MLK Day Protesters Block Traffic on the Bay Bridge
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Gordon Shumway
Banned
This would require "you" to ask "they" bud..
Something tells me you don't get even half as outraged when cops murder your fellow citizens and go unpunished.
backflip10019
Member
That would also be terrible behavior. What would people who genuinely need help do?
DontBeThatGuy
Member
We're gonna see it escalate to Rapture levels any moment now.
MHWilliams
Member
Again, I offer up this post, including many of the successful protests involving Dr. King, which are held up as the gold standard of non-violent protest. Many disrupted traffic.
That's not how blockades work. If an ambulance is sandwiched far back, they can't jsut let the ambulance through. ALl of the trafick has to pass.
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
Minneapolis BLM took over a police station and sat in it for weeks just a couple of months ago.
http://www.newsweek.com/minneapolis-mayor-end-encampment-4th-precinct-399452
Almost no one I know knows this ever happened. I didn't until it was almost over. When the protest isn't inconvenient to the public, no one knows about it.
Tesseract
Banned
of course i do, please don't do that
Cops will shoot a black person for talking on the phone, think they won't for blocking their way?
EatinOlives
Member
Well you're not shitposting because you've elaborated on your position, so that's good.
Tesseract doesn't "vaguely" hit this profile. It's almost literal a word for word description of his deplorable behavior in this thread. He's not the problem because he fits the description of the quote either, he's the problem because he fails to understand the purpose of a peaceful disruptive protest, and considers protesters the "monsters" and "pieces of shit" in this scenario, not the people actually committing the atrocities that fueled these protests in the first place. Legitimate rage about a protest, instead of the cause of the protest, is a fundamental misunderstanding about the very concept of protests at their core. All this rage because the "order" was disrupted for a few hours. And the fact that yes, this discussion is happening on MLK day makes the quote appropriate in context.
You're right, that was unfair, I apologize.
Subpar Spatula
Banned
Unless you live in an area with terrible drivers, most places have enough space so cars can move to the side. You've been in a traffic jam with emergency vehicles before, right?
Do you have any specific examples of protesters blocking roads to where an emergency vehicle failed to get somewhere and something awful occurred?
Tesseract
Banned
both are wrong, how about that? stop trying to think for me, thanks.
and the irony of your profiling me will give me many laughs tonight.
Thank you, was curious to see if they attempted this.
People dying in am ambulance is a hysterial situations? it's a totally plausable situation and it's ridiculous to act as if any protestor should choose to do something like this while ignoring the possibility. Nothing good comes out of "If it didn't happen, then we don't have to consider the possibility of it happening.
I don't really take "MLK did it" as a reason why it is okay. MLK did a lot for this country and racial relations, but that doesn't mean all of his methods were ideal or justified like a rule or something.
It's what happened back then too. You think those protesters marched on sidewalks all the way to Washington? And yet now we almost all say that it was indeed necessary.
I know you probably aren't trying to, but this is pretty much blaming the victims of police brutality here. These protesters feel the need to do something so drastic just to be noticed.
They are so concerned about their own lives and that of families/loved ones that they are risking a lot to do what they are doing, they could easily have been new victims (actually they still can be). And they are still for the most part getting ignored. Perhaps there are going to be hypothetical ambulances blocked, but perhaps save some concern for what is already going on? They are protesting the lives lost that have already occurred, yet you seem more worried about hypothetical stuff.
Sometimes the most ideal option is in fact not an option. The world doesn't work that way. Also, considering what they are trying to combat and how they are doing it, the risk of what they are doing and what they are facing, the potential risk to others is extremely minimal.
EatinOlives
Member
I'm not trying to think for you, I'm pointing out your behavior and how it's coming off to everyone else.
If that's not how you think, you may use this as an opportunity to adjust your attitude. It's frankly pretty disgusting.
Liu Kang Baking A Pie
Member
If you've ever wondered what you would have done if you were alive during the Civil Rights Movement, right now is a very good way to find out. It never ended.
So he never gave a heads up to the news they were doing a march? That surprises me, I thought he did. I admit, I was wrong about that.
It still doesn't change the fact that it is dangerous. I mean, there were CHILDREN on the highway. Are people still going to be defending them if a child gets hit by a car? I don't know, I guess I am both paranoid and am wary to bad/angry drivers. I mean, that didn't happen to the March during MLK's time where people would get away with it (of course at the end of the march people were arrested and all that terribleness...) so probably not to much of a chance of it happening to a MUCH smaller group on only one road.
And, while I personally would just be annoyed (though find it interesting), people do have a point about ambulances and other emergency vehicles. Thankfully none needed to pass, but why risk innocents dying in trying to protect innocents?
But the worst part honestly is seeing how quickly Neogaf turned on each other. It is true that doing this helps brings awareness to BLM and it is not my position to tell them not to do this. However, acting someone is a scumbag for wanting to get to their job or pick up someone they love over seeing a protest is, ironically, very ignorant. It isn't because they don't care about black lives, but they DO have a life.
But whatever, not trying to demonize the protestors as what they are protesting IS a serious thing. But also not acting like people wanting live their lives don't care about BLM.
