[ennui2]

True as far as that goes, but people who deliberately attend events that call for violence against others is kind of a warning sign is it not?

Yeah. This is a free-speech issue as was put to the test way back in the 70s with the neo-Nazis in Skokie.

http://www.jta.org/2013/06/20/news-opin ... ugh-skokie

These days, though, communication isn't about marches or even churches anymore. Hate speech is transmitted through the internet. It knows no borders.

[KaiserJeep]

-snip-
Is not advocating violence the same as shouting Fire in a crowded theater?

Yes, and when race-baiters (call them "community organizers" if you wish) advocate violence against other people with different skin tones, it is also hate speech. Except of course, only the majority race ever gets charged with a hate crime.

[evilgenius]

I brought this up because I was angry at the response of the left to Trump's son's Skittles jibe. I didn't like how they didn't attack his math, how we accept things like driving as part of our lives which are far more dangerous than immigrant terrorism looks like it even can be, but instead went after how he compared people of color to Skittles. I find a real lack of focus in that. They could have used the driving example, or a host of other examples from daily life that people are familiar with. They didn't need to inflate the use of Skittles and make it into a red herring.

Reading some of the posts since, I wonder what people think about basic concepts generally accepted throughout Western Society, such as people having to commit a crime before they can be arrested. That has been one of the first things that has been transgressed in dealing with terrorism. You know, actually it's also had a lot to do with some of the police shootings that have riled the black community too. Not all of them, but some. While it hasn't necessarily been 'driving while black' that has been why some of the people have been pulled over or stopped for questioning by the cops the treatment of the folks in some of those cases has been well out of line as to the purported reasons why they were initially engaged. Why pull a gun on somebody stuck with a stalled car? Why assume that people who have guns drawn on them who are innocent are going to act a certain way that will make you feel better and if they don't they must be guilty of something?

Both of these things, looking at statistically inconsequential numbers and conflating them with consequential numbers and treating people a certain way as a matter of course without prior cause, are excuses for fear. Fear is what gives you the George Zimmermans of this world. It also gives you laws that make it acceptable to shoot someone simply because you were afraid. Yeah, fear inducing actual legislation making it legal to refuse to deal with your own fear, such that you act out on it instead of reason whether it is even justified. Anybody can be afraid. You don't have to be special in any way.

Also, there is a difference between those who incite from prejudicial perspectives and those who incite out of a desire to seek redress of grievances. The right to freedom of assembly is about recognizing that people have a right to seek redress of grievances, and that in order to do so they will have to assemble or otherwise communicate with each other. When it comes to terrorism there are a lot of baddies who hide behind this. Even though their true intent is to subvert the society they enjoy participation in, they always claim a whole list of wrongs have been perpetrated against this or that subgroup of their main group, and thus they are actually seeking redress of grievances.

Again, this appeals to a fundamental right accepted in the West. Just like requiring people to have actually committed a crime before they can be arrested, it can sit there at the feeling of an inflection point and tempt people to fear. I wonder what people think about how far these kinds of things should run before they have gone too far? How much do people have to fear before changes to these long held principles are enacted? Should they change at all? If those changes take place, how ought the principles, which I think nobody really wants to do away with on a wholesale basis, be honored still, so that things don't become complete anarchy?

[KaiserJeep]

EG, I think you are mixing up two different topics here, which are civil unrest in a native subculture (i.e. the Black riots in Charlotte NC) and terrorism which pretty much divides into "domestic (homegrown)" and "immigrant" categories.

When it comes to civil unrest, we have the Black subculture in America, whipped into a "righteous fury" by "community organizers" such as Louis Farrakhan, Jesse jackson, Barack Obama, and Al Sharpton. Then we have the Latino subculture, which has hotspots and very large minority populations in the five states of California, Texas, Florida, New Jersey, and Illinois.

Pardon me, but outside of political protests at the other major political party, the White majority is relatively peaceful. They hardly ever loot stores while demonstrating, either. (I get to say that as a member of the most despised group in America, the financially conservative, heterosexual adult White males who support both the police and the military.)

Warning: Now I will be politically incorrect.

Terrorism is largely associated with one religion which is Islam. I do not doubt that the vast majority of Muslims are good peaceful people, whether they be native American or immigrants. But some are not. That is after all, what the Skittles analogy is all about.

