Say It Again and Again: “All Black Lives Matter”

 

We are both rational and emotional beings, made in the image of a Creator who reveals both perfect knowledge and perfect feeling. We cannot engage each other in our marred imago Dei with “facts don’t care about your feelings,” because feelings are part of the facts of our nature. So it is that reeling off statistics is no real answer to “black lives matter.” We must answer the left’s deception with feelings that are made even stronger in a majority, or at least effective plurality, because the feelings we invoke are reinforced by facts agreed upon now by enough people.

Michael Knowles pointed out the need for an alternate emotional narrative on his podcast this week. He pointed out that no one disagrees with the innocuous claim that “black lives matter.” As an answer to the radical left’s manipulation of this phrase and associated feelings, he tossed out “support black lives” as a conversation starter.

Yes, we do need an effective counter-narrative, organized around a simple catchphrase. What is that phrase? “All lives matter” is not the answer, as it confronts and minimizes the feelings around “black lives matter.” Yes, we are all made in the image of our Creator, and bear his image imperfectly. Yes, believers are commanded not to be partial, not to treat each other differently based on ancestry or other non-moral characteristics. And, we cannot get to “all lives matter” when there is an effective narrative that we do not really believe this because America does not treat black lives as having equal worth with white lives. Stomping our feet, huffing, rolling our eyes at this is a loser strategy.

So, what is to be done? Double down. Make the leftists own their contradictions and lies. Seize the moral and emotional high ground. Be angry. Be outraged. Shout it out: “all black lives matter.” Then show we mean it.

This does not work by saying that BLM holds no protests over the weekly slaughter of mostly young black men in our cities. This does not work by “what about” rhetoric. This works by starting to regularly, and I mean as it happens, honor each life lost and the hurting families left behind. We should see this every Monday or Tuesday at the White House press briefing. We should see the names on a roll at the Department of Justice website, made the top item weekly. Perhaps even declare a national day of mourning and reflection on lives lost to urban violence, lowering the flag to half-staff for them. Consider this snapshot of the carnage testified to by Heather MacDonald in testimony before Congress on June 10, 2020, repudiating the anti-police narrative [emphasis added]:

Blacks between the ages of ten and 43 die of homicide at thirteen times the rate of whites, according to the CDC. In New York City, blacks make up 73 percent of all shooting victims, though they are 23 percent of the city’s population. In Chicago in 2016, there were 4,300 shooting victims, almost all black. Among the two dozen victims under the age of 12 was a three-year-old shot on Father’s Day who is now paralyzed for life and a ten-year-old shot on Labor Day whose pancreas and spleen were ripped apart. In Minneapolis, last September, a two-year-old girl was shot in her backyard at 1 AM; another Minneapolis two-year-old, Le’Vonte King Jason Jones, was killed in broad daylight in 2016 by gang rivals of his mother’s boyfriend. These are the realities that police commanders in urban areas face daily.

This also means really meeting and really listening to the mothers and grandmothers whose children have been robbed of their American birthright by criminals and politicians together. It means praising the dignity and courage of our fellow Americans who have endured war-like conditions their entire lives. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson should be the lead in a long tour of our nation’s troubled communities, with Attorney General Barr alongside him in support. Give voice to the elderly women who spoke to Heather MacDonald:

An elderly cancer amputee in the Mt. Hope section of the Bronx described to me her fear of going into her building lobby, since it was so often occupied by trespassing youth hanging out and selling drugs. The only time she felt safe was when law enforcement was there: “As long as you see the police, everything’s A-OK. You can come down and get your mail and talk to decent people.” This vulnerable senior citizen longed for the surveillance watchtower that the local precinct had erected on her block several summers earlier to deter shootings. Anti-police activists would undoubtedly condemn such a watchtower as a weapon of the oppressive police state. To the cancer amputee, it was a literal godsend. “It was the peacefulest summer ever. I could sit outside at night. Please, Jesus,” she said, send the surveillance tower back.

Place this silenced majority at the head of the table in discussions about public policy failures and reforms. No lecturing. No patronizing. Then act vigorously within the law and our Constitution to support their felt and factual needs and desires. At all times, speak and act on standing up for these forgotten and shamefully misused Americans. Then answer demands to kneel with demands to stand up for the oppressed, the neglected, the grieving.

