103. Ok, and agreed.

White chick from alaska responds - I understand, having grown up in the deep South.

[Maedhros]

105. Riots are inevitable when every reasonable path to justice is blocked.

I do not condone the rioting, but I understand it.

Rather than cluck our tongues at the rioters, we should be addressing the real problem: a system that allows police brutality to flourish, with no consequences for police officers who kill civilians.

Better yet, let's address the bigger problem: an economic system that creates and thrives off of a disadvantaged underclass, then punishes them for rejecting the yoke.

“For if you suffer your people to be ill-educated, and their manners to be corrupted from their infancy, and then punish them for those crimes to which their first education disposed them, what else is to be concluded from this, but that you first make thieves and then punish them.”
― Thomas More, Utopia

[L0oniX]

107. Seems that many here don't know that most cops are republicans.

Of course that means they have a lot of racists in their ranks. Google: republican cops

[Orsino]

114. More Americans died in the GWOT than on 9/11, too.

Oddly-placed outrage is to be expected.