As everyone notes, it's hard to get information on the case, which is trickling out and heavily influenced by where you got your facts. My understanding so far is that the Wikipedia entry is pretty authoritative, and the basic facts are as follows:
- Jena is a town with racial issues. There was a special tree at the high school that white students sat under to read.
- A black kid, who may or may not have been new to town, asked permission to sit under the tree. The principle said "of course you can sit anywhere you want.
- The next day, everyone came into school to find three nooses hanging from the tree.
- Three kids were identified and expelled. The school board overrode the expulsions and gave the kids three-day suspensions.
- In the resulting ugly atmosphere, there were escalating interracial fights at school. The DA came in, and spoke in a manner that was perceived by the black kids as directed mostly at them. The black kids tried to bring their concerns to the school board, but were ignored.
- The school building was burned down by unknown perpetrators. The burning is believed to be related to the racial tension, and both sides accuse the other.
- In December, the end of football season quelled much of the solidarity that had kept the nastiness in check. At a mostly-white party on December 1st, five black kids tried to gain entrance, and a fight broke out with a group of white men who were not students. Eventually, one of those men was identified, charged with battery, and given probation.
- The next night, a white student who'd been at the party ran into that group of black kids in a convenience store, and an argument broke out. The white kid ran to his pickup truck and got a pistol-grip shotgun--he says because he was afraid they would attack them, they say unprovoked. They wrestled it away from him and drove off with it, resulting in a theft charge.
- Two nights after that, six students, now dubbed the "Jena Six", got into some sort of verbal altercation with a white kid named Justin Barker, who they claim was taunting them about the assault of three days earlier. He was hit in the back of the head, and fell unconscious either then or after hitting the ground. The six continued kicking him after he was unconscious; Barker's father says, in the head, which could have been fatal. However, Barker was up and around later that night, so his injuries do not appear to have been anything near life threatening, and there's no evidence that the kids intended deadly assault.
- The Jena Six had the entire library thrown at them: attempted murer bargained down to assault with a deadly weapon. The pattern of leniency on whites and harsh punitive measures on blacks has enraged people throughout America.
This is why I'm not sure how you even things out; without other witnesses, it's hard to know whether the kid with the shotgun was acting in self-defense or not, and if he is telling the truth, I'm libertarianish enough to regard waving a shotgun at people who have threatened to jump you as a legitimate use of force. (On the other hand, the fact that they didn't jump him after they'd separated him from the shotgun weighs against this interpretation.) The assault at the party has already been tried, and an inadequate sentence handed down; you can't try him again in order to match his offense to the other, and moreover, the sketchy facts of that case do not include six guys kicking one unconscious one. I'm happy to agitate for hanging sentences on deserving white kids, but which ones, who have not already been tried, do you want to punish?
See, that's a much more reasoned response than the first. Like I said, I am sympathetic to the notion that everyone should be charged with crimes they commit. But as I've already said, I don't think the white students at the party were charged appropriately; I don't think the Jena 6 were charged anywhere near appropriately; and I don't think they could possibly have received justice in this climate. And while I don't think that they should be freed without any punishment whatsoever, in this context, that may be the thing most equitable thing to do. And I do have a hard time understanding those rushing to condemn these students beyond the hardship they've already endured. Their lives will never be the same.
See, that's a much more reasoned response than the first.
And it's made all the more impressive by how she produced it in spite of how few reasoned responses she got the first time -- what with all that hissing about "iconoclast cred" and accusative assertions of counterfact that were at least as erroneous as whatever errors Megan made.
Link via Steve Sailer, so salt indicated--but this article states that the students who hung the noose were allowed back in the school SYSTEM after 3 days, but had to attend alternative school.
And it's made all the more impressive by how she produced it in spite of how few reasoned responses she got the first time
Had she had a lot of reasoned responses the first time, would she have produced this more reasoned version? It appears that this one is the direct result of the condemnation the first, rather shallow, attempt received. That condemnation wasn't so much unreasonable as a refusal to engage with reason something that didn't appear to deserve it.
Good news for you Megan:
Mychal Bell, the sole defendant who remains behind bars from the group of teens known as the "Jena 6," will not be released Friday, a court decided.
Woo! There has been a LOT of heat on this topic.
I have a very libertarian attitude towards most issues, and I am a strong proponent of the right of self defense.
So here comes the radical part of my opinion: it is POSSIBLE that those 6 black youths should be COMMENDED and THANKED for showing REMARKABLE RESTRAINT under the circumstances.
"What", you ask, "is this guy a NUTCASE?"
Well, my wife may think so, but let me give you a "devil's advocate" argument.
This is the SOUTH we are talking about. Blacks were held as slaves there for hundreds of years, and white-on-black lynchings were both prevalent and accepted for most of the 20th century. A noose is not only a symbol of grotesque and horrific oppression and murder, it is also a WEAPON. And it is a weapon that has been used to DEADLY effect against thousands of innocent blacks across the South, for decades, even centuries.
When those kids hung a noose fom that tree, it was no different than if a bunch of Nazi skinheads in Germany held up swastica flags, waved around full canisters of Zyclon-B gas, and threatened to release it into a Jewish Highschool.
The black students at the school waited patiently for the wheels of justice to turn, and for the white students involved to be arrested, tried, convicted, and sentenced to PRISON time (3 to 5 years each?) for assault. The justice system failed them UTTERLY.
Now, they were faced with a situation where they had been credibly threatened with murder, in a jurisdiction where the murder of blacks by whites was a socially acceptable hobby within living memory, and the forces of law enforcement had refused to either offer them protection or prosecute the offenders.
Individuals have a right to be secure in their persons. If the police refuse to do the job, then the individual if morally obligated to protect himself BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY.
I say that white kid got of lightly. I am Jewish. I am married with 4 children. If a Neo-Nazi ever threatened my wife or one of my children, he'd be lucky if all I did was kill him.
Sigh, Megan, the point is not so much what happens to the Jena 6 at this juncture. The point is to highlight extreme racial injustice perpetrated not only by citizens but by law enforcement officials and other civil servants.
Yes, it's a good question. What do you do about the fact that the whites in this scenario were treated leniently? Do you treat the blacks leniently or do you give them a fair sentence (of course, throwing the library at them is completely wrong). It's sort of not the real issue anymore.
Personally, I think you let them off, not because they deserve it but because we need to start doing something about the inequality of the justice department in its handling of whites and blacks in many circumstances. Yeah, maybe it's not fair to the Jena 6 (or more likely, their victims). It's certainly fairer to society.
Marc,
Please explain:
The noose issue was addressed threw expulsion immediately (later overturned, but the students were sent to alternative schools),
The party fight wasn't students, but the identified people were adjudicated.
The shotgun incident is under heavy dispute, though I'm of a mind that the brandishing was unwarranted and was probably criminal.
And I will NEVER accept gang beating an unconscious victim as RESTRAINT let alone COMMENDABLE.
Let's say your ilk get their way and all 6 are freed and exonerated, can Barker's family come after them because they feel the "wheels of justice" aren't turning? Where does that end?
The DA was a bit overzealous in charging the six with attempted murder. Felony assault would have been a more appropriate charge, and had that happened the case wouldn't have gotten much attention.
And it's made all the more impressive by how she produced it in spite of how few reasoned responses she got the first time -- what with all that hissing about "iconoclast cred" and accusative assertions of counterfact that were at least as erroneous as whatever errors Megan made.
Except that, I'm right, about that.
Don't mess with teacher, huh, anonymouse?
The DA literally threatened the lives of the students. He later charged a white kid with misdemeanor battery for attacking a black kid with a beer bottle, and then charged Mychal Bell with assault with a deadly weapon for kicking the victim with soft-soled shoes.
There is absolutely no room for this sort of systematic abuse of discretionary power. The DA is a disgrace and must resign.
"kicking the victim with soft-soled shoes"
lol, ok then.
Why don't we know the DA's name? Does he get no public censure for how he's handled this? How about those on the school board who overturned the initial expulsion for the noose issue? I'm not saying they all necessarily need to be fired, a la Nifong, but they seem to have gotten off rather cleanly in this.
The white kid in question was apparently not related to the noose incident. He'd already been investigated.
Regardless, beating him was not likely to nor did it do anything to protect the black kids. Arguing that it's some kind of holistic preemptive self-defensive only makes sense if the beating had some chance of making the black kids better off. Given the location, six black kids beating a white kid are not likely to end up better off...
As far as I can tell, the DA is a racist asshole who did what he could to make things worse, not better.
EI
I hate the south.
A couple of my southern friends complain that Midwesterners hide their racist attitudes while prejudice lives on via segregation and other quiet forms of racism. that might be true.
but is this what you get in the south with more openess? Yeah, the south is much more enlightened (sarcasm).
Trying this again as for some reason this comment is in moderation limbo,
World Citizen:
The DA's name is Reed Walters.
And I will NEVER accept gang beating an unconscious victim as RESTRAINT let alone COMMENDABLE.
If the authority/law fails to protect the citizenry is well within rights to protect themselves.
Also, why do you refer to the Barker incident as a "gang beating?" From the snippet of reports we've seen on this site it looks like a fight at school where friends of one guy got involved as well.
The remedy for unreasonably harsh punishments for black youth is, obviously, not more harsh punishment for white youth too. The remedy is a prosecutor who doesn't abuse his discretionary power to punish blacks more harshly.
I find it interesting that a spate of racial violence in the rural deep south results in no serious injuries and the worst injuries are probably to a white kid.
The most egregious part of this whole thing is the charges filed by the DA.
EI
A travesty. First of all Wikipedia seems to lean in the direction Google leans on all things controversial. I don't know if it's just who puts it in, or if its changed afterwards...so a bad source Megan.
All involved need to be thrown in jail. The black kids didn't show any more restraint than the white boys did.
Why did the black kids want to go to the mainly white party? Was it a defiance, spit in your face situation? Did the white kid have to get his gun? Perhaps to both.
Long story short is send em all up. At least until I can find a version of the story that is proclaimed by left and right alike, that it is the true version.
Frankly, everything should have been just suspensions from the beginning. Now the genie is out of the bottle.
Unless these kids have criminal records, probation is the sentence they would receive in most jurisdictions. The "serious beating" claim is an absolute joke. People who get serious beatings aren't partying hours later.
The attempted murder charge is an obvious example of a son-of-a-bitch prosecutor playing hammer-the-black-kids. In a way, though, the kids are probably lucky that the racist bastard played it this way - otherwise they'd just have ended up jailed on felony assault charges and suffered the usual ruined lives as a result.
Stop playing law'n'order goon squad leader, Megan. It ill becomes you.
"If a Neo-Nazi ever threatened my wife or one of my children, he'd be lucky if all I did was kill him."
Marc, if you did kill said Neo-Nazi, would you willingly go to jail?
But they shouldn't be freed. Six guys assaulted one, and after he was lying on the ground unconscious, kicked him repeatedly in the head. They should go to jail for this.
Ya think?
Sam Hutcheson,
Gang beating? That's how I describe groups of people people GANGING up on someone, generally defenseless. Group beating would work as well.
And I understand self defense, and the role of personal action when exposed by state inaction, but even the most liberal reading of that doctrine does not support attacking and UNCONSCIOUS person. They simply cannot pose a threat to you in that situation. Some domestic violence laws skirt that issue, but those are much more tricky due to financial dependence and living space.
I just can't fathom how you can't see that attacking people who pose ZERO threat to you, with your buddies, is ALWAYS wrong, and while my not merit jail time, NEVER, NEVER deserves COMMENDATION.
In Response to Skullberg,
First, thanks for reading and responding to myh comment.
First, I think that the entire episode shows where the first error was made - by the District Attorney, for not taking the INITIAL actions of the white students seriously enough, and therefore giving the affected black students the sense that they canoot trust the authorities to protect them. Therefore, they must take their safety into their own hands.
Expulsion, even if it were NOT overturned, is FAR too light a punishment for the white students, and would still perhaps leave a sense that they were favored because they were white. But the expulsion WAS overturned.
I think part of the problem white people from the North have understanding this is that they don't understand what a noose from a tree MEANS to blacks in the South. I have a co-worker who is black and from the deep South. He is married with kids, college educated, politically conservative. He told me that if it had happened to one of HIS kids, and the DA did nothing to the white students, he would seriously consider sending his son to school with a loaded gun for self protection.
As far as the shotgun incident, all I can say is that the black kids showed good sense in not escalating; it could easily have become a fire fight, even if they didn't personally use the gun. All else is speculation and hearsay.
Just for that, within the scale of what everyone there says about it (at most intimidation), they should not have suffered consequences as long as the shotgun was returned.
First of all Wikipedia seems to lean in the direction Google leans on all things controversial. I don't know if it's just who puts it in, or if its changed afterwards...
