
How to Make this Moment the Turning Point for Real Change - mwseibel
https://medium.com/@BarackObama/how-to-make-this-moment-the-turning-point-for-real-change-9fa209806067
======
kajumix
"I’ve heard some suggest that the recurrent problem of racial bias in our
criminal justice system proves that only protests and direct action can bring
about change, and that voting and participation in electoral politics is a
waste of time. I couldn’t disagree more. The point of protest is to raise
public awareness... But eventually, aspirations have to be translated into
specific laws and institutional practices — and in a democracy, that only
happens when we elect government officials who are responsive to our demands."

Laws are just a consequence of an actual cultural change, and can only succeed
(and not precede) the conversion of hearts and minds. Voting and democracy
should not become a device to placate the dissatisfied masses into silence,
make them lineup for ballot, to choose a lesser evil who, in most likelihood,
will turn out to be a egotistical power-seeker. We shouldn't conflate voting
with "will of the people."

~~~
systemvoltage
One big problem is that the elected after being elected, choose to not follow
or dilute those promises. There is no accountability. So time and again,
democracy fails as they just change their minds after being elected.

There is this "damping" factor like a mechanical system, that takes the energy
out of the people's hands and dampens it with lobbying, dishonesty,
unaccountability and complete neglect for public interest. The response of the
system is now steady state with little change. We need a public roster of each
politician and their promises written in notarized documents, that can be used
to strip them of relection and penalize them in some way so that future
politicians cannot weasel their way out of promises.

I would also vote for public presentations with slides + data by each
politician instead of these stupid debates and speeches. They should be
documented and scrutinized for accuracy of data and their claims. We have
startup decks, but yet politicians don't have to make presentations. Instead
they trade blows on a debate stage with polished repertoire which has now
become an entertainment show, at least at the presidential level.

~~~
chr1
The idea about presentations is very good, but it alone won't fix the problem.
We need to be able to vote for individual decisions instead of people, and we
on hn are best positioned to fix the democracy
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23377423](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23377423)

~~~
chii
> We need to be able to vote for individual decisions instead of people

What about this: for most decisions, people elect their representative, and
don't directly participate. The representative votes on decisions in gov't,
but their vote is weighted by the number of people they represent (let's call
this V).

However, if there is an issue that a person deems important to participate in,
then that person gets to directly vote for said issue. Then, the elected
representative's vote _for that issue_ drops by 1, and thus their vote only
weights V-1.

Hence, by this method, most people who don't give a shit can continue not to,
and allow their electoral representative to make decisions on their behalf.
But direct democracy is available for those who care enough.

~~~
chr1
Exactly, i had tried to describe this in the linked submission by saying "you
can put your vote to follow someone else" and you described that better. The
fact that many people come to the same idea independently means that time is
ripe for that idea to become reality.

------
RcouF1uZ4gsC
> So let’s not excuse violence, or rationalize it, or participate in it.

Taboos around violence for political are one of the crucial building blocks
for a functioning democracy. If those taboos are broken, even for a good
cause, you set a precedence that violence works. And the next cause won’t be
as good. One only has to look at the lessons of the Roman Revolution that
started with the murder of Grachus, and ended with an Emperor who everyone
acclaimed as they were so tired of the bloodshed.

~~~
mmastrac
I cannot condone violence nor encourage it, but you have to admit that the
first few protests and property damage drastically influenced the quick arrest
of an officer that may not have been arrested or even fired if it didn't
happen.

The non-violent protests of Colin Kaepernick were mocked and used to rally the
other side and just weren't effective.

The problem here is not the violence, but a policing system that is so
fundamentally damaged and has not been effectively reformed fast enough.

The MLK quote is trotted out pretty often, but "a riot is the language of the
unheard".

~~~
toast0
> I cannot condone violence nor encourage it, but you have to admit that the
> first few protests and property damage drastically influenced the quick
> arrest of an officer that may not have been arrested or even fired if it
> didn't happen.

I don't think this is a good thing. The office involved should be charged or
arrested based on the circumstances and evidence, not to appease angry
protesters and to attempt to quell riots.

In this case, it appears overwhelmingly clear that the office should be
charged; but arresting people because their actions have inspired protests or
riots is very dangerous.

~~~
simondw
> The office involved should be charged or arrested based on the circumstances
> and evidence

Obviously. But they weren't, and given precedent, probably never would have
been. That's why this is happening.