The flag is only a symbol, so repeating demands, even in all caps, to “stand for the flag” is no longer a winner. We should only stand for the flag and the national anthem if they have worthy meaning. Put meaning back into them, meaning and feeling that works today for a majority or politically effective plurality.

It may be that I have the phrase wrong, that there is a stronger slogan. Nevertheless, I believe the path forward out of this radical moment, this latest attempt to overthrow our constitutional republic, is along the lines I have traced. We have a country to save.

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  1. GrannyDude Member
    GrannyDude
    @GrannyDude

    I think you’re onto something, Clifford! 

    • #1
  2. GrannyDude Member
    GrannyDude
    @GrannyDude

    Somebody tell Trump—this sounds like something he would do with sincere enthusiasm. He can tweet those names out, starting with the children.

    • #2
  3. Clifford A. Brown Member
    Clifford A. Brown
    @CliffordBrown

    GrannyDude (View Comment):

    Somebody tell Trump—this sounds like something he would do with sincere enthusiasm. He can tweet those names out, starting with the children.

    Absolutely. He has a special soft spot for children, visible in his interactions with his grandchildren. I was almost surprised that he did not order the targeted killing of Assad after he saw the pictures of little children killed in poison gas attacks. I agree that talking about the youngest victims has the strongest emotional punch, and I think that highlighting the oldest victims has a similar effect. Grandparents and grandchildren.

    • #3
  4. Vance Richards Inactive
    Vance Richards
    @VanceRichards

    I like how people come up with names that you seem hard to disagree with. For instance, the Affordable Care Act. Who wouldn’t want affordable care? What they failed to tell us is that the affordable care costs about three times as much as the unaffordable care I used to have.

    Do black lives matter? Of course. But what about the organization by the same name? Here are some of their stated goals:

    We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.

    We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

    We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.

    We practice empathy. We engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts.

    We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work.

    We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure

    You don’t need to join with an extremist far-left group in order to fight racism. There are other ways . . .

    • #4
  5. Clifford A. Brown Member
    Clifford A. Brown
    @CliffordBrown

    Vance Richards (View Comment):

    I like how people come up with names that you seem hard to disagree with. For instance, the Affordable Care Act. Who wouldn’t want affordable care? What they failed to tell us is that the affordable care costs about three times as much as the unaffordable care I used to have.

    Do black lives matter? Of course. But what about the organization by the same name? Here are some of their stated goals:

    We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.

    We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

    We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.

    We practice empathy. We engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts.

    We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work.

    We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure

    You don’t need to join with an extremist far-left group in order to fight racism. There are other ways . . .

    And you are losing as you attack this way. There is no “of course” about the assertion that black lives matter. That is not our nation’s history. Yes, a radical leftist group is operating under the banner, AND yes both parties have neglected and misused around 13 percent of our population from our founding.

    • #5
  6. Hartmann von Aue Member
    Hartmann von Aue
    @HartmannvonAue

    Vance Richards (View Comment):

    I like how people come up with names that you seem hard to disagree with. For instance, the Affordable Care Act. Who wouldn’t want affordable care? What they failed to tell us is that the affordable care costs about three times as much as the unaffordable care I used to have.

    Do black lives matter? Of course. But what about the organization by the same name? Here are some of their stated goals:

    We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.

    We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

    We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.

    We practice empathy. We engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts.

    We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work.

    We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure

    You don’t need to join with an extremist far-left group in order to fight racism. There are other ways . . .

    Thanks for the link. I didn’t know YWAM was doing this. The Lord be with them. 

    • #6
  7. Bryan G. Stephens Thatcher
    Bryan G. Stephens
    @BryanGStephens

    All lives matter.

    That is as least racist a statement as I can make.

    I do not believe the BLM crowd thinks my life matters.

    • #7
  8. M. Brandon Godbey Member
    M. Brandon Godbey
    @Brandon

    Hot damn, this is a good idea.  

    • #8
  9. Ansonia Member
    Ansonia
    @Ansonia

    This is a really good idea.

    • #9
  10. Bryan G. Stephens Thatcher
    Bryan G. Stephens
    @BryanGStephens

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):

    Vance Richards (View Comment):

    I like how people come up with names that you seem hard to disagree with. For instance, the Affordable Care Act. Who wouldn’t want affordable care? What they failed to tell us is that the affordable care costs about three times as much as the unaffordable care I used to have.

