It isn't easy being a cop.

I think we’ve got enough problems of our own with you shooting at us, so if you could avoid laying your personal problems on us as well, I think we’d probably find it easier to cope!

Well played!

If only there was a way to restrain someone without restricting their intake of oxygen so the police wouldn’t have to gamble with people’s lives to know the truth.

No doubt, but is that anything more than a useless truism? It would be utterly and even more pathetic than it is already if the majority of those the police arrest were not criminals, and criminals are of course likely to do things which are not entirely honest. But the whole point of the problem we're facing is that the police are using this statistical likelihood as an excuse to murder people who are not criminals, and the suggestion that criminals are now using "I can't breathe" as a dodge does not help, and it certainly does not help the fact that some small but non-trivial minority of people are saying it because they are either being murdered or fear that they will be.

e.t.a. posted without looking at link which did not work.

Amen to that.

Good point.

I don't know what happened with the link - here goes again for your delectation

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I AGREE

This is certainly nowhere near the severity of the things discussed in this thread, but it's still an indicator of the larger trend of police impunity.

It is absolutely routine to see cops without masks in public places. Even in cities with large covid numbers and strong edicts from the city/state in order to protect public health, the cops routinely flaunt this requirement. In every protest I've attended in the Boston area, cops without masks outnumber those with masks.

I mean, nothing is going to happen to them, and they know it. Obeying minor laws is really optional for cops, because nothing short of a major civil rights violation is even going to come close to getting on the radar for prosecution or professional discipline.

A social and political statement.

This one shows your average US LEO's going about their sworn duty.

Noise complaint ends up in a multi officer beatdown.

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I AGREE

They should just be thankful they didn't have the dogs set on them.

2 Richmond police officers indicted by grand jury for assault and battery related to their official actions during protests through the summer.

https://twitter.com/Alex8news/status...89703530078208

In San Antonio, Texas a female detective, Mara Wilson, pulled a tampon from a woman's vagina in public in and front of five male officers, going so far as run her fingers along the woman's vaginal lips and commenting "You're very hairy".

The case ended with a settlement of $205,000. Detective Wilson was unrepentant and said


Of course Detective Wilson was completely inside the lines according to the police department:


Neither the city nor the police department have since apologized.

When you hear "We don't comment on pending litigation", it usually means "We don't comment on pending litigation unless we're in the right."

The crime that most greatly concerns many police is clearly hat of disrespecting superior White men. "When I say jump, boy, you jump!"

Remember just how much you hated Nazis in WWII movies when a kid? Well dang, take a guess just how many now feel that way about Americans around the globe. Them there's nigh on 37 million refugees displaced from US military action, now mostly homeless, and under attack from a virus. In response, not only a total lack of concern for the consequences of US action, but gaslighting and lies. Shucks, time was you got strung up for all that, and damned rightly so. Instead, thousands of ill-begotten medals now clink on murderous, guilty chests, and US leadership has yet to swing for it, their wicked feet all a-dangle.

There's your normalization of all that plagues American society right there. You embrace torture as policy? Then fully expect children in cages, cavalier attitudes about hundreds of thousands of your own dead, and to see the defenseless beaten down by mindless fascists with a badge and a gun.

When you start eating swill from the trough, you go whole hog in a nano.

Words aren't capable of expressing my disgust for that.

At least I can be confident that if that happened here, she would be out of a job and facing serious criminal charges for sexual assault.

While I agree with what you very succinctly said, I don't think the Americans in here are the ones who need to be told it.

I'm fairly sure most of the people at this forum - as well as most Americans who aren't brain dead and/or outright racist filth - would very much like to see that side of America consigned to history asap.

"actions didn't violate the department's policies"

There you have it.

No thought of changing 'the department's policies'

The Wolfe City, TX police officer that shot and killed unarmed Jonathan Price, who was intervening in a domestic violence fight at a gas station, has been indicted on charges of murder.

https://www.fox4news.com/news/wolfe-...-prices-murder

This cop is clearly an agitated *******, but what also strikes me is the non-compliant reactions from both of the black guys who were unlucky enough to encounter him. This seems to be a recurring theme among black people.

Instead of shutting up and defusing the situation and following instructions, he argued with the cop and then alluded to how he didn’t want to be the next police shooting victim! I can assure you that is NOT the time and place for that conversation. You tell the officer that you work here, then keep your hands up and don’t move, following instructions.

Regardless of the description, the cop doesn’t know what kind of situation he is walking into and how many perpetrators he could be dealing with, so he is essentially a scared and dangerous animal at that point.

This is not a defense of the cop’s fearful actions at all, its just common sense.


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Yes, it is. Your comment is all about defending the cop's behavior.

If it isn’t a defence then it is an irrelevance to the incident.

I know this is a delicate balancing act, but you’ve got to pay a little more lip service to criticizing the police if you want a chance to pull it off. And definitely don’t say things like “This seems to be a recurring theme among black people”. That gives up the game almost immediately.

It appears to me that far too many cops become "scared and dangerous animals" (very apt description, BTW) far too often, with very little provocation, and not infrequently no provocation at all.

Trying to offload the blame for this on the victims of their inability to control themselves is quite explicitly victim blaming.

