LIVE: Thousands Of New Yorkers Heading To Block Holland Tunnel in NYC - Polidicks

[QUOTE=atl101;46642539]Someone was just arrested:[/QUOTE] It isn't live..

[QUOTE=Alec W;46641058]I kind of agree, but at the same time, why protest where no one is going to see you? Blocking traffic makes a point through the inconvenience. But it's still an inconvenience. I'm torn.[/QUOTE] It's making a point that is going to fall on deaf ears because the people it's being made to are not the ones it needs to be made to, but simply people trying to get by every day. They don't care why the protestors are in the street, they only care that the protestors are keeping them from getting to the 9-5 paycheck they need every week to stave off the foreclosure lawyer. You want to make a point with a protest? Inconvenience the people who have the power to make the changes you want made. Inconveniencing a bunch of random people is only going to make them angry at you and it will ensure that nobody with the power to do anything listens to you.

[QUOTE=TestECull;46642575]It's making a point that is going to fall on deaf ears because the people it's being made to are not the ones it needs to be made to, but simply people trying to get by every day. They don't care why the protestors are in the street, they only care that the protestors are keeping them from getting to the 9-5 paycheck they need every week to stave off the foreclosure lawyer. You want to make a point with a protest? Inconvenience the people who have the power to make the changes you want made. Inconveniencing a bunch of random people is only going to make them angry at you and it will ensure that nobody with the power to do anything listens to you.[/QUOTE] You're missing the point. It isn't done with the sole purpose of inconveniencing people - the protest is done like that to generate news. "Official" protests rarely generate news - I've marched against the death penalty in a legal protest in Austin and it barely made the news. Blocking traffic will absolutely cause news, especially on a major road in NYC. Instead of having CNN and other news outlets going "Gardner was choked what a shame," it's going to be "Gardner was choked, look at these protests, let's get our legal experts to discuss this" and it spreads awareness nationwide.

some of you seem to have an extremely low opinion of the average person

[QUOTE=sloppy_joes;46642541]i dont think being selfish and hedonistic is a good reason to ignore the problems of the world. "I JUST WANT TO GO HOME AND WATCH FOOTBALL, CAN'T WE SHUT THESE NIGGERS UP? hey... lets use fire hoses!" if people are going to spend hours and hours of their day organizing these rallys and trying to change the government by trying to stop systematic evils, i can at least sit in traffic for a few extra minutes.[/QUOTE] yes because that's a legit reason to interrupt people lives. Instead of just chanting, breaking the law, and ignoring others safety, why not fix the problem by protesting at the police station/city hall/park. hell you could get a fucking permit and march in the street. All those are completely legal, blocking a tunnel and ignoring the police when they tell you to get out of the way is not. Imagine working your ass off all fucking day and when you try to get home, a bunch of fuckheads show up and block the road to cause a massive traffic jam. OH WOW WE SURE RAISED AWARENESS TO HOW FUCKING ANNOYING WE ARE. you can sit on your fucking pillar and act like you did the right thing, or you can actually do it the legal way, piss off literally no one, and gain much more support by not annoying anyone that gets near you. but no, have to pull the "I GOTTA GET HOME FOR FOOBALL" instead of the much more fucking likely "holy fuck in exhausted and just want to get home to see my family or get some rest" that most of the working class thinks. They might support the movement, but fuck if they actually want to support it when they cant even get home.

