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#5152 May 29 2018 at 5:50 PM Rating: Decent
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Almalieque wrote:
Gbaji wrote:
Which would lead a reasonable rational thinking person to conclude that she didn't call the cops merely because someone was "cooking at a BBQ", regardless of skin color.
You're intentionally trying to befog the situation with race to discuss tangents because you know you're wrong.


Um... I'm the one trying to "defog" the situation with race. I'm specifically responding to folks who automatically assume that if the person who did something harmful was white, and the person who was the recipient of the harmful thing was not-white, that the harmful thing itself must have been motivated by racial bias.

Sorry. I find that assumption to be ridiculous. There's a massive gulf in between "assume it must be about race" and "assume it could not have been about race". Most of the cases are going to be in that range.

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The major point is that the lady at the BBQ improperly called the police.


Absolutely. The problem is that the case was posted here specifically as a supporting argument for the Starbucks case being assumed to be driven by racial bias. That assumption is *not* supported by the facts though.

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This is evident, (regardless of skin colors).


Sure. Except for the fact that no one would have known about the event happening, much less posted about it on this forum, if not for the skin colors of the people involved. Which is somewhat my point.

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So, why is it hard to accept that the barista might have improperly called the cops as well?


It's not. It's entirely possible that she overreacted to the situation at hand. In fact, I've posted this as a possible explanation for the events in question already in this thread. The point isn't whether it was proper for her to have called the cops, but with the assumption that it was not only improper, but that the motivation on her part was driven by racial bias.

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Why do you insist that the customers must have done something wrong when the people at the BBQ didn't do anything wrong either?


I have not insisted that the customers "must have done something wrong". I have presented that as a more likely possibility than that the barista is just an evil racist bigot who called the cops on two guys just for being black. Obviously, it's also possible that they did nothing wrong, but she called the cops anyway, but that her motivation was also not about race. As I mentioned earlier, she may have overreacted to the guy's request to use the restroom. Misunderstood something they said. Was having a bad day. Whatever.

My position on this has always been that in the long list of possible explanations for what happened "she's just a racist" is far far far down the list. Laughably so. Yet, that's the first one that everyone seems to leap to, and that has been repeated over and over in the media.

I'll also point out that the odds of a random person calling the cops by mistake on someone who was doing nothing wrong at all is vastly higher than the odds of an employee in a customer facing position doing the same. I've had the cops called on me by a nosy neighbor for "doing nothing wrong" before. I suspect most of us have at some point. It happens. People see you hanging out with your friends somewhere, don't recognize you as someone who lives in the neighborhood, and they call the cops. Because some people are just like that. There does not need to be any racial component to that action at all. Yet, if the person who got the cops called on them happens to be a PoC, in many cases, it is assumed to be racially driven.

I think that's a bad assumption to make. That's seriously all I'm trying to say here.
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#5153 May 29 2018 at 8:11 PM Rating: Good
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#5154 May 30 2018 at 7:36 AM Rating: Good
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gbaji wrote:
That assumption is *not* supported by the facts though.
From the guy whose only supporting argument is nothing but generic assumptions that's saying something.
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#5155 May 30 2018 at 4:33 PM Rating: Decent
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My assumptions are not "generic". They are derived via an analysis of available data, and represent a "most likely" case. I clearly state this as well. You'll note that I very rarely simply say "it must be X!". I usually say something like "X is more likely than Y". In this case, I'm looking at the relative likelihood that the reason the two men were asked to leave was simply because the barista is a horrible racist who hates black men and comparing it to the likelihood that there were other actions taken, words spoken, etc, which caused her to do so. I've provided a relatively detailed explanation of my logic, which you're free to re-read if you wish. In any case, my conclusion is that it's much more likely that the one or both of the men did or said something that prompted the barista to ask them to leave, which in turn escalated to her calling the cops.

One big factor in this analysis is the two men's own reactions when the cops did arrive. They were given multiple opportunities to simply leave the store and refused. That mentality and refusal to do a pretty basic obvious thing, even when presented with the alternative of "we will have to arrest you if you don't", is a big ringing alarm bell suggesting that they likely engaged in similarly belligerent behavior with the barista. It's not proof, of course, but it's a pretty strong indicator of how they respond to authority, and provides a far more likely explanation as to how the situation escalated to them being arrested than the ridiculously unlikely and absurdly simplistic "she must be a racist!" scenario.

