More St. Louis Churches to Offer Prayer Vigils, Shelter After Ferguson Grand Jury Verdict

[loyalsister]

The night after the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney's office releases the results of the grand-jury investigation into Brown's shooting, clergy groups and the NAACP say they're calling the community to gather at the West Side Missionary Baptist Church, at 2677 Dunn Road, northeast of Ferguson. There, clergy and community leaders will share how congregations and residents can peacefully respond to the jury's decision.

http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/dailyrft/2014/11/more_st_louis_churches_to_offer_prayer_vigils_shelter_after_ferguson_grand_jury_verdict.php

Kudos to the churches for behaving like Christians

[BlueCaliDem]

1. It appears that clergymen/women anticipate that Wilson will be exonerated for the murder

of Michael Brown.

Yet another message is being sent that it's open season on black people...and genocide by law enforcement is approved by the American people (the people on the Grand Jury) and by law enforcement officials, taking the Jim Crow mindset out of the South and spreading it far and wide among law enforcement in the United States until it's integrated and solidified as part of American culture.

Maybe we should rename our country from the United States of America to the Segregated States of America.

[Oktober]

2. Well... That was certainly... hyperbolic...

Last edited Tue Nov 11, 2014, 10:26 AM - Edit history (1)

Go chat with a Rwandan about what the word genocide means and report back....

[BlueCaliDem]

4. For the sake and integrity of this country...let's hope you're right, that it's just hyperbole.

But figures don't lie even though there's no doubt that they're being under-reported.

According to the FBI’s most recent accounts of “justifiable homicide,” in the seven years between 2005 and 2012, a white officer used deadly force against a black person almost two times every week. Of those black persons killed, nearly one in every five were under 21 years of age (git'em while young?). For comparison, only 8.7 percent of white people killed by police officers were younger than 21. And since police departments self-report these numbers, the numbers are most likely underestimates.

Genocide is genocide, whether in a drip-drip-drip fashion (as currently is happening in America against black men and women) or in mass scale slaughter such as it is in Rwanda. Even you can't deny that Blacks are disproportionately executed in our streets for no reason other than walking/driving/being Black - by WHITE COPS. Not if you're willing to believe in documented stats These same white cops are responsible for reporting those deaths. Do you think it's in their best interest to under-report the fatal shooting deaths of Blacks?

White people rarely get shot, let alone executed, in our streets for doing worse than any black person. But you keep on believing that there is no genocide of Blacks happening in this country if it helps you sleep better at night.

[Oktober]

7. I do believe it.. because I can do basic math....

Not to mention my understanding of what genocide actually means...

It's blatantly offensive to even compare the two and has the hint an angsty teenager who says that she is just GOING TO DIE if she can't go to the Bieber concert.

[BlueCaliDem]

11. NOWHERE in the definitions of genocide does it say that there has to be a certain number

of people executed/killed/murdered in order to define it as genocide.

Genocide [jen-uh-sahyd]

(noun)
1.
the deliberate and systematic extermination of a national, racial, political, or cultural group.

British Dictionary definition for genocide:

(noun)
1.
the policy of deliberately killing a nationality or ethnic group

But you believe that's not happening to Blacks? Oh brother.

Your "basic math" skill results are 100% wrong. Why? When you work with incomplete variables, you can't expect the end result to be accurate. So that's why I can tell you that your math is WRONG.

And as I've explained in my previous post - which you've undoubtedly refused to read - the numbers are UNDERestimates of fatal shootings of Blacks by white cops, but even those reported numbers tell an ugly story about old South African-style racism so prevalent in this country. You are in serious denial if you can't see it.

It's also blatantly offensive to the Black community - and any other "minority" group in the U.S. - who suffer under the yoke of American racism on a daily basis, that some people of certain privilege in America REFUSE to see that there is a war on Blacks happening right under our noses. Sticking your fingers in your ears and singing "la-la-la-la" so you don't have to hear the truth doesn't change the reality Blacks are forced to live under.

You might be in a position never to have to know what it's like to be Black in America, but American Blacks don't have that luxury. They have to see it for what it is - the systemic extermination of their race and extrajudicial execution of their children. Jim Crow is alive and well in the United States and deniers are only exacerbating the problem by now acknowledging that painful truth.

[Oktober]

14. Stuff like this...

the systemic extermination of their race and extrajudicial execution of their children.

Is why you can't be taken seriously and why opportunity after opportunity to actually find solutions to the race problems of the world is squandered.

