[Damorian]

>false realities

Or just other people's realities. You mention BLM riots, which affected me a great deal; tens of millions in damages to my city, destruction of local landmarks, one of the teachers in my local school district was arrested for assaulting a state politician for recording them burning a police car, and to top it off, they smashed the pharmacy where I get my wife's medicine, so she had to go without for a few days. This isn't some biased false reality/folk wisdom. This was my experience so when people tell me they were "peaceful protests" or the news says "statistically, they were 99.99999999% peaceful" but I look at what I saw with my own eyes, and also what was on TV in other cities... I can't be convinced that they weren't violent, destructive, and plainly, evil, no matter how much other people tell me what to think.

[nobody9999]

>This was my experience so when people tell me they were "peaceful protests" or the news says "statistically, they were 99.99999999% peaceful" but I look at what I saw with my own eyes, and also what was on TV in other cities... I can't be convinced that they weren't violent, destructive, and plainly, evil, no matter how much other people tell me what to think.

Your point is well taken. I live in a large city. The area where I live, while mixed, is majority minority. My own experience was quite different. No one assaulted teachers from my local school. I saw no businesses burned. I don't know anyone who was directly impacted by the months of daily BLM protests.

Those are my experiences. Why are you telling me what I should believe?

I mirrored my experiences against yours to point out that your anecdotal experience is not the whole of the story. Nor is mine.

Now for some facts that neither you nor I actually experienced:

Where I live there were a few instances of violence against police (and in every single case, nearly all the folks involved were both white and from out of town).

There were also numerous instances of police instigating violence against peaceful protestors.

There were a few instances of looting, and the police and local government addressed them quickly and harshly, as just about everyone, including the protestors (many of whom were captured on video chasing would-be looters away) was horrified and angered by such actions.

There were (and are) violent miscreants who should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. However, those folks were a tiny group compared to those who peacefully protested.

When you hear folks say the protests were "mostly" peaceful, they are empirically correct. Something like 20,000,000 people around the US peacefully protested against police violence.

At most, a few thousand people committed acts of violence and vandalism. Let's say there were even 10,000 (a high number, I suspect) folks who committed violent/destructive acts alongside the peaceful protests.

If that's correct, 99.95% of people protested peacefully and 0.05% of folks were violent/destructive.

I'm not sure how that could be construed as anything other than "mostly peaceful". in fact, I'd characterize it as "overwhelmingly peaceful".

I'm most certainly not telling you what to think or believe. Just presenting my own experiences and a few facts.

Don't take my word for it. I'm just some random asshole on the Internet.

The facts speak for themselves.

[Damorian]

Normally I'd agree, but I'll point you to comments elsewhere in this thread as to why this is misleading. The amount of damage is huge, and this was excused all the while by the group's leaders and other "peaceful" supporters with "people > property" and similar logic. Using this same logic, I'm sure 99+% of Nazis were peaceful during the holocaust as well.

[nobody9999]

>this was excused all the while by the group's leaders and other "peaceful" supporters

Who? Specifically. This is important. AFAIK, no reasonable, law-abiding people advocated for or excused violence and destruction.

In fact, such violence was roundly criticized and there were calls from all quarters for the apprehension and prosecution of anyone committing violent acts.

I've heard the same refrain over and over again. But no one ever actually names names. So. Who are these people who actually advocated for violence and destruction during the protests last summer?

That isn't a rhetorical question, friend.

[wl]

I posted a status update the morning after a major riot happened in my neighborhood that consisted of a short summary of what happened, a statement that I was ok, and essentially "fuck the rioters." I could name names of friends who, in response, insisted on "people > property", "fuck the racist capitalist system", "rioting is language of the unheard", "looting is reparations," and "don't tell black people how to protest." I'm sure you can find examples of this on twitter and reddit if you look—it was unavoidable for a time.

Since I'm not willing to out my friends or comb through old social media, have an example from local media instead: https://www.wbez.org/stories/winning-has-come-through-revolt...

