Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto condemned recent protests outside his home. Over the course of several days, a couple of hundred demonstrators brought their concerns about police oversight and the plainclothes arrest of a Black Lives Matter protester directly to the mayor.
Peduto’s neighbors reported protesters yelling profanities and playing siren sounds late at night and early in the morning.
“What I cannot defend is any neighborhood in our city — and their residents and families — being disturbed through the night and morning, and a peaceful protest devolving into unacceptable conduct in which residents are being harassed and threatened,” Peduto said in a statement.
The mayor deserves credit for taking such a stance publicly.
When a group of protesters moves from a peaceful demonstration to carrying out harassing, bullying or threatening behavior, it is no longer a protest. It is a riot.
A protest is speech. A riot is violence.
There is no justification for violence.
Peduto has consistently decried riots and protests that turn violent, though he has been careful in his public comments to distinguish between peaceful protesters and those instigating violent behavior.
Recently, Peduto announced that he would make changes to the Pittsburgh police department, including creating new oversight positions and staffing to ensure balanced responses to protest activity, among other directives. He has also prohibited “jump-out arrests” by plainclothes officers in unmarked vehicles, the tactic that led to the protests outside his home.
Pittsburgh police Chief Scott Schubert voiced support for the changes, but some protesters and members of the community see the changes as too little too late.
Meanwhile, in Kenosha, Wis., video of another shooting of a Black man by police has triggered fierce protests and riots. Almost immediately after the video began circulating online, a crowd gathered and quickly crossed the line between protest and riot, damaging property, setting vehicles ablaze and injuring some officers. Police in riot gear responded with tear gas and rubber bullets.
Politicians immediately leaped to cite the shooting as another example of systemic racism of police officers against Black Americans. Such posturing continues to heap fuel on the fires of the greatest civil unrest of recent decades.
The situation has turned deadly. The Wisconsin governor has condemned the violence and deployed members of the National Guard.
The anger of those demanding change due to the killing of Black men and women at the hands of police is understandable, but it cannot justify violence and mob behavior.
A protest is speech. A riot is violence. Police, protesters and politicians alike need to keep that line in sight.
— Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (TNS)
