Black Lives Matter

 

Well, duh. The sky is blue. The sun rises in the East. This goes without saying, and in 2020 America no one disputes it. Otherwise, they would be tarred, feathered, and burned at the stake.

Nevertheless, we are professing it across the country, and in some instances, in very nauseating ways. People getting on their knees with hands raised chanting like some cult after some bland leader’s recited creed from a stage. Why? Because of some perceived privileged guilt or fear or both. Sad.

So what does Andy Rooney have to do with this conversation? Rooney was very memorable from his “60 Minutes” days and particularly with his closing sketches that started with “Didja ever notice” … and proceeded to highlight some blatant inconsistency and hypocrisy with some piece of “conventional wisdom.”

Which brings me to BLM. Didja ever notice that Black Lives Matter, except, when they are at Planned Parenthood? Legal abortions by race of women. And didja ever notice that BLM, except, during a weekend in Chicago?

Ladies and gentlemen, there is an elephant in the room. Does racism still exist in America in 2020? Yes, of course, but I would suggest that it is more isolated and a result of flawed human beings rather than some sort of institutional or systemic racism in America itself. And to be forced, forced at the threat of lives destroyed if not compliant, to chant some mindless drivel in order to somehow “prove” that you are not racist is un-American, unjust, and unsustainable as some sort of solution to mobs of looters and destroyers who will not be placated.

The elephant in the room is that many black folk are not very hospitable to their own people and own communities. And it is a jarring concept that those same people are saying that this diminishment of the value of black lives is solely due to the institutional racism of white folk. Didja ever notice?

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  1. JoelB Member
    JoelB
    @JoelB

    Well put. I miss Andy.

    • #1
  2. Ralphie Inactive
    Ralphie
    @Ralphie

    Didja notice the rich like the idea of destructive riots and BLM pledges that include the destruction of the family more than the people who have to live with the result?  The instigators are not the poor and oppressed it seems. I notice rich blacks are very supportive of riots, but then see a video of a black person crying over their loss, and see a very big disconnect. I’m thinking this is more a class issue than a race issue, and it is upper class against lower class.

    • #2
  3. Matt Bartle Member
    Matt Bartle
    @MattBartle

    Do Black victims of vandalism matter?

    Do Black victims of looting matter?

    • #3
  4. Columbo Inactive
    Columbo
    @Columbo

    Ralphie (View Comment):

    Didja notice the rich like the idea of destructive riots and BLM pledges that include the destruction of the family more than the people who have to live with the result? The instigators are not the poor and oppressed it seems. I notice rich blacks are very supportive of riots, but then see a video of a black person crying over their loss, and see a very big disconnect. I’m thinking this is more a class issue than a race issue, and it is upper class against lower class.

    Hey! I resemble that comment!

    • #4
  5. Hang On Member
    Hang On
    @HangOn

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    • #5
  6. RightAngles Member
    RightAngles
    @RightAngles

    Well said, Columbo.

    • #6
  7. Columbo Inactive
    Columbo
    @Columbo

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    And he is such a phony. Everything he does is calculated, poll-tested and air-brushed. He thinks this is a winning photo op. And it only appeals to the hopelessly mindless ‘republicans’ who live in a fantasy world that long ago went the way of the dodo bird.

    Plastic Mitt, the Hollywood version ‘Ken’ doll for the old mindless Republicans.

     

    • #7
  8. DonG (skeptic) Coolidge
    DonG (skeptic)
    @DonG

    Let me explain this again.  “Black lives matter” the phrase should *not* be deconstructed.  The phrase has a special meaning in that Black folks feel they are oppressed by tyrannical government via police.  Saying “XXXX matters” dismisses the intended meaning and expression of frustration.  A good response is “government tyranny is bad and should not be tolerated by a free people.”   

    It is like a big TEA party movement where people are chanting “taxed enough already” and an observer responds with “taxes are high in England”.  It is insulting.

    Then there is the BLM organization.  Whatever that was in the beginning is now just a socialist front. 

    • #8
  9. Matt Bartle Member
    Matt Bartle
    @MattBartle

    Whatever it was in the beginning, “Black lives matter” is now a club to beat people with. It means, “You and your whole society are racists if you don’t repeat it, and even if you do.” I just don’t accept that anyone has the right to decide that “All lives matter” is something that we’re not allowed to say.

    • #9
  10. Columbo Inactive
    Columbo
    @Columbo

    Matt Bartle (View Comment):

    Whatever it was in the beginning, “Black lives matter” is now a club to beat people with. It means, “You and your whole society are racists if you don’t repeat it, and even if you do.” I just don’t accept that anyone has the right to decide that “All lives matter” is something that we’re not allowed to say.