    Do black lives matter? Of course. But what about the organization by the same name? Here are some of their stated goals:

    We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.

    We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

    We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.

    We practice empathy. We engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts.

    We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work.

    We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure

    You don’t need to join with an extremist far-left group in order to fight racism. There are other ways . . .

    And you are losing as you attack this way. There is no “of course” about the assertion that black lives matter. That is not our nation’s history. Yes, a radical leftist group is operating under the banner, AND yes both parties have neglected and misused around 13 percent of our population from our founding.

    Either they dennoun BLM or they support it. 

     

    • #10
  11. Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… Member
    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio…
    @ArizonaPatriot

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):
    There is no “of course” about the assertion that black lives matter. That is not our nation’s history. Yes, a radical leftist group is operating under the banner, AND yes both parties have neglected and misused around 13 percent of our population from our founding.

    Clifford, this does not seem like a fair statement to me.

    The Republican Party did not neglect or abuse black Americans when it fought a bloody Civil War, and freed the slaves.  The abuses of the Jim Crow system were almost entirely the work of the Democratic Party.

    Name one thing that the Republican Party has done to “misuse” black Americans.

    I don’t think that Republicans typically think in terms of specifically helping black people.  I don’t.  We think in terms of policies that are good for people, of whatever race.  Fighting crime is important for everyone.  Creating a thriving economy is good for everyone.  School choice is good for everyone.  Promoting marriage and family is good for everyone.

    • #11
  12. Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… Member
    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio…
    @ArizonaPatriot

    Clifford A. Brown:

    Give voice to the elderly women who spoke to Heather MacDonald:

    An elderly cancer amputee in the Mt. Hope section of the Bronx described to me her fear of going into her building lobby, since it was so often occupied by trespassing youth hanging out and selling drugs. The only time she felt safe was when law enforcement was there: “As long as you see the police, everything’s A-OK. You can come down and get your mail and talk to decent people.” This vulnerable senior citizen longed for the surveillance watchtower that the local precinct had erected on her block several summers earlier to deter shootings. Anti-police activists would undoubtedly condemn such a watchtower as a weapon of the oppressive police state. To the cancer amputee, it was a literal godsend. “It was the peacefulest summer ever. I could sit outside at night. Please, Jesus,” she said, send the surveillance tower back.

    I’m in the middle of listening to this audiobook.  I can’t recall if it was this same woman, but one of MacDonald’s examples of a strongly pro-cop black woman had a picture of Obama on her wall.  The most race-baiting, anti-cop President in our history, I think.  Another “community organizer” whose ideas make everything worse.

    She has a voice.  She could vote Republican, in support of law and order.  I do not see many black people doing this, unfortunately.

    • #12
  13. MichaelKennedy Inactive
    MichaelKennedy
    @MichaelKennedy

    I prefer “Black Labs Matter” but I am a dog person.  The whole BLM thing is a marxist creation of three black lesbian women who are Bolsheviks at heart.

    • #13
  14. lowtech redneck Coolidge
    lowtech redneck
    @lowtech redneck

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):

    Vance Richards (View Comment):

    I like how people come up with names that you seem hard to disagree with. For instance, the Affordable Care Act. Who wouldn’t want affordable care? What they failed to tell us is that the affordable care costs about three times as much as the unaffordable care I used to have.

    Do black lives matter? Of course. But what about the organization by the same name? Here are some of their stated goals:

    We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.

    We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

    We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.

    We practice empathy. We engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts.

    We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work.

    We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure

    You don’t need to join with an extremist far-left group in order to fight racism. There are other ways . . .

    And you are losing as you attack this way. There is no “of course” about the assertion that black lives matter. That is not our nation’s history. Yes, a radical leftist group is operating under the banner, AND yes both parties have neglected and misused around 13 percent of our population from our founding.

    Its been our nation’s history for my entire life, as well as the lives of almost all of the (peaceful) protesters (it being a somewhat strenuous activity and all).  The BLM narrative is, here and now, a Big Lie.  It may well be a losing strategy to stand up for the truth, but in that case we have already lost, and all that is left figuring out which options are available to us as a persecuted political minority.  We simply have no future in a country that accepts the BLM narrative, so we may as well challenge it now, before it becomes any further rooted.

