The Tunisian revolution worked because the system was overloaded with protests in almost every single region of the country. Contrary to previous localized protests in 2008, that were more contained and effectively suppressed by the regime.
But it is also worth to remember that unarmed protestors rarely "just" overrun the barricades and enter the palace (figuratively). Someone with power (police or military) has to decide that they're OK with letting the protests go through, that is the signal of the end.
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Obviously my opinion, but I was in Tunis, Tunisia during those times.
One of the oddest bits of recent American news was seeing armed protestors occupy a capitol building .. and then leave again, with no shots fired by either side.
The Tunisian Army was impartial (still largely impartial to these days) and would not intervene. They did protect some government buildings so nobody really overrun the palace. What happened is that support for the old dictator become too low and most of his supporters decided to bail on him (many people hates him too).
The Tunisian army was mostly impartial, but there were instances where they actively protected protestors from the police (which gained them a lot of good faith).
And there was this rumor that Ben Ali and his close family were "tricked" by the palace guard and the military to leave the country "temporarily" because protestors were going to be closing in (which never happened).
But that is exactly my point, supporters in key power positions decided that it was too much trouble to keep Ben Ali around.
Malachi Ritscher's suicide by self immolation in protest of the Iraq war made a strong impression on me at the time. That was near the end of 2006. It seemed to go unnoticed by most everyone else, though.
There are loads in between the protests. Eventually the murders pile up and the evidence against the police’s actions is so strong that people collectively snap. If it were merely every other murder, there’d never be a day of peace.
normally perhaps,
It is perfect storm of other factors.
- 40+ Million people are unemployed
- the mental strain of being up indoors
- covid affecting the poorest potion of the population disproportionately
- finally Trump being president and handling the situation in the worst possible way everyday.
Not sure why you are getting down voted here. These are all very valid points, this situation has a lot of variables that make it remarkably different than any other and can encourage the resistance (protests, &c) to continue far longer than standard.
I will bite, even if he actually means better than he tweets, his tweets has only added fuel to the fire.
When you are in the public sphere you do not spew out every thought that comes out unfiltered - whether it is trump or musk it damages what they stand for and works against them.
I would expect a president, 3 years in, to be able to communicate to all his constituents with a measure of forethought and attempt to keep in mind that not all of them apply "critical thought".
Sorry about that, did not mean to use a code block. just wanted to make a list.
HN formatting is little confusing.
Personally I prefer explicit markup attributes. i.e. if I want to mark something as code an markup like ``` or {code} or whatever is clearer than inferring tabs for code formatting, this kind of accidental code blocks could be easily avoided.
On a side note I read on mobile all the time, I understand the frustration, but it not poster's fault HN has some poor formatting choices which are not mobile friendly and no preview options, you should direct their feedback towards HN rather than the poster, most of them do not do this intentionally.
HN has already said they will do nothing about it, it’s been this way for years. Therefore the only person people can direct their rage to is the poster.
If you want to make a list, there’s nothing wrong with using new lines, they will work just fine.
Protests like this one happened before covid for similar reasons. While those might be factors, I don't think they're very important ones. I think the fact that there have been several such murders in the past few months is the main reason this is happening.
Candidly, because Team Red and Team Blue are too busy screaming at each other and throwing plates across the room to care about actually fixing problems.
The number of deaths of police officers on duty has not exceeded 141 for over ten years [1]. Considering every city has cops, I can hardly consider it to be a dangerous jobs. There's almost a million cops on duty[2]. With a yearly chance of death of roughly 1 in 10000, being a cop is probably safer than not being a cop! [3]
Cops in the US receive training to protect their own safety at all costs, even if that may endanger the lives of innocent people around them. If their duty is to protect and serve, they should not be trained and equipped like this. We don't need to fix crime, we need to fix police training, and yes, we have to be willing to increase the risk policeman are exposed to as part of their work.
On a different point, you mention "bad apples will happen". The expression is "a bad apple ruins the bunch". That is to say, if you don't eliminate all the bad apples quickly, the bunch is ruined.
We do, by making less things crimes. "Resisting arrest" should not be a crime, for example. Should a suspect attack police, we have assault laws to cover this; why do we need another law for "was not absolutely passive while being put in handcuffs"? (Genuinely curious here, happy to hear other perspectives).
Gosh, that sounds awful (both the actions of the police, and the decision of the judge). This failure to hold the police to a high standard is what brings about these situations.
What do you think the police should have done differently in this particular situation (it's an interesting thought exercise)?
Also, if you haven't done it, there's a really sobering mental exercise that you might want to try.
Median police response times in the United States are about ten minutes for violent crimes. 90th percentile is something like an hour.
Don't know the breakdowns beyond that, but I would also imagine that there's a sharp wealth divide in response times.
Imagine that a bunch of large, angry men are trying to break into your home to kill you. Set a timer for ten minutes. Wait. As you do, imagine what's happening, for those ten minutes, because that's how long it will take for police to arrive.
