6 ms·

>false realities Or just other people's realities. You mention BLM riots, which affected me a great deal; tens of millions in damages to my city, destruction

>false realities Or just other people's realities. You mention BLM riots, which affected me a great deal; tens of millions in damages to my city, destruction of local landmarks, one of the teachers in my local school district was arrested for assaulting a state politician for recording them burning a police car, and to top it off, they smashed the pharmacy where I get my wife's medicine, so she had to go without for a few days. This isn't some biased false reality/folk wisdom. This was my experience so when people tell me they were "peaceful protests" or the news says "statistically, they were 99.99999999% peaceful" but I look at what I saw with my own eyes, and also what was on TV in other cities... I can't be convinced that they weren't violent, destructive, and plainly, evil, no matter how much other people tell me what to think.

mlthoughts2018 6y ago
I am sorry you feel this way, and I hope you will find a way past the biases that are preventing you from accepting the facts.
- Damorian 6y ago
  And I'll say the same to anyone who supports BLM, that's my point.
  - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
    That’s not much of a point. It’s really just you being on the demonstrably wrong side of actual facts, but acting like your extreme and indefensible take deserves equal validity or ontological status as a “right” belief, but it completely and unequivocally doesn’t. You wouldn’t be saying this stuff to BLM supporters, only an echo chamber filled with your non-fact-based alternate world. There’s a complete difference of kind between what you’re saying and actual reality, one that can’t be overcome or mitigated at all just by your own gainsaying. Your stance just is, factually, invalid, and you calling the opposite stance invalid as if it’s just two sides of some coin is likewise just invalid all the way down.
    - Damorian 6y ago
      I hope you understand how unreasonable you sound to me. You're telling me that what I both saw and experienced, with verified fact and video evidence, isn't real. Your conviction that you know more about me and my life, than me, and your insistence on how invalid it is, makes you sound, frankly, like some sort of political zealot. I tend not to waste my time convincing other people of things to this degree. I will share my experience, but beyond that, it would be unreasonable for me to tell someone else that their experience isn't even real, which is what you're doing.
      - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
        What you are saying is simply not ok. If your take away of your experience led you to believe BLM is responsible for significant violence, that is a manifestation of problems with you and your beliefs, not an accurate fact-based conclusion drawn from a legitimate interpretation of the BLM movement or any experience of BLM protests. You saying that I sound unreasonable by not letting your shit slide doesn’t change anything. You can say that. You can cling to racism-based biased refusal to accept the facts or accept your stated understanding of your experience is wrong and unduly biased, but it does not make what you’re saying any more legitimate or worthy of respect. What you are saying is just unacceptably wrong - it really is, really - in a way where you cannot just say, “well I believe different” and have that be treated like it’s valid or on equal footing. You are starting off from a position so irredeemably far from acceptable fact-based reality, that for you to say my response sounds unreasonable is completely unsurprising and carries no weight. It might sting to have your attachment to what you think is an acceptable interpretation of your experience called out for the unreasonable anti-BLM bias that it is. Oh well, the anti-BLM fantasy stuff is not OK, not going to slide.
        Damorian 6y ago
        I'm confused... it's verifiable fact... insurance claims from the riots are between $1-2 billion in damages... dozens of people died and between just a few cities thousands of police were injured, who knows how many protestors and bystanders... support for the movement dropped rapidly once things escalated... these are the facts. How can you look at this, and when someone says they witnessed just a small piece of it, say they're "irredeemably far from fact based reality" and you just can't let it "slide". Consider at least, that your extreme position harms your movement. What is your exact criticism of my opposition? Or at the very least, to what I witnessed?
- dang 6y ago
  Please don't cross into personal attack in HN comments. That's not allowed here and we ban accounts that do it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
nobody9999 6y ago
>This was my experience so when people tell me they were "peaceful protests" or the news says "statistically, they were 99.99999999% peaceful" but I look at what I saw with my own eyes, and also what was on TV in other cities... I can't be convinced that they weren't violent, destructive, and plainly, evil, no matter how much other people tell me what to think. Your point is well taken. I live in a large city. The area where I live, while mixed, is majority minority. My own experience was quite different. No one assaulted teachers from my local school. I saw no businesses burned. I don't know anyone who was directly impacted by the months of daily BLM protests. Those are my experiences. Why are you telling me what I should believe? I mirrored my experiences against yours to point out that your anecdotal experience is not the whole of the story. Nor is mine. Now for some facts that neither you nor I actually experienced: Where I live there were a few instances of violence against police (and in every single case, nearly all the folks involved were both white and from out of town). There were also numerous instances of police instigating violence against peaceful protestors. There were a few instances of looting, and the police and local government addressed them quickly and harshly, as just about everyone, including the protestors (many of whom were captured on video chasing would-be looters away) was horrified and angered by such actions. There were (and are) violent miscreants who should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. However, those folks were a tiny group compared to those who peacefully protested. When you hear folks say the protests were "mostly" peaceful, they are empirically correct. Something like 20,000,000 people around the US peacefully protested against police violence. At most, a few thousand people committed acts of violence and vandalism. Let's say there were even 10,000 (a high number, I suspect) folks who committed violent/destructive acts alongside the peaceful protests. If that's correct, 99.95% of people protested peacefully and 0.05% of folks were violent/destructive. I'm not sure how that could be construed as anything other than "mostly peaceful". in fact, I'd characterize it as "overwhelmingly peaceful". I'm most certainly not telling you what to think or believe. Just presenting my own experiences and a few facts. Don't take my word for it. I'm just some random asshole on the Internet. The facts speak for themselves.
- Damorian 6y ago
  Normally I'd agree, but I'll point you to comments elsewhere in this thread as to why this is misleading. The amount of damage is huge, and this was excused all the while by the group's leaders and other "peaceful" supporters with "people > property" and similar logic. Using this same logic, I'm sure 99+% of Nazis were peaceful during the holocaust as well.

mlthoughts2018 6y ago

I am sorry you feel this way, and I hope you will find a way past the biases that are preventing you from accepting the facts.

