Everything Everyone Is Getting Wrong About Police Brutality And Racism, And What Can Be Done To End It

By John Paluska, Founder of The Daily Fodder

NOTE: If you come to agree with what is in this article, PLEASE share it to show your support. It's time for honest conversations about racial issues and police reform.

The misinformation about the protests and progress in race relations in this country is manifold. To date, people across the ideological spectrum believe straight misinformation fed to them by different news outlets. This has helped fuel tensions and division rather than unity between the different mainstream political groups in this great country that used to be a haven of freedom, economic prosperity, and charity.

As I write this from my place of dwelling, America is currently embattled in an invasion and people are mislabeling that invasion as a protest against racism. To be clear, there ARE peaceful protests happening over George Floyd. And, to be clear, I support them.

But what people DON'T realize is a concerted effort by the press to connect the peaceful protesters with the agents of chaos that are being coordinated across the country to destroy the country we know and love.

If you don't believe me, I'll prove it:

As per the AP's front page:

Note how the article's first paragraph says the violence was "set off" by George Floyd's death.

This is COMPLETELY FALSE. In fact, the AP actually told people this in a lone article they wrote on it. But I have also written about it extensively. Here's a snippet I wrote about what we know:

Additionally, the Associated Press reported that experts tracking the situation have found anarchist symbols and white supremacists and other such associations with known extremist groups in the US.

Further, the Detroit police chief reported that most arrests were from people who didn't even live in the city. And another AP report commented that officials across the country are all blaming different groups for their individual protests, proving they are all attacking at once.

Further, Minnesota's governor commented on reports that DRUG CARTELS are involved in the protests, as NBC News reports.

Further, Attorney General William Barr has spoken about it too:

 Unfortunately, with the rioting that is occurring in many of our cities around the country, the voices of peaceful protest are being hijacked by violent radical elements.

Groups of outside radicals and agitators are exploiting the situation to pursue their own separate and violent agenda. 

In many places, it appears the violence is planned, organized, and driven by anarchistic and far left extremists, using Antifa-like tactics, many of whom travel from out of state to promote the violence. 

 The fact of the matter is, the violence we see is not over racism. It is by agents of chaos who are invading this country. The plan is to get President Trump to declare martial law so the people pulling the strings can appear and take control of the country.

Don't believe me? The press has been flaunting with the idea of Martial Law now for days. In addition to that AP screenshot, Reuters currently has this:

But what's more. They've also completely downplayed just how VIOLENT it is out there right now. I wrote previously about it here:

Recently, reports of peaceful protests being hijacked by anarchists, white supremacists, antifa, and even drug cartels began to show the dire situation of these agents of chaos making war in our cities. But things only seem to be getting worse, as gunfire, brick throwing, and attacks on the White House turn already violent riots even more violent.

As the Associated Press reports, 5,600 people have been arrested as of today. Previously, the number stood at 4,100, meaning ARRESTS BALLOONED UPWARD 39% in just one night. But it gets worse. . .

Missouri's WCSC reports that 4 officers were shot.

 It's official at this point. The cities of our country have turned into war zones. People are dying because extremist groups are out there raising hell. We know they're being paid to do it. 

I mean, shoot, here's one of these rioters taking about it candidly with a local media crew.

There is a literal WARZONE out there. Police are taking fire from these agents of chaos. There have been strange piles of bricks that showed up on Monday that the agents of chaos have been using for the attacks. This isn't fake news. This is reported by real news agencies. All of this sounds nothing like protests but more akin to the guerilla warfare in Vietnam and Iraq.

Despite what ANYBODY says, these are NOT race riots. This is a coordinated, planned attack. This is an INVASION. And it is PLANNED. It injected itself into peaceful protests about race but in reality wants and has nothing to do with them. The best thing for you to do right now is NOT JOIN THE RIOTS. Don't give the guerilla troops any more bodies to use to bring about anarchy and martial law. Protest during the day when it's safe. And make sure you SHARE this information with others so they know that engaging in the riots is not for racism but to bring about martial law.

If you know anybody who will be out and about protesting at night, alert them that there are trained guerrilla warfare fighters and homegrown terrorists who likely enter their protests and use them as an excuse for their ultimate goal of taking down the country. Show them this article or others like it and encourage them to follow the article links. Let them come to know the truth for themselves.

Myths and Lies Concerning Racism and Police Reform That Everyone Probably Believes

Now, let's actually get to the bottom the reason the PEACEFUL protesters are out there: racism.

First off. YES. There's racism in the police force. NO. It is not systemic. There is no bogeyman or central commission telling cops to attack black men. There are simply too many bad cops who go on to do racist things while wearing the badge. 