What does this mean?
It means that reality has a notorious liberal bias.
Anomdebus,
So, you really think that if I intend to assault you, you pull a gun, and I take the gun from you that I would just walk away? Assault was intended and now I'm in posession of a gun! Assault would almost assuredly follow! What a joke. The fact that the black kids walked away from the incident without violence is VERY strong evidence that no violence was originally intended. I find the very thinly veiled racist ignorance of people like anomdebus really insulting.
Skullberg: You're quite right, once your opponent is down you should back off, but the "fight or flight" response & adrenaline sometimes make it difficult to switch to "mellow" mode. IIRC, that was one of the defenses offered by the police officers in the Rodney King beating.
this is a very weird post. As many have said, Megan misses the point entirely. It's not just about the "Jena 6", and about freeing them. It's called the tip of the iceberg: a system of racism has been exposed.
It's very daft to say: well, the light sentences to the whites already happened, so nothing to do there. But with the black kids, they should just be prosecuted appropriately.
I find this to be an odd, colorblind approach to this issue, which starts with the assumption that any accusation of racism is probably overblown, and exhibits a strong desire to conclude that "this was just a few bad apples -- calm down people." There is obviously no objectivity in how we view racial issues -- we all come at these questions from a pretty loaded perspective.
TO Freddie and other: this is where politics steps in, it's no longer about blind justice in particular cases ... something has to be shaken up.
p.s. to Marc: good point. Most people in general don't know much about the history of lynching -- how pervasive it was, how long before the practice stopped, and how lynchings were "community" events where people posed in happy pictures with black bodies hanging in the background.
Gang beating? That's how I describe groups of people people GANGING up on someone, generally defenseless. Group beating would work as well.
I think you should defer to "group beating" then. "Gang" has a heavy connotation when used in reference to groups of young black men. Referencing this incident as somehow "gang" violence already predisposes the discourse to assume criminality for the black boys, even if it is unintentional on your part.
And I understand self defense, and the role of personal action when exposed by state inaction, but even the most liberal reading of that doctrine does not support attacking and UNCONSCIOUS...
I think you're reading of Barker's case is unduly sympathetic to Barker. He was involved in a verbal altercation with one or more of the six boys. They claim he was taunting them about an assault on black kids from three days ealier. He is not an innocent bystander in this scene.
A fight ensues. As Bouffant says, when the fight is on it's not a simple case of "oh, we're done now" to switch back to walk away mode when the other guy goes down. There is no reason that I have seen to assume they knew he was unconscious and rationally decided to continue fighting him regardless.
M. Bouffant,
I'm not saying they should be condemned, "fight or flight" (which doesn't apply since they weren't threatened, but we'll use it as a proxy for "heat of the moment") is understandable. They shouldn't be commended is the point.
As for Rodney King, the argument was mainly that he was clearly on drugs and kept trying to get up. They were WAY WAY over the line, and they used adrenaline because of the chase he had lead them on. I see the analogy, it is just a weak one.
As for Rodney King, the argument was mainly that he was clearly on drugs and kept trying to get up. They were WAY WAY over the line, and they used adrenaline because of the chase he had lead them on. I see the analogy, it is just a weak one.
It is a weak analogy only insomuch as a post run adrenaline rush is hardly comparable to the edge of nerve and reason you live on when your entire existence resides in the crucible of racial violence.
Once again the right and Megan shows it's racist base. In this and in the other thread we see Megan and her supporters trying vainly to find whatever thin justification they can for overt racism and bigotry. Shame on you all.
Three kids were identified and expelled. The school board overrode the expulsions and gave the kids three-day suspensions.
The DA, Reed Walters, is also the school attorney and he told the school board that they were not allowed to consider their own investigation into the matter. Walters is guilty of prosecutorial misconduct.
The whites of Jena voted overwhelmingly for David Duke, the former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan when he ran for governor of Louisiana. Are you sure these are the people you want to make common cause with? Are their values your values? I suggest you think long and hard about that. I further think "The Atlantic" should reconsider just who it is they hired and if they really want you representing them.
Sam,
If gang beating brings up images of young black men in your mind, so be it. It is how I describe the situation, and I'm not willing to let someone else re-signify my speech.
As for Barker, I don't think I'm sympathetic at all. No one claims he assaulted the boys, threatened them, or had a history of violence. There is some discrepancy as to what he was saying, but the worst of it is racial slurs. I think those are wrong, but I'm not willing to commend 6 young men for beating an unconscious man who called them the n-word.
And "a fight ensues" is a whole lot of hand waving. It's as if a magic "fight" was forced on the scene with no primary actors.
From all accounts, he never defended himself. He was struck once, fell and was unconscious. I've seen my share of fights, and it's always been pretty clear when someone gets knocked out. The whole not defending yourself thing tends to surprise the attacker, who then stops.
citizen,
You are painting in facts that we don't know.
You assume that the only way it could have been provoked was with intent to assault, as opposed to the other party merely fearing that they might be assaulted. I think more likely, they may have been trash talking and no more. For all of the scrapes, don't you think there were probably a lot more verbal exchanges, only some of which escalated?
The white kid in that example could merely have been wrong about how much the situation had escalated, and most probably was.
My comment was not directed at the white kid, but about what the black kids did right.
A hypothetical, one rather sympathetic to the black kids:
Lets say that the black kids were a little angry about the party and were a little gruff (read merely rude). Lets then say that the white kid is paranoid and escalates the situation for no good reason by pulling the gun. Something like that does have a tendency of provoking people, even if they weren't before. The black kids sensibly defused the situtation and deescalated it by leaving the scene. All I was saying that this was a good response. If they had let their emotions get the better of them and punished the white kid on the spot for his actions, word might get around that there was an assault with a weapon. Then things could escalate.
It also could have happened that they otherwise might have gotten into a scrape but thought better of it with the escalation.
However, all we have are two probably at least somewhat self-serving views of what went on that night.
noen,
I don't see anyone supporting the noose-hangers, defending the over-reaching DA or the school board. Can you point me to those?
Megan's point is that you can't re-try the completed cases, no matter how much you want to. You also can't expect most people to support NOT punishing 6 young men who initiated a fight with and beat an unconscious person.
The DA here clearly incompetent, probably racist, and not long for his job. No one thinks what he did was right.
Also, do you happen to have the Jena voting records for post gubernatorial elections? That's a mighty obscure fact I won't accept without proof. And I'm no David Duke fan, but have you condemned all of West Virginia for electing, and all Senate Democrats for deferring to, a Klansman?
No one is trying to "re-signify" your speech. I'm merely pointing out that words, just like all signifiers, have connotations external to your personal use of them. When somone hangs a noose on a tree in the deep south, there are historical realities that give that act meanings external to the "prank" of simply hanging it there. When you say "gang beating" in reference to black men you are signifying more than what you might pendanticly _want_ to signal. This is simply the case, and I think it's wiser to accept the reality of the case and use language carefully than to stand above and aloof and pretend that the words you use are pristine coffers of nothingness meant only to hold your own personal meaning or intent.
As for Barker, pretty much all of the accounts say he was barking at the other boys. If you've seen your fair share of fights you probably know that the line between yapping and swinging is very, very thin, and if he went down immediately there's still the onset emotional reaction of the other boys who were probably moving well before he went down. Which is not to say he deserved it, but he was not an innocent bystander in the event.
Skullberg:
If gang beating brings up images of young black men in your mind, so be it. It is how I describe the situation, and I'm not willing to let someone else re-signify my speech.
There's letting others re-signify your speech, and there's showing a basic awareness of how your words will be commonly interpreted. "Gang" has a definite connotation to it in relation to groups of young black men that is not accurate in this instance--namely, organized gangs in urban centers that are essentially criminal organizations. It's like referring to a murder by a group of Italians as a mob hit when the mafia's not involved at all.
"I'm libertarianish enough to regard waving a shotgun at people who have threatened to jump you as a legitimate use of force."
You should probably be aware that white people *always* think black people are going to jump them. Are you libertarian enough to think that waving a shotgun as a racist threat is a legitamite use of force?
"It's called the tip of the iceberg: a system of racism has been exposed."
Now, if that's not an overblown statement, I haven't read many in my life. There is nothing tippish about this. Racism is and has been present in our country (and EVERY other country in the world too, Eli - including Russia and Iran). It's not 'a system' as if there are thousand of little racist elves working away to create hate and discontent, and cause the high flying feeling risin' like piezen into the gorge of the emotional.
Oh, Neil, you get the gold ring. Sometimes the Left-handed are incapable of seeing an unblemished reality.
And I gotta say one more thing - "Once again the right and Megan shows it's racist base." Noen, nothing you are pointing towards as showing a 'racist base' is at all consistent. You fly all over the chart, pick-a-cherry here, pick-a-cherry there. If you TRULY believe what you wrote, then the ability of Man to use unbiased logic in coming to a conclusion, has slipped way, way back into the evolutionary slime.
oh, I meant to add:
Regardless of which "extreme" scenario was closer to what happened, they did the right thing in the end.
A clarification on my original comment. What I was trying to say in the second paragraph is that the black kids should not have been charged with anything wrt the shotgun incident. My use of a non specific pronoun may have been confusing. Sorry.
Sam,
The line between talk and fisticuffs is thin, however it is a line (both morally and legally), and Barker didn't cross it. From the previous link to the news report, according to the court proceedings, he was struck from behind. There were witnesses, but I've not seen that contradicted.
All of that is beside the point, my comments aren't a defense of Barker, who I'd go 70/30 is an a**. My comments were to refute the misguided notion that the Jena Six were restrained in there behavior and commendable in their actions. They were neither.
An outstanding article by a local minister:
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?AuthorID=17296&id=32967
He asserts that the local black community is not behind the Six, at least not in the same way that Jackson and Sharpton are. (I don't care for his article's title, but the rest is excellent.)
Megan's point is that you can't re-try the completed cases, no matter how much you want to. You also can't expect most people to support NOT punishing 6 young men who initiated a fight with and beat an unconscious person.
Megan is not a lawyer, she is just someone with a blog, and her "knowledge" about this case appears to be limited to the Wikipedia entry. The cases should never have been brought in the first place but should have instead gone to juvenile services and the convictions were overturned for just that reason. Ten months in adult prison for a school yard fight is more than sufficient.
I don't see anyone supporting the noose-hangers
My point is that by playing word games, by pretending not to know the facts of the case and by seeking to justify the actions of the racist whites of Jena you are indeed "supporting the noose-hangers".
"do you happen to have the Jena voting records for post gubernatorial elections? That's a mighty obscure fact I won't accept without proof. And I'm no David Duke fan, but have you condemned all of West Virginia for electing, and all Senate Democrats for deferring to, a Klansman?"
Jena is a city in Louisiana so before you go spouting off please try to get the basic facts right. That you do not know even the first thing about this case tells me I am wasting my time responding to you at all. Democracy Now is my source for the David Duke info. Unlike you and apparently Megan, they do actual journalism by, you know, looking stuff up and even talking to witnesses. Go listen and educate yourself.
noen:
No matter how superior it makes you feel, there's no rational way to read the original posting or this update as supporting the noose hangers. There's universal consensus that there's bad juju afoot in Jena. The question that "Free the Jena 6" poses is: do two wrongs make a right?
It's a question without a obvious answer. I'm always amazed by people who think that anyone who comes to a different conclusion on a complex issue can't just have a different point of view or even have made an honestly mistake, but must be evil. So much for that vaunted liberal nuance, huh?
BTW, the comment about Senat Democrats and West Virginia supporting klansmen was in reference to Sen. Robert Byrd. Perhaps you might wish to educate yourself as well. Or at least refrain from casting stones...
James Kabala said:
He asserts that the local black community is not behind the Six,
He's a white pastor in the deep south in the midst of a re-awakening of civil rights era bigotry.
And you believe him.
beneficial said:
Noen, nothing you are pointing towards as showing a 'racist base' is at all consistent.
Interesting...
"It's called the tip of the iceberg: a system of racism has been exposed."
Now, if that's not an overblown statement...
As I have repeatedly been saying. You all consistently try to justify, rationalize or minimize overt racism. That makes you racist too. That you don't even understand this only supports my position and undermines yours.
Yes Skullberg I made a mistake. Although if I understand correctly what you wrote here under my nickname (I keep clicking "Remember personal info" but it never remembers) are you saying that Senator Byrd is currently now a Klansman? Because that would be one reading of what you just wrote. While you're at it why not just throw in Ted Kennedy too?
You've already wasted more of my time than you deserve troll. Goodbye.
Noen: Do you have any evidence that this man is a racist or that his facts are wrong? Since he also wrote an article condemning racism in strong terms and calling attention to the very same David Duke fact that you are so fond of, which he would certainly have tried to hush up if he were himself bigoted against the Six, it seems likely that he is not a racist.
