Jonathan Kay on X - "Since the suicide of @tdsb principal Richard Bilkszto (following “egregious & vexatious” abuse from KOJO Inst “anti-racism trainer” Kike Ojo-Thompson) I've wondered how @TDSBDirector justified KOJO’s $81K *sole-source* contract (for a bunch of Zoom sessions). Answer: George Floyd"
For Journalists, The New York Times' Social-Justice Meltdown Is a Sign of Things to Come - "One notable aspect of the response to Floyd’s death is that many of the institutions being assailed most scathingly are charities, media companies, museums, and arts organizations that have no direct connection to the issue of law enforcement... the Poetry Foundation... it’s difficult to imagine any subcultural silo more insulated from issues connected to street violence and police brutality. And yet, in an open letter signed by former awardees and contributors, the foundation stands accused of perpetuating “harm, exploitation [and] even trauma” against “people of color, disabled people, trans people, queer people and immigrants.”... the foundation had issued a solemn public statement announcing “solidarity with the Black community.” Ironically, it was the alleged inadequacy of this very statement that caused manifesto signatories to demand the resignation of both the foundation’s president and the chair of its board of trustees, as well as “a meaningful, well-researched acknowledgment of the debt that the Foundation owes to Black poets, [including] a specific acknowledgment of the harm done in recent years to Latinx poets, trans poets, disabled poets, and queer poets.”... These poets’ complaints seem too far-fetched to warrant concern—especially given the ludicrous (and even insulting) suggestion that the real life-and-death issues of police brutality endured by the black community should be spoken of in the same breath as the imaginary “harm, exploitation [and] even trauma” experienced by poets who feel ideologically at odds with a white-shoe charity... the dust-up exemplifies a larger pattern of conflict that will continue to embroil all manner of arts, literary, and cultural institutions... the New York Times published an op-ed by a Republican senator, Tom Cotton... [it] has been tagged prominently with an “editors’ note” explaining why it supposedly didn’t meet the newspaper’s lofty standards. (This is the very same Times opinion section, I might add, that, just two days later, published an op-ed instructing white people to socially excommunicate “relatives and loved ones” who refuse to attend protests or donate money to black causes.)... there has to be something larger at play here—because similar scenes of moral panic now are on display in other English-speaking countries where levels of violent crime and police brutality aren’t remotely comparable to conditions in the United States... the president of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), a woman named Catherine Tait, felt compelled to publish a lengthy document—Our Stand in Solidarity—in which she described the entire CBC as existing in a state of paralyzed emotional devastation. Since Minneapolis is not a Canadian city, it all seemed completely over the top (especially given her inclusion of vapid but dramatic-seeming one-sentence paragraphs meant to communicate an attitude of steely moral resolve)... Yet when a Toronto-based gossip site started publishing internal CBC messages criticizing Our Stand in Solidarity, it became clear that certain staffers—far from being mortified by their president’s maudlin theatrics—actually found them inadequate. And so two days later, Tait produced a second manifesto, this one indicating to staff that she was “truly sorry” for the deficiencies of the first... the anti-racism movement is now more akin to a performative religion, presenting garment-rending adherents with concepts analogous to original sin (whiteness) and excommunication (cancelation). America and its white inhabitants are presented as having permanently cursed souls, a defect that can be addressed only through elaborate rites of penance, as in recent scenes of white people washing the feet of black community leaders. And it’s notable that the above-described art-house and newsroom controversies always seem to originate in some supposedly sacrilegious text or monologue, whose heretical nature is taken as proof of a contaminated character. The real roots of black suffering... are massively complicated problems that can’t be addressed with new-age religious ceremonies or self-lacerating Facebook posts from preening white suburbanites. Nor will a single black person be helped by privileged culture workers in Toronto, New York, London, Chicago, and Los Angeles leveraging George Floyd’s martyrdom to boost their social-justice bona fides or prosecute pre-existing professional feuds. There’s a reason why it’s poets, writers, and editors who’ve gone into cancel-culture beast mode over the last week, and not, say, carpenters and plumbers. Unlike a table or a sink, the things we wordsmiths sell—political postures, controversial opinions, artistic styles, insights, purported moral truths—have no set value. Sometimes we publish things that get declared “stunning and brave,” while a colleague’s very similar offerings sink quickly into obscurity. Or vice versa. In the pre-social-media age, readers typically consumed our writings privately, often through longstanding print subscriptions. But that has now changed: The materials we write, read, edit, and publish act as personal brand signifiers whose moral value fluctuates wildly on the daily stock markets known as Twitter and Facebook. Even at the best of times, it’s an unstable system—because