How do we heal after the Ferguson grand jury decision?

Firstly, we as a nation, as Americans, need to stop practicing the politics of self-destruction. By that I mean stop looking for an excuse to make the landscape erupt and then cheer as it burns. That's bottled anarchy and it's not healthy.

Secondly, we have to get our stories straight and not prejudge the path to justice. Let the system BREATHE and while it's breathing, take the time to do vigorous research.

Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, we need to take anything and everything we observe from the media, particularly the abomination known as "social media", with several grains of salt. It's reliability and validity has been proven to be bogus on many occasions.

Lastly, we need to be cognizant of those with a vested interest in making certain that their story is conveyed, and by implication received, in a certain way by certain groups of people. They will do anything and everything to make certain that message is conveyed and damn the consequences. In that way, you could call it biased narrowcasting.

Usually, the first casualty of this self-destructive behavior is the truth.

My thoughts on this Ferguson issue. There is still racism in our society. To say there is not is ignorance. Is the racism as prominent as it was as in the 50’s and 60’s? To say yes is as ignorant as my previous statement.

I can even admit that I have experienced some kind of racism. I don’t know if I would call it racism, but I have seen favoritism. Nobody ever discriminated against me for race, but I have seen senior leaders of other race “hook up” their like race with things I feel were not deserving to them. Unfortunately, I have seen this more with African Americans than whites; on the other hand, I have seen “sleeper” White Supremacists soldiers. I feel they were raised that way and may not feel that way anymore, but the hate can easily be triggered. With the Hispanics, I remember seeing the “Latino Pride” crap when I was stationed in Korea. This was an obvious race gang hiding under the element of Latino Pride. I remember them giving me crap because I was Cuban and I did not really know what being latino was all about. But I digress…

The real issue about this Ferguson case is not just about race. It is about the criminal mentality. I currently work in a Federal Prison, and I can attest that this does exist. I give you an example I myself experienced.
I was working in a housing unit doing my 30 minutes rounds. While walking, I observed two inmates in an altercation in a cell. I requested for assistance, then I grabbed the closest inmate to me and pulled him out of the cell. He was resisting and attempting to go back in the cell. Responding staff arrived while I took the inmate to the ground and handcuffed him. Why am I telling you this story??? Well this inmate filed a grievance on me saying I was racist and I utilized excessive use of force. He said I punched and kicked him. This inmate even got other inmates to write supporting memorandums to support his grievance. The inmates were also being helped on how to write his grievance by the jail house lawyers. When I was pulled in by the investigating Lieutenant and I read all the statements. I thought my job and career was over. I thought I was going to jail. I had over 1000 pounds on my shoulders. Then the Lieutenant showed me the video from the unit. The video had everything from pulling the guy out to taking him down.

I am not a very religious person, but I yelled LORD JESUS THANK YOU!

Ironically, all races in prison play this same card.

Now, the point I am getting too. We are talking about the poor kid. But I am like, what if the officer was actually right. What if he was innocent? What about his feelings and his plight. Things to think about as a reasonable person.

I do not know that we will ever be as healed as the majority of people in this nation would like us to be, there are so many different issues facing us as a nation that unless we learn, allow ourselves to really understand our differences and develop real leaders that want to tackle issues instead of flaming them up for their own personal gain/glory. We seem to have, by all accounts and portrayals, an entire generation of individuals who feel, rightly or wrongly, disenfranchised with our society/nation and those in positions of authority. Then you have others who, rightly or wrongly, view a lot of this younger generation as the "Entitled" generation, who believe that everything should be handed to them without having to put in the work/effort that previous generations did. Somewhere in the middle of this is the reality of our nation today. Noone should face any type of prejudice at all at any time in their life, it is simply wrong; however until we take responsibility for any and all of our own actions as individuals throughout this nation, we will never be able to fully heal.

THEY ARE LOOTING, SHOOTING, and RIOTING!!! This isn't honorable protests. This isn't a way to honor the memory of anyone. Nevermind my politics. Nevermind what I believe. This is absolute bull. These rioters need to be made an example of. Especially those that stopped freeway traffic.

We have to appreciate the situation from the other man's/woman's perspective and then we have to ask ourselves, "who am I going to be in response to this."