[JustAnotherGen]

17. The race problems of the world

Are not an issue for black Americans.


They have their problems - we have ours.


I'd love to hear your solutions . Did you learn anything at the Voters Value Summit in February? Anything to enlighten us? What did the Duck Dynasty guys teach you?

[Oktober]

18. Cute...

It seems you don't have the ability to defend your position intellectually or honestly so instead you reference an event completely out of context to distract from your failings...

Is that what you have to do to feel good about yourself?

[BlueCaliDem]

20. You've attended the Voter's Values Summit??

Or do you deny it?

If not...well, that explains a LOT.

[JustAnotherGen]

22. Is this a personal attack?

You need to check yourself.

Oktober

18. Cute...




It seems you don't have the ability to defend your position intellectually or honestly so instead you reference an event completely out of context to distract from your failings...

Is that what you have to do to feel good about yourself?

Cute - Dismissive - even though it's true - A Voters Value Summit . . .

Defend my position intellectually - Did you call me stupid? Or are you standing on the line of TOS?

Honestly - You just called a long term star member at DU who also hosts a group here a Liar. It's the opposite of honesty - right?

It's important folks here know who you hang around with.




It puts your responses into context.


If you didn't like my response you could have just not responded to it - or put me on ignore. That's your right. I didn't break TOS or not meet community standards in what you've responded to -

Or in this response to you.

[Oktober]

26. My point is that it was dishonest and frankly unbecoming...

... to try and redirect from your faltering position with that Voter's Values crap and your attempt to make it seem as if I was an active participant.

Since it seems you took the time to search my post history you would know that I happened to be in DC for business and just happened to be staying at the hotel that was flooded by the evangelical nutjobs of the world.

If that's how advance your position, through out of context and underhanded smears, to dismiss a POV you disagree with, you shouldn't be surprised when you are dismissed out of hand.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025587936

Live from the voters values summit...

Got booked in the same hotel in DC on pure chance . It's madness...

Santorum, Beck and the duck dynasty guys are coming...

Jesus give me patience...

Edit : Oh Lord, the duggars are coming as well...

[JustAnotherGen]

28. I don't care about your opinion of me

My position isn't faltering -

Your the one who dismissing DU'ers who CARE about the issues black Americans face.

You don't care about us - Blue doesn't.

That's MY opinion of you vs. Blue - and frankly that view/opinion is EXTREMELY honest.

I'm just being honest with you.


If you weren't in the conference room - why would you worry about what is being said and who is attending?


That's odd. They were paying guests too . . .

[Oktober]

31. Now it's getting a little bit... sad...

Come on... Admit it...

You got itchy when called out on your hyperbolic claims... double itchy when references to real genocide were mentioned and you lashed out in an intellectually dishonest way to try to take some pressure off...


Everyone stumbles now and again...It's ok.. Just admit that you were underhanded, as I have already documented, and you'll feel better.

[JustAnotherGen]

32. I wasn't the one who made the hyperbolic claims

You were talking to BlueCali - do you want to update your post to reflect that? Then I'll respond. But an 'odd edit' in the subject line.

ETA - please make sure you read your post to me again - did you mean to state that to bluecali?

[BlueCaliDem]

19. Sorry to read that's all you've gleaned from my posts.

There's no discussing a serious issue with people who deny there is even an issue.

So in closing I leave it with this: as long as people deny there is a systemic racial problem in our country, no serious solution will be sought, and the extrajudicial execution of Blacks - men, women, and children - will continue with impunity.

[JustAnotherGen]

23. That is all they've gleaned

[hfojvt]

27. what is a serious issue?

You gave a statistic of two people killed on average every week and then swore that it was likely under-reported.

Okay, let's say there are 4 times as many as reported. That would be 416 a year.

Does 416 amount to the "systematic extermination" of black people in America? As the black population grew by 12% between 2000 and 2010?

Well, here are the statistics of black people killed by other black people in America.

2002 - 7,990
2003 - 8,080
2004 - 7,755
2005 - 8,255
2006 - 8,710
2007 - 8,610
2008 - 8,070
2009 - 7,495
2010 - 7,450
2011 - 7,380

Now, all of those were not killed by other black people, just over 80% of them (or maybe over 90% I cannot remember this morning, and my source for the data does not seem to say) and the majority of victims are also under 30. They don't break it down by race, but 63% of all victims were under the age of 34. http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hus11.pdf

Tell me, why isn't the death of 6,000 far more of a concern than the death of perhaps 100-400?

