Comments like this are why I don't really buy the "distraction" framing. Folks will bend over backwards to find any pretext justifying the murder of people they don't like, no distraction necessary.
Maybe in some circumstances, sure. There is good reason not to like this person, who demonstrated the will and ability to hurt or even kill innocent people.
By fleeing the police who murdered him? I appreciate that you can’t drop the façade for even a moment or the whole house of cards comes tumbling down, but I just want you to know that no one is actually fooled.
Sorry, not trying to use innuendo! I’m explicitly saying that you’re using a post hoc justification for Nahel Merzouk’s murder because you’d already decided that it’s okay for police to murder people like him.
What does "people like him" mean, is that some racist dog whistle?
> you’d already decided that it’s okay
Before I heard his race, yes. Based on the fact that he'd risked people's lives before they stopped him and he was trying to flee to do it again. The police gave him a warning and a chance to surrender.
> to murder [him]
Shooting a violent criminal to prevent imminent further violence is the epitome of justification.
> I just want you to know that no one is actually fooled.
I assure you, no fooling, that I'd support shooting whatever color of criminal was driving the car.
My thoughts are with the pedestrians they nearly hit and those people's families, and the police officers who risked their safety to stop him.
A “violent criminal” who had never hurt anyone or been convicted of a crime? Whatever you say, man. It’s pretty clear what you’re doing here. We’re not going to be able to agree, so I’m ducking out.
Joyriding and fleeing police at high speed through a city is a violent crime. He doesn't have to be convicted - they witnessed it. They told him he'd be stopped and yet he chose to endanger more people trying to escape lawful custody.
> never [...] been convicted of a crime
That's the injustice. He'd been arrested for resisting arrest just the weekend before and if they treated him properly he'd have still been locked up - unable to get himself killed.
> Whatever you say, man. It’s pretty clear what you’re doing here.
You're race baiting. You're taking something an entirely understandable reaction to violent crime that happened between two people of the same race and are distorting the facts to play it up as some systemic white supremacy despite that a whole country has been thrown into violence and people have already died for that lie.
You're trying to get people killed and stoke tensions to support your politics at home because the lives of these people (French people, sit down) are worth so little to you that it's a game.
All I’ll say is that the police statement and the video of what actually happened are both available. So to anyone reading this: you can decide for yourself how reliable the cops are as witnesses. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Nahel_Merzouk
Nobody is disputing the reckless driving before he got stopped and that's all that matters. The cops weren't chasing him because of racism, they were try to stop a dangerous driver joyriding through traffic.
For whatever reason he didn't stop when the police had their guns on him and he tried to escape in the same car he'd already endangered people's lives with. Had he let the police remove him from the car he wouldn't have needed to be shot to accomplish it. He's endangered people's lives with his car, it's a weapon and he should be treated like an active shooter when he tries to flee with it.
Consider the rights and feelings of the pedestrians he almost hit and their families and communities rather than the gang banger. (If it helps you have empathy, imagine that they - the real victims - might also not be white.)
> Consider the rights and feelings of the pedestrians he almost hit and their families and communities
I don't think "we should stack up feelings against a human life" (or "we should stack up their right to feel safe against a right to be alive") is a winning argument.
There were options for diffusing the situation that didn't involve killing a man. People are justifiably angry they weren't taken.
> There were options for diffusing the situation that didn't involve killing a man.
Those were explored, in the time they had, but in the end he accelerated away.
> People are justifiably angry they weren't taken.
No, they aren't, they're all lying. They say stuff like "he was shot at a traffic stop", pretending he hadn't just sped through crosswalks and didn't have a history of resisting arrest. They don't care one bit what was tried, only that they've got a martyr for their class warfare.
> I don't think "we should stack up their right to feel safe against a right to be alive" is a winning argument.
That's not quite what I said, but regardless it is a winning argument. That's why the police officer has more donations than the joyriding criminal.
> That's why the police officer has more donations than the joyriding criminal.
That implies the officer has the support of the moneyed class, not the most people.
Pitting the moneyed class against the people has historically gone poorly in France. Best of luck to them.
