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Nonviolent protests in the united states
The non - violent protest
Nonviolent protests
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If a person want a peaceful protest, then sit at home and use social media to protest and wait for change. However, violent protest raises awareness and get the issue resolved much quicker than just holding hands and chanting. Violent Protest shows the anger and frustration of the person or people. It also shows how people are willing to risk their life by standing by something they believe in. When violence is used during a protest it gets the point across much quicker. Violence cannot be ignored and it forces the authorities or whomever to take notice. Williams (2014) stated that the nonviolence philosophy that Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. promoted, that came from the bible, a political strategy that many people believed in was not effective enough forcing many to adapt the nonviolent tactic an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, and life for a life. This was the operation that many violent protestors believed in. According to James ( 2016) the author of the bible, when a person commits a crime, their punishment is an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, life for a life, foot for a foot, hand for a hand, burning …show more content…
Rodney King a black man who lived in Las Vegas was severely beating by four white police officers. The officers were brought into court and tried on charges of assault. The officers were acquitted of the assault charges. Immediately protestors took to the streets, to express their angry over the judge’s decision. Protestors found the ruling to be unfair and was fed up with the ill-treatment. The violent protest turned into a riot. A lot of damage occurred; over 50 people were killed, over 2,300 people injured, 8,000 arrest and estimated over $1 billion in property damage. The riots exposed the police abuse, poverty, and lack of economic opportunity. If it was not for the violent protestors no light would have been shed on the the way black were being
The activating occasion of the Los Angeles riots occurred one spring evening when Rodney King was driving, neglectfully and inebriated, on the Foothill Freeway. At the point when two officers timed King speeding, and started to seek after him, a fast auto pursue followed. Rodney King was on parole, and was concerned a speeding ticket, joined with his blood liquor level, would cost him his opportunity. When King was at long last cornered, numerous squad cars were included. After one officer let go two tasers into King, King professedly opposed capture and four cops started utilizing their rod to beat King into accommodation. The battle that took after included a severe beating, more than 50 hits from the cudgel, kicks from the
A Civil Rights leader and a member of a religious organization, Cesar Chaves in his article “He Showed Us the Way” (1978) suggest that the correct way to protest is through a non-violent protest than a violent one, because many people would rather see a problem be solved without violence than with violence. Causing mayhem to property or/and livestock is defying the message that he is trying to put out to the world, also why would someone join a protest if the protesters are just harming or destroying innocent people’s property or/and livestock.
The Los Angeles riots kicked off on the twenty-ninth day of April 1992 following the acquitting of four officers who had beaten and injured a motorist in the previous year. In the year 1991, California Highway Patrol officers detected Rodney King speeding as he drove in Los Angeles. King then led the officers on a high speed chase for the fear that the court would revoke his probation for a robbery offense he had committed (Gray, 2014). He was caught and ordered out of his car surrounded by several L.A.P.D cars and this led to a struggle between him and the police officers with some of them thinking that he was resisting arrest. One sergeant, Stacey Koon, used a Taser gun to fire at him before they beat him with their buttons mercilessly. He was struck with police batons more than fifty times and suffered eleven fractures besides other injuries. George Holiday, who was a nearby resident, videotaped the ordeal and delivered it to a local television station the following day (CNN Library, 2014). The tape sparked tension between the black Americans and the whites. The blacks saw the beating as racial discrimination against their community. However, no violence was recorded from the blacks du...
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. believed that sometimes laws were unjust. In these cases, King would first attempt negotiating with those who were proponents for the unjust issues or laws. If the negotiations were found to be unsuccessful, King would arrange non violent direct action. Antigone on the other hand, didn’t attempt negotiations, she believed that in certain cases, civil disobedience was necessary, and would do whatever was necessary to do her part of doing what she felt was just.
The beating of Rodney King from the Los Angeles Police Department on March 3, 1991 and the Los Angeles riots resulting from the verdict of the police officers on April 29 through May 5, 1992 are events that will never be forgotten. They both evolve around one incident, but there are two sides of ethical deviance: the LAPD and the citizens involved in the L.A. riots. The incident on March 3, 1991 is an event, which the public across the nation has never witnessed. If it weren’t for the random videotaping of the beating that night, society would never know what truly happened to Rodney King. What was even more disturbing is the mentality the LAPD displayed to the public and the details of how this mentality of policing led up to this particular incident. This type of ethical deviance is something the public has not seen since the civil rights era. Little did Chief Gates, the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, and the LAPD know what the consequences of their actions would lead to. Moving forward in time to the verdict of those police officers being acquitted of the charges, the public sentiment spiraled into an outrage. The disbelief and shock of the citizens of Los Angeles sparked a mammoth rioting that lasted for six days. The riots led to 53 deaths and the destruction of many building. This is a true but disturbing story uncovering the ethical deviance from the LAPD and the L.A. riots. The two perspectives are from the Rodney King incident are the LAPD and the L.A. riots.
