A report in the New York Times:
The looters tore off the plywood that boarded up Macy’s flagship store in Herald Square, swarming by the dozens inside to steal whatever they could find before being chased down by the police. Others smashed the windows at a Nike store, grabbing shirts, jeans and zip-up jackets. They crashed into a Coach store, vandalized a Barnes & Noble, ransacked a Bergdorf Goodman branch and destroyed scores of smaller storefronts along the way.
The eruption of looting in the central business district of Manhattan — long an emblem of the New York’s stature and prowess — struck yet another blow to a city reeling from the nation’s worst coronavirus outbreak.
The mayhem late on Monday night and into the early morning marred otherwise peaceful protests conducted by thousands of people across the city in the wake of the death of George Floyd, and it touched off a new crisis for Mayor Bill de Blasio.
Beginning Monday afternoon and growing wilder as night fell, small bands of young people dressed mostly in black pillaged chain stores, upscale boutiques and kitschy trinket stores in Midtown Manhattan, as the police at first struggled in vain to impose order.
Within hours, the normally vibrant center of wealth and upscale retail had descended into an almost clichéd vision of disorder: Streets were speckled with broken glass and trash can fires. Bands of looters pillaged stores without regard for nearby police officers. The screech of sirens echoed between skyscrapers.
By the early morning hours, a sense of lawlessness had set in.
After a weekend filled with shocking scenes of looting, scuffles between the police and protesters and destruction of police cars, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Mr. de Blasio announced Monday afternoon that they would deploy twice as many police officers and impose an 11 p.m. curfew.
The curfew succeeded in ending most of the peaceful protests before midnight. As for the looters, it seemed only to embolden them to start earlier in the day. Even before the curfew took effect, the mayor announced Monday night that the curfew on Tuesday would begin at 8 p.m. Protest organizers adjusted their schedules accordingly, timing Tuesday’s demonstrations to begin earlier in the afternoon; at least two were to begin in Manhattan before noon.
On Monday, protesters sometimes deputized themselves to stop the destruction and stealing. When one group shattered the windows of an Aldo shoe store in the afternoon, protesters rushed forward to push them away from the store, pulling one young man out of the broken window as he tried to climb inside.
“Stop doing this!” one distraught woman yelled, her friends holding her back as she lunged toward the looters. “George Floyd’s brother said not to do this! That is not what this is about!”
Several reporters and photographers for The New York Times witnessed numerous scenes of people setting upon storefronts all across Midtown. The police at first appeared outnumbered before eventually massing reinforcements and making arrests.
The mayor and police commissioner have attributed some of the violence during the protests to unidentified groups from outside the city and state, but there did not seem to be evidence of that overnight.
The Police Department said it had made 700 arrests, by far the most of any night since the protests began last week, and that several officers had been injured, including one being treated at a hospital in serious condition.
The mayhem was perhaps most serious at Macy’s flagship on 34th Street, one of the largest department stores in the world. Video showed scenes of chaos as fires burned on the street and looters began gathering in front of one of the blocked entryways.
One man repeatedly kicked the plywood as cheers erupted from other looters. When the door was broken, people raced inside, followed later by police officers dashing through the aisles, trying to catch them.
The Police Department confirmed on Tuesday morning that many looters had made it inside Macy’s and that “enforcement action” had been taken.
At a Nike store, dozens of people, mostly teenagers, broke in the front glass and entered the store, grabbing jeans, jackets and other apparel as the security alarm blared. Looters scurried in and out of the store, blanketing the sidewalk in empty hangers, while crowds of protesters berated them from the street.
“That’s not what this is about!” one group chanted.
Several minutes later, police sirens could be heard in the distance. But when officers arrived, they were too late: both the looters and the protest march they had splintered away from were long gone.
As Midtown drained of demonstrators, more swarms of marauders poured into the streets, smashing shop windows and rushing through already broken-into buildings.
As they hopped from store to store, they grabbed clothing and tried to grab jewelry from lockboxes. But many high-ticket items were left untouched. On Fifth Avenue, a crowd smashed the window of a Camper shoe store, but did not take the pair of $800 sneakers advertised prominently by the entrance.
A different group shattered the windows of a boutique tea shop, leaving a traffic cone hanging, nose out, through a hole in one of its windows. But they disturbed almost none of its merchandise, creating a surreal scene of smashed glass and delicate, carefully preserved tea sets — their bright red cups and saucers balanced in an avant-garde display.
It seemed for some that the desire to steal was less alluring than the thrill of destroying and, with few police officers cracking down, relishing in a powerful feeling of impunity.
Along Broadway, roving bands of young people dashed between destroyed stores and biked freely along the empty roads. Even as rows of police vans flanked the surrounding streets, the looters seemed to know that they were winning the game of cat and mouse with the police.
“They’re looting, causing damage, they didn’t come here to protest,” said one security guard on Broadway between 37th and 38th Streets, who declined to give his name. “One kid flashed his knife at me. It’s just a bunch of kids, no adults.”
Around 9 p.m., the guard watched as looters shattered the storefront at an Urban Outfitters two blocks away. The group then tore through the store, leaving hangers, clothes and display stands strewn across the floor in their wake.
An hour later — while the police stood within sight — people peered in to assess what merchandise was left. One man in a red sweatshirt jumped through a shattered glass panel and emerged seconds later with two large boxes in his hands.
On Fifth Avenue, Cartier, Gucci, Versace, Armani, Zara, and Salvatore Ferragamo had all armored their stores with plywood to protect against the swelling theft.
Others were frantically trying to do so, even as the looting wore on: At 10:45 p.m. outside a Santander Bank on 35th Street, construction workers sawed pieces of wood and boarded up the bank as small groups of young people passed them on the street and rummaged through already shattered stores.
On Seventh Avenue, Heidi Murga, 34, watched as a group of people broke into a FedEx store. After the looters dispersed, Ms. Murga, who works as a broker and lives in Midtown, decided to stand guard outside the store to ward off other bands of looters.
“I’m just going to stand here and pretend it’s my store, it’s what I can do,” she said. “This is not protest, this is violence, completely.”
She added: “I don’t like this at all, this is not the city I moved to.”
By the time the citywide curfew went into effect at 11 p.m., the mood had darkened: an air of anarchy seemed to metastasize across Midtown.
Just after 11, a group of looters approached Madison Jewelers on Broadway, where the glass storefront lay shattered, and forced open the store’s metal gate. With the store alarm blaring, young men foraged inside and dozens of others rushed to the scene. When an unmarked police car with its lights on passed the scene, it paused briefly — and then continued down 37th Street.
“This way! This way!” one looter yelled.
Minutes later, two police officers on bicycles sped toward the crowd, sending people fleeing down Broadway. The cops threw one man to the ground, but as they hand-tied him, another man in a gray sweatshirt pelted two large rocks at the officers before he was chased away.
An hour later, around 200 people flooded into Seventh Avenue chanting expletives about the curfew. As they approached two police vans, the cars pulled away — prompting a wave of applause from the crowd.
“If you want to peacefully protest, stay inside!” one young man bellowed through a megaphone. “If you want to do whatever you want, stay out here.”
When the group happened upon a New York-themed gift shop whose storefront had already been smashed open, they ransacked the store once again. As they tore through the merchandise, one person lobbed a Statue of Liberty figurine outside.
It landed, fractured, in the street.