a single bad tweet can set off the equivalent of a bank run. So the temptation is always there to hype your own stock, or downgrade someone else’s, as a means to rally followers and punish enemies... the firewall between social media and real life has now broken down completely thanks to the pandemic lockdown... Editors are now in a no-win situation: They need to take a knee to signal their guilt and enlightened attitude—but as soon as they do so, every syllable of their confession becomes a jumping off point for fresh indictments... the phenomenon has far more to do with politics and score-settling than actual anti-racism. The ultra-progressive young staffers who’ve been recruited by these institutions in recent years are now so collectively powerful that they can mob their own bosses from within without fear of pushback from conservatives (since there aren’t any left). In regard to Don Share, the besieged editor of Poetry magazine since 2013, for instance, one poet told me that Share’s position is “hopeless” precisely because he’s been methodical about giving the insurgents everything they’d ever previously asked for: He’s “pursued a profoundly accommodationist policy toward… the diverse and the woke. Almost every poem [the magazine] publishes is anti-racist and inclusive. The response from the community Share has tried so goddamn hard to woo? A hostile takeover. And because Share has successfully frozen out almost all other ‘non-diverse’ voices that traditionally published in [his] magazine, the signatories have him over a barrel.” If you want to get a glimpse into the future of journalism—not to mention poetry, music, fiction, and all the rest—these tempests offer a good taste of what’s to come. We’re going to spend more time at home, invest less trust in our peers, and increasingly leverage the mob power of social media to prosecute petty disputes, even as we cynically dilute the very real idea of racism into a meaningless prop."
From 2020
The Church of Black Lives Matter - "What has been witnessed in the British and Irish media over the past few weeks with their craven, spineless, kid-glove treatment of Black Lives Matter is eerily reminiscent of those dark days when many Irish journalists lived in fear of the proverbial ‘belt of the crozier’. That’s because Black Lives Matter has become to the UK media what the Church used to be to the Irish media – a force not to be reckoned with, not to be questioned, not to be scrutinised, and never, ever to be criticised, regardless of your own feelings. Call it cowardice. Call it professional insecurity. Or perhaps just the very human desire to avoid unnecessary hassle. It has been hard to listen to the protesters’ endless shrieks of ‘silence is violence’ without thinking that the only real silence is coming from a media that is too cowed to look behind the slogans and hold BLM up to the same kind of scrutiny that should be applied to any other political pressure group. We’re currently witnessing one of the great political con jobs in recent years and the blame lies squarely with a press that is failing to do its duty... We now seem to live in the church of BLM, with George Floyd as their sainted prophet, and anyone who dares to criticise or question this new order is immediately denounced as a blasphemer and heretic. Instead, from footballers to cops, we are expected to genuflect before them – or take the knee, as they prefer to call it. But that’s a distinction without a difference. Bending the knee is always, always, about supplication... George Floyd is nothing but a Trojan Horse used by an extremist organisation to get through the gates of rational society. I’m sure many of their privileged, white supporters may endorse BLM’s desire to ‘dismantle capitalism’ – if they even know that’s one of their aims (although given the disastrous economic impact of the global lockdown, one could easily argue that Covid-19 had beaten them to that particular punch). Similarly, how many of these modern-day Wolfie Smiths (ask your parents) share BLM’s beliefs that ‘climate change is racist’? Or what about abolishing borders? Or somehow ‘ending the patriarchy’? Or closing prisons? Let’s be honest: if most of these white protesters had encountered George Floyd outside their house they would have called the cops they want to abolish. If he had invaded their home – for which he had form – they would want him sent to one of those prisons they want to shut down. Like its ideological bed mates — the goons of Antifa — it’s no surprise that BLM also wants to ‘disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear-family structure’. If you really want a full smorgasbord of all BLM’s aims, it’s impossible not to admire their opposition to – deep breath – ‘homophobia, lesbophobia, biphobia, queerphobia, transphobia, sexism, misogyny, misgynoir, enbyphobia… eugenics… stereotypes… respectability politics…’. The list goes on, interminably, like a demented students’ union’s fever dream... But you have to admit, they’ve done it brilliantly. Due to the cowardice of the media, commentators, footballers and presenters, coupled with a wilful lack of intellectual curiosity among their ‘white allies’, BLM has managed to portray itself as a sort of black Salvation Army, when it owes more to the nutters of the Occupy Wall Street movement. Perhaps the greatest example of the new religiosity that has been conferred on the group came when one English soccer reporter condemned the recent fly-over in Burnley by saying the banner ‘disrespected the Black Lives Matter movement’. Not that it ‘disrespected’ black people, but that it dissed the movement itself. Heresy! Burn the witch!"
