Virus Impact on CP

Sounds like Fox is manufacturing a lot of the “madness” In Seattle.

I feel bad for the business's there. The mayor just abandoned them. Mayor shouldn't ask for government funds to repair it all when it's over since they are allowing it. I don't get how she is calling it a "summer of love" if calls for police help for crimes have tripled. She said people have a right to peacefully protest, but a takeover with guns is far from that. If it WAS a summer of love, I'd take my vegan hippie self there on my vacation.

BUT, change has got to happen. ANOTHER black man dead from a shot in the back last night. WTHeck. I'm so torn between wanting to support the police because most are great & I want to feel safe, vs. seeing the system in place is woefully inadequate. I'm glad for the exchanges on here as it's helped me hear intelligent discussion.

We all want to feel safe. We all want a responsible police force that is worthy of admiration. And when I say "all" I mean every race and nationality. The white population's perception of police is going to be much more positive than the perception from the African American population. You have to understand how and why that level of distrust came to be and stand with them to demand change. Of course there are good cops, there's good in many things. But it's woefully ignorant to use that as an excuse to not demand that the system, as a whole, weed out the bad actors and step up training and education.

Is that true? At least here in Columbus our police have been working day and night to make the white population just as upset with them as our non-white brethren. I'm thinking about what I watched a couple of weeks ago, when a group of curfew protesters was marching up High St. Yes, they were blocking traffic, but from the livestream I was watching (from my couch; I'm not much of a protester myself), most of the traffic was participating in the protest. When they got to Lane Ave., Columbus Police came up from behind the group and dispersed it with tear gas, pepper spray, and explosives, allegedly to clear the intersection.

Would it have hurt to ask not-so-nicely first? Why is it that the first tool employed was a tear gas grenade instead of a bullhorn? I admit, it's very possible that I missed something that didn't get caught on the live stream. But it was an incident that certainly didn't improve my opinion of my local police force. If you care about such things, I'm a white male. So were a non-trivial number of the protesters I was watching. And it was certainly possible to avoid any violence...that's exactly what happened when I watched the streams on subsequent nights...CPD circled around the group and blocked their progress and told them to go home...and that's what the group did.

I fear that as long as the issues are distilled down to a racial problem, we're going to get an exacerbation of racial tensions instead of a solution. The real problem is that as a culture many of us have forgotten that human life is *sacred*. It's not a problem of black lives or all lives or any of that; the real issue is that violence should not be the first response to a conflict. That goes for everybody, and it goes double for the police, who, yes, are the ones we empower to use force, even deadly force, to protect our society. But a violent response should not be the response of first resort for the group that is supposed to be protecting all citizens including those accused of or suspected of committing crime. That isn't a race issue. That's an issue of police officers who really aren't doing their jobs, because they have forgotten what their job truly is. Sure, it is a problem that disproportionately affects people of color. But I don't think trying to solve it as a racial problem is going to work. It needs to be handled as a violence problem. Fix that and it will go a long way towards solving the racial issues. What if every use of force beyond a certain threshold required the same documentation and investigation as when an officer fires his gun? And where do you set that threshold, and how do you enforce it?

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Oh. back when I was talking about Michigan, should I have included this? Please remember that it, like my comment earlier, is to be taken lightly...

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

TTD 120mph said:

You have to understand how and why that level of distrust came to be and stand with them to demand change.

And for anyone that is still unsure of that (which it blows my mind that there are), there are two videos you need to watch. First from John Oliver and most recently from Dave Chapelle. If anyone takes the time to watch these and still doesn't get it, or worse disagree with the message, then you are a loss to the human race.

^^Whenever the issue comes up, it seems to me that because African Americans are disproportionately exposed and subject to police violence, the narrative among the community becomes "If I'm white, I should be fine. If I'm black, I might need to worry." Obviously that's not the case in every state and every county. Like I said, there are good cops and there will always be examples of other ethnicities being subject to wrongful violence. The past 2 weeks of protests have shown MANY awful individuals in law enforcement doing awful things to just about anyone associated with the protests (including reporters). Then you see the complacency of the other individuals in law enforcement to their actions and the solidarity they show when those officers are held accountable. You see that and the support they get from regular citizens for their awful conduct and you can't help but feel the system is fundamentally broken. Broken for the African American community, broken for protesters against police violence and the militarization of local police....just broken all around.

Police unions are a major part of the problem. They're the ones that do their damnedest to make sure no cop is ever held accountable, that no cop is ever at fault, and no reform will ever take place. An example of this is showcased on a Twitter thread showing Ohio congresswoman Joyce Beatty being maced as she tried to help a woman who'd been shoved to the ground (and also maced) at the protests in Columbus. The general reply, rightly, was outrage- and then the VP of the local FOP chimed in that Congresswoman Beatty grazing the cop's arm was 'assault on an officer.'

Needless to say, he was roundly savaged as the Congresswoman is old enough to be somebody's grandma.

Just read the BLM official organization is for some things I oppose. So I want to clarify I am FOR peaceful protest of a broken & sometimes racist system, & change to show black lives be valued as any other color person. Just not the "official" organization.

I'm not aware of any dispute over the value of white people.

Master D said:

What Fox did do was mesh the two together. This practice is done fairly often...

No. No, it's not.

Well maybe at FOX News it is, but straight up fabrication of "news" in order to forward an anti-American agenda is not a widespread thing outside of the alt-right FOX News bubble.

Lots of folks walking around the park today. Not sure if it's employee training?

Resort guests?

I would say Sun n Fun guests. Just because the park isn't open doesn't necessarily mean they can't just walk around the park.

Guests are not allowed in the park except for the dinner and movie near Lake Side Pavilion and the dueling pianos at Back Beat.

These were groups of people walking from what looked like the Iron Dragon midway up to Power Tower and then up the main midway toward Raptor

Y'all know people are working right? You're likely seeing employees on the cameras.

I also saw some people in the waterpark. Just a couple- they had their truck parked at the end of the splash runs for Point Plummet. I couldn't see what they were doing but the fact that there are workers at Shores at all makes me happy.

Saw Magnum, Valravn, and Matterhorn all testing right now. It's great to see some things in motion in the park, even if it's empty trains.

Very nice to see. I find myself hypnotized by the rides cycling. 🤣

We need a cam back on the Giant Wheel, we only saw half the gondolas are back on, but I'm going crazy wondering if it's completely assembled. 🤪

Corkscrew and Scrambler are also testing.

It's been a beautiful June. Lots of great weather weekend days. Were it not for this pandemic I think the park would have been slammed with 150, gold pass and this excellent weather. Awful.