Iris lilies, how are things in your hood?

[Gregg]

I agree with you 100% and then some! I do believe the government wants to protect the monopoly of the force thing and I do believe self policing might be worth a try.....scary thought to cops everywhere, I'm sure. Rob

While I'm generally a fan of smaller and less omnipotent government in any and all senses, I'm not sure a self-policing society with a starting point in Ferguson would work out so well. Anarchy often sounds better on paper than it actually functions in real life.

[CathyA]

OMG............self policing? Haven't we humans shown over and over and over that we just can't make the best choices?
Okay........let's put a large fence around Ferguson, and they can be the first to give self-policing a try.

[gimmethesimplelife]

OMG............self policing? Haven't we humans shown over and over and over that we just can't make the best choices?
Okay........let's put a large fence around Ferguson, and they can be the first to give self-policing a try.

Something has to be done about the police force in Ferguson....it is not racially similar to the general population in Ferguson and if the police step one millimeter over the line going forward, more lawsuits, more negative publicity (some of it international making us look further like the laughing stock of the developed world, which to me fits) more drama in general.....is this what we want? If self policing is a bad idea, fine, then something else needs to be done because the status quo is not working. Rob

[rodeosweetheart]

Catherine: "I have a weird idea that the whole "7 generations" thing is actually true, and that we probably have about 50-60 years to hammer out with the African American community before they feel they can trust us (if you use the end of the Civil War to start the 7 generations clock). '

I don;t buy this at all. First of all, the "we" you talk about here--who is this, and why doesn't this "we" include the African American community? This makes no sense to me, having lived in South Carolina where the community is emphatically composed of both black and white and people think in terms of a we that encompasses both--people live together, work together, and think of themselves as a community. I don't think in terms of some "we" that is a white identity. Where I teach in SC--we are definitely a "we" community, not separated into black and white, either students or teachers. I don't get this.

Second, generationally speaking, my paternal great grandfather fought for the Union Army from Illinois. So that is what--3 generations back? It's nowhere near 7. My 7th great granddad fought in the Revolutionary war. My maternal great grandfathers were Confederate soldiers. So how in the world does this 7th generation thing play out, unless you want to keep everyone in whatever identity box they were assigned in 1863? It just makes no sense to me.

[ApatheticNoMore]

people live together, work together, and think of themselves as a community.

think of themselves as a community when engaged in volunteering and so on I might buy, sure because such things are often by nature "everybody in". Of course what community one can afford to be part of (where one can afford to live) depends very much on income (unless one inherits a house etc., and of course one can often rent where they can't afford to buy). Work together? This is simply in my experience not true. While the work place is very very far from all white (heavily Asian at the jobs I've held), it's not exactly entirely racially integrated either. What jobs people (and the corresponding income) do tends to breakdown to a degree on racial lines. So I went to a high school that was heavily minority (hey high school reunion thread), the racial makeup of the jobs I have held in adulthood (professional middle class) is very different than that.

[rodeosweetheart]

Right, ApatheticNoMore, that is your experience. I report my experience, teaching at a community college in South Carolina, where it is racially integrated and we do work together--I am talking about faculty, as that is my job; can't speak to any other job. My neighborhoods where I lived there have also been racially integrated. Jury I served on was racially integrated. Those are the things I was thinking of, which sound like they differ from where you live, your community.

[catherine]

Catherine: "I have a weird idea that the whole "7 generations" thing is actually true, and that we probably have about 50-60 years to hammer out with the African American community before they feel they can trust us (if you use the end of the Civil War to start the 7 generations clock). '

I don;t buy this at all. First of all, the "we" you talk about here--who is this, and why doesn't this "we" include the African American community? This makes no sense to me, having lived in South Carolina where the community is emphatically composed of both black and white and people think in terms of a we that encompasses both--people live together, work together, and think of themselves as a community. I don't think in terms of some "we" that is a white identity. Where I teach in SC--we are definitely a "we" community, not separated into black and white, either students or teachers. I don't get this.

Second, generationally speaking, my paternal great grandfather fought for the Union Army from Illinois. So that is what--3 generations back? It's nowhere near 7. My 7th great granddad fought in the Revolutionary war. My maternal great grandfathers were Confederate soldiers. So how in the world does this 7th generation thing play out, unless you want to keep everyone in whatever identity box they were assigned in 1863? It just makes no sense to me.