From 2020
Philadelphia Settles Lawsuit in Fatal Police Shooting of Walter Wallace Jr. - The New York Times - "The city of Philadelphia has agreed to settle a wrongful-death suit filed by the family of a Black man whose fatal shooting by the police last year was recorded on video and prompted widespread protests. The man, Walter Wallace Jr., 27, had mental health issues and was holding a knife when he was shot by two Philadelphia police officers on Oct. 26, 2020... someone repeatedly yells at Mr. Wallace to “put the knife down,” after which about a dozen shots are heard."
Joe Biden, Kamala Harris React To Fatal Police Shooting Of Walter Wallace Jr., Condemn Looting In Philadelphia
The police need to let black men stab them to death, or that's racist
Richard Hanania on X - "Amazing. We’re not just locking up cops now for confrontations with dangerous criminals that go wrong. We’re locking up the paramedics who try and sedate them! Nothing is too good for our heroes. How does our stupid society even function?"
Paramedics Found Guilty in Last Trial in Elijah McClain Death - The New York Times - "Two Colorado paramedics were convicted of criminally negligent homicide in the 2019 death of Elijah McClain, a young unarmed Black man whose case drew national attention and forced public safety reforms in the city where he lived and died. But the mostly white jury split on two assault charges against the paramedics, Peter Cichuniec and Jeremy Cooper, after two days of deliberations. They convicted Mr. Cichuniec of one of the assault charges, second-degree assault for the unlawful administration of drugs, but cleared Mr. Cooper of both assault charges. The men had injected Mr. McClain with the powerful sedative ketamine while he was in police custody in Aurora, Colo., which doctors said left him near death. He died days later in the hospital... “It seems like they laid accountability at the feet of the paramedics,” said Douglas M. Wolfberg, a former emergency medical technician and founding partner of a Pennsylvania law firm that represents emergency medical service organizations. Mr. Wolfberg said the case was the only one he was aware of in which paramedics faced such serious charges related to patient care. The verdict, he said, would “send a ripple through the E.M.S. community. This is a new calculus.” The Aurora fire chief, Alec Oughton, said he was “deeply concerned and disappointed” in the convictions and discouraged that the paramedics had “received felony punishment for following their training and protocols in place at the time and for making discretionary decisions while taking split-second action in a dynamic environment.”... Mr. Cichuniec, the senior-ranking paramedic that night, described a chaotic scene in which the police were struggling with Mr. McClain more than he had seen on the “thousands of combative calls” he had been on... Months after Mr. McClain’s death, a local prosecutor declined to press charges against the five police officers and paramedics. But after the death of George Floyd in 2020 by a Minneapolis police officer and the mass protests that followed, the Colorado attorney general opened an investigation that eventually resulted in a 32-count indictment."
