sadly true….

most of the news reports I see about 18-year-old white males refer to them as "men".

times a BILLION

18 years old is not some innocent child.

The Marine Corp had no problem bringing me on board at 16 years of age. Three weeks later and I'm flying to Parris Island.

legal drinking age here in the UK is 18 (as it is in most of the world).

Is that a flaw in the picture or some place without a drinking age?

Figures Utah makes it look like America has a hole in it.

It's not 19 for the whole country, it varies per province. Quebec, Alberta and Manitoba are 18.

But yeah, I think 21 is too high.

is not having to produce my "papers" just to buy a drink. It's so refreshing!

Fed law is that an FFL (licensed gun dealer) cannot sell a handgun to someone under 21. Possession and ownership is a state issue. I can sell a handgun to my 19 year old neighbor (private sale) completely legally here in Texas. And he can legally own it. See 18 USC 922(b).

Life is what you make of it.

What exactly are you disagreeing with? Please explain in depth. Thank you.

Coercion can go quite a long way toward taking choices away from a person.
I think this is what sheshe2 was getting at; there is a distinct double standard in how non-white people are treated.

Not.

It almost requires a daily detox.

an adult, a grown up......our laws say so.

The law doesn't really reflect that.

http://www.urmc.rochester.edu/encyclopedia/content.aspx?ContentTypeID=1&ContentID=3051

I prefer to live in the world that exists, not the one that we think exists. I have trained 18 year old men to fight and die for the country. At 18 they are men as far as the laws of our society are concerned, that's good enough for me.

You've trained 18 yr olds to fight. I've trained toddlers to use a toilet. Kids are trainable at any age.

Except 18 year olds are not kids. I have trained adults to kill, because training kids to kill would be sick.

And those kids you train come back to me really screwed up.

the job of turning young men into killers is a necessary evil. It is sadly the world we live in.

I think the military damages our children and changes them in ways that are not conducive to a productive civilian life. I also think that age may be at the root of the PTSD, depression and suicide that many of these young people suffer.

and happy you are not in charge. IT is a necessary evil.

until the age of 25. Laws and society are made based on information we have at a given time. When we get better information, we change accordingly. Or, at least, that's what a civilized society would do.

That would be absurd (and I would note you're not a "teen" after 19).

I had my law degree at 25. Others are finishing medical school, officers in our armed forces, developing cutting edge software and technologies, leading social welfare organization, and otherwise often well into their careers. Many are even married with children, as used to be the norm with older generations.

If you have not developed basic impulse control and possess a rudimentary understanding of right from wrong by age 18, no less 21, as has vast, vast majority of every man and woman, regardless of race, the problem is yours, not that of society.

n/t

Because from my vantage point it seems you are arguing against the basic building block of American society. At 18 you can vote, join the military, buy tobacco, enter into certain types of contracts, etc.......For all intents it seems that the US considers 18 to be adulthood. Therefore 18 = man, not child.

Are you familiar with the laws that govern children versus those that govern adults?? Here's hint, they change at 18. Seems like it might be an important data point if you can look at things analytically and objectively instead of emotionally.

And the father showing up to see his kid convicted is likely to be called a "boy" on the way home.

I had a long "conversation" with them last night and to tired tonight for a repeat.

behold they stand before you Spitfire.

A sad reality.

Or it's the other classic fear of "Reverse Racism" is the only TRUE racism.

We saw that during the Bush Years with them hounding the UNCF claiming it should be charged with discrimination against whites.

Not talking about it doesn't make it go away. We've done that for generations. It doesn't work.

We were discussing why a female athlete (Hope Solo) can be charged with assaulting a child, still be playing on her team and face NO uproar at DU. Many people chimed it and said that the 17 year old she assaulted was a man and not a child. I can't keep up with the flip flopping on what the cutoff is.

There's no "flip flopping". A black youth is shot dead and described as a "man" to make him sound like a threat to white ears.

You don't have sympathy for the mom. If you consider her at all its to blame her bad parenting for raising yet another "thug" criminal type.

Got it now?

Or perhaps I do.

black boys don’t get to be BOYS, because they are forced to become men far too soon. They are taught at an early age how to walk and talk to survive, they listen to "The Talk" at their parents knee. and black men don’t get to be MEN in this country because open season has been declared in this country where some believe they are a threat. They have targets on their backs for nothing more than being black. And they are dying.

It's racist and it's wrong.

It keeps going back to fear in white people.