This is a nightmare, reminiscent of scenes from one of those dystopian action horror films like Purge or Escape from New York. The far right neo-Nazis are cheering this sort of thing on because they would love to have a race war. I’m worn out from all this combination of disasters and crises.
““If you want to peacefully protest, stay inside!” one young man bellowed through a megaphone. “If you want to do whatever you want, stay out here.”
Where were all these reporters and photographers who supposedly witnessed this and could not bother to take a photo to identify this man? Who is he? Where is he from? What are his politics? When did the NYT stop hiring real journalists?
Who are the FIRST people who break into a store?
I am starting to wonder if the NYC police are intentionally ignoring the instigators. But if the media and public are on the look out for white men with backpacks and handy supplies that allow them to break in who are often the ones starting this, and and document this publicly, the police could not ignore and try to blame only the followers.
The photos of the destruction after give a misleading sense of what is going on. The ones who are STARTING this must be identified. There should be a concerted public appeal to everyone at those protests to look out for the instigators who are there to discredit them and follow them and film them and publicize their faces.
Document the instigators. Videotape them. Don’t confront them, just videotape them and post it publicly so they can be identified. And media, stop focusing on the followers and looking at who is starting this and brought the supplies needed to cause the destruction, which most protesters would not be carrying.
NYCParent: This related from the Washington Post, The Daily 202 this morning:
“Local officials blamed white instigators for mayhem in some protests.
“In some cities, local officials have noted that black protesters have struggled to maintain peaceful protests in the face of young white men joining the fray, seemingly determined to commit mayhem,” Isaac Stanley-Becker reports. ‘From Baltimore to Sacramento, black protesters … were filmed protecting storefronts and placing their bodies before police barricades to preserve principles of nonviolence, and to prevent backlash disproportionately aimed at them. Videos emerged, too, of them confronting white demonstrators. … /‘Don’t spray stuff on here when they’re going to blame black people for this,’\ a black woman said in challenge to two vandals outside of a Starbucks in Los Angeles. … After reviewing footage of the weekend’s events, Jenny Durkan, the mayor of Seattle, said she feared the black community would shoulder the blame for havoc others caused. /‘It is striking how many of the people who were doing the looting and stealing and the fires over the weekend were young white males,’\ Durkan (D) said in an interview. …
“’In East Liberty, a gentrifying neighborhood of Pittsburgh, a young black protester delivered a case of bottled water to a phalanx of police officers standing guard at a demonstration on Sunday outside of a Target store. /‘With all this stuff going on, I just wanted to spread the positivity,’\ said Alexander Cash, 23, who lost his job at a nearby Residence Inn because of the novel coronavirus pandemic. /‘It doesn’t matter if it’s one or 45 cops standing there. I can walk up to them and still be peaceful.’\’
“Separating protesters from vandals is not easy, experts say. ‘Looking at demonstrators as one singular group with one unified mission oversimplifies protests and who tends to show up at them, said Dana R. Fisher, a University of Maryland sociology professor who studies protests and social movements,’ Marisa Lang reports.
/’There are the folks who genuinely want a peaceful protest and all the young people who have over the last several years gotten really good at civil disobedience, which, by the way, does not include throwing rocks at police.’\ ‘After weeks of economic devastation wrought by shutdowns that have shuttered businesses and pushed the national unemployment rate to nearly 15 percent, Fisher said, those who might not have otherwise participated in looting may have joined in when the opportunity presented itself.’” END QUOTE
“those who might not have otherwise participated in looting may have joined in when the opportunity presented itself.”
Yes, that is why it makes me so angry that the media is focusing on those people instead of the instigators. Those instigators know that people suffering may loot or destroy if the opportunity presents itself. But those white instigators start it and slink off (as we have seen in so many videos) after treating any African American protestors trying to stop them with the same racist disdain as the white police officers.
there should be a public call for everyone at those protests to capture video of those white instigators and follow them at a safe distance (not try to stop them) and use social media to identify them. They slink off as soon as they get what they want, which is to discredit the Black Lives Matters movement (because they are actually right wing white supremacists) or to use it for their own ends (because they are white anarchists).
NYC Parent: I guess some just don’t see the bigger picture, or don’t care about it . . . like some teenagers;; and some who remain adolescent in attitude all of their lives, like many smokers I know: “I can do things to kill myself if I want . . . and you cannot stop me . . na na na.”
Like Trump supporters–they’ll always be with us (sigh). But the “bigger picture” of human dignity for all remains and I think that’s coming forward well, at least I hope so. CBK
Not sure where you are, but in NYC it is dangerous. A delivery man on 34th and 3rd was robbed at gunpoint during the march down 3rd Ave. A group rushed an apartment building last night and beat up the doorman. When a senior woman took out her cell phone to call for help, she was cornered. My son-in-law’s friend came to her assistance. He was badly beaten. The fire department came so the perps ran away. Why anyone is defending criminal, violent behavior is beyond my understanding.
carolcorbettburris Where am I located? I am in a suburb of LA–about 40 miles s/se from center stage LA. Our local CA/LA news showed ALL KINDS of peaceful protests, but also a good amount of looting (close-up), and a few burning cars, but where it looked to me like young people holding armloads of stuff and having a good time being chased by the police. Some were picked up by waiting cars (I assume in communication via cell phones).
The national news I watched (MSNBC/CNN/PBS/BBC and some others), went from city-to-city where there occurred the whole spectrum of events–even where police knelt with the protesters; and then where there was violence on both parts–the people and the police–and all in-between.
I felt no fear–perhaps because it’s not down the street from me; but then again I’m 73 and went through the 60’s, the John and Bobbie Kennedy, King, and Malcolm and Medger Evans assassinations, the LA riots, the Vietnam protests (with a husband “over there”); the famous Democratic National Convention, . . and then there was Kent State where the national guard shot at several students, killing one and wounding several others. I do think things got better, but . . . still, a long way to go. CBK
Thank you. I feel like I’m losing my mind (moreso than usual).
I am certainly not defending violent behavior and I don’t think anyone on this thread is.
I am just pointing out that the police were able to arrest Chiara de Blasio and many others for “unlawful assembly” and they should be arresting the people acting out violently instead.
They are not the same people, but there does seem to be a concerted effort by some police to act as if they are the same.
Your love of Mayor DeBlasio is touching. Governor Cuomo warned today that DeBlasio was so ineffective that Cuomo might take over NYC.
Not being a New Yorker, I find these posts to be so disheartening. One of the things I’ve long loved about the city is how safe I felt being there anywhere, anytime. I always chuckle during Kojak episodes or, more recently, rewatching The Taking of Pelham 1, 2, 3. Let’s hope this ends soon and doesn’t become a justification for my worst fears at the national level. Sending whatever good karma I can.
Thx
Whatever agreements or disagreements we may have–and we will have many of both in the future–I hope, the fact that we are here–even though we may never meet–tells me we have more in common than not. Wishing you all the best and wishing I could do more than send platitudes. We are living through the worst time in American history since Dec. 7, 1941. It’s time to embrace our strengths and differences. I wonder what our world will look like one year from today. The worst case is unimaginable now. The best will be that we survived it and see a path forward.
Diane,
I don’t love Mayor de Blasio, but I like Mayor de Blasio 100x more than I like Andrew Cuomo. I respect de Blasio for being one of the only white politicians in this city for standing up against stop and frisk and other aggressive police tactics when it was UNPOPULAR and Cuomo was still defending them and getting political mileage from discrediting the police reform movement.
