BYOB wrote:

tennyson wrote:

BYOB wrote:

Although some witnesses state that Brown held his hands up at shoulder level with his palms facing outward for a brief moment, these same witnesses describe Brown then dropping his hands and “charging” at Wilson. - said Common Sense


So in other words, everyone was right. It sounds like he most likely put his hands up for a brief moment, then charged back towards the officer. It still doesn't change the fact that an unarmed kid is dead for possible shoplifting, when other non-lethal force could have been used. It sounds like crappy choices on the part of both Mr. Brown and Mr. Wilson. The chant "hands up, don't shoot" may have started out having a literal meaning, but it quickly morphed into a metaphor for other widespread occurances where the issue of excessive force is in play. If you still take it literally, then you don't get it.


(I have no idea why my computer all of a sudden would only type in Italics, but now it's normal again. ?)

 

You certainly have your right to your opinion, but my take is number one he was NOT shot because he may have been involved in a grocery store incident. I don't even believe the officer knew it when this occured from what I had read. The moment that Brown grabbed for the officers gun, the whole dynamics of the situation would have changed from the officers perspective. 

As far as the chant, yes, I do believe it was used literally and still is by some. It did provoke nationwide violence. It was NOT a good thing. The protests were fine when they were non-violent, but I stand by my eralier comment that the people in Ferguson have had the power in their hands (voting and getting therir own representatives in a position to make change) but have abdicated that power and responsibility. 

I make these statements not to defend the overall action of the police. The report paints a picture of a culture that needs to changed. If you read the report, howeve, just as much (I actually think more) blame goes to the city officials who pushed the police to generate revenue. That should not be the purpose of the force. 


 

The entire incident started because Mr. Brown was accused of shoplifting by a shopper at the store. Odd that no one ever determined if the kid actually did it or not. While alot of people seem to think that what starts an incident doesn't matter, I happen to think starting points are very important to a story. I tend not to skip the first couple of chapters when I read a book, that is if I want to fully understand it. It is important to know these things if you want to try to understand someone's frame of mind. People's actions follow their thoughts. It is possible that the kid did not steal anything, was accused by the store owner, got mad, left, then got mad again when he was stopped by Mr. Wilson. If Mr. Wilson did not know that Mr. Brown was involved in a possible shoplifting, then he severly over-reacted when he almost hit the kids with his vehicle because they were jay walking, which then escalated the situation. Is it also possible that Mr. Brown did not try to take Mr. Wilson's gun? Yes. He could have gotten scared that it was being drawn on him so close, so he could have reached out to push it away because he was scared of getting shot. While I don't agree with the actions Mr. Brown took, I also don't agree with the actions Mr. Wilson took.
He had the upper hand - he was in an SUV. At any time, while he was still in the vehicle, he could have stepped on the gas to remove himself. After Mr. Brown started running away, Mr. Wilson could have waited for back-up in his SUV. The whole thing was unneccesary due to the over-reactions from them both, IMO.

And I would respectfully disagree that the slogan was what sparked nationwide violence. I believe it is the sometimes excessive use of force on unarmed people for infractions that do not warrant punishment by death. i.e. - selling loose cigarettes, jaywalking, shoplifting, running, carrying merchandise you plan to buy through a store, etc., etc. Officers have non-lethal options available to them for a reason. And before anyone says it, no, I do not think cops are always in the wrong. But sometimes they are.

As far as voting goes, I do agree that the people of Ferguson do have some power to elect who they want, but the police are not elected. They also stay on the force while many politicians come and go. Maybe we should start electing police, or at least the chief. I also agree that the police should NOT be generating revenue.

Wasn't there security camera video of him grabbing a box of cigars then walking out?
 

BYOB wrote:

tennyson wrote:

BYOB wrote:

I kind of feel like we may be starting to go around in circles. How 'bout you?
I'll just say this. Reports only matter if we learn from them where we can do anything different to prevent the same outcomes of the same actions. Which is why I get so hung up on what initially happens in these types of situations. If we don't use them for that purpose, they are just a news report and nothing more.

And when I really think about it, I don't really care if someone had their hands up or not, so to me the whole "it's a lie!" title of this thread is irrelevant.