[QUOTE=dbk21894;46642190]there are what, 4-6000 protesters? let's just say 6000 New York City has 8.406 million residents that's 0.000713775874% of the population let's assume half of NYC pays taxes that's 0.00142755175% of the people who paid for those roads blocking them from use by the other 99.9985724% of the population these people need to get the fuck off of their high horses and do something productive like getting thousands of people to write letters to congress protest all you want, but these people have just made themselves the "1%" that these same people protested two years ago I am all for peaceful protests, but the second that you begin to impact the daily lives of people who have nothing to do with what you are protesting, I no longer consider it a peaceful protest. Just because you're not actively engaged in an act of violence doesn't make it peaceful. If you cause someone to lose their job because they were tardy to work, or you cause a heart-attack patient to wait an extra 5 minutes for an ambulance and that person dies, you have flushed the entire cause of your protest down the toilet. There are literally thousands of places that you could protest in NYC. The protest would still be heavily covered, word would get out, people would be aware. You protest in the streets like barbarians? That's uncivilized and shows how much you care about your neighbors. The people you are inconveniencing are your peers. They aren't "the enemy", they aren't "the man", they aren't bad people. They are regular every day Americans who just want to get on with their fucking miserable lives. You don't have to go and make it any worse.[/QUOTE] ok there's so many weird things with this post i'm going to try and address it all 1. you're saying that roads being blocked = shit movement 2. "writing letters to congress" yeah k lets apply the same awful logic you're using with the roads "this will congest postal services!" "this will make congress' job harder because it's preventing REAL ISSUES from being read!" 3. "lets think of things that could've happened but that's VERY unlikely that will happen!" 4. you are literally saying that one of the core elements of democracy is barbaric and that it's uncivilized to give a fuck about police brutality. THOSE SELFISH PRICKS. [editline]5th December 2014[/editline] Like i've seen two fucking arguments against this protest that are just so mind boggling "Those poor people trying to get home! This protest is meaningless!" "Ugh why do people care about what happens to another group of people, fucking sjws!" can't we pit people who think these things against eachother because "why should someone care about what happens to another group of people!"

Getting a permit to protest and having "legal areas" to do it in is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard of. Following the rules and not inconveniencing anyone rarely makes any change. You can play with "what-ifs" about people getting fired or ambulances getting delayed all you want, but in in the end it's still a what if. I never could understand why people have this immediate gut reaction to protesters supposedly making life so horrible for people trying to commute, while the protesters are actually protesting the fact that someone literally ended someone else's life and wasn't punished get a sort of grumbling acknowledgement. You go home, sit on your computer. Pretend the wider issues don't and won't ever impact you, then bitch about how people trying to change that system are the REAL bad guys here, then wonder why nothing ever fucking changes.

[QUOTE=codemaster85;46642528]What hes saying is you're effectively making an us vs them situation when you interrupt other people's lives. most people know that its terrible but fuck, they just want to get home and relax from working or do things with their friends/families. why do you suddenly have the right to interrupt that at all. If they get a permit to do a march or if they stay in a public area, then there would be no problem. Blocking a major road is just pissing off bystanders and the police while making the majority of the protesters look like dickheads.[/QUOTE] What everyone else is saying is that this minor inconvenience is negligible. Interruption is *the goal* of the protest, otherwise no one would care. You wouldn't be watching this livestream. Thousands more people now know who Eric Garner was and how he died. Also, the government permit/public area thing is a joke – can you imagine how many protests would have never happened if they needed the government's permission? People are saying that the inconvenience makes them not want to support the cause. I'd be worried if the average person was truly that apathetic – to the point where they would immediately decide to not support a cause because thousands of protesters have inconvenienced them. The jobs argument is also funny to me – there's this nightmare scenario where you miss one shift (despite it being fairly obvious why), and all of the sudden you're fired or can't pay rent. In that instance, I'd say it's worth the loss. I think people get frustrated because they don't see protests resulting in any direct change – and they're right. People gather for protests, they ruin part of a city for a while, and then they dissipate. But what the protest accomplishes happens afterward. There are now thousands more people that are capable or motivated to write letters to Congress than there were before. It might have inspired someone to vote differently (or vote at all). Viewing the event in isolation is a contrived way to conclude that it was useless.