Also, an image macro posted to my wall, representative of the kinds of stuff I was seeing at the time: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EnCI4_9W4AAAxDf.jpg

[nobody9999]

>I could name names of friends who, in response, insisted on "people > property", "fuck the racist capitalist system"

How many of those friends are elected or appointed public officials?

And what political power/social clout does Ariel Atkins[0] have? Especially given that over 100 arrests were made and as the mayor of Chicago said[0]:

"This is not legitimate First Amendment-protected speech. … This was straight-up felony, criminal conduct"

So some of your friends and an "activist" made incendiary comments.

No one with any real power or media reach condoned or encouraged violence during the BLM protests. Not one.

If a bunch of randos mouthing off is a huge problem, how much of a problem do you consider the statements encouraging violence by some folks with real power and media reach[1][2][3][4]?

[0] https://www.wbez.org/stories/winning-has-come-through-revolt...

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nz-zWeqtVo8&feature=youtu.be

[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2021/01/02/gop-r...

[3] https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/die-for-something-arizo...

[4] https://thehill.com/opinion/civil-rights/461498-why-are-we-t...

[wl]

You asked someone to explain their comment about the "group's leaders and other 'peaceful' supporters." I gave you an example of both. If you want more, they're not hard to find by searching for the slogans I recited.

I am thankful that government officials and more respectable media outlets with significant reach have tended to condemn the BLM rioting. Outright endorsements probably would have made the situation worse. And even tacit support can have disastrous consequences, as we saw at the Capitol. But they're not activists and they don't speak for the movement (although who can?).

[mlthoughts2018]

I am sorry you feel this way, and I hope you will find a way past the biases that are preventing you from accepting the facts.

[dang]

Please don't cross into personal attack in HN comments. That's not allowed here and we ban accounts that do it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[Damorian]

And I'll say the same to anyone who supports BLM, that's my point.

[mlthoughts2018]

That’s not much of a point. It’s really just you being on the demonstrably wrong side of actual facts, but acting like your extreme and indefensible take deserves equal validity or ontological status as a “right” belief, but it completely and unequivocally doesn’t.

You wouldn’t be saying this stuff to BLM supporters, only an echo chamber filled with your non-fact-based alternate world. There’s a complete difference of kind between what you’re saying and actual reality, one that can’t be overcome or mitigated at all just by your own gainsaying. Your stance just is, factually, invalid, and you calling the opposite stance invalid as if it’s just two sides of some coin is likewise just invalid all the way down.

[wl]

It's only demonstrably wrong if you're going to insist on the very literal "almost none of the BLM protests involved violence" and ignore that that statement, in isolation, is rather misleading. Sure, most of the protests were peaceful. But when they weren't, it was was very bad.

I was living in Downtown Chicago during the two major BLM protests that went violent last year. From my window, I saw people shooting out windows, starting fires, and looting. Even if it were a moot point to call 911, it didn't matter because you'd get a busy signal if you tried calling. Businesses I frequented, including the coolest camera shop I've ever seen, were destroyed. In the days following these riots, it took 45 minutes to an hour to enter my neighborhood because of National Guard checkpoints. The grocery stores and pharmacies were closed because their windows were smashed in, they were looted, and they were generally smashed to hell. And local BLM organizers infamously defended their actions as the "cry of the unheard" and the looting as "reparations."

I've read accounts similar to my own from people in Seattle and Minneapolis.

I get that some opponents of BLM want to use these riots to discredit what the movement stands for. But BLM proponents shouldn't try to gas light me and others who were victims of these demonstrations in defense. They were horrific. People died.

[mlthoughts2018]

Nobody is gaslighting anyone. By your own account, the perpetrators of the looting, property damage, etc., were not part of the BLM protests, but clearly differentiated groups adding violence to something non-violent.

I live in NYC and in my neighborhood we also had windows boarded up after days of looting, cars smashed in the street, fires and more. Literally none of it was related to the BLM movement.