Weird. Liberals tell us that we shouldn't question medical decisions. But of course that only applies to abortion and trans affirming "care"
Good luck "defunding" the police and passing their load to medical professionals
DOUGLAS MURRAY: Anarchy is breaking out - Where are the brakes on this thing? Does anyone know? - "the rioting was all too predictable from the moment the police, politicians and other prominent figures decided to indulge the Black Lives Matters (BLM) demonstrations all around Britain... The smell of double standards is hard to avoid. Yesterday, the police behaved as they should. Properly equipped, they contained a lawless mob and protected public property. Politicians and commentators were outspoken in their criticism of the thugs. But where were they last weekend? The politicians were calling the protestors ‘peaceful’ or even praising them. And the police in some cases not only kneeled before the mob but then, as it turned violent, ran away from them. No wonder people were angry at that sight. Permitted lawlessness only encourages more of the same. And adds to the madness in the air at the moment. Anarchy is breaking out. Where are the brakes on this thing? Does anyone know? Why is it that the Cenotaph in Whitehall must be boarded up, and the statue of Winston Churchill? How did a debate on police racism in the US turn into an attack on almost everything in Britain’s past, not to mention protests – and now counter-protests – and rioting across European cities? This is a very dangerous moment... there are segments of the population who feel racism is the single most important issue in our country. They portray Great Britain as a hell-hole, a vile society, with ‘white supremacy’ and ‘institutional racism’ everywhere. An even greater part of the population profoundly disagrees. But where is the debate? How did protests against a policeman killing an unarmed black man in Minnesota last month lead to the cancelling of Fawlty Towers, the destruction of statues and assaults on the police by two different sets of thugs? The fact is that police chiefs set a dreadful example last weekend, standing by in the face of mass law-breaking. Why? Because like our whole society they fear that opposing any action by BLM will lead to accusations of racism. And now we see the consequence of this retreat from reason. The destruction of our monuments, mob rule on our streets and festering hatred on the internet... These protestors are using the actions of a policeman in Minnesota (currently charged with murder and awaiting trial) to push for the erasure of British history and culture. What we are seeing is nothing less than an attempt to reshape Britain in the image of militant groups and the ideologues of the Far-Left. And to do so they are crushing debate and punishing dissent using classic tactics of moral intimidation. Across the country, people fear that remaining silent is somehow to support the violence meted out to George Floyd: an oboe recital on Radio 3 was interrupted by a trembling speech about his killing; a presenter on the BBC2’s Springwatch used the return of the wild beaver to Cornwall to use as a counterpoint to events in Minnesota. Speak out against BLM – as Nigel Farage did last week – and you might lose your job. As he did. People learn from such punishments and shaming, and most of the media – like everybody else – has been intimidated into agreeing with the protests, for fear of seeming to condone racism. Why has our culture become like this? Are we Communist eastern Europe, where people have to condemn people with whom they are associated in case they are condemned in turn? Whatever happened to polite disagreement? Or healthy debate? The crowd behaviour at the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol last weekend was deranged. Whatever the rights and wrong of the statue, the manner in which it came down was shocking. It was a clearly organised, pre-planned event. But look at the heat of that crowd, jumping up and down on the toppled statue, as though he had been a dictator who had oppressed them all their lives. Even more shocking was the fact that the police stood by, with police chiefs justifying that decision and the city’s mayor congratulating the mob on their actions. That move was deeply significant. Because we know from history that at such moments crowds of this kind are interested in one thing above all: testing the limits, seeing how far they are permitted to go... Can anyone explain convincingly why things made only a decade ago are now so threatening? No. Any more than we can explain how any child in Britain – of whatever ethnic background – is going to benefit from this demented cultural purge... Andrew Roberts, historian and author of Churchill: Walking With Destiny, said: 'As well as being a Tory PM, Churchill was a Liberal for 20 years and a founder of the welfare state, so The Mail on Sunday's excellent campaign is something that all Britons should be able get behind, regardless of politics.'"
From 2020
Meme - "Thanks helping me out with my police trouble Ken."
"No problem Ken, I just had to listen to the officer's instructions and not be aggressive."
*Epic Handshake / Predator Handshake*
Meme - "A Man Of Memes: After 6 burglaries, 3 car thefts, multiple illegal trespasses, ongoing cocaine and alcohol addiction, committing 2 violent home invasions, 3 armed robberies, dealing Fentanyl and Meth, passing counterfeit money, beating 4 victims senseless, and being arrested 23 times since 1998, George Floyd hasn't committed a crime in over three years!"
