[wat0n]

*Or* why don't you get back to the thread's topic and address what the protestors are protesting about.

Sure, they are protesting police brutality. That doesn't excuse rioting, looting and knocking people unconscious.

[Unthinking Majority]

'My' riots -- ?

This is *slanderous* language on your part. You're implying that I'm some kind of *commander* of rioting.

I was addressing the Time interpretation of the one quote. You obviously want to *pigeonhole* MLK into a version of your choosing, which is unfortunate, on par with the slanderous characterization you just made of me.

You seem to obviously support the riots, and you seem to desperately want MLK to support them too, in order to help justify them. Do you deny your support for them?

He says 'in the final analysis', indicating that *this* part *supersedes* whatever else he said prior to this part, that a riot is the language of the unheard. He said previously that 'Certain conditions continue to exist in our society which must be condemned as vigorously as we condemn riots.' He's *obviously* not condemning riots, because he's referencing the political action of rioting in his *final analysis*, and *not* condemning it there.
...
My previous analysis of his quote stands.

First, who the heck says "we" when they don't include themselves? If he meant other people besides himself, he'd say "you". Second, I agree with him on his explanation of why riots happen, because people continue to be unheard.

Anyways, here he is specifically denouncing riots, which disproves your theory:

KING (interview): I will never change in my basic idea that non-violence is the most potent weapon available to the Negro in his struggle for freedom and justice. I think for the Negro to turn to violence would be both impractical and immoral.

MIKE WALLACE: There's an increasingly vocal minority who disagree totally with your tactics, Dr. King.

KING: There's no doubt about that. I will agree that there is a group in the Negro community advocating violence now. I happen to feel that this group represents a numerical minority. Surveys have revealed this. The vast majority of Negroes still feel that the best way to deal with the dilemma that we face in this country is through non-violent resistance, and I don't think this vocal group will be able to make a real dent in the Negro community in terms of swaying 22 million Negroes to this particular point of view. And I contend that the cry of "black power" is, at bottom, a reaction to the reluctance of white power to make the kind of changes necessary to make justice a reality for the Negro. I think that we've got to see that a riot is the language of the unheard. And, what is it that America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the economic plight of the Negro poor has worsened over the last few years.

WALLACE: How many summers like this do you imagine that we can expect?

KING: Well, I would say this: we don't have long. The mood of the Negro community now is one of urgency, one of saying that we aren't going to wait. That we've got to have our freedom. We've waited too long. So that I would say that every summer we're going to have this kind of vigorous protest. My hope is that it will be non-violent. I would hope that we can avoid riots because riots are self-defeating and socially destructive.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mlk-a-riot ... e-unheard/

and:

“And as long as America postpones justice, we stand in the position of having these recurrences of violence and riots over and over again.”

So obviously when he says "riots are the language of the unheard", he's not giving his approval of them, he's giving his explanation of why they're happening.

*You* continue to *deflect* your attentions *away* from 'certain conditions [that] continue to exist in our society', meaning state-sanctioned killer cops, summary executions, and institutionally-racist killings by killer cops.

Total BS. You realize one can be anti-riots and anti-cop abuse right? MLK was.

[Pants-of-dog]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQdu9SfSrxE

Am I supposed to watch this? How does this relate to your claim (that elected officials and almost the entire left are either lying and/or ignoring the riots and rioters)?

MLK Jr. was a peace-loving pastor who believed in non-violent resistance and civil disobedience after his inspiration, Gandhi. He'd agree with the protestors in their gripes, as do I.

I never said he doesn't support civil disobedience, of course he did. Why do you constantly put words in my mouth and invoke strawmen? Civil disobedience is refusing to obey unjust laws, like Rosa Parks did, it doesn't mean ignoring all laws and going apeshit crazy.

Are protesters ignoring all laws and going crazy?