    Indeed. And if you say “All lives matter” or even if you say nothing, you are pilloried and shamed into submission.

    • #10
  11. Joshua Bissey Inactive
    Joshua Bissey
    @TheSockMonkey

    Someone (like his biological parents) should have told Trayvon Martin his black life mattered before he decided to start a gunfight (without bringing a gun). Someone (again, biological parents) should have told Michael Brown the same thing.

    Some people should tell their kids their black (or white) lives matter, before the kids decide to go around terrorizing cities, and destroying their neighbors’ businesses.

    I just hope no one decides his life doesn’t matter when he’s around me. Or you.

     

     

    • #11
  12. Jim Wright Inactive
    Jim Wright
    @JimW

    DonG (skeptic) (View Comment):

    Let me explain this again. “Black lives matter” the phrase should *not* be deconstructed. The phrase has a special meaning in that Black folks feel they are oppressed by tyrannical government via police. Saying “XXXX matters” dismisses the intended meaning and expression of frustration. A good response is “government tyranny is bad and should not be tolerated by a free people.”

    It is like a big TEA party movement where people are chanting “taxed enough already” and an observer responds with “taxes are high in England”. It is insulting.

    Then there is the BLM organization. Whatever that was in the beginning is now just a socialist front.

    What led my wife to embrace the phrase “Black Lives Matter” was Rep. Ilhan Omar’s breezily dismissive “some people did some things” to wave away 9-11. 

    • #12
  13. Taras Coolidge
    Taras
    @Taras

    Columbo (View Comment):

    Matt Bartle (View Comment):

    Whatever it was in the beginning, “Black lives matter” is now a club to beat people with. It means, “You and your whole society are racists if you don’t repeat it, and even if you do.” I just don’t accept that anyone has the right to decide that “All lives matter” is something that we’re not allowed to say.

    Indeed. And if you say “All lives matter” or even if you say nothing, you are pilloried and shamed into submission.

    Black Lives Matter — Only When Their Deaths Are Useful to the Left.

    The vast majority of blacks who die by violence are killed not by police but by civilians, almost always black civilians.  These are the Black Lives That Don’t Matter.

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

    DonG (skeptic) (View Comment):

    Let me explain this again. “Black lives matter” the phrase should *not* be deconstructed. The phrase has a special meaning in that Black folks feel they are oppressed by tyrannical government via police. Saying “XXXX matters” dismisses the intended meaning and expression of frustration. A good response is “government tyranny is bad and should not be tolerated by a free people.”

    It is like a big TEA party movement where people are chanting “taxed enough already” and an observer responds with “taxes are high in England”. It is insulting.

    Then there is the BLM organization. Whatever that was in the beginning is now just a socialist front.

    No.

    It is an anti-American ideological worldview and statement that is based on intersectional bigotry, paranoia, and a Big Lie.  It is also intrinsically linked to the hate group that originated the term in the first place.  And I find the direct implication that patriotic Americans who don’t share that worldview don’t think that black lives matter to be quite insulting in itself, as well as dangerous demagoguery whose predictable consequences are being made apparent as we speak.  It must be confronted and steadfastly debunked and rebuked if this nation is to avoid socialist tyranny, and possibly Civil War.

    All lives matter, and Blue Lives Matter.

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

    Jim Wright (View Comment):

    DonG (skeptic) (View Comment):

    Let me explain this again. “Black lives matter” the phrase should *not* be deconstructed. The phrase has a special meaning in that Black folks feel they are oppressed by tyrannical government via police. Saying “XXXX matters” dismisses the intended meaning and expression of frustration. A good response is “government tyranny is bad and should not be tolerated by a free people.”

    It is like a big TEA party movement where people are chanting “taxed enough already” and an observer responds with “taxes are high in England”. It is insulting.

    Then there is the BLM organization. Whatever that was in the beginning is now just a socialist front.

    What led my wife to embrace the phrase “Black Lives Matter” was Rep. Ilhan Omar’s breezily dismissive “some people did some things” to wave away 9-11.

    That makes no sense whatsoever.

    • #15
  16. Goldwaterwoman Thatcher
    Goldwaterwoman
    @goldwaterwoman

    RightAngles (View Comment):

    Well said, Columbo.

    Agree.

    • #16
  17. Jim Wright Inactive
    Jim Wright
    @JimW

    lowtech redneck (View Comment):

    Jim Wright (View Comment):

    DonG (skeptic) (View Comment):

    Let me explain this again. “Black lives matter” the phrase should *not* be deconstructed. The phrase has a special meaning in that Black folks feel they are oppressed by tyrannical government via police. Saying “XXXX matters” dismisses the intended meaning and expression of frustration. A good response is “government tyranny is bad and should not be tolerated by a free people.”

