3 ms·

and this is why i don't like to deal with police. They can't control their weapons

cies 9y ago
State is not controlling their police: they mostly walk after committing brutalities. Thus they've learned there is no need to restrain themselves.
ako 9y ago
They can't control their weapons because they have to operate in a society that can't control its weapons...
- TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
  Other countries have plenty of weapons around, yet don't have police that use deadly force immediately. Finland is a prime example[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_guns_per_capita_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_guns_per_c...
  - indubitable 9y ago
    It's not about the weapons, it's about the people with the weapons. Finland has a national murder rate of 1.6. [1] At first that doesn't seem too bad as our murder rate is "only" about 300% higher. But that comparison by itself is quite misleading. Crime, and especially the most violent crimes including murder, are not evenly distributed in the US. They're heavily centralized into relatively small areas. So for instance these [2] are the crime data for Ferguson, Missouri where Michael Brown was killed. In the year Michael Brown was killed, their homicide rate was double the US average. It's now skyrocketed to 42.8 - 2,675% higher than Finland. To give some context to that 42.8 the murder rate in Mexico is 16.35. In Columbia it's 26.5. As a matter of fact, in terms of nations - there are only 5 places in the world more dangerous than Ferguson, Missouri -- a town of some 20k people. I'm certainly not condoning police actions, but at the same time I think people don't really consider these situations in terms of context. Somebody, seemingly without irony, suggested we ought disarm the police. Imagine disarmed police in Mexico.. now increase the danger they face by 300%. That's what disarming police in areas like Ferguson, Missouri would be akin to. This sort of reality is very foreign to us, who I suspect for the most part have led very privileged lives. And so we extrapolate our lives to a situation where suddenly the police are just killing people. And that would indeed be insane. It's so foreign for us to imagine how dangerous many places in the US are -- and it's these locations where the systemic police violence tends to also be heavily centralized. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intention... [2] - http://www.city-data.com/crime/crime-Ferguson-Missouri.html http://www.city-data.com/crime/crime-Ferguson-Missouri.html
    - TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
      > I think people don't really consider these situations in terms of context. Then let's add some context to this conversation. This whole post was made because of the recently released video of a police officer executing a citizen[1]. That police officer was then acquitted. This kind of police response would never occur in other civilized countries, regardless of the relative murder rate. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M62Va6Ft2cw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M62Va6Ft2cw
      - indubitable 9y ago
        I'm having a bit of a parallel discussion elsewhere and I think my response there is completely appropriate here, but I'd rather not just cut and paste the same stuff all over the place: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15885977 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15885977 The downside of threaded discussions!

cies 9y ago

State is not controlling their police: they mostly walk after committing brutalities. Thus they've learned there is no need to restrain themselves.

ako 9y ago

They can't control their weapons because they have to operate in a society that can't control its weapons...

TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
Other countries have plenty of weapons around, yet don't have police that use deadly force immediately. Finland is a prime example[1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_guns_per_capita_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_guns_per_c...
- indubitable 9y ago
  It's not about the weapons, it's about the people with the weapons. Finland has a national murder rate of 1.6. [1] At first that doesn't seem too bad as our murder rate is "only" about 300% higher. But that comparison by itself is quite misleading. Crime, and especially the most violent crimes including murder, are not evenly distributed in the US. They're heavily centralized into relatively small areas. So for instance these [2] are the crime data for Ferguson, Missouri where Michael Brown was killed. In the year Michael Brown was killed, their homicide rate was double the US average. It's now skyrocketed to 42.8 - 2,675% higher than Finland. To give some context to that 42.8 the murder rate in Mexico is 16.35. In Columbia it's 26.5. As a matter of fact, in terms of nations - there are only 5 places in the world more dangerous than Ferguson, Missouri -- a town of some 20k people. I'm certainly not condoning police actions, but at the same time I think people don't really consider these situations in terms of context. Somebody, seemingly without irony, suggested we ought disarm the police. Imagine disarmed police in Mexico.. now increase the danger they face by 300%. That's what disarming police in areas like Ferguson, Missouri would be akin to. This sort of reality is very foreign to us, who I suspect for the most part have led very privileged lives. And so we extrapolate our lives to a situation where suddenly the police are just killing people. And that would indeed be insane. It's so foreign for us to imagine how dangerous many places in the US are -- and it's these locations where the systemic police violence tends to also be heavily centralized. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intention... [2] - http://www.city-data.com/crime/crime-Ferguson-Missouri.html http://www.city-data.com/crime/crime-Ferguson-Missouri.html
  - TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
    > I think people don't really consider these situations in terms of context. Then let's add some context to this conversation. This whole post was made because of the recently released video of a police officer executing a citizen[1]. That police officer was then acquitted. This kind of police response would never occur in other civilized countries, regardless of the relative murder rate. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M62Va6Ft2cw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M62Va6Ft2cw
    - indubitable 9y ago
      I'm having a bit of a parallel discussion elsewhere and I think my response there is completely appropriate here, but I'd rather not just cut and paste the same stuff all over the place: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15885977 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15885977 The downside of threaded discussions!