~~~
devalgo
The officer in question has been charged with murder. The Minnesota Governor
and AG were both advocating for charges basically since day 1 and well before
the protests so it's not at all clear the turmoil influenced his arrest.

~~~
teachrdan
To the contrary, the prosecutor had this to say about why he had not pressed
charges:

'But my job in the end is to prove he violated a criminal statute - but there
is other evidence that does not support a criminal charge.'[0]

This quotation is from a tabloid, but the quote--and the DA's failure to say
unequivocally that he would prosecute Floyd's killer, Chauvin--contributed to
the riots.

And then Chauvin was arrested the day after riots started.

[https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8367221/Prosecutors...](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8367221/Prosecutors-
warn-evidence-does-not-support-criminal-charge-George-Floyds-killing.html)

~~~
devalgo
Attorney General != District Attorney last time I checked.

~~~
jessaustin
DAs decide whether to file murder charges. AGs are not relevant to the
process.

------
frogpelt
I agree with almost everything Mr. Obama wrote.

But...

I feel the complete opposite of “hopeful” when I see these riots, when I see
people so angry they will destroy their own cities.

Because it accomplishes the exact opposite of they hope it will accomplish:

1\. Those who side with heavy-handed police tactics feel vindicated for their
prejudices.

2\. The communities of those who feel unheard and left out are torn down even
further.

3\. Every civilian-police officer interaction post-riot will be even more
contentious, thus making violence more likely.

Don’t get me wrong I believe there are corrupt officials and police officers.
Obama is right about how to fix that on the local level.

About the actual problem being protested: One of the themes of the protests is
to say the names[1] of those have been killed at the hands of the police. Just
using common sense tells me that if you can name off the victims it means the
problem isn’t widespread or systemic across the country.

Try naming the victims of rape or suicide or even murder.

Name the police officers killed in the line of duty in the last ten years. You
can’t there’s way too many.

George Floyd should not have died. And the police officer(s) who contributed
to his death should be held 100% accountable for their actions.

But there will always be unnecessary deaths in law enforcement situations.
Rioting and burning down your own city will not make that fact go away.

So, I feel a loss of hope when I see these riots. To me, it means we are so
far from working together to fix the problems that can be fixed. It creates a
bigger divide in our society.

[1][https://www.npr.org/2020/05/29/865261916/a-decade-of-
watchin...](https://www.npr.org/2020/05/29/865261916/a-decade-of-watching-
black-people-die)

~~~
kryogen1c
> Just using common sense tells me that if you can name off the victims it
> means the problem isn’t widespread or systemic across the country.

true, but the counterpoint is the problem is not the volume of errors, its how
the errors are handled. people know those names because the issues were never
closed. Public servants like police officers should be open kimono; if someone
dies, it should be a big deal. where's the brutally honest post-mortem? we
expect this out of meaningless things like $SaaS, why in gods name not our
police forces?

~~~
mhh__
The US imprisons roughly 5 times as many black people as a proportion of it's
population than apartheid South Africa, it's volume too.

------
softwaredoug
If you haven’t learned about the US Civil War and Reconstruction, it’s
required context for _everything_ around this topic. I’d particularly
recommend the recent Chernow biography on Grant and the Blight biography on
Frederick Douglass. The civil war & reconstruction are the single most
defining events in US history. They’re extremely relevant to today’s politics,
racial justice, and identity based partisanship.

In short I think it’s crucial to get an accurate (not “lost cause of the
valiant confederacy”) appreciation for how bloody it was and the real stakes
(slavery, not “states rights”). How progress was made politically. How there
were a few years of positive change before the US backslid into racial
patterns of old due to moral exhaustion fighting the south.

~~~
Balgair
_Grant_ is a very dense, but very good book.

The period after Lincoln's death until Grant's election is nearly
unbelievable. Johnson was an avowed racist and openly apologistic to southern
gentry. The south and a sizable percent of the population was under armed
guard and were essentially in military dictatorship under Grant. Grant was the
obvious next pick for president and, wisely, was quiet about being the 'real'
power in the US, physically right next to Johnson.

