Meanwhile on the International front....

Anyone know what became of the kid at Missouri that went on a "diet" and got members of the football team riled up?

 

Police officers have badges and other ways they are held accountable. They also have to have gear to make sure they are protected so they can protect others. Why are you so desperate to excuse the protestors lack of accountability that you are willing to make these terrible comparisons?

 

I'm not desperate to do anything, but the objection to masking as concealment cuts both ways.

As does the badge argument.

https://theintercept.com/2020/06/03/nypd-badge-black-band/

 

I respect your take, too, and where it is coming from. I just disagree.

The problem is that many of the protestors are using masks to protect themselves from consequences of bad behavior. Chanting anti-Jewish things. Standing with people who praise Hamas. Intimidating fellow students, especially the way many of them have treated Jewish people. Many of the protestors are doing these things with a sense of impunity because they are covering their faces.

Yes, blocking public areas is a tactic of protests, but that doesn't mean there should be no consequences for it. These are students who agreed to follow school policies when they enrolled. If they violate those policies, including following instructions from school officials, they are subject to the consequences. Also, I think it is fair to draw a line between people of color who were American citizens standing up to the trampling of their rights in this country and a bunch of college kids speaking out against the actions of a foreign government.

 

When you pull of a reach like that to justify the chickenshit protestors hiding their faces (to borrow Spartan's term for it), that seems like desperation to me. Too many of these protestors are abusing the freedom their anonymity buys them to intimidate fellow students, scream vulgar and hateful messages, break laws, and/or violate school policies they agreed to follow when they enrolled.

Also, perhaps we wouldn't be hearing so many pro-Hamas messages if the people chanting them and those standing all around them weren't hiding behind masks. Sorry, but there is no place for that.

 

I don't disagree with you, nor that the civil rights movement benefited from the openness and willingness of participants to make their identities known.

But masked protest has been around awhile, too.

1967

Moreso lately of course,



in this age of 21st-century facial recognition technology.

My point about the cops obscuring their identities in order to avoid accountability is of equal interest to me, since public safety officers work for the state, and therefore. . . me.

 

Again, I don't disagree. Nor did I suggest cops don't have legitimate reasons for what they do.

I'm saying the mask thing works both ways to obscure identity.

Not every riot cop in every jurisdiction is wearing a balaclava for protection.

 

You make some defensible points but your history of the region and Jewish return to Israel in modern times is pretty ahistorical. And as for the bolded, those participating in the lunch counter sit-ins were protesting the very entities -- the segregated chain stores -- that were directly imposing the injustice. When you block traffic in LA or Boston or wherever to protest IDF operations in Gaza in response to an unprecedented terrorist attack from Gaza or you block other students, in NY, who have fuck-all to do with Israel and Gaza, from entering an academic building they're paying an arm and a leg to use for academic pursuits, you're engaging in performative bullshit and hurting your cause.

 

The protestors aren't just wearing the mask to protect their identities, though that seems to be their state reason. It is part of how they intimidate counter-protestors and others who just want to walk to a building on campus.

That said, you are correct about the police officers protecting their faces.

 

This is a police riot helmet with shield.



This is a police balaclava, which is a mask, which is what I'm describing:



which is also used to intimidate.



If we're holding one group to a moral imperative regarding public protest, we should hold the group enforcing our moral imperatives to the same standard.