An interview with Ferguson residents.

[blueberryhill]

Bravo, Hair!

[Cutz]

Don't worry, I'll continue to provide you with such wonderful mysteries such as leading questions. I'll reiterate that I'm not trying to claim I know what you really think, how could I when you refuse to answer either the questions you pose yourself or the hypotheticals that I've given? It's wonderful that you mock those simple examples without having the gumption to give an honest answer, but then the point of diatribes is rarely to actually discuss the topic, huh. Maybe that's just the general discourse for the community here, but I prefer to have a point to my general ramblings. You're right, I am arrogant... enough that I don't need you to appease my apparent angst by agreeing with me. I assure you, any calling for recognition of bias was not literal. I don't much care if you want to be as logical and rational as I am.

[HairOfTheDog]

You've made the bulk of your posts in this thread about your analysis of my thinking and post style/construction, not the shooting incident or the broader case at hand. Read your posts; it's right there. There's no restriction against doing that here.

I've addressed aspects of the case, along with your critiques, suggestions, and claims about me. Some of what you posted struck me as mock-worthy, so I mocked it in the process. There's no restriction against doing that here.

If your logic questions were not intended to be so basic as to be interpreted as rhetorical, I'll gladly answer them for you. There is no gumption required in doing so. Here you go, Cutz.

If I'm a teacher... and another teacher from my school is arrested for having a relationship with a student... am I suddenly a pedophile as well?
MY ANSWER: The fact that you're associated with a pedophile does not make you a pedophile.

If I'm accused by a student of sexual harassment, does the other teacher's arrest imply that I too am guilty? It should have no bearing.
MY ANSWER: The fact that you have an association with someone who's arrested for sexual harassment does not imply to me that you are guilty of sexual harassment (nor does it imply to me that the person arrested must be guilty).

If it's alleged within the community that the school where you work breeds a culture of pedophiles and sexual harassers, it's something that I'd expect people to discuss, whether the allegation is ultimately true or not. I would not support restricting people from thinking about or discussing that allegation (or any other). I also would not insist that having those thoughts or discussions equates to deeming accused individuals of being guilty.

Characterize my posts in any way you like. I'm a wordy bitch sometimes and you're not required to read anything that I or anyone posts, of course. There's also very little that's outta limit for discussion here, even if it isn't covered by national media. It's a free-thinking community where everybody does their own thing -- not narrow or restricted to the comfort level of any individual.

If you wanna tell people what or how they think or make suggestions about what they should or shouldn't post, it's not realistic to expect people (me or anyone else) to insincerely agree with you or conform to your personal preferences. It doesn't matter who you're addressing; in my experience, that's rarely going to happen here.

We don't have to agree, Cutz, and you don't have to like my style for me to be glad you're here and posting, in any case.

[HairOfTheDog]

More from Ferguson...

This is good news, IMO -- the Ferguson PD is now joining other departments across the country in the use of body cams. I love 'em (dash cams, too).



The body cams were donated after the shooting of Michael Brown and some of the officers wore them while policing the recent protests. That won't help shed any light on the shooting incident of course, but it may help support or quash a law-suit claiming police brutality and false arrests at the protests.

And, the cam footage is really helpful in all investigations -- great evidence. Personally, I think they're probably a good deterrent for suspects who might otherwise assault cops and decide to stop short when they note the cams. Likewise, if a cop is getting riled, the body cam could keep him from going too far with a suspect. Even the ACLU -- which opposes other types of surveillance -- supports the use of police body cams.

On a separate note: two web pages raising money to back Officer Wilson suddenly stopped taking donations without any explanation over the weekend, the Los Angeles Times reports. The pages, on the crowd-source fundraising site GoFundMe, had raised a total of $433,000, the newspaper says.

UPDATE: In a Facebook post, the Support Darren Wilson confirmed that their (GoFundMe) online fundraiser had ended but vowed to continue raising money for the St. Louis County cop. According to the page's moderators, the decision to end the fundraiser was "made by those closest to Officer Darren Wilson looking out for his best interest." The group said that any donations that were already made would go directly to Wilson.

Ref:
www.cbsnews.com/news/ferguson-missouri-cops-start-wearing-body-cameras-report/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/31...45858.html

[Duchess]

There's that GoFundMe phrase again.

Awesome they had all those body cams donated. Maybe now people will be able to see how the officers are taunted & the cops response to that.

[ZEROSPHERES]

I signed a petition from Kirk Siefert [email protected]. In it he asked that the police consent to wearing body cameras and make it their policy to so in the future. It wasn't but days after signing that I saw the police accepted the change.org request. This quick response was either the power of the oranization making that request or the desire of the police to improve their relationship with their community. Possibly a combination of the two.

[Cutz]

I signed a petition from Kirk Siefert [email protected]. days after signing that I saw the police accepted the change.org request.

Or they saw your name on it and finally decided to take it seriously.

[HairOfTheDog]

UPDATE

There are now three investigations being undertaken concurrently in regards to the shooting of Michael Brown.

1. The county/grand jury investigation into the shooting incident itself.
2. The federal investigation into possible civil rights violations in relation to the shooting.
3. And, a new broader federal/justice department investigation into the police policies and allegations of historical and current police misconduct in Ferguson. (About 20 such investigations of police forces across the country have been launched over the last several years.)

A new set of witnesses has also emerged. They are two construction workers who were 50 feet from Brown and Officer Wilson when Brown was shot to death. Unbeknownst to them, their immediate reactions to what they witnessed were caught on video by another bystander. What they noted is consistent with the accounts of other eyewitnesses; Brown's hands were up in the air, Brown was not posing a threat, and Brown was surrendering but Wilson kept firing.

Here's the video and audio of the construction workers' reaction to the shooting.



Refs:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/10...01330.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/ferguson-mis...epartment/

[Duchess]

Good God Almighty. What was that after the interviews? I'm so glad I'm white. Jesus. I couldn't even watch 12 Years A Slave the other night because it was just too much unhappiness to take in.

[HairOfTheDog]

^ I didn't see that movie clip attached to the original video that I posted, Duchess.

Swapped it out with another version of the CNN piece with just the construction workers' reactions.

[Duchess]

^ I didn't see that movie clip attached to the original video that I posted, Duchess.

It's so awful the way they were treated. I know those film clips were fiction but they were based in reality. It's difficult to see.

[HairOfTheDog]

Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.

Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson released a video statement yesterday.

Here's a clip:


He said he was sorry to the parents of Michael Brown for the loss of their son.

He said he was sorry that the police force left Michael Brown laying dead in the street for so long.

And, he apologized to any peaceful protestors who felt the police were trying to infringe upon their right to peaceful assembly.

He also said he wants to be part of the discussions surrounding race and policing equality, and part of the solution.

Good to know. With three high profile investigations involving his department underway simultaneously, he better be ready for some changes. IMO.

[IroningBroad]

Well better late than never.Although he could've apologized sooner imo.