The other article I mention is here: http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?AuthorID=17296&id=25922
Democracy Now is my source for the David Duke info.
You've gotta be kidding me... this is just precious!
Noen: "You all consistently try to justify, rationalize or minimize overt racism. That makes you racist too. That you don't even understand this only supports my position and undermines yours."
All you are trying to do is say, in effect, 'If you don't agree with me, I'll call you a racist, which automatially means I win.' Absolutely doo-doo for logic.
I'm quite aware of racism in its many guises, and yours is the form that is most insidious and evil. You claim that the act or thought is racist, without being able to point to a factual utterance that supports the charge of racism, to even the most indolent thinker.
No, noen, it's your throwing gasoline on a fire with no justification that is approaching a terrorist act...something to inflame the passions and create hate. That you don't even understand this only supports my position and undermines yours.
Took me five minutes to find, why is that so hard for you?
Louisiana Secretary of State
Election Results by Parish-Official
Results for Election Date: 11/16/91
Governor
Jena is located in LaSalle parish (scroll down) which voted 4,910 for David Duke and 2,432 for Edwin W. Edwards.
I expect an apology.
Everybody here seems to be ignoring the dirty little fact that all of the "Six" have previous criminal records for various crimes around the neighborhood. They are hardly victims.
beneficial said:
All you are trying to do is say, in effect, 'If you don't agree with me, I'll call you a racist, which automatially means I win.' Absolutely doo-doo for logic.
ummm, no, what I said is that when one makes excuses for racists or racist policies that is a form of rascism too. Covert rather than overt, I'll grant you that but racism none-the-less.
I'm quite aware of racism in its many guises, and yours is the form that is most insidious and evil.
No, the most evil form of racism is dragging a black man off in the dead of night and torturing him then burning him alive. This was commonly done in the living memory of the people in Jena.
You claim that the act or thought is racist, without being able to point to a factual utterance that supports the charge of racism, to even the most indolent thinker.
I have not made that claim. My claim is that by attempting to rationalize and justify the bigots in this case you lend them your tacit support. In my opinion that makes you just as bigoted by implication. I've been pretty clear about that so please respond to what I say and not what you want to believe I said.
No, noen, it's your throwing gasoline on a fire with no justification that is approaching a terrorist act...something to inflame the passions and create hate.
Please, don't be childish. It is not terrorism to point out your bigotry. This is not a gasoline fire and I see no dead bodies. Just the ruins of your argument.
That you don't even understand this only supports my position and undermines yours.
Oh snap!
Mychal Bell, the sole defendant who remains behind bars from the group of teens known as the "Jena 6," also happens to have been before the court three times in 2 years for violent felonies.
Pick your heroes more carefully.
No-en, sorry, but I'm trying real hard to see where someone said that dragging a black man into the night and torturing him was condoned by anyone here.
It is your delusional thought process that makes a connection with that to anyone who even QUESTIONS the situation and probabilities of this clear-as-mud case. It is your lazy flaying about calling others racist because you either get off on it, or you feel you are In The Right and can call others racist because...well, because you're going to have a hissy fit since they don't quail, blanch and back down because you've used the Big 'R' word. Sorry, kemosabe, it doesn't work that way anymore. Never again.
You will be called on it by people such as those who comment here, and other places. Your Sharptonian tactics aren't going to work anymore.
This comment has been deleted for racist trolling
Right Guava (are you really a delicious tropical fruit?), I am sure those couldn't have been trumped up charges brought by a racist prosecutor who most recently claimed that Mychal Bell wielded a deadly weapon in the form of...
...a tennis shoe.
BWahahahahhaahaha!!!!!!
BWahahahahhaahaha!!!!!!
noen, sit down and let the grownups talk. And quit posting when you are drunk.
Well, I am libertarian enough to think privatized, vigilante justice against some racist jerk is not a big deal.
beneficial said:
No-en, sorry, but I'm trying real hard to see where someone said that dragging a black man into the night and torturing him was condoned by anyone here.
I never claimed anyone did. Here is what you actually said:
I'm quite aware of racism in its many guises, and yours is the form that is most insidious and evil.
My counter reply to your claim of my "insidious evil" even if true (which it is not) was that the practice of lynching was far more evil.
Are you having a problem understanding that?
First of all, there are no rules, piling on after an agent provokes is called getting what you deserve. The victim in all of this seems to carried a loaded shotgun to school post fight, got himself expelled, and is now a high school dropout. Perhaps, you good people with all of your sympathy will be kind enough to give his all-American red, blue, and white self a job working for your periodical. But no, he wouldn't qualify would he? But then he is free, white, and almost 21, and I'm sure you'll be able to school him in all the current libertarian cliches that seem so in vogue since Bill Maher came out. Permit me to say that it is you who are the problem. You know as well as I do that you don't want any inbred redneck co-workers anymore than you want them as neighbors. Your political point of view is spineless. You have to spend absolutely nothing in order to claim your territory. Whites who live in East side enclaves and toss frisbees in Central Park on Sunday afternoons are as removed from the true realities of race politics in America as is BushII. Don't try to run. You know you voted for his skull and bones resume just like you vote for white-skin privilege/racism in places like Jena. You can't help yourselves. You were born racist and you will probably die of the same chronic condition.
You speak of piling on, a fair fight. Fights are never fair or even. Someone always has an advantage. You, however, wish to obscure the obvious, the victim was the provacateur and got his just desserts.
Oh yeah and one last thing for all you second and third generation American conservatives, some of us black folks have been in America for 8 generations. We have been what we needed to be. But no longer will be lectured, hectored, or dictated to by you responsibles for the present condition of this nation. You have supported the candidacy of the world's laughing stock, you support permanent war, and you love your Shi-Tzu/Poms more than you like your gardeners.
A great bunch of folks you are; so glad to know you!
Lynn Brookes, I don't think you understand libertarians very well.
The timeline elides some of the important details, especially about the DA.
All sides of this dispute agree that in his address to the School, the DA threatened to 'destroy the lives' of those who crossed him. In an atmosphere of simmering tensions and escalating violence - and the shotgun incident is pretty darn clear; six guys who are supposedly threatening violence have a gun stuck in their face, get hold of the gun, and neither assault the guy who just stuck a gun in their faces nor even vandalize his truck? - the DA basically did nothing to white miscreants (including impeding punishment of the noose hangers in his dual role as shool attorney). Then he throws a whole library at the so-called Jena Six.
I'm not defending the so-called Jena Six; I don't believe in offensive violence and I find rendering a victim unconscious, let alone continuing to beat him, deplorable and worthy of punishment. With two previous convictions, the alleged ringleader doesn't sound like anyone I'd care to meet. But an attempted murder conviction when the victim wasn't even hospitalized overnight? Launched by a prosecutor with an apparent pattern of bias? A prosecutor who was very clearly attempting to disproportionately 'destroy the lives' of the so-called Jena Six?
It's a mirror image of the Duke Lacrosse case: a racist DA is pushing his own agenda without regard to the facts, to please his own community. Is there any reason we can't decry both Nifong and this Jena guy Reed Walters? I had no problem decrying Nifong's actions and defending his victims without having any illusions about those Duke Lacrosse jocks, and the same applies for Reed Walter's victims.
Although to be honest, I can see how Lynn Brookes came to her conclusion by reading the above comments.
Blogs can attract some insane people. not representative of libertarianism as I know it. We need some moderation.
This comment has been deleted for racist trolling
I guess the words "all white jury" mean nothing to you guys. Perhaps you should read some history.
A local minister, Eddie Thompson (who was one of the earliest critics of white racism in Jena), has posted on the Internet a list of everything the national media has gotten wrong about the Jena story. I've taken the liberty of rearranging it and shortening it, so go here to see the original:
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?AuthorID=17296&id=32967
- Jena does have racial problems. Jena does have bigotry and prejudice, just like every other town in America, perhaps even worse than some. If there were no racial problems, there would have been no nooses hung from a tree. There would not be one white student beaten and six black students charged with attempted second-degree murder. The local ministers would not have hurriedly called a meeting to deal with the issue. The cameras of the world would not have focused their lenses on Jena.
- The actions of the three white students who hung the nooses (on a tree at the high school) demonstrate prejudice and bigotry. However, they were not just given "two days suspension" as reported by national news agencies. After first being expelled, then upon appeal, being allowed to re-enter the school system, they were sent to an alternative school, off-campus, for an extended period of time. They underwent investigations by Federal and Sate authorities. They were given psychological evaluations. Even when they were eventually allowed back on campus they were not allowed to be a part of the general population for weeks.
- There was no "fight" on December 4, 2006 at Jena High School, as the national media continues to characterize the event in question. Six students attacked a single student who was immediately knocked unconscious. According to sworn testimony, they stomped him, as he lay "lifeless" upon the ground.
- Justin Barker, the white student attacked, was not the first white student targeted by these black students. Others had been informed they were going to be beaten, but stayed away from school and out of sight until they felt safe.
- CNN reported that there were "obviously no witnesses to the fight." In fact, over thirty eyewitnesses, students and teachers, were questioned immediately following the attack, all of who implicated one or more of the black students arrested in the case. In fact, some of the accused black students did not stop stomping Barker until they were pulled away from him by some of the teachers, according to testimony given in the trial of Mychal Bell.
- The media continues to make the point that Justin Barker "attended a party" later that evening, insinuating that his injuries were not very severe. The Barkers, by no means a wealthy family, face medical bills already over $12,000 from the emergency room visit. Imagine what an overnight visit would have cost. Justin Barker was advised to remain hospitalized but decided he would not let the event keep him from participating in the once-in-a-lifetime, traditional Ring Ceremony at First Baptist Church in Jena, where class rings are presented to the upcoming senior class.
- The fight on December 4 was unrelated to the noose incident, or any other incident that occurred earlier in Jena that week. The media keeps reporting otherwise. There are three different boys named "Justin" involved in three different events that the media have morphed into the "Justin" who was attacked on December 4:
A. A juvenile named Justin, whose name was not released to the media, was one of the boys who hung nooses from the trees in September.
B. Three months later, Justin Sloan, not a student at Jena High, fought with one of the black students, Robert Baily, at the fair barn when a couple of black students tried to enter a private party. The next evening, at "Gotta Go" store, Justin Sloan and Robert Baily confronted one another in the parking lot. There were two other black students with Baily. As they ran towards Sloan, Sloan rushed to his truck to get a shotgun, which the black boys wrestled from him and fled.
C. On December 4, six black students at Jena High School attacked Justin Barker, who is neither of the previously mentioned young men.
- The speech given by [District Attorney] Reed Walters that included the now infamous statement "I can end your life with the stroke of a pen" was not given to a group of black students. It was given during a speech to the entire student body in an assembly called by the school's principal to calm a community that was pulling their children out of school because there were two fights one day with racial overtones. Two girls, one white and one black fought. Another student was taken to the emergency room to receive stitches.
- The national news media has not mentioned a single time that there was an FBI investigation into the hanging of the nooses and the conduct of Reed Walters that concluded there was no criminal activity or "hate crime" involved. The report is available to the media, along with court records and sworn testimony, none of which has been reported.
- It has been reported that the school has two standards of justice since white students who attacked a black student were not treated as the black students who attacked a white student. No group of white students attacked a black student at Jena High School. Fights that have occurred have always been handled equally. This was not a fight. This process was taken out of the hands of school officials when the ambulance was called to bring Justin Barker to the hospital for the attack. Both the appearance of the ambulance and Barker's visit to the emergency room requires an investigation by law enforcement.
- The "Jena Six" have repeatedly been held up as heroes by much of the race-based community and called "innocent students" by the national media. Some of these students have reputations in Jena for intimidating and sometimes beating other students. They have vandalized and destroyed both school property and community property. Some of the Jena Six have been involved in crimes not only in LaSalle Parish but also in surrounding parishes. For the most part, coaches and other adults have prevented them from being held accountable for the reign of terror they have presided over in Jena. Despite intervention by adults wanting to give them chances due their athletic potential, most of the Jena Six have extensive juvenile records. Yet their parents keep insisting that their children have never been in trouble before. These boys did not receive prejudicial treatment but received preferential treatment until things got out of hand.