I told you it's a weird idea. In my mind I think that the "sins of the father" (meaning, in this case, the sins of the white colonialists who made the slave trade a part of our culture) will take many years, many generations to overcome. So while it's easy for many of us to say, "get over it, blacks have alot more opportunity now," the remnants and the repercussions of slavery are still alive in the descendents of the slaves, and we, as a society, still suffer from those consequences.

I'm happy that you coexist happily in SC as a color-blind community, but as a country, the wounds are not healed. You see that in the disparities in the experience of blacks vs. whites today. Even Megyn Kelly gave Bill O'Reilly a talking-to about this.

OK, maybe my math is wrong, but a generation is typically defined as around 30 years, so 7 generations is 210 years. And I don't take this literally, like in 2075 everyone will wake up all healed and happy. But I think time has to pass, and I think that the response to the event in Ferguson is still tied to how blacks were treated in 1865, not even consciously, but subconsciously, almost at a cellular level.

In the book "In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts" by Gabor Mate (which is a wonderful book about addiction), he talks about how children who are in utero when their mothers are going through a stressful time have that stress imprinted in their DNA. They haven't felt stress at all--but it's transferred to them, and the likelihood of them growing up to be addicts is more likely than those whose mothers were stress-free. So I think it's a similar concept, and also similar to the Jungian concept of the collective consciousness. Some things are transferred through time, through "ether," through cells.. and they hang around, until we transform the experiences and feelings and change things for future generations.

[CathyA]

But what I don't understand is..........think of the holocaust. Maybe all the Jews now secretly hate all Germans, but I don't think that's true. Why do some people hang on to things longer than others? Sometimes I think it's just an excuse to vent one's free-floating anger.

Catherine........I don't know if you saw my question above, but please look back and respond to it. It's about the fetishization of things. I really didn't quite understand it.

[catherine]

But what I don't understand is..........think of the holocaust. Maybe all the Jews now secretly hate all Germans, but I don't think that's true. Why do some people hang on to things longer than others? Sometimes I think it's just an excuse to vent one's free-floating anger.

Catherine........I don't know if you saw my question above, but please look back and respond to it. It's about the fetishization of things. I really didn't quite understand it.

Cathy, first of all, I did see your post after my original post on this topic and a) you're not slow and b) I actually don't have a firm hold on the idea of fetishization of the victim, but one of the examples Derrick Jensen gives in his book is how we kill sharks with impunity and no one says anything, but one shark bites someone swimming in the Gulf of Mexico and all sharks are evil creatures and the victim is treated with reverence. So, apply that to Ferguson, and we will tend to praise Wilson as a hero (as a symbol of the top end of the hierarchy) and villify Brown (as a symbol of the bottom end). This is before we have any facts.

As far as the Holocaust example you give, first of all, I can't speak for the Jewish people. I never had a loved one lost in the Holocaust or any genocide. But I wonder if their strong relationship to the land in Israel is connected, not to the Germans in particular, but to the the consequences of having what they thought was their nation (Germany) turn on them so violently. I'd love to have Selah weigh in on this. Selah, will it take 7 generations to overcome World War II?

[Packy]

Here are two of my pet theories about greatly reducing the number of casualties (on one side) in the war against crime. I've actually had these in mind for quite awhile. One is, if we can put a man on the Moon--no wait--make readily-available handheld phones that do...everything, then why can't the masters of technology make some advances in non-lethal weaponry, that subdue suspects without lasting harm? Those "beanbags", rubber bullets, tasers, mace, etc.--they've been around since long before the cell phone with all its apps became widely available. So, my thought is--the engineers in the labs need to focus on developing this nonlethal technology, bringing it into the 21st Century. It would also have the potential for reducing civilian noncombatant deaths in the international wars we keep getting entangled in--making them a Peacekeeping mission, instead. The second thing I have is a deterrent policy for law enforcement. This would be effective, but lack political support--I just know it would. It's like this: If a cop shoots someone, they automatically lose their job, and go onto a universal LE no-rehire list. Ever hear that old joke: Robber says to Victim "Your Money or Your Life!" And the victim--I think it was Jack Benny telling this--says "Take My Life--I'm saving my money for my old age!" Okay--it's not perfectly analogous, but demonstrates the same principle. The cop will need to quickly evaluate the risk of death or serious harm he is facing and weigh it against the temporary inconvenience having to get into another line of work. See? Cops would be less trigger-happy if they know they will face sanctions-- get fired(if not prosecuted), and only use their guns as a last resort, and not as a crutch just to solve their problems in negotiating with suspects. Just like we citizens. Certain terms and conditions would apply. Think it over, and I'm sure you will realize I am right.