Citing ‘A Violence Problem,’ Cuomo Calls on New Yorkers to ‘Respect the Police’
November 03, 2015 | by David Howard King
Gov. Cuomo with graduates of the state police academy (photo: Governor’s Office via flickr)
Governor Andrew Cuomo is concerned that New York City is sliding backwards when it comes to order, citing disrespect for law enforcement as a key example and decrying a lack of leadership in allowing what he sees as an unacceptable atmosphere to permeate.
In comments to reporters after the recent killing of NYPD Officer Randolph Holder, Cuomo took veiled shots at Mayor Bill de Blasio and lamented the state of society when it comes to respect for the police. Calling violent incidents against police officers “troubling signs,” Cuomo said, “I believe we’ve had more police officers assaulted in New York than any city in the country.”
….
Saying that he understands police officers feeling unsupported and repeatedly stressing in a frustrated tone that New Yorkers must “respect the police,” Cuomo not only intimated that he believes de Blasio has allowed an anti-police environment to take root, but raised eyebrows among some who see the governor’s comments as vilifying the police reform movement.”
Yes, call me crazy, but I don’t trust Andrew Cuomo for a minute because he does not care at all about what happens to African Americans who are suffering from police brutality except to consider how he can use them politically.
And yes, call me crazy, but unless the rumor that the NYPD has some blackmail ability over de Blasio is true, I think that the Mayor cares about what happens to African Americans in this city and when he is caught between a rock and a hard place has been known to make mistakes. He has made mistakes during this time but this idea that Cuomo can save the day because he cares and de Blasio doesn’t just seems wrong.
The police DESPISE de Blasio and they love Cuomo. I don’t see any of Cuomo’s children getting arrested by the NYC police for simply being present at a non-violent assembly of concerned people.
And it is clear there is an organized attempt by groups of people to disrupt the protests and destroy and last night they ignored Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Queens to focus on Manhattan to discredit the BLM movement (which they do not support).
If this violence and destruction was really some organic reaction that happens in protests, you would have seen it in Brooklyn last night. Instead, it was in Manhattan and the fact that the police seemed not to care speaks volumes about the NYPD. Blaming de Blasio is like blaming Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey for the Minneapolis police that has shown itself to be much worse than NYC.
In fact, that is exactly what has happened. The democratic governor of Minnesota is blaming Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey.
“As Minneapolis burns, mayor takes heat for the response”
“First-term Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey appeared to be doing everything right.
He worked with the city’s booming business community and the City Council. He reached out to minority neighborhoods and advocated for affordable housing. He implemented stricter disciplinary measures against police who violated the city’s body camera policy.
When George Floyd, a handcuffed black man, died Monday after a white police officer pressed his knee into his neck for several minutes and ignored his “I can’t breathe” pleas, Frey quickly expressed outrage and called for charges against the officer. Four officers were fired the next day, and on Friday, now-fired officer Derek Chauvin was charged in Floyd’s death.
But Frey’s leadership is being questioned after police failed to quell three nights of looting, rioting and fires that followed Floyd’s death. Frey, who pleaded for calm, also approved the decision to abandon the city’s 3rd Precinct station on Thursday night, surrendering it to protesters who set fire to the building.”
Jacob Frey made the same mistakes that de Blasio made. I don’t know if the Minneapolis police hate Frey with the extreme passion that the NYPD hates de Blasio, but for both of them, they are getting attacked from both sides for being too soft and too harsh!
…send more than platitudes… WordPress!!!
Have you not seen any of this stuff happening? Are you not in the city right now?
I am in Brooklyn as I have been throughout the pandemic. I have not seen any people with megaphones extorting people to “do whatever you want” — I would definitely have taken out my phone to record it. I have only seen video taken by others — not just in NYC – of individuals who were clearly hijacking peaceful protests for purposes that had nothing to do with their concern for racist policing.
FLERP!, you have every right to be upset if your property is being damaged. I am outraged that you have to experience that when I recall that you were feeling the stress from the shelter in place orders already.
Can you see who is doing this on your block? Is it stupid teens just looking to use this to break some things? Do you think it is organized and looting? I am very sorry you are experiencing this and I wish the police would focus on the people causing the problems, instead of arresting peaceful protesters. Because it does seem as if there are a lot more peaceful protesters and not nearly as many people causing that destruction.
Packs of young people, both men and women, generally in their teens and 20s. There is a mixture of atttudes that range from gleeful (but not the kind that inspire glee in the beholder) to menacing. They were generally not “white.” I don’t know what they did with the rest of their day, it’s possible they were attending rallies or marches earlier. But it did not seem spontaneous. It seemed like the kind of thing that was planned, i.e. a plan to destroy and steal as much as possible, with the knowledge that the police were either overmatched and unable, or unwilling, to do anything to stop it.
FLERP,
Perhaps you might address your thoughts to Dienne, who seems to believe that these actions you describe are laudable.
I’d rather not.
If it seemed planned, there is almost always someone leading it.
The NYT article almost made it seem as if the police were driving by those people and focusing on the ones who were peacefully gathering. How did Mayor de Blasio’s daughter get arrested – with others – for “unlawful assembly” while the people who start breaking store windows get ignored?
Newark, NJ seemed to remain peaceful and I doubt that would have happened if hoards of marauding teenagers were doing what they seemed to be doing on your block. I think the instigators have ignored Newark so far, and if they decide to target that city, if the Newark police decide to ignore them and instead arrest the peaceful protestors, it will exacerbate things, not calm them down.
I am not saying that all the young people on your block were plants, but that there may be someone there trying to normalize their behavior so they act out in ways that kids of similar age are not doing in Newark.
But I’m very sorry that this is happening to you and it is absolutely wrong and I understand why you would be upset.
It seemed planned in the sense that a “flash mob” is planned. There did not appear to be any “leaders.” It was pretty much anarchy. I highly doubt there were “plants” there. I’m mentally unstable these days, but that seems too conspiratorial and doesn’t gel with what I saw.
Unfortunately, anarchy is what the leaders may be after.
I just don’t think it is a coincidence that this isn’t happening in Newark or even in Queens or Brooklyn or the Bronx.
The NYT described it is “small bands of protesters dressed mostly in black”. And they were ignoring the real protesters telling them to stop.
Meanwhile the police still seem to be focusing on rounding up the peaceful protesters.
I hope they can put an end to those people who want to loot and vandalize tonight so you have some peace, FLERP!
I’ve seen the black-clad protesters. Those are the ones I’d characterize loosely as “anarchist” types, for lack of a better term. I definitely saw a lot of them at protests over the last few days. I saw a lot of the same types back in January when the subway vandalism happened. If you go on YouTube and look up videos of clashes between “Antifa” and Trump supporters, or the videos of the clashes between “Antifa” and the “Proud Boys” in Manhattan last year, you’ll see the same type. They’re generally (although not always) white. Anyway, that is definitely not who was looting in Midtown.
My own peace is important to me in the near-term, but what really upsets me is the long-term effect that this will have only the city when piled on top of the pandemic and the extraordinary budget problems that NYC faces. This is a real kick in the teeth. I hate to say it but I fear the city will not come back from this for a long, long time.
I am experiencing great guilt being here in NE Ohio, looking out of my window and thinking the worst thing in my life is that my lawn mower died and I need to do something about the rampant growth in my yard. But I guess that’s why I chose to live here. While I’m happy for my family, deep down, I wish could be in the middle of the turmoil somewhere trying to do something positive. Regardless of the world around me, I want to be in DC, NY, MN, L.A…. It’s time to put our lives on the line if we really care about our fellow man and woman.
