No, they don't care when white people die either, but it's not national news because [retracted]white people don't riot and[/retracted] it doesn't fit the narrative.
>In a mixed verdict, a federal judge awarded $3 million to the parents of an 18-year-old honor student shot and killed by plainclothes drug enforcement agents, but also determined that the authorities were not negligent in their actions.
U.S. District Judge Michael Fitzgerald said that DEA agents had reason to believe they were in danger, but determined that the agents should not have fired their weapons at Zachary Champommier's car because shooting at a moving vehicle would not have helped their predicament.
Middle to upper class people (many white) rioted when the SF Giants won the World Series [1]. I don't recall any police officers in military gear.
I believe it's because middle or white crowds don't pose any perceived threat even though they're burning cars and otherwise breaking the law. There were arrests, though.
If you're community is poor and black then you're SOL.
It's a peaceful protest even if the people are heavily armed [1]. But at Ferguson unarmed protests are considered as non peaceful protests and dealt with force. There's one conspicuous difference between the people who were protesting on each occasion.
Except that 1. so many are afraid of losing what little they have, and 2. I am not sure about others, but if I am not caught up in it personally, it just comes out as more statistics, happening somewhere else, not my back/frontyard.
I just read the Wired article on Snowden on HN this evening, and in it he referred to the process of becoming numb/accepting of something that you get repeatedly shown, regardless of how sad/miserable/bad it is, the frog in the slowly heating pot of water.
I have come to the realization that the country (USA) I was taught about in school that was so great and cherished its Constitution and Bill of Rights is mostly just a fantasy, a hopeful work in progress that does not seem to be making much progress, and the best thing I can do is teach the people around me what I think is right/ethical and keep working to make my small section of the world a better place.
There is a better and better chance that more shit is going to hit the fan financially (http://vimeo.com/user20236372/review/101487179/54bf993e5d), wars seem to now be a constant state of human social equilibrium, and rather than give in to depression, I will teach those around me how to care for what we have, and maybe survive any larger disaster that doesn't just wipe my area off a map.
Sad, but about the only positive thing I can currently think of doing.
I'm not sure why you're getting downvoted, given that you're absolutely right. There are a number of people on this thread engaging in 2nd amendment rights fantasies without stopping to consider what would happen in this situation if a bunch of black people started openly carrying weapons while being confronted by a bunch of hostile, heavily armed SWAT team members. We need more MLK, and less NRA.
It's not even hypothetical. The Black Panthers were trying to do a lot of good stuff for the community (despite their flaws) by using their legal right to carry arms for their protection and the result was that the government cracked down on their freedoms because they were so uncomfortable about being unable to oppress them with shows of force and police harassment.
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/aug/21/local/la-me-ln-zacha...
>In a mixed verdict, a federal judge awarded $3 million to the parents of an 18-year-old honor student shot and killed by plainclothes drug enforcement agents, but also determined that the authorities were not negligent in their actions.
U.S. District Judge Michael Fitzgerald said that DEA agents had reason to believe they were in danger, but determined that the agents should not have fired their weapons at Zachary Champommier's car because shooting at a moving vehicle would not have helped their predicament.