We know they allowed (by their own actions) the situation to escalate from a simple "leave the store and nothing bad will happen" to "being arrested" after the cops arrived. I don't think it's unreasonable at all to speculate that they made similar decisions prior to their arrival as well.
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#5156 May 30 2018 at 5:58 PM Rating: Decent
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Gbaji wrote:
Sorry. I find that assumption to be ridiculous. There's a massive gulf in between "assume it must be about race" and "assume it could not have been about race". Most of the cases are going to be in that range.
Welcome to the argument of systemic racism, which is different from old school racism. It doesn't matter if the intent is about race if the end result is the same.

Gbaji wrote:
Obviously, it's also possible that they did nothing wrong, but she called the cops anyway, but that her motivation was also not about race.
If this country weren't literally built on racism when the time where black people didn't have civil rights wasn't 100 years ago, but during the time of my DAD, then you might have a point. You, along with conservatives, DO NOT WANT TO BELIEVE that it could be about race, because that is contrary to your fictional post racism utopia.

We live in a world where people randomly kill other people in open settings in mass shootings, but it is unbelievable that a racist might call the cops due to racism?!?Smiley: rolleyes
#5157 May 30 2018 at 6:35 PM Rating: Decent
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Almalieque wrote:
Gbaji wrote:
Sorry. I find that assumption to be ridiculous. There's a massive gulf in between "assume it must be about race" and "assume it could not have been about race". Most of the cases are going to be in that range.
Welcome to the argument of systemic racism, which is different from old school racism. It doesn't matter if the intent is about race if the end result is the same.


The problem with the ideology of systemic racism is that it can be blamed for anything and everything. Which makes it a useless methodology to use (well, except for the case I mention below). It also has the nasty side effect of being used as a logic crutch in preference to a better and more valuable examination of the cause of a negative outcome. And when that happens, it decreases the likelihood that we, as a society, can properly identify the underlying issues causing racial outcome disparity, and thus increases the odds that such a disparity will continue in the future unaddressed.

So yes. If your objective is to maximize the odds that disparate racial outcomes will continue to exist (presumably so you can cling to it as a social issue), then blaming everything on "systemic racism" is a great tool to use. Note, however, that you're never going to actually improve the conditions of PoCs within society as a result. You're more or less choosing to trap these people in a sub-standard condition in order to allow your social narrative of victimization to be useful for you. Which I find somewhat deplorable as a social instrument.

You can't fix a problem if you don't first correctly identify it.

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Gbaji wrote:
Obviously, it's also possible that they did nothing wrong, but she called the cops anyway, but that her motivation was also not about race.
If this country weren't literally built on racism when the time where black people didn't have civil rights wasn't 100 years ago, but during the time of my DAD, then you might have a point. You, along with conservatives, DO NOT WANT TO BELIEVE that it could be about race, because that is contrary to your fictional post racism utopia.


I'll paraphrase my statement above: There's a massive gulf between not wanting to believe something, and not immediately leaping to the assumption of that thing. I have, multiple times, acknowledged the possibility that this event could have been racially motivated. However, I have also examined numerous alternative possibilities as well, and concluded that it's wrong to simply assume it must be race, when there are so many other possible explanations which, frankly, I find to be more probable.

Quote:
We live in a world where people randomly kill other people in open settings in mass shootings, but it is unbelievable that a racist might call the cops due to racism?!?Smiley: rolleyes


It's certainly within the realm of believability. But so is the possibility that space aliens made it happen, right? Just because something is possible, doesn't mean that it must be the truth. This is where the concept of probability enters the equation. And yes, I find it far more probable that one or both of these men did or said something which precipitated the barista's decision to ask them to leave, and that both of these men refused to do so (just as they did when the cops arrived), resulting in the decision of the barista to call the police, which lead to the police asking them to leave, which they also refused, leading the police to arrest them.


The only thing missing in that chain is the first step. Which is the part we have no direct information about. So we're left with two possibilities. Overt racism on the part of a barista, despite such a thing having (as far as we know) never been acted on before by her, in a location where she presumably dealt with black customers all the time, *or* that the two men did or said something which caused her reaction.

I'm going with the second possibility as the most probable case. This does not mean that there is no racism in our society, nor that there are no racists. But in this case? It seems like a stretch. It also doesn't mean that she didn't still act in an improper manner. But, at the risk of repeating myself, there's a ton of cases of bad customer service out there, that don't involve race at all. I suspect we've all had bad encounters with a person working in some form of retail or customer service in our lives. Is it always about race? No, it's not. So why assume that if the employee is white and the customer is black then it magically becomes about race and nothing else?

I think that's silly.

