More than that, though: the "resistance to race", as Street puts it, even if it's a luxury, is no less progressive for that. One can hardly advocate for a world in which a black writer is a "writer" and not a "black writer" by self-identifying as a "white writer"--and feeling faux-guilty about it. I think the focus on whiteness here is entirely regressive. — jamalrob
Social workers and mental health intervenors should attend to most domestic disputes -- along with a police officer (in support, not in charge). Restorative justice programs should be established in neighborhoods where there are numerous misdemeanor property crimes (shoplifting, petty theft, etc.). Homelessness must be addressed with Housing First, then social services. Drug/alcohol addiction needs to be addressed with treatment, not jail time.
There are plenty of activities which the police can and should attend to: speeding, running red lights, murders, robbery, fighting, and so forth. — Bitter Crank
while the momentum is here, I say use it - I haven't seen so much interesting and fruitful discussion about the role of police (in general)... maybe ever. If they have to bear the weight of all injustices so be it. All the better even, until actual change happens. — StreetlightX
I think it's discraceful that the newspapers and socialist discussion groups are dominted by outcry over the deaths of a thousand blacks at the hands of their police when nearly a thousand times that amount of children (virtually all of whom are black) die from poverty in the same period due directly to our consumer choices — Isaac
How do you propose to change consumer preferences in such a way that people will be willing to spend more on a product because they know the product is sourced more fairly? — Benkei
What actions, other than what companies are already doing and have dedicated PR departments for, should you and I be doing to get more people on board? — Benkei
why not articulate the two together? — StreetlightX
It's no good playing the agonized more-progressive-than-thou when frankly, many people simply don't care — StreetlightX
:chin:Firstly, they're not even more expensive, just less cool. — Isaac
If you think funding public libraries, education, and transport will turn a country into the USSR, then Gosh, the USSR sounds pretty awesome. — StreetlightX
Now, if I'm poor. That 60 EUR makes a large difference and I probably wouldn't be willing to part with 60 euros to give some abstract Chinese worker a bit more money. It's too much. — Benkei
If not-buying from non-conflict zones or not having manufacturers that pay their employees well wouldn't cause prices to rise, everybody would be doing it. — Benkei
Once out of poverty people will have the time and luxury to worry about the climate impact of their purchases or the effective slavery that exists in those countries to which we've outsourced manufacturing of goods. — Benkei
Ad homs are the multiple "points" you have made in this thread.I've addressed this point multiple times in this thread. If you lack the literacy or the ability to understand those points, then I've nothing more to add. — StreetlightX
If we use what we can get, when is it going to be the turn of the 35,000 children working for less than 50 cents a day down mines to make mobile phones. — Isaac
More than that, though: the "resistance to race", as Street puts it, even if it's a luxury, is no less progressive for that. One can hardly advocate for a world in which a black writer is a "writer" and not a "black writer" by self-identifying as a "white writer"--and feeling faux-guilty about it. I think the focus on whiteness here is entirely regressive. — jamalrob
I don't understand why you feel to need to turn violence into a competition. — StreetlightX
Systemic racism obtains when a system(s) function (regardless of explicit rules) to favour certain racial groups over others. It doesn't require overt individual racists (though it may protect and even reward them) nor does it necessarily require any conscious acts of racism at all (and obversely you could have conscious acts of racism in a system where no systemic racism exists, only rather than being performative of the system, they would be antithetical to it). Systems are culturally contextual, they're embedded in cultures and how they function depends on their relationship to the culture they're in. So, often it's what the system allows rather than what the system demands that's important. — Baden
We cannot maintain outrage at every injustice. — Isaac
Isn't that what you're trying to do? What about this injustice? And that injustice? It's precisely because we 'cannot maintain outrage at every injustice' that one needs to work with momentum where one finds it. — StreetlightX
I'm not convinced that I want - or anyone should want - 'changes in consumer choices'. — StreetlightX
I'm not saying the current waves of protest are fake, I'm saying they've been 'let through' the filters in place to control public discourse and we shouldn't take that as a means of deciding which injustice to work with. — Isaac
Yes we can do so by legal action, but consumer action is quicker and, if it can be culturally integrated, more sustainable. — Isaac
Again, I'm a big tent person - let's get children out of mines and defund the police and refund public goods. — StreetlightX
(1) You acknowledge the reality of global systemic racism.
(2) You know that it's almost always white supremacist in nature,
Well there is your problem. If people are not willing to spend another 60 euro to avoid supporting the use of children as young as 6 years old down a mine then what's the point? We live in a democracy. If people are so unbelievably selfish that they think 60 euros is worth a kid being sent down a mine for then any policy aimed at reducing poverty will be undone or voted out the moment it yields a net loss of 60 euros or more. — Isaac
This is kind of offensive to people in poverty. I know you didn't mean to be. A few years ago I had the great privelidge to work with a local co-op in an area of my country so poverty stricken it was on the European Objective 1 zone. They were struggling to afford good food, so they set up a worker's co-op, met with local farmers and wholesalers, organised distribution, negotiated deals and ended up with a supply network of organic locally grown vegetables (and even a few wholesale items). The idea that poor people cannot help but support oppressive or environmentally damaging practices because they can't afford otherwise is really just a way of perpetuating them as a market for large corporations to profit from selling cheap crap to. — Isaac
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