I’m not so sure you can pin causality here. Anecdotally, the protests I’ve visited in the past have always been exactly as violent as the police initiates. A peaceful police usually means a peaceful protest in my experience. A violent police—on the other hand—can sometimes cause a violent protest, and even a riot.
Crowd control is a science. And you are sort of ignoring the science by claiming that rioters are the cause of the conflict.
> Anecdotally, the protests I’ve visited in the past have always been exactly as violent as the police initiates.
Things escalate when someone escalates them. Sometimes that's the police. Sometimes it isn't. And even when it is, you still have to be willing to be provoked. Don't.
We have people in this thread justifying riots as "we tried kneeling at football games" as if there is some kind of reasonable progression from there to looting and burning down churches.
Like I said, crowd control is a science. Even if you have violent actors at the protest, it is still a failure of crowd control if the whole protest turns violent.
Reacting when violated is a natural reaction. With a group this big you cannot think in individual terms. If provoked there and there is a non-zero chance you’ll see a reaction, you will see a reaction. And now you have a positive feedback loop between the police and protestors that may escalate into riots.
The premise "many assholes are cops" doesn't need a lot of new evidence. There is more than enough existing evidence.
But what do you honestly expect riots to lead to? Concessions? Or loss of the moral high ground and even more riot gear and tear gas and escalation?
It's just handing the cops a free pass to justify arresting you. And not just arresting you, but charging you with something that could actually stick. Its hard to advocate policy when you're serving a decade in prison for arson and conspiracy.