Then, as Johnson can't help himself but to be a bullheaded moron, he gets
impeached by the radical left wing of the house: the 'newish' Republican
party. His trial is _wild_ , by the way. He gets impeached, and is then sent
to the senate. Where the southern states, still under the war department,
can't vote or sit; it's all Union states. Bribing was rampant in the senate,
but not publicly known. Johnson misses conviction by one vote. The left-wing
Republican senators that vote to acquit never serve in public office again.

Again, _Grant_ is a dense read, but Chernow did a fantastic job on it. Big
recommend

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment_of_Andrew_Johnson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impeachment_of_Andrew_Johnson)

~~~
softwaredoug
One thing I have found is having basically a PoV character to follow through
history is really useful for learning the period. Maybe its the game of
thrones in me :)

~~~
Balgair
If you're looking for a _great_ book like this, I cannot possibly recommend
anything higher than Edmund Morris' _The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt_. Morris'
writing is masterful and gripping. It seriously reads like an adventure novel.

[https://www.amazon.com/Edmund-Morriss-Theodore-Roosevelt-
Tri...](https://www.amazon.com/Edmund-Morriss-Theodore-Roosevelt-
Trilogy/dp/0812958632)

------
mwseibel
I think it’s time for America’s leaders to stand up and organize our citizens
in order to make long lasting policy changes. Citizens are paying attention. I
want there to be a great American debate about what these changes should be.
The world is watching and the American system is being tested. Let’s meet the
challenge and be the example we want to see in the world. Clearly America is
nowhere near perfect but with effort we can improve.

~~~
systemvoltage
I am disappointed by the lack of leadership from the white house. The
president should address the nation, bring it together and create a strategy
to resolve these issues.

Edit: I should say "disappointed" instead of "surprised". Agree with the
responses, there is no expectation anymore from the Whitehouse after 3 years
of incompetency.

~~~
bananabreakfast
What's surprising about that? I'm actually asking, not trying to provoke.

There are four years of precedent of the leadership specifically and
intentionally dividing and radicalizing the nation to directly drive electoral
support to maintain power. Cruelty to outside groups is historically a very
effective means to consolidate power. This is completely in line with past
behavior and will more than likely continue.

~~~
frockington1
4 years? Probably closer to 40 on all sides of the spectrum

------
zebnyc
Seems to me everytime there is a groundswell of activism, there is some
element of discord (looting / rioting) which becomes the new narrative and is
used to discredit the entire movement. This story has been on repeat-loop for
almost a decade now.

Here is a protestor in NY claiming that looters were actually undercover NYPD
detectives
[https://twitter.com/AndrewSolender/status/126693546402143027...](https://twitter.com/AndrewSolender/status/1266935464021430274?s=20)
Another example I can think of is the video of Jon Jones taking the spray cans
from couple of rioters. These rioters are caucasian and we can only assume
that they were more interested in wreaking damage than on "protesting" and
hence can only be incidentally related to the movement. While strictly
anecdotal, this simply disproves the false narrative on conservative circles
which are inevitably going to focus on the rioting / looting rather than how
to improve society.

------
randyrand
Police brutality is a real issue. It's less clear that racial bias in policing
is a statistically significant issue, however, when accounting for obvious
things. If someone has numbers that tell a different story I am all ears. Here
are mine when I attempted to find it for myself:

    
    
        black arrests (all crimes) a year: 2.2 million
        white arrests (all crimes) a year: 5.6 million
    

[https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2017/crime-in-
the-u.s.-...](https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2017/crime-in-
the-u.s.-2017/tables/table-43)

    
    
        black deaths by police: 4.5 per 100k
        white deaths by police: 1.5 per 100k
    

[https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793](https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793)

    
    
        USA black population: 13%
        USA white population: 75%
    

Given a black committing an average black crime, and a white committing an avg
white crime, the black person is 16% more likely to die in a police
altercation. Whether or not this is statistical error or a real difference is
harder to tell, but this difference is not nearly as large as most media
outlets lead people to believe.

Again, If someone has numbers that tell a different story I am all ears

~~~
danharaj
Laws are disproportionately overenforced on black communities. Your numbers
are collected after a large amount of the bias is already baked in and
collected by the people perpetrating the bias. Maybe that didn't occur to you.

You're just asking questions right?

~~~
randyrand
I welcome more data that has less sampling bias, but without some attempt to
quantify the amount of sampling bias here we don’t know if it has a big impact
on this data.