    It is like a big TEA party movement where people are chanting “taxed enough already” and an observer responds with “taxes are high in England”. It is insulting.

    Then there is the BLM organization. Whatever that was in the beginning is now just a socialist front.

    What led my wife to embrace the phrase “Black Lives Matter” was Rep. Ilhan Omar’s breezily dismissive “some people did some things” to wave away 9-11.

    That makes no sense whatsoever.

    Mention 9-11 to most Americans and most can tell you where they were the moment they found out, and what they did that day.  For Omar, a self-professed al qaeda fan girl, to write off the loss of thousands of people from Islamist terrorists as “some people did some things” is infuriating.

    To some people, being told “all lives matter” as a riposte to “black lives matter” is like them calling a suicide hotline and being told “suck it up, sunshine; everybody hurts.” Aside from the professional grievance-mongers, blm (lowercase) is a need to hear “your life matters too.”

    • #17
  18. Gary Robbins Member
    Gary Robbins
    @GaryRobbins

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    So what did you think about Michigan Governor George marching with Martin Luther King in the 1960’s?  

    Please note that Senator Romney was marching with a group of evangelicals, and not the more radical elements of “Black Lives Matter.” 

    As for myself, after watching George Floyd losing his life, my reaction in my living room was “black lives matter.”

    • #18
  19. Gary Robbins Member
    Gary Robbins
    @GaryRobbins

    Columbo (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    And he is such a phony. Everything he does is calculated, poll-tested and air-brushed. He thinks this is a winning photo op. And it only appeals to the hopelessly mindless ‘republicans’ who live in a fantasy world that long ago went the way of the dodo bird.

    Plastic Mitt, the Hollywood version ‘Ken’ doll for the old mindless Republicans.

    You may be forced to choose between voting for George Romney or voting for a Democrat.  Who would you choose? 

    • #19
  20. Goldwaterwoman Thatcher
    Goldwaterwoman
    @goldwaterwoman

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):
    You may be forced to choose between voting for George Romney or voting for a Democrat. Who would you choose? 

    None of the above.

    • #20
  21. Randy Webster Inactive
    Randy Webster
    @RandyWebster

    Columbo (View Comment):
    Indeed. And if you say “All lives matter” or even if you say nothing, you are pilloried and shamed into submission.

    They might pillory me, but they aren’t going to shame me into submission.

    • #21
  22. Columbo Inactive
    Columbo
    @Columbo

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Columbo (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    And he is such a phony. Everything he does is calculated, poll-tested and air-brushed. He thinks this is a winning photo op. And it only appeals to the hopelessly mindless ‘republicans’ who live in a fantasy world that long ago went the way of the dodo bird.

    Plastic Mitt, the Hollywood version ‘Ken’ doll for the old mindless Republicans.

    You may be forced to choose between voting for George Romney or voting for a Democrat. Who would you choose?

    I voted against 0bama in 2012 rather than for Mitty. It was the height of GOP ignorance to nominate Romney, author and dupe of Romneycare in MA, when his base wanted to repeal 0bamacare.

    • #22
  23. Taras Coolidge
    Taras
    @Taras

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    So what did you think about Michigan Governor George marching with Martin Luther King in the 1960’s?

    Please note that Senator Romney was marching with a group of evangelicals, and not the more radical elements of “Black Lives Matter.”

    As for myself, after watching George Floyd losing his life, my reaction in my living room was “black lives matter.”

    This is the power of the anecdote over the statistic.

    As Heather MacDonald has pointed out, studies of police killings show that white suspects have more to fear than black ones.  Because policemen know the consequences of killing a black suspect can be dire indeed.

    Look at what is going on right now across the country.

    By the way, there is also a familiar phrase I have not heard once since the beginning of this controversy:  “innocent until proven guilty”.

    • #23
  24. Columbo Inactive
    Columbo
    @Columbo

    Columbo (View Comment):

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Columbo (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    And he is such a phony. Everything he does is calculated, poll-tested and air-brushed. He thinks this is a winning photo op. And it only appeals to the hopelessly mindless ‘republicans’ who live in a fantasy world that long ago went the way of the dodo bird.

    Plastic Mitt, the Hollywood version ‘Ken’ doll for the old mindless Republicans.

    You may be forced to choose between voting for George Romney or voting for a Democrat. Who would you choose?

    I voted against 0bama in 2012 rather than for Mitty. It was the height of GOP ignorance to nominate Romney, author and dupe of Romneycare in MA, when his base wanted to repeal 0bamacare.

