Discussion for article #244096
BLM, making friends everywhere they go. It wasn’t the Grinch who stole Christmas.
Their choice of targets seems to be wildly off-base, doesn’t it? “Gee, let’s rally support for our cause by making people miss their flights to spend the holidays with their families.”
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I am sympathetic to the cause but I don’t think interrupting everyone’s holiday plans is a positive way of promoting it.
In before some scumbag racist Sanders dude who’s still upset BLM had the nerve to protest against his candidate shows up.
Too bad these young folks don’t have a Bayard Rustin to organize them. I’m largely sympathetic to their cause, but sometimes they ain’t helping it any. Sigh.
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Would be a stronger article if it included a bit more about what actually transpired at the airport.
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“What do we want? Justice! When do we want it? Now!”
In the Brooks Brothers Riot, a mob of GOP staffers bussed from DC tried to block Dade County from completing the 2000 Florida recount.
Al Franken led counter-protesters in the world’s first Dadaist cheer:
“What do we want? Patience! When do we want it? Now!”
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To bring pressure on the city of Minneapolis, the protesters shut down a mall in Bloomington? What brilliance.
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I’d expect Minnesotans to empty the mall, I can just hear them saying “Well, if those lives matter folks want to have a rally at the mall, we’ll just stay out of their way and let them have the place to themselves.”
It will be interesting to see what happens when people who pride themselves on being “Minnesota nice” are confronted by the people who will follow you to the airport to ruin your holiday.
@MisterNeutron and @Springfielder:
Making people miss their lunches didn’t win the civil rights protesters any friends, either.
Protests aren’t meant to be polite. They’re meant to screw people up and make them look at an issue in a new way. And since marching on the National Mall with signs garners near-zero attention, these folks may have found a way to get coverage.
The lunch counter sit ins were at establishments that would not serve blacks. If the mall and the airport refused to serve blacks, you might have a point.
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And the airport and the Mall of America (why is it referred to as themall throughout the article?) provide tax money for communities that hire cops who kill blacks with impunity.
Yeah, but targeting people who may well be your allies is just dopey. Protest at City Hall, or Police Headquarters.
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So do the protesters. Are you suggesting that they set up picket lines around their own homes?
Think this through…
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Maybe I missed the stories about flights delayed or cancelled? Or about shoppers who fled screaming when BLM arrived? And why the expectation that the protest was going to turn into looting and rioting?
You seriously think TV or print news outlets are going to cover yet another protest by those people at City Hall or Police Headquarters? When there are stories about Santa’s electric sleigh or the house with 100,000 lights?
That’s small and circular reasoning from someone whose opinion I respect.
Please read the story again. Significant traffic delays on the way to the airport. That doesn’t mean that flights were delayed or cancelled - it means that some people almost certainly missed their flights. Stores in the mall shut down. Do you have any idea what that means to a retailer, a few days before Xmas?
And to repeat, these are not people who have done any harm to anyone else. They may, in fact, have been huge BLM supporters. Right up until the moment when BLM screwed them over for no reason.
I’m afraid you are not thinking this through logically.
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Nothing circular about it. It’s simply the logical path. You’re saying that the mall and the airport are suitable targets because they provide tax revenue to the city. But everyone provides tax revenue to the city. The mall and the airport haven’t somehow “decided” to throw their support behind the current administration. They pay their taxes, just like everyone else. Paying taxes does not imply consent.
Edit: And by the way, the mall and the airport don’t get to vote, either. Despite what you may have heard, corporations are not people.
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[quote=“MisterNeutron, post:19, topic:30526”]
And to repeat, these are not people who have done any harm to anyone else.
[/quote]Who do you think the police exist for? Who do you think they’re killing black people to protect? Who do you think they’ve shoved millions into prison at the behest of?
You’re talking about the police like they’re some sort of natural disaster, and not a public institution controlled by White Americans (you know, like those shoppers at the mall).