Just because MLK understood rioters, and could empathize with the rioters, doesn't mean he advocated people riot or ever took part in rioting. He's a hero because of his success using non-violent methods, eschewing the great American tradition of violence. He's probably the greatest American who ever lived. Anyone invoking MLK to justify rioting doesn't know anything about MLK or what he stood for & should be ashamed.

"…I think America must see that riots do not develop out of thin air. Certain conditions continue to exist in our society which must be condemned as vigorously as we condemn riots. But in the final analysis, a riot is the language of the unheard." - MLK

"King’s point, though subtle, is clear. He does not support violent tactics, including riots, but he argues that the way to stop citizens from rioting is to acknowledge and fix the conditions that they are rioting against." - Time Magazine
https://time.com/3838515/baltimore-riot ... ard-quote/

Some on the left are intent on rewriting history and redefining dictionaries to further their political agenda.

Your accusations about “the left” are noted. Whoever this vague entity is.

Back to the topic, what are the reasons for rioting? Unless we look at the reasons why people riot, all this hand wringing and focus on riots (instead of the police brutality that is the cause of the protests) is just a way of ignoring the police brutality and killings.

So, which do you want to address: the cause for the riots, or the police brutality and killings that have led to protests?

I'm sympathetic to the reasons. Looting businesses, burning down Target, graffiti-tagging anything you please...I don't support that. Vandalizing police stations or cop cars....at least that makes sense.

Again, what are the reasons?

[SpecialOlympian]

A mob of what looks like mostly black women are harassing and terrorizing residential areas in Portland. Why?

Because it's Mitch McConnell and that man doesn't deserve a good night's rest.

Sure, they are protesting police brutality. That doesn't excuse rioting, looting and knocking people unconscious.

People should just keep doing nothing and protesting quietly, because that is effective.

[wat0n]

It actually is, MLK got quite far doing so. Something the rioting was in fact quite effective at was at getting Nixon elected.

[ckaihatsu]

You seem to obviously support the riots, and you seem to desperately want MLK to support them too, in order to help justify them. Do you deny your support for them?

You're missing the point, as usual -- since this is *political*, you have to look at what you're *focusing on*, and *advocating*. You spend most of your time here going after allegedly criminal acts by the protestors while ignoring what it's all about, the 1000+ killings per year, by cops.

I'm not in a position to *tell* the protestors what to do, what tactics to use -- but I agree with their *message*, and their *strategy* of bringing attention to those who are ignored by mainstream society, to paraphrase MLK.

First, who the heck says "we" when they don't include themselves?

We covered this already -- *see*, there it is, the use of the *general* 'we', since we've been conversant about it. Okay, slightly different since I *am* including myself, but in political rhetoric the 'mainstream' 'we' is often used, meaning that we're all in the same society, regardless, and so the 'societal' / 'mainstream' 'we' does not necessarily address the specificity of this-or-that individual. It's more like a *physical*, societal 'we', while *individual* stances may vary, and differ, from the 'physical' 'we'.

The sentence MLK used was 'Certain conditions continue to exist in our society which must be condemned as vigorously as we condemn riots.'

So he's saying that mainstream society ('we') will tend to condemn riots, and that same level of *intensity* must also be used by mainstream society to condemn the 'certain conditions' that continue to exist, meaning police brutality, poverty, etc.

If he meant other people besides himself, he'd say "you". Second, I agree with him on his explanation of why riots happen, because people continue to be unheard.

Okay on this latter part, and see the previous segment for my treatment of how MLK uses 'we' instead of 'you'. The language is meant to address the dimension of *scale* -- society as a whole, including the speaker, versus the individual speaker's *own* set of politics which *doesn't* condemn the rioters because they're just using the 'language of the unheard'.

Anyways, here he is specifically denouncing riots, which disproves your theory:

KING (interview): I will never change in my basic idea that non-violence is the most potent weapon available to the Negro in his struggle for freedom and justice. I think for the Negro to turn to violence would be both impractical and immoral.