ETA: It is entirely possible that the shooting of Nahel Merzouk was completely legal and the law says there should be no repercussions for the officer who shot him. That's rather the problem: the people, it seems, are tired of the arrangement the law presents and feel powerless to change it.
> That implies the officer has the support of the moneyed class
Who do you think is walking through the city and driving to work? The idle rich?
The joyriding criminal was in a $100k car, he was hardly a worker.
You've got the class situation exactly backwards.
> It is entirely possible that the shooting of Nahel Merzouk was completely legal and the law says there should be no repercussions for the officer who shot him.
The people of France, and everywhere else, want the police to stop criminals from joyriding through their neighborhoods.
> That's rather the problem: the people, it seems, are tired of the arrangement the law presents and feel powerless to change it.
No, the rioters aren't "the people". They're generally also child criminals and race-baiters (his mother) and they're just upset that one of them got the consequences of his dangerous actions.
The vast majority of the population, including pretty much the entirety of the working class, do not support the riots or the rioters or the criminal.
I wonder if this is what the bourgeoisie had themselves convinced was the case in the late 1700s before the Bastille was seized. After all, only about 600 people participated. Hardly "the people," not by a long shot...
> I wonder if this is what the bourgeoisie had themselves convinced was the case in the late 1700s before the Bastille was seized.
This guy was a criminal who preyed upon and endangered the working class. He didn't sell drugs to Macron's kids, or speed through a crosswalk where the elites would walk. That's why the riots are getting so little support from the average person, even other Algerians, despite the media telling us this riot is for them.
The rioters claim to be upset over a situation that nobody would have a problem with if anyone else had gotten shot, and which the media would have ignored if it hadn't fit the USA's racism narrative.
The point is not arguing whether Nahel Merzouk was breaking the law, or whether he was a danger, or whether the shooting was legal.
The point is that the law that made the shooting legal may be sour. It puts a lot of power over life and death in the hands of law enforcement. It's also new for France; the authority to shoot drivers when the officers are in no imminent danger is only a power they have as of 2017.
The Bastille was stormed on the rumor that Louis the XVI was going to arrest the National Assembly, not on action taken. Just as these riots are fueled on the risk of what on-paper authority has been given to French police: if they decide you could be a risk to other people and you move your car one inch, your life is legally forfeit (their call, and you'll be too dead to offer counter-testimony). People believe that bargain of safety vs. their right to life is untenable, and don't believe the system is set up to allow them to change it legally. Hence, the riots.
Earlier, you said
> The people of France, and everywhere else, want the police to stop criminals from joyriding through their neighborhoods.
No disagreement, but I think the concern is the people of France don't want so much risk to their own right to life to protect the community's right to life. Letting the cops decide whether "You probably need killing; you look like a threat" is a huge power to hand to them, especially through the lens of out-groups vs. in-groups and subconscious assessments ("I have this power to protect the people from terrorists; this guy looks like a terrorist, therefore...").
> the authority to shoot drivers when the officers are in no imminent danger is only a power they have as of 2017.
That's not relevant here - they've always had the ability to shoot drivers who are using their car as a weapon or otherwise endangering the public. There's never been a time officers haven't been allowed to use lethal force to stop a deadly crime in progress.
> I think the concern is the people of France don't want so much risk to their own right to life
The only people who seem to be upset about this other than literally other child street criminals in France, are upper-class liberals from the USA who see it as an opportunity to push the racism narrative.
The law abiding people of France don't see themselves in this guy's shoes - fleeing from a justified arrest and endangering people. They see themselves as the people almost killed on the crosswalk, or in almost hit driving their kids home from school.
> Letting the cops decide whether "You probably need killing; you look like a threat" is a huge power to hand to them
The police didn't arbitrarily decide this guy was a risk, they had witnessed him risking people's lives just moments before. They shot only when he took off again.
I think we saw the same video and are arriving at different conclusions about the fact pattern, so we likely will not see eye-to-eye. At no point when the officer opened fire was the driver in imminent danger of harming or killing anyone. I agree the driver may have been about to become a danger again; there are myriad ways to deal with that (cutting the driver off with backup, for instance) that don't result in an immediate loss of life.