I don't know that it is irrelevant overall. I think the statement (that it is a total lie) however does not help overall either. The investigation implies that it was not the truth and that was all that needed to come out. To focus on it is not good. The reason I would not call it irrelevant overall is that I believe is spurned nationwide bad reactions from looting to cop shootings, etc. BOTH sides need to learn from all the mistakes. 

As an aside, do you believe (as me) that the local community involvement in their own communities (there and elsewhere) would go a long way to solving some of the problems ?  By that I mean total involvement in voting for and having people running in the positions that most effect their day to day issues. 









 

Well, I think we might have to agree to disagree on whether it was the dead kid or the slogan that caused the chaos. I do agree that looting and harming police because you're angry is not good in any way. The reason I said I thought the "it's a lie!" thing was irrelevant is because if the report states that some people saw him with his hands up for a short time, and some people didn't, then you can hardly call it a lie, as a lie implies that no one saw him with his hands up at any time but just said so anyway. It wasn't a lie, it was different people seeing events at different times and perspectives.


I think that much more community involvement would go some way to helping, but I'm not convinced it fully affects the individual police/person interaction. You could probably make the argument that electing judges that represent your ideals and legal expectations as a community would go a step farther to help. But the problem with that is, even when done, that's a level that kicks in after the fact of the actual police/person encounter. It would help offset, which is good, but it wouldn't necessarily change the initial problem. As far as mayors and other local politicians go, I think more involvment is never a bad thing, but again, on an on-the-street level I don't know that it would be a huge help, just some.

We should also not fail to account for human emotion in all of this.
Sure, it's obvious to me that I need to get involved politically if my community seems to be getting the shaft.

But, experience has shown that some people react to misstreatment by becoming more estranged from the process. They don't necessarily act in their own best interests without some help.

You have to have bootstraps before you can pick yourself up by them.

BYOB wrote:

"But, experience has shown that some people react to mistreatment by becoming more estranged from the process." - said Goose


Very true. I used to be that way. Then I wisened up and decided some say is better than no say.

You know, I don't look at the protests and marches as rowdy people acting up. I see it as the physical symptom of an ignored problem manifesting itself, and that will never look pretty. People don't get angry when they look around and see good experiences, they get angry when they see bad ones. That doesn't mean people's responses will always be rational and make sense. Look at the example of the Tea Party when they rose up after getting angry at the way things were going with the government. I absolutely don't agree with their idea of what to do about it, but I too was angry with what the wars and economic collapse, etc. did to us and what the government did or didn't do about it. I totally get why they were pissed, I just didn't end up agreeing with what they thought caused it or would fix it. People can be pushed to a point, but when they won't be pushed anymore, you see the results.

Part of their being estranged is directly related to their lack of involvement in their own community via voting and getting the people into the positions to influence their own destiny. Like I said earlier, I hope that this will bring some light to that fact and get more involved in being instrumental people in their own communities. 

I don't know about what others here believe, but certainly for me the protests and marches were not the problem. People have the right and should exercise that right. My concern is when it escalated to violence, looting, etc. and unfortunately that was not just in Ferguson. 

 

Conspiracy Theory wrote:

BYOB wrote:

Conspiracy Theory wrote:

Did this office have a non-lethal optiion.

News reports never mention it.

What was he armed with?

 

Most police carry tasers, batons, pepper spray, etc. He aparently opted to not carry a taser because he said it was large and awkward for him (it's in his testimony), but doesn't mention what else he exactly had that I know of. He also had the option of staying in his car to wait for back-up when the guy was running away. Like I said before, I don't think he was out to kill anybody, but he may have been able to choose a different option, and that is what makes the difference between life and death a lot of times.


There was store video of him paying for items, but nothing that showed him grabbing anything and leaving without paying that I saw. I was extremely curious as to whether the store receipts match the inventory, etc. but it doesn't seem as if anyone bothered to look that far into it.

Okay, I think I see a very large contributing factor.

When did armament become optional?

An individual officer can opt out of non-lethal force?
 

Part of the reason given was that there were only so many tasers to go around, so he opted to not use one because he felt it was bulky and obtrusive anyway. 

I really can't imagine a taser costs that much these days. It's not exactly new technology. Plus, they should have had plenty of money from shaking down all of those people all the time.