So yesterday some dude gets shot during an alleged traffic stop for a broken tail light.

Today, this.

http://www.cnbc.com/2016/07/07/two-police-officers-shot-at-dallas-protest-rally-nbc-5-reports-amid-outrage-over-alton-sterling-philandro-castile-shootings.html

These things go in cycles.

No bikes were injured.

Labeled an act of terrorism on the radio this morning.

Looks like they’re using the chart again.

Yeah watching it alive atm…..another US shooting debacle. Automatic rifles in city centres = lots of dead people, although it’s five Police so far.

<Trump> Well, if all the crowd had been armed, they could have shot the snipers…</Trump>

😐

Is it just me, or is the world rapidly descending down the shitter at the mo?

Does seem that way.

Is it just me, or is the world rapidly descending down the shitter at the mo?

Well it’s raining today, so yes. Yes it is.

nah just people getting on their high horses making a lot of noise. I did wonder what the actual figures of people being killed by police in america were like. They focus on the fact he was black but in reality shouldnt the campaign be for the number of deaths of innocent people killed the police.

Unfortunately the figures for deaths of unarmed people in America by the police is more
revealing
Deaths by police in 2016

24 /566 were black unarmed
42 /566 were white unarmed

82 in total out of 566 were unarmed ( not saying that being unarmed means you are innocent)

So why is this a race issue when there is a wider picture other than the fact that people want to make it a race division?

And shooting police officers is not going to help the situation if you want them to stop shooting at you.

cheekymonkey888 – Member
nah just people getting on their high horses making a lot of noise

😯

Shooting and killing people is “getting on your high horse”? WTF?

I’m guessing cheeky monkey didn’t read the link. 5 police officers shot dead at protest.

My post was in relation to the world in the shitter telling us how bad things are but in actual fact it could be worse and nothing has actually happened

Being armed also does not mean you’re guilty of anything – it’s legal to openly carry rifles in Texas, and Philando Castile was legally carrying when he was killed.

82 in total out of 566 were unarmed ( not saying that being unarmed means you are innocent)

So why is this a race issue when there is a wider picture other than the fact that people want to make it a race division?

Because black people comprise circa 5% of the US population and yet make up about 1/3rd of the victims of unarmed police killings?

Unfortunately Dallas PD are supposedly some of the good guys, and you’ll note how professional they are by the way they calmly and in a very friendly manner arrested a black man with a camo t-shirt on – during the shooting – who was just carrying a weapon legally.

Whilst I see your point I think it should take into account %age of black / white / asian people in the area the shooting. I mean America is a big place and to take the whole is similar to saying the whole of Scotland wanted to stay in the EU.

Im not condoning what the poilce have done but equally I think the killing by the police is not just limited to black people as seen by the rallies and media interviews

No you shouldn’t – If you localised the data that would mean that you could twist the statistics to suit your own agenda.

Surely it would be a more accurate representation taking into account the ethnicities in the local police force jurisdiction and therefore the actions taken by that police force rather than spreading it across the whole of the US.

I would hope that the police forces standards are the same throughout but clearly they are not and this should highlight it.

Surely it would be a more accurate representation taking into account the ethnicities in the local police force jurisdiction and therefore the actions taken by that police force rather than spreading it across the whole of the US.

I would hope that the police forces standards are the same throughout but clearly they are not and this should highlight it.

From what I gather from the data I saw a while back, the vast majority of them are also shot by white cops. No need to go into that much detail to see a pattern – it would just be an attempt in confirmation bias.

Using your logic, you could defend either side of the argument because police forces in predominantly white areas will shoot predominantly white people and vice versa, you need a large enough data set to see an overall trend.

Local police forces should be held to account eventually, but the message should be that nationally – American police departments have an issue and appear to be much more willing to kill unarmed black people.

true but then you would have to see how many black officers are in those forces equally how many white people were shot by black officers etc. We can paint the picture whichever way you like but in reality it is the unlawful killings I am concerned about whether they are black/ white/ asian by either white / black or asian police officers.

Well you are just denying the racism/issues behind blacks being something like 7.5-10 times more likely to be killed whilst unarmed than white people.

If you focus on just reducing the total numbers of unarmed deaths, then black people will still suffer from a higher likelihood of being killed.