    I think your heart’s in the right place, but I don’t think it will work, its too fine a needle to thread, and grants too little direct challenge to the narrative in the meantime.

    • #14
  15. lowtech redneck Coolidge
    lowtech redneck
    @lowtech redneck

    Bryan G. Stephens (View Comment):

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):

    Vance Richards (View Comment):

    I like how people come up with names that you seem hard to disagree with. For instance, the Affordable Care Act. Who wouldn’t want affordable care? What they failed to tell us is that the affordable care costs about three times as much as the unaffordable care I used to have.

    Do black lives matter? Of course. But what about the organization by the same name? Here are some of their stated goals:

    We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.

    We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

    We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.

    We practice empathy. We engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts.

    We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work.

    We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure

    You don’t need to join with an extremist far-left group in order to fight racism. There are other ways . . .

    And you are losing as you attack this way. There is no “of course” about the assertion that black lives matter. That is not our nation’s history. Yes, a radical leftist group is operating under the banner, AND yes both parties have neglected and misused around 13 percent of our population from our founding.

    Either they dennoun BLM or they support it.

    And with the BLM narrative in place, dissenters will not only be made to care, but to kneel.  

    • #15
  16. Ontheleftcoast Inactive
    Ontheleftcoast
    @Ontheleftcoast

    Bryan G. Stephens (View Comment):

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):

    Vance Richards (View Comment):

    I like how people come up with names that you seem hard to disagree with. For instance, the Affordable Care Act. Who wouldn’t want affordable care? What they failed to tell us is that the affordable care costs about three times as much as the unaffordable care I used to have.

    Do black lives matter? Of course. But what about the organization by the same name? Here are some of their stated goals:

    We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.

    We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.

    We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.

    We practice empathy. We engage comrades with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts.

    We make our spaces family-friendly and enable parents to fully participate with their children. We dismantle the patriarchal practice that requires mothers to work “double shifts” so that they can mother in private even as they participate in public justice work.

    We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure

    You don’t need to join with an extremist far-left group in order to fight racism. There are other ways . . .

    And you are losing as you attack this way. There is no “of course” about the assertion that black lives matter. That is not our nation’s history. Yes, a radical leftist group is operating under the banner, AND yes both parties have neglected and misused around 13 percent of our population from our founding.

    Either they dennoun BLM or they support it.

    Demanding denunciations is getting old. It’s mostly a ritual humiliation. The real trick is to make it easier for people to back down and walk away, and to provide a face saving way out for them.

    The reality is that the vast majority of dead young black males in this country were killed by other young black males. That is a horrifying thing for a community to face. It’s much easier to scapegoat the police…who are the successors to police officers who did in fact under color of law kill or aid and abet the killers of other young black men in the past.

    It’s worse than useless to whatabout and say that some dead young man was a thug. Even if it’s true, it doesn’t help console the immediate and extended families of those dead children—yes, children. When they die, it’s the childhood innocence and hope that is the most painful loss—and that demands to be met with humanity. @clifforda.brown is right.

    • #16
  17. Clifford A. Brown Member
    Clifford A. Brown
    @CliffordBrown

    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment):

    The Republican Party did not neglect or abuse black Americans when it fought a bloody Civil War, and freed the slaves. The abuses of the Jim Crow system were almost entirely the work of the Democratic Party.

    Name one thing that the Republican Party has done to “misuse” black Americans.

    The Jim Crow system and the long series of ritual torture murders that were euphemistically called “lynchings” were enabled by Republican indifference. Once the radical abolitionists were shoved out of the Republican tent, once we gave up on reconstructing the South and effectively suppressing domestic terrorism, Republicans’ history has been one of empty posturing. There were regular phony “antilynching” bills, but they always counted on the sacred filibuster to keep the bills from becoming federal law. 