- The entire black community of Jena is not being heard in this controversy, just the parents, relatives, and close friends of the Jena Six. The black community of Jena has not been involved in the protests and demonstrations called by national race-based organizations. Some state and national race crusaders have chastised them for not "rising up" with the parents to force law enforcement to "free the Jena Six." Many do agree that the charges seem wrong, but they also know the criminal history of the boys referred to as the "Jena Six." It is their neighborhood these boys have terrorized. Not even all of the parents claim that these boys should be set free with no consequence for their actions. One of the parents was interviewed, saying that the boys should suffer the fair punishment for their actions. He suggested that simple battery would be an acceptable charge. With one exception, the local black pastors do not support the demonstrations. They have been openly criticized for their lack of cooperation with the national race crusaders. One of them counseled the "Jena Six" families to not stir controversy for controversy's sake. The black pastor was openly condemned by a local radio personality sympathetic to the cause of the black parents. The rhetoric grew so intense that the black pastor was referred to as Reed Walter's "house Negro" on the local radio talk show. The pastor is consistently accused on this show of working in cooperation with Reed Walters in a plot to undermine the "Jena Six."
This comment has been deleted for, among other things, advocating the rape of Reed Walters
Shorter Steve Sailer:
"Everything was fine before you do-good outsiders came in and got our blacks all agitated"
The national media has this story all wrong -- it's not some flashback to the ancient Emmit Till Era, it's instead a representative example of the Post-OJ Era in which star athletes, like the Jena 6, are allowed to run amok off the field until they finally go too far. Mychal Bell, who scored 18 touchdowns for Jena High in 2006, had four previous convictions before being the first of the Jena 6 stompers to be found guilty of 2nd degree aggravated battery. Yet, he was allowed to continue playing football through his previous lawbreaking. Similarly, the youngest of the six stompers, who was too young to be charged as an adult, is the star running back for this year's Jena HS team!
Here's Jason Whitlock, the outstanding black sportwriter on Jena:
"There was no “schoolyard fight” as a result of nooses being hung on a whites-only tree.
Justin Barker, the white victim, was cold-cocked from behind, knocked unconscious and stomped by six black athletes. Barker, luckily, sustained no life-threatening injuries and was released from the hospital three hours after the attack.
A black U.S. attorney, Don Washington, investigated the “Jena Six” case and concluded that the attack on Barker had absolutely nothing to do with the noose-hanging incident three months before. The nooses and two off-campus incidents were tied to Barker’s assault by people wanting to gain sympathy for the “Jena Six” in reaction to Walters’ extreme charges of attempted murder.
Much has been written about Bell’s trial, the six-person all-white jury that convicted him of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery and the clueless public defender who called no witnesses and offered no defense. It is rarely mentioned that no black people responded to the jury summonses and that Bell’s public defender was black.
It’s almost never mentioned that Bell’s absentee father returned from Dallas and re-entered his son’s life only after Bell faced attempted-murder charges. At a bond hearing in August, Bell’s father and a parade of local ministers promised a judge that they would supervise Bell if he was released from prison.
Where were the promises and supervision before any of this?
It’s rarely mentioned that Bell was already on probation for assault when he was accused of participating in Barker’s attack. And it’s never mentioned that white people in the “racist” town of Jena provided Bell support and protected his football career long before Jesse, Al, Bell’s father and all the others took a sincere interest in Mychal Bell.
Amazing!
Amazing how a discussion of race brings out the best in Americans.
A couple of things...
First, it is mind-boggling to hear and read so many comments that essentially harken back to the old, "We'd be fine down here if outside agitators would just leave us alone and stop riling up our colored folks!"
Yes, during TV interviews, time after time, white Jena residents looked into the camera and expressed that sentiment. (And it has been expressed here also.) You have to wonder what type of time warp those folks are living in. But then, in a state that almost elected David Duke as governor a few years ago - an inconvenient historical fact that most white folks want to ignore and forget - what else can you expect?
Also, where is all the conservative outrage about this out-of-control, ethically-challenged prosecutor? Conservatives were ready to do all sorts of nasty things to the Duke rape DA. This guy has taken steps that are as bad or worse. After all, none of those fine young college boys spent almost a year in the county jail. This DA has been instrumental in actually destroying the life of a young black boy - and he was really just a boy when this happened - and yet, we hear no collective outrage from the right wing.
Perhaps, does that have something to do with the fact that the victim of this DA's actions has dark skin?
The fact that the DA represented the school board at the same time he had responsibility for any future criminal or delinquency cases concerning the boys involved is an incredible conflict of interest. Most states have statutes that require some sort of court system response if a school system takes certain actions - like expulsion - and for the DA to be involved in the expulsion decision, knowing that it was likely that he would then have to determine if and how he would prosecute the boys...well that is about as sleazy as sleazy gets.
Where is the outrage?
A
the victim was the provacateur and got his just desserts. - Lynn Brooke
Should we enshrine that principle in law?
If six white kids had beaten a black kid unconscious because they claimed he provoked them, would you be arguing that the black kid got his "just desserts"?
Megan is not a lawyer, she is just someone with a blog, and her "knowledge" about this case appears to be limited to the Wikipedia entry. The cases should never have been brought in the first place but should have instead gone to juvenile services and the convictions were overturned for just that reason. Ten months in adult prison for a school yard fight is more than sufficient. - noen
Are you a lawyer, or just someone with a comment?
it is about "Jail Reed Walters." (And secretly hope he gets viciously a**raped repeatedly) - Max Power
Let me guess: prison rape = good, naked pyramids at Abu Ghraib = human rights travesty?
Here is one African American perspective on this. From "Lessons from Jenna, LA", by Jason Whitlock:
The first of the Jena 6 to be convicted in the stomping of Justin Barker, Mychal Bell, was an All-State football player with four previous convictions. (The other five stompers were football players, too.) Rather than being the victim of discrimination by the authorities, Bell had been given preferential treatment time and again because he was such a stud athlete.
From the Shreveport Times on August 25:
"Three months prior to that attack, [Mychal] Bell committed two violent crimes while on probation for a battery Christmas Day 2005, according to testimony. Later that same week, he led the Jena Giants to a shutout victory in a football game against the Buckeye Panthers. Bell was adjudicated — the juvenile equivalent to a conviction — of battery Sept. 2 and criminal damage to property Sept. 3, said Cynthia Bradford, LaSalle Parish deputy clerk.
A few days later, on Sept. 8, Bell rushed 12 times for 108 yards and scored three touchdowns — one of the best performances of the year for the standout athlete.
Mack Fowler, Jena High's football coach at the time, said Friday he hadn't heard about Bell's specific criminal history.
Fowler said that at one point he had a policy in place more severe than the school's when it came to students with discipline problems. But he said he discovered that while he was punishing his players, the school "wasn't doing anything" to them.
Fowler said he decided then that he was going to do the same thing the school did — nothing.
http://www.shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?Date=20070825&Category=NEWS03&ArtNo=708250353&SectionCat=&Template=printart
I see Sailer brought up Whitlock already. Sorry for the redundancy. Worth reading the original in any case though.
Steve Sailer: nice how you left out some of the ridiculous assertions from Eddie Thompson and nice how Eddie Thompson creates and debates straw men in his article: nobody is arguing that the Jena 6 are heroes; not one in-dept media-report I have seen reported that the pen-incident was addressed at blacks only. His most ridiculous assertion: "There has never been an “all white tree” at Jena High School". He refers to official school policy and thinks that when other areas of the school don't have any forced segregation, it's okay.
And what are we to conclude about his assertion that there weren't three but only two nooses? What the heck is that about?
Thompson also relays several of the incidents prior to Dec. 4 only from the viewpoint of the whites. He doesn't note that the guy who had used a beerbottle in the fight got away with probation.
The FBI did not say that no hate crime had occurred: FBI agents who went to Jena in September to investigate the noose report, and other federal officials who examined what happened, concluded it "had all the markings of a hate crime."
The incident wasn't prosecuted as such because it didn't meet the federal standards required for the teens to be certified as adults, Washington said. A court makes the final decision on whether to drop their juvenile status.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/law/09/19/jena.six.link/index.html
Note that one of the Jena 6 was a juvenile as well but was tried as an adult.
This DA has been instrumental in actually destroying the life of a young black boy - and he was really just a boy when this happened - and yet, we hear no collective outrage from the right wing.
Quick question, not being familiar with LA law. Does a juvenile have to be certified to stand trial as an adult in a court proceeding, or is it automatic for some level of charge? I know up here in MN they have to have a hearing, even for murder.
The facts of the case turn out to be radically different from the media narrative, but, basically, nobody cares. Everybody wants to wallow in Jim Crow nostalgia, when this is really a 21st Century racist hate crime in which six pampered athlete/thugs stomped some kid of another race. But because the star football players were black and their victim was white, the stompers are now the victims, not the stompee.
The real question here is why is there such a hunger in America to be lied to about race?
Kevin,
I know nothing about Louisiana law (or anybody else's, really), but as I recall the fellow was tried as an adult, and an appeals court overturned the conviction on the grounds that he should not have been tried as an adult. So clearly it isn't automatic, as there was both room within the law to charge as an adult and room to challenge that decision.
Ahh, what to say about Steve Sailer. If he didn't exist, we'd have to invent him. Scratch that, I'd hope we wouldn't *have* to. Still, I'd rather think someone invented him than that he's real.
"The real question here is why is there such a hunger in America to be lied to about race?"
Because the truth is monotonous and depressing. Tom Wolfe nailed this twenty years ago with his "Bonfire of the Vanities", with the part about how the assistant district attorneys got depressed by the endless parade of black and brown defendants, nearly all obviously guilty.
Right, "Bonfire" perfectly adumbrated the Duke lacrosse hoax 19 years before it happened:
In Tom Wolfe's classic, the Bronx District Attorney Abe Weiss "was notorious in his obsession for publicity, even among a breed, the district attorney, that was publicity-mad by nature." Weiss is known to his underlings as "Captain Ahab" for his pursuit of the "Great White Defendant." The D.A. finds the perfect Great White Defendant in Sherman McCoy, a rich, pompous, adulterous WASP bond trader, whom he charges with running over an innocent black ghetto youth with his Mercedes. McCoy is Central Casting's dream candidate for the role of GWD. The only minor flaw is that McCoy is not, actually, guilty. But a little thing like his innocence doesn't stop the DA's office and the New York media from ruining his life.
Why was the Bronx D.A. fixated on finding the almost-mythical Great White Defendant? First, as Wolfe explains:
"Weiss had an election coming up, and the Bronx was 70 percent black and Latin, and he was going to make sure the name Abe Weiss was pumped out to them on every channel that existed. He might not do much else, but he was going to do that."
Second, Wolfe notes:
"Every assistant D.A. in the Bronx … shared Captain Ahab's mania for the Great White Defendant. For a start, it was not pleasant to go through life telling yourself, "What I do for a living is, I pack blacks and Latins off to jail."… It was that it was in bad taste. So it made the boys uneasy, this eternal prosecution of the blacks and Latins."
I encourage everyone to take a look at Steve Sailer's website. Especially his entries on Interracial Marriage, Race and most hilarious of all his articles on Dariwnism[sic]. As well as his many links to VDare
Steve is no ordinary racist.
Oh please!
First, the complete Whitlock column referred to a couple of racist apologists is very different from how it has been characterized by same racist apologists. Read the entire column if one has a desire to read Whitlock. Personally, I think he is extraordinarily lame - and have thought that since he got ran out of Detroit years ago - but read the column for yourself. It is not a defense of the actions of the prosecutors and it is certainly not a condemnation of the 6 kids.
The fact that readers would attempt to cherrypick sentences and paragraphs in order to bolster their position says volumes about their credibility and integrity.
As for why race is such a touchy subject, your question would best be addressed to your fellow white Americans who cannot confront and own up to their racist and genocidal history. An illustration: this country still cannot even apologize for the sin of slavery. We are not talking reparations, we are just talking about a national figure offering an official apology, no strings attached. If this country still cannot politically reach out in that simple fashion, that is a strong indication that we will never move forward.
I represented juveniles in a midwestern state. What happened in Jena happens to black kids all over the country.
The problem with the system is that it works well for white kids. They are treated as kids. As should be the case.
However, as happened in Jena, black kids are treated like the second coming of Charles Manson for any small transgression. Consequently, I would put very little stock, absent specific info about the specific adjudication and the facts behind it, on any supposedly "violent" past that Bell had. He could have been convicted of battery for pushing someone. Damage to property could have involved tearing a page out of a book.
Don't laugh, I've seen those types of charges and adjudications. For black kids. As happened with the nooses, a similarly situated white kid is simply told to stay out of trouble and is sent home.
One last point.
Most states have a process that provides for treating kids as adults. In some states a particularly heinous charge is sufficient to allow a prosecutor to file an action in adult court first. Then the juvenile can ask the court to transfer it back to a juvenile court. In some states, that is referred to as a reverse waiver.
Most times, however, the case starts out in juvenile court and the DA has to ask the court to "transfer" or "waive" the kid into adult court.
I am not certain what happened in this particular matter.
noen writes: "I encourage everyone to take a look at Steve Sailer's website. Especially his entries on Interracial Marriage, Race and most hilarious of all his articles on Dariwnism[sic]. As well as his many links to VDare
Steve is no ordinary racist."