~~~
danharaj
It is on you if you don't take the testimony of hundreds of thousands of black
people that they're terrorized by the police as evidence of possible police
brutality.

Does that sound absurd? Is it as absurd as presuming the police would
incriminate themselves with the data they create?

All evidence you can gather will be indirect. You make your judgment based on
which you consider relevant.

------
_bxg1
I feel the need to point out that this is the president who spent eight years
promising big-C Change, all while mostly just reinforcing and benefitting from
the existing status-quo. I think it's that sunny, vaguely positive but
cowardly and ineffectual brand of politics that _set the stage_ for the wave
of populist unrest we're seeing from both the left and the right right now.
Politicians have been promising change without delivering on it for far too
long, and voters are done. I would argue that politicians like Obama are the
very reason people no longer believe democracy works.

~~~
nostromo
The fact that Obama is almost universally loved by the rich, the famous, and
the powerful should tell one a thing or two about how effective he was at
bringing about big-C Change in America.

------
runawaybottle
What are some actual laws we can pass from this situation?

I was thinking at the very least to get a citizen right where you can request
to have any encounter with the police recorded.

‘Officer I request my right to have this encounter recorded’.

~~~
zo1
My crazy ideas to stop this and violence/law-breaking in general. This should
cause a huge reduction in these issues we claim we're having.

1\. Body cams mandatory for all police inside & outside of the station, and
they stay on 100% of the time and batteries should last the whole shift. No
ifs/buts/maybes. If the need arises, bathroom breaks can be edited out after
the fact.

2\. National ID card, in all states and mandatory for everyone over 13/16\.
Put all biometric, facial and possibly DNA data on file, encrypted and only
available for searches. Be creative.

3\. Remove the need to arrest people for any non-violent crimes. People are
positively ID'd via some tech (insert something wild here if you want). Cop
files a report, includes evidence of positive ID, person needs to appear in
court as they will be notified by SMS/Email/letter/lawyer-visit because that
stuff should all be on-file and up to date. Send them warnings if they don't
appear in court, meanwhile block their access to everything like cell-phones,
bank accounts, etc. Start pro-actively messaging their family, or them, and
let them know about the additional time/fines they are racking up by missing
court dates. 3.a) Assume they're guilty if they don't show up for court and
don't have a valid reason.

4\. Disallow police from forcibly cuffing people for arrest. Procedure should
be to throw two pairs of cuffs at the person while they're being pointed at
with gun/taser, and they have to put it on themselves. Procedure allows for x
minutes of that, then by default they _have to_ taze this individual into
submission and just arrest them. Once they're cuffed, just carry them in a
car/van, or wait for support.

5\. Punishment for disobeying orders by a policeman to do the above.

6\. Very strict guidelines and sets of laws being broken that justify physical
arrest. The default should be to just tag the person and tell them to appear
in court. If it's a grey-area, just block their cellphone, bank-accounts,
cards, etc.

7\. Track all cell-phone locations, strongly-linked and verified to individual
identities, and store permanently. Store it securely and allow court-orders to
open for case investigations. Allow anonymized access to information-based
researches that are told to investigate crimes. This one _alone_ could solve
so many crimes in my view that I am saddened to no end that people prevent it
from happening safely at the recurring expense of innocent lives.

One could go on and on. But guaranteed the above sets of actions/laws are very
unpalatable for the majority of people, and it would cause "human rights
lawyers" to salivate at the potential for litigation and for "human rights
activists" to salivate in protestual anger.

~~~
manfredo
So the police never arrest someone for non-violent crimes, and the only
disincentive is to get fined.

This basically just gives people a license to steal whatever they want and
stalk and harass anyone they want, so long as they don't lay a finger on a
person. The only consequences are fines, and non-payment of a fine is not a
violent crime and thus not cause for arrest.

~~~
zo1
Of course they'll get arrested, after they've been convicted?