No, that's not true. In fact, the cop should probably be charged for raising his weapon out of the low ready position on the first man who walked out the door. I'm all for police accountability, even though I do not support Black Lives Matter.

There is no game, it's just the sad state of a polarized world. Reasonable people can observe that both the cop and the unfortunate guys held unreasonably at gunpoint reacted badly. And there are definitely recognizable patterns both in cops, and in yes, black people (but not exclusively black people). Specifically the black people who wind up as victims in police shootings in videos put forth by the media.

I'm explicitly not victim blaming. I'm making an observation that pertains to the ability to survive these unfortunate situations. The first thing I thought about when watching that video, was how I would have reacted in a similar situation. I would have exclaimed "I work here.", then slowly put my hands up, and waited for instructions. I'm not particularly interested in agitating people with weapons drawn on me, or engaging them in political discussions.

Handcuffs and/or fast straps. Until someone was cuffed or strapped, they were not restrained. Even a cuffed person then needs holding, best done with the good old "come along hold".

The UK cop recently shot dead was shot by someone cuffed to the back, so nothing is guaranteed.

Cool. Tell me more about recurring themes among black people and how if they would just shut up and do as they’re told, everything would be fine.

No one has to do anything. But there are consequences for doing, or not doing certain things, and they apply to all people, not just black people, independent of whether or not they're justified. But in the vast majority of recent police abuse videos I've seen involving black people, there is a common and recurring theme, they are all uncooperative at best, or actively resisting arrest. It's as if they're not aware of the adage "You can beat the rap, but you can't beat the ride."

Here's a video of Daniel Shaver, a white dude who was mercilessly gunned down by a rifle-wielding cop, while pleading for his life. This video shows that some cops may be inclined to murder you no matter how you respond, so it follows that you should probably keep your cool when cops (or anyone) threaten you with a weapon. In Shaver's case, the fact that he was drunk, sobbing, and pleading may have actually hurt his chances, perhaps triggering the predator/prey instinct in the psychopathic cop that murdered him. If I were in that situation, I would try to remain calm, but also keep my dignity and do my best to sort out the conflicting instructions that the psychopath was barking out. Think about it. Cops aren't going to be interested to hear about your political views, or how you think you're being mistreated if they're in a situation where they feel threatened, so don't do it, unless you want to wind up dead. That isn't apologizing for them, or blaming the victim, it's about common sense and survival.

And you'd have been shot dead anyway, and strangers on the Internet who weren't there would be pointing out exactly how you could have avoided getting shot dead by doing something different.

Dave

Not necessarily, and nor did I claim that, but nice try.

So much for "Land of the free" and all that stuff. Just cower to the police whenever they violate you no matter how unreasonable their actions might be because they might shoot you if you don't.

The highlighted bit betrays you. Also, victim blaming is never a good look.

Oh and I missed the racist bit. Yeah, you're done.

The cop is a 'scared and dangerous animal', so deserves the benfit of the doubt and is allowed to be irrational

The person with the gun in their face, of course, isn't allowed to be scared and must be completely rational...

Sure, that adds up.

It isn't easy being a scared and dangerous animal. It's not like you can expect them to be responsible for their own actions.

That's not a charitable reading of what I wrote, to say the least. I'm pointing out that when you're being held at gunpoint in an obviously tense situation, it's probably not the time for activism. Also, I don't suggest "cowering", ever. Look what it did for Daniel Shaver.

Betrays me how? Have you considered that I'm typing exactly what I think and mean, every time? I am indicting police for overreacting to what seems to be every situation, but at the same time, these are unprecedented times. School shootings, stabbings, mass murders, riots, police ambushes are all actually happening.

The problem is that police are turning all of these risks around on the public, when they should not be, and the results are what you're seeing in videos like that.

Police work is a dangerous job. They signed up for it, voluntarily, in exchange for money (in some cases a lot of money, with fat pensions). I want them to use rules of engagement which put them at risk, not the general public. Opening fire on every potential threat will definitely keep them safer, but this is obviously a cost that society cannot bear.

I'm prejudiced, not racist. If you think pointing out obvious cultural differences in the way people interact with police is "racist", and specifically in videos popularized by the media, then you're irrational, and possibly unable to discern patterns in human behavior.

I'm not particularly concerned with the "racist" label, though, as that is inevitable in our toxic PC culture that denies objective reality.

I posted that the cop should probably be arrested for pointing his service weapon at those men. How is that allowing his irrationality?

He's certainly allowed to be scared. I was criticizing his response. My first response to people pointing a gun at my face, in uniform or not, is not to antagonize them. What about you?

How often has it happened to you? I ask because I can't really say how I'd react. Under extreme pressure, people react oddly and nobody really knows the answer to that question until it happens to them. Has it happened to you?

Demanding perfect response from the entirely untrained in high pressure situations is unreasonable.

Fortunately, good selection and training can ensure that people in positions of responsibility react rationally when placed in high pressure situations...

Almost as dangerous as fishing, or construction work, or farming, or driving a truck, or collecting garbage, or ... a list that continues for a while.

And if the cop fatalities are limited to only the ones always put up as an excuse for their acting like scared and dangerous animals, the ones from encounters with people who actually want to harm them, then that list of more dangerous jobs gets even longer.


This has always been the weakest excuse for cops acting like scared and dangerous animals, and yet it persists among their fanboys and groupies.