"News of their arrest quickly began spreading on social media, and the Ferguson police chief was alerted to their arrests by a reporter for the Los Angeles Times."
There are plenty of good people trying to manage a bunch of people who are out of control. People like to find fault with those trying to manage a war zone in the heat of battle rather than focusing on those who are causing the problem in the first place.
The local police seem pretty incompetent here: Bringing in tanks, aiming assault rifles at unarmed protesters, and an injudicious use of tear gas and rubber bullets.
They're treating civilian protesters like enemy soldiers.
Presumably people flagging it, possibly the same sort of people who wrote Twitter's trending algorithm that's currently suppressing the #Ferguson hashtag from appearing in many people's interfaces (see here for more info: https://twitter.com/xkeepah ).
Much as those engineers don't get to hide behind "a computer did it!", the people flagging this post are actively participating in suppressing the knowledge of police oppression, regardless of their view of "appropriate" content on HN. If any of the administrators of HN are reading this, they're also a participant in that system. Choosing to reduce visibility is complicity.
EDIT: The deleted parent inquired why this post rapidly fell off the front page.
6 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 23.9 ms ] threadSounds like nobody is in control.
They're treating civilian protesters like enemy soldiers.
See more here: http://www.vox.com/2014/8/11/5988925/mike-brown-killing-shoo...
http://www.vox.com/2014/8/13/6000799/ferguson-governor-nixon...
Much as those engineers don't get to hide behind "a computer did it!", the people flagging this post are actively participating in suppressing the knowledge of police oppression, regardless of their view of "appropriate" content on HN. If any of the administrators of HN are reading this, they're also a participant in that system. Choosing to reduce visibility is complicity.
EDIT: The deleted parent inquired why this post rapidly fell off the front page.