I hope New York can come together and get through all the insanity and budget crunch.
NYCPSP, re: Newark, it is a very different city. Just 282k people! 86% black & hispanic, w/black son of famous homegrown ’60’s radical poet as mayor, who has been a unifying influence– one of first things he undertook was getting the school system [taken over by state in ’95] back under local control. Newark does not have chi-chi downtown stores to loot. It is still painfully rebuilding from the ruins left by ’68 race riots. (That experience is still a milestone in many memories, & no doubt contributes to evolving police methods.) At this point it boasts large centers for the arts, and some prominent colleges, that draw folks in from surrounding region But you do not have that sense of exclusivity surrounded by poverty that one notes in midtown Manhattan, 5th Ave etc. It is a poor city.
dianeravitch
I am with NYC public school parent on this one. NYPD has a long history of stifling peaceful protest and I have personally witnessed it. While resources are wasted doing so, criminal elements are rampaging away from the protests. .
As for Cuomo, he is the second biggest narcissist in America (and I voted for him 4 times 3+1 primary ) . Who would have thought he would get into a pissing contest with deBlasio. After all his last pissing contest only cost the life of thousands of NY residents as they went back and forth for 2 weeks about closing schools and the city. By the 12th of March NYC Health Commissioner Dr Oxiris Barbot noticing a huge increase in unexplained respiratory ER visits had threatened to quit and go public.
“He don’t close the schools I close the schools ” “He don’t close the City I close the City. ” 10 Days with a virus doubling infections every three.
Joel, in case you misunderstood whatever I said, I am not defending Cuomo. I supported Cynthia Nixon when she ran against Cuomo. He had $35 million (from Wall Street) and she had maybe $1 million. He refused to debate her or even acknowledge her existence. As for DeBlasio, he courted my support when he first ran for office and I endorsed him. I have been disillusioned by his lack of leadership and his poor stewardship of the schools. NYCPSP gets very upset whenever I criticize DeB. That’s her choice. I believe he is all-in for high-stakes testing and has completely abandoned his early opposition to charters.
Joel,
Yep – no doubt Cuomo will get involved and make the situation 100x worse, just like he did with the COVID-19 response.
Instead of making this about how to make things better, Cuomo uses it to belittle the Mayor that the NYPD hates the most.
By the way, I just watched Chris Cuomo’s outrageously pandering interviewing with the white NYPD chief who knelt with the protesters. Good for him, but then the guy completely denied that there was any racism at all in the NYPD! He actually had the chutzpah to say something like “NYPD are just out there looking for criminals”, and Andrew Cuomo’s little brother didn’t even say “do you realize THAT is the problem — that you assume African Americans are dangerous criminals and treat them that way?” Nope, Andrew Cuomo’s little brother just praised how wonderful and fantastic this white NYPD chief was.
It was a shocking example of the clueless white privilege of the Cuomo family. No wonder Andrew Cuomo is such a rabid supporter of charters that suspend as many as 20% of their kindergarten and first grade children — who all happen to be African-American or Latinx — and accepts without question when a white charter CEO labels them all as violent.
When charter CEOs keep promoting as “truth” a racist idea that huge numbers of children in charters that have virtually no white students act out violently at age 5 and 6, should anyone be surprised that the police claim they assumed that the African-American person they just harmed was violent and they “needed” to act brutally toward them just like those charters “needed” to aggressively punish those “violent” kindergarten children who mysteriously keep winning their lotteries?
Diane,
I don’t get upset when you criticize de Blasio! I respect you and respect your opinion!
It is because I respect you that I sometimes try to make my case for why I believe you might be judging de Blasio too harshly, but I hope it doesn’t seem like I am getting “upset” if you don’t agree with me! You don’t have to agree!
I didn’t even think I had commented on your criticism of de Blasio until you seemed to think I loved him. I really don’t — I just think he is sometimes where all his negatives are amplified and all good things forgotten, (like she who must not be named who ran against Trump in 2016.) I didn’t think she was perfect either, but I thought some of the criticism of her was unwarranted.
I completely understand why you are disappointed with de Blasio. But watching as a parent with kids in public schools maneuvering between all the different constituencies, I just don’t think all his negatives (of which there are certainly many) outweigh his positives and what he tries to do even when he fails.
I guess one of the things that made me angriest about Obama is that it felt like he wasn’t trying. With de Blasio I felt as if he was trying, even if he was unable to do what he wanted.
I know he has made many mistakes handling the protests, but I believe he is someone who would look to correct them and not double down. Some people think that is weak, but I see that as what flawed humans do.
And I still think de Blasio is probably public enemy #1 in the charter movement! I know you think he sold out, but they certainly don’t think he did because he won’t give them any more but the minimum.
No one will be happier than I am if the next Mayor actually successfully stands up to the charters. I am waiting to find a candidate that will do that and not simply be much much worse than de Blasio.
My friends tell me that DeBlasio has made his peace with the charter lobby and gives them almost everything they want. For him, it’s a lost cause. His chancellor Richard Carranza seems to be a huge fan of standardized testing. DeB’s political career is near its end. It will be interesting to see where he goes next.
I don’t think de Blasio has much of a future as an elected politician!
I have to defer to your friends’ counsel about de Blasio because I really am just a parent and I have no insider perspective. But I just find it really odd that the two groups that de Blasio supposedly completely gave into — the NYPD and the charter schools — remain the two groups that hate him with the most virulent passion and publicly demonstrate it all the time. So from my non-insider perspective, logic tells me that it is because he is not doing what they want all the time and they aren’t happy. Otherwise, why wouldn’t they just be indifferent instead of continuing to demonstrate such over the top hate? I just don’t buy that the antipathy from charters and the NYPD is just for show. The treatment of his daughter this week demonstrates that the hate is real, and Cuomo would not be using de Blasio as a punching bag if he wasn’t sure that it would please his billionaire funders who love charters. de Blasio could just tell those billionaires to call off their Cuomo dog and he’ll give their favorite charter what they want.
From a parent’s perspective — I think what de Blasio and Carranza did with the standardized testing was pretty great. They minimized the importance of it for admissions (and are continuing to do so) which took an enormous amount of pressure off of students. I don’t think the parents cared nearly as much about kids taking tests as they did kids taking high stakes tests with a lot of pressure to “do well”.
I see an enormous change from Bloomberg to de Blasio. I know that it is never enough, but there was quite a lot of change for the better. District 15 middle school admissions is entirely by lottery. I remember when parents who wanted that first started talking about that years ago and I thought it was a completely unlikely pipe dream. I’m still shocked it happened. Maybe the changes are too slow for some, but I can appreciate how difficult it is to achieve any change that goes in the right direction instead of the wrong one, and I believe that NYC public schools went in a very progressive direction — from universal pre-k to far less emphasis on standardized testing in admissions — under de Blasio.
And it’s funny to me that de Blasio is attacked from both sides — giving in to the reactionary forces, and being a radical socialist. I don’t think either is true – he is a politician who has made compromises and has made some wrong decisions, but from what I see as an outsider, it seemed like those wrong decisions were not because he intended them to have the bad outcome they did. And unlike Trump and Cuomo, he would try to act to alleviate his mistakes.
I really do admit he has a lot of flaws. I just don’t see that those flaws are any worse than the flaws of any other politician and he certainly seems to be trying to make NYC more progressive.
DeB gave up resistance to charters six years ago.