Edited, May 30th 2018 5:41pm by gbaji
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#5158 May 30 2018 at 7:16 PM Rating: Decent
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Gbaji wrote:
The problem with the ideology of systemic racism is that it can be blamed for anything and everything.
You obviously have no clue what systemic racism is. I think you're confusing systemic racism with "The man".

Gbaji wrote:
So we're left with two possibilities. Overt racism on the part of a barista, despite such a thing having (as far as we know) never been acted on before by her, in a location where she presumably dealt with black customers all the time, *or* that the two men did or said something which caused her reaction.
Evidence on you not understanding systemic racism. She could have called the cops because of the clothes that they were wearing.

Gbaji wrote:
However, I have also examined numerous alternative possibilities as well, and concluded that it's wrong to simply assume it must be race, when there are so many other possible explanations which, frankly, I find to be more probable.
Yes, there are multiple possibilities, but given the nation's history and current events, to believe those other alternative possibilities are more probable without any additional facts to the situation is delusional.


Gbaji wrote:
No, it's not. So why assume that if the employee is white and the customer is black then it magically becomes about race and nothing else?
Read above. Usually people come out to defend themselves when accused of something, even if they are guilty. There doesn't appear to have been much effort in countering the narrative. Oh yea, and the witnesses (white people) that you keep neglecting.

Gbaji wrote:
I'm going with the second possibility as the most probable case.
You just said that you weren't suggesting that those guys must have done something wrong, when compared to the black family in the park. Now, you're back to saying that it is more probable.
#5159 May 30 2018 at 11:27 PM Rating: Good
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gbaji wrote:
They were given multiple opportunities to simply leave the store and refused. That mentality and refusal to do a pretty basic obvious thing, even when presented with the alternative of "we will have to arrest you if you don't", is a big ringing alarm bell suggesting that they likely engaged in similarly belligerent behavior with the barista. It's not proof, of course, but it's a pretty strong indicator of how they respond to authority, and provides a far more likely explanation as to how the situation escalated to them being arrested than the ridiculously unlikely and absurdly simplistic "she must be a racist!" scenario.
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*clueless observer* "golly, them negroes shoulda listened to "authority". This is their fault.SAD.
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#5160 May 31 2018 at 8:14 AM Rating: Good
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gbaji wrote:
They were given multiple opportunities to simply leave the store and refused.
They refused because they did nothing wrong. You assuming they did doesn't make it an "analysis of available data."
gbaji wrote:
I don't think it's unreasonable at all to speculate that they made similar decisions prior to their arrival as well.
There's that generic assumption I literally just said you were basing your entire narrative on.
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#5161 May 31 2018 at 8:32 AM Rating: Good
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lolgaxe wrote:
"analysis of available data."

gbaji is a racist *******


Analysis complete
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#5162 May 31 2018 at 8:34 AM Rating: Excellent
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No no, it's possible that gbaji is a racist, therefore analyzing the available data that there was at least one racist person in history, and not finding any instances of him admitting he's racist which means the media is hiding the fact that he is racist, it's most likely that gbaji is racist, therefore we must all conclude that gbaji is, in fact, racist.

You have to fluff it.

Edited, May 31st 2018 10:36am by lolgaxe
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#5163 May 31 2018 at 2:40 PM Rating: Good
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lolgaxe wrote:
They refused because they did nothing wrong.
Except they did do something wrong. At least by the time the police had arrived. They had been asked by the business operator to leave the premises. They refused to. At that point, they are trespassing.
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#5164 May 31 2018 at 3:06 PM Rating: Good
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Uglysasquatch wrote:
lolgaxe wrote:
They refused because they did nothing wrong.
Except they did do something wrong. At least by the time the police had arrived. They had been asked by the business operator to leave the premises. They refused to. At that point, they are trespassing.


At that point, actually, they were also protesting.
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#5165 May 31 2018 at 3:33 PM Rating: Good
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Professor stupidmonkey wrote:
Uglysasquatch wrote:
lolgaxe wrote:
They refused because they did nothing wrong.
Except they did do something wrong. At least by the time the police had arrived. They had been asked by the business operator to leave the premises. They refused to. At that point, they are trespassing.


At that point, actually, they were also protesting.


At that point then, weren't they still inside a private business?

Edit:
Just because I figured that's why people always protested outside places, rather than inside places, as to avoid the whole trespassing and arrests.