Basic math would say that 6,000 is much, much larger than 400.

While we continue to hear about Michael Brown and Ferguson, on the other side of the street, Angel Hooper is not getting the same kind of national attention. Six years old, she certainly wasn't doing anything, didn't assault anybody, and was gunned down in a drive-by. http://www.kansascity.com/news/local/crime/article3005456.html A ten year old girl was also shot and killed - in her own damned home for God's sake, about a week later.

Open season on black people, indeed.

[JustAnotherGen]

30. hfo

It's really not helping.

I know - we all know black people kill black people.

And white people kill white people. All the time. Like ALL the time.

But it's kind of - I don't know.


Why can't I push the numbers of white on white crime (including white collar - overwhelmingly white male and it's a tragedy) without it being -

Stop dodging, deflecting, and deferring.


There are so many more white people in America and they never take personal responsibilty for their faults.

I think you could make these arguments stronger if you started showing the crime rates (including beyond killing - because the Wall Street thing was horrible in 2008) side by side.

Your numbers are good - and you have 'street cred' at DU - but we we need to see BOTH sides doing it.

It will give your words more power.

[KingCharlemagne]

33. Why isnt't the death of 6,000 far more of a concern than the death of perhaps 100-400? Because

this sub-thread is on the topic of that 100-400. If you're truly concerned about the 6,000 figure, you could always start your own OP about it.

As it is, though, your comment appears designed to deflect and derail the thrust of this sub-thread, not to advance it.

Frankly, aside from the deflection, I'm having a great deal of difficulty figuring out exactly what your point is. Are you saying that because people in an OP about law enforcement disproportionately killing black youth are not taking up the larger issue of black-on-black violence that somehow the OP's subject is thereby discredited?

[BlueCaliDem]

35. I believe that's exactly what that poster is trying to say.

But that's just my personal reading of his/her post.

[KingCharlemagne]

36. Beats me. Here's the thing. I'm upset about white police officers

killing black youth for little or no reason at all. But somehow, the integrity of my outrage becomes open to question because I don't take up the poster's pet peeve (in this case, 6,000 alleged black-on-black deaths) in a thread that doesn't have anything to do with black-on-black violence? That's why I charge deflection and derailing and a fundamental lack of integrity on that poster's part. It seems fundamentally dishonest to me and smacks of some other hidden agenda.

[hfojvt]

39. is it integrity?

or validity?

Why get upset about 400 and ignore 6,000?

Why, in any sane universe, should Michael Brown be more important, more talked about, more mourned than Angel Hooper?

How do you know how many of those 400 (or 104) people were killed for "little or no reason at all"?

And while I said nothing about your integrity, here you are saying that I, myself, seem fundamentally dishonest. Can we not just talk about things, without trying to play games about motives and reading between the lines?

[KingCharlemagne]

40. Two can play this game: a woman is killed by her mate 3-4 times per day

in the U.S. and every 9 seconds a woman is beaten by a mate she trusts. Why, in any sane universe, should Michael Brown or Angel Hooper be more important than the plague of domestic violence?

For that matter, 1 in 5 American children experiences at least one episode of hunger each month. Why, in any sane unverse, should Michael Brown, Angel Hooper or victims of domestic violence be more important than the scourge of childhood hunger?

I'll tell you what: if you start an OP about black-on-black violence, I promise not to deflect or derail it with non-sequiturs about domestic violence or childhood hunger.

[hfojvt]

37. okay fine, the thread is about the 100-400

To call THAT a genocide, next to the much, much larger number of black people being murdered by other black people seems to really lack perspective.

That's one point.

Rather than a deflection, I call 6,000 deaths a far more serious problem than 400 deaths.

And also, those 6,000 murder victims presumably had 6,000 murderers. People that the police are trying to arrest. I used to compare Jalisa Reed and Ranisha Jones to Trayvon. I figured their murderers would never be caught, never be brought to justice.

Apparently I was wrong about that. People have now been arrested in both cases.

But if you look at that 1-400, how many of those people were a) murderers (or other criminals) who got into a shootout with the cops, and how many were b) just people innocently minding their own business.

I am guessing, just a guess (of course) that 70%+ fall into that first group.

I dunno. I tend to get pissed off about the murder of a six year old girl. If the cops go to arrest the person responsible for Angel's death, and he resists and gets shot and killed, I think that is far, far less of a tragedy than Angel's death, even though he's likely to be a young person too, and has parents, and siblings, and friends who care about him.

