@juliamacfarlane You are free to speak whatever form of English you like, but here in the US, it's soccer. If you say football here, everybody thinks...
@jchmcl09@RBrookhiser In contrast to what I've seen since the 1990s and since, there was no big deal made over the loss--I recall asking workers in the main library at WSU why the flag wasn't at half-staff and they looked at me like I had 6 heads.
If one group of people think the law shouldn't apply to them, that leaves two options:
1. We just let that group get away with murder, resulting in an eventual break-down in social order.
2. We enforce the law and hope that they eventually learn that laws apply to all.
We want to talk about optics and reform. Boy, am I ready! We should reform! We could use policing as a counter-example.
Because it's really very simple. If a whole bunch of Americans think the existing process is racist, then it actually is racist. That's how this stuff works.
@svenbrimstone You're right about connected people and celebutards being very entitled, it's a self-correcting problem though, since ambitious prosecutors love to make a name for themselves by getting a conviction.
Let's take these lies one by one...
Lie 1: "Karmelo was invited to the tent."
That was the defense's theory and it was rejected. The one kid who supposedly knew Karmelo, Edwin Parra, took the stand and distanced himself. Witnesses said Karmelo sat uninvited and refused to leave when asked. Repeatedly.
Lie 2: "The twins were harassing him."
Austin told him to leave. Hunter told him to leave. Telling a stranger to get out of your team's tent is not harassment. One witness testified Austin was calm and said he didn't want to fight and asked Karmelo to leave a dozen times.
Lie 3: "Then all of a sudden they changed their stories."
What actually happened: a dozen teenagers gave slightly different accounts of how hard a shove was. That's what real eyewitness testimony looks like by the way. Most prosecution witnesses said the same core thing the whole time. Anthony was the aggressor. Nobody changed their stories.
Lie 4: "An all white jury."
False. Three of the twelve jurors were minorities. Asian and Indian. Six of the eighteen, counting alternates. It was not all white.
I think you just have to ask yourself whether the right to vote by mail is something so fundamental to your conception of democracy that you are unwilling to compromise on it.
Because, I have to say, on the other hand, “Black people get policed the same way everybody else does, even if this result in disproportionately more Black people in prison” actually is a hard line for me. We’re going to police everybody the same. We’re not going to make exceptions for groups that get arrested a lot because they’re frustrated about that.
@svenbrimstone I've seen a ton of people in the last couple of days who seem to think it's unfair for a black man to go to jail for stabbing a kid in the heart.
The first time I saw a solitary Japanese Beetle, I was delighted by the beautiful iridescence.
Years later, when a plum tree I had planted became infested with them, I was not so delighted by them any more.