[QUOTE=Action Frank;46642694]Getting a permit to protest and having "legal areas" to do it in is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard of. Following the rules and not inconveniencing anyone rarely makes any change. You can play with "what-ifs" about people getting fired or ambulances getting delayed all you want, but in in the end it's still a what if. I never could understand why people have this immediate gut reaction to protesters supposedly making life so horrible for people trying to commute, while the protesters are actually protesting the fact that someone literally ended someone else's life and wasn't punished get a sort of grumbling acknowledgement. You go home, sit on your computer. Pretend the wider issues don't and won't ever impact you, then bitch about how people trying to change that system are the REAL bad guys here, then wonder why nothing ever fucking changes.[/QUOTE] This makes the purge seem like a good idea..

Here's to hoping this makes a fucking difference for once. I honestly feel like these protests will go unheard, and when you have no say, it really makes you feel powerless as a citizen. I truly hope my country gets its shit together and soon, what these people are protesting is only one of many problems. I'm not trying to be sensationalist I promise I am a very rational person, but things have been quietly spiraling downwards for years now and not much is being done about it, and the US isn't the only country facing certain detrimental problems whatever they may be.

Yall critique apathy when it comes to shit you care about, but when people are protesting racism all of a sudden its convincing? There is an elephant in the room.

I love how people can actually give more of a shit about a hypothetical person being inconvenienced in traffic than they have sympathy for people actually standing up for their society and actively protesting police brutality. I can only either conclude they are ignorant as shit, and really aren't even paying attention to what they are saying, or they are disingenuous as all hell and actually don't have a problem with the issue being protested, namely police brutality. If you're going to argue that people should sit down and take the beatings they deserve from authority than come the fuck out and say it, don't act like you have the right to be indignant about a fucking traffic slowdown when you live in total complicity with abusive police inside a sham of a democracy.

[QUOTE=Zillamaster55;46641844]So wanting attention is justification enough to be a giant group of dicks and sit in front of people who just want to get home. Alright.[/QUOTE] There you go, you finally got it! [editline]5th December 2014[/editline] [QUOTE=ilikecorn;46642130]The civil rights movement had clear and concise goals. They wanted housing, they wanted equal education, they wanted segregation to end. Those are tangible, they're easily addressed. The easiest way to get what you want is to break it down into managable chunks. "We want police brutality to end" Ok, so lets first make it so the cops aren't always coming around, to do that we address gang violence, to address that we make inner city schools better and make the drug trade no longer lucrative. Ok but that still hasn't addressed the issue. It has, but it hasn't, you've now made the police statistically less likely to beat you to death because they're not coming around all the time. So now we address the abysmal conviction rates: Most of the time cops get away with excessive force because of things like "i had probable cause to think he was gonna beat me". A simple way to address this is to say "ok, you're all going to wear cameras, if you turn them off while you're on shift, you're fired and if something happened while your camera was off you're fucked". These are just examples of breaking down the "big picture" When you break down your demands into smaller chunks, more people can get behind it, and more people can see why what your protesting is important. The more people who see your cause as an important one, the more are willing to support you, the more they're willing to give you money, the more they're willing to help with your legal issues, the more they're willing to vote in politicians who'll be sympathetic to your cause. You NEED to break your goals down, because if you don't then its SO much harder to get people behind you.[/QUOTE] How about holding police officers to the same legal standards as the rest of the population?

did some people in this thread ever read about the civil rights movement during social studies like ever

