Why are people protesting and rioting in the midst of the Covid-19 crisis?

If you read the link, then you would know they are all fired and have been charged. Chauvin is the only one charged with murder.

They are all awaiting trial.

I don't see how that is racist in anyway.

Sturgis is saying that if someone dies in a certain manner, that is because God wanted to make an example.

You’re the one mentioning race.

You’re the one implying that all African Americans who experience police brutality somehow deserve it.

An example of what?

I didn't say that. Don't put words in my mouth. A number of African Americans have wrongfully been killed by cops.

I don't know. That life is not fair?

You previously said that God uses natural disasters and other calamities to get people's attention, though you didn't give details on why He wants their attention or how these unrelated disasters achieve that goal.

Sorry (now I could be wrong) but I do not read anything racist in it.

I did not take it as being directed at you personally - I took it as a generalization - meaning God decides when it is your time (your meaning any person's time) and how He decides this is done is also up to God; praying is not going to change it.

I do not take anything racist from it - maybe I just did not read into it as much as you. I doubt that Sturgis would intend anything racist with his remark - does not seem like him. Maybe you are just misunderstanding what Sturgis wrote?

Some people everywhere are racist.


Did I say it was?


Everyone's different, but even if you aren't racist, it's possible to be biased toward certain types of people based on how they look or act, which gets associated with black culture, even when the people are white, Asian, etc. i.e. because of a pro-criminality/pro-violence culture that is expressed in certain kinds of rap and other cultural styles. You have kids who act tough/ghetto/gangsta who are not really criminals just because they don't want to appear weak and get victimized by tougher kids, but when police or others see those kids acting that way, they don't realize they are just faking it to look cool.


Thugs are not only African American. They are people of any color who don't shy away from crime and violence as a way of achieving goals. There are thuggish people of every color and nationality/ethnicity. It's a cultural attitude that some people may ignore in whites or other non-blacks because of racism.


The people who are threatening come in various identities. Do you want to ignore all criminality because some people are racist?


Why do you capitalize, 'white?' It's not a proper name.


Because of racism, but racism also causes people to overcompensate by ignoring defiant/criminal behavior in certain people just because they are afraid they'll be accused of racism if they recognize it.


That's demographics. You should realize there are cultural differences among African Americans that are not simple. For example, you have middle-class black people who dislike 'ghetto' behavior and avoid it, but you have others who think it's cool and act like that even though they are not really poor and/or criminal, just like white middle class kids who think it's cool to act 'gangsta' like they see in certain music videos and movies. Then, you also have criminals (white/black/etc.) who try to look and act middle-class in order to get away with crime without being suspected, i.e. because there is bias in favor of assuming people aren't criminal if they're middle-class.


Maybe, or maybe they were on edge because of dealing with defiant bad guys all the time, lying and trying to get away and so they weren't in as good of a state as they should have been, so when a cooperative suspect was not resisting, they were constantly on edge that he was just pretending to cooperate until the moment when he would make his move and try to get free and run away.


Yes, and in many ways black and white employees are still treated as property in the US and elsewhere, but does that mean there shouldn't be police to do something about crime?


I agree there is racism, but the problem is that there is also racism in organized crime, where criminals seek to recruit other criminals from the ranks of people who they expect will be desperate enough to risk jail to make money. So if you are poor and need money to help your family, or if you just expect to be discriminated against because you're black, criminals are more likely to approach you about joining their crime ring, and if you give in, you are going to be in a struggle between the criminals trying to keep you out of jail in order to keep using you and the police who are trying to put you in jail to stop crime from using you.

I capitalize "black", "white", "red", "yellow" and "brown" when referring to people. Is this wrong to do?

Yes, gangsta rap and other violent influences such as criminal gangs are unfortunately associated with and is part of African American culture.

Gang violence and other criminal activity often come about in areas where there is a lot of poverty.

I noticed you didn't comment when I capitalized "black". Lol.

Racism is something taught and people choose to be racist. Kids are not born with racism instilled in them. Young children don't care about things like race, ethnicity, nationality and skin color.

They're not proper names. You capitalize, "African American," because the two words are continents, the same as you would capitalize, "European American." Colors are not capitalized. You wouldn't say, "the Blue shirt," for example.

If you capitalized, "black," and I didn't mention it, it's because I didn't notice. It is not because I am racist that I didn't notice, but because I just didn't notice it until I did.