Similarly with Portland where many friends and coworkers live, the violence there was literally brought about by Trump and his false allocation of Homeland Security agents to “protect” federal landmarks, yet they abducted people off the street with no due process.

I’m certain looting happened, destruction happened, violence happened. It happened literally around the corner from my apartment.

That absolutely does not give anyone any entitlement to indulge racist or fascist biases to blame that violence on BLM or associate it with somehow representing the purpose of BLM, etc.

[wl]

You assert that the groups responsible for the rioting were clearly differentiated from the BLM protests, but I don't see how one can differentiate them without making a no-true-Scotsman argument that the rioting somehow goes against the principles of the movement and they can be distinguished on that basis. At the time, some people were claiming that the rioting was the work of alt-right agents provocateurs, but that doesn't seem to have panned out. (Cf. the assertions that the Capitol rioters were antifa agents provocateurs.)

It's also not a good argument given there were loud voices claiming to speak for BLM that were justifying the rioting and looting. Reparations, smashing the racist capitalist system, etc. Maybe they don't represent the movement as a whole, but if so, the movement had lost its voice to extremists by that point.

An example of this kind of thing, posted by a friend who took part in BLM protests, in response to a status update I made: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EnCI4_9W4AAAxDf.jpg

Bad actors doing embarrassing or destructive things is a real problem for ad-hoc decentralized movements. And that's why I'm careful to not hold the acts of individuals against a movement unless said acts are the whole point of the movement. But at the same time, "Black Lives Matter riots of 2020" is the most accurate label for the events in question that I can think of.

[Damorian]

I hope you understand how unreasonable you sound to me. You're telling me that what I both saw and experienced, with verified fact and video evidence, isn't real. Your conviction that you know more about me and my life, than me, and your insistence on how invalid it is, makes you sound, frankly, like some sort of political zealot.

I tend not to waste my time convincing other people of things to this degree. I will share my experience, but beyond that, it would be unreasonable for me to tell someone else that their experience isn't even real, which is what you're doing.

[dang]

Please do not perpetuate flamewars on HN and do not cross into personal attack yourself. It's not what this site is for and it's no ok here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[Damorian]

I'm respectfully exchanging ideas. I challenge you to find my personal attacks. Please do not blame me for the content other users post.

[mlthoughts2018]

What you are saying is simply not ok. If your take away of your experience led you to believe BLM is responsible for significant violence, that is a manifestation of problems with you and your beliefs, not an accurate fact-based conclusion drawn from a legitimate interpretation of the BLM movement or any experience of BLM protests. You saying that I sound unreasonable by not letting your shit slide doesn’t change anything. You can say that. You can cling to racism-based biased refusal to accept the facts or accept your stated understanding of your experience is wrong and unduly biased, but it does not make what you’re saying any more legitimate or worthy of respect. What you are saying is just unacceptably wrong - it really is, really - in a way where you cannot just say, “well I believe different” and have that be treated like it’s valid or on equal footing.

You are starting off from a position so irredeemably far from acceptable fact-based reality, that for you to say my response sounds unreasonable is completely unsurprising and carries no weight.

It might sting to have your attachment to what you think is an acceptable interpretation of your experience called out for the unreasonable anti-BLM bias that it is. Oh well, the anti-BLM fantasy stuff is not OK, not going to slide.

[Damorian]

I'm confused... it's verifiable fact... insurance claims from the riots are between $1-2 billion in damages... dozens of people died and between just a few cities thousands of police were injured, who knows how many protestors and bystanders... support for the movement dropped rapidly once things escalated... these are the facts. How can you look at this, and when someone says they witnessed just a small piece of it, say they're "irredeemably far from fact based reality" and you just can't let it "slide". Consider at least, that your extreme position harms your movement. What is your exact criticism of my opposition? Or at the very least, to what I witnessed?

[dang]

Please stop.