First off, to those who do not believe there is racism in the police force, I'd like to direct you to the following study of Chicago police that The Intercept reported on:

The data shows not only police shootings, but also thousands of regular police uses of force over more than a decade — involving an average of 10 people every day — documenting cases in which officers tackled, tased, or used other types of force on civilians, nearly 90 percent of whom were people of color. The data provides a more detailed look at the pattern of unconstitutional force discovered by the Justice Department investigation that opened shortly after the release of the McDonald video.

But this isn't just in Chicago. A meta-analysis by the Bureau of Justice Statistics in 2015 also brought up problems in police in regard to racial bias:

When police initiated contact, blacks (5.2%) and HIspanics (5.1%) were more likely to experience the threat or use of physical force than whites (2.4%), and males (4.4%) were more likely to experience the threat of use of physical force than females (1.8%).

So, yes. There is racism in the police force. But what everyone fails to do is comment on how the situation is getting better. How race relations have, despite what the news media say, been getting better and politicians have been trying to do their part. In fact, that same Bureau of Justice Statistics report stated police use of force has declined over the years:

The number of persons experiencing police-initiated contact fell by 8 million (down 23%), the number of persons who initiated contact with the police fell by 6 million (down 19%), and the number experiencing contact from traffic accidents did not change significantly.

But even further, in that earlier Intercept article I quoted, it also states the following:

In late July, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan announced their plan to fix the Chicago Police Department. The 225-page draft document provides a detailed proposal for police reform, to be overseen by a federal judge.

The "plan," as linked to in the Intercept article states:

The State, the City, and the Chicago Police Department (“CPD” or the “Department”) are committed to constitutional and effective law enforcement. In furtherance of this commitment, the Parties enter into this Agreement to ensure that the City and CPD deliver services in a manner that fully complies with the Constitution and laws of the United States and the State of Illinois, respects the rights of the people of Chicago, builds trust between officers and the communities they serve, and promotes community and officer safety. In addition, this Agreement seeks to ensure that Chicago police officers are provided with the training, resources, and support they need to perform their jobs professionally and safely. This Agreement requires changes in the areas of community policing; impartial policing; crisis intervention; use of force; recruitment, hiring, and promotions; training; supervision; officer wellness and support; accountability and transparency; and data collection, analysis, and management. 

And, according to media reports, it was enacted and the reforms outlined in it were made: 

A report says the Chicago Police Department failed to meet most of its deadlines in a far-reaching court-supervised reform plan, but has made progress.

The first progress report filed Friday shows 37 out 50 missed deadlines during the first six months of implementing the consent decree, a court order outlining reforms, including on use of force. However, the report noted the city met obligations after deadlines.

The reforms are the culmination of a process that started with the release of video in 2015 showing a white police officer fatally shooting black teenager Laquan McDonald 16 times.

The latter part of a plan for reform being implemented never made national headlines. It was not talked about, but it DID happen. This is important, because when you constantly tell people of a problem but never reveal there was a solution that was implemented, people come away thinking all hell has broken loose and there is nothing anyone is doing to stop it. They come away with a marred and inaccurate perspective. And it makes them needlessly angry, depressed, worried, and feeling powerless.

But getting back on topic, Chicago was not the only city to dole out police reforms, In 2015, the Department of Justice forced a whole set of police reforms on the nation in various cities. The outcome, according to The Washington Post, had mixed results:

In Detroit, the Justice Department forced reforms on police after officers fatally shot 47 people, including six who were unarmed, in five years. The overhaul took 11 years and eight police chiefs.

In Los Angeles, Justice intervened after police officers in an anti-gang unit were accused of beating and framing people. The reforms cost taxpayers an estimated $300 million.

In New Orleans, Justice stepped in to overhaul the police department after officers over 17 months shot 27 people, all of whom were black. The changes have fueled departures from the ranks and deterred some officers from proactive policing. 

These are some of the unintended costs of federal intervention at agencies where the Justice Department found police had committed civil rights violations, according to a review by The Washington Post and the PBS series “Frontline.”

Over the past two decades, the Justice Department has undertaken its deepest interventions at 16 police departments that had patterns of excessive or deadly force, implementing reforms under the watch of independent monitors. More than its predecessors, the Obama administration has aggressively pursued police departments over the abuses, recently launching probes after individuals died as a result of encounters with police in Baltimore and Ferguson, Mo.

So reforms have been in motion to reform police departments for years. But NOBODY talked about this. You didn't hear Don Lemon opine about it. You never heard a single Fox News host mention it. It never made the front page of AP News or The New York Times. The reviews and progress on reforms slipped quietly into the night. 

