Shooting Of A Black Teenager In Missouri Sparks Riots

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2726416/I-just-saw-die-Rapper-live-tweets-Michael-Brown-shooting-shares-graphic-photo-teens-body-street-victims-family-accuse-Ferguson-police-character-assassination.html

Disregarding why this teenager was shot, the police say one thing and a rapper says another.

What I wish to discuss here is the fact that whether in America or the UK it would seem that if a black person is deemed to be mistreated by the police, a wholesale riot takes place, along with more violence looting and damaging of property.

This never happens if a white person is killed by the police (or at least I can never remember such a thing) why?

[Sqad]

AOG....yes...even in the UK.

That query drug dealer who was shot dead in Tottenham which started the riots.

I can't remember his name....but he was white.

[jim360]

Do you mean Mark Duggan?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Mark_Duggan

[Gromit]

AOG,
I think you mistakenly used the wrong word...

// if a black person is deemed to be mistreated by the police //

That of course should read...

// if a black person is cold bloodedly murdered by the police //

When we use the correct term, it is easy to see why the local community feels threatened and angered, and fight back.

[Sqad]

jim....yes.....thanks.

[Svejk]

yeah, that'll make them feel safer. Nick a telly and some nice trainers. For Funks Sake.

[ChillDoubt]

I believe Mark Duggan was mixed race Sqad, black father and white mother so invariably he deemed himself black.

[Sqad]

Chilli...;-).....naturally....

[jim360]

Presumably the answer to your question is really very complicated but on the surface it's presumably because in the US in particular there is a deep-running feeling that the black communities are still not treated as equal citizens. Thus a police death takes on a greater significance. Particularly cases like this where from what little I know of the story the justification for shooting Michael Brown seems rather scant. He has been accused of stealing cigars, I think. So shooting him dead for that? Takes on the macabre overtone of a summary execution, or more likely racial profiling.

[anotheoldgit]

Sqad

/// I can't remember his name....but he was white. ///

Mark Duggan, didn't look white to me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mark-duggan.jpg

[Gromit]

It was clear from the first footage comming out of Ferguson, that eyewitnesses were calling it an execution.

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=dc9_1408208134

[Sqad]

AOG....LOL....point taken.

[ChillDoubt]

The mood of the public didn't really change even when the young man in question was shown via CCTV to have committed a robbery.
What happened subsequently will no doubt be contentious, however this is the gun-toting US, which invariably means that such actions mean you are literally taking your life in your hands.
To some extent, it's almost natural selection.

[anotheoldgit]

Gromit

Phrase it how you choose, it still does not answer the point that I am making.

Had it been a member of the white 'community', the 'community' would not have taken to the streets to go on a rampage of looting and destruction.

[Gromit]

Blair Peach was white and murdered by the Police...

// Days after Peach's death, 10,000 marched past the place where he collapsed. The now-demolished Dominion Cinema, Southall, where his body was lying in repose, was visited by 8,000 Sikhs on the eve of Peach's funeral. 10,000 people attended his funeral, which took place 51 days after 23 April. Public reaction to Peach's death, and other underlying racial tensions including excessive police use of the Sus law, ultimately led to the 1981 Brixton riot and a public inquiry by Lord Scarman. //

[jim360]

Also while I'm thinking about it, while it didn't lead to riots directly, the case of Raoul Moat in this country in 2010 shows that there is a mistrust of the police in some communities that can be easily provoked. There was all that "Raoul Moat you hero [for shooting a police officer who had nothing to do with anything in Moat's life...]" reaction, for one thing. In the end Moat shot himself first, but if he had indeed been shot by the police it's possible that people could have used his death as a rallying cry for protests. Or, more likely, just an excuse to go and do some looting. pillaging etc.

Which perhaps is the broader point, that there are two different reactions in both this story and that of the August 2011 Riots. Initially there was a protest at the death of a young (black) man that had been shot in circumstances that at least on the surface looked like it was racial profiling. That protest was legitimate and even now there is a case to be made that he shouldn't have been shot, as "the official story has undergone numerous changes" [Wikipedia... I would like a more official source for that but I believe it's been widely reported in the news]. But then this protest just got hijacked and soon there were riots all over the country that had nothing to do with the initial death but were pure and simple opportunism. To an extent, the same thing is true here -- and the opportunists were then, and are now, of all kinds of different racial background.

[berniecuddles]

A O G i for one agree with you

[Kromovaracun]

In America, the police treat unarmed black youth and unarmed white youth quite differently. Of course, there are cases of police brutality against whites, but the overwhelming victims of police brutality are blacks. That's why people riot - they are sick and tired of being terrorised by people they are supposed to be able to trust.

The Mark Duggan case is more complicated (although the subsequent lies by the police were infuriating and in my view unnecessary). He was armed, and was warned - Brown was neither.

[anotheoldgit]

Gromit

/// It was clear from the first footage comming out of Ferguson, that eyewitnesses were calling it an execution. ///

A video taken and posted to facebook by a black person, shows nothing more than the dead teenager lying in the road.

[Kromovaracun]

The police version of the incident is countered by at least 2 eye witnesses. The only justification the police have is the claim that Brown tried to grab the officer's gun, of which there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever.

And even if it were true, when Brown was killed he was on his knees and had his hands in the air, pleading with the officer to stop shooting him. If that is not unlawful, nothing is.

[jim360]

Why does it matter who posted the video?

A large proportion of the rioters are just using the death as an excuse, sadly, to protest. I don't think this has anything do do with skin colour. Indeed by definition it doesn't since skin colour says exactly nothing about who you are. At the same time there is clearly a serious issue with the way police respond to cases like this, and there are signs that black teenagers are treated differently from white teenagers. That cannot be right and must be addressed, changed, dealt with.