A lot of black people would call your opinion “colourblind racism” and I would agree with them.

The man in the widely circulated photo has turned himself in, according to police, who are now calling him a “person of interest”. In a previous tweet with his photo, the department called him a “suspect”.

A man who said he was the person of interest’s brother told a local news station that his brother was innocent and that he handed his gun over to police when the shooting happened.

“100% it’s not him,” the brother said, adding, “With him having an AR-15 with him, I said … ‘give your gun to the cop so there’s no misidentification.’”

He said his brother brought the gun to the protest because “it is his right. He was simply exercising his right.”

This piece that was in the Guardian about the shootings this morning kind of summed it all up for me.

The guy took an AR15 to an anti-violence march because it was his right. The very fact that you can buy such a weapon and carry it in the street shows what a f***ed up society you’re living in.

It’s terrible that there’s been five police officers killed, absolutely horrendous, but it was only going to be a matter of time before something like this happened IMO with the number of unarmed people they’ve shot lately.

you’ll note how professional they are by the way they calmly and in a very friendly manner

I saw one shaven headed bully throw a man to the ground because he was in his way.

For every nice cop who plays basketball with the youth, there’s another who is an idiot with a gun and a mandate to shoot first and ask questions later.

I would prefer innocent people not to be killed by the police whatever their colour. I am worried that some Police officers may feel they can get away with killing people.

I’m not sure how calling someone racist whether colourblind or not really helps the cause?

Is it just me, or is the world rapidly descending down the shitter at the mo?

Not just you. I generally have 5 live on in the morning until Keevney has finished, and its safe to put 6 music on. But this morning, for the first time ever, as I was listening to the gunfire ringing out across Dallas, I turned the radio off. I’ve just had enough ‘News’! I’m totally newsed out. No more. Its all just so unremittingly grim, negative, and generally shit.

It just seems that in so many ways the world is heading backwards at a rate of knots, to things I thought we’d left behind, but seem to loom larger and larger with each passing day! And with the Trumps, and Farages, and Boris’s of the world all too happy to exploit the situation to sow division, paranoia and fear

Utterly utterly depressing 😥

Well theres only one thing for it. Heres a picture of Oolong the rabbit, with a pancake on his head…..

For every nice cop who plays basketball with the youth

They even cheat at that

Terrible. Descent into further madness. Short term I think there will be no more demonstrations allowed as they have become a target. The police are only going to respond more forcefully. Hard to see where this is going to end.

. Short term I think there will be no more demonstrations allowed

The problem is who will stop them? The cops won’t want to.
This needs handling very carefully. All it will need is for Isis to take out a few cops “to protect the brothers” and you have a civil war on your hands.

Did anyone see the piece on BBC3 (I think) after the last police shooting, in Shitsville , Wherever a few months ago? It showed a large group of black guys who had effectively formed a militia. They were marching down the streets with full camo gear, body armour and assault rifles. When interviewed they said that they had to do this as they were effectively at war, and this was the only way to defend their communities.

It was absolutely gob-smacking. It looked like a mix of some weird dystopian post-apocolyptic future, with the racial politics of the 1950’s thrown in for good measure.

But what it did suggest is that there was a certain inevitability to what has just happened. And this could well be the sign of far worse to come

The most depressing thing about this is that in the ‘through the looking glass’ world of the present American political system, Trump and the NRA and all the rest of the Fox News watching squirrel-eating rednecks will conspire to make this situation a hundred times worse, for their own short term and selfish reasons. And in a society already awash with heavy weaponry, all I can say is that I’m grateful that I live in a society (for now) where cooler heads tend to prevail.

The Americans still seem to be in denial about how absolutely insane their tooled up society looks to the rest of the world 😯

EDIT: Found it. This is madness

Black Power. America’s Armed Resistance Imagine living in a society where this is deemed necessary?!

I have to say that footage of the girlfriend videoing the Cop shooting her boyfriend through the window of their car was utterly appalling. He asked to see his licence and as he went to get it from his glove comp, he was shot FIVE times and died in his seat.