------
HorizonXP
Local politics have the most impact on people, but get the least attention.
Shouldn't it be easier to engage folks on a local level via social media,
electronic voting, campaigns, etc?

~~~
dfxm12
_Local politics have the most impact on people, but get the least attention._

FWIW, this is not a truism. First, the current administration in particular
has been consolidating power.

Also, by many measures (ads, canvassing, town halls, discussion on community-
based forums), the local elections get pretty much the same attention as the
federal in my area.

------
teekert
Some of those that work forces [0]... It's from 1992. 28 years old, little has
changed. Still love that song.

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8de2W3rtZsA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8de2W3rtZsA)

------
marnett
Tangentially related: Alex S. Vitale's book "The End of Policing" is currently
free in e-book from Verso: [https://www.versobooks.com/books/2817-the-end-of-
policing](https://www.versobooks.com/books/2817-the-end-of-policing)

Worth reading to familiarize oneself with leftist views on institution of
Policing. Likely some eye-opening viewpoints for most.

~~~
thundergolfer
His arguments for the origins of policing being a protector of private capital
was an eye-opener for me.

I already was familiar with the argument that the police are more often
deployed in the service of protecting private property rather than public
protection (eg. these protests) but it was surprising just how blatant the
relationship was between capitalists being scared of labour power and new
police forces being created.

I need to look into it more.

------
hkai
I like this post because it avoids making provocative claims that are
sometimes seen in the media, and I hope that this restores some of the lost
trust between the people on two sides.

For example, unlike the media, Obama avoids saying that violence is partially
justified, or claiming that some groups have a higher chance of being killed
by police, and instead talks about the "recurrent problem of racial bias in
our criminal justice system".

Indeed, people on the center and center right sometimes use the FBI crime
stats to argue that there is no racial bias in police killings: since African
Americans make up 27% of the arrests while constituting 13% of the population,
it is consistent with the fact that they are twice as likely to get killed by
police.

Much fewer people, however, would argue that there is no bias in the criminal
justice system, given the evidence.

So I am hopeful that by making more moderate arguments, Democrats will be able
to squeeze perhaps the extra 1-2% which is all is indeed to defeat Trump.

~~~
woodpanel
Don't get why you're getting downvoted.

I agree with you except on the "defeating Trump" part. Moderation is not
enough IMO. Everyone with a progressive agenda who is not stongly distancing
themselve from the rioters right now will have his cause collaterally defaced
by them, just as they collaterally deface these neighbourhoods.

Disclaimer: Not a US-citizen nor resident.

------
kelvin0
Now I know this is old news, but it's not unheard of that law enforcement
finds ways to infiltrate protests and make them turn into something else than
a peaceful affair, even in tame ol' Canada.

[https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/quebec-police-admit-they-
went...](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/quebec-police-admit-they-went-
undercover-at-montebello-protest-1.656171)

[https://www.ctvnews.ca/quebec-police-defend-officers-
actions...](https://www.ctvnews.ca/quebec-police-defend-officers-actions-at-
summit-1.253860)

So instead of condemning the few who 'incite violence', it might be useful to
ponder if the game isn't rigged and external malicious actors could be acting
as agent provocateurs.

~~~
mistermann
The one group who is most on top of such things, the dread _conspiracy
theorists_ , have been the subject of an intense, coordinated slur campaign
for many years now. There are several interesting quirks about this whole
affair, but you'll sure as hell never see them on the 6 o'clock news,
voluntarily at least.

------
mythrwy
A couple of thoughts:

Racism is an issue, but I wonder in the case of police the abuse the issue
could be more generally described as one of class?

There was an incident a few years ago in my state were police picked a white
guy up who had been convicted of methamphetamine possession a few times. I'll
describe the guy as a "scraggly white guy". He was dirty, unkempt, skinny,
poor spoken in an old vehicle. The cops I believe were Hispanic. So the decide
he is hiding meth on him, search him, push him around a little. Then they
drive him to the hospital and force several enemas on him. Which turn up
nothing. Then the hospital sends him a bill for the "service". It's egregious
and he is rightfully suing. Is this a race issue?

If George Floyd had looked like Obama or OJ Simpson, had been driving a nice
car in nice clothes and was well spoken and had no priors would he have been
treated the same? I don't think so, particularly if it appeared he had means
to get a good lawyer.

Please don't misunderstand, I'm not saying racism isn't an issue. It is and it
exists. But the problems with police brutality seem almost as much a class
issue. In fact you can see no shortage of black cops. But the problems still
keep happening. Addressing this is long overdue but perhaps the lens should be
expanded?

Thought #2:

People believe and are suggesting to make their voices really heard engaging
in violence and unrelated property destruction is appropriate. I guess the
thinking goes this will force systemic change.

