Why does the media focus on looting?

[Ziggurat]

I didn't ask a question.

Whenever someone says that they don't understand something, there is an implicit question: why is that thing the way it is?

Surely you knew this. You're playing stupid now, but you aren't actually stupid.

 

[Ziggurat]

How is the Warsay uprising analogy bizarre? People in both cities lived in constant fear of those that ran their cities who were abusing and degrading their respective populations that they deemed as subhuman. One rose up against them and got slaughtered the other is now finally at long last mounting appropriate retaliatory actions and it is dismissed by the pejoratives "riots" and "looting".

"Riots" and "looting" are factually correct descriptions. And it's amazing to me that you think burning down drug stores and old peoples' homes are "appropriate retaliatory actions". How the hell did you ever come to that completely ****** up conclusion? Seriously, what the ****, Travis?

 

[cullennz]

I would imagine the media are talking about the looting because in amongst the genuine protesters there are a huge amount of scumbags running round destroying peoples lives and burning others homes, shops and cars down.

Without the thugs, the protesters would be focusing a lot more spotlight on the whole thing

 

[Travis]

"Riots" and "looting" are factually correct descriptions. And it's amazing to me that you think burning down drug stores and old peoples' homes are "appropriate retaliatory actions". How the hell did you ever come to that completely ****** up conclusion? Seriously, what the ****, Travis?

Well allow me to get on my soapbox.

Revolutions are nasty and messy. And in a perfect world we wouldn't even need them. But debased and oppressed minorities frequently need them to enact any meaningful change. The elephant in the room we don't want to acknowledge in America is that peaceful protests are now and pretty much always have been a huge waste of time.

No meaningful reform happened in New York regarding gay rights until the Stonewall Riots. In San Francisco the police department made pretty much zero effort to understand their growing gay population until the riots following the trial for the murder of Harvey Milk. The Los Angeles police department thought of race relations as merely a PR problem until the 1992 riots. Only after people got legitimately scared did anyone try to do anything to address the systemic problems they had largely ignored until then.

Fear, it seems, is the only way to actually get people already entrenched in power to change their ways.

Suppose, as an analogy, that you lived in a society where (to borrow something here) people are divided up into castes of short ears and long ears. You grow up your entire life as a long ear knowing that the short ears run everything. Corporations create algorithms to identify names associated with long ears and so discard without even reading most resumes sent in by long ears. Long ears don't get shown the same houses by realtors. They get charged higher interest rates for loans if they can even get them. The police murder them with seeming impunity giving lip service to "sensitivity training" whenever they get caught red handed.

If the short ears would try to reform things maybe things would improve. But they don't. Instead the same problems persist like a festering sore that they hide away hoping no one will notice it. But one day things will be pushed too far. And the result, to put it mildly, will be destructive.

When revolutions come those that might have even been on the side of the oppressed might be caught up in the tide of violence. Was everyone put to the guillotine in France actually guilty of crimes against the peasantry? Almost certainly not. But that is the way these things go.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Whenever someone says that they don't understand something, there is an implicit question: why is that thing the way it is?

Surely you knew this. You're playing stupid now, but you aren't actually stupid.

Don't call me Shirley.

And, Shirley, do you know what a rhetorical question is?

 

[xjx388]

How is the Warsay uprising analogy bizarre? People in both cities lived in constant fear of those that ran their cities who were abusing and degrading their respective populations

Really? I always thought that the Warsaw uprising was about the Polish Resistance fighting against the Nazis who invaded Poland -a very different situation than what we have in Baltimore.

an that they deemed as subhuman.

Do you really think that the entire government of Baltimore thinks of black people like the Nazis think of Germany?

One rose up against them and got slaughtered the other is now finally at long last mounting appropriate retaliatory actions and it is dismissed by the pejoratives "riots" and "looting".

No. One was a military operation in a war and the other is a bunch of criminals looting a CVS. Get a grip, man!

 

[Travis]

Really? I always thought that the Warsaw uprising was about the Polish Resistance fighting against the Nazis who invaded Poland -a very different situation than what we have in Baltimore.Do you really think that the entire government of Baltimore thinks of black people like the Nazis think of Germany? No. One was a military operation in a war and the other is a bunch of criminals looting a CVS. Get a grip, man!

No, both are revolutionaries trying to overthrow tyrants and systems that exist only to debase, bully and kill them. In Warsaw it was Nazis that needed to be fought in Baltimore it is their police that need to be vanquished and defeated.

 

[Axiom_Blade]

a lady was asking an MSNBC reporter why there was no media in Baltimore for a week of peaceful protests but after one night of riots and looting the entire nations media shows up. The reporter fumbled for a bit before throwing coverage back to the studio.

Peaceful protests are boring; they aren't going to cover that. Bad for ratings, you know.

 

[xjx388]

No, both are revolutionaries trying to overthrow tyrants and systems that exist only to debase, bully and kill them. In Warsaw it was Nazis that needed to be fought in Baltimore it is their police that need to be vanquished and defeated.

Warsaw: a resistance army fighting against the Nazis.

Baltimore: people destroying and stealing private property.

