Mediaboss Marketing

Nick Robertson and The Hill

3 days ago

A counter-protestor is seen in a T-shirt reading "Black Lives Matter" during a protest by Trump supporters following the results of the 2020 election in November 2020. (Associated Press/David Goldman)

(The Hill) A Michigan man was sentenced to 10 months in prison Wednesday over his racist attempts to intimidate Black Lives Matter protesters.

Kenneth Pilon, 62, called nine Starbucks stores and told employees to threaten and racially demean employees supporting Black Lives Matter. He also threatened to kill Black people, according to court records.

Pilon had called the stores in the days after Starbucks announced it would provide T-shirts for employees who wanted to support Black Lives Matter in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis.

Pilon also left nooses and threatening notes at Starbucks parking lots and other establishments.

One note read, An accessory to be worn with your BLM t-shirt. Happy protesting! court records show.

Read the original:
Man sentenced for racist intimidation of BLM protesters - NewsNation Now

Legendary NBA coach Phil Jacksonswinning pedigree cant get him out of his latest controversy. Jackson appeared on record exec Rick Rubins podcast, Tetragrammaton with Rick Rubin, where he spoke about why basketball is a significant part of his life story, but it hasnt been of much interest to him since the 2020 NBA season finished []

Team CASSIUS

19 hours ago

Jackson appeared on record exec Rick Rubins podcast, Tetragrammaton with Rick Rubin, where he spoke about why basketball is a significant part of his life story, but it hasnt been of much interest to him since the 2020 NBA season finished up in the bubble.

But its got nothing to do with the odd, reclusive setup inside the Disney World campus and everything to do with the rise of social justice awareness around the league.

They had things on their back like Justice, and a funny thing happened like, Justice just went to the basket, and Equal Opportunity knocked him down, Jackson said. Some of my grandkids thought it was pretty funny to play up those names; I couldnt watch that.

Amid the protest of George Floyds killing, the NBA became more socially conscience and allowed players to wear progressive statements on the back of their jerseys in place of last names, like Black Lives Matter, I Cant Breathe, Vote Say Their Names, Anti-Racist, Justice, Power to the People, How Many More, Equality, Peace, Respect Us, and Stand Up.

While the NBA was applauded for standing with the oppressed and victims of police brutality, Jackson thinks it upset another demographic.

It was trying to cater to an audience or trying to bring a certain audience to the game and they didnt know it was turning other people off, he said. People want to see sports as non-political. Politics stays out of the game; it doesnt need to be there.

You can listen to the entire episode above and see how Twitters reacting to Jacksons comments below:

See the original post:
Phil Jackson Says He Stopped Watching NBA Games Because Of Black Lives Matter Politics, Twitter Roasts Him - The Rickey Smiley Morning Show

The Black Lives Matter organization only creates division that leads to violence. ORACLE GRAPHIC/OLIVIA SCHENKMAN

With the House Bill 999 revising Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) at universities, some USF faculty and students are considering leaving the state, according to an April 20 article by The Oracle.

Some professors are considering leaving because HB 999 limits what they can teach at Florida universities. Under this bill, the university would have to remove courses on critical race theory, queer theory, intersectionality and radical gender theory, and they would not be allowed to allocate funds to DEI efforts.

Yet, despite the popular concern for diversity and equality, the phrase All Lives Matter is viewed as divisive and wrong, according to a 2020 CBS article. It is, however, socially correct to say Black Lives Matter (BLM) despite the organization only creating more division.

Saying All Lives Matter should not be demonized when the BLM movement is the one that has caused so much conflict and violence.

The BLM movement started in 2013. After George Floyd, an African American man, was murdered by a police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota during an arrest made in May 2020, BLM grew even bigger, according to a 2020 article by Brookings. On May 28, 2020, the Black Lives Matter hashtag was used 50,000 times. By June 3, that number skyrocketed to 1 million.

With the spike of the BLM movement came the increase in DEI statements by companies across the country. These statements advocate that a particular organization is inclusive, according to an Oct. 4, 2022 article by Diversity Resources.

BLM started in order to eradicate white supremacy and build local power to intervene in violence inflicted on Black communities, according to BLMs page.

The movement has even received support from several organizations at USF like the Humanities Institute.

We condemn the violence against members of the black community and support the work of organizations like Black Lives Matter, states the groups website.

