Sounds like you are arguing racism is a big/pervasive problem that needs more resources/needs to be a higher political priority.

Yep.

The DOJ report made a big deal out of the fact that FPD was searching black motorists at a rate 2.07 times that of whites. Nationally, blacks are searched at a rate 2.74 times that of whites. I’m not saying that to exonerate the FPD, but to point out that what we’re seeing in Ferguson isn’t any different than what we’re seeing in police departments across the country. The difference is FPD cops are searching motorists at a rate twice the national average. For example, nationally 2.3% of white motorists are searched whereas in Ferguson 5% of whites are searched, and nationally 6.3% of black motorists are searched whereas in Ferguson 11% of black motorists are searched. Add to that the fact that the FPD stop rate is over four times the national rate, and we end up with the black motorists of Ferguson being searched 8 times more often than the national norm for blacks. I agree that’s a huge problem. I just don’t agree that it stems primarily from racial animus.

I think the primary factor is over-policing, not racism and not just in Ferguson. Wherever we look, when we’re over-policing areas with a high concentration of blacks - and we’re pretty much over-policing every area with a high concentration of blacks - we end up with similar outcomes. So while I’m not ignoring the racial disparity, it’s that over-policing that’s the actual cause for most of the disparate outcomes. For instance, the white motorists of Ferguson are 8 times more likely to be searched than their national counterparts. So even if we were to get rid of the racial disparity in Ferguson, the blacks of Ferguson will still be 8 times more likely to be searched than the average American. And that holds for every area we’re over-policing, i.e., every area with a high concentration of blacks.

As far as the individual cops go, if you look at what they’re doing on a day-to-day basis, there’s not much of an argument that racism plays much of a factor. For instance, your average beat cop only tickets a couple dozen motorists a year and maybe conducts a few searches a year. I think there’s a bit of a misconception that they’re out there stopping and searching people multiple times throughout the day. They’re not. The overwhelming majority of their time is spent responding to calls, doing paperwork and eating donuts. So placing the bulk of the blame on the individual cops is really off the mark, imo. Cops are cops. I don’t particularly care for the sort of people the job attracts, but nonetheless we’re the ones putting those sorts of people into stressful environments, giving them a certain degree of autonomy, and we end up with what we end up with. So, to me, saying we need better cops is like saying we need better politicians. Sure it would be nice, but I’m not expecting much improvement in that regard. In other words, if we don’t like the output, we need to stop creating the input. That input being over-policing. In my view, everything else is secondary to that because most of the ill effects stem from that, not the racial component.

I didn't say you couldn't intervene I was saying your intervention didn't add anything.

The only assertion I've made regarding you is that I don't consider you qualified to judge FoldnDark's grasp of morality. This doesn't really require any clarification and wasn't obviously what was being asked when you replied to my earlier post.

And this is why I have little interest in engaging with you, I find your posts and lines of thought hard work and not in an interesting way. I know you dislike people making an issue of your posting and I accept that in most cases what you mean is clear irrespective of my concerns with how you say it but it's not interesting to me. I think Nietzsche captures my objection best.

You don't strive for clarity, if you put as much effort into posting better as you do in criticising those who object to your posting style engaging with you would be much more appealing.

Now rather than make an issue of how you post I may have preferred that my earlier decision not to go down the rabbit hole with you had been followed but sometimes I kinda just feel the need to call bull**** bull****.

What about the part where every blacks represented 100% of resisting arrest charges and dog usage? Or how violence was used against blacks, but not whites, in similar situations? Why are we just focused on traffic stops (which do indeed show racism), especially when you have argued traffic stops are only a small part of the job?

Why can we not try to crack down on the overpolicing and the racism at the same time?

You really don't think we can hold cops to standards like "don't send massively racist emails around the department" and "don't act violently against black citizens"?

Once again, the stats that you provide argue that institutional racism is a bigger problem, not a smaller one.

Im sorry, its pretty lol to read that Ferguson report and come away thinking "man, this racism is a sideshow to the real problem"

I agree and I admit that my objection is kinda nitty but it's not difficult to construct a number of examples where the perception of racism and it's actuality harms someone equally.