I didn't say a god damn thing about race and your attempt to cover up your hypocrisy by calling me a racist is fucking cheap and bullshit.

Are you even aware of that?

If that was not your intent, why reply to my post with race?

We called Trayvon Martin (a 17 year old) a child.
We called Hope Solo's victim (a 17 year old) a man.
We are now calling this victim(an 18 year old) a child.

Throwing race out the window, how do YOU delineate a child from an adult?

That's not the point though.

The point is the way the term is used to maintain the stereotype of the dangerous black man.

An 18 year old white male shot by the cops would be handled differently by American society. We would at least ask, "Why?"

An 18 year old black male shot by the cops is a shrug figuring he had to have done something to deserve it.

To me being a man is to stand on your own two feet, help support your family and do the right thing. No one is stopping anyone from being a man but maybe because I don't view people by color. What is the difference between being a black man and a white man, I don't see a difference.

One of us is doesn't see race, one of us does, I feel sorry for you.

But are you a black man? I ask because if you are than I completely understand your point of view.

What it is it be a black man?

I posted was linked to a Blog. It was written by a black woman. So no they are not my words.

However, your question

Sincerely,

Mother of 2 teenage boys that have to be conscious of what color they are every waking moment that they are not in the safety of their home.

Keep your boys safe any way you can.

and it's heartbreaking. It's also heartbreaking when we have to try to explain these issues on a democratic board. White people aren't being gunned down by the police because of their skin color. It's so frustrating to try explaining this on this board. White privilege and racism do exist and burying your head in the sand doesn't make it go away. We cannot be a color blind society as long as these killings and institutional racism continue.

is the end goal, but racism and police brutality make it impossible for individuals to live as if that is so. Cultural induced political racism is what causes agencies of the government and corporate America to respond to African Americans as having no meaningful agency. African Americans who choose to live "as if" are likely to get killed.
All of us together need to speak out and acknowledge institutional and cultural racism; black, white, latino, asian, native American, et al. It's not going away on its own; in my opinion it's getting worse, especially from militarized police departments. It needs to stop and we all need to yell and scream so our voices are heard. There are too many African Americans being gunned down or brutalized by government agencies and policies.

White people taking supplies were scavenging while black people taking supplies were looting.

Because DU ROCKS!!!

"Finding" is even more benign.

And I agree, a watermark would have been fun.

It's like you're just minding your own business and suddenly food appears!

It was all over twitter.. I believe.. and in many places on the internet.

He was certainly old enough to commit adult crimes.

But, no one can win with this. Posters are excoriated for calling an 18-19 year old black man a "boy."

Or vice versa.

Posters made comments about Michael Brown...his height, age, stature all indicate MAN. But I saw equal insults hurled at those who called him a MAN, and those that called him a BOY. This is fricking ridiculous.

I know a lot of women in their 70's who call themselves "girls."

Perhaps there should be some DU standard so we know what we can call whomever it is we're talking about.

It's a specific assertion that you are off duty from adult responsibilities. As in "out with the boys," or "out with the girls." They are most emphatically NOT "girls" to their kids or their employers.

stand to hear women referred to as "girls" as in "I know this girl (maybe in her 30's or older!).

@ 00:16

Not as non-adults.

More like in Clintons speech,we tend to refer to men as boys quite a bit.
Like "that boy that lives past the school has a boat for sale",he could be 55.
But we don't mean non adult when we say it.

at all.

Now if i call an 18 year old a "kid", i don't think there is a racial overtone there. And, let's be honest, to nearly everyone over 30, an 18 year old is a kid. I'm 58. It's REALLY true at my age. It is literally possible (although not accurate in this case) for an 18 year old to be my grandson. That would sure make me think "kid". Probably you too.

It's a less charged word and prevents the kind of phony fear mongering the OP is talking about. An unarmed 18 year old gets shot, and we can honestly say a "kid" got shot. It's both true and language neutral. Now we don't have to avoid "boy" and not make the threat seem more menacing by using "man".

I see so many kids at work that look like him....or like Michael Brown, or Trayvon.....or any of the others.
Sweet kids in engineering classes, or liberal arts, or design, or math, or student clubs........sweet kids being college students.

Yes they are Blanche.

This part from my link breaks my heart. Vonderrit was profiled within minutes and found guilty by cop...

“One of them ran in a way that the officer believed that he was armed with a gun – holding his waist band, not running at full stride,” Dotson said, referring to the 18-year old.

