Ferguson

[BLADE]

What would prevent the attorney of the defendant from having an impact on the void dire? Unless the attorney is terrible, it seems they could at least break up all white juries. (That said, I suppose we should pay our public defenders more to attract those that are better)

Nothing. Except prejudices, structural favoring of the prosecutorial team (I admire and count rather a few prosecutors as friends but the nature of the system affords them quite a few more tools), some of the factors you yourself mentioned, etc. That doesn't really address the fact that an adversarial system may in itself be something of an alogism when concerned with questions of adjudicating the truth.

And it certainly doesn't really get at the core issue of how structural racism replicates itself. Theocracies do not always need the constant imprimatur of Talmud-readers, goat-seers, and fire-dancers to make the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. Concomitantly, albocracy seems a far more durable weltanschauung than one that necessarily needs fire hoses and snarling dogs (though certainly the images from Ferguson don't suggest a sneering or shying contempt for the usage of those) or even --in its slier and distilled forms-- all-white juries and differing sentencing laws.

I was having this type of conversation with Laurent the other day about the nature of professions, and I should say that barristers are as good as the systems they can effect change in. There are no revolutionary lawyers. Only those revolutionaries educated in law.

tl;dr Strictly looking at this from a normative legal standpoint may ultimately undermine the cause of real reform. You bring up a trenchant point about the nature of voir dire containing manifold sides, but responses to racism cannot end at the point of a gavel. Our legal system contains many things --good and bad--, but it cannot fully contain something as horrible and wonderful as equality and justice.

 

[jpchewy01]

Everyone is capable of racism, and depending on what degree you'd want to it it, everyone is racist in their own ways. And to believe otherwise is to deny a race of being human, it's a dehumanization through glorification, that because someones group went through a struggle of oppression that it makes them incapable of enacting the same sort of mentality that their oppressors had. It's dangerous to do, it assumes way to much about someone and ignores the dangers of ignorance and arrogant racial beliefs.

Racism is alive and well in America. I, as a black man, can assure you. To think otherwise is to ignore that which is right under your nose. You sit here talking about how black people nowadays shouldn't get all riled up because their ancestors used to be oppressed while the topic of this very thread is an example of that same oppression continuing to this day. Have you no sense of irony?

 

[Kaeb]

Exactly, fluffy ideological statements like 'Everyone is equal, I'm colourblind', would be great if they were actually true.

Sure, as human beings we're all stuck on the same planet, with similar genetics and similar needs, desires and weaknesses, but to say we are all treated equally and equally treated as not equal is the most inane and empty statement you can make in this kind of debate.

No, black people largely would not treat white people with the same level of racially motivated disdain/lack of empathy that would be enacted in the reverse, to think otherwise is to live in a dream world. This is because, as we've been saying for awhile, these issues are cultural, systemic and in a sense, viral. To enact real change you have to examine the complexity of that institutionalized racism and weed it out entirely. It'll take decades to accomplish, so in the meantime, we're still stuck with racism, no matter how much we choose to lie to ourselves. You can't thank our ancestors for that.

 

[Cailst]

Exactly, fluffy ideological statements like 'Everyone is equal, I'm colourblind', would be great if they were actually true.

Sure, as human beings we're all stuck on the same planet, with similar genetics and similar needs, desires and weaknesses, but to say we are all treated equally and equally treated as not equal is the most inane and empty statement you can make in this kind of debate.

No, black people largely would not treat white people with the same level of racially motivated disdain/lack of empathy that would be enacted in the reverse, to think otherwise is to live in a dream world. This is because, as we've been saying for awhile, these issues are cultural, systemic and in a sense, viral. To enact real change you have to examine the complexity of that institutionalized racism and weed it out entirely. It'll take decades to accomplish, so in the meantime, we're still stuck with racism, no matter how much we choose to lie to ourselves. You can't thank our ancestors for that.

Eh, with their backs to the wall, many oppressed peoples can become oppressors. A good 70 years ago, most Jews were not bombing Gazans, innocent or otherwise, they were being herded and gassed. And American blacks themselves did find themselves in the position of being an oppressive minority when they moved to Liberia and displaced many of the indigenous people.

Of course, there would have to be massive changes before Black people in America could exhibit a similar strain of racism to what white people exhibit but the potential exists.

 

[Sovereign]

Eh, with their backs to the wall, many oppressed peoples can become oppressors. A good 70 years ago, most Jews were not bombing Gazans, innocent or otherwise, they were being herded and gassed. And American blacks themselves did find themselves in the position of being an oppressive minority when they moved to Liberia and displaced many of the indigenous people.

Of course, there would have to be massive changes before Black people in America could exhibit a similar strain of racism to what white people exhibit but the potential exists.

Calvin, I missed you. Please stay.

 

[Cailst]

Calvin, I missed you. Please stay.

I'll try, though I have school tomorrow so it might be a bit of a challenge. Missed you too :bittercrying:

 

[Rune]

From CNN: New audio reveals pause in gunfire when Michael Brown shot

If it's true, I'm wondering what the reason for the pause could be?