[QUOTE=ilikecorn;46641930]The American civil rights movement was HIGHLY organized, by MULTIPLE entities, and was supported by various WEALTHY individuals. These protests aren't.[/QUOTE] this just in: only organised rich people are allowed to protest! your whole rhetoric is completely fucked and based around ideas that have no proof behind them or completely miss the point of mass protest "annoying people isn't a way to get them on your side!" - the protest isn't trying to get people 'on a side' - there's already hundreds of thousands of people on 'their side'. they don't need stuck up stuffy new york suits complaining about being late for work on their side and they don't give a fuck if said people complain about being late for work anyway, where is your evidence of people having that mentality? have you just made it up as part of your argument? where are the news stories, blog posts, twitter trends, that say "fucking idiot protesters caring about police murdering a man, i was late for my 9am"? i haven't seen any your entire philosophy on this is based around making sure people who don't have a legitimate voice continue to go silent. you're basically making protest a classist issue where if you don't wear the right clothes, speak in the right voice, use the right language, organise yourselves in the proper way, fund it properly, and apply for the right permits, you're not allowed to protest protest isn't and never has been about logical debate. it's about anger. a dude was murdered by police with no consequence and people are angry. they wan't their voice to be heard. that voice is angry. that voice is out in the streets telling people about it. they don't give a fuck about your permits and your ideas of what proper language or organisation is you're fabricating a no-win argument here too: you're saying that the issue isn't obvious and clear enough as segregation was, but then you're also dismissing the entire protest because they don't have a clear manifesto of demands. is everyone just supposed to sit tight until the issue clears up enough and until they've written their 30-page detailed explanation of why they're protesting? there isn't a clear manifesto because this isn't a homogeneous movement - it's just pure anger at a terrible event that runs deep into american culture and american police culture people want change, they just don't know exactly what change they want - and that's absolutely FINE. there are no prerequisites for protest, as much as you'd like to keep the uneducated working class voice down

[QUOTE=Lachz0r;46642556]people complain about how apathetic americans are re: their politics and shit, and yet here people are defending that very apathy[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=Flameon;46642814]Yall critique apathy when it comes to shit you care about, but when people are protesting racism all of a sudden its convincing? There is an elephant in the room.[/QUOTE] I can't understand how 'don't protest in a way that pisses uninvolved people off, since you want them on your side, not angry at you' gets twisted into 'don't protest at all apathy is great'. I don't think it's correct, some of the most effective protests in history have come from protestors blocking roads and bridges, but good god it's not hard to read what they're actually writing.

[QUOTE=catbarf;46643996]I can't understand how 'don't protest in a way that pisses uninvolved people off, since you want them on your side, not angry at you' gets twisted into 'don't protest at all apathy is great'. I don't think it's correct, some of the most effective protests in history have come from protestors blocking roads and bridges, but good god it's not hard to read what they're actually writing.[/QUOTE] when it comes to a fucked up justice system noone is uninvolved

As an outsider, based on the threads in this subforum, I would say the biggest problem in the US are the actual cops.

[QUOTE=Lachz0r;46644110]when it comes to a fucked up justice system noone is uninvolved[/QUOTE] Don't try to play word games. 'Uninvolved' meaning 'not actively participating in the protests'. People on the sidelines who might join your cause and help put public pressure on elected officials, but aren't yet convinced. The exact people that protests are meant to help recruit by spreading awareness.

Corn I think you have a great opinion on a lot of issues but I don't think this is one of them. I see police abuse even in my small town, and if the protests are still going on in NYC when I move I'm going to join them. I get a cascade of boxes when I make posts about things I don't know about, for obvious reasons, I lack knowledge on the subject and sound like an idiot. YOU give me those boxes corn, you've taught me that I need to understand exactly what I am talking about before I open my mouth. The "inconveniences" these protests are causing sound petty and trivial when you compare them to the cause of the protests themselves. Maybe it's just because we live in different worlds, your world is where getting to your job is important because you've been recognized as important. I know the working poor are not important in that sense, I could get fired tomorrow, find a job the next day, and repeat ad infinitum; while being in the exact same financial situation if I had stayed at a job for two years waiting for a raise that will never come. Or that you just want to get home to your kids, while the rest of us want our children to be able to walk outside without the fear that the police that are supposed to protect them are going to hurt them. I'm telling you this because we rarely agree on anything, and instead of holding something against you, I thank you. You've forced me to accept opinions that run counter to my own, and consider other opinions as valid as my own. I think, this is one of those times that I can finally return the favour and help you. People are angry and want change, this isn't some illusioned misjustice a radical minority dreamed up, I can assure you of that myself. Put yourself in our situation and think about what people have been trying to tell you in this thread, if it were you, would the protest be worth participating in despite knowing you'll inconvenience others? [editline]5th December 2014[/editline] Just in case you try to get cheeky with me corn, just remember I already know your opinion about the American Revolution; which was extremely violent and the caused by taxes, while this protest is simply civil disobedience in response to what many would describe as murder. Checkmate, mate.