But instead, what the media ARE reporting is inflammatory stuff like Mark Cuban's letter, which essentially tells white people to do better. Well, contrary to Cuban's thoughts, white people HAVE done better. His accusations are totally baseless and they lump in the majority of white people who hate racism and want to see it end with the small minority of KKK wackjobs and neo-nazi crazies.

If you look at live footage that was recorded from the peaceful protests, you'll see THOUSANDS OF WHITE PEOPLE PROTESTING. Just have a gander at these actual recordings of the protests and count the number of white people there:

I'm showing this to disprove the narrative that white people don't care or think the problem is non-existent. We do care. I'm white and I'm writing this article. Whites are also are out there protesting with blacks over police brutality. Clearly many white people care or else thousands of them wouldn't be out there hitting the streets peacefully protesting.

I'm not writing this to say the reforms are done. Nor am I writing this to say reforms are useless. On the contrary, Minneapolis, before the death of Floyd, was coming on the heels of some SERIOUS PROGRESS on police reforms. Something no other news outlet even bothered mentioning. And on the AP, it was an article anyone who didn't scroll down to the "latest articles" section would have missed. Because it never even made it to the front page or anywhere else other than a 3 hour tops stint in the "latest articles" section that you must scroll down for a long time to arrive at. It was also, to my knowledge, the only article that mentioned it in the scores of articles that the AP published about the Minneapolis situation.

I'm simply saying the hunger and thirst for reform in the police is THERE. You who are protesting peacefully and talking about police brutality and filming it are BEING HEARD. There are people in your corner. The world is not completely against you. You have sparked interest and reforms. There is movement happening. BUT, you didn't hear about it because the freight-train-sized evidence of it was scantly reported on or even suppressed.

What we must do now is talk about what reforms we want made. We must come together and rally behind a set of reforms we want accomplished. And we must channel the conversation to the proper channels: the state, federal, and local governments that are open to implementing these reforms and can put them into practice. We must sign petitions. We must talk to police. We must bombard our representatives with calls. And we must spread the truth about police reforms and police brutality and racism. Because without doing this, without saying WHAT we want, without giving people the facts, we might as well not say anything at all.

So, in the spirit of this endeavor, I have put together a few suggestions. If you like them, then share them. Tell your governor about them. Circulate petitions to get them enacted or considered in your local and state governments. Write them on social media. Bring them up in conversation. Make signs about them. Let's get some good reforms going. I shall call them the 3 C's of Cop Reform:

The 3 C's of Cop Reform:

1. Cameras
   Police shall wear button cams and begin recording for every altercation they are in. Likewise, citizens shall take measures to record police in action from the moment a the police stops them. No footage that begins halfway through or only once the arrest is made. That footage helps no-one because we do not even know how that situation developed.
2. Community
   The police and the community will get to know each other. This was how it was in neighborhoods for many years. There should be meetings multiple times a year between cops and the members of their community. These should be engagement meetings, where cops and fellow citizens gather together side-by-side and do activities together.
   Likewise, cops will be assigned certain locations they patrol. This would help foster identity and also improve officer intelligence of the community they are policing. If officers get to know the ins-and-outs of their area of reach, and they make an effort to reach out and talk to fellow citizens, then they can make better decisions about who might be dangerous and who is not. They also will be less likely to make a mistake because they know the people. Think Andy Griffith but in real life. 
   Andy Griffith was an AMAZING sheriff precisely because he knew the town very well. He knew its people. But he also was not afraid to do his job, and people respected him for it because he did his job well, and they knew who he was. If Andy Griffith had no idea who the townspeople were, then he likely would have made far more mistakes than he did.
3. Coolness
   Police training will include as a requirement handling violent and dangerous situations. Police will go through Krav-Maga-like training where they are attacked in the dark, when they are choked, bitten, attacked violently, etc. They will be trained how to react and act when someone is threatening their lives so that, when the situation actually happens, they will have a coolness and react better, since their training closely resembles what happens in those situations.
   Police will also engage in rigorous gun training with paintballs at close range. This ensures they feel pain if shot, much like in real life. And that way can more closely mimic what would happen in a real life-or-death situation. The cops will be trained how to disarm someone with a gun in this manner, where pain to the officer if he messes up is a part of the disarmament process, just like in real life.
   These reforms in police training should breed better, more-skilled cops that will handle life-or-death situations with a better, cooler head. It will also make them much more advanced fighters, which will help protect the community more.

When you protest today, or when you post on social media, think about what you want the end result to be. Don't just say there's a problem and charge people to "do better." Inform them. Tell them what you want. Get a movement going. I wrote this article to help start that. Lets do something great.

HELP STOP THE SPREAD OF FAKE NEWS!

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