Diane,
I am starting to join your opinion of de Blasio. I have been sorely disappointed at his lack of oversight of the police, who have seemed to now go overboard targeting peaceful protesters. While I have some sympathy for him being between a rock and a hard place — clearly it’s not fair for people like FLERP! to have to experience vandalism every night — it does seem as if the NYPD is being unnecessarily and incomprehensibly aggressive with the people who are genuinely peaceful protesters. Maybe it’s harder to thread the needle between the two, and I know that much of the destructive vandalism has seemed to stop, but I do think it is wrong to treat peaceful protesters as if there is no difference between them and people out to destroy property or loot. And I blame de Blasio for that. He needs to address this, right away. de Blasio must insure that peaceful protesters be treated with respect instead of enabling the NYPD to use unnecessary harsh and provocative tactics against them as if they were looters.
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2020/06/revolutions-are-good-and-should-happen-more-often
Is Lyta Gold yet another white person who wants to hijack the pain that victims of racist policing and their families feel every day “for the revolution”? Where white boys and girls playing revolutionary cause violence and delegitimize the cause that those protesters are protesting for, because all problems of racial injustice will be solved as long as there is economic justice so that is more important?
I wonder if Lyta Gold also railed against the “identity politics” of the democrats and was angry that the democrats actually counted the votes of African Americans in South Carolina when white Bernie supporters pretended they didn’t exist or were following orders from their DNC overlords. I do know that she was still claiming she could not vote for Biden over Trump not very long ago. Of course, as a privileged white woman she isn’t paying the price for the racism fomented by Trump and the enabling and rise of white supremacy.
I do think that it is possible to protest non-violently but in a way that is disruptive to society. That is what Bill de Blasio’s daughter got arrested for doing. Not for destroying property like some privileged white revolutionaries who care more about burning down the system than they care about racism. There have been a number of times when an African American protester confronts a white person causing destruction and they are met with disdain. Not respect.
It is much easier for privileged white people like Lyta Gold to sacrifice Black Lives Matter to their call for revolution because they have never and will not in the future be paying the price. Thus we have Trump.
Could you please provide more information with respect to your racist slandering of “white Bernie supporters” as having tried to suppress voting in South Carolina? Are you referring to the fact that Senator Sanders respected Representative Clyburn’s firm support for Vice President Biden and chose not to lobby or attack Mr. Clyburn for his preference? Why would you suggest that Sanders supporters are racist, when large majorities of Black women and men under 40 supported Senator Sanders? Why would you refer to “their DNC overlords” when all evidence shows how the DNC and its operatives supported Vice President Biden? Where do these nasty charges come from? And what motivates you to attack Sanders supporters at this particular, painful moment?
You didn’t ask me the questions, but I know of no evidence that Senator Sanders’ supporters are racist or tried to suppress votes anywhere. Senator Sanders ran an honorable campaign.
teamwhq,
Can you please provide more information with respect to your slandering me with you racist claim that I said white Bernie supporters tried to suppress voting in South Carolina?
Why are you trying to divide people? If you aren’t voting for Biden over Trump, then you are part of the problem, not the solution.
And taking faux offense at something that didn’t happen is typical of far right propagandists. I did re-read my comment carefully, and I realize that I should have clarified and said SOME Bernie supporters, as I have posted over and over again that the vast majority of Bernie supporters (and I am one) do not do that, but there is a small segment that is still trying to de-legitimize the votes of African-American democrats in the South Carolina primary.
You could have posted that all Bernie supporters are not like that, and I would have apologized for not being more clear in that post because I absolutely agree that all Bernie supporters are not like that because the vast majority of Bernie supporters are listening to Bernie and supporting Biden and understand their most pressing issue is to get rid of Trump. I should have clarified that I was talking about the small percentage of Bernie supporters who still refuse to vote for Biden and are still claiming that the evil DNC “stole” the primary from Bernie.
But that isn’t what you did. Instead, you wrote a misleading attack typical of far right propagandists trying to divide those who recognize the extreme danger of Trump instead of addressing the point of the full comment.
If you aren’t voting for Biden over Trump, you are part of the problem, not the solution. Because you don’t think that 4 years of Trump are enough punishment for the African-American voters who didn’t support whatever candidate you like (and I don’t know if that is Trump or Bernie).
NYCParent As a common method: it bears repeating: “. . . taking faux offense at something that didn’t happen is typical of far right propagandists.” AKA: Strawman arguments, . . . and also an Orwellian moment related to doublespeak. CBK
This is where I live. It was terrifying and shocking to see.
https://www.theonion.com/sweatshop-worker-devastated-to-hear-jacket-she-worked-s-1843834363
But on a serious note. How many words in this scolding and not one of them about police brutality, not even the act of violence that ended George Floyd’s life and kicked off this whole thing? The fact that there is this much hand-wringing about lost corporate profits and not a word about racial or economic justice tells you a lot about why this is happening.
Behavior is communication. You can either listen to what people are trying to tell you, or you can tr to control the behavior as people keep trying to tell you louder and louder. The fact that DeBlasio and other mayors have responded to protests about police violence with more police and more violence is very telling.
“How many words in this scolding and not one of them about police brutality, not even the act of violence that ended George Floyd’s life and kicked off this whole thing?”
This is an excellent point. Thank you.
On the other hand:
Mayor de Blasio’s daughter was arrested at a protest, with the police intentionally tweeting private details that they do not release for any other person arrested. The police hate de Blasio.
I have seen some speculation online anonymously that the police “have something” on de Blasio so he is doing their bidding. I think that is highly unlikely, but I do think that unlikely scenario is far more plausible than any idea that he simply wants to support the police for political gain. I mean, de Blasio was out there fighting stop and making changes while Bernie Sanders and some of his supporters were complaining because Black Lives Matters protestors were interrupting his rallies in July 2015 “demanding that he center the struggle for black lives in his campaign.”
Here is Shaun King — who supports Bernie! — described what happened after those 2015 interruptions:
“A few weeks later, in the wake of those two moments, Sanders met privately with another group of black activists to discuss criminal justice reforms. I spoke directly with many of the attendees that day, including DeRay Mckesson, and was told that the meeting didn’t go well – that attendees sensed very little emotional connection from Sanders and that some wondered if he truly even wanted to be there.”
But the point of Shaun King’s article was how Bernie had transformed in 2018 and seemed to really get it.
The problem is that there are still a small number of his supporters who still don’t get it and believe it is their duty to hijack the Black Lives Matters protests for their own message and what is most upsetting is that they do that from their position of white privilege where other people suffer — the African Americans who are focusing on racial justice which a few white people on the left have no respect for because they insist that only economic justice matters.
I feel as if that earlier article you posted by Lyta Gold was focusing just as much on “revolution” as the NYT journalists was and barely mentioned the RACISM that those people were fighting. Nice to call for revolution when you sit in privilege and it is the peaceful African American protesters who pay the price.
Let us look at facts. Police are killing fewer people in large cities and more in rural areas. I expect you to start advocating for WHITE RURAL RIGHTS, Dienne! Listen to what people (and data) are trying to tell you.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/police-are-killing-fewer-people-in-big-cities-but-more-in-suburban-and-rural-america/
The first job of government is to maintain order so that the society doesn’t descend into vigilante justice. If people don’t feel physically safe, all other considerations will be secondary. Sensible liberals know that fair, effective law enforcement is essential if they want to eventually achieve other goals that they believe advance the cause of social justice. The rioters are turning more people toward Trump’s side every day, as this liberal pundit implies.
https://theweek.com/articles/917408/there-no-justice-until-riots-stop
I think seeing Trump’s “army” attacking peaceful protestors – including a priest! — so that Trump could have a photo opportunity at a church that he has never attended holding a Bible is turning everyone who isn’t a neo-Nazi against Trump.