Here's the systemic change I see coming from that. Increased support for
surveillance. Scaring the average joe middle class person into voting for law
and order candidates. A few hundred people rioting aren't going to overturn
capitalism. Capitalism is well embedded and a little scratch isn't going to
harm it, nor is this kind of behavior likely to change public sentiment.
However it does make it easier to lump everyone (rightfully) upset with police
brutality into the camp of crazy destructive anarchists. So I think it's going
to turn out to be a counterproductive move. The massive peaceful marches were
much wiser and also get effects believe it or not. When elected politicians
see that many folks that energized they ignore at their own peril.

~~~
Jun8
Ross Douthat's opinion piece from two days ago backs your Thought #2:
[https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/opinion/sunday/riots-
geor...](https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/opinion/sunday/riots-george-
floyd.html)

------
js8
I think clearly USA is on a brink of a revolution. When I was a kid, I had a
peaceful revolution in my country (Czechoslovakia). Here's roughly what
happened and I think is relevant:

\- A student protest was beaten by the police, which shocked the nation. More
mass protests were organized. You're at that point now.

\- A week later, there was a general strike. It was more a symbolic one (I
think it was a day). I think it's good to organize it because it signals to
the elites and everybody - this is serious, and the citizens are willing to
solve the problem peacefully and constructively. The protests can be easily
misconstrued in the media, the general strike cannot.

\- In our case, the general demands (IIRC) were as follows:

1\. Make constitutional changes to remove the single party (the communist
party) from power.

2\. Organize a free, special elections, which would allow newly formed parties
and other candidates to run.

3\. Free all the political prisoners, and honor the general declaration of
human rights in practice.

\- As a result of this, a provisional cabinet (kind of compromise between the
current elites and opposition) was established, which realized these goals in
the timeframe of half a year.

I think in your case, you should organize a general nationwide strike, and
demand the following:

1\. A constitutional reform to end dual-party system in the US, i.e. allow
more candidates and parties to run, forbid all the shenanigans around voting
(like electoral college and gerrymandering and queues at polling stations and
obscure voting methods and machines), reform the campaign financing.

2\. A special elections (starting on federal level, going down eventually)
under this better system.

3\. A constitutional police reform, which will put more oversight over all the
civilian and military intelligence agencies that you have in the U.S., both
federal and state level. (Possibly from an independent, randomly drawn body of
citizens.)

I believe these are demands that most Americans can agree on, so the real
change is possible.

------
tobyhinloopen
love that guy. Great write.

~~~
vixen99
For those who have a different view (if that's allowed)

[https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/obama-
administration-...](https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/obama-
administration-scandals-coming-to-light-legacy-in-tatters/)

~~~
saagarjha
> if that's allowed

Please don't.

FWIW, I see little relevance of the article you just linked in what appears to
be a conversation of the former president's writing abilities.

------
aSplash0fDerp
This really has become a convoluted issue about identity, coming from the
perspective of a caucasion male.

Having no direct or indirect involvement with "class warfare" and "culture
clashes", I think most individuals are trusting that government
representatives (who many want to vote out anyways) will not milk a crisis for
every penny, but instead inact meaningful reform.

Once we see autonomous delivery of work (physical production, not digital)
spread in the developed world, it will be a great relief knowing that
everybody can make a living without having to interact with groups that choose
not to (if they desire).

The solution will provide a safety net for everyone (females, single parents,
working aged adults, etc) and keep the emotions out of the equation.

Its already sickening...

~~~
aSplash0fDerp
Just downvotes and no retort?

[https://www.huffpost.com/entry/george-floyd-cup-foods-
police...](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/george-floyd-cup-foods-
police_n_5ed548d6c5b667aaa22ea396)

It was all over a shop owner losing $20.

Fortunately, creative WFA solutions will allow individual freedoms to blossom
again.

Time is still the most valuable Commodity in the 1st world.

------
amoorthy
Some amazing comments on this thread. Thank you!

If you're looking to take an actionable step to help with racial injustice
consider supporting the Equal Justice Initiative. (eji.org). Inspiring org and
a leader we would all be proud to support. I donated and my grad school class
is pooling in together to do the same.

I'm also talking to my children about the role they can play in quelling
racism when they see it. I need to do better myself. Change starts with us.

