Blue Lives Matter - What is the true meaning of the movement

[Oppressthemville]

"On December 20, 2014, in the wake of the killings of officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, a group of law enforcement officers formed Blue Lives Matter to counter media reports that they perceived to be anti-police.[9][10] Blue Lives Matter is made up of active and retired law enforcement officers. The current national spokesman for Blue Lives Matter is retired Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Lieutenant Randy Sutton."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Lives_Matter

So what if it's Wikipedia- the point is still the same.

[-Officer-]

"On December 20, 2014, in the wake of the killings of officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, a group of law enforcement officers formed Blue Lives Matter to counter media reports that they perceived to be anti-police.[9][10] Blue Lives Matter is made up of active and retired law enforcement officers. The current national spokesman for Blue Lives Matter is retired Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Lieutenant Randy Sutton."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Lives_Matter

So what if it's Wikipedia- the point is still the same.

Wikipedia is generally an acceptable source. More so than many news websites that is..

I guess from what I can tell by what you pasted it was never founded to honor those who were killed in the line of duty, which is kind of disappointing having supported it in the past, and even more disappointing to know the people who make those claims are either unaware of the reasons for the creation or they actually agree with it.

And regardless, if you’re unaware of the real meaning of the movement, there has to be a degree of ignorance there. I say it with experience having supported the movement in the past.

[Big Bad Blue]

It is and always has been the white supremacist response to Black Lives Matter. That black flag with the blue stripe is a fascist flag and treated as such by me.

[Page]

I've heard the quote "There's a few bad apples out there but...." so many times it's become a nuisance. It goes both ways.

The people playing this tired old cliche would do well to remember the truth of the part of the proverb they're omitting.

One bad apple spoils the barrel.

Even funnier is that even that doesn't apply here: the barrel was filled with bad apples from the start.

[Lanoraie II]

It is and always has been the white supremacist response to Black Lives Matter. That black flag with the blue stripe is a fascist flag and treated as such by me.

Then you clearly don't know the meaning of the flag. The Guardian is a joke journalist website, btw.

[Republic Of Ludwigsburg]

Blue Lives Matter is an irrational movement. BLM was founded because Afro-Americans are legitimately oppressed. It's a dogwhistle for far-righters.

[El Lazaro]

It is and always has been the white supremacist response to Black Lives Matter. That black flag with the blue stripe is a fascist flag and treated as such by me.

Then you clearly don't know the meaning of the flag. The Guardian is a joke journalist website, btw.

Saying that the people are the enemy of the state (especially in reference to race issues) isn’t necessarily fascist, but it isn’t a good thing to have either. Law enforcement should be exactly what the name says, not a bunch of quasi-military thugs attacking the people they’re supposed to protect.

[Mtwara]

A while ago I read that following George Floyd and an increase in anti-police rhetoric, a lot of people who are friends and family of police officers began to identify with Blue Lives Matter, so my impression of the movement is that it's a combination of sweet but very naieve people, and genuine right wingers.

It would be nice to see some data on that - who identifies with it, and why?

[Dumb Ideologies]

They want us to interbreed with smurfs and then bus in the halfbreeds to our schools.

[Vassenor]

It is and always has been the white supremacist response to Black Lives Matter. That black flag with the blue stripe is a fascist flag and treated as such by me.

Then you clearly don't know the meaning of the flag. The Guardian is a joke journalist website, btw.

So educate us: What is the actual meaning of the flag?

[Risottia]

I'm not an American, but I've heard that these "_____ Lives Matter" movements are quite popular in your country. Quick question, why not "All Lives Matter"? Why does it have to be strictly be Asian or Black? Don't you understand that this type of stuff only further divides your country both racially and politically?

Because America is trongly divided along racial lines (and census lines, but hush, we're not actually allowed to say that poverty determines one's life way at least as much as skin hue does).
So strongly divided - and by "divided" I mean "there's actually a gun-down-that-n*****r" de-facto policy - that American policemen, judges and politicians need to be remembered that "EVEN black people are human, you know, so please don't kill them wantonly as you usually do".