Edited, May 31st 2018 5:36pm by TirithRR
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#5166 May 31 2018 at 3:54 PM Rating: Good
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I was specifically thinking of sit-ins but I was also just being contrary.
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#5167 May 31 2018 at 6:47 PM Rating: Good
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Professor stupidmonkey wrote:
I was specifically thinking of sit-ins but I was also just being contrary.
Yay! I made it contagious.
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#5168 May 31 2018 at 8:09 PM Rating: Good
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Uglysasquatch wrote:
Professor stupidmonkey wrote:
I was specifically thinking of sit-ins but I was also just being contrary.
Yay! I made it contagious.

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#5169 Jun 01 2018 at 8:28 AM Rating: Good
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Uglysasquatch wrote:
They had been asked by the business operator to leave the premises.
They weren't doing anything wrong to justify the manager telling them to leave.
TirithRR wrote:
Just because I figured that's why people always protested outside places
You protest outside because more people can see and hear you.

Edited, Jun 1st 2018 12:03pm by lolgaxe
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#5170 Jun 01 2018 at 9:15 AM Rating: Good
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lolgaxe wrote:
Uglysasquatch wrote:
They had been asked by the business operator to leave the premises.
They weren't doing anything wrong to justify the manager telling them to leave.
Not buying something is justifiable grounds for a business to ask you to leave. If it was done within 2 minutes of them sitting as they said, then its completely ridiculous, but technically, still within the business' rights.


lolgaxe wrote:
Uglysasquatch wrote:
Just because I figured that's why people always protested outside places
You protest outside because more people can see and hear you.
I appreciate the attention, but I never said this.
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#5171 Jun 01 2018 at 11:01 AM Rating: Good
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Uglysasquatch wrote:
Not buying something is justifiable grounds for a business to ask you to leave.
I doubt it was within two minutes, and according to all the resources the men arrived ten minutes before a meeting and they were being arrested just before the guy they were waiting for got there so let's clock the whole sequence of events at 15 minutes. Not buying something in that time frame might be grounds to ask them to leave, but it's definitely not grounds for them to call the cops over it.

After the fact, Starbucks just changed their policy so you can hang out without purchase.
Uglysasquatch wrote:
I appreciate the attention, but I never said this.
Sorry, morning was all over the place. Fixed.

Also, I seem to have forgotten to press the post button here.
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#5172 Jun 01 2018 at 11:23 AM Rating: Good
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lolgaxe wrote:
it's definitely not grounds for them to call the cops over it.
Reasonable grounds anyway.

I'm just being pedantic and pointing out that they didn't technically, do nothing wrong.
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#5173 Jun 01 2018 at 11:45 AM Rating: Good
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Uglysasquatch wrote:
lolgaxe wrote:
it's definitely not grounds for them to call the cops over it.
Reasonable grounds anyway.

I'm just being pedantic and pointing out that they didn't technically, do nothing wrong.


They the Customers, or They the Employees?
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#5174 Jun 01 2018 at 1:49 PM Rating: Good
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The customers
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#5175 Jun 04 2018 at 6:53 PM Rating: Decent
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Uglysasquatch wrote:
lolgaxe wrote:
it's definitely not grounds for them to call the cops over it.
Reasonable grounds anyway.

I'm just being pedantic and pointing out that they didn't technically, do nothing wrong.


I think the bigger point here is that by the time the police arrived, the two men absolutely were doing something wrong from the point of view of those police. They don't know anything about what happened prior to being called there and arriving on the scene. All they know is that the employee has asked these two men to leave and they have refused to do so. Their job is not to assess why they were asked to leave, much less adjudicate the legitimacy of that request. They have one job: enforce the law. The law says that if someone is asked to leave a business and refuses to do so, that person is trespassing. Period. Their job is to either get the person to leave, or to arrest them if they do not. That's it.

The proper place to argue that the request was unreasonable or unfair is in the court, not at the scene with the police. While you can certainly attempt to argue with police at the scene, your odds of success are usually pretty low. The only chance you have is if the officer is the one making the accusation and not a third party. So if an officer observes something and then approaches you believing what you did was in violation of the law, you can absolutely attempt to argue otherwise (and it may work even). But if the officer is responding to a third party making a claim, and the officers observation upon arrival is that the claim is correct (which it is when the claim is "trespassing", and you are physically in the location when they arrive), you don't really have a leg to stand on legally.
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#5176 Jun 04 2018 at 8:32 PM Rating: Good
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gbaji wrote:
Uglysasquatch wrote:
lolgaxe wrote:
it's definitely not grounds for them to call the cops over it.
Reasonable grounds anyway.

I'm just being pedantic and pointing out that they didn't technically, do nothing wrong.

The proper place to argue that the request was unreasonable or unfair is in the court, not at the scene with the police. While you can certainly attempt to argue with police at the scene, your odds of success are usually pretty low.


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