There is freedom of art and culture and speech, so you can't incriminate culture, and some people may watch that stuff and see it as education about what to be weary of, e.g. mysogyny, racism, criminality, etc.; but other people find it alluring and they desire to have that power that comes with being a bad ass and wearing expensive clothes and jewelry and offending whoever you please and getting away with it because you are tough enough to beat anyone else's ass in a fight, etc.

A lot of kids get seduced into acting bad because of what they see/hear in culture, and that attitude ends up wearing down the nerves of police and others who have to maintain a respectful and polite demeanor no matter how much other people are cussing at you and acting aggressive/hostile; so when some people break down and start acting aggressive/hostile back, it would be a lie to pretend that it was just hate that came from learned racism and not due to being provoked by a culture of shameless criminality and anti-authoritarianism that is spread through media.


Right, but look closer; it is racism and classism on the part of criminals to target people in those areas. It's no different for a racist criminal to think that they can recruit a poor black kid to deliver drugs as it is for a racist cop to assume a poor black kid is carrying drugs because he looks poor/black. You see, they are two sides of the same coin; the same racism that targets the same young men.

What should be happening is that police presence in poor communities should be geared toward stopping gangs and criminality from ruining young people's lives to begin with by recruiting them into crime. No one is born a criminal, so police and others should be striving to keep crime away from kids. That requires more police and more deterrence, not less.

True, one can't necessarily incriminate culture. Living around violent environments and being subjected to violent culture isn't going to neccesarily sway people to act degenerately. There are good people who live in slums and in other poor, seedy areas.

Rock music is just as bad as rap, if not worse, especially heavy metal.

I wasn't really subject to violence influences in my youth, except maybe violent cartoons. My mother called me out about how violent my cartoon work was. About how violent the toons and comics I was planning on producing were going to be.

Violent cartoons never swayed me to go out and do violent things.

You implied it.

You are correct! I wish somehow we could bottle that pure innocence.

I remember when my daughter was pretty young probably somewhere around 2nd grade give or take. We went to the library and she picked out a movie to rent -- It was a Disney movie called The Color of Friendship.

The story is based on a true story where a black teen girl in the US begs her parents to allow them to have a foreign exchange student from Africa. At the time this occurred was during apartheid in South Africa. Her dad was a senator and supporting the rights of black Africans in South Africa. But shock when it is a white girl that arrives from South Africa just those that they are fighting against.

This was the first time that my daughter ever really saw anything that resembled racism. She watched it and was befuddled. She could not understand the concept that because your skin was a different color someone would treat you differently. Her couple of closest friends in our neighborhood (we lived in a townhouse community at the time and there were not too many children) at the time were African Americans - their parents directly from Africa so to her they were like brother and sister as she knew them from a very young age.

I wished I could have bottled that and kept it. Yes we teach this - very sad.

I said nothing about race! I was placing information about religious beliefs. I stated that God is the one that determines the length of a person's life. With or without prayer. And God can visit an accident upon a person, or other difficult times. It's part of trials and tribulations, which most Christians are aware exist. They are meant to ask for, through prayer, that God gives them the strength needed to get through it.
I made no generalization or comment about Americans in the post you have referenced!

Once more, I was making a statement about Christianity and that it is God that makes decisions. If God allows you to be hurt or killed, you will be judged by God for how you lived your life.
Again, trials and tribulations. Something which most Christians acknowledge. Take out your bible and read about a man by the name of Job. Read what he endured and how it was done as a test and indeed testament to his faith.

As to the numbers of black friends I have, I do not know the exact number. I base friendship upon each person individually. Gender, religion, ethnicity, country of origin is not a criteria.

I said nothing about race! Whites, Asians, Hispanics, Latinos have also been killed by cops. PEOPLE.

And PEOPLE are often injured or killed in other ways too...PEOPLE!
And PEOPLE of all races can be Christians, which is what I was pointing out to you!

That depends. He did resist arrest in that he dropped to the ground and would not let them put him in the back of the police car. He did not however offer any violence to the police officers.

They did not deliberately kill him for resisting arrest. But the force that was being used against him was because he was resisting arrest.



I don't know. He was accused of passing a counterfeit bill when he was being arrested. It was the reason for the arrest. Whether the accusation is true I have no idea.

I also have no idea whether it is true that he was spreading counterfeit bills elsewhere. Your question here is the first I've heard any mention of that. But I am not closely following the case.

It is unlikely that anyone in the general public (including anyone who posts on a2k) currently knows whether these accusations are true or not. It is possible that reliable information will come out in the future.

Not letting officers put him in the back of the police car is resisting arrest.