Damorian 6y ago
And I'll say the same to anyone who supports BLM, that's my point.
- mlthoughts2018 6y ago
  That’s not much of a point. It’s really just you being on the demonstrably wrong side of actual facts, but acting like your extreme and indefensible take deserves equal validity or ontological status as a “right” belief, but it completely and unequivocally doesn’t. You wouldn’t be saying this stuff to BLM supporters, only an echo chamber filled with your non-fact-based alternate world. There’s a complete difference of kind between what you’re saying and actual reality, one that can’t be overcome or mitigated at all just by your own gainsaying. Your stance just is, factually, invalid, and you calling the opposite stance invalid as if it’s just two sides of some coin is likewise just invalid all the way down.
  - Damorian 6y ago
    I hope you understand how unreasonable you sound to me. You're telling me that what I both saw and experienced, with verified fact and video evidence, isn't real. Your conviction that you know more about me and my life, than me, and your insistence on how invalid it is, makes you sound, frankly, like some sort of political zealot. I tend not to waste my time convincing other people of things to this degree. I will share my experience, but beyond that, it would be unreasonable for me to tell someone else that their experience isn't even real, which is what you're doing.
    - mlthoughts2018 6y ago
      What you are saying is simply not ok. If your take away of your experience led you to believe BLM is responsible for significant violence, that is a manifestation of problems with you and your beliefs, not an accurate fact-based conclusion drawn from a legitimate interpretation of the BLM movement or any experience of BLM protests. You saying that I sound unreasonable by not letting your shit slide doesn’t change anything. You can say that. You can cling to racism-based biased refusal to accept the facts or accept your stated understanding of your experience is wrong and unduly biased, but it does not make what you’re saying any more legitimate or worthy of respect. What you are saying is just unacceptably wrong - it really is, really - in a way where you cannot just say, “well I believe different” and have that be treated like it’s valid or on equal footing. You are starting off from a position so irredeemably far from acceptable fact-based reality, that for you to say my response sounds unreasonable is completely unsurprising and carries no weight. It might sting to have your attachment to what you think is an acceptable interpretation of your experience called out for the unreasonable anti-BLM bias that it is. Oh well, the anti-BLM fantasy stuff is not OK, not going to slide.
      - Damorian 6y ago
        I'm confused... it's verifiable fact... insurance claims from the riots are between $1-2 billion in damages... dozens of people died and between just a few cities thousands of police were injured, who knows how many protestors and bystanders... support for the movement dropped rapidly once things escalated... these are the facts. How can you look at this, and when someone says they witnessed just a small piece of it, say they're "irredeemably far from fact based reality" and you just can't let it "slide". Consider at least, that your extreme position harms your movement. What is your exact criticism of my opposition? Or at the very least, to what I witnessed?
dang 6y ago
Please don't cross into personal attack in HN comments. That's not allowed here and we ban accounts that do it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

nobody9999 6y ago

>This was my experience so when people tell me they were "peaceful protests" or the news says "statistically, they were 99.99999999% peaceful" but I look at what I saw with my own eyes, and also what was on TV in other cities... I can't be convinced that they weren't violent, destructive, and plainly, evil, no matter how much other people tell me what to think. Your point is well taken. I live in a large city. The area where I live, while mixed, is majority minority. My own experience was quite different. No one assaulted teachers from my local school. I saw no businesses burned. I don't know anyone who was directly impacted by the months of daily BLM protests. Those are my experiences. Why are you telling me what I should believe? I mirrored my experiences against yours to point out that your anecdotal experience is not the whole of the story. Nor is mine. Now for some facts that neither you nor I actually experienced: Where I live there were a few instances of violence against police (and in every single case, nearly all the folks involved were both white and from out of town). There were also numerous instances of police instigating violence against peaceful protestors. There were a few instances of looting, and the police and local government addressed them quickly and harshly, as just about everyone, including the protestors (many of whom were captured on video chasing would-be looters away) was horrified and angered by such actions. There were (and are) violent miscreants who should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. However, those folks were a tiny group compared to those who peacefully protested. When you hear folks say the protests were "mostly" peaceful, they are empirically correct. Something like 20,000,000 people around the US peacefully protested against police violence. At most, a few thousand people committed acts of violence and vandalism. Let's say there were even 10,000 (a high number, I suspect) folks who committed violent/destructive acts alongside the peaceful protests. If that's correct, 99.95% of people protested peacefully and 0.05% of folks were violent/destructive. I'm not sure how that could be construed as anything other than "mostly peaceful". in fact, I'd characterize it as "overwhelmingly peaceful". I'm most certainly not telling you what to think or believe. Just presenting my own experiences and a few facts. Don't take my word for it. I'm just some random asshole on the Internet. The facts speak for themselves.

Damorian 6y ago
Normally I'd agree, but I'll point you to comments elsewhere in this thread as to why this is misleading. The amount of damage is huge, and this was excused all the while by the group's leaders and other "peaceful" supporters with "people > property" and similar logic. Using this same logic, I'm sure 99+% of Nazis were peaceful during the holocaust as well.