[QUOTE=Comrade_Eko;46645011]Corn I think you have a great opinion on a lot of issues but I don't think this is one of them. I see police abuse even in my small town, and if the protests are still going on in NYC when I move I'm going to join them. I get a cascade of boxes when I make posts about things I don't know about, for obvious reasons, I lack knowledge on the subject and sound like an idiot. YOU give me those boxes corn, you've taught me that I need to understand exactly what I am talking about before I open my mouth. The "inconveniences" these protests are causing sound petty and trivial when you compare them to the cause of the protests themselves. Maybe it's just because we live in different worlds, your world is where getting to your job is important because you've been recognized as important. I know the working poor are not important in that sense, I could get fired tomorrow, find a job the next day, and repeat ad infinitum; while being in the exact same financial situation if I had stayed at a job for two years waiting for a raise that will never come. Or that you just want to get home to your kids, while the rest of us want our children to be able to walk outside without the fear that the police that are supposed to protect them are going to hurt them. I'm telling you this because we rarely agree on anything, and instead of holding something against you, I thank you. You've forced me to accept opinions that run counter to my own, and consider other opinions as valid as my own. I think, this is one of those times that I can finally return the favour and help you. People are angry and want change, this isn't some illusioned misjustice a radical minority dreamed up, I can assure you of that myself. Put yourself in our situation and think about what people have been trying to tell you in this thread, if it were you, would the protest be worth participating in despite knowing you'll inconvenience others? [editline]5th December 2014[/editline] Just in case you try to get cheeky with me corn, just remember I already know your opinion about the American Revolution; which was extremely violent and the caused by taxes, while this protest is simply civil disobedience in response to what many would describe as murder. Checkmate, mate.[/QUOTE] Everyone understands that. The problem is that people don't understand that purposefully blocking traffic will not help you draw more people into your cause. It's going to cause people who didn't know about your cause to now have a very bitter first impression, which WILL affect your ability to draw more people in. You're starting off in a negative light in their eyes. With an important cause, such as this one, you don't want to give ANYONE an excuse as to why they won't support your protest. You're also opening yourself up to being hurt by someone who is pissed off that you're blocking them just driving through everyone. It HAS happened many times when protesters decide to block roads. It's not safe and it's not a positive move. A better solution is for people to gather around red lights and such if you want to spread awareness through traffic. People are less likely to be pissed off if it's the red light stopping them, and while they are stopped, they have time to hear you, read your signs, and directly ask questions. That way, you're not giving people against your cause ammunition against you, AND your message gets spread.

[QUOTE=.Isak.;46642563]Americans, especially the educated youth, are incredibly active when it comes to protests and political activism. Unfortunately almost none of them [I]fucking vote[/I].[/QUOTE] Probably because voting in the US seems to be a choice between eating donkey shit or elephant shit. Not really much of a choice.

[QUOTE=.Isak.;46642585]You're missing the point. It isn't done with the sole purpose of inconveniencing people - the protest is done like that to generate news. "Official" protests rarely generate news - I've marched against the death penalty in a legal protest in Austin and it barely made the news. Blocking traffic will absolutely cause news, especially on a major road in NYC. Instead of having CNN and other news outlets going "Gardner was choked what a shame," it's going to be "Gardner was choked, look at these protests, let's get our legal experts to discuss this" and it spreads awareness nationwide.[/QUOTE] Legal protests are honestly a joke. The only ones that ever get in the news over here are the ones with shitcunts like the BNP or UKIP counter-protesting/ being counter-protested by left learning parties like the Greens. And that's only because "aww look at those two, thinking they can politics, isn't it cute!". Nobody hears their message or gives a fuck. Civil disobedience is going to inconvenience people, think of that poor white bastard who couldn't sit down on a "whites-only" seat because Rosa Parks refused to move. The fucking [I]gall[/I] she had getting in the way of that clearly righteous white man! How God-damn dare she! Oh wait, that one event is one of the most famous contributions to civil rights in the last century. Huh...turns out being a pain in the everymans ass can work.