That's true - he's a professional race-baiter. I think he's gunning for fill-in slots on Michael Savage's show.
I'm going to file this under "making our case for us" and say no more.
Wow! To say that Sailor has some ...interesting ideas on race is like saying that Yao Ming is a tall guy.
Thanks for the tip.
People usually reveal who they are if you just pay attention to what they say or write.
Sailor pretty much shows his hand through his...interesting writing.
Sailer is correctly spelled "Sailer", not "Sailor".
I should at least spell his name correctly.
If six white football players in Jena had stomped one black kid and been charged with the exact same crimes, we'd be watching exactly the same coverage on CNN of the Revs. Jesse and Al leading a march denouncing the South for its racism.
As Lenin said, the crucial question is always Who? Whom?
Sailer's comment makes no sense.
Why would Jackson and Sharpton allege racism against african-americans if white students were treated in an overly harsh fashion?
That makes no sense.
Historical fact: the South has a racist history. Southern states attempted to break away from the Union in order to maintain their peculiar institution, slavery. Race-baiting southern politicians are the norm, not the exception. Fifty years after Brown, the South is still largely segregated and whites seem to like it just fine that way. Fifty years after Brown, some whites still maintain and defend separate and segregated proms, when the schools are integrated. This is the reality.
Though they have come a long way from Lester Maddox and the 1960's version of George Wallace, Southerners still essentially play the same racist game.
As an African-American, I was refused entry into a "private" nightclub in Myrtle Beach while they passed out "membership cards" and allowed entry to whites who were standing behind me in line.
I could tell many more stories about the South.
If the South does not like being portrayed in a certain fashion, it should take a hard look at itself and undergo some serious changes.
If six white football players in Jena had stomped one black kid and been charged with the exact same crimes, we'd be watching exactly the same coverage on CNN of the Revs. Jesse and Al leading a march denouncing the South for its racism.
Sailer: You fail to note the possibility -- maybe the likelihood -- that the white players wouldn't be charged "with the exact same crime" but with a lesser offense meriting a less draconian punishment. Do you contend with a straight face that the criminal justice system metes out the same degree of fairness without regard to race? That's what the the protesters are protesting.
Of course Jesse and Al wouldn't be protesting overly harsh treatement of the six white stompers. They'd be denouncing the lessening of the charges to 2nd class aggravated battery and calling for reinstatement of the original 2nd degree attempted murder charges.
But, they'd still be on CNN marching around Jena making speeches denouncing the South's past and present of white racism -- look at how six football players stomped one kid when he was unconsious! If that isn't proof of racial hatred, what is?
And you'd be nodding your head along with the Reverends and saying how right they are.
Objective reality just doesn't much appeal to people.
You haven't seen racism until you go into SE Washington D.C. (and dozens of other places in the country that I'm aware of, probably more) and are anyone other than black. The looks of hate flashed your way are nothing but blood curdling. Heck, even the flip off of the finger and the scream, "Get outta here you don't belong here!" aren't as bone-chilling as the looks.
Face it folks, there is racism in many people in many places. No race has a monopoly on idiots and race-bigots who do all they can to further this BS in our modern age. There is no justification for the crap people put up with.
What I'm not too sure of is the validity of many anecdotes that really do little more than get others mad. Don't you agree?
Six dudes with unsavory backgrounds (not 4.0 students as one caller from Atlanta tried to paint them) who repeatedly was kicking someone from another race while he lay unconscious is not anything even a semi-reasonable person can condone. And don't give me this, "You're a racist," crap if my view doesn't happen to agree with yours. It won't work any more.
frankie d, you seem to think Whites are those with the racist background. You probbly outa open your eyes and see that there aer other races who practice racism on a daily basis. Haveyou ever tried to date an asian girl, when their parents pull that "GuessWho's Coming to Dinner" attitude on you, but without the happy little warm ending? My girl was berated pretty bad for months until she finally caved in and said she couldn't put up with her family and Asian friends wondering why she'd wanna hang with a guy who wasn't Asian (even a Hispanic doesn't work with the Asians, even less so, really than Whites).
As for the Jena...the whole media circus is out of control and don't think its going to get resolved well. Just look at this thread and see what supposed calm, thoughtful people let their juices flow and start calling names.
Can't we all just get along?
The real question seems to be "what happened the night of the alleged kicking?" Was the Kickee actually knocked out, viciously stomped, or did he just lose a schoolyard fight (which included a few kicks to the gut, but it's just an asskickin, not deadly assault. I mean, does this kid just need to suck it up, or was this serious?
The only complaint since the attack, after healing up, is recurrent headaches (there was a swollen eye and a bit of a concussion). With that level of injury, that the extent of the harm (when 6 humans, in an attack, could clearly do so much more if they wanted to kill or maim someone) the charge is clearly excessive.
That is excessive, and the individuals should be punished. Suspensions, community service, and participation in public discussions on respecting human rights and dignity (including not whaling on people to give then concussions, unless sanctioned by the Leviathan (strange how Hobbsean our society has become lately, with all authority ceded to the executive in the name of protection).).
Jena is almost a twisted metaphor for Iraq. There is a sectarian dispute, the local gov. just favors its own sect, past murderous violence is referenced, and one side starts taking matters into its own hands. Because they believe they are entitled to have... well, that's where the analogy dies. One is just high school, with some kid who got beat on a bit, the other is geopolitical chaos.
I am from the south, and while the executive and city council branch of that town were just pouring gas on a smoldering fire, it's not representative of the area. Hopefully, it will be a lesson to us all in the need to respect the freedom and dignity of our fellow man, and if we follow that precept (a value truly honored by our founding fathers), if we remember that we must live free or die defending individual liberty, we will continue to prosper as a people. I only hope the recent misconduct, both overseas and by corrupt and tyrannical government entities can cease.
Here is local reporter Abbey Brown's summary of statements filed by witnesses to the attack by the six football players on Justin Barker:
"Investigators from the LaSalle Parish Sheriff's Office have gathered statements from more than 40 people -- a number of them students -- who told investigators they saw everything that happened. Many of these statements were included in court documents.
"When I heard a black boy say something to Justin, I turned my head and I saw somebody hit Justin," one student wrote in a statement. "He fell in between the gym door and the concrete barricade. I saw Robert Bailey kneel down and punch Justin in the head. ... Then Carwin Jones kicked him in the head. ... Theo Shaw tried to kick him so I pushed Theo Shaw down. I also saw Mychal Bell standing over him."
"Phrases like "stomped him badly," "stepped on his face," "knocked out cold on the ground," and "slammed his head on the concrete beam" were used by the students in their statements."
http://www.thetowntalk.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/99999999/NEWS/70916045
If six white football players had stomped one black kid, there would be exactly the same demonstrations led by Jesse and Al in Jena and the same speechifying about white racism.
Who stomps whom doesn't seem to matter much anymore.
If six white players had jumped one black student, Jesse and Al would be marching in Jena demanding that the DA make the punishment harsher by adding hate crime charges to the indictments. And they might well get their wish.
But because it was six black players jumping one white student, nobody in the media is asking why there aren't hate crime charges against the blacks.
Steve - most likely because of the nooses and the whites-only tree and the taunting based on those actions. It's generally not a hate crime when you're the one hated upon.
There's no evidence that what happened here was a part of any premeditated effort to intimidate white students based on race or ethnicity. Going the other way, though...
noen: "Jena is located in LaSalle parish (scroll down) which voted 4,910 for David Duke and 2,432 for Edwin W. Edwards.
I expect an apology."
You "accidentally" failed to mention that Edwin Edwards had ties to organized crime and is currently serving 13 years in Federal prison for corruption. Louisiana is full of unsavory politicians.
I expect an apology.
tydanosaurus: "I guess the words "all white jury" mean nothing to you guys. Perhaps you should read some history."
150 citizens, both Black and white, received jury summonses. 50 decided to show up, all of them white. Perhaps if the Black recipients of jury summonses had a sense of civic duty, there might have been a different outcome.
Or perhaps not: Black people are equally capable of deciding that a 6 to 1 beatdown is not a schoolyard fight, it's a felony.
Hanging a noose WITH a black person in it is a sick violent crime. Hanging an EMPTY noose is called "symbolism" and "free speech" no matter how sick, vile and repugnant it is. Although they had NO right to do it on school grounds and the expulsion should have stood IMHO. Am I the ONLY one whose mother recited "stick and stones will break my bones" to? Why is everyone so sensitive to NON PHYSICAL attacks these days? How is hanging a noose any less political speech than the KKK marching down mainstreet in sheets with a permit protected by the ACLU?
The black kids should have met and held a prayer meeting under the nooses to pray for the little white bigots' souls. This would have ended the escalation and given the blacks the MORAL HIGH GROUND. But nooooo, they was "dissed" man....someone's gotta pay with their skull!
Welcome to modern American splittering apart.
Have a nice day.
TO DAVE who wrote: "You should probably be aware that white people *always* think black people are going to jump them.
***Whites aren't the only ones who think this...Maybe you should go talk to Jesse Jackson who once said (go look it up DAVE) "I hate to admit it, but there are times when I am walking down a city street and I am RELIEVED to see white kids, not black kids, following me."
Sorry Dave but we DO have some nice parting gifts for you. 8-)
I suggest that before people who were living in other parts of the country testify as to Mr. Bell and the other student's 'awful behavior' they read this weblog posting which gives very detailed recounting of the aggravated assault trial of Mychael Bell.
Of the all the conflicting testimony, only one person testified that Bell actually hit the white kid -- and that was one of the kids who had hung the noose at the 'white tree'. Other sites provide even more detail of this mockery of a trial and the DA's incredibly dubious actions.
You all want justice? Then why the heck don't any of you do anything more than read Wikipedia about this story? Get the facts -- this wasn't a gang attacking a kid. This is most likely a couple of kids hitting another and a bunch of other people charged because, after all they were all black, and therefore they're all guilty.
Shelley,
The article you linked to says four witnesses testified that Bell hit Baker, not one.
One thing I think everybody really ought to agree on here. Those touchy-feely multiculti sensitivity training sessions which schools usually impose in the wake of incidents like nooses being hung from trees? Though not, unfortunately, in this case? Maybe they're really not such a bad idea.
I am UTTERLY convinced by people who CAPITALIZE every third WORD! I really AM!
"The black kids should have met and held a prayer meeting under the nooses to pray for the little white bigots' souls. This would have ended the escalation and given the blacks the MORAL HIGH GROUND."
Ah, another double standard, not only in the justice system.
What strikes me most in this story is that NOT ONE (not that local minister and not one racist here on the board) has suggested that those white kids who hung the nooses should have offered apologies to the black kids, to the black community, to the entire community. No, they are excused because it was a prank. The Coulter-defence: do or say the most horrendous things and pretend it was just a joke.
Disgusting.
There are many unfortunate aspects to this case, brooksfoe. Almost too many to mention, in fact. One which really irritates me is that it appears that the principal had a handle on the matter, in his decision to expel the noose-hangers, and then the idiot school board undermined him, which I think likely set a lot of bad things further in motion.
A local columnist (black columnist) points out that the main target of the assault charges against the six, a Mr. Bell, had been to court three times in the previous two years on assault related charges and was on probation at the time of the the incident that precipitated the latest charges. In light of that fact (if true) it makes his predicament much less sympathetic.
One thing that's becoming ever clearer, as the vast number of people who fell for the Duke hoax indicates, is that lots of highly opinionated people, in and out of the media, really have no idea how the modern world works. So, they get snookered all the time. They deeply want to believe it's perpetually 1877 and the Klan is about to ride. Well, it's 2007 and things have changed a lot, as we see when we dig into this story and discover that the beating of Barker was the culmination of a long skein of criminality by the football players winked at by the school authorities because they were so talented.
Steve Sailer writes: "Of course Jesse and Al wouldn't be protesting overly harsh treatement of the six white stompers. They'd be denouncing the lessening of the charges to 2nd class aggravated battery and calling for reinstatement of the original 2nd degree attempted murder charges.
But, they'd still be on CNN marching around Jena making speeches denouncing the South's past and present of white racism -- look at how six football players stomped one kid when he was unconsious! If that isn't proof of racial hatred, what is?"
When NYC cops blew Amadou Diallo away with 41 bullets, the Steve Sailers of the world couldn't understand what the fuss was all about. They thought it was a fine display of marksmanship and that Diallo's family should have been presented with a bill for the bullets.
It's also interesting how Steve Sailer obsesses about what "Jesse and Al" are up to. If there were a 24 hour "Jesse and Al" webcam site I have little doubt that Steve would be watching it most of the day, 7 days a week, probably hoping to get a glimpse of one of them touching a white woman inappropriately.