It's too bad we live in such a violent society. It's too bad that every young person does not grow up to live a long, happy, productive and helpful life, but I don't think that cops are the main problem in that regard.

[KingCharlemagne]

38. It seems as if you are in denial that there is a problem with white law enforcement

killing black people for little or no reason at all.

That there may be other more serious problems does not mean that this problem does not exist.

You seem to be dismissing its severity and seriousness because of some fixation with numbers. That's your perogative, of course, but if your principal objection was lexicographic, i.e., to the use of the term 'genocide' to describe this problem, then you should have been upfront about it, instead of trying to damn the poster for failing to hitch his wagon to your personal hobby-horse in a thread that didn't concern black-on-black violence.

[BlueCaliDem]

34. White cops disproportionately executing Blacks with impunity, is that serious issue.

I made that very clear in my previous posts. Perhaps you'd like to go back and read them instead of trying to divert the subject by tossing in all kinds of crime stats to muddy the issue?

As you can read in the OP, this is about St. Louis bracing itself for what appears to be yet another exoneration of a police officer for executing yet another Black American with impunity, adding to the growing consensus that it's open season on Blacks. Propublica has done an analysis that young black males, in recent years, are at far greater risk of being fatally shot by police than their white counterparts. TWENTY-ONE TIMES greater.

Deadly Force, in Black and White

A ProPublica analysis of killings by police shows outsize risk for young black males.
http://www.propublica.org/article/deadly-force-in-black-and-white
by Ryan Gabrielson, Ryann Grochowski Jones and Eric Sagara
ProPublica, Oct. 10, 2014, 10:07 a.m.

Young black males in recent years were at a far greater risk of being shot dead by police than their white counterparts – 21 times greater (i), according to a ProPublica analysis of federally collected data on fatal police shootings.

The 1,217 deadly police shootings from 2010 to 2012 captured in the federal data show that blacks, age 15 to 19, were killed at a rate of 31.17 per million, while just 1.47 per million white males in that age range died at the hands of police.

One way of appreciating that stark disparity, ProPublica's analysis shows, is to calculate how many more whites over those three years would have had to have been killed for them to have been at equal risk. The number is jarring – 185, more than one per week.

ProPublica's risk analysis on young males killed by police certainly seems to support what has been an article of faith in the African American community for decades: Blacks are being killed at disturbing rates when set against the rest of the American population.
***
(i) ProPublica calculated a statistical figure called a risk ratio by dividing the rate of black homicide victims by the rate of white victims. This ratio, commonly used in epidemiology, gives an estimate for how much more at risk black teenagers were to be killed by police officers.Risk ratios can have varying levels of precision, depending on a variety of mathematical factors. In this case, because such shootings are rare from a statistical perspective, a 95 percent confidence interval indicates that black teenagers are at between 10 and 40 times greater risk of being killed by a police officer. The calculation used 2010-2012 population estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey.

Mother Jones has a good piece addressing this systemic American problem as well:
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/08/police-shootings-michael-brown-ferguson-black-men

But instead of admitting there is a problem, let's just keep sticking our heads in the sand. So much nicer down there.

[haele]

41. The problem is in the social perception and reaction to young black men in general...

Frankly, everywhere I've been in this country, and sadly enough, in organizations such as in the military, the social default perception of a young black man is of either of a sullen, disrespectful thug or irresponsible, lazy drug-addict. Someone of which there are too many of, and who is disposable.

It hasn't changed in 50 years since I first was able to remember watching civil rights protests on TV and got my mouth washed out with Lava soap when I asked my Mom "what's a N***?" I remember Selma. I remember George Wallace. I remember the hate and dis-regard of people who just wanted to be treated with the dignity every citizen deserves.

With police training having digressed from serving the community to "the thin blue line/warriors with a shield", that creates a significant disadvantage when it comes to any young man just being a young man who doesn't look like a "good college-bound kid with a future" - i.e., young, white, and well-off.

I agree with you, the increase of police incitement and shooting of young men of color based on their reaction as evidence of a tacit acceptance of slow, indiscriminate culling of a particular sub-culture within this country - which can also be defined as genocide.