Because of the way he was running? That he held his waist band...give me an effing break! Kids wear baggy falling down pants everyday. See this...The picture of him sans hoodie, buying a sandwich and look at his pants! This was about 10 minutes before he was shot.



The pic is IdaBriggs http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002564461

This is from my OP last night where I was told over and over that you empty your clip every damn time when a cops life is threatened. You shoot and you keep on shooting.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025645400#top

So profound.

Such a beautiful smile. Gone.

... if I was in her position. Either join my son in the hereafter or lobby my state legislators to pass a bill to force police to shoot to disable, NOT TO KILL. We need to hold police accountable for excessive use of force. If a cop is so fearful that he shoots 16-17 shots, I don't think he should be a cop to begin with. We don't need cowards on our streets.

Sorry, but we don't live in a Hollywood movie. There is no such thing as shoot to wound. If someone is shooting at you, you shoot to kill PERIOD.

You shoot for center mass, the largest target and usually the torso, until your're certain the threat is stopped. It is an unfortunate but certain fact that stopping a target will often result in their death or serious injury.

Under the pressure and adrenaline accompanying any literal life-or-death situation (the only time a firearm should be discharged against a human being), often against a moving target, in poor light, at a distance, with an individual of unknown capabilities or armament, or sometimes multiple opponents, prudence dictates that you do everything to increase you chances of actually hitting the target. Unfortunately, many on DU are totally unfamiliar with firearms and basic tactics, and do not realize how difficult it is to actually hit a target under even much better conditions.

Similarly, many don't realize that a standard magazine in many popular firearms, carried by both police and civilians, such as the Glock 17 and 19 or Beretta 92FS, include 15+ rounds. In the heat and stress of an exchange of gunfire, it is not unusual, and may actually be wise, to empty the magazine to save one's life, usually within just a couple of seconds, and without even realizing you have done so. That is why so many rounds are fired, only a small percentage generally hit the target, and it's often a meaningless number when evaluating if the shooting was justified.

Lastly, even a hit to a limb can very easily be fatal from simple blood loss, while many torso hits are survivable. When employing a lethal tool such as a firearm, there really is no "shoot to wound". Additionally, trick shots like trying shoot a weapon out of someone's hand are the work of Hollywood magic, not reality, and more than likely will not only result in a total miss, but endanger innocent third-parties.

I appreciate that people would like to minimize deaths (although police officers' lives sadly seem unimportant to some) and mourn the loss of a young life. However, before demanding completely unrealistic policies that may result in more dangerous situations, it is not unreasonable to expect some research and familiarity with the topic.

We don't need wimps on the street in police uniforms who are out to KILL. I don't know the facts in this case yet, but if he indeed had a gun and got three shots off at the cop, did the shots HIT the cop? Did the cop get shot? Did anyone else? If he did, I haven't heard about it yet. Oh yeah, and who shot first? WERE there any witnesses? But the cop, since he was so immature and afraid, puts 16-17 bullets into the kid, then that's alright?

This isn't the wild wild west, and it's NOT a GD battlefield. This was a kid who went out on a Friday night and got a sandwich and got shot to death by a cop in the same county that Michael Brown was shot down in cold blood by another wimp in uniform 2 months ago today.

Sorry, but the only thing capable of not being a "wimp" is robocop.

... you and I can't have a conversation, because we are evidently on different planets.

I can't make heads or tales out of your reply.

Until they are physically hit with a bullet. If they are being shot at, but aren't hit, they try to be a police officer in a movie and aim for the arm. And if they don't do that, they are a "wimp".

That is flat out insane.

Last edited Sun Oct 12, 2014, 06:06 PM - Edit history (1)

I laid out your original position and you now say it makes no sense. I am glad you understand my consternation making heads or tails of your original post.

Besides the fact that you dealt with absolutely none of the issues raised in my responsive post about WHY shooting to injure is impractical and foolish, are you actually stating that police basically cannot fire their weapon unless they are shot at first and hit, and then only "shoot to wound" their attacker? The only proof of a good shoot is a dead or crippled officer?

The only result of such a ridiculous policy would be scores of dead officers, very emboldened and even more dangerous criminals, and the complete inability to recruit anyone into law enforcement, local, state or federal, of any race or gender.

If a suspect is pointing a lethal weapon at an officer (it need not always be a firearm) or has otherwise demonstrated he is a serious danger to the officer or other innocents, the officer is entitled to fire his weapon to stop the threat. It's really no different than basic self-defense everywhere, except the officer's job is actually to seek out, pursue and stop offenders.