Every non-Neo Nazi understands that there will always be some rioters who cause the same damage they do after sporting events. Every non-Neo Nazi knows that when some people act out and create damage after their team wins it does NOT mean that all people who attend sporting events are violent and should be thrown in jail for even lining up to go into a sports arena.
Everyone saw the video of Trump’s “army” harming peaceful protestors in front a church so Trump could have a photo opportunity. Only the neo-Nazis saw that footage and said “I’m voting for Trump I want more of that!!”
If there are enough neo-Nazis who go to Trump, well, then that says something about America and those people and their values.
First of all, it was in no way an emotional outburst. It was the most accurate description I could think of and I stand by it. If you view a verbatim quote of the Declaration of Independence as “incivility,” then you really do need a civics refresher (assuming you learned it at all in the first place). The reason I
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Yes, I do put the vast majority of protesters on the same plane as the intent of the founders. Why do you put them all in one basket, calling them “rioters”? Are all peaceful protesters “rioters”? It seems to me that the “rioters” are a distinct minority of the protesters and evidence is grown that a lot of these “rioters” are fascist troublemakers. And those who engage in wanton destruction should be condemned and stopped. But you are not going to paint me in a corner and call everyone “rioters.” Your convolution says a lot about your real motives and lack of honesty.
Now, please explain to me what about “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness” endorses violence? Can it not be do done peacefully? Could not the American Revolution have been a peaceful one if George III accepted their claims? Why to you jump on this as being automatically about violence? Would you have been a traitorous Tory back then? After all, they were all about “law and order.”
I stand by my initial description of you. I’ve got a whole lot more invective I could burst on you, and it would all apply. Sometimes profane language is the only thing that is accurate. It’s no wonder you are a mouthpiece for the sinister, selfish cabal that would kill public education and create permanent classes of haves and have nots. You fundamentally do not understand the founding principles of this nation and the struggles to realize them for everyone, which are ongoing and often messy for the powers that be.
Your desire to hurl more personal invective confirms my last comment. I sympathize with your emotional distress: you’re not used to being challenged by someone who is at least your intellectual equal.
This was not meant for you NYPSP. It was for the charlatan below.
If I’m your intellectual equal, then we’re both in the depths of the sewer. I grew up in the South. Profanity is our first language. G–d-mn WordPress hoisted me again!
I wish you well, John! I’m sure your charter masters have take good care of you and interacting with rabble like me must be great fun for you. But your are and will always be…
John Webster, you are a f^cking idiot. “The first job of government is” NOT “to maintain order so that the society doesn’t descend into vigilante justice.” May I refer you to the Declaration of Independence of what “the first job of government” is: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
Sorry, Greg. That was the Declaration of Independence written by Thomas Jefferson. That is not the document on which our country’s government is based. Sorry to disillusion you.
The fact is, if people do not feel secure in their person and property, nothing else really matters. We shall see the results of this madness in November.
I’m guessing making irrelevant arguments is your thing, Abby. Fifty six men signed the Declaration. They are referred to in history as the Founding Fathers. It was also the declaration of war that was fought by the American soldiers of the Revolutionary War. To propagate the ruse that one man wrote the Declaration and therefore makes it illegitimate (try using that argument in an 8th grade civics class and see how far it gets you) ignores the 56 and every individual who sacrificed to create a fledging nation and their progeny. Six of the 56 also signed the Constitution, along with 33 others. They are referred to in history as the Framers of the Constitution. Both the Founders and the Framers are cited as precedents of virtually every governmental function in our history (too often, commentators conflate the two). We celebrate the Declaration every July 4 because of their legacy. It is not Thomas Jefferson Day. This recognizes the fact that the Declaration embodies the values, ethics and principles of what it means to be American. Is this simple enough for you? I’m sorry that you seem not to have either had or passed civics in school.
GregB, you need to read much more widely and in greater depth if you want to understand the roots of the Declaration of Independence. The philosopher Thomas Hobbes had significant influence on the Founders’ thinking, and he is best known for his belief that humans are born into a state of nature and then ultimately come together to establish societies with a social compact. Part of that social compact is surrendering an unlimited right to vigilante justice to law enforcement authorities. No way would the Founders approve of the chaos and anarchy we’ve seen over the last week. To believe otherwise is to betray one’s deep ignorance of early U.S. history.
John,
Say what you want but don’t call Greg ignorant. He is one of the best informed commenters on this blog.
John, focusing on Hobbes and ignoring Locke, and posting some random article that brushes on both is truly the definition of intellectual laziness. I’ll be happy to provide longer answer on some future date, but no single source can be cited as the primary intellectual influence on the Founders and Framers. In addition to Hobbes and Locke, they were influenced by people as diverse as Bacon, Rousseau, Machiavelli, Vico, and even the ancients like Plato, Socrates, and most all, Cicero. They relied heavily on the philosophies and histories of the Age of Enlightenment. They also relied on the literature of Homer, Virgil, and Swift. They were students of their times and knew instinctively what they didn’t want: monarchy or parliamentary factionalism. They were well versed in the politics of the monarchies in France and Prussia. They were well versed in the factionalism of the Italy and the German states. They knew about the history of the papacy. As Robert Dahl wrote so convincingly in A Preface to Democratic Theory the form of governing they eventually adopted is Madisonian democracy, which tried to create rules that would not allow majorities to overwhelm the interests of minorities. Was it perfect? No. Was it a workable framework for future generations of modify and improve? Yes. And we now see that the primary reason the nation has endured a messy history because of underlying assumptions of tradition (precedent), decency, fairness, and compromise that don’t rest on brute force. But when we have leadership and disproportionate influence of factions that ignore these things, indeed try to kill them as is happening now on my fronts in the executive, legislative and judicial branches and state and local governments, we see the limits of our form of governing laid bare. The death of checks and balances, for example, are a perfect example of this. I suggest you read a bit about Isaiah Berlin’s differentiation between positive and negative liberty. I suggest you pick up some books by Robert Wiebe to see how these ideas have been realized or not throughout American history. I especially encourage you to read Robert Dahl’s discussions of democracy, especially After the Revolution: Authority in a Good Society. But to say Hobbes was THE influence on the founding ideas of this nation is something that would get you a big fat F in any introductory course in American government or political thought. Especially since your argument could easily be used in the same way to justify the existence of totalitarianism. Which is actually more apt.
I didn’t say Hobbes was the only influence, but he was an important influence. You’re basically arguing by implication that the Founders would have approved of the recent rioting and looting, which you clearly try to justify. Ms. Ravitch won’t admit that she agrees with me and disagrees with you on this matter.
I am not in between the two of you.
Of course, I believe that those who run the government must provide safety and security of persons in that society. I also believe they should protect every member of that society and provide equal justice to all. And they should guarantee medical care and free public education through graduate school. I don’t believe the Founding Fathers would approve of a society where people die because they can’t pay for the medical care they need or where people can’t participate in their democracy because they were not educated.
Show me one example of where I have “argu[ed] by implication that the Founders would have approved of the recent rioting and looting, which [I] clearly try to justify.” Just one. We saw the Hobbesian nightmare in action a couple of nights ago near the White House.
