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[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Bastard! You beat me to putting up that link. This is fantastic writing:

When nonviolence is preached as an attempt to evade the repercussions of political brutality, it betrays itself. When nonviolence begins halfway through the war with the aggressor calling time out, it exposes itself as a ruse. When nonviolence is preached by the representatives of the state, while the state doles out heaps of violence to its citizens, it reveals itself to be a con. And none of this can mean that rioting or violence is "correct" or "wise," any more than a forest fire can be "correct" or "wise." Wisdom isn't the point tonight. Disrespect is. In this case, disrespect for the hollow law and failed order that so regularly disrespects the rioters themselves.

I'd have taken it one step further. Blacks in these communities obviously want violent rioting to end, but when they're paraded before cameras, as Gray's family was, they might want to add a caveat to their pleas for calm. A thing they never say, but should, would be:

"Please, stop destroying your own neighborhood. And those who are using this as cover to commit crimes, we hope you are prosecuted for victimizing your own community.

But you outside this community -- you need to understand why this is happening. You are using a violent police state to manage a population of people who cannot find jobs. You are allowing large portions of this country to degrade into favelas. There is a third world nation hiding behind the curtain of America, and it's only growing larger every day.

If the best reaction you can summon to this is to blame desperate people for reacting violently to violence, you can expect a whole lot more of this in coming years."

Some men just want to watch the world burn.