End politically incorrect monologue.

Otherwise, I find myself in agreement with many of your words. I like that you don't mind pulling the flush chain on the LIMs (Liberal Idiot Members) at PO.com.

[dohboi]

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/07/ ... acial-bias

What the Data Really Says About Police and Racial Bias:
Eighteen academic studies, legal rulings, and media investigations shed light on the issue roiling America.

...the probability of being black, unarmed, and shot by police is about 3.49 times the probability of being white, unarmed, and shot by police...

http://www.alternet.org/tea-party-and-r ... -white-men

Most of the terrorist activity in the US in recent years has come not from Muslims, but from radical Christians, white supremacists and far-right militia groups

[kuidaskassikaeb]

I think the real problem with the skittles analogy is mathematical. He is balancing eating a sweet with death. Well I wouldn't do that.

What you are really doing when you let in a refuge is saving a life.

[Subjectivist]

I think the real problem with the skittles analogy is mathematical. He is balancing eating a sweet with death. Well I wouldn't do that.

What you are really doing when you let in a refuge is saving a life.

What are you doing when you let in a terrorist who is in a refugee group?

[dohboi]

Not much.

Better to worry about lots and lots of other things that are much much more likely to hurt or kill you than a terrorist...like...furniture:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/mon ... terrorist/

You’re more likely to be fatally crushed by furniture than killed by a terrorist

[kuidaskassikaeb]

Sujectivist wrote

What are you doing when you let in a terrorist who is in a refugee group?

I guess I would consider that an honest argument. I think there is a reasonable likely hood that ISIS at the very least would try to booby trap refuge flows. The problem with the Trump quote was that it was an attempt to win an argument with a complete BS analogy, that just happened to dehumanize a very vulnerable group of people.

[JV153]

I don't know about terrorists, but I've had a few people take a swing (punch) at me.. including in vehicles, and no police ever responded.. probably too many swings and too few police. The worst was high school, the hockey players seemed to think the classroom (particularly german class) was a hockey rink.

.. also had a police officer swing open his door once and try and give me a ticket since I didn't have a bell on the bicycle - which I wouldn't use anyway since everybody is driving around with their windows rolled up, but I didn't have any pockets, so the police officer noticed this and let me go with a recommendation.

ISIS ? Never met'em.

[ROCKMAN]

"I think there is a reasonable likely hood that ISIS at the very least would try to booby trap refuge flows." Likelihood? Would seem a certainty given ISIS et al has already generated internal "booby traps" in the US. But again so what if they do? A dozen ISIS infiltrators amongst the refuges couldn't claim nearly as many fatalities in the next 12 months as US drunk drivers will. Which worry keeps one awake a night (if either does) says more about that person then the nature of the threat IMHO.

[evilgenius]

"I think there is a reasonable likely hood that ISIS at the very least would try to booby trap refuge flows." Likelihood? Would seem a certainty given ISIS et al has already generated internal "booby traps" in the US. But again so what if they do? A dozen ISIS infiltrators amongst the refuges couldn't claim nearly as many fatalities in the next 12 months as US drunk drivers will. Which worry keeps one awake a night (if either does) says more about that person then the nature of the threat IMHO.

And this points out something by way of free association: many of the domestic problems that occur surrounding the relationship of the police to society are not the fault of either the police or the people. They are more the result of political decisions aimed at revenue generation. Many police departments across the US don't provide the sort of service they could because their efforts are directed at snagging as many drunk drivers as possible. I think they probably average over $10,000 per citation, after all of the things a guilty drunk driver has to pay for are settled. The same goes for unpaid parking tickets in some towns accelerating to failure to appear warrants for people who can't pay. It's possible to design your system to prey upon the people for doing what they do. Sometimes that's a good thing. Sometimes it's not. Doubtless, if you went after possible refugee terrorist infiltrators you'd wind up having to catch a much higher proportion of the refugee population doing something that is matter of course, and trying to weed the scoundrels out of that group. Just like how the push to catch drunk drivers, though, has cut community policing in certain places and how the push to snag ordinary people for doing ordinary things such that they are bound to owe the courts some bit of money just for living has created a gulf between poorer constituencies and the police going after terrorists could come with its own set of unintended consequences.