In the following quote he writes, “I doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking their teeth into unarmed, nonviolent Negroes. If you were to watch them push and curse old Negro women and young Negro girls; I doubt that you would so quickly commend the policemen if you were to observe their ugly and inhumane treatment of Negroes here in the city jail. I cannot join you in your praise of the Birmingham police department.” In this quote, King shows how the police officers would let the dogs out to bite the Negroes. It would be more understanding if the Negros were retaliating with violence. However, they were doing nonviolence protest and the police would use violent attack against the people. The police were treating the Negros as if they were not human just because they look physically different. This is unbelievable because you would not expect law enforcers to mistreat old Negro women and young Negro girls. They were not just picking on one group of people; they would bully people from young to old. Dr. King agrees to the point that they need to have law enforcement; however, he cannot join this group of law enforcers. They are not being fair to the people in the community and they are using their power in a negative
This incident would have produced nothing more than another report for resisting arrest had a bystander, George Holliday, not videotaped the altercation. Holliday then released the footage to the media. LAPD Officers Lawrence Powell, Stacey Koon, Timothy Wind and Theodore Brisino were indicted and charged with assaulting King. Superior Court Judge Stanley Weisberg ordered a change of venue to suburban Simi Valley, which is a predominantly white suburb of Los Angeles. All officers were subsequently acquitted by a jury comprised of 10 whites, one Hispanic and one Asian, and the African American community responded in a manner far worse than the Watts Riots of 1965. ?While the King beating was tragic, it was just the trigger that released the rage of a community in economic strife and a police department in serious dec...
On the night of March 2, 1991, Rodney King and two of his friends decided to go "cruising around looking for some girls." After a few drinks, the three men began cruising around the streets of Los Angeles. At about midnight, King was driving at speeds of up to 115 miles an hour on the freeway. Two California Highway Patrol officers clocked King's car, and began to pursue him. This, however, was not going to stop King. After a 7.8-mile pursuit on freeways and city streets, King was forced to pull over because another vehicle was blocking the street.
On the night of August 11, 1965 the Watts community of Los Angeles County went up in flames. A riot broke out and lasted until the seventeenth of August. After residents witnessed a Los Angeles police officer using excessive force while arresting an African American male. Along with this male, the police officers also arrested his brother and mother. Twenty-seven years later in 1992 a riot known as both the Rodney King riots and the LA riots broke out. Both share the similar circumstances as to why the riots started. Before each riot there was some kind of tension between police officers and the African American people of Los Angeles. In both cases African Americans were still dealing with high unemployment rates, substandard housing, and inadequate schools. Add these three problems with policemen having a heavy hand and a riot will happen. Many of the primary sources I will you in this analysis for the Watts and the LA riots can be found in newspaper articles written at the time of these events. First-hand accounts from people living during the riots are also used.
The Los Angeles riots were a release of pressure that had build up from the innocent charging of Officer Laurence M. Powell and other Police officers that "Used excessive force" on Rodney King on March 3, 1991, but that was not the only reason.(8) In the words of a singer singing about the riots "They said it was for the black man, they said it was for the Mexican, but not for the white man, but if you look at the streets it wasn't about Rodney King, It's bout this f****d up situation and the f****n' police."(9) Did the riots even have anything to do with King? Was King a minor reason for this to happen, or did King put the level of pressure right over the top? Whatever way you see it, the fact is that on April 29, 1992, anarchy was set free in Los Angeles and before the papers could write about the happenings in this city of angels, the writing on the walls could tell it all.
On the morning of March 3rd, 1991 an African-American man led police on a high-speed chase through the city of Los Angeles. Approximately eight miles later police swarmed around the car and confronted the driver, who went by the name Rodney King. During the confrontation, officers tortured King until the point he was forced to seek medical care. A case was opened and the police officers were acquitted. This angered many people, specifically Blacks and led to the historical “L.A. Riots’’ , where they felt race had something to do with the case.
...te police officers of charges stemming from the videotaped beating of black motorist Rodney King. As a result of this verdict, thousands of citizens rioted for six days. Mass amounts of looting, murder, arson and assault took place.” Riots are one of the most common forms of mob mentality and are shown in this book several times.
The 1990s is arguably the most controversial, clamorous, and dangerous times in the United states for race. The beating of Rodney King and the Los Angeles riots were only some contributions to what would lead to the change in the landscape of race relations in the early 1990s. Rodney King would be hit 56 times by 4 white policemen causing him to suffer through a broken leg, his skull being shattered in 11 places, permanent brain damage, and both of his knees injured (Whitman, David). Within hours of the jury's verdict, the riots began. Los Angeles was in turmoil with what it has witnessed. What was most surprising was that this was the first time
The day of March 3rd, Rodney King sped away from the police officers while intoxicated. The day of March 3rd, Rodney King was roughly taken from his vehicle.The day of March 3rd, Rodney King was brutally bashed and beaten close to sixty times by Los Angeles, California police officers (Boyd 1). The Rodney King Legacy Lives states, “The sickening tape, shot by a neighborhood resident, clearly shows the man on the ground offering no resistance as the cops pummeled him reportedly fifty-six times in the body and face,” (Carter 2). From the tape, the member’s of the jury had the opportunity to see, for themselves, the acts of brutality that took place. Some of the damages caused “skull fractures, nerve damage, a crushed cheekbone, a broken ankle and possible brain damage” (Brady 1).With this information, the members ...
Rodney King Beating and Riots. CNN documentary (Full length). (2011, March 6). YouTube. Available at: