4 ms·
It's not a rationalization that police lives are more important, but rather about the stupidity of holding up a phone in such a way towards the police engaged i
by jtuente 9y ago
It's not a rationalization that police lives are more important, but rather about the stupidity of holding up a phone in such a way towards the police engaged in a dangerous situation that it appears as though you are acting aggressively towards them. The officers only have a limited time to assess the threat of any given person before more lives are lost due to an unknown danger. It's a high stress situation and wrong decisions are easily made. The officers weren't right in their immediate assessment of the danger, but that doesn't mean their actions were unwarranted.
- ajross 9y agoSo... the police made a mistake, but that's OK. The guy made a mistake, but he died and that's warranted (your word!). It's the asymmetry of this morality that horrifies me. I can understand people who think this is a terrible mistake but still sympathize with the officers and don't want to see them punished. But you guys... yikes.
- bobwaycott 9y agoFor the equally callous flip side, we pay LEO to put their lives at risk and potentially die every day. We do not compensate citizens to put their lives at risk when a cop is around. In this cold and calculating scenario, maybe dying is what they're paid to do, kind of like soldiers. Except soldiers have massively more training and seem to be pretty decent at verifying an individual is a combatant before opening fire. Because LEOs were dead wrong in their immediate assessment of the danger, that means exactly that their actions were unwarranted. When you act upon a false and unwarranted belief, you don't get to say your actions were warranted.
- eruditely 9y agoMilitary's are more than professional, get paid less, and still risk your life much more, being a LEO is not harder than being in the military.