    • #17
  18. Ontheleftcoast Inactive
    Ontheleftcoast
    @Ontheleftcoast

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):
    Once the radical abolitionists were shoved out of the Republican tent, once we gave up on reconstructing the South and effectively suppressing domestic terrorism,

    There was a lot of crookedness an oppression under the rubric of Reconstruction, and some radical abolitionists wanted blood. As Bruce Catton put it in his lovely U.S. Grant and the American Military Tradition,

    In midsummer of 1865 a Federal judge at Norfolk, Virginia, called together a grand jury which indicted Lee for treason. Lee immediately wrote to Grant asking how this squared with the terms of surrender Grant had written at Appomattox. With his letter he enclosed, for Grant to forward if he saw fit, his own application for pardon and amnesty under the President’s proclamation. (The understanding, of course, was that this application should not be forwarded unless Grant agreed that the Appomattox terms made an indictment for treason invalid.)

    That put it all up to Grant. Lee’s was the test case. Grant acted promptly. The terms of surrender, he said, meant exactly what they said. If the government broke those terms it would be breaking (among other things) the pledged word of U. S. Grant, and if that happened he would resign his commission and take the case straight to the country. Inasmuch as Grant at that moment enjoyed a prestige and popularity such as Americans are willing to confer on one of their number not oftener than two or three times in a century, that was that. Nothing more was ever heard about punishing Lee for treason. Johnson made one mild protest. Nearly all Confederate officers were protected as Lee was protected, and by Grant’s interpretation that protection was pretty substantial. When, asked Johnson, can these men be tried? “Never,” said Grant, “unless they violate their paroles.”

    Catton, Bruce. U. S. Grant and the American Military Tradition . Open Road Media. Kindle Edition.

    Perhaps Lincoln might have restrained them, if he hadn’t been assassinated. But with him gone, the only Republicans who could were the crooks.

    As President, writes Catton

    [Grant] believed that the sacred heart of that program lay in the effort to protect the Negro in his new freedom. He believed too (and with a good deal of reason) that the Negro would infallibly be trodden back down into second-class citizenship or worse unless the strong arm of the Federal government protected him. So far, so good: both hard fact and clear logic could support this position. Yet the old political error was all-crippling, now. The men who supported Grant on this stand were the men who definitely were not in politics for their health, and with such defenders the colored man was in a dire fix.

     

     

     

    • #18
  19. Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… Member
    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio…
    @ArizonaPatriot

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):

    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment):

    The Republican Party did not neglect or abuse black Americans when it fought a bloody Civil War, and freed the slaves. The abuses of the Jim Crow system were almost entirely the work of the Democratic Party.

    Name one thing that the Republican Party has done to “misuse” black Americans.

    The Jim Crow system and the long series of ritual torture murders that were euphemistically called “lynchings” were enabled by Republican indifference. Once the radical abolitionists were shoved out of the Republican tent, once we gave up on reconstructing the South and effectively suppressing domestic terrorism, Republicans’ history has been one of empty posturing. There were regular phony “antilynching” bills, but they always counted on the sacred filibuster to keep the bills from becoming federal law.

    So nothing — not one single thing — that Republicans supposedly did to “misuse” black Americans.  Just failure to stop Democrats from doing so.

    The studies that I’ve seen indicate that there were something around 5,000 lynchings over a period of 70-100 years.  This is approximately equal to the number of black-on-black homicides each year, and everyone just yawns.

    Of course, the lynchings were bad.  But the figures that I’ve seen indicate that they were pretty rare.

    For Republicans to get something done, they need to gain political support.  We “gave up” on reconstructing the South because of Democrat voters (relating to the disputed 1876 election).  What was the North supposed to do — keep the South under armed occupation forever?  To make matters worse, back in the bad old Jim Crow days of the 1930s, the bulk of the black vote migrated to FDR and the Democrats.  How are Republicans supposed to get anything done in such circumstances?

     

    • #19
  20. MISTER BITCOIN Inactive
    MISTER BITCOIN
    @MISTERBITCOIN

    Do we need another organization/acronym fighting for blacks in America?

    What is the difference between BLM and NAACP?  Surely there must be some overlap…

    BLM is a terrible name for many reasons… one is self-entitlement.

    Another is deception: BLM pretends to be non-violent… they have started a war against and jeopardized the lives of law enforcement (Heather Mac Donald)

    Their stated ‘mission’ is incoherent… it’s a laundry list of left wing grievances and talking points.  For instance, what does capitalism (or socialism) have to do with police misconduct?  Why would ‘commune’ life raise the living standards of blacks in America?  

