One building was burned, and that seems to be about it. It seems that 99% of the activity going on is definitely "protest" rather than "riot"... so far. Which means there's still a good chance of the police not doing jack shit about this guy until rioting DOES become widespread - the police are afraid of riots, but they know how to suppress protests just fine. As MLK said, "A riot is the language of the unheard." There's national media attention right now, but we'll see if that results in anyone actually listening. If not, I suspect there might be an actual riot, instead of sparse flareups of idiocy, but violence and destruction is what you get when the authorities will notice nothing else.
If it's a language of the unheard it's a language no one understands because all it does is give the police the narrative to increase their power and allow any legitimacy in your message be swept under looters.
A liquor store was looted, a QuikTrip set on fire, a tire and rim shop was looted, the local Wal-Mart looted, a Walgreen's looted, the K-Mart Pawn shops looted, some cars, a gas station was set on fire (some rioters had death wishes?) and there was firefights between police and rioters which has resulted in one hospitalized. That's only from the things I know of myself. If anything can be learned from the London riots is that violence against yourself is by nature self destructive and does not even make your message heard as the media WILL solely focus on the violence to exclusion of all else.
Of course, with Ferguson police quoted as saying "Bring it on, you motherfucking animals, bring it on", and the mayor reneging on his promise to release the name of the officer, and the policesoldiers launching gas canisters at people's homes and forcing news media out of the area at gunpoint (military-grade gunpoint), I have a suspicion they aren't particularly interested in listening. Best bet might be if some greater city or state authority just outright disbands the fuckers.
I don't think the Mayor releasing the name of the officer is a good idea, whether it be to calm intense riot-passions or to protect an individual before a proper investigation has been conducted. Either the officer is innocent or the officer is guilty, either way releasing the details runs the risk of starting a mob hunt and Lions defend their own. By military grade weapons, what do you mean? And in the end chances are you're not going to get the police to listen if the police are in on it, but by going around rioting you're mainly just alienating the people that matter and that's other people. Get popular support and politicians have to listen, and in the end change is effected.
Disbanding the police altogether is also an awful idea. Definitely scale down on the amount of force they have available.
Anonymous is sort of a vague entity, and somebody majorly tampered with two of the city's websites before "anonymous" put out that statement. So I think I have to call you wrong on that one. What makes you say that Anonymous is dead, anyway?
Anonymous is a vague entity because it is not an entity, there was nothing distinct about them. In popular consciousness the anonymous "hacktivists" all quit, got doxxed, sent to jail or are probably working for the governments of the USA and UK. The first flag that points to you being rused is that the moment large amounts of MS Sam messages started appearing declaring that "Anonymous is against David Cameron putting cameras in televisions" or "Anonymous is for justice for jesus" and more specifically "Anonymous is against whoever I don't like," it stopped being used altogether almost immediately and by god, they're actually using hashtags. So you know whoever's made this is just imitating any other of the AnonOps on youtube. Hey, who knows. Maybe there is a hacktivist out there bricking people's emails, but they're not the super 1337 haxl0rds who know linux and ate sony for breakfast. The whole thing doesn't even read like something Anons would have done, old Anonops are too offensive for me to transcribe, this one seems more like an occupy wallstreet rally as written by someone on the bottom of the privilege pyramid. The intro itself is probably the most damning thing as it's just lifted from a year old youtube vid meant to act as a template for introing other "Anonymous" vids.
This. I can understand why rioting would seem immature and pointless, but I think it has its place. That doesn't make it a pure and wholesome activity which the participants only do after much thought into the meaning and repurcussions, or that it's always proper and that there are never better options. But sometimes it is the only means a population has by which to make the statement "We're here. Fucking notice us. Take us seriously. We're ready to fight if you don't." And it's looked to me like there is a history of rioting or the clear threat of rioting being a necessary element to the prosecution of an officer.
People will notice the crowd, notice the people looting and surmise that the rally and the riot are one and the same. Likewise as has been brought up every time some unfortunate American tries convincing anyone that their private armoury could challenge the American state, no one can challenge the American state. Gandhi's the only way to go, he didn't just choose peaceful protesting because it was the moral thing to do he was also pragmatic about it, having served alongside the British army he realized a violent independence movement would have been dashed across the force of a superior army, and the American police alone are better equipped than some nations' armies. Have you seen American "rescue" vehicles? That is not a fight you will win. One minute you're there protesting, the next you're there rioting and before long you're on the ground. The difference between the outrage of Michael Brown's shooting and whoever else it was that just got shot by police in the riots is that the former was unarmed and the latter was, even if we assume the latter attacked the police over the former the former has raised the issue of police brutality onto a national level of awareness whilst the latter merely jeopardizes any chance of anything constructive being brought out from this.
This interview is relevant. It's from some guy called Darcus Howe talking about the London riots, or more specifically not talking about the London riots. He did his best to talk about the plight of youths and the shady circumstances of Duggan's death and these sort of people were swept aside because people only remember the wankers looting stores for luxury items who knew nothing of the protests and only heard on facebook and twitter that rioting time had begun.
And now the posterchild of the Ferguson riots won't be Michael Brown, it'll be this twat:
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