Moreover, the Myers shooting thus far appears nothing like the Brown matter. It will be very easy to confirm independently if Myers had an illegal weapon and if it was fired. Note also that Myers was currently on bail with a trial set for November on illegal weapons possession and resisting arrest charges. Since he was subject to house arrest, I would like to know why he was purportedly out getting a sandwich at all. Everyone should wait for a full investigation before making too many conclusions, but the initial facts seem to favor the officer.

You also apparently know little about the real "wild west" or rules of engagement on the battlefield. Your "shoot to wound" nonsense is the work of fiction writers and movie directors, not trained law enforcers, criminologists or even constitutional scholars.

Simply, the vast, vast majority of police officers of all races are not out to kill anyone, they will, however, properly defend themselves and others against dangerous threats, and this will inevitably lead to some of their deaths.

At this point in time, police don't have allot of credibility left. I'd say odds are that that boy didn't possess a gun two months ago.

I am choosing not to sit here and argue with you. I stated my point of view and I'm sticking to it. There's nothing you can say to me, at me, or about me that will ever change my view, so give it up, OK?

Give up, what exactly? Current law enforcement procedures are already far closer to my views than anything you've suggested.

In the real world, police encounters as simple as a traffic stop are often decidedly deadly and we don't live in the fictional world of Star Trek where we can just set phasers to "stun."

You never really explained anything to anybody, except vague concepts concerning Hollywood-style marksmanship and demanding that all police need to actually be shot before using their weapon. Even among some of the more unusual and vocal activists, you ideas are not prevalent.

If you're offering policy suggestions on a discussion forum, shouldn't you be willing to, well . . . discuss them? If you cannot substantively defend and support these policies among other engaged Democrats, how would you ever expect them to receive wider popular support?

This is a pervasive national problem. Congress has made some noises about de-militarizing the police and we need to do whatever we can think of to fan those embers into a flame, even if our pleas disappear into the DC ether. No one should have to teach his or her son or daughter to bow and scrape to people on a public payroll or worry that their kid might get killed for being outdoors while black (or Hispanic or anything).

However, this is also a local matter, a place where your voice is louder than it is on the national scene and where you can mobilize your neighbors, maybe your whole town. Write your mayor, your town council members or whoever governs your locale and also your Governor and state house. Start a petition. Picket the state house or city hall or police union hall. Write your local papers and local TV stations. Do something. Put it on your calendar and give yourself a deadline of two weeks to begin something, anything, but something.

Maybe it's also time for another March on Washington, too. Your right to vote, while very important, is not useful to you if you get shot dead at 18. It's over 50 years the last one. I propose Juneteenth or July 2 (date in 1954 when the Civil Rights Act of 1964was signed) or August 28 (date Emmet Till was murdered) of 2015. But, that's me. A less in your face date might work better?

If we are going to be about social issues, let's at least really be about them.

I know that you care about this situation, but the media is not going to be friendly in this instance.
They are going to demonize Myers, and somehow make it his fault that he is dead.

One other thing I want to say about whether it is right to refer to young males as "boys" or "men", I think it really depends upon the individual person, and the situation they are currently involved with.
This is just my opinion, so don't carve what I say about it in stone.

For instance, I can remember one of my football coaches referring to us on the team as "men" when he was giving us a pep talk when I was only 12 years old.
He was trying to make us take responsibility for missing tackles.
I played on the defense, so he wanted us to act like men, and act accordingly.

I have to admit, nothing got our football squad's attention faster than when the coach started that pep talk with, "Well, men . . ."
That's what we wanted to be thought of . . as men.
We wanted to be like our heroes who played in the NFL, we wanted to be thought of as young men.

But then, about 9 months later, my dad told me to stop trying to help my older brother and his 2 friends put an engine in to his car, telling me that "this is a job for men."
So, while on one day much earlier the previous year, I was grown up enough to take on some responsibility, yet on a different day, just a few months later, I wasn't grown up enough to help out with the task.
Mostly because my dad considered that task to be a lot harder and much more dangerous.

So, there are different levels of responsibility.
And also different levels of risk involved as to whether a young male is acting like a boy, and should be treated accordingly, or should be expected to act like a man, and be treated as such.

"Don't get your expectations too high" is a common refrain told to some young black men, even to this day.
Because disappointment is a hope killer.
And without hope, you can't have dreams.
And without dreams, you're facing a very difficult future, wrought with hardship with no way out.