[Risottia]

It is and always has been the white supremacist response to Black Lives Matter. That black flag with the blue stripe is a fascist flag and treated as such by me.

Then you clearly don't know the meaning of the flag. The Guardian is a joke journalist website, btw.

I'm sure InfoWars was more reliable, but seems like they've gone bankrupt, so too bad, eh.

[GuessTheAltAccount]

I am aware they kill people in cold blood, but rioting and destroying businesses and homes is not an ideal method to preventing police brutality. Improve police training and remove military-grade equipment to decrease the chance of abuse of power.

And how do you suggest we get the state to do those things? Cops have been killing black people at a shocking rate for decades now, even as crime has fallen. Politicians have no incentives to change anything since they get to issue the orders.

So what is the alternative?

It doesn't matter what the alternative is. There is no excuse for rioting more generally, but especially not for destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what one was protesting.

[Vassenor]

And how do you suggest we get the state to do those things? Cops have been killing black people at a shocking rate for decades now, even as crime has fallen. Politicians have no incentives to change anything since they get to issue the orders.

So what is the alternative?

It doesn't matter what the alternative is. There is no excuse for rioting more generally, but especially not for destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what one was protesting.

So what should they have done instead? It's easy to sit here and play respectability politics but you're not really offering anything new here.

[GuessTheAltAccount]

It doesn't matter what the alternative is. There is no excuse for rioting more generally, but especially not for destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what one was protesting.

So what should they have done instead? It's easy to sit here and play respectability politics but you're not really offering anything new here.

Well, for starters they could've jumped in front of live cameras with the names of studies demonstrating racial biases in policing. That would still make the message easy to notice but wouldn't involve destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what they were protesting.

I don't know whether to find more absurd that doing the latter is effective or to find dangerous the precedent it would set if it were.

[Vassenor]

So what should they have done instead? It's easy to sit here and play respectability politics but you're not really offering anything new here.

Well, for starters they could've jumped in front of live cameras with the names of studies demonstrating racial biases in policing. That would still make the message easy to notice but wouldn't involve destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what they were protesting.

I don't know whether to find more absurd that doing the latter is effective or to find dangerous the precedent it would set if it were.

So you can prove that every act of property destruction was done by people involved in the protest and in the name of the protest and not just by people trying to take advantage of the situation?

Or as we saw with Umberella Man actively trying to stoke unrest to justify police responses.

[Ostroeuropa]

Both movements are misnomers.

For black people; Accidents, Suicides, Other Homicides, Heart Disease, and Cancer are more leading causes of death. Together they absolutely dwarf police shootings.

For police, it's similar.

Yet both are prattling on about this instead. It's certainly an issue, but I get the sense it would be like if I told you "Children's educations matter" and then waffled about the need for milk in the canteen constantly and shared a platform with people who were suggesting we burn all books simply because they said "Oh yes, but bring back the milk. Our childrens education is important.".

The cops go on fox news that peddled constant bullshit policies that lead cops (And pretty much everyone else) to kill themselves.
BLM isn't much better either.

However championing mental health is too nebulous and you can't create an US V THEM dynamic that allows you to be racist with plausible deniability. So instead we've got what we've got.

Realistically the blue lives matter movement is at least closer to the mark given that they talk about the stress of the job, but their solution appears to be "So let's change nothing" rather than "We need funding for maintaining our mental health and a few changes around here". They only bring it up to dismiss BLM's criticism of the police. And BLM only bring up the police shootings because it slides neatly into a racist and sexist framework for viewing the world and prioritizing that issue above others is important to them.

Sort of like if I get bored and mutter to myself about my house being an absolute dumpster but the moment a Jewish kid spills his tea I won't shut up about it and it becomes "The Big Issue Here" and I draw a placard about how my house is a mess and needs to be cleaned, but focus feverishly the tea while waffling about Judaic Bolshevism as a reason my house is a mess, only talking about other things in passing despite it being very obvious to everyone where my passion and focus lies.

The mainstream progressive left is desperate to act as though problems you can argue are caused by white males are the most important ones in society and should take up all the air time. (Dissents in the progressive left aside for the moment).