I think many people have gotten a very skewed perception of this entire event. I feel the media, social media included, played a huge role in how the nation has perceived this entire thing, and played a significant role in making this a race issue. Yes, I do feel that we need to provide enough money and equipment into law enforcement to effectively and safely do a thankless job. Personal mounted camera's, tasers, etc... But, that being said, we need to look at the processes involved in a Grand Jury, and what a Grand Jury does. A Grand Jury is NOT, a Trial Jury, that's not what they are there for, by our 5th Amendment right, anyone accused of a Capital Crime gets a Grand Jury investigation. Evidence is presented before Grand Jury. A Grand Jury looks at ALL of the evidence, not just the evidence presented by a Prosecutor, or Defender. We have to understand, the Police are going to be given certain leeway when it comes to Deadly Force, if we didn't, then every Soldier that has been in Combat could be charged with murder as well. Another side to this, is personal accountability, what happened to holding our children accountable for their actions, yes, in this case, a youngster lost his life, but, how many people are going to try and grab a Policeman's weapon? Of course the parents are going to state, "he was a good kid, washed behind his ears, said yes and no ma'am or sir, but what was he like away from home? Yes, I said it, many of our nations youth live a double life, they're great at home around family and relatives. But, how are they around friends, around people that family would not approve of? How are they when they are on the street?

realize the media racebaited this into a frenzy in order to justify police militarization the cop was in the right this time but they caused such a frenzy amongst the public that justice was forgotten by most and all that matters now is that the white man and his cops are still trying to hold a brother down of course in reallity racism is mostly dead and we got to get away from blameing this on race and realize the police have to many new toys and too little real training they get armored equipment and a federaly sponsored pep talk and think there delta force hunting alqeda or isis and they very often are not held accountable for there actions

We will never heal as a country no matter what happened to Brown. I have not kept up with the Brown story I did at first but when the people there started that rioting shit I lost interest. As soon as that started I knew we would never hear the truth from the media, cops or the people. And when you start beating up innocent people and burning down places of business I have no respect for you. And you sure don't get on TV and bitch about a job when your burning all those business. When you act like that you don't want justice you want war and that is the Sharpton's and Jacksons talking not people of justice. And lastly when the parents get on TV they better be crying and in my eyes they should be more upset that they lost a son not on the street inciting violence against whites. People that speak about racism every time you see them on TV and they are the biggest offenders of racism do not get any sympathy from me if they want that they can look in the dictionary between shit and syphilis. Because what has been lost in all this is a young man is dead and a young man killed him, color don't mean shit. The young man that is alive has to live with the fact that he ended another humans life and if he has a conscience at all this will be with him for ever and a day will not go by that he will not see that young mans face that is punishment trust me.

I will have to agree with others in this discussion, there is too much hate in this country by people of all races. I know I am personally tired of hearing people of the news who think that this country holds them back because of the color of their skin, when in reality the truth is that they are the ones that hold themselves back. The government is to blame in the fact that generation after generation the welfare entitlement has grown and grown to the point that if you were to scale back it would collapse. If you want other people to take you seriously in life than it is no one else but yourself that can make it happen. I would like to say that things will get better, but in my opinion this is only the beginning of a larger fracture of our society.

My friends always told me never talk about religion or politics in public because you will piss some one off. First off I am not black so I have never experienced life as a man of color but I would like to make some points. One I had a really crappy father - you know what that taught me ? When i grew up and had kids of my own I was going to do everything in my power to not be like him and raise my kids in a loving, normal, non-violent household. Another point what about Jews, Italians, Irish and the Chinese? What about the Japanese who were interred in camps during WW II? The Chinese built some of the greatest neighborhoods around the country - people fly to San Francisco and DC to see Chinatown and the amazing food food and people. They stopped feeling sorry for themselves and worked their asses off. Slavery was abolished over 150 years ago, Civil Rights have been written into law over 40 years ago - when is enough enough? when do you realize that it is not the "systems" fault? The system did not make you have five kids by five different people, the system is what you make it. Stop blaming others and get back to work. McDonald's does not care who they sell franchises to, if you work hard and put in the effort you will get ahead. You break the law and disrespect police officers you get put in jail or worse. You know what I do when I get pulled over by the police? First I put my hands on the wheel so they can see them, I call them sir or ma'am, I tell them I am going to get my papers from the glovebox... I dont swear at them, I don't lie to them and at the end of the day I get my ticket and I pay it. You know how many times the police have kicked in my door ? None, I did all the dumb shit kids do when they are young - I drank beer underage, I got in fist fights, I skipped school but I did not blame that on anyone.
Maybe it is just me but I am tired of people blaming others - blame the government, blame the police, blame white people. At the end of the day we are Americans not African, not Chinese, not Iraqi just plain old Americans. Welcome to the Internet Age - stereotypes are meant to be broken - stop living in the past and live for tomorrow, live to make this country what it use to be.
Again just my two cents .....