------
aerodog
What significant thing did he achieve in his 8 year presidency regarding
police brutality?

Malcolm X conceived of things much more honestly than Barack Obama:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiSiHRNQlQo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiSiHRNQlQo)

------
drudru11
I miss this guy

------
softwaredoug
Are we headed for a system wide collapse (in the US, but perhaps elsewhere?).

The current environment is one of crisis mounting on top of crisis, each with
increasing urgency and each never getting solved.

Just to count them

\- issues of executive power concentration (pre trump even..), now alongside
corruption and ignoring rule of law

\- US overextended and largely illegitimately engaged militarily across the
world

\- mass surveillance without consent

\- covid & associated economic devastation

\- racial justice

\- unending sense of riots, damage etc..

A friend of mine lived in East Germany when the Wall came down. I recall there
was one event after another that eventually culminated in the collapse of East
Germany and communism.

Is the US experiencing something similar? Not just in terms of government
effectiveness but even legitimacy?

~~~
eanzenberg
No, it’s just the media narrative you’re seeing. Not reality.

~~~
softwaredoug
Which parts are the media narrative?

The “imperial presidency” is part of an ongoing trend of increasing executive
power for decades. High unemployment from Covid is objectively true.
Ineffectiveness combating Covid at a Federal level is hard to debate...

~~~
AnimalMuppet
We used to have media that tried to be objective. They produced an Overton
Window that was pretty centrist.

Those days are gone. Now we have Fox with a clear bias or slant, CNN with a
clear bias to the other side, and NBC somewhat more centrist but still not
objective. (If you want relatively unbiased US news, try Reuters.)

That's bad enough. But people don't just get "news" that way; they get it from
Facebook and Twitter. The "news media" is now the people that you subscribe
to, whether or not they know what they're talking about. If they feel like the
system is failing, the narrative you see will be that the system is failing,
_whether or not it actually is_.

Then you have people trying to manipulate that feed. Start with the two
political parties. They try to get the feed to say "You _have_ to elect us!"
One way to do that is to manipulate the feed so that it indicates that the
system is failing because of the other party. There are also far-right and
far-left activists, who want to manipulate the feed so that people think that
the system is failing due to both parties, so that people will turn to the
extremists as the only hope.

And _then_ you have foreign disinformation campaigns, deliberately trying to
destabilize the US. "Your country is failing" is a _great_ narrative for them
to foster in order to destroy peoples' faith in the viability of institutions.

Look, the system isn't in great shape. The imperial presidency was a thing
clear back with Nixon. It got beat back with Watergate, but it's been growing
again. Competence in government has also been... let's be charitable and say
"not always as evident as we would prefer". But it seems to me that there is a
media narrative (or mostly "meta-media", if you want to use that term for
Facebook and Twitter) that is far stronger than the circumstances warrant.

~~~
Avicebron
I recommend to everyone that they read jurgen habermas' "The Structural
Transformation of the Public Sphere", we are eroding our ability to have
rational communication. I won't say it's deliberate, but it feels that way.

------
Folcon
I could be completely off base here, but I see a lot of discussion around how
to elect the correct people when I personally think that a more important
issue is "how the sausage gets made".

Politics is about compromise and deal making yes, but it should also be about
looking at the problems that plague society and trying to find a solution that
does the most good while incurring the least harm.

But when decisions are made that significantly affect the lives of a group of
citizens is there any effort made to consult with them? Or do they just get to
find out when their life get's turned upside down?

How much of the process is about what's convinient for who's currently in
power or currying favour with them than trying to take apart problems that
affect the citizenry and make a best effort at a solution?

Part of my thinking on this came from reading about and hearing how vTaiwan
was used to try and decide how to legislate how Uber would be treated there.

Full disclosure, I've only read around the topic, I may get details or points
wrong. I'm only mentioning it here because I've not spotted it being discussed
and I think it's relevant.

An overview is here for you to look at [0], however please read around it
yourself if you want more detail =)...