You see a justified shooting likely (definitely?) preventing other deaths. Those setting town halls on fire do not.
> The law abiding people of France
Again... The law-abiding people of France ca. late 1700s obeyed the orders of their King. Until a revolution swept that entire pattern away. Recoursing to "The law-abiding people's" behavior as inherently correct, just, or righteous fundamentally misunderstands the nature of why riots happen or what effect they intend to have.
> there are myriad ways to deal with that (cutting the driver off with backup, for instance)
Your ideas involve letting him flee and trying to stop him, which is how they got to this point in the first place. What happens when they cut him off and he just speeds off again, or dives onto a sidewalk to make his escape?
> You see a justified shooting likely (definitely?) preventing other deaths.
Justified because it stopped the risk.
> that don't result in an immediate loss of life.
The criminal who risked other people's life lost his, not an innocent person. Those are not equal outcomes.
> The law-abiding people of France ca. late 1700s obeyed the orders of their King. Until a revolution swept that entire pattern away.
The law abiding people decided they didn't want a king and they made it happen. The power of the masses.
> Recoursing to "The law-abiding people's" behavior as inherently correct, just, or righteous fundamentally misunderstands the nature of why riots happen or what effect they intend to have.
You keep shouting out to the revolution kind of like you'd enjoy watching another, but the point is that "the people" aren't upset about this situation. This is their police functioning as intended.
Pretty much everyone is France is sick of the riots and the rioters.
Oh, so all the justification the police need to strip someone of their rights (or life) is to... Say they need to be stripped of their rights (or life)?
Who has the power in France? The People or the cops?
The police have the power to strip someone of (some of) their rights. It's called arrest. Since there are people out there who won't respond to a stern glare, that power is kind of necessary.
Now here's someone who resists arrest. Yes, the police have the power to use violence in that situation. What's your alternative? A stern glare?
Ackshually, no. They have the legal power to detain you for the purposes of figuring out if they need to arrest you. If they had to have proof, and a conviction, to show that someone was guilty before detaining them they'd never be able to arrest them to take them to court and have them convicted in the first place.
What you're saying is somewhat relevant to false arrest, where a police officer is acting outside his legal role.
In this case though, they had a duty to remove him, even with deadly force, from the car which he'd just risked people's lives with, above and beyond their power to arrest him after removing him from the car.
Every driver who was fleeing at high speed through civilians, and who attempts to do it again, yes. Absolutely.
It's literally the time they're supposed to shoot.
I'll quote US law here because it's in English, but it's pretty much the same worldwide.
> "1-16.200 - DEADLY FORCE - Law enforcement officers and correctional officers of the Department of Justice may use deadly force only when necessary, that is, when the officer has a reasonable belief that the subject of such force poses an imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to the officer or to another person."
Fleeing wouldn't be enough, but fleeing in a car after reckless driving that already endangered civilians is.
Additionally, he ran through the cop that was propped up on the hood and windshield of the car. We hear the engine rev up, and he accelerates away. It's egregious.
"les conducteurs n'obtempèrent pas à l'ordre d'arrêt et dont les occupants sont susceptibles de perpétrer, dans leur fuite, des atteintes à leur vie ou à leur intégrité physique ou à celles d'autru"
meaning, "drivers do not comply with the stop order and whose occupants are likely to perpetrate, in their flight, harm to their lives or bodily injury or to those of others"
> Were these men speeding through civilians or fleeing dangerously when they were shot?
No, the men in your stories were sleeping in their cars. One was shot 55 times.
The driver in France had just been witnessed fleeing through civilian traffic and crosswalks. They saw him commit a crime and try to flee to continue risking others' lives. He was shot once, only when he tried to escape.
What do you think these stories have in common?
> Do you want others to make the same excuse as you if you were shot by the cops?
If I was risking other people's lives by fleeing from police and used deadly force to try to escape, then yeah. It's not "an excuse", it's their literal job. They tried to detain him peacefully.
He said this so people argue about whether or not videogames make kids violent instead of question why cops are shooting unarmed kids.
It was a distraction. It appears to be working.