Because, well. They're racists. They're sexists. It's brazen.

The blue lives matter guys are also racist and sexist, but they do at least talk about mental health of the officers.

If you took a picture of a black man and a cop standing with a gun in the middle of them and asked "What are the most likely outcomes here?" almost nobody would say "One of them is going to pick it up and shoot themselves.".

And yet...

"Police are the number one victim of police shootings".

[GuessTheAltAccount]

So you can prove that every act of property destruction was done by people involved in the protest and in the name of the protest and not just by people trying to take advantage of the situation?

Show me where I said this.

[Vassenor]

So you can prove that every act of property destruction was done by people involved in the protest and in the name of the protest and not just by people trying to take advantage of the situation?

Show me where I said this.

When you kept complaining about protestors destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what was being protested.

That would still make the message easy to notice but wouldn't involve destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what they were protesting.

It doesn't matter what the alternative is. There is no excuse for rioting more generally, but especially not for destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what one was protesting.

[Ifreann]

So what should they have done instead? It's easy to sit here and play respectability politics but you're not really offering anything new here.

Well, for starters they could've jumped in front of live cameras with the names of studies demonstrating racial biases in policing...

lol
Imagine thinking this.

[Engadine Mcdonalds 1997]

So what should they have done instead? It's easy to sit here and play respectability politics but you're not really offering anything new here.

Well, for starters they could've jumped in front of live cameras with the names of studies demonstrating racial biases in policing. That would still make the message easy to notice but wouldn't involve destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what they were protesting.

I don't know whether to find more absurd that doing the latter is effective or to find dangerous the precedent it would set if it were.

The bourgeoise would never ever have this happen, especially in America. People are only allowed to complain about 3 things in liberal media: "Do we have enough Black Billionaires", "Do we have enough Female Billionaires", and "Do we have enough Gay Billionaires". Actual injustices and legitimate grievances with the State get thrown aside because it would expose the truth of liberal democracies. The only way to get people talking about racial prejudice and police brutality rates amongst the African-American population is by actually doing something that the bourgeoise elite wouldn't approve of.

Surely someone with the People's Republic of China's flag as their pfp would get this

[Malphe II]

So what should they have done instead? It's easy to sit here and play respectability politics but you're not really offering anything new here.

Well, for starters they could've jumped in front of live cameras with the names of studies demonstrating racial biases in policing. That would still make the message easy to notice but wouldn't involve destroying businesses that had nothing to do with what they were protesting.

I don't know whether to find more absurd that doing the latter is effective or to find dangerous the precedent it would set if it were.

Do you actually believe this? Do you think that anybody would care about protests as milquetoast as that? People aren't getting heard unless they make themselves heard, the impetus is on the government to stop killing ethnic minorities, not on the oppressed groups to let themselves be killed in the name of keeping the order.

Don't want civil unrest? Fix your shit, people don't trash their own places of living if the straits aren't dire.

[Mutualist Chaos]

Then you clearly don't know the meaning of the flag. The Guardian is a joke journalist website, btw.

Nah, we understand it just fine.

The "thin blue line" flag is a fascist symbol, full stop. If you believe in that metaphor - police are the thin blue line between order and chaos - you have stopped believing in the principle that individual persons are citizens with rights, who must be presumed innocent until proven guilty. You have chosen to believe instead that police are a class of overlords tasked with keeping a subject population under military occupation because they're too stupid and violent to be treated any other way.

[Sordhau]

They want us to interbreed with smurfs and then bus in the halfbreeds to our schools.

Idk I could go for a 10/10 qt blue girlfriend tbqh.

[Icecane]

So what should they have done instead? It's easy to sit here and play respectability politics but you're not really offering anything new here.

Well, for starters they could've jumped in front of live cameras with the names of studies demonstrating racial biases in policing.

Wow because that’s totally worked for them in the past! People don’t riot and destroy their own cities for fun. People are just going to look at the news and go “meh more statistics” if they blurt out facts and studies. But when shit is burning down people tend to go “oh wow that’s not good” and then look into why things are burning. Is rioting good? No. But at a point people feel like it’s all they can do.