I tend to care more about abuse of power by elected officials or officers of the law than I do about what a couple of preachers are up to, but I guess Steve is entitled to his prurient hobbies.
I'm happy to agitate for hanging sentences on deserving white kids, but which ones, who have not already been tried, do you want to punish?
So, you're "happy to agitate" for something that can't take place, and you reject that leniency for the black kids, not harsh punishment for the white kids, is the point. Thanks for not getting it and contributing nothing to the debate.
The "Principal" not "principle" told the student where he could sit.
Will Allen: actually, I've never really understood the logic behind expelling malefactors from school, unless they're so violent they actually pose a physical threat to other students. Denying budding young bigots a high-school education doesn't seem to me to be a rational way to try to steer them towards the right path. It lets them off easy. They should be forced to finish school, and be saddled with remedial civics requirements focused on racial equality and civil rights; their behavior shows quite clearly that they have failed US civics.
Shorter Steve Sailer: everyone is leaping to conclusions about the Jena Six based on their own stereotypical preconceptions about race. But my deep investigation into the actual facts of the case have led me to the very unpredictable conclusion that the Jena Six are actually out-of-control super-muscular black criminals, just the kind whose criminal tendencies white people are always excusing because black people are so good at football. The fact that I happen to have reached this conclusion, purely based on the facts of this individual case, has nothing to do with the fact that my entire blogging career is a concerted effort to denigrate black people.
As usual, racist apologists want to change the subject and not address the true issue here: the obvious double standard in the criminal justice system.
I am not, and most reasonable people are not, condoning or seeking to excuse any criminal or delinquent behavior on the part of any of the six black kids who may have engaged in certain criminal or delinquent behavior.
The issue is clearly the fact that the prosecutor exercised his discretion in a racist and discriminatory fashion.
White kids hung nooses, engaged in fights, pulled weapons on black kids and busted a bottle over the head of a black kid and they were treated like kids by the prosecutor and the system. They received a great deal of leniency because the prosecutor chose to charge and prosecute their cases via less severe prosecution theories.
The black kids who engaged in fights and kicked a white kid with a tennis shoe were prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The prosecutor treated them as adults. (At least one of them.) He had to present a novel and harsh theory - tennis shoe as dangerous weapon - to charge one kid as an adult on the most serious felony possible.
This is the issue. Attempting to argue that I or anyone else is attempting to excuse the black kids' behavior is a diversion and it is untrue!
People like Mr. Sailer continually bring that argument forward because they cannot address the racist nature of the charging process that has led to this debacle.
I know this is not 1877. The bigger question is why your fellow Southerners do not understand that it is not 1877.
Memo to rednecks: the South lost the Civil War. There is no Confederacy. And the flag of the Confederacy - a symbol of traitors and racists - is no less offensive than the Nazi Swastika. When are Southerners and their racist sympathizers going to let go of the most divisive symbol in American history and live in 2007?
When someone explains the relevance of flying Confederate flags - the flag of traitors and white supremacists - over official government buildings and fixing it on their personal belongings and how that indicates understanding and tolerance I'll be willing to cut the South a bit of slack. Until then, it is what it is. And racists like Sailer is what he is.
A correction:
A racist like Sailer is what he is.
Shorter Steve Sailer: David Duke.
Things have changed a lot?
Two arrested in noose incident near Jena, Louisiana
Authorities in Alexandria, less than 40 miles southwest of Jena, arrested two people who were driving a red pickup Thursday night with two nooses hanging off the back, repeatedly passing groups of demonstrators who were waiting for buses back to their home states.
The marchers had taken part in the huge protests in Jena that accused authorities there of injustice in the handling of racially charged cases -- including the hanging of nooses in a tree after a group of black students sat in an area where traditionally only white students sat.
Shelley e.a., you don't get it either.
There is NO discussion that guilty people should face punishment. NONE.
There is NO discussion that any previous criminal behaviour (or non-criminal behaviour) - and the nature of that behaviour - should be taken into consideration when appropiate punishment is meted out. NONE
That's not the point here. Get that into your skull.
The point is that the charges leveled against them and the punishments that come with it when convicted, should fit the crimes that were committed. The point is that the boys are entitled to a fair trial.
Everybody agrees they committed an assault, the police recommended that they should be charged with assault. Up until this point, this whole mess was ugly and signified a lot of things but it would never had made international headlines, only local and regional headlines.
The story would probably have only featured in a broader study about racism in the Lousiana or the South. The assault on Dec. 4 would have been mentioned as one of the many fights and problems that occurred after the nooses-incident.
That ugly story however became a scandal and eventually an international story after District Attorney Walters increased those assault charges to attempted second-degree murder.
When found guilty, the boys could be out of jail when they are 50. That's not an appropiate punishment.
With two previous convictions, the alleged ringleader doesn't sound like anyone I'd care to meet.
Mr. Bell does not seem to be a very sympathetic figure. Of course, neither does Mr. Barker. With that said, if you are discussing a case in which an allegedly biased district attorney abused his power to over-harshly punish young black men then it seems odd to cite previous decisions on his part as evidence against the young black men. If Reed Walters can't be trusted to prosecute the "Jena 6" case why exactly should we believe that Mr. Bell's previous "violent crimes" were prosecuted without bias?
actually, I've never really understood the logic behind expelling malefactors from school, unless they're so violent they actually pose a physical threat to other students. Denying budding young bigots a high-school education doesn't seem to me to be a rational way to try to steer them towards the right path. It lets them off easy.
In most places expelled students have to be provided with home tutoring or other alternatives at the school district's expense until they graduate and/or turn 18. This of course can be very expensive.
Sam Hutcheson,
Thank you for nailing one of the critical points in this entire debacle.
I would be willing to bet that most of the white kids had as many, if not more, "contacts" with police and other authorities. But miraculously, they were always given the benefit of the doubt and not charged and therefore, voila, no record!
On the other hand, given even the slightest pretext to charge and prosecute a black kid, the DA did exactly that. And surprise, surprise surprise...you have a bunch on local black kids with previous records. And any subsequent contact with authorities will take those previous records into consideration.
This is exactly how the game is played. I saw this process play out time after time during a decade of representing kids in the justice system.
This is the issue that needs to be addressed.
Here's a complete list of conservatives who thought George "Macaca" Allen's decision to hang a noose from a tree in his office had a strong whiff of racism:
So it's no wonder the good white folks of Jena didn't take the matter too seriously.
If it hadn't been for one guy with a camcorder Macaca Allen would probably be one of the leading contenders for the Republican nomination.
You know Guava, (and you are a delicious tropical fruit aren't you?) if you are going to snark at least try to be original instead of aping me. Though I am flattered, thank you.
And since you don't seem to be able to follow even your own arguments here is what this was all about.
First, I said the citizens of Jena voted overwhelmingly for David Duke in 1991.
Then you claim BS and demanded proof.
I said my source was Democracy Now.
You laughed.
I produced an independent source by going to the Sec of State of Louisiana. I did this in five min. by consulting The Great Gazoogle. Which is a skill you apparently lack.
You concede my point but claim that because Edwin Edwards was corrupt that somehow invalidates my original assertion that the citizens of Jena showed their true colors when they voted for David Duke. Which of course it does not.
Edwin Edwards is indeed a crook but even so he was far more preferable than a known Grand Wizard of the Klan. There was in fact a campaign to "vote for the lizard, not the wizard". Most normal people understood that as bad as Edwin was, Duke would be utter disaster. But apparently for the good people of Jena, their preferences were clear. In their minds a vicious, murderous racist like David Duke was to be preferred over yet another corrupt public official.
That of course was my original point. Thank you for making it for me.
What a facinating discussion by both highly educated (and some not so) people.
I only happen to come across the Jena story only couple of days ago as I don't own a TV since I find very little worth watching.
It is interesting how polarizing this topic is although I wonder how many people who are writing have really lived through any prejudice or injustice. Growing asian in the 70s and 80s in the midwest thickend my skin from frquent taunting based on my skin color by both whites and blacks. Too early for hispanics I guess.
I think being older (late 30s) and having children of my own have mellowed me out because overall I have faith that most Americans are normal people who are probably too busy to care about the color of their neighbors. I am not saying there is no prejudice or even racism but I feel that most people have a moral sense of what's fair.
By reading the reports out of Jena I think the fact of the matter is that there were two noose put on a tree which are symbolically very offensive which culminated in an assault (I call it an assault because six on one is not a fight, where is sense of honor these days. Growing up my coach stopped six kids fighting a single kid one day. He made them fight one at a time and the single kid kicked the living day lights out of the six)
Some people in this blog seem to assert that the facts in the court cases and news reports are in dispute because Jena is a racist town and if we are naive enough to believe anything the government, police, preacher, even FBI says is true, we must be racists. Which leads to a conundrum of who do you believe.
A another view point is that white kids getting off with a slap on the wrist vs. black kids getting attempted second degree murder is unfair. I do think there is some level of unfairness in the system altough its tougher to put a proper perspective on it since the situations are somewhat different. As a parent, if my idiot child was caught putting a racially motivated noose on a tree, I would be very upset but wouldn't want him in jail since he didn't physically hurt anyone. However, if my child and his buddies kicked a kid unconcious I would think he deserve to spend some time in jail and hopefully get scared back to Jesus.
I guess my comment is that there are lots of examples of injustice. Recently, I think of the case of the poor black young man in jail for performing oral sex on his underaged girlfriend. Now that is injustice. I din't see Jesse James or Al Sharpton marching for his release. Could it be because it doesn't involve white people?
Not everybody who disagrees with noen or frankie d is a racist. I think people who want to see the six boys freed is being unfair. Their sentences should be reduced but they deserve jail time. That is justice.
We all need to take accountability of our actions.
No, Peter, that isn't correct in the school districts I've lived at. Usually, the kids are supposed to be at school only until the age of 16. There is one district in Connecticut I know of that says 17.
Also, if the student is expelled do to behaviour (which is pretty much always if they're expelled), it is up to the parents to provide education alternatives until they're either let back in or turn 16. Most of the time, though, they aren't tracked to the point where this is enforced.
If the parents can't control their kids, they pay, like they should, since they're very much responsible for raising kids that suck. MLJ, frankie and noen, that goes for white and the black kids. Colour blind is a good thing, by the way, not a bad thing.
Oh, and Oranje, they definitely have changed. No one was in the noose, no?
brooksfoe, hanging a noose from a tree, in the context of this story, is reasonably interpreted as a terroristic threat. An educational institution should have zero tolerance for terroristic threats. Frankly, given the First Amendment does not protect such threats, the noose hanger's activities should result in prosecution, assuming the legislature has been wise enough to outlaw threatening people. No, I wouldn't favor jail for such a crime, but being sentenced to extremely hard physical labor and super-intensive classroom instruction, until competency is achieved in the areas you mention, would likely be a useful avenue to pursue for such crimes.
Colorblindness is an admirable goal.
It would be wonderful if our society and its institutions behaved in a colorblind fashion. Unfortunately that is not the case. Incident after incident, case after case illustrates this point, but apologists continually excuse, attempt to distinguish or somehow attempt to protect and shield racist decisions and actions.
Bystander,
I agree that many people who disagree with me are not racists. However, many people who defend obviously racist actions by authorities are exactly what they appear to be: racists. And they hide behind our societal reluctance to confront them and continue to behave in an injurious, racist fashion. They understand our country's deep reluctance to address issues of race and they exploit that reluctance by continually engaging in and supporting racist conduct by themselves and others in power.
I spent many years watching many people in government deal with these issues in various ways. Many good people simply did not want to get involved in the hassles associated with this difficult issue so they always avoided it as best they could. Many evil, racist people took advantage of this and acted in a fairly openly racist fashion because they understood that, like the racist bullies they were, they could simply intimidate most others into NOT standing up. They were willing to take things to another level. People with no skin in the game - so to speak - just didn't care enough to confront and stop this kind of behavior.
That is the problem.
I always think back to that old saying in the civil rights movement. I think Stokely Charmichal said it: If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem.
Beneficial,
I think you are confusing the legal obligations of the students with the legal obligations of the school district. The news articles about the Jena affair make it clear that the expelled/suspended students had to go to an alternative school.
In New York, students are required to attend school until they are 16, but the school districts are required to school students until they are 21. And in New York, expelling or suspending a student still requires the school district to pay for their schooling, whether it be at home or an alternative site. Even in-school suspension requires the district to pay for a teacher.
frankie d,
Thats what makes it hard. We don't have a gold standard that says "okay this action is racist and that action is not" Lynching people by race is deplorable. Not agreeing with your view of injustices doesn't necessarily make me a racist. Just a difference in opinion.