There has to be an exit door available to that type of overwhelming despair in that kind of existence.

On a personal level, I don't let anyone define me.
I learned that lesson when I was 13 years old.
And I constantly have to remember what I learned from that lesson, I have to relearn it.

Peer pressure was really hard for me to deal with back when I was only 13 years old.
So, I sat down with my father and I had a lot of heart-to-heart talks with my dad in order to deal with that situation.
And I dealt with it the way my father told me to deal with it -- like a man -- even though it is true that I was still only a boy at that time.

Yet, the one thing we all know is that the media didn't know Myers.
So, why should they believe anything that was good that was said about him.
The media is great at ignoring all of the exculpatory evidence when they trying someone in the public eye.

Keep the faith.
Have hope because the DOJ is getting involved in this incident now.
And they are going to get knee deep in it real quick until the truth about what happened this week in St Louis is found out.
No matter what the freakin' media says!!!

"Don't get your expectations too high" is a common refrain told to some young black men, even to this day.
Because disappointment is a hope killer.
And without hope, you can't have dreams.
And without dreams, you're facing a very difficult future, wrought with hardship with no way out.

And let us not forget that white people consistently misjudge the age of black kids - this has been proven in experiments - they think black kids over the age of 9 are on average 4.5 years older than they actually are. That means that a 14-year old black boy would be considered "an adult" in the eyes of many white cops, when a 14-year old white boy would be seen as a child.

Let us also not forget that due to treatment during slavery, African-American boys who grew up fast physically had a better chance of survival. The sooner they got tall and physically strong, the more likely they were to grow to adulthood and be able to have children. Let's not kid ourselves - slavery was also a breeding program - after all, they considered African-Americans animals, and in some cases forced men and women to have children together because they thought they were "superior stock". (Blech!) In other words, black boys are damned if they do and damned if they don't.

I was talking to a friend and said something along those lines and he said I was full of shit. I want to send it to him.

Thanks

Black boys as young as 10 may not be viewed in the same light of childhood innocence as their white peers, but are instead more likely to be mistaken as older, be perceived as guilty and face police violence if accused of a crime, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association.

“Children in most societies are considered to be in a distinct group with characteristics such as innocence and the need for protection. Our research found that black boys can be seen as responsible for their actions at an age when white boys still benefit from the assumption that children are essentially innocent,” said author Phillip Atiba Goff, PhD, of the University of California, Los Angeles. The study was published online in APA’s Journal of Personality and Social Psychology®.

Thanks

as a man, black or white. They are becoming men; finding their own way. My son is 20 and is becoming a man. This age group may be responsible workers on their jobs but they still have a lot of social immaturity. So yeah, it's tragic when these black victims, killed by the militarized police are labeled men or thugs to justify their murders. This isn't done with white kids; the phrasing of language is so different that it's hard to believe that people can't or don't want to see it.

I dare you to call an 18-year-old man "boy", and let's see if it generates that saccharine lukewarm itchy feeling that you seem to be trying to associate with treating an 18-year-old as child.

I'd also like to see some examples where the news references an 18-year-old as a boy.

This is an inaccurate unhelpful post in the discussion on examples of racism.

nt

Anything is possible. For me to understand what you are referencing, could you tell me of what am I in denial?

She understands and stands with another black woman that lost her child.

Sadly I believe that what I posted went way over your head.

you say

The SG observation seems accurate enough. I'm saying that an 18-year-old is not a boy, that typical media never denigrates black men by using the term boy anymore than they call a black person who is under 18 a man in order to justify killing him, despite what the author, a self-described "Spiritual traveler, a devoted wife, mother, sister, lover of dream study, reading, theater, music, dance, and thought-provoking discussions on love, life, humor and service," might think she has seen.

I understood the context. However, the race of the writer is irrelevant if the information is incorrect or if the author is clumsy when they try to manipulate the reader's emotions.

I'll stand by my criticism that the emotion the author is evoking feels synthetic, and that the author is mistaken that a typical black 18-year-old is a child or that media call black juveniles men in order to justify killing them.

From what I have seen, if they justify it at all, it's to say the officer did it in self defense and then to portray the victim as a criminal. Some esoteric code using the terms "man" and "boy" seems far-fetched at best.

I find some of the replies here quite disturbing but also quite revealing

I agree with you about the tone some responses. Disturbing indeed.