There's going to be an entirely justifiable issue of trust, but it merely means that those who genuinely wish to address inequality born of discrimination in any guise need to win the trust of those whose injury they are trying to address in order to succeed.

As an example my partner is an advocate who works on behalf of clients who have been denied some entitlement, usually welfare often housing. A lot of the clients are foreign nationals who have english as a second language to varying levels, given how complex forms can be this effectively discriminates against everyone who does not have English or Irish as a first language. In order to advocate for people who, justifiably, felt discriminated against, trust had to be won within those communities, it wasn't enough to wait for those clients to go to the service the service sought out those clients effectively winning their trust.

So you are full of **** and just can't stop repeating it. Just to be clear, that's your problem, not mine.

All this time? Or have your perceptions of racial problems evolved over time?

I don't have a problem I'm merely responding to what I can understand of your posts. Or was, I'm done, you're welcome.

First you said you can read my posts, and now magically you can't even understand them ? LOL. You don't even ask questions, just proclaim bull**** you don't even try to back up. LOL. I'll leave you to your problem then.

We are well past this stage and I think we have finally come to the 'things which can be misperceived as racist when they are not' stage of the ongoing racism meta-topic.

I think you read lots you don't understand.

You’re completely missing my point, or trying to make one that I’ll most likely agree with anyway.
Let me ask a question: Do you think there is any racial disparity in regard to police arresting murder or violent crime suspects?

Yes

Racism is over btw.

Black Man Found Hanging from Tree in Mississippi; FBI Investigating

There are parallel problems in play here. On one hand people under-estimate and deny racism, on the other hand people over-estimate racism and deal with it as a monolithic moral problem. In the middle there is racism problem to solve in ourselves and society. It is as much an awareness, error of perception, and lack of information problem as well as a moral problem when it come down to individuals.

The question is ...

what is an effective way to approach either if one believes every little genuine effort to change racism into no racism counts?

Fits and starts over the years. Talking to people I know from N. St. Louis who were completely unsurprised by the Mike Brown shooting and following protests made it obvious there is a significant problem with race relations up there, something I didn't notice when I lived nearby a decade ago. But speeding tickets aside, I didn't have a problem with police, and racial oppression is easy to miss when your black friends and coworkers don't tend to talk about it openly. Dave Chappel was just exaggerating for laughs, right?

I'm glad for the protests and the discussions they start. They are very important to get us white folks to think about it and find our empathy. I'm not discouraged about honest disagreements, because arguments are to be expected, and no side has a lock on the whole truth. It's like any strained relationship, everyone benefits from listening to each other.

like what, carefully worded JAQing off?

Even if we accept these are parallel problems, I don't, they are not equivalent problems. Your final premise that every effort to address actual racism counts seems to acknowledge this. Consider the cost of denying racism where it exists and failing to address an injustice. Consider then the cost of attempting to address racism where none exists, I'm not entirely sure what that looks like but it seems both much less costly and much less common than failing to address racism.

Do you think it’s about equal to the search disparity of ~2x?

Short answer: don't know, not comparable, but just go on with your point.

I think eliminating real racism, the racism that thinks whites are superior or blacks inferior, is multi-generational. Meaning, those racists aren’t going to change nor will we see any short-term improvements in that area, so our tactics need to focus on the long-term, i.e., preventing the spread to future generations.

Nah, they put into strong contrast those among "us white folks" who ought be rejected/punished/sanctioned/whatever by "us white folk."

"Stop embarrassing me in front of the other ethnic groups please" should be a rallying cry.

Institutional racism is real racism.

One thing we can do is to make racism socially unacceptable and turn racists into pariahs.

The racial disparity, in regard to police arresting violent crime suspects, is effectively zero. So as we move away from police responding to, investigating and arresting suspects of known crimes, towards crime prevention tactics with more autonomy and discretion given to the cops, we go from 0x to 1x. As we move to the wholly discretionary, as with searches, we go from 0x to 2x. What’s the common denominator?