[QUOTE=ROFLBURGER;46641072]Uh Ok tell me, what a citizen should do, to get their voice heard besides mass protesting?[/QUOTE] Not be a fucking dick to people who are not responsible for their plight?

[QUOTE=soccerskyman;46641607]Liberal "stay in the fenced-in protesting area!" style resistance wont do anything. I'm glad that these guys have the right idea.[/QUOTE] lmao this has nothing to do with "liberal" policy. Left wing protests are usually pretty fucking loud because you need to get the attention of an apathetic majority somehow. I'm not sure why I'm so fucking surprised that the only people who seem to have problems with this shit are known conservative users. So much for smaller government huh? Only when it doesn't help you I guess? [editline]5th December 2014[/editline] [QUOTE=BFG9000;46645321]Not be a fucking dick to people who are not responsible for their plight?[/QUOTE] "I could read this thread and gain some basic understanding of civil disobedience. But nah...this post is totally a better option". Who should they be a dick to instead? The higher ups wont give a fuck because it's actually pretty hard to inconvenience the guys who can pay off people to get you out of their sight.

[QUOTE=Silence I Kill You;46645237]Everyone understands that. The problem is that people don't understand that purposefully blocking traffic will not help you draw more people into your cause. It's going to cause people who didn't know about your cause to now have a very bitter first impression, which WILL affect your ability to draw more people in. You're starting off in a negative light in their eyes. With an important cause, such as this one, you don't want to give ANYONE an excuse as to why they won't support your protest. You're also opening yourself up to being hurt by someone who is pissed off that you're blocking them just driving through everyone. It HAS happened many times when protesters decide to block roads. It's not safe and it's not a positive move. A better solution is for people to gather around red lights and such if you want to spread awareness through traffic. People are less likely to be pissed off if it's the red light stopping them, and while they are stopped, they have time to hear you, read your signs, and directly ask questions. That way, you're not giving people against your cause ammunition against you, AND your message gets spread.[/QUOTE] But disruption is how protests result in real reform, not through violence or non-violence. Think of the industrial workers in America before the New Deal, the sit ins that disrupted companies and how unfavourable they were to anyone outside of the strikes. The police were violently against them, strikebreakers, which were just normal people, were violently against them, and martial law was even implemented in some states. People were MORE than inconvenienced by those protesters, and I dare say those protests were more dangerous to be a part of than the protests now. Helpful protests, the kind of protests that actually work are not necessarily violent, nonviolent, legal or illegal; the key point to any protest is to be disruptive. Populist movements engage in civil disobedience whenever they fail to get what they want through traditional means, and recognize that society is dependent on their cooperation. At that point they cease cooperating and actively disrupt societies smooth functioning. Disruption is one way in which progress is made, and these people, obviously, feel that it is the only option left to them.