Church of England tells parishes to set up ‘race action plan’ put forward by pro-BLM bishop - "The Church of England has told all of its parishes to draw up “race action plans” after a pro-Black Lives Matter (BLM) bishop urged it to embrace being “woke”. The General Synod, the Church’s legislative body, passed a motion on Sunday which said it should “encourage parishes and deaneries to develop local action plans to address issues of racial injustice”. The Rt Rev Rose Hudson-Wilkin, the Bishop of Dover, said the Church needed to “further embed racial justice” and should not be afraid of being called “woke”... No members stood up to make speeches opposing the motion as it passed by 364 votes in favour to zero against, with two abstentions. The Archbishop of York, the Most Rev Stephen Cottrell, spoke animatedly as he said the Church “has not been good enough” on diversity and inclusion, that “racism and discrimination rupture our body” and asked, “May the Lord have mercy upon us”. The Rt Rev Martin Gorick, the Bishop of Dudley, said every Anglican who becomes a parish representative in his Diocese of Worcester now has to undertake compulsory unconscious bias training. Bishop Hudson-Wilkin said in response that every other diocese should follow suit. The training was axed across government and the civil service in December 2020 because there was “no evidence” that it improved equality. The Rev Rachel Webbley, team rector in Whitstable, Kent, told Synod she was a “recovering racist” and said she was shocked by “just how much white resistance there is to feeling discomfort about racial injustice”. Daniel Matovu, a lay member of Synod, added that he had been forced to bear a cross throughout his life “because of the colour of my skin”. “You white folks have no idea, particularly those of you who are white male, heterosexual and not disabled,” he said. “You’ve only been given small sticks to carry, with which to beat the rest of us.” David Hermitt, another lay member, said the Church needed to become more anti-racist to reverse its falling membership figures because “young people” are “more radical than we are”. However Dr Rakib Ehsan, the author of Beyond Grievance: What the Left Gets Wrong About Ethnic Minorities, told The Telegraph: “It appears that no sphere of British life is free of divisive identitarian thinking – including the Church of England. “Abandoning traditional Christian values in favour of the unholy trinity of diversity, equity, and inclusion, the established Church of the land risks alienating conservative ethnic minorities who have little time for the politics of grievance and victimhood.”... The bishop was born in Jamaica and became the first black female Church of England bishop when she was appointed to the see of Dover in 2019. In June 2020, she addressed BLM protestors outside Canterbury Cathedral and called for “structural change in all walks of life” in response to the death of George Floyd. She also said that month that the Church discriminated against black clergy and was “still stuck” in a mindset that “black people couldn’t possibly lead, or can only minister to black people”. In April 2021, she condemned as “deeply disturbing” a Government-backed review of race in Britain that found this country “should be regarded as a model for other white-majority countries” on race relations. In February 2020, the Church issued an apology for racism as the Archbishop of Canterbury said there was “no doubt” that it was “deeply institutionally racist”. Dr Alka Sehgal Cuthbert, the director of Don’t Divide Us, said: “Black people, like anyone else, need the same justice as their fellow citizens, not a special ‘racial’ kind – you’d think a religion that preaches we’re all equal in God’s eyes would get this.”"