For those who think it's hyperbole, what else do you call the above? It's not as sudden as Rwanda or the Holocaust, but it's basically a cultural acceptance that "those people are disposable", and the police are encouraged to become a public enforcer for "keeping the peace" by getting rid of "the useless social elements" rather than being a public servant and making sure everyone has equal rights and is treated fairly under the law.
It doesn't matter if the young man is being shot by a gang-banger or a public enforcer. That young man (and that gang-banger) has little to no opportunities for a viable future as those who are either higher up on the economic scale and the historic social scale are struggling to protect their own young men as resources in terms of jobs and success are being squeezed out.
And the public enforcer is there to ensure that if that boy even thinks about stepping out of that little line of social acceptance he is granted by the community he lives in, the threat of "the young thug" is quickly taken out of society.

To make it all worse, media has been promoting for decades that it's socially acceptable for boys to have tunnel vision and not take a lot of responsibility until they're in their mid-20's in this country - the seductive message that you are entitled to have fun and be extreme until you've become old and useless. That being a man means being aggressively confident, creating your own reality, and just taking what you want - setting up young people with few examples of maturity - especially young men who just want to be someone, to have a little importance or respect, to increasingly react poorly to childish taunts and conflict.
To make major profit off useless and potentially destructive objects, you need to sell stupid to the general public first. And frankly, selling stupid is not difficult - because people want to hear they're better than someone else, or are entitled to more than "that lesser person".

Young Black Men in the United States of America have historically been "the social lesser". They've been the extraneous, the expendable, the disposable when inconvenient - when their strength, intelligence, or energy is used up, they're considered useless to have around because there would be another, less bothersome "boy" just waiting for a chance at a sliver of social respect. Even when they've been lucky enough to have achieved success, they're considered fungible and are usually the first to let go when it's time to cut staffing, or the first to be dismissed when they have a concern - or the first to be considered suspect when there's a problem.
I think that's why so many people who don't know what it's like to be the average young black man or think we're "post racial" also think it's hyperbole to think that fungible and disposable is similar to a slow genocide.

I thank the lucky womb lottery that I was not born a Black Man in this country a couple times a month every time I see what is happening on the news, in the workplace, or in society in general.
And it's not because of bigotry, though I will admit to some self-serving prejudice throughout my life. That's from realization of what my life would be like if I tried to do what I have done as a black man. It was hard enough being a white woman, but I had the advantage of white parents who taught me to strategize my way around gender minefield and make it through society in general. I don't know if I'd have the additional strength to deal with the racial minefield without exploding or imploding...

FWIW, I'm sorry for those who have been offended by some of my frank usage of terms I heard from casual racists. I'm not sorry for those who might be offended because they suspect I'm calling them out as casual racists or bigots. Racism is about power derived from projection of the prejudice against a race, not about the feeling of prejudice itself.

Haele

[JustAnotherGen]

3. Plus 10000000

[BlueCaliDem]

12. Thanks, JAG. eom

[JustAnotherGen]

16. No problem

Was this by pure chance?


http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025587936

[BlueCaliDem]

21. You're too kind.

And extremely helpful!

That explains a LOT.

[JustAnotherGen]

24. It does

Hang around this thread for awhile - seems someone wants to insult and argue.

[loyalsister]

6. They are preparing people for the worst possible outcome in order to facilitate a peaceful response

This is happening in my community (120 miles away), as well. There is a feeling here that we will need to respond and call for justice. People are as angry as your post and more. If we don't respond peacefully, the ugliest racism will surface and the media and law enforcement will point to altercations as confirmation of their biases.

If we can make our anger understood and keep people on our side, we might be able to help get one productive thing done. A republican legislator plans to sponsor a bill to transfer all cases involving law enforcement shootings to the state prosecutor. This is something that needs to happen and there might be enough citizen advocacy to get it done if we maintain our credibility. It's not enough, but it is a step in the right direction.

[BlueCaliDem]

15. Any step, however small, to eradicate this alarming trend of killing Blacks in our streets with

impunity is a big step in the right direction.

But I have to also agree with KingCharlamagne's post in response to you:

At a certain point, peace in the absence of justice is a hollow value. After all, Nazi Germany from 1933-39 was at 'peace' but few would say that its peace signified 'justice.'

Up to now, the Black community has been taking it on the chin, again and again, yet no progress is being made to stop the senseless killing and discrimination in our legal system against them and theirs.

Black men are disproportionately executed for no reason, are arrested and incarcerated for offenses no White would ever be convicted of; IF they're lucky and they find their way into a courtroom rather than a morgue, their sentences are just outrageously ridiculous in comparison to what their White counterparts receive; and they are gunned down or blown up by our militaristic police force at alarming rates and with impunity. This has got to change.