    Here are some interesting headlines:

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/06/10/leaked-2015-democrat-memo-warned-lawmakers-dont-offer-support-for-radical-black-lives-matter/

    https://www.breitbart.com/crime/2020/06/10/pollak-on-red-november-black-lives-matter-attacks-america-institutions-not-just-police/

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/06/11/the-complex-funding-and-ideology-of-black-lives-matter/

    https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2020/06/11/woke-mob-targets-cornell-prof-behind-legal-insurrection-blog-for-critiquing-black-lives-matter/

     

     

    • #20
  21. lowtech redneck Coolidge
    lowtech redneck
    @lowtech redneck

    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment):

    The studies that I’ve seen indicate that there were something around 5,000 lynchings over a period of 70-100 years. This is approximately equal to the number of black-on-black homicides each year, and everyone just yawns.

    Of course, the lynchings were bad. But the figures that I’ve seen indicate that they were pretty rare.

    I generally agree with what you’re saying, but I have to point out that, as instruments of terrorism, lynchings did not need to be very frequent, they just needed to set an example in case blacks got too ‘uppity’ regarding specific things-in much the same way that Cancel Culture serves the Totalitarian Left (including BLM) today; high profile or highly visible targets, followers motivated by an indoctrinated combination of fear, hate, and paranoia to keep an eye out for transgressions, and control of institutions to maintain the state of terror for anyone who steps outside the imposed boundaries, which can be shifted at the convenience of the group in power.  This is also the way apostasy and blasphemy laws operate in Islamic societies under Shariah law.

    Something of a caveat in the other direction, many lynchings were simply informal justice for actual crimes, with white on white and black on black lynchings making up a significant portion of the overall number.  This isn’t to excuse such occurrences of informal (in)justice, but not every lynching was an act of racial terrorism.  Still, the point of the previous paragraph stands.

     

    • #21
  22. David Carroll Thatcher
    David Carroll
    @DavidCarroll

    I like the concept.  All Black Lives Matter should include the unborn black babies murdered by Planned Parenthood and others.  

    • #22
  23. Clifford A. Brown Member
    Clifford A. Brown
    @CliffordBrown

    lowtech redneck (View Comment):

    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment):

    The studies that I’ve seen indicate that there were something around 5,000 lynchings over a period of 70-100 years. This is approximately equal to the number of black-on-black homicides each year, and everyone just yawns.

    Of course, the lynchings were bad. But the figures that I’ve seen indicate that they were pretty rare.

    I generally agree with what you’re saying, but I have to point out that, as instruments of terrorism, lynchings did not need to be very frequent, they just needed to set an example in case blacks got too ‘uppity’ regarding specific things-in much the same way that Cancel Culture serves the Totalitarian Left (including BLM) today; high profile or highly visible targets, followers motivated by an indoctrinated combination of fear, hate, and paranoia to keep an eye out for transgressions, and control of institutions to maintain the state of terror for anyone who steps outside the imposed boundaries, which can be shifted at the convenience of the group in power. This is also the way apostasy and blasphemy laws operate in Islamic societies under Shariah law.

    Something of a caveat in the other direction, many lynchings were simply informal justice for actual crimes, with white on white and black on black lynchings making up a significant portion of the overall number. This isn’t to excuse such occurrences of informal (in)justice, but not every lynching was an act of racial terrorism. Still, the point of the previous paragraph stands.

     

    Yes. Ritual torture murder “lynching” was an effective instrument of control. To the extent that these were also public rituals, including mutilation and trophy taking for public display, the terror tactic also bound the white community in shared guilt, reinforcing support for the system. 

    Indeed, Jim Crow was instituted as a less controversial means of white supremacy after the national and international reputation of former Confederate states was damaged by even limited reporting on the atrocities.

    • #23
  24. Clifford A. Brown Member
    Clifford A. Brown
    @CliffordBrown

    MISTER BITCOIN (View Comment):

    Do we need another organization/acronym fighting for blacks in America?

    What is the difference between BLM and NAACP? Surely there must be some overlap…

    BLM is a terrible name for many reasons… one is self-entitlement.

    Another is deception: BLM pretends to be non-violent… they have started a war against and jeopardized the lives of law enforcement (Heather Mac Donald)

    Their stated ‘mission’ is incoherent… it’s a laundry list of left wing grievances and talking points. For instance, what does capitalism (or socialism) have to do with police misconduct? Why would ‘commune’ life raise the living standards of blacks in America?