Meme - Black Woman: "MUH BABY DINDU NUFFIN. EXCEPT ARMED ROBBERY, RESISTING ARREST, AND GOING FOR AN OFFICER'S GUN"
The year the ruling class got woke - "For me, the defining image of 2020 was also the funniest: that of Democratic lawmakers in the US taking the knee, in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, draped in Ghanaian kente cloth. Watching thoroughly establishment politicians, House speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer to the fore, literally kneeling before the new woke politics was striking. It provoked so many questions, not least if Pelosi and Schumer (80 and 70 respectively) would be able to rise again unassisted. But this absurd attempt at virtue-signalling – which provoked mockery rather than plaudits, even among those it was meant to impress – made one thing clear: that wokeness is the new orthodoxy, and the old elites know this... For all the protesters’ radical pretensions, the woke movement has been easily co-opted by the most rich and powerful in society. This is because identity politics is in many ways more spiritual than material. Heretics must be ousted. Blasphemies must be scrubbed. Past sins must be ‘come to terms with’, in some vague, undefined sense. None of this threatens the rich and powerful. Indeed, it is much cheaper for businesses to pay people like Robin DiAngelo – the millionaire diversity consultant and author of the bestselling White Fragility – to lecture staff about their alleged racism than it is to offer them better pay and working conditions. Wokeness is not some capitalist plot to divide up the working class, leaving people of similar economic interests bickering among one another about their relative privilege. But that certainly is the effect of it. And that suits the bosses just fine. More than that, wokeness offers the elites who embrace it a false sense of moral authority – a way to salve their consciences and to appear progressive without giving anything up themselves. In politics, in the form of people like vice-president-elect Kamala Harris, it provides a progressive gloss to what is, in effect, the same old establishment, neoliberal agenda. Whether or not the elite’s embrace of wokeness is entirely sincere remains up for debate. But in a sense that doesn’t matter so much. Identity politics has become the new official religion, something which sets the moral framework, and which must be deferred to regardless of whether or not one believes every word of scripture."
Why some reforms prompted by police brutality are being rolled back - The Washington Post - "the city passed the Tyre Nichols Driving Equality Act, barring officers from conducting certain traffic stops for low-level violations, among other measures. But now state lawmakers are advancing legislation that would nullify the Memphis law... Gillespie’s measure is part of a groundswell of legislative and voter pushback against reforms initiated over the past four years after the police killings of Black Americans including Nichols, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd. Each killing stunned Americans and inspired activism, rioting and a racial reckoning that translated into hundreds of bills aimed at curtailing law enforcement powers and reshaping how police do their jobs. In some cases, lawmakers and voters now say those changes needed to be fine-tuned to work well. In others, they are trying to address community backlash at measures that have been labeled anti-police, as well as a perception that crime has worsened while police have been hamstrung by policy changes. Florida lawmakers are considering a bill that would ban civilian-run police review boards. Louisiana legislators voted in favor of a law that would make it harder to sue police officers; cities including Portland, Ore., and Los Angeles have restored police funding that was cut after Floyd was killed. Under pressure to address high-profile incidents of crime on New York’s subway system, Gov. Kathy Hochul last week said she would send the National Guard underground to help police with random searches of riders’ bags. San Francisco voters last week approved loosening the rules around police surveillance and allowing officers to pursue suspects in their cars even for some misdemeanor violations. And in Washington, D.C., lawmakers passed a massive public safety bill that increases punishments for a range of crimes and adjusts or walks back accountability measures that addressed police transparency and rules for neck restraints and vehicular pursuits. In Tennessee, Gillespie declined an interview request, but explained his bill in a written statement that said Memphis, where crime has ticked up in recent years, has become “a safe haven for criminals.” “We cannot allow any local government to embolden criminals by nullifying our state laws and demonizing law enforcement,” he wrote... In D.C., last year’s homicide spike gave officials fodder to argue that funding cuts to the city’s police force have damaged public safety. Other lawmakers and researchers say it is too early to make that correlation, pointing to other factors like disruptions to schools and social services caused by the coronavirus pandemic. D.C. Council member Brooke Pinto (D-Ward 2), a lawyer, was elected in 2020, weeks after Floyd’s murder. At the time, she voted in favor of sweeping police reform and accountability laws. Years later, she joined a D.C. police officer for his night shift. She said the officer shared his frustration about a new rule for police body cameras, which barred officers from reviewing the footage. The change was an attempt to keep officers accused of wrongdoing from being able to prepare for questioning by reviewing what had happened. But officers also relied on the footage to write accurate reports."
Richard Hanania on X - "Summer of Floyd laws are being rolled back across the country. Blacks still get arrested and incarcerated at higher rates, we’ll go back to forgetting about that for the sake of sanity, until the next time things explode and we decide to pretend this is a new issue again."
Meme - Black man being arrested: "Ouch!!! Ooww! Ooww! Hey! You're hurting my wrists!"
Black woman: "Hey look! They're hurting his wrists!"
Black man: "Yeah!"
Black man 2: "Brutality!"
*multiple dead people in liquor store slumped over and bloodied, with money and knife on ground*