My girlfriend asked me why this is happening so much lately.

I explained that this has been going on for a VERY long time and the reason it has been exposed and continues to grow in exposure is due to what I "think" we here in the United States like. Exposing hypocrites and pointing out how bad we are but, never trying to actually solve the problem.

Unfortunately...exposing hypocrites very rarely address the problem because our media wouldn't have anything to report if we fixed it.

Or, we tend to exaggerate the issue and not look at the supporting facts because that story would not get headlines. Case in point, a white cop shooting black men gets massive amount of exposure in the United States, however, if you look at the stats (actual data) the amount of white cops that shoot black men is significantly lower than black on black murders or cops shooting people other than black.

We also tend to jump on the story of the day such as the extreme outrage of a dentist killing a lion when we have people in the United States with no health care. Where is the outrage of people not having health care?

I am not trying to take anything away from the Weinstein exposure, however, I am pointing out that unless we act now, the story will go away and the news media will only report new allegations as they see it being profitable and not addressing the how do we fix this.

These are all my thoughts and I am not trying to poke anyone with a stick.

 

X1 ........... you are overall correct. There is a problem with/generated by the media, today this issue is 'fashionable' but next week/month it'll be history and transposed by another 'crusade' and the media will invariably move on and the fundamental social problem will remain and never be solved because it's too complex and imposes on social lives of the hierarchy too much. The power brokers at the top don't want this sorted because they want to indulge themselves in the murky 'perks' of their positions in life at the top.

 

So when police open fire on an innocent African male in a staircase, emptying their ammo cases of 41 shots in less than a few seconds, that shouldn't be news? When a cop holds a black man in a strangle hold until he is unconscious and then stands around for minutes as the man expires, we shouldn't be outraged? When two officers with known issues with their department pull up to a 12 year old in a playground and shot the child dead, there's nothing to see here? When a black man, licensed to carry a handgun alerts the officer that he is in possession of a weapon, only to be shot multiple times while seatbelted into the passenger seat of his car, we're all supposed to be ok with that?

You expressed a few thoughts in that brief paragraph I copied above. First, you make the claim that there are more black on black murders than cop on black murders in the US.

" the amount of white cops that shoot black men is significantly lower than black on black murders " is precisely what you said. I hope you realize the absurdity of your statement, especially considering it was lead by this statement:

"we tend to exaggerate the issue and not look at the supporting facts "

Talk about an exaggeration of facts. You do realize there are roughly 74.5 million people in the US who identify themselves as black Americans. The last time I checked there were roughly 765,000 "police officers" with the power to make arrests. Damn, if it wouldn't be frightening if the number of black Americans killed by 765,000 police officers was greater than the number of black American's killed by the other 73,499,999 black Americans in the US.

Now, I'm pretty sure you're all set to assert that more white people are killed by police officers every year. I agree, substantially more white people are killed by roughly 765,000 police officers. However, you must also remember that the white population in the US stands at 245,500,000 or 77% of the US population. The problems lies in the fact that a black person stands a great chance, per capita, of being killed by a police officer. That's a fact that can actually be supported by numbers. Whether you like to acknowledge it or not, we do have a problem with the way the certain elements of the police treat people of color.

You also closed that paragraph with this statement:

"cops shooting people other than black."

Yes, even worse still, look at the number for Native Americans. We should be horrified by the rate at which they die in the hands of authorities. But, we should also be appalled by numbers suggesting suicide, alcoholism, drug abuse, assault, ect., are rampant in a culture that has been stripped of it's identity and deliberately deprived of opportunity. But is that what you were really thinking?

"We also tend to jump on the story of the day such as the extreme outrage of a dentist killing a lion when we have people in the United States with no health care. Where is the outrage of people not having health care?"

First of all, I think many people were upset at the circumstances surrounding the death of Cecil the Lion. He was, after all, something of a celebrity and the notion of trophy hunting is just so 19th century. Now, as far as your concern of people's failure to be outraged over our healthcare situation, I simply ask what have you done to force a change in our predicament? Who did you vote for and how have they performed in achieving your desired end vis-a-vis healthcare.

I don't know what media you watch, what news you rely upon to inform your worldview. I will say that there are still plenty of us out there who don't hang of the words of outlets like Fox News or CNN but even more importantly, are able to parse through nonsensical conspiracy theories that conveniently explain away our perceived problems.

 

I don’t disagree with your feedback on my comments and source of my news and data comes from Adam Carolla.

The big point I was trying to make without putting my foot in my mouth was what are we actually going to do about this instead of cheering for headlines

 

Not to beleaguer the point but I'll ask again, what are you doing in an effort to move the dial when it comes to healthcare and insurance. You made a valid point about concern for the millions without it and the millions who stand to lose coverage as we move forward. What are you doing to help resolve this problem in a manner you support? Are you attending town hall meetings, contacting your legislators, protesting, writing letters to the editors of your local newpaper, doing volunteer work for political candidate you support? Are you doing anything? This is more of a rhetorical question coming off your point about actually doing something instead of cheering for the headlines.

Democracy is a participatory sport. Frankly, you get what you put into it. If you're not willing to get involved, it really minimizes the legitimacy of your bit@#ing. And, again, I'm not trying to harangue you, personally.

 

No worries Paul, I don’t take things too personally here and if I did, I should stay out of the OT section.

I use my voting power to try and make changes that I feel meet my personal beliefs.

And provide personal experience to those who may disagree with me so they can see and understand my point of view.

With The current healthcare, I wish the media would put more effort into explaining the impacts, however, i do inform friends and colleagues on how the health care impacted my family and let them draw conclusions as to what impacts their families may have. That is done through conversation and of course my vote.