If these "revolutionaries," in Baltimore believe what you say they believe -that the police need to be "vanquished and defeated"- then why aren't they ...you know....vanquishing and defeating the police? Seems a weird way to start a revolution.

 

[WildCat]

And when the Native American tribes conquered and took over the lands of their competing neighbors, we generally refer to that as "seized" or "conquered",.... not "discovered". That's the point of the joke. We, the noble White Man, discovered these backward areas and brought them civilization and the Love of Jeebus and in return took away all their properties and rights.

No, Europeans discovered the Americas. Obviously the Indians already knew it existed.

Do you get similarly hung up if someone tells you they discovered a new band, or a new recipe, or a TV show?

Ya see, it was a joke. From a comedian. Posted in response to a barb posted by someone else. There's truth in a lot of humor. Uncomfortable truth and not precisely accurate truth, but the underlying theme is interesting in an Arsenio Hall sorta way.....

It's only uncomfortable in a Dukakis driving a tank kind of way...

 

[Foolmewunz]

Just a nit-pick for historical accuracy.....

I believe Travis is referring to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising ('43) and not what historians have termed the Warsaw Uprising, which was the national/coordinated Polish Resistance effort in '44.

The analogy is still a "reach", to put it mildly, but it's closer to appropriate than the '44 uprising.

 

[SezMe]

The thieves also stole the coverage of the important message the actual protesters were trying to get across.

That's naive. Without the rioting, the media don't give a damn about the "actual" message. No rioting, no coverage.

 

[SezMe]

It was implicit in the logic of your question. Of course, maybe I was wrong to assume your question was logical.

Be careful, TM, Zig is an absolute bear when it comes to implicit logic. He can spot it between lines in a flick of his keyboard.

 

[The Big Dog]

How is the Warsay uprising analogy bizarre? People in both cities lived in constant fear of those that ran their cities who were abusing and degrading their respective populations that they deemed as subhuman. One rose up against them and got slaughtered the other is now finally at long last mounting appropriate retaliatory actions and it is dismissed by the pejoratives "riots" and "looting".



You have odd ideas about things that are supposedly false.

everything you post is false, sport

 

[Travis]

Just a nit-pick for historical accuracy.....

I believe Travis is referring to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising ('43) and not what historians have termed the Warsaw Uprising, which was the national/coordinated Polish Resistance effort in '44.

The analogy is still a "reach", to put it mildly, but it's closer to appropriate than the '44 uprising.

Ah, yes.

Warsaw: a resistance army fighting against the Nazis.

Baltimore: people destroying and stealing private property.

If these "revolutionaries," in Baltimore believe what you say they believe -that the police need to be "vanquished and defeated"- then why aren't they ...you know....vanquishing and defeating the police? Seems a weird way to start a revolution.

In a way I agree. I keep waiting for someone to really do something...well revolutionary. Sack a police precinct, kill everyone and string the bodies from lampposts. That would get some real reform real quick.

 

[Travis]

everything you post is false, sport

Evidence?

 

[Mumbles]

This is something that always bugs me. Once again our nation's police murder someone and a city rises up against them. But all the media wants to talk about are looted stores. That's like covering the Warsaw uprising and only talking about how much it will cost to clean up all the bricks laying scattered about.

Is the media just lazy here or is this part of an agenda?

To be truthful? The Freddie Gray protests *were* getting some national coverage before any violence broke out. Not much, of course, especially with that horrible earthquake in Nepal to cover, but some.

But yes, it ramped way up once there were easy shots of fires and people running in and out of stores - and police and rioters throwing rocks at each other. That's just how the media operates. They had people in place to take "dramatic" footage, they had reporters ready to stand around and blather, so once the riot broke out, they had everything they needed in place.

 

[Ziggurat]

Don't call me Shirley.

And, Shirley, do you know what a rhetorical question is?

I do indeed. And rhetorical questions also depend on logic. I'm glad you're no longer pretending that there was no question, though.

 

[Ziggurat]

Well allow me to get on my soapbox.

Revolutions are nasty and messy.

This isn't a revolution, Travis. This is just rioting and looting.

And in a perfect world we wouldn't even need them. But debased and oppressed minorities frequently need them to enact any meaningful change.

As has been pointed out upthread, within Baltimore, this isn't widely seen as a racial issue. Do you understand why?

If the short ears would try to reform things maybe things would improve. But they don't. Instead the same problems persist like a festering sore that they hide away hoping no one will notice it. But one day things will be pushed too far. And the result, to put it mildly, will be destructive.

I never knew you had such a low opinion of the Democratic party.

When revolutions come those that might have even been on the side of the oppressed might be caught up in the tide of violence. Was everyone put to the guillotine in France actually guilty of crimes against the peasantry? Almost certainly not. But that is the way these things go.

And do you think the French revolution was a good thing, Travis?

 

[TragicMonkey]

I do indeed. And rhetorical questions also depend on logic. I'm glad you're no longer pretending that there was no question, though.

If you know what a rhetorical question is, why did you answer it? Shirley, I fear you have fallen in love with arguing itself, and argue for the sake of arguing. Argument is a bad boyfriend, I think you should reconsider the relationship.