Let’s look at the sequence of comments. In my first comment I wrote that “The first job of government is to maintain order so that the society doesn’t descend into vigilante justice. If people don’t feel physically safe, all other considerations will be secondary.” You responded with a hostile emotional outburst: “John Webster, you are a f^cking idiot…” You then quoted the section of the Declaration of Independence that justifies the armed rebellion against the existing British government.
You weren’t just disagreeing with me on a minor point regarding political philosophers, a disagreement that wouldn’t invite incivility. You responded so angrily because you viewed me as attacking your moral view that the rioters are on the same moral plane as the American revolutionaries of 1776, i.e. they are trying to overthrow a repressive system. That’s your argument by implication – why else did you refer to the Declaration of Independence in the context of my comment criticizing the rioters?
Coincidentally, I’m currently reading “The Righteous Mind” by Jonathan Haidt. He describes in great detail the mindset I’m referring to, a mindset that we all fall into quite frequently. Haidt’s book deserves the high praise it received.
See above for my response to you. Clicked the wrong post.
Just read Gen. Mattis’s statement, John. Read it if you have the stones to do so. Seems like he interprets the link between the Founders and the response today much like I do. Guess he’s on the side of the so-called protesters you disingenuously conflate with “rioters.” I’ll be happy to provide a list of profanity that applies to you if Diane would allow it.
Looters Read?!
And sometimes, readers loot! Or was that lute? At least some of the musically inclined readers. Looting lutes had to be a thing somewhere, sometime in medieval times.
If you look for Andrew Kimmel on Twitter you can see a series of tweets about how cops in Minneapolis slashed all four tires of every single car in a parking lot they overtook and also destroyed a medical encampment set up there.
Do you condemn this kind of looting and vandalism as strongly as you condemn people breaking into corporate chain stores?
I condemn police brutality even more strongly than civilian vandalism, because the police have a duty to protect us. All of us. If you read the article in the Los Angeles Times that I posted, the stores that were destroyed were not corporate chains. They were small businesses that someone poured their life savings into. Do you condone smashing the windows of a small bike shop and stealing all the bikes? Do you condone breaking into and looting businesses owned by black proprietors? Do you understand that the civil disorders of the 1960s elected Nixon? Do you not understand that criminal behavior advances the re-election of Trump?
. . . a news video piece in LA showed a line of around 8 white men standing in front of the owner’s small business store holding rifles and guns. The reporter asked if they were supporting the protesters’ movement–the owner said (paraphrased) I’m not supporting anything.
I’m just keeping looters from breaking into my store. CBK
The stock prices of gun manufacturers has soared, I heard on the radio.
This is a list of ten things a Bernie supporter has said Democrats could do to mitigate the unravelling of our nation. I do not agree with all of them but they highlight the role of money in politics, in support of police, and much else leads to inaction.
https://sirota.substack.com/p/10-things-dems-could-do-right-now?token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo0MDU3MDYxLCJwb3N0X2lkIjo1MTE3NzUsIl8iOiJNUWpDKyIsImlhdCI6MTU5MTEyNjk5MywiZXhwIjoxNTkxMTMwNTkzLCJpc3MiOiJwdWItMzc3NzgiLCJzdWIiOiJwb3N0LXJlYWN0aW9uIn0.O5eoSSqBLjy6Ab3qzZIS1jBJbHv4pHYnAPa93cDpasg
And everything Sirota is asking for would have been significantly easier to achieve without a right wing Supreme Court (Citizens United might already be ended) and with a Democratic president.
I hope there is some kind of action the House can take, and maybe some of this would be helpful, but it’s kind of frustrating to see someone who kept harping that it didn’t matter if the executive branch and supreme court and entire federal judiciary were completely taken over by the far right lecturing to the half of the one branch of government that isn’t entirely taken over by the right wing about how they have all kinds of power to do things and they are entirely to blame for not doing it.
If you allow the far right to be entirely empowered by owning the executive branch, the supreme court, the federal judiciary because you don’t think it matters if they are completely empowered, it seems rather hypocritical to then demand that because the democrats control half of one branch of government, they should solve the problems that your vote to empower the right wing caused.
First empower the democrats to the fullest extent and then demand that they do things. it’s ridiculous to empower the far right and then demand that the democrats, with their limited power, stop them, and blame them for not doing so.
Obama was way too conciliatory, but part of it was because the Republicans held complete filibuster power in the Senate and at the time it was unclear whether destroying the filibuster was going to come back to haunt democrats. Hindsight is 20/20 and if the Dems win the presidency, senate and house, they can make the Republicans pay a huge price for ending the filibuster and push a lot of progressive legislation through. But first they need to win all 3 branches. First they need to be empowered instead of those who intentionally disempowered them then turning around and lecturing them about not stopping the rise of the far right.
And because of Trump, the dems have to achieve that with a right wing federal judiciary and Supreme Court which makes it much, much harder.
On yesterday’s Vice News there was coverage of demonstrations in various cities. In Minneapolis and St Louis police were filmed deliberately squirting non-aggressive protesters and members of the press in the face with mace. The police also shot non-violent protesters with rubber bullets. There is no need for such aggression. Looting and destruction of property must stop, but the police need to stop using Gestapo tactics without provocation.
Yes, this infuriates me. Police going after the non-violent protesters and ignoring the non-protesters who are acting out and looting, but using the actions of the non-protesters that they are ignoring as the excuse for aggressively attacking the non-violent protestors.
Diane,
You probably don’t want to hear this, but I wouldn’t be surprised if many of these young vandals have a history of disrupting class and flouting rules at school. Vandalizing the educational project is a daily affair in many New York City schools; the adults and well-behaved kids suffer in silence. Teachers fear speaking up because they don’t want to seem like bad classroom managers, don’t want to bring bad publicity to their schools, and above all because they know they won’t be believed — because they don’t have body cams and posting video of students is a forbidden breach of privacy (and because some of their colleagues gaslight them). If there were such videos and they were shown widely we might have massive street protests against student brutality. Teachers’ Lives Matter! I can imagine you, a defender of teachers with a strong aversion to injustice, leading such a march. Instead, in a Kafka-esque twist, beleaguered teachers –the victims –are absurdly blamed for stoking a “school-to-prison” pipeline if they dare issue punishments for educational vandalism. The teachers are liars –the misbehaviors they allege are the invention of racist imaginations or must have been provoked by the teachers’ own “disrespectful” behavior (stupid edu-cliche: “If you give respect, you get respect” –very often this is simply not true. Will a Trump respect you if you show him respect?). Racial justice is not advanced by allowing kids to vandalize learning with impunity. Alas, many white liberals seem to think it is. In fact I suspect some white liberals feel a certain satisfaction in the idea of black students defying white teachers –a vague sense that karma is setting the scales of cosmic justice aright. Understandable, but wrong. We decry smashed windows; why don’t we decry smashed classes? Is education less worthy of protection than a boutique?
Ponderosa, what a great comment. You’ve captured perfectly the mindset of many white liberals who fear being called racist if they try to stop bad behavior by non-white students. Over the years I’ve talked to many dozens of parents – black, white, Hispanic, Asian – who sent their kids to charter schools. The main reason – by far – was the lack of order and physical safety in traditional neighborhood public schools. Sorry, folks, that’s the reality like it or not.
wow, talk about scapegoating.
Your mischaracterizing of the racial justice movement in schools is similar to those on the right who would have you believe that the people peacefully demonstrating on the street are no different than those who are looting and destroying.