I am a solution in my own way. By being tolerant and some times looking at things at face value instead of looking for some deeper sinister intent. What you may consider indifference to your perceived injustice doesn't mean I don't fight racism where I see it.
bystander writes: "What you may consider indifference to your perceived injustice doesn't mean I don't fight racism where I see it."
So where do you see it and how have you fought it?
Part of Megan's mistake was relying on Instarube Glenn Reynolds as part of her original sourcing. He doesn't get anything right, and only links to the most bizarre wingnuts out there.
An educational institution should have zero tolerance for terroristic threats. Frankly, given the First Amendment does not protect such threats, the noose hanger's activities should result in prosecution, assuming the legislature has been wise enough to outlaw threatening people.
Good point. Considering that the SCOTUS just told an Alaskan kid his free speech rights did not extend so far as to allow him to hold up a sign that read "Bong Hits For Jesus" at an event only tangentially related to school function I'm pretty sure they would apply that same reasoning -- the free speech rights of kids are limited by the need of the educational system to control their actions -- to hanging nooses on school property.
The noose narrative about how there was a direct connection between the incident at the beginning of September and the incident at the beginning of December, which we've all heard a million times by now, was made up long after the events. None of the 40 statements taken of eyewitnesses to the December stomping mention the noose hanging of three months before. Maybe it has some validity, but there's a counter-narrative that fits modern trends and is being ignored.
It's fascinating how so many people assume the Jena Six were despised, marginalized outcasts whom the White Power Structure was just itching to send to prison. In reality, they were Big Men on Campus who had scored at least 29 touchdowns among them in the 7-3 season that had just ended in football-mad Jena.
And they had long been acting like they were above the law, since the school authorities wouldn't suspend them from the team because they were such good players. In the 12 months immediately prior to his stomping the unconscious Justin Barker, All-State star Mychal Bell had scored 18 touchdowns and been convicted of four earlier crimes, two of them violent. He wasn't the only one of the Jena Six with a criminal record -- he's just the only one who's juvenile record has been unsealed so far. Eddie Thompson, a Jena minister, wrote of the six friends "reign of terror:"
"Some of these students have reputations in Jena for intimidating and sometimes beating other students. They have vandalized and destroyed both school property and community property. Some of the Jena Six have been involved in crimes not only in LaSalle Parish but also in surrounding parishes. For the most part, coaches and other adults have prevented them from being held accountable for the reign of terror they have presided over in Jena. Despite intervention by adults wanting to give them chances due their athletic potential, most of the Jena Six have extensive juvenile records. … These boys did not receive prejudicial treatment but received preferential treatment until things got out of hand."
But they were protected by the school authorities. Abbey Brown reported in the local newspaper on August 25:
"Mack Fowler, Jena High's football coach at the time, said that … he discovered that while he was punishing his players, the school 'wasn't doing anything' to them. Fowler said he decided then that he was going to do the same thing the school did — nothing."
In stomping the unconscious kid on December 4, 2006, the Jena Six had finally gone too far, and they got the book thrown at them.
So, which narrative sounds more like 21st Century America -- your beloved one where it's 1877 and the Klan is about to ride, or this one?
bystander -- Does that sum you up? Always a bystander and never a participant? Maybe that has something to do with the racial abuse you suffered? And maybe that is the desired effect, to marginalize and sideline you.
People who disagree with me are not racists. I have never even implied that. What I have argued here is that those who seek to justify and rationalize overt racism are themselves racist. I think that should be pretty obvious to almost anyone.
BTW, yeah I have really "really lived through any prejudice or injustice". I live it everyday of my life. It's why I live where I do, in the inner city, it's why I became homeless twice and it's why it's difficult to find work.
I agree with you that developing a thick skin is important but I also believe that it is vital to speak out against bigoty and intolerance. That's what I am doing. The bullies, and that is what they are, can cry and whine all they like. But I won't be complacent, they only see that as permission.
Steve Sailer writes: "It's fascinating how so many people assume the Jena Six were despised, marginalized outcasts whom the White Power Structure was just itching to send to prison. In reality, they were Big Men on Campus who had scored at least 29 touchdowns among them in the 7-3 season that had just ended in football-mad Jena."
It's funny how no one is making the assumption the racebaiting professional Steve Sailer says "so many" are making.
"In stomping the unconscious kid on December 4, 2006, the Jena Six had finally gone too far, and they got the book thrown at them."
They sure did - in marked contrast to how white kids who assaulted a black kid en masse were treated. It's funny how Steve supports the attempted murder charges, but it's not surprising. It's also not surprising that he accepts every single white account in the story. You would almost think he had been there himself.
What he's doing is playing Great White Knight in opposition to his old pals Jesse & Al, and he's even more predictable than they are.
If the Jena cops added on additional charges because the kids "looked at them funny," Steve would be all for it.
Charles Giacometti wrote: Part of Megan's mistake was relying on Instarube Glenn Reynolds as part of her original sourcing. He doesn't get anything right, and only links to the most bizarre wingnuts out there.
Interestingly, I remember having an afternoon coffee conversation with my dad and uncle last week, in which the uncle observed that Larry Craig had given one of the key warning signs of being an indiscretionate closet homosexual (much like Ted Haggardt, in fact) -- he was loudly opposed to them, to the point that reasonable people had found it necessary to rebuke his public rhetoric on previous ocassions.
Charles Giacometti, thank-you for inadvetently identifying yourself as a closet wingnut. Continued toe-tapping on your part will be hereafter ignored.
anony-mouse (sooner or later some wit uses that name on every message board) writes: "Interestingly, I remember having an afternoon coffee conversation with my dad and uncle last week, in which the uncle observed that Larry Craig had given one of the key warning signs of being an indiscretionate closet homosexual (much like Ted Haggardt, in fact) -- he was loudly opposed to them, to the point that reasonable people had found it necessary to rebuke his public rhetoric on previous ocassions.
Charles Giacometti, thank-you for inadvetently identifying yourself as a closet wingnut. Continued toe-tapping on your part will be hereafter ignored."
So does this make anony-mouse a closet Giacometti?
"As everyone notes, it's hard to get information on the case"
Good thing you found that obsecure website "wikipedia"
I'm a little late to the thread here, and didn't read all the 140+ comments so I sorry if someone said something similar
"As everyone notes, it's hard to get information on the case"
Good thing you found that obsecure website "wikipedia"
I'm a little late to the thread here, and didn't read all the 140+ comments so I sorry if someone said something similar
Bystander,
There is an infamous and classic photo from the South's quaint lynching period. In this photo, you see a black man swinging from a rope. Lynched. In the foreground, you see a crowd of white folks raucously laughing and partying. Just having a good old time. Men, women and children out for a night's worth of entertainment. See, in the South, a lynching was almost as much of a community event as a Friday night football game and people came from wide and far to see the community's will enforced.
Strange fruit indeed.
Now, I happen to think that each and every one of those people in that crowd was as guilty of the crime of lynching as the person who tossed the rope over the branch or the person who tightened the noose around the man's neck.
At the very least, each person in that crowd was manifestly guilty of an almost criminal negligence that was informed by the worst kind of racism imaginable.
In the same sense, people who are told about rank injustice going on right underneath their noses, who choose to look the other way and not do anything because it will complicate their lives - and this happens routinely - well they are just as guilty of the racism that is taking place right underneath their noses.
Silence or tolerance in the face of the kind of rank injustice that took place in Jena is exactly what racists rely on. But for the acquiescence of the larger society, they could not do their dirty work.
I certainly am not aware of your own specific circumstances, but I am always wary and somewhat amused when people attempt to argue that recognizing racism is tough because it requires an essentially subjective determination. What is racism to one person may not be racism to another person.
Nonsense!
To paraphrase a Supreme Court ruling on obscenity, people know racism when they see it. They certainly may not wish to deal with that recognition because it may be extremely uncomfortable or inconvenient, but people - except for the willfully blind folks like Sailer - know and recognize racism and injustice when it happens. Wanting to do something about that understanding is an entirely different matter.
Anony-mouse, that was almost clever, but it wasn't, and it's also a false analogy. So at the end of the day, it was unclever and illogical.
Nice try, but if you don't like my points, just say so, or ignore me.
So...
Are strong, non-profane comments from black folks banned from this site?
It appears that way.
Amazing.
But then, not surprising.
Lynching people by race is deplorable.
At last -- the equal-opportunity lynchers have found their voice!
I find two meta-issues interesting in this case:
a. How strongly most people's prior assumptions seem to be influencing their judgement of what happened and whether it was right.
b. How many assumed details are grafted into the story by almost anyone discussing it, tending to turn the story into a consistent narrative that probably is much cleaner than reality.
As far as I can tell, most of us (including me) can't really get enough reliable information to determine all the rights and wrongs of the case. So, our priors swamp our data, and we build stories that make sense to us, spin satisfying narratives that make sense of the situation, etc. Reality is very unlikely to be tidy and morally satisfying in this case. It's quite possible that the town, school board, and prosecutor are racist as hell, and that the guys involved in the beating are still thugs, and that the guy who got beaten up provoked the fight, for example.
Every ethnic group has bias, prejudice, opinion on certain people or thing. What fairly can say is the degree of it and circumstance of it.
Well, in order to determine how people act certain way, we also have to look into history, causes, reason, intention, believe, personal experience, societal, etc.
True, people have certain perception based on their family, raised, experience, and cause. True, African American blames because they are mostly in the povety line, they have a higher crime rate. But, that's not the excuse either. Being povety is separate than committing crime. Someone can be povety, hard working, dedicating, peaceful, but not causing trouble or crime.
Yes, every country has discrimination, bias, and opinion on certain people. For example, some immigrant Chinese in Japan cause some robbery crimes in Japan. Why? First generation, secondary job, third, not a small population. But have their financial problem. How about Korean Japanese, they adopted into the culture because they lived over generations.
In general, most Chinese/Asian Americans do quiet well even as minorities in every country across the globe. Except Western countries, Chinese minorities hold the highest enterprises and financial footing in other Asian countries. They are being respected by mainstream natives of contribution and peaceful residency.
But, from a general scale, African American tend to committ outstanding crimes in country they reside. For example, Britain, America, some part of Asia, Latin America. So, over time people really developed a perception that they try to stay away.
Caucasian American have their problem too. They tend to feel they are the landlord of this country, somehow true because they been here longer, at least the ancentry. But, bias, could be, but seven guys beat up one, I feel a bit excessive, defensiveless, organized predictary.
But, school segregation, justice, equality, and police action seemed like the old problem reacted sensitively. The trial, we need to look at again, let the appeal and reexamination.
I keep meaning to walk away but the comments flowing here are just too interesting. I think frankie d and noen are both very articulate and make excellent arguments for their cause.
However, I have to say that defending the Jena six may be not be the best use of your fight against racism.
By your posts and others there is only one fact that is irrefutable. No one here on this blog can really vouch for the mental character of the Jena six or the white kids involved through first person account. Therefore we are basing opinion basd on printed news which I hope we can at least concede that they are flawed and conflicting. No one can say for certainty what went through the minds of the perpetrators for motives so we can only speculate based on the reported facts of the case.
I think its only fair that people make up their mind based on what they read and hear on the Internet and we have to respect their opinion as long as they are objective and intelligent
I am willing stand by my observation that the noose was nasty work and it looks to be racially motivated. I also think that the beating by the six was criminal and maybe racially motivated.
I guess the fundamental debate is whether the prosecution of the six is consistent application of the justice system. I lean toward an opinion that there is tendencies for racism in the court system against young black men. Having said that the topic in this blog is about the Jena six not the state of the nation as a whole.
Do I think there was overt or covert racism in Jena in prosecuting the six? I am not sure because the conduct of the six in my "naive" opinion was very bad and I think people got really tired of bullies crossing the line. I hope you don't think I am a racist because I don't agree with your view that race was a major factor in this case?
I don't think the Jena six were boyscouts based on multiple articles. I also don't see any articles that say they beat up the boy and were leaving on their own accord. There are some accounts of teachers having to pull them off, maybe they would have killed the white boy if they were left to themselves. So because they didn't get to beat him up long enough to kill him we argue they they got more than they deserve? So then frankie, in your opinion do the Jena six deserve their sentence only if they would have paralyzed the boy?
As a parent, if six boys jumped my son and caused a flesh wound on his scalp I would be calling for the hangman whether they be black, white or anything in between.
I've spent the last 15 years with the military and have seen some interesting places. Basically, the world is not fair. I think defending Jena six as if some great injustice was done because they didn't really beat or maim the kid, in my opinion is wasting your obvious intellect and energy. Pick somebody worth fighting for.
Again its free country, you can do whatever you want.
bystander writes: "I've spent the last 15 years with the military and have seen some interesting places. Basically, the world is not fair. I think defending Jena six as if some great injustice was done because they didn't really beat or maim the kid, in my opinion is wasting your obvious intellect and energy."