A public university should not be supporting such a divisive group. Even the founder acknowledged that she does not see all races as equal.

White people are the genetic defects of black people, BLM co-founder Yusra Khogali stated in a 2016 tweet.

The tweet has been deleted, but not before news outlets like iHeart reported on it and included an archived version of the Tweet.

Plz Allah give me strength to not cuss/kill these men and white folks out here today. Plz plz plz, Khogali stated, according to a 2016 article by CBC.

The leader of this organization, which is supposedly focused on equality, suppresses another race by stating they are lesser and casually states her desire to kill them.

Pushing down one race to uplift another only creates division. In order to truly bring justice, leaders and everyday citizens need to uphold the same moral and ethical standards, no matter their race. BLM advocates also need to follow this, as two wrongs dont make a right.

Creating groups strictly based on the color of ones skin merely categorizes people by their race and not who they are.

During the George Floyd BLM riots that occurred from May 26 to June 8, 2020, many buildings were destroyed by BLM members. The destruction cost $1-$2 billion dollars in property damages, according to a 2020 article by Axios.

The protest also resulted in 19 deaths which included a police officer being shot down by protesters and a man being run over by a FedEx truck, according to a 2022 article by Forbes.

BLM protests in Tampa also occurred. A total of 40 stores on Fowler Avenue, 15th Street, Busch Boulevard, Nebraska Avenue and 30th Street were looted on May 30, 2020, according to a June 1, 2020 article by the Tampa Bay Times. Hundreds of rioters eventually caused Fowler Avenue to be shut down, according to a May 30, 2020 article by WUSF. Champs Sporting Goods was also completely burned down.

Some believe that promoting BLM also means promoting the notion that all lives matter, and by saying All Lives Matter, Black lives are excluded, according to a 2020 CBS News article.

And if we are committed to a world where all lives matter, we are called to support the very movement that inspired and activated so many more. That means supporting and acknowledging Black lives, said co-founder of the movement, Alicia Garza in a 2014 article she wrote for The Feminist Wire.

However, when one racial group is lifted higher by bringing down another, it clearly shows that all lives do not matter and that some are more important than others.

Even though BLM isnt the only racial organization and other organizations such as Native Lives Matter, Asian American Pacific Islanders Lives Matter and White Lives Matter stand, creating groups based on the color of ones skin will only continue to split the country by dividing people based on their race.

People should combat this by simply using All Lives Matter. This phrase should not be demonized. Rather, it should be embraced.

If all lives truly matter, then using an inclusive term should not be a bad thing. This type of division leads to violence and death, making no life matter at all.

View post:
OPINION: All lives matter The Oracle - The Oracle

A Michigan man who tried to intimidate Black Lives Matter supporters by leaving nooses and threatening notes around his community and making racist phone calls in the summer of 2020 has been sentenced to 10 months in federal prison and a year of supervised release, the U.S. Justice Department said on Wednesday.

The man, Kenneth D. Pilon, 62, pleaded guilty in December to two misdemeanor counts of willfully intimidating and attempting to intimidate citizens from engaging in lawful speech and protests in support of the Black Lives Matter movement, according to federal prosecutors.

On June 14, Mr. Pilon, a retired optometrist, made nine phone calls to Starbucks stores in Michigan in which he told the employees who answered to make racist slurs toward their colleagues who wore Black Lives Matter T-shirts, prosecutors said. He also told one employee that he planned to lynch a Black person, they added. Two days earlier, Starbucks had announced that it would send Black Lives Matter T-shirts to its stores after it had initially banned workers from wearing apparel with the phrase because it could amplify divisiveness.

The following month, Mr. Pilon also left five nooses across Saginaw, Mich. four of them in parking lots, and one in a 7-Eleven store together with handwritten notes that read: An accessory to be worn with your BLM t-shirt. Happy protesting! the Justice Department said.

Four other charges relating to separate, but similar, episodes were dropped, according to court documents filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.

A noose is a symbol of hatred that evokes the darkest days of our countrys past, Dawn N. Ison, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan, said in a statement. Its placement is meant to terrorize a part of our community, but we will not tolerate these race-based threats.

Kristen Clarke, the assistant attorney general of the Justice Departments civil rights division, noted in a statement that such threats had no place in civilized society.