But he was able to do a lot for this country because of his methods, not in spite of them.
Gentleman Jack
Member
Tesseract called the protesters pieces of shit and compared them to monsters, didn't he?
No idea. I'd be rich if I did know.
Perhaps protesting in front of the houses of the cops that shoot people? That would certainly get the media's juices flowing and keep the cops' names in the public sphere. That would also get people to not complain about road closures.
Sit at home and spitball hypothetical scenarios to not shout down but really shout the movement?
theignoramus
Member
The specific method of civil disruption is precisely how he managed to spur momentum for change. It doesnt matter if you personally dont like it, its a large part of the reason he is celebrated today as a catalyst for racial progress and why people here in 2016 seek to emulate his modus operandi.
Tesseract
Banned
that's a vaguely racist thing to say, i would've marched hand in hand with the movement
yup, disrupting traffic in 2016 is unacceptable
it's getting ugly in here, i better leave now
the answer for everyone here then is nothing. got it.
It matters when somebody is trying to use it as an appeal to authority argument towards me.
You would have marched with pieces of shit and monsters? Why would you do that?
Good for them, but man. I want to believe protesting like this would work, but I don't think it will.
We already have people here in GAF, a pretty liberal site, not seeing the point of disruptive protesting. Imagine how the rest of the country views it.
And the sadder thing is, you HAVE to protest like this, because yes, why would white people even bother to listen to you if you're protesting out of the way? They don't care. They're not the ones being killed.
But then when you DO protest like this, they see you as monsters who don't think about others.
There is no winning, and that's terrifying. I wish the movement had someone as iconic as MLK or Malcolm X (In his later years) because I think that having a hero like that really helped the movement in the 60's,
We already have people here in GAF, a pretty liberal site, not seeing the point of disruptive protesting. Imagine how the rest of the country views it.
And the sadder thing is, you HAVE to protest like this, because yes, why would white people even bother to listen to you if you're protesting out of the way? They don't care. They're not the ones being killed.
But then when you DO protest like this, they see you as monsters who don't think about others.
There is no winning, and that's terrifying. I wish the movement had someone as iconic as MLK or Malcolm X (In his later years) because I think that having a hero like that really helped the movement in the 60's,
UltimaPooh
Member
That's a disingenuous statement. You have the ability to look at the past with 20/20 vision.
A Link to the Past
Banned
How would that stop police from unlawfully killing black people?
I have no idea and don't claim to. I wasn't following or responding to that entire conversation. His post was the last one when I opened the thread, and it fit the typical meme-like usage of that block quote.
That posters gross language you cite doesn't change the reason why the block quote gets invoked, even if the target actually "deserves" an ad hominem.
Subpar Spatula
Banned
To be fair, us white people never care. Conquest is just our way of going to the corner store.
Gentleman Jack
Member
I mean, it's ugly because we're flinging some horrible language in here and not explaining ourselves, sure. Don't complain it gets ugly when your opening salvo is literally 'pieces of shit.'
Vicetrailia
Banned
You keep making more and more rationalizations. We all will have to live with disruptions as the future unravels from any number of groups. We're in interesting times.
The potential for having the news capture photo/video of something terrible happen was why MLK's marches were so effective. The iage of a black teenager getting beat down, hosed or biten over wanting to sit at a different table, register to vote or go to a new school was so shocking that is gave moderates a kick in the ass to acually do something other than just say "I'm not racist" or "That's not right." The potential for danger, and actual injury, was a big component of MLK and other non-violent activists success.
Gordon Shumway
Banned
? Did it happen..I forget. Yet, you quoted and never answered.
You've been making an appeal to consequences argument with the stuck ambulance scenario.
freeofgreed
Member
I'm just tired of this hypothetical lives > black lives argument you guys are making. Considering how often the media shits on blm you'd think a story would've surfaced by now at how someone died due to not making it to the hospital in times because of these protests. Does anyone have any actual articles on this? Cause right now it seems you guys are more concerned about hypothetical people dying then actual ones.
Well if you want these radical forms of protest to go away how about you get mad at the actual cause of them and not the effects of it?
The same way blocking traffic would. It wouldn't.
theignoramus
Member
I think it got ugly when you used descriptors like "pieces of shit" and "monsters", my friend.
Yes. I believe actions should be judged by the consequences that they can be reasonably be determined to make or possibly make. To be okay with this protest is to be okay with potentially dusrupting critical services that save lives.
No one here wants black people to get killed, but disrupting a major roadway is not the correct way to do it. Causes a lot more problems and secondly the protesters get arrested and potentially have it on their records.
Subpar Spatula
Banned
Got any examples of disrupting traffic has caused something awful with emergency services?
Big Baybee
Member
Man, people will sure be upset when they see all that footage of MLK marching in the street with hundreds of other protestors. People have places to go!
freeofgreed
Member
Bull fucking shit man. Hindsight is 20/20. If this kind of shit bothers you, you know damn well your ass wouldn't have been protesting in the 60s. You would've been making the same sort of comments you are now.
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