I asked you where you see racism and how you've fought it, bystander. I think I have my answer now.
You don't and you haven't.
I think if these 6 kids get locked up for years and ruined you'd be perfectly okay with it. No skin off your nose.
If they were in uniform and did the exact same thing to some Iraqi kid nothing at all would happen to them. You'd be okay with that, too.
bystander again: "As a parent, if six boys jumped my son and caused a flesh wound on his scalp I would be calling for the hangman whether they be black, white or anything in between."
And if your son were involved in such an assault you'd hire the best lawyer you could and feel great when he got off with probation, which he almost assuredly would.
Hanging a noose WITH a black person in it is a sick violent crime. Hanging an EMPTY noose is called "symbolism" and "free speech" no matter how sick, vile and repugnant it is. Although they had NO right to do it on school grounds and the expulsion should have stood IMHO. Am I the ONLY one whose mother recited "stick and stones will break my bones" to? Why is everyone so sensitive to NON PHYSICAL attacks these days?
JC: I'm somewhat of an absolutist on free speech issues, so I'm personally deeply sympathetic to this point of view, but nonetheless I think you're wrong here. If it had been a photo of an empty noose, then I'd say "okay, that's free speech."
But an actual noose attached to an actual tree limb can be used to, er, murder someone. I think this particular instance crosses from mere symbolic speech to a sort of terror threat. I don't think anybody ought to have a robust free speech right to terrorize someone with a noose any more than one has a robust free speech right to brandish a gun.
I think defending Jena six as if some great injustice was done because they didn't really beat or maim the kid, in my opinion is wasting your obvious intellect and energy. Pick somebody worth fighting for.
bystander: You should be conscious that this is the exact same argument which has historically always been deployed in the US to discourage activism in any case of racial injustice. "Now is not the time," "This is not the best use of one's anti-racist energies," and so forth. It's somehow never quite the right time or place to denounce institutionalized racism. Curiously, it's never quite the right time or place to press for gay rights, either.
This is what Langston Hughes referred to as a "dream deferred". What happens to it? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?...Does it sag like a heavy load? Or does it explode? People shouldn't be surprised if the explosion comes at a time or place where it might not strictly have been appropriate or expected.
brooksfoe writes: "This is what Langston Hughes referred to as a "dream deferred"."
I'm guessing bystander thought Hughes was really funny on "The Jeffersons," but isn't familiar with his other work.
I bet none of the Jena Six has ever heard of Langston Hughes.
I bet none of the Jena Six has ever heard of Langston Hughes.
If not, that's one more thing they have to reproach their crappy public school over.
The idea that the those six thugs were AFRAID of a noose put up by white kids is laughable. It was fighting words, like a white person saying the "n" word. It wasn't an indication that Louisiana was about to have its first lynching since 1946. Putting up a noose is akin to burning a flag, or similar incendiary speech. The kids KNEW each other.
What people need to realize is that white-on-black violence is basically nonexistent. When it occurs, you'll hear about it, and probably on the national news (as the recent West Virginia case shows). Whites on the other hand, have very good reason to be scared of blacks whom they don't know (and often even those whom they do). Black violence towards whites, and every racial group, on the other hand, is skyhigh, AS USUAL. Read "The Color Of Crime" easily accessible online.
What we have here is a failure to communicate.
Actually, I want to comgratulate Megan's bunch. I began reading this blogpost as a standard, verklimmt white boy and became a, insert n-word here, lover. As the Economist recently opined, Africa has an iron age culture. Part of that is perhaps a greater instinctual expression from the women; thus the physical fight between the black and white girl at the beginning of the story. There is also a great stoic forebearance in the face of identified adversity. Take the example of the black boys being threatened with a shotgun and just taking the gun away; wisely not giving it back then but also not finding the occasion for an excuse to inflict damage on the one who threatened them using the excuse of 'self defense' in the cloud of the confrontation. Rather like King Kong with Myrna Loy where the object is not Myrna but being included, I think the black boys that came to the party just wanted to be included, an underlying melody in this story. No guns have appeared yet except that of the white youth. Had the boys been accepted as Abraham accepts the stranger in the Bible there would have been peace. Instead the story was passed on to a conflict for tribal dominance. The white boy, aka the 2007 victim, challenges the black tribal heroes, turns his back on them to add insult to challenge. He asks thus of Mycha, can you display instinct, will you participate in this struggle for dominance? His answer is, 'Yes' where Mycha knows that, as with the nooses, there will be intervention at school before something serious happens. As for the victim's going to 'that once in a lifetime ring presentation ceremony at Church,' yes, I believe that is as sacred to him as pissing from the Temple Mount would be to the Arab.
What people need to realize is that white-on-black violence is basically nonexistent. When it occurs, you'll hear about it, and probably on the national news (as the recent West Virginia case shows). - Hung
You mean like we heard about the beating administered by white guys to the black kid who attended that mainly white party in Jena in the fall of 2006? Yeah, that was all over the national news. Not.
In Michigan, Minnesota, Virginia, Oregon and Florida, there are school districts there that don't care whether a kid goes to school after 16, no alternative school necessary. IF they wanted to get a degree, or continue to school, then they would go to an alternative, but it is a choice after the age of 16. If you think you have a chance in college to play football you HAVE to get a degree, that's why they made so much of any expelled footballers needing to go to an alternative school. And to age 21, don't make me laugh. Check your fax again, maybe you go the wrong paper.
Should whites be afraid of blacks? No. What you have to be concerned with and take steps to protect yourself, is dependent on the situation. While driving through Oakland in the 70's I was riding with two black friends from Oakland. As we were going towards a military post, we had a certain route to drive and I didn't take a detour. Both of them locked their doors and said I needed to lock mine, and asked that I put a hat on my blonde head. The reason? Not that we would be stopped and offered lemonade and cookies, certainly. These were tough guys who knew how to avoid problems with a non-black going through an area of town you must be careful in. Generally, do what you need to do, but just take the steps necessary to protect yourself or be able to inflict an uncommon amount of pain on an attacker.
MoeLarryandJesus:
If my kids were participants I would hope that I would do the right thing but if they were threatened with jail time I may do as you suggest. Its tough being a parent and watching your child make bad mistakes. Thats precisely why I wouldn't be an objective bystander.
And I ask you to refute what I am saying on the blog objectively. You don't have to launch in to a tirade against institutions and personal attacks on my character without knowing me.
Your racist mind probably can't comprehend that someone other than a black man can be a non racist .
Brooksfoe: As for Lanston Houghes, I thought his poem the "Congo" summed up the exploitation of Africa perfectly and he is one of my favorite poets.
As I have grown older I have come to respect Martin Luther King more and more, because his dream included everyone. His greatest legacy is for non violent protest even during the worst of the civil-rights era. He was no coward.
pick your battles. Not everything you see on TV is about racism. And we in the military do bleed for even people who say such unthankful remarks about us.
Access to information has not been difficult, if you are aware of news sources beyond the domestic mainstream media - incl. blogs such as those at the Atlantic. The Chicago Tribune is one of the few U.S. papers that has been reporting on this story for some time, and the Guardian and other overseas sources have been reporting on it for months as well. Feminist blogs, progressive blogs, and blogs written by persons of color have been writing about this for a long time too.
(Someone else may have pointed this out by now. I did not read the 165 comments before me.)
I realize "reduce the sentences of the Jena6" doesn't roll off the tongue quite as cleanly as "free the Jena 6", but the former is something I would support; not the latter.
While my current understanding of the facts makes me believe that the DA is a racist and the current sentence is unjust, freedom seems even less just. Given a choice between underpunishing and overpunishing 6 people who were beating an unconscious victim, I'd go for overpunishment everytime, irrespective of the color of anyone's skin.
Perhaps that makes me a racist, though. I'm sure someone here will let me know.
A moron who is proud of being a racist writes: "What people need to realize is that white-on-black violence is basically nonexistent. When it occurs, you'll hear about it, and probably on the national news (as the recent West Virginia case shows)."
White people hire cops to commit the violence for them.
And no, I'm not kidding.
bystander "replies": "If my kids were participants I would hope that I would do the right thing but if they were threatened with jail time I may do as you suggest. Its tough being a parent and watching your child make bad mistakes. Thats precisely why I wouldn't be an objective bystander.
And I ask you to refute what I am saying on the blog objectively. You don't have to launch in to a tirade against institutions and personal attacks on my character without knowing me. "
I know that I have asked you two simple questions TWICE in follow-up to one of your posts and you haven't even attempted to answer them.
And of course you'd get your kids a lawyer instead of "doing the right thing." Like every other yahoo claiming to have a rigid moral code, you're just a hypocrite.
As for "refuting what you're saying objectively," what a sad load of crap that demand is. You're not saying anything that demands refutation.
One more time, here is the post bystander seems unable to answer. He made a self-aggrandizing comment and can't back it up, like most yahoos.
"bystander writes: "What you may consider indifference to your perceived injustice doesn't mean I don't fight racism where I see it."
So where do you see it and how have you fought it?"
To Asian Pacific American and bystander: Please don't bring in the model minority nonsense. The notion that Asians in America have succeeded and thus disproved the relevance of racism has been injected by conservative apologists.
Asians are beneficiaries of civil rights protest and anti-racist mobilization. In San Francisco and other cities we took an active leadership role in civil rights, especially fair housing, and we continue to have a stake in it. The fact that Asians can even purchase real estate without covenants that prohibit the sale to "mongoloids" should begin to convince you of this. We shouldn't allow ourselves to be "used" to denigrate other races in the U.S. when our welfare is tied to the status of other racial minorities.
And don't fool yourself that "racism" has existed in every country to the same degree. Despite the ethnic tensions in Japan, Malaysia, and Singapore, the USA is the most racially dysfunctional country in the world. This land has countenanced slavery for longer than it has renounced it. Apartheid ended half a century ago in legal terms and hasn't yet ended in real terms. Asian Americans have been forcibly expelled by white supremacists, interned by xenophobes, exiled wholesale from Chinatowns that were then burned to the ground.
Given that history, suspecting racism in the Jena Six is not a matter of simply "reading too much" in to the news -- it is interpreting printed news in light of an unblinkered exposure to American history. To think that a legal system that grew up alongside apartheid and slavery without flinching in its direction can now be expected to operate in a race-neutral fashion is not an example of "taking facts at face value" -- it's a naive, highly unrealistic interpretation, one which racist apologists would love for us to adopt.
I suspect that is partly what frankie d means when he says that chanting justifications for racist acts and institutions is tantamount to aiding and abetting racism. Look at history! We really ought to know better.
StJoe,
Don't include me with the idiot Asian Pacific islander. His comment is baseless and stupid. Any smart person can see that.
MoeLarryand Jesus: you seem particular brainless to notice how I answered you.
Your flaming posts on this blog is nothing about fighting racism. Its a freaking entertainment for me. Its people like you who drive bystanders to be active racists.
Have a good life.
bystander writes: "MoeLarryand Jesus: you seem particular brainless to notice how I answered you.
Your flaming posts on this blog is nothing about fighting racism. Its a freaking entertainment for me. Its people like you who drive bystanders to be active racists.
Have a good life."
You're essentially unable to write English, bystander, so it's possible you answered my questions and I missed it in the morass of gibberish like "you seem particular brainless to notice how I answered you," which doesn't convey an actual meaning. Nor does, "Your flaming posts on this blog is nothing about fighting racism."
I asked you where you see racism and how you fight it in response to a post where you implied that you do both things. You have never answered me. This is your fourth chance to do so. I have no expectation that you'll do so.
I miss the old days when nitwits knew they were nitwits and avoided debates like this. Perhaps you're actually a good guy and you're just not good with words, bystander, but if that's the case you should either learn your limitations or try a whole lot harder.
I'll try to make this simpler for you. Where have you seen racism in your life and how have you fought it? Or are you just saving it all up for a rainy racist day?
Sounds to me like Mychal Bell is best understood as a young Michael Vick, insulated from consequences until he inevitably went too far.
Racist trolling
It's funny you should take out a post based on racist trolling when this whole story is nothing but racist trolling. Black people have created a generation of parent less children who are often sociopathic in their behavior. Many are in prison, some because of a bias against blacks in the system but many because they are a danger to society. It is amazing that the demagogues sharpton and jackson never address the inherent problem within the black community that creates violent and racist behavior from within this community. Also if you are black and have been here for 8 generations than someone in your family may well have been a slave at some point. There is a chance that someone posting here may have owned this persons great grand parents. This is a fact and not a racist trolling whatever the hell that is.
Sam babbles: "It is amazing that the demagogues sharpton and jackson never address the inherent problem within the black community that creates violent and racist behavior from within this community."
In fact they do address it, but yahoos never acknowledge it.