At a high level, they broke the process down into several stages: 1) Contact
the stackholders and inform them a decision is being made and provide a place
for engaged citizens to participate. This encompases fact finding as well as
translating complex areas like legal information to be understandable to the
general public. 2) Allow people to air concerns and highlight potential
issues. Try and understand what groups exist and what they want, ensure that
participants who will be significantly affected have a proportional voice.
Treat this as a period of relflection so people can get a deep understanding
of where things are. 3) Take subject matter experts as well as appropriate
voices in industry and have them study what was produced in the prior stage,
then have them put together a series of briefings and Q/A sessions designed to
dispell common misconceptions brought up during the prior stage and put
together a series of clear proposals that can be enacted outlining the pros
and cons as such as feasible. This will help educate the public as well as
give them a much clearer idea what the state of possible outcomes are. At this
point the public are actively able to question and ask for more detailed
information around the proposals on offer. 4) Take the proposals that were the
outcomes of the prior stage and turn draft it into a law.

Note that I'm not saying tech is the solution here, just that we might want to
think more broadly about what the problem is.

And now it's way past my bedtime, I'll respond to any replies after I get up
=)...

\- [0]: [https://www.centreforpublicimpact.org/case-study/building-
co...](https://www.centreforpublicimpact.org/case-study/building-consensus-
compromise-uber-taiwan/)

------
dirtyid
Flagged / dead again. As with most posts about current turmoils.

~~~
m4r35n357
Possibly the article was considered too positive for some elements?

------
m4r35n357
Now unflagged. Good.

------
HorizonXP
META: Not sure why this was flagged/dead? I just vouched for it. Is it because
it's political and not strictly about tech/hacker news?

I'd argue that current events have a direct impact on all of us and this
absolutely warrants discussion. Furthermore, I'm not sure I know of any
instance where a President has disseminated writing like this. It's an
interesting change, since it means that former Presidents can continue
exerting influence.

~~~
dqpb
I think political content is discouraged here because of an assumption that
politics is inherently unreasonable and trollish. But politics, government,
society/culture are as much a system with dynamics as anything else, and we
should be able to discuss that here. And as systems-thinkers, we should hold
ourselves to a higher standard of thought and discourse.

~~~
jtr1
I really appreciate this way of articulating it. There are responsible and
constructive ways that we can discuss politics in this forum and I hope that
adopting a systems mentality can help us sidestep tribalism and put problem-
solving at the center of the discussion. There are obviously still questions
to be resolved outside of a systems discussion, like values and the proper
ends for politics, but I often find that if you dig into those with humility
and curiosity, there's more commonality than most people realize.

------
user982
Obama presided over the deaths of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Freddie Gray,
and so many other black victims of police violence which sparked very similar
protests/riots and birthed the Black Lives Matter movement. Then, as now, he
had the same blanket denunciations of civilian violent resistance, support for
militarized police crackdowns, and anodyne advice to vote your killers away.

Those responses clearly produced no real change from those turning-point
moments. Why would we hope they will in this one?

------
clairity
> "So the bottom line is this: if we want to bring about real change, then the
> choice isn’t between protest and politics. _We have to do both_. We have to
> mobilize to raise awareness, and we have to organize and cast our ballots to
> make sure that we elect candidates who will act on reform."

obama spends the first 7 paragraphs explaining the ideals of government and
the vulgarity of violence, and somehow ends up on this "bottom line": let's
both (peacefully) protest and politic.

with all due respect, his perspective is subverted by the unique privilege and
prestige that only comes with being a past president, from having played the
game and won, and reads as out of touch with the needs and desires of most
black folks. those folks are tired of waiting and being told to be nice and
polite and civil while the police kill members of their community at random.

let's appreciate the need to work the political system the way it was designed
--to be slow, deliberate and inefficient--but let's not lose touch with the
long violence and oppression of the system against people of color,
principally black and brown folks. let's not lose touch with the immediacy and
direction of the need that necessarily supercedes slowly meandering civil
discourse.

~~~
hkai
> police kill members of their community at random.

I understand your emotion, but saying that the police walks in the street
killing random black people is also unproductive.

You can imagine folks on the right showcasing your post as an example of the
"loony left", then starting a discussion about the fact that more whites are
killed by police, and so on.

Each time that happens, you lose a tiny bit of support, and that hurts what
Obama thinks is important - the election outcome.

~~~
dthul
> saying that the police walks in the street killing random black people is
> also unproductive

It's unfortunately true though. We have seen countless examples in the last
few years alone where the victim was murdered by a cop. And those are only the
ones that were recorded and managed to go viral.