Regarding what the police should have done, I think the Wikipedia article is quite clear:
> 'a call was dispatched to officers on the street as a "Code 2" assignment, although calls of a crime in progress should be given priority and designated as "Code 1."'
> ' This second call was received at 0642 and recorded merely as "investigate the trouble;" it was never dispatched to any police officers. '
The dispatchers failed twice to notify correctly about the situation.
> Also, if you haven't done it, there's a really sobering mental exercise that you might want to try.
I'm not sure what your point is here. For what it's worth, given where I live I don't see how they could break in less than ten minutes (with a key I guess?), and without alerting neighbors in at least 5 adjacent units, who I could ask for help through the window.
> The number of deaths of police officers on duty has not exceeded 141 for over ten years
My point wasn't that cops gets killed a lot, but that young black men are about 40 times more likely to get killed by criminals then cops. Stronger policing actually makes things safer for dangerous areas.
Cops are just regular people on a power trip. Soldiers work in far more dangerous situations and have better trigger discipline. In Afghanistan, plenty of times soldiers cannot engage an enemy of military age holding an assault rifle until that enemy aims at the American soldiers. Cops are unprofessional and have no good excuses for their behavior. If soldiers are tried according to the UCMJ for violating rules of engagement, cops should certainly be tried for murder.
If you think that crushing a man's neck was a mistake, how many minutes of crushing his neck would turn that mistake into intentional murder? If you think those three policemen guarding the killer were also bad apples, how many policemen would have to stand guard for it to be a systemic issue? If it's not a good time to protest police murders, when should we?
There is a difference between the hazard (what would happen) vs the risk (what can happen after adding in precautions). Eg, maybe a lot of police would die, but they are wearing body armour so they do not. Compare to forestry workers who are in an environment where they don't need armour at all.
But the stats aren't really relevant here; the issue is that there is a video going around in which official appears to brutally murder someone in cold blood. And a sneaking suspicion that justice won't be served. And a large population suffering under an uncertain non-economy for around 2 months now.
The issue is that there’s a large population suffering under fear and injustice for over a century now. Maybe you’re just now noticing the pleas for it to stop.
> In Saint Paul, a Dollar Tree store and another Target store were looted, and a Wendy's restaurant was set ablaze. [0]
That is also a factor, but I'm going to interpret this as tell-tale signs of a breakdown under economic stress.
I can't see a train of thought that starts with a century of injustice and ends with "therefore I should loot Target". I can very easily see a link from "I can't afford stuff because my job just vanished" to the burning and looting.
I don’t understand what statistics have to do with this.
It might be possible that the quarantine and economic hardships are a factor at play, but the ultimate causative factor is that non-white Americans are tired of both the veiled and bald faced racism and mistreatment that is a daily issue.
The protests aren’t just about cops killing black men; they’re about every single aspect of daily life being made more difficult because of constant racism and abuse.
> The real reason the situation can't improve is the people angry about police brutality are misinformed and don't want to learn.
What information are the people angry about the current situation missing?
> It's not about the reality of the situation; it seems like more of a tribal thing.
This seems needlessly dismissive. The “reality of the situation” is that police brutality needlessly kills people frequently, most of the people who are killed are black, the police involved are rarely held accountable, and nothing has seemed to change for years.
Only about 25% of the people killed by police are black; about 50% are white non-Hispanic.
There's definitely a tribal aspect, and unfortunately most people don't know or don't care about most victims.
That said, if changes inspired by concern for black victims improve the situation for everyone, that would be a good thing. And that seems to be happening, leading to changes like body cameras and perhaps cracks in the blue wall, as more officers seem to be speaking out against it now.
I disagree, I think it's historical context. The KKK used to infiltrate the police throughout the south. The police aided and abetted domestic terrorism against black people. There are people still living who remember this. It's not tribalism to point out that you are being targeted based on your race and being sensitive to that threat. If you want to call out tribalism, call out the group that is targeting others based on race. They are the tribal ones.
I guess the difference is that white people don't care as much when a white person is murdered by a cop. We distance ourselves from it and try to rationalize it.
If you really believe this you are truly ignorant beyond all measure of what it’s like to not be white in this country.
It isn’t just police brutality. It’s the constant mistrust, passive aggressive behavior, assumptions that you’re poor, dumb, hooked on drugs, stealing, out and out racism, and that you’re a threat that either needs to be avoided or needs to be handled with threats and 911 calls.
You should educate yourself. This comment is just shameful.
We've banned this account for perpetuating flamewar on HN.
"the victim was either a stain on ordered society" is particularly egregious trolling. You can't do that here, and adding a diversionary word like 'either' doesn't help.
"Get over" is a funny way to describe a war that was bloodier for the United States than WWII was for any Allied power. Please don't lump everyone in with the southern states.