    Here are some interesting headlines:

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/06/10/leaked-2015-democrat-memo-warned-lawmakers-dont-offer-support-for-radical-black-lives-matter/

    https://www.breitbart.com/crime/2020/06/10/pollak-on-red-november-black-lives-matter-attacks-america-institutions-not-just-police/

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/06/11/the-complex-funding-and-ideology-of-black-lives-matter/

    https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2020/06/11/woke-mob-targets-cornell-prof-behind-legal-insurrection-blog-for-critiquing-black-lives-matter/

     

     

    Notice you are citing one conservative news and opinion website. Do you actually want to win in November? Then, yes, we need to effectively challenge the surface rhetoric, the thing most Americans agree upon, not by attacking the group using the positive idea, but by pressing the claim further. “We agree, in fact we are acting on the belief that every black life matters. Will you join us in taking back the housing and streets and schools for the people who have been terrorized by gangs for decades? Will you join us in working to end the slaughter on our streets?”

    • #24
  25. MichaelKennedy Inactive
    MichaelKennedy
    @MichaelKennedy

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):

    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment):

    The Republican Party did not neglect or abuse black Americans when it fought a bloody Civil War, and freed the slaves. The abuses of the Jim Crow system were almost entirely the work of the Democratic Party.

    Name one thing that the Republican Party has done to “misuse” black Americans.

    The Jim Crow system and the long series of ritual torture murders that were euphemistically called “lynchings” were enabled by Republican indifference. Once the radical abolitionists were shoved out of the Republican tent, once we gave up on reconstructing the South and effectively suppressing domestic terrorism, Republicans’ history has been one of empty posturing. There were regular phony “antilynching” bills, but they always counted on the sacred filibuster to keep the bills from becoming federal law.

    Disagree. There is some misreading of history here.  Have you read Ron Chernow’s biography of Grant?  The radical abolitionists, like Stanton, rejected Lincoln’s (and Sherman’s) attempt to bring the Confederate states back peacefully.  Reconstruction was overdone and led to the KKK and other resentment, some of which survives in “The Lost Cause” movement.  I think there are a few here who surface if Sherman is praised.  Grant tried to push reconstruction  without the anger and oppression but some of his appointed officers, like those of Harding, discredited him.  Wilson was the one who reversed many of the reforms of Grant, not Republicans.  Anti-lynching bills were introduced year after year by Republicans but the Depression and the Solid South (Democrats to a man) voted them down.

    • #25
  26. MichaelKennedy Inactive
    MichaelKennedy
    @MichaelKennedy

    MISTER BITCOIN (View Comment):

    Do we need another organization/acronym fighting for blacks in America?

    What is the difference between BLM and NAACP? Surely there must be some overlap…

    BLM is a terrible name for many reasons… one is self-entitlement.

    Another is deception: BLM pretends to be non-violent… they have started a war against and jeopardized the lives of law enforcement (Heather Mac Donald)

    Their stated ‘mission’ is incoherent… it’s a laundry list of left wing grievances and talking points. For instance, what does capitalism (or socialism) have to do with police misconduct? Why would ‘commune’ life raise the living standards of blacks in America?

    Here are some interesting headlines:

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/06/10/leaked-2015-democrat-memo-warned-lawmakers-dont-offer-support-for-radical-black-lives-matter/

    https://www.breitbart.com/crime/2020/06/10/pollak-on-red-november-black-lives-matter-attacks-america-institutions-not-just-police/

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/06/11/the-complex-funding-and-ideology-of-black-lives-matter/

    https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2020/06/11/woke-mob-targets-cornell-prof-behind-legal-insurrection-blog-for-critiquing-black-lives-matter/

     

     

    BLM is a Marxist revolutionary organization that has little to do with black lives.

    • #26
  27. MichaelKennedy Inactive
    MichaelKennedy
    @MichaelKennedy

    lowtech redneck (View Comment):

    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment):

    The studies that I’ve seen indicate that there were something around 5,000 lynchings over a period of 70-100 years. This is approximately equal to the number of black-on-black homicides each year, and everyone just yawns.

    Of course, the lynchings were bad. But the figures that I’ve seen indicate that they were pretty rare.