MIKE WALLACE: There's an increasingly vocal minority who disagree totally with your tactics, Dr. King.

KING: There's no doubt about that. I will agree that there is a group in the Negro community advocating violence now. I happen to feel that this group represents a numerical minority. Surveys have revealed this. The vast majority of Negroes still feel that the best way to deal with the dilemma that we face in this country is through non-violent resistance, and I don't think this vocal group will be able to make a real dent in the Negro community in terms of swaying 22 million Negroes to this particular point of view. And I contend that the cry of "black power" is, at bottom, a reaction to the reluctance of white power to make the kind of changes necessary to make justice a reality for the Negro. I think that we've got to see that a riot is the language of the unheard. And, what is it that America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the economic plight of the Negro poor has worsened over the last few years.

WALLACE: How many summers like this do you imagine that we can expect?

KING: Well, I would say this: we don't have long. The mood of the Negro community now is one of urgency, one of saying that we aren't going to wait. That we've got to have our freedom. We've waited too long. So that I would say that every summer we're going to have this kind of vigorous protest. My hope is that it will be non-violent. I would hope that we can avoid riots because riots are self-defeating and socially destructive.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mlk-a-riot ... e-unheard/

and:

“And as long as America postpones justice, we stand in the position of having these recurrences of violence and riots over and over again.”

So obviously when he says "riots are the language of the unheard", he's not giving his approval of them, he's giving his explanation of why they're happening.

Yes, he's describing why they're happening, *objectively*, but please note that his *critique* -- 'I would hope that we can avoid riots because riots are self-defeating and socially destructive' -- is a statement of *strategy* and *tactics*. He's addressing *internal* politics, internal to the civil rights movement.

Historically this is the point at which *Malcolm X* began to receive increased support, over this very *strategic* issue of how to appropriately proceed regarding the best interests of the oppressed population of black people in the U.S.

I don't necessarily agree with Malcolm X's *separatism*, but it's understandable:

Malcolm X was equally critical of the civil rights movement.[103] He called Martin Luther King Jr. a "chump", and said other civil rights leaders were "stooges" of the white establishment.[104][H] He called the 1963 March on Washington "the farce on Washington",[106] and said he did not know why so many black people were excited about a demonstration "run by whites in front of a statue of a president who has been dead for a hundred years and who didn't like us when he was alive".[107]

While the civil rights movement fought against racial segregation, Malcolm X advocated the complete separation of African Americans from whites. He proposed that African Americans should return to Africa and that, in the interim, a separate country for black people in America should be created.[108][109] He rejected the civil rights movement's strategy of nonviolence, arguing that black people should defend and advance themselves "by any means necessary".[110] His speeches had a powerful effect on his audiences, who were generally African Americans in northern and western cities. Many of them‍—‌tired of being told to wait for freedom, justice, equality and respect[111]‍—‌felt that he articulated their complaints better than did the civil rights movement.[112][113]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_X ... ith_Nation

---

*You* continue to *deflect* your attentions *away* from 'certain conditions [that] continue to exist in our society', meaning state-sanctioned killer cops, summary executions, and institutionally-racist killings by killer cops.

Total BS. You realize one can be anti-riots and anti-cop abuse right? MLK was.

But by saying this you're putting yourself into a *void* regarding the struggle itself -- how *should* BLM / Antifa proceed, similarly to the civil right movement in 1963, if you're going to dismiss the *current* political practices being used?

This is where your (liberal) political credentials and credibility come into question, because your stated positions are *superficial* if you're going to repeatedly take the side of law-and-order / the police / the state, when it comes to political *practice*, as in what Antifa / BLM are doing in Portland, etc. Your stated 'principles' don't match your *analysis* of real-world events.

I just whipped-up a chart / graphic organizer that's applicable here. I invite you to use it as a part of the ongoing discussion. (The two columns are 'means' and 'ends', with two intersecting rows being 'protestors' and 'police / state', for four quadrant intersection cells in total.)