[loyalsister]

25. We won't get anywhere if there are conditions that allow anyone to make excuses for violence

toward us and especially toward black men. When the nazis came to my city, one woman said that we have to get between the nazis and black men. They are already under suspicion expressing anger can be an excuse for law enforcement and wanna-bes with guns. There are a lot of radicalized George Zimmermons floating around this state.

It absolutely has to change, but I don't want to see more carnage just to prove that there is a problem.

[KingCharlemagne]

5. "The night after"? Frankly, the time to be organizing peaceful responses is right now. "The

night after" may be 24 hours too late, after McCulloch's Grand Jury gets through lighting the kindling beneath the bonfire that is currently America's race relations.

[loyalsister]

8. It's a statewide effort

I'm attending a community meeting that will focus on it tonight. The organizing is taking place well in advance.

[KingCharlemagne]

9. Good. If the community is able to protest peacefully, they will further distinguish

themselves from the racists and white supremacists that currently call the shots in St. Louis County.

However . . .

Were I a black person or person of color in the region and the Grand Jury did not indict, I would be seriously considering taking up armed struggle, much like the ANC under Mandela did against apartheid. At a certain point, peace in the absence of justice is a hollow value. After all, Nazi Germany from 1933-39 was at 'peace' but few would say that its peace signified 'justice.'

[loyalsister]

10. I totally understand that impulse

In my city, all law enforcement now wear cameras. And, the general assembly is entertaining an idea to immediately transfer such incidents to the state prosecutor. Leading by example and trying to keep peace in order to respond in ways that don't get people hurt or killed are things we are trying to keep in mind.

[KingCharlemagne]

13. Cameras are no panacea and are not all they're cracked up to be, as

this Los Angeles Times story illustrates:

Los Angeles police officers tampered with voice recording equipment in dozens of patrol cars in an effort to avoid being monitored while on duty, according to records and interviews.

An inspection by Los Angeles Police Department investigators found about half of the estimated 80 cars in one South L.A. patrol division were missing antennas, which help capture what officers say in the field. The antennas in at least 10 more cars in nearby divisions had also been removed.

LAPD Chief Charlie Beck and other top officials learned of the problem last summer but chose not to investigate which officers were responsible. Rather, the officials issued warnings against continued meddling and put checks in place to account for antennas at the start and end of each patrol shift.

http://articles.latimes.com/2014/apr/07/local/la-me-lapd-tamper-20140408

Oh, by the way, I called my City Councilperson's office (Mike Bonin) about this litle outrage, was pushed into some unnamed staffer's voicemail, left a message and never got a call back or a return email to the email I sent. Needless to say, Bonin will receive one fewer vote when he's up for re-election in 2017. They really don't give a shit what the 99% think.

[loyalsister]

29. Good point

Sorry to hear about your experience with your councilman. I feel your pain. Mine has turned out to be one who thinks she understands race, but has shown with her actions that she really doesn't. I worked on her campaign, but she won't get my vote again in 2016.

On a more positive note, we do have some very good city council members. They tried to decriminalize marijuana horticulture (2 plants), but the effort failed. Possession of small amounts is already decriminalized. That's certainly not enough to make a serious dent in the unjust prosecutions, but it is a step.

We have had issues with law enforcement bigots that have resulted in terminations. So, our city is not immune to problems with law enforcement.

I didn't address your mention of executions, but it is pertinent to this discussion. Our current governor previously served as AG, and 90 % of MO executions have taken place under his watch. There have been 8 this year alone (overseen by Nixon and current AG\future Democratic gubernatorial candidate).

In many ways, MO is a shining example of the worst manifestations of racism in this country. I happen to live in a spot that is beginning to recognize it, but still has a long way to go. It is miles ahead of most of this state, though.

I hope we can orchestrate a response that is peaceful and positive. I really want people to be safe in the aftermath of this verdict. I have never had such a specific fear of real danger coming to people I care about until now.

[loyalsister]

42. Emmett Till's legacy

Clenora Hudson-Weems was here and talked about Emmett Till's murder as the catalyst for the Civil Rights Movement. She said that he and Michael Brown have that in common and this time it's going to be bigger and louder. She believes that difference in the media, alliances, and general boldness of people in this country are a perfect storm for something much larger to take place.

One thing that she pointed out was- so what if Michael Brown shoplifted, strong armed a store clerk, smoked some pot, and\or jaywalked. Even if he did everything he was accused of, none of those things are punishable by death.

My and other communities are in stand-by mode. We were told to meet at the church when we learn of the verdict. At that time we will decide together how to respond.