    I generally agree with what you’re saying, but I have to point out that, as instruments of terrorism, lynchings did not need to be very frequent, they just needed to set an example in case blacks got too ‘uppity’ regarding specific things-in much the same way that Cancel Culture serves the Totalitarian Left (including BLM) today; high profile or highly visible targets, followers motivated by an indoctrinated combination of fear, hate, and paranoia to keep an eye out for transgressions, and control of institutions to maintain the state of terror for anyone who steps outside the imposed boundaries, which can be shifted at the convenience of the group in power. This is also the way apostasy and blasphemy laws operate in Islamic societies under Shariah law.

    Something of a caveat in the other direction, many lynchings were simply informal justice for actual crimes, with white on white and black on black lynchings making up a significant portion of the overall number. This isn’t to excuse such occurrences of informal (in)justice, but not every lynching was an act of racial terrorism. Still, the point of the previous paragraph stands.

     

    Also, remember that the “militia” of the Constitution was made up of WHITE men of 17 to 35 age.  Condaleeza Rice has commented on men she knew as a child keeping guns.

    • #27
  28. Ray Kujawa Coolidge
    Ray Kujawa
    @RayKujawa

    (split comment 1 of 2)

    Member poll – Like this comment if you think Abortion and Pro Choice matter more than Black Lives Matter.

    This article says Planned Parenthood is endorsing Black Lives Matter.

    [Edit by member: https link removed to: https://spectator.org/planned-parenthood-says-black-lives-matter/ because of causing overload of CPU usage.]

    As I have said elsewhere, we are being asked to contemplate a very great ambiguity. The only way of being compassionate is as the post suggests to adopt the philosophy, if not necessarily the exact words, that ‘all black lives matter.’

    • #28
  29. Ray Kujawa Coolidge
    Ray Kujawa
    @RayKujawa

    (split comment 2 of 2)

    Member poll – Like this comment if you think that Black Lives Matter matters more than Abortion and Pro Choice matter.

    This article says Planned Parenthood is endorsing Black Lives Matter.

    [Edit by member: https link removed to: https://spectator.org/planned-parenthood-says-black-lives-matter/ because of causing overload of CPU usage.]

    As I have said elsewhere, we are being asked to contemplate a very great ambiguity. The only way of being compassionate is as the post suggests to adopt the philosophy, if not necessarily the exact words, that ‘all black lives matter.’

    • #29
  30. Clifford A. Brown Member
    Clifford A. Brown
    @CliffordBrown

    MichaelKennedy (View Comment):

    Clifford A. Brown (View Comment):

    Jerry Giordano (Arizona Patrio… (View Comment):

    The Republican Party did not neglect or abuse black Americans when it fought a bloody Civil War, and freed the slaves. The abuses of the Jim Crow system were almost entirely the work of the Democratic Party.

    Name one thing that the Republican Party has done to “misuse” black Americans.

    The Jim Crow system and the long series of ritual torture murders that were euphemistically called “lynchings” were enabled by Republican indifference. Once the radical abolitionists were shoved out of the Republican tent, once we gave up on reconstructing the South and effectively suppressing domestic terrorism, Republicans’ history has been one of empty posturing. There were regular phony “antilynching” bills, but they always counted on the sacred filibuster to keep the bills from becoming federal law.

    Disagree. There is some misreading of history here. Have you read Ron Chernow’s biography of Grant? The radical abolitionists, like Stanton, rejected Lincoln’s (and Sherman’s) attempt to bring the Confederate states back peacefully. Reconstruction was overdone and led to the KKK and other resentment, some of which survives in “The Lost Cause” movement. I think there are a few here who surface if Sherman is praised. Grant tried to push reconstruction without the anger and oppression but some of his appointed officers, like those of Harding, discredited him. Wilson was the one who reversed many of the reforms of Grant, not Republicans. Anti-lynching bills were introduced year after year by Republicans but the Depression and the Solid South (Democrats to a man) voted them down.

    The core source of resentment was that anyone would dare to elevate Americans with one drop of black African ancestry to the status of fully human and politically equal citizens. The rest is rationalization, as with the poor put upon Germans between the two World Wars. The problem of Reconstruction was the same as all our other long engagements around the world. Eventually politicians and their backers lose interest or find other priorities.

    • #30
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