Means and Ends CHART

Spoiler: show

[Pants-of-dog]

Conservatives invoke MLK when they want to judge rioters, but ignore MLK when he points out that the riots themselves are a reaction to a bad situation faced by black people in the USA.

[wat0n]

Conservatives invoke MLK when they want to judge rioters, but ignore MLK when he points out that the riots themselves are a reaction to a bad situation faced by black people in the USA.

Leftists invoke MLK when they want to justify rioters, but ignore MLK when he points out that the riots themselves are detrimental to helping black people in the USA.

[Pants-of-dog]

So far, none of the conservatives who invoke MLK have even tried to discuss the reasons behind the riots, despite the many MLK quotes that focus specifically on this.

So, we can discuss the reasons for the protests or the reasons for the riots.

Either way, the situation calls for real change.

[wat0n]

So far, none of the conservatives who invoke MLK have even tried to discuss the reasons behind the riots, despite the many MLK quotes that focus specifically on this.

So, we can discuss the reasons for the protests or the reasons for the riots.

Either way, the situation calls for real change.

Sure, let's do it. I propose the following list of both stated and real reasons:

• Police brutality (it has actually been trending down since 2015)
• Racial inequality (it has actually been trending down for the last few decades, although the pace has slowed since 2000)
• Socioeconomic inequality (it has actually been mostly flat since 2014)
• Millennials have problems to become economically independent (true since 2008) in a society where people are expected to be independent at a young age (this has not changed)
• An ever increasing polarization of the US body politic
• Attempts by the progressive Left to impose their views on the broader society
• Trump winning in 2016 (itself a reaction against the above Left)
• Progressives deserting the Democratic Party
• Unwillingness by the local authorities to put down the riots

Do riots lead to solving any of that? No. Should a precedent be established that rioting will get you results? Not either, that would only accelerate some of those trends above.

And if Biden wins, would Trump supporters have the right to riot (and likely do worse) if they decide they've had enough of the Democrats? Or the underlying reasons for their rioting wouldn't matter and they should just be put down?

[ckaihatsu]

Democrats leave 20 million unemployed in the lurch

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/0 ... m-a24.html

[Pants-of-dog]

For example, MLK himself discusses economic hardship and lack of opportunity as a cause of riots. This seems to make sense to a limited degree, since it is almost always poor people who riot. But at the same time, almost all poor people do not riot most of the time, so that can not be the only reason.

In other words, actual science will be needed to get a grasp on this.

[Unthinking Majority]

This is where your (liberal) political credentials and credibility come into question, because your stated positions are *superficial* if you're going to repeatedly take the side of law-and-order / the police / the state, when it comes to political *practice*, as in what Antifa / BLM are doing in Portland, etc. Your stated 'principles' don't match your *analysis* of real-world events.

I can't be taking the side of police and the state if i'm criticizing them and their abuse of power and unjust violence and saying we need to jail these rogue police not following the law and have major reform throughout the system

This thread is about the Portland riots, which have become ridiculous and stupid. A weekend or 2 of riots might be understandable, even though i wouldn't condone them. We're talking about months of violent protests in 2 cities with known radical anarchist elements with foolish mayors who won't tell these people to go home.

[Pants-of-dog]

@Unthinking Majority

Who exactly is rioting? What are the reasons for it?

[ckaihatsu]

I can't be taking the side of police and the state if i'm criticizing them and their abuse of power and unjust violence and saying we need to jail these rogue police not following the law and have major reform throughout the system

This is all *lip service*, though, because this is the most you'll say in a counter-status-quo / leftwards direction.


Anatomy of a Platform

Spoiler: show

---

This thread is about the Portland riots, which have become ridiculous and stupid. A weekend or 2 of riots might be understandable, even though i wouldn't condone them. We're talking about months of violent protests in 2 cities with known radical anarchist elements with foolish mayors who won't tell these people to go home.