Jeez! 😯

Binners, did you see the preceding documentary about the KKK / white power?
the Black Power documentary fed off the back of that one and highlighted both sides of the ongoing and increasing tensions.
When there are reports of growing numbers of KKK members throughout the Midwest U.S, and when they are openly saying that their members work in the police force and important roles then it’s only a matter of time until someones personal judgement blinds their professional judgement.

and as for guns, well that genies well out of the bottle and it’ll be a struggle to get it back in that’s for sure. I just hope that it doesn’t get worse before it gets better, if that’s ever possible.

Jim Wright at Stonekettlestation.com is a great source of information for the state of America today and all it’s faults re gun laws.

Won’t be long and armed drones will be in the air.

Did anyone see the piece on BBC3 (I think) after the last police shooting, in Shitsville , Wherever a few months ago? It showed a large group of black guys who had effectively formed a militia. They were marching down the streets with full camo gear, body armour and assault rifles. When interviewed they said that they had to do this as they were effectively at war, and this was the only way to defend their communities.

Isn’t this pretty much what the second amendment is there to allow? You have the right to bear arms to protect yourself from a corrupt / authoritarian government. You can see why certain parts of the American population don’t feel the authorities are on their side.

Made sense in post-revolution times but illustrates how it doesn’t fit in with a modern society where there are (should be) better ways than getting bigger guns – things like a judiciary and justice system and your vote.

Because black people comprise circa 5% of the US population and yet make up about 1/3rd of the victims of unarmed police killings?

Black people are 12.3% of the population. I checked because I thought it was more than 5%. I assumed it was more like 20% tbh

I wouldn’t worry about this, their senators are praying so it will all be sorted soon

cheekymonkey888 – you’re sounding a bit like those people who say that certain kinds of terrorism “nothing to do with religion”

It would be wonderful to live in a world where you could be “colorblind” and look only at guilt or innocence, but statistically in the case of “police involved shootings” of innocent people colour is clearly a factor (as religion is in my example above).

An interesting fact to watch for whether the NRA kick up a fuss (or make any comment at all) about how this man had a legal right to carry a gun and that law enforcement shouldn’t have killed him for it.

tick tock …

I was astonished that the original victims girlfriend appeared to be using her phone to video her boyfriend dying from gunshot wounds rather attempting any sort of first aid, however unlikely it was to be successful.

Also wondering how well planned and trained the Dallas snipers were to take out so many cops with only one civilian apparently injured.

Crazy world.

12% still makes those numbers high – they certainly don’t constitute 20 percent.

I don’t think armed black militia groups is that surprising really, considering their history and ongoing struggles in the US.

cheekymonkey888 – you’re sounding a bit like those people who say that certain kinds of terrorism “nothing to do with religion”

It would be wonderful to live in a world where you could be “colorblind” and look only at guilt or innocence, but statistically in the case of “police involved shootings” of innocent people colour is clearly a factor (as religion is in my example above).

An interesting fact to watch for whether the NRA kick up a fuss (or make any comment at all) about how this man had a legal right to carry a gun and that law enforcement shouldn’t have killed him for it.

tick tock …

Heh.

Oh and +1

Also wondering how well planned and trained the Dallas snipers were to take out so many cops with only one civilian apparently injured.

Thats no mystery, surely?

Seeing as how the white powers that be in the States have always viewed the poor black community as a pool of resources to fight its foreign wars for it. And given recent history and its endless conflict, I’d imagine there are a large amount of seriously well-trained and battle-hardened black guys (PTSD?) now back in places like Dallas, who are probably feeling pretty disillusioned at how they’ve been ‘rewarded’ after ‘fighting for their country’

I was astonished that the original victims girlfriend appeared to be using her phone to video her boyfriend dying from gunshot wounds rather attempting any sort of first aid, however unlikely it was to be successful.

Also wondering how well planned and trained the Dallas snipers were to take out so many cops with only one civilian apparently injured.

Coming from a target shooting background, taking aimed shots with a scoped rifle isn’t that hard. I wouldn’t take that as evidence that they were trained.

But what did creep me out was the way the one on the ground moved towards an officer taking into account sightline, distracted him in a feint by firing on one side of the column and then burst round and shot him in the back. That MAY indicate training – and it’s pretty probable as so much of the US population have served in the forces.

Not really a great country is it? Lot’s of people who all hate each other for various reasons, are armed to the teeth and battle hardened.