    Look at Ted the Swimmer. He is looking at Romney with a face that says, “He can’t be this stupid, can he? He just got rolled in the biggest way.”

    • #24
  25. Columbo Inactive
    Columbo
    @Columbo

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    So what did you think about Michigan Governor George marching with Martin Luther King in the 1960’s?

    Please note that Senator Romney was marching with a group of evangelicals, and not the more radical elements of “Black Lives Matter.”

    As for myself, after watching George Floyd losing his life, my reaction in my living room was “black lives matter.”

    Here is who Phony Mitt is marching with now.

    • #25
  26. RightAngles Member
    RightAngles
    @RightAngles

    Taras (View Comment):

    As Heather MacDonald has pointed out, studies of police killings show that white suspects have more to fear than black ones. Because policemen know the consequences of killing a black suspect can be dire indeed.

    Look at what is going on right now across the country.

    By the way, there is also a familiar phrase I have not heard once since the beginning of this controversy: “innocent until proven guilty”

    And nobody talks about the black lives lost because there are neighborhoods in Chicago and Detroit among others where the police just don’t want to go. And that was caused by black people, partly the ones committing the black-on-black crimes and partly the ones  who, with their white “allies,”  have hamstrung the police so they can’t do their jobs or are afraid to.

    • #26
  27. lowtech redneck Coolidge
    lowtech redneck
    @lowtech redneck

    Jim Wright (View Comment):

    lowtech redneck (View Comment):

    Jim Wright (View Comment):

    DonG (skeptic) (View Comment):

    Let me explain this again. “Black lives matter” the phrase should *not* be deconstructed. The phrase has a special meaning in that Black folks feel they are oppressed by tyrannical government via police. Saying “XXXX matters” dismisses the intended meaning and expression of frustration. A good response is “government tyranny is bad and should not be tolerated by a free people.”

    It is like a big TEA party movement where people are chanting “taxed enough already” and an observer responds with “taxes are high in England”. It is insulting.

    Then there is the BLM organization. Whatever that was in the beginning is now just a socialist front.

    What led my wife to embrace the phrase “Black Lives Matter” was Rep. Ilhan Omar’s breezily dismissive “some people did some things” to wave away 9-11.

    That makes no sense whatsoever.

    Mention 9-11 to most Americans and most can tell you where they were the moment they found out, and what they did that day. For Omar, a self-professed al qaeda fan girl, to write off the loss of thousands of people from Islamist terrorists as “some people did some things” is infuriating.

    To some people, being told “all lives matter” as a riposte to “black lives matter” is like them calling a suicide hotline and being told “suck it up, sunshine; everybody hurts.” Aside from the professional grievance-mongers, blm (lowercase) is a need to hear “your life matters too.”

    The problem is that the narrative the term is meant to convey is a Big Lie that is being employed as a cudgel to remake society, exactly like the transgender movement destroying the lives of people who do not submit to a socially destructive denial of reality, but on a much larger scale.  To validate the politicized phrase is to support the brainwashing of children against their country and parents and the unpersoning of anyone who does not take the knee, and that’s only the short term.

    • #27
  28. lowtech redneck Coolidge
    lowtech redneck
    @lowtech redneck

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    So what did you think about Michigan Governor George marching with Martin Luther King in the 1960’s?

    A brave man standing up for what’s right.

    Mitt Romney, on the other hand, is a narcissistic quisling fraud who might as well be marching with George Wallace.

    • #28
  29. Gary Robbins Member
    Gary Robbins
    @GaryRobbins

    Columbo (View Comment):

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    So what did you think about Michigan Governor George marching with Martin Luther King in the 1960’s?

    Please note that Senator Romney was marching with a group of evangelicals, and not the more radical elements of “Black Lives Matter.”

    As for myself, after watching George Floyd losing his life, my reaction in my living room was “black lives matter.”

    Here is who Phony Mitt is marching with now.

    Are you saying that every one of your fellow Ricochetti is a member of a lynch mob?

    • #29
  30. Columbo Inactive
    Columbo
    @Columbo

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Columbo (View Comment):

    Gary Robbins (View Comment):

    Hang On (View Comment):

    And now Senator Never Trumper Romney has gone full on racist with BLM. Time to defund the junior Senator from Utah.

    So what did you think about Michigan Governor George marching with Martin Luther King in the 1960’s?

    Please note that Senator Romney was marching with a group of evangelicals, and not the more radical elements of “Black Lives Matter.”

    As for myself, after watching George Floyd losing his life, my reaction in my living room was “black lives matter.”

    Here is who Phony Mitt is marching with now.

    Are you saying that every one of your fellow Ricochetti is a member of a lynch mob?

    Nah, just Mitt.

    • #30
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