[QUOTE=hexpunK;46645314]Civil disobedience is going to inconvenience people, think of that poor white bastard who couldn't sit down on a "whites-only" seat because Rosa Parks refused to move. The fucking [I]gall[/I] she had getting in the way of that clearly righteous white man! How God-damn dare she! Oh wait, that one event is one of the most famous contributions to civil rights in the last century. Huh...turns out being a pain in the everymans ass can work.[/QUOTE] That's a really terrible comparison and your snark is unwarranted. A much better example would be the Selma to Montgomery marches. [QUOTE=hexpunK;46645338]Who should they be a dick to instead?[/QUOTE] Maybe you should be thinking 'how do I best raise awareness of this issue' rather than 'well who am I supposed to be a dick to'. Getting people mad at you is not the objective, it's an acceptable risk if in the process of making them mad you also substantially raise awareness and consequently support for your cause. Not every instance of 'public inconvenience' will necessarily do this, there have been plenty of protests that caused enough problems that they polarized uninvolved people who might otherwise be sympathetic to their cause into opposition. If you've been paying attention to the news lately you can see a lot of this in the Ferguson protests- there aren't many people [I]against[/I] protesting racial injustice, but there's a backlash to the looting, rioting, and violence because of the destructive impact it's having on innocent people. Protesting in a high-profile public place to gain widespread awareness with minimal impact to the local community, like these protestors are doing, is fine. Deciding that being a dick gives you publicity so you should go out of your way to cause problems for innocent people is not fine.

[QUOTE=catbarf;46645776]That's a really terrible comparison and your snark is unwarranted. A much better example would be the Selma to Montgomery marches. Maybe you should be thinking 'how do I best raise awareness of this issue' rather than 'well who am I supposed to be a dick to'. Getting people mad at you is not the objective, it's an acceptable risk if in the process of making them mad you also substantially raise awareness and consequently support for your cause. Not every instance of 'public inconvenience' will necessarily do this, there have been plenty of protests that caused enough problems that they polarized uninvolved people who might otherwise be sympathetic to their cause into opposition. If you've been paying attention to the news lately you can see a lot of this in the Ferguson protests- there aren't many people [I]against[/I] protesting racial injustice, but there's a backlash to the looting, rioting, and violence because of the destructive impact it's having on innocent people. Protesting in a high-profile public place to gain widespread awareness with minimal impact to the local community, like these protestors are doing, is fine. Deciding that being a dick gives you publicity so you should go out of your way to cause problems for innocent people is not fine.[/QUOTE] I think the problem was more that the victim in Ferguson started to look less and less like a victim as new evidence came to light. The riots just helped solidify people's opinions on the matter. My hopes are that this one will be different, this time the protesters have fact and logic to back up their conclusion of events, and thus their outrage. I'm pretty sure the two most conservative members in our community are right in this thread, and as you can see they're as logical as anybody and maintain good points through their arguments. I've learned a lot from them and gained a lot of respect for conservatives due to them. I'm just saying this last part because these threads always devolve when someone pops in and starts accusing anyone with a conservative viewpoint a racist, and I want to try to nip that in the bud.

[QUOTE=Comrade_Eko;46645875]I think the problem was more that the victim in Ferguson started to look less and less like a victim as new evidence came to light. The riots just helped solidify people's opinions on the matter. My hopes are that this one will be different, this time the protesters have fact and logic to back up their conclusion of events, and thus their outrage. I'm pretty sure the two most conservative members in our community are right in this thread, and as you can see they're as logical as anybody and maintain good points through their arguments. I've learned a lot from them and gained a lot of respect for conservatives due to them. I'm just saying this last part because these threads always devolve when someone pops in and starts accusing anyone with a conservative viewpoint a racist, and I want to try to nip that in the bud.[/QUOTE] I think there's quite a difference this time. The whole deal with Micheal Brown was really sketchy at best. However the case in New York is extremely clear-cut without any nonsense as to what actually took place. I cannot begin to comprehend just how much bullshit they had to have pulled in court to get a non-indictment from the grand jury. This verdict should speak volumes as to which side the scales of justice tips in favor of.

[QUOTE=kidwithsword;46641046]I will never understand how people think that blocking traffic accomplishes anything. The people they are protesting against are not going to care about a bunch of people standing in a road somewhere, and the people they are inconvenciencing are people completely unrelated to the issues they are protesting against. What kind of systematic change, the kind of change that they claim to want, could they possibly hope to effect by doing stuff like this?[/QUOTE] Yes, you're right, people protesting should completely avoid inconveniencing anyone so that their protests can be effectively ignored by everyone. Brilliant.