It is similar to those who defend a charter school that suspends 20% of their African American kindergarten and first graders — children who are 5 and 6 years old! — in the name of “preventing smashed classes”.
Eva Moskowitz would claim that anyone who question her suspending 20% of the children in a school serving an exclusively African American and Latinx population of children is because they “condone violence.”
I understand that teachers feel disempowered in some way, but the point of that movement has NEVER been to excuse violent behavior.
The point was to recognize that there were actions that were severely punished if African American teens did them that were lightly punished (or overlooked) if white kids did. Perception is everything. Is a student asking a question “disrespectfully” or just bringing up another point of view and forgot to raise their hand?
And is a student acting out because they are embarrassed because they don’t want to look stupid? Addressing that instead of simply suspending them or kicking them out of school certainly seems worthwhile.
Clearly there are kids who just want to hurt other people just like there are some protesters who get joy out of destruction and violence. But it seems worthwhile to understand that brutalizing the peaceful protesters or suspending any African American kid who isn’t “respectful” enough is not an answer and just makes everything worse.
I am certainly cognizant that there are likely schools where this hasn’t been implemented in good ways, but that doesn’t mean that the ideas behind it are not good.
Unfortunately you won’t believe me until you see the videos (when and if they’re ever produced and released). In the meantime you should view the French film The Class to get a sense of the daily, damaging unruliness that obtains in many classrooms. The ex-teacher who wrote, directed and acted in that film clearly had a mission to expose to the world the hidden truths of our classrooms. I honor him for it.
I have seen that film.
Diane, I know you’ve seen the film –you’ve mentioned it before. What took me aback was your reaction –something like, if it’s that bad, why even bother. To me this revealed that even an eminent thinker about public education like yourself has not received accurate intelligence about the actual situation in our classrooms. I don’t blame you –it’s extremely difficult for outsiders to know what goes on in the “black box” of the classroom. I hereby declare that that film is an accurate depiction of what VERY many NYC and other public schools are like. If there are teachers on this blog –or others who would be in a position to know –who would dispute me, please speak up.
To me, “The Class” is the single most honest, brilliant film ever made about modern-day public education. No American film comes close to the mark. I am grateful to the man who made it happen. (BTW, another brilliant, brutally honest French account of school is Colette’s novel Claudine at School. It’s also very funny. I think you, Diane, would like it. I’m re-reading it now.)
I don’t recall the pressing that reaction, Ponderosa. My recollection is that the film was very depressing. The teacher was eager to teach the classics to disengaged youth from the banlieu (Sp?), the suburban ghettos of non-French, angry youth who don’t care about school or learning French culture. The gulf between them and their teacher was very wide.
ponderosa,
I will try to watch The Class — I do recall the discussion here when it first came out.
However, my question to you is why the solution is harsh discipline? Aren’t there a lot of other things to try first?
If I was designing a fantasy school for at-risk kids, I would have very small class sizes. Teachers would be empowered to send students who acted out to talk to trained psychologists who understood the problems of at-risk youth and might be able to learn more about what the problems are. Kids not getting enough meals would have 3 good meals. The needs of students who need glasses or dental care would get them. Kids who were being psychologically or physically abused at home or at school would be attended to. Kids who were acting out because they had learning issues that they were ashamed of would be addressed in a way that allowed those students to save face.
I agree with you that teachers should not be the ones to handle students with discipline problems who impact the learning of those who don’t. But I think the educational justice movement isn’t just having teachers ignoring discipline problems. It is about first addressing the needs of those students that make them act out before assuming they are just “bad” and some discipline will whip them into shape. It takes a lot of funding, but no more than the money spent on the education of children of privilege who already start out at a huge advantage.
Parents choose charters because charters just dump those kids. But if public schools do that, too, what happens to them? And what happens to our society?
Diane, I apologize if it seems as if my reply below was picking a fight with ponderosa.
You just need another ‘e’ and the end banlieue.
Here’s the thing, Ponderosa. You assume. And you know the aphorism about assume. It makes an…
A white 18 year old, Thomas Joseph J. Rooney, got arrested in Jupiter, Florida for vandalizing the wall of the Trump golf course there. His dad was a former Republican Congressman.
I wonder who Ponderosa believes is to blame for that. The privileged schools he attended?
NYCPSP,
Try not to pick fights with others on the blog.
GregB Foundational thought also works at the level of assumptions; and where would we be if we didn’t know our own foundations and couldn’t recognize those of others. CBK
If this is a double post, then I apologize in advance:
A white 18 year old in Jupiter, Florida, Thomas Joseph J. Rooney, was just arrested because he defaced the Trump National Golf Course with BLM graffiti. He was the son of a former Republican Congressman (and I believe also related to Pittsburgh Steelers owner Art Rooney) and probably he received the type of “proper” education that didn’t include any of the racial justice education that Ponderosa blames for the people using the protests to further their own private ends.
I’m thick and stupid, CBK. I have no idea what you’re saying. Not trying to be sarcastic, I really don’t. I, on the other hand, was sort of sarcastic (OK, not sort of) in my initial post.
Greg B I meant to say about assumptions that all sorts of them are present and operative in ALL of our thinking about all sorts of things.
If so (and it IS so), then that old saying is the problem, and not the fact of having assumptions. And if so, isn’t it best to know what our assumptions are rather than not?
Also, it goes back to Plato’s directive to “know thyself;” and “the unexamined life is not worth living.” Does that help? CBK
Greg I actually got that, because it’s been crossing my mind a lot lately. Maybe because covid-quarantine limits communication to written exchanges/ phone/ IRL masked– even on videoconference you can’t pick up enough facial expression/ timing/ intonation. We must start from assumptions. It takes an unusual mind & considerable life experience to methodically question one’s own assumptions by asking more Q’s.
I obviously can’t remotely vouch for the accuracy of this article, and which seems to rest entirely on one guy’s observations. But I like Susan Edelman. And it is interesting, so I’ll pass it on.
https://nypost.com/2020/06/02/how-nyc-looters-pull-off-a-well-organized-scheme-to-target-high-end-stores
Thank you, this is enlightening.
I also note that there is certainly at least one white guy leading the group.
The question is why are the NYPD targeting peaceful African American protestors and ignoring this?
Also, this is the kind of thing that teenagers see folks starting and copy, whereas those same kids might not be destroying if they didn’t see older guys getting away with it.
And it would not surprise me if those guys are breaking other windows just to get teens to go into stores that aren’t high end and while they commit their crimes.
The looting started with the breaking of the windows of an Auto Zone store in Minneapolis. This led to widespread looting there and to copycat actions around the country. Here is a video shot on the scene of the breaking of those windows. The perpetrator is a middle-aged white man in black, military-style gear: https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2020/05/30/who-is-umbrella-man-mystery-vandal-at-minneapolis-riot-spurs-conspiracies/#5843a638236e
Similar reports have cropped up all around the country of these white young men, dressed in all black, with military-style packs on their backs, starting the looting, and news reports are saying that there was a lot of chatter on extreme right-wing channels on the Internet calling on supremacist morons to disrupt the protests by instigating violence and mayhem.
The mysterious man who smashed windows in Minneapolis might be a member of what is called the “Bougaloo Movement,” right wing fanatics who want to start a race war.
Read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boogaloo_movement
https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2020/04/27/anti-lockdown-rallies-are-providing-opening-proud-boys-and-other-far-right-extremists