Bruce Steinberg

@Ron The last time NYC had a curfew was in 1943—in response to protests around a white police officer killing a black soldier. I don't think these protests are going to stop until the city backs down and ends it. Our elected Public Advocate has been on the streets with the protesters and is calling for the end of the curfew. The State Legislature and City Council are both up in arms about it as well. Cuomo and De Blasio can frame it as responding within the political system, not capitulating to "mob rule".

And to tell the truth, the best way to end the looting at this point would probably be to get the police off the streets. Protesters in NYC have been trying to prevent looting as well, but it's hard to do when the police are creating chaos.

Plus, they shouldn't be booking anyone during this pandemic. Packing people into cells for over 24 hours will do far more to spread Sars-CoV-2 than the outdoor protests.

@bix I think there are some good-faith misreadings happening on their end. I remember there being some brain-related medical issues several months back. They did link to a video about how segregation was enforced outside the South, which is not something everyone educates themselves on. //@pratik

@bix Ta-Nehisi Coates and Ezra Klein has a great discussion today. Among other things, they talked about what a non-violent state would look like. What if there were people trained in mediation to call instead of people trained to enforce order with guns?

@manton The important thing is that so many people are speaking up now. I also think a huge thing is the flood of videos this time. Journalists were kept away from the worst abuses and the children didn't have cameras of their own. That made it a lot more difficult for everyone to pay attention.

And you made micro.blog a place and wonderful discussions are happening on it right now. :) //@danielpunkass

@danielpunkass I struggle with finding a way to speak that doesn't push others away. Two summers back I was furious at the silence of the Apple/Tech opinion-sphere around family separations at the border. I was so strident that I don't think anyone listened. I know I was rough with both you and @manton.

I am very heartened that many of the voices that were silent then and speaking up now! 🤝

@jthingelstad I need to give Janelle Monáe's Dirty Computer again. Some lyrics from "Crazy Classic, Life":

We don't need another ruler All of my friends are kings (Oh-oh, oh-oh, oh-oh, oh-oh) I'm not American's nightmare I'm the American dream (Oh-oh, oh-oh, oh-oh, oh-oh) Just let me live my life

@manton Gorgeous!

@Ron There was some fun dancing at protests in Newark, NJ. There's an established protest movement in the city and they have a positive relationship with the police department. Without masses of warriors in riot gear, things have stayed calm:

The mayor probably told the police that we know for a fact that the reason why all these other cities were escalating was because of police violence. The police are so aggressive with the protests, who reciprocate an act of violence, and then it’s on, you know? The police are familiar with the People’s Organization for Progress. We’ve had numerous marches were the police got accustomed to us. They didn’t really feel the need to have that kind of aggressive behavior that police usually have. And we also have a city administration, the mayor of which has an official policy that is anti-police brutality.

The difference in police tactics on the two sides of the Hudson River is shocking. And the results speak for themselves. When the police don't escalate, the protesters keep the peace:

But I saw on Instagram, that when we were on Broad Street, there was a guy with a baseball bat looking into the Dunkin Donuts, and looking like he was about to bash the window. I saw protesters rush over to him and move him away from the window. It wasn’t the police. It was a group of young protesters. Not no old people like me.

@dejus So sweet! 💛

@Ron I can understand that. The world is pretty overwhelming right now. My point was about how non-violent protest takes practice and it’s not fair to expect spontaneous protesters to live up to the standard of a rigorously trained organized movement.

@pratik No, it’s a conversation about expectations of non-violent behavior and comparing the current protests to the organized civil rights campaigns. The other person was suggesting that the police today are not as bad as the police were then. Mostly a bit of confusion about what my point was; certainly not a defense of the police.

@dejus Did you pick up some earplugs for the fan noise? 😝

@klandwehr If you subscribe to Slate Plus, they have Slate Academy seasons both on the history of slavery in the US and on Reconstruction. The latter of which is hardly taught in schools and super important to understanding how Jim Crow happened.

@twweaver He does have quite the ego doesn’t he? And, from what I’ve read, no idea of how to write a believable female character.

@Ron I don’t exactly think they are showing much restraint in most cities.

But in any case, less restraint than police in the Jim Crow South is not the standard I want for my police department. To paraphrase Ta-Nehisi Coates: I wonder if the protestors would have thrown rocks if the police had shown up in their regular uniforms instead of riot armor?

@mjmoriarity Or maybe I’m being too pessimistic:

“Several of us on the council are working on finding out what it would take to disband the Minneapolis Police Department and start fresh with a community-oriented, nonviolent public safety and outreach capacity,” he wrote.

@mjmoriarity Ta-Nehisi Coates was on Ezra Klein’s podcast today and they both had a lot of good things to say about reform. It was also heartening to hear TNC point out the hopeful differences between now and ‘68.

As for Camden, making disbanding a department into a “realistic” solution feels like an important step. Full abolition doesn’t feel politically possible, but if we get used to the idea of replacing departments, perhaps getting rid of them entirely becomes more imaginable.

@mjmoriarity Disbanding and reforming the department seems to have improved things in Camden, New Jersey.

@twweaver Those are my kind of shelves! (Peaking at them, how do you feel about Franzen?)

@odd And we cannot expect most people to have Bovell’s courage and fortitude. We need to pull out the trees from the roots up and replant the orchard.

@ChrisJWilson And the comparison between the current spontaneous protests and the intensely planned movement that Dr. King led are also absurd. Non-violent direct action is incredibly hard—you have to resist fighting back against an attacker. It takes training and discipline. To ask an huge, organic, and relatively leaderless movement to be completely non-violent is akin to expecting a first time jogger to complete a marathon. Especially when, as the case in most cities, the police are hardly practicing restraint. //@Ron @Patrickrhone

@grayareas I’ve been very impressed with the Camden, NJ Police. It took disbanding the entire department in 2013, but the change in culture has had the police and the community on the same side over the past week.

Also, now their union gets to focus on helping officers who are in need instead of paying the legal fees of abusive cops.

@patrickrhone Grandparents took their grandkids to a protest in Stockbridge, Mass last night. I can’t stop thinking about what their grandparents thought and did in 1968.

I’ve been listening to Ta-Nehisi Coates discussion with Ezra Klein and it’s giving me some hope.

@JohnPhilpin Right now, it feels like the country is thinking in 4 hour news cycles. 😬

@twweaver “You know how to open this door, right?”