Mr. Pilons lawyer, Barry A. Wolf, could not be immediately reached on Wednesday evening for comment, but in a sentencing memorandum earlier this month, he told the court that Mr. Pilon was deeply remorseful and embarrassed by his actions.

Mr. Pilon had never previously been convicted of a crime, but in 2020, during a perfect storm of physical pain, social isolation and untreated mental health problems, he became consumed by news of the civil unrest and lashed out with racist and intimidating conduct, Mr. Wolf said in the memorandum. He understands the seriousness of these offenses.

Regina Simon, whose husband at the time found one of the nooses in his car in Saginaw, said in an interview on Wednesday that the sentencing showed that the court was moving in the right direction in terms of taking the rights of the marginalized seriously. She added, however, the contention that Mr. Pilot had suffered while watching news reports about political demonstrations was not a good enough excuse.

More here:
Man Sentenced to 10 Months for Leaving Nooses and Racist Notes - The New York Times

A ground mural depicting a portrait of Breonna Taylor is seen at Chambers Park in Annapolis, Md., on July 6, 2020. Julio Cortez/AP hide caption

A ground mural depicting a portrait of Breonna Taylor is seen at Chambers Park in Annapolis, Md., on July 6, 2020.

Myles Cosgrove, a former Louisville police officer who shot and killed Breonna Taylor in March 2020, became a law enforcement officer again in a nearby county, according to various local media outlets.

The Carroll County Sheriff's Office, which is about an hour drive northeast of Louisville, recently hired Cosgrove, Chief Deputy Rob Miller told The Courier Journal on Saturday.

"We think he will help reduce the flow of drugs in our area and reduce property crimes," Miller said. "We felt like he was a good candidate to help us in our county."

This photo released by the Louisville Police shows Louisville Police Det. Myles Cosgrove after a narcotics raid on March 13, 2020. Louisville Police/AP hide caption

This photo released by the Louisville Police shows Louisville Police Det. Myles Cosgrove after a narcotics raid on March 13, 2020.

Miller added that Cosgrove had nearly two decades of experience in the police force. The Carroll County Sheriff's Office declined NPR's request for comment.

The hiring has garnered scrutiny in both Louisville and Carroll County.

Chanelle Helm, the lead organizer of Black Lives Matter Louisville, said Cosgrove's return to the police force showed the impunity often afforded to law enforcement.

"The way in which he can go and get a job in the same field should be illegal. For a typical citizen, we aren't able to re-enter certain fields, if we're fired from them. That carries with you," she told member station WFPL.

Cosgrove was one of seven officers involved in the deadly raid inside Taylor's apartment in the middle of the night. Police, who came to serve a no-knock search warrant, barged in startling Taylor, a 26-year-old ER technician, and her boyfriend. Believing the officers were intruders, Taylor's boyfriend fired a single shot at them. Officers returned 32 shots, half of which were fired by Cosgrove. Two of his rounds struck Taylor.

An FBI ballistics report later showed that it was Cosgrove's bullets that killed her, according to WFPL.

In January 2021, the Louisville Metro Police Department fired Cosgrove for violating department procedures on the use of deadly force by failing to properly identify a threat when he fired his weapon. Cosgrove also violated LMPD policy by not wearing a body camera during the raid.

In Cosgrove's termination letter, the interim LMPD Chief Yvette Gentry wrote: "The shots you fired went in three different directions, indicating you did not verify a threat or have target acquisition."

Gentry added, "In other words, the evidence shows that you fired wildly at unidentified subjects or targets located within the apartment."

Cosgrove appealed his case to get his job back in November 2021, but ultimately the court upheld the department's decision to terminate, local media outlets reported.

The officer has not faced any criminal charges in connection to the killing. Four officers were formally charged by the Justice Department with civil rights violations but Cosgrove was not one of them.

In 2022, the Kentucky Law Enforcement Council voted to allow Cosgrove to keep his police certification, making him eligible to work for other police departments in the state, WFPL reported.

Cosgrove is not the first officer to be removed from a police department after misconduct only to be hired elsewhere. The phenomenon known as "wandering cops" has been an issue for decades in the U.S. in part because there is a lack of national coordination to keep track of officers with a history of misconduct.

Taylor's death fueled racial justice protests across the country in the summer of 2020. That year, Louisville's city council unanimously voted to ban no-knock warrants.

Link:
Louisville officer who killed Breonna Taylor hired by police force in ... - NPR