Monday, December 01, 2014

This...

...is what is wrong with so much of what happened in Ferguson and happens in so many other cities and towns around the United States:
"I know that there are those that will say that these players are simply exercising their 1st Amendment rights," Roorda said in the statement. "Well I've got news for people who think that way, cops have 1st Amendment rights too, and we plan to exercise ours. I'd remind the NFL and their players that it is not the violent thugs burning down buildings that buy their advertiser's products. It's cops and the good people of St. Louis and other NFL towns that do."
 [You can find the rest of the article here.]

Where to start?
Let's see, the fact that the St. Louis Police Assn believes that the first amendment rights of the organization or its constituent members is more important than the first amendment rights of anyone else.

Second, that they believe that the players on the Rams are their sovereign subjects.  Has the SLPA noticed that many of those players are Black?  Does this mean that the SLPA believes that the city of St. Louise OWNS those players?  YIKES!

Third, that the SLPA believes that white, non-protesting dollars have more rights than Black, protesting dollars.

Yeah, there is so much here, but the bottom line is for all of you who do not understand what we call "white privilege" looks like, here is a textbook definition.  Anyone who believes that they can come forward to say whose rights are inherently more important, who intimates that Black athletes are the property of a city or anyone else, or that suggest that white dollars are more valuable than those spent by anyone else.

Someone should get them a media consultant.  I hope that people around the country will jump on this statement instead of trying to shame some people who were merely expressing their horror at a series of events.  Raising your hands in protest is hardly like looting ... and can we ever have a conversation about the "narrative" that the police were trying to convey when they didn't use the national guard to protect businesses after the power that be decided to wait until the evening to release the grand jury findings.

All of these actions have reactions ... all actions have reactions ... and none of these actions are blameless... none. 

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