And now you're back to supporting the status quo / police / state, over the protestors and their political message.

What are oppressed people supposed to do, in your estimation, if they're typically being *ignored* by the bourgeois power structure -- ?


Means and Ends CHART

Spoiler: show

[wat0n]

For example, MLK himself discusses economic hardship and lack of opportunity as a cause of riots. This seems to make sense to a limited degree, since it is almost always poor people who riot. But at the same time, almost all poor people do not riot most of the time, so that can not be the only reason.

In other words, actual science will be needed to get a grasp on this.

And not only that, but there seem to be plenty of middle and even upper middle class people rioting. Particularly among Whites.

I think the list I put earlier is relevant. Particularly the part about Millennials being unable to get their economic independence, having to push back on forming a family or buying a home, and while other issues are either stable (socioeconomic inequality) or even improving (racial inequality, police brutality) those problems are still standing and the issues Millennials in particular face have seemingly only gotten worse. Particularly in the West Coast.

The political problems from the second part of the list have also gotten worse. And that should be a concern, because Trumpers may decide rioting can pay off at some point in the future. They also won't be as "nice" as the current crop, I don't doubt for a second their rioting would not simply take the form of pelting cops with stone but would take the form of shootouts in the streets. They are 2nd Amendment types after all. A longer view of American history would also lead anyone with half a brain to conclude Whites can perfectly be more insane when race rioting than minorities are which is yet another reason for not allowing the language of the riot to become the language of the land.

[Pants-of-dog]

@Unthinking Majority

Please provide some sort of source to corroborate any claims as to who is rioting and why. Thank you.

[ckaihatsu]

A longer view of American history would also lead anyone with half a brain to conclude Whites can perfectly be more insane when race rioting than minorities are which is yet another reason for not allowing the language of the riot to become the language of the land.

This amounts to a *veiled threat*, particularly as fascist neo-Nazis are now inflicting violence against Antifa protestors in Portland:


Portland police stand by as Proud Boys and far-right militias flash guns and brawl with antifa counterprotesters

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2 ... t-protest/


'Not allowing the language of the riot to become the language of the land' is perfectly *abstract* and easy to *say*, but then one has to ask what it would *take* to "prevent rioting", and then your politics is back to status-quo *statism* and ignoring the oppressed, so you're not really saying anything here.

You're *almost* as bad as Oxymoron in calling for police to just *mow down* protestors with gunfire.

[wat0n]

This amounts to a *veiled threat*, particularly as fascist neo-Nazis are now inflicting violence against Antifa protestors in Portland:


Portland police stand by as Proud Boys and far-right militias flash guns and brawl with antifa counterprotesters

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2 ... t-protest/


'Not allowing the language of the riot to become the language of the land' is perfectly *abstract* and easy to *say*, but then one has to ask what it would *take* to "prevent rioting", and then your politics is back to status-quo *statism* and ignoring the oppressed, so you're not really saying anything here.

You're *almost* as bad as Oxymoron in calling for police to just *mow down* protestors with gunfire.

It's not a "veiled threat", it's simply a prediction. And yes I'd rather see the state stopping the riots than seeing the stuff we're now seeing in Portland. It's just a matter of time until they start using firearms rather than just batons and the like.

Also it shows the hypocrisy from the Left on these matters. Or what, shouldn't have the cops and the military stopped the rioters from a century ago who would go and start lynching Blacks?

Note that this doesn't mean the underlying issues shouldn't be addressed. It only means rioters should be stopped.

You claim to live in Chicago, don't you? Why do I assume you live in one of the upscale neighborhoods around the Loop or in the North Side? When was the last time you went to Woodlawn or Englewood?

[Pants-of-dog]

I see @wat0n is once again accusing people of disagreeing with him of being upper class elites.

And still no proposals to address the actual causes of riots.

It seems the riots are unimportant except as a justification for continued police brutality.