11 ms·

Americans' perceptions of police drop significantly in one week

204 points by srameshc 6y ago

bovermyer 6y ago
Ancedote: my father-in-law is a prison guard in Minneapolis. HIS opinion of police has plummeted in the last week.
- SN76477 6y ago
  Powerful stuff.
reminddit 6y ago
graph is like unemployment. Several deviations drop from mean. Expert's models say they are rare, but they are always wrong. Now the anger is toward those experts whose models always break because they don't handle the extremes, while they are drinking coffee in their ivory towers.
- rsynnott 6y ago
  Rapid shifts in public opinion in response to high profile events aren’t at all rare, and I don’t think any experts were claiming they were...
post_break 6y ago
When a 75 year old man is trying to return a police helmet to them, and they push him down causing him to bleed from his head and ears, and they fire two officers who did it, and the rest resign from the riot group in purpose in support of the two who pushed him, what else could you possibly expect? https://twitter.com/WBFO/status/1268712530358292484?s=20 https://twitter.com/WBFO/status/1268712530358292484?s=20
- Larrikin 6y ago
  What about when they killed a hit by keeping they knee on his neck while arresting him and preventing anyone from giving him care?
  - crooked-v 6y ago
    Unfortunately, for a lot of white people, oppression isn't real until it happens to white people.
    - SN76477 6y ago
      Very true.
    - creddit 6y ago
      Maybe the major point they’re conveying is that in contrast to the George Floyd murder which could be construed to show isolated issues with cops, it’s unavoidable to paint with a broad brush in the Buffalo incident? But still, feel free to assume their race and prejudices because you’re morally superior or whatever.
    - yyyymmddhhmmss 6y ago
      *poor people
    - mythrwy 6y ago
      Here's something I found interesting. I'm not sure how it got calculated because police kill around 1,000 people a year in the US and about 300 black people a year in the US. https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793 https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793 According to this the chance of black male being killed by police (over lifetime?) is 1 in 1000. The chance of a white male being killed is 1 in 2000. The chance of a female being killed is 1 in 33000. I'm not sure what to say here. Are more men getting killed because men behave more violently (well probably)? Or are more men getting killed because of some bias?
      - komali2 6y ago
        > I'm not sure what to say here. Are more men getting killed because men behave more violently (well probably)? Or are more men getting killed because of some bias? If you're taking feedback here mine would be to avoid drawing such enormous conclusion from such a minimal, uncontextualized set of data.
- mythrwy 6y ago
  And before resigning, they all walk by the guy bleeding on the ground purposefully not looking. Hard to watch that and not be horrified. I guess this guy has been a constant gadfly at protests for some time. I don't know if that had anything to do with it or not but shocking.
  - SN76477 6y ago
    That video is terrible. If even looks as if a second officer is about to strike him again until he is held back by a third officer. But the walking over his body maybe the worst part.
    - loeg 6y ago
      Yeah, at least the two national guardsmen (stuck behind the cop line) check on him as soon as they get a chance.
  - non-entity 6y ago
    If I recall correctly, they also instructed other officers to grab the two witnesses. No not protestors, not rioters, witnesses
  - rectang 6y ago
    > they all walk by the guy bleeding on the ground purposefully not looking. There's another video, slightly longer, which shows that the police stop after a few more seconds and attend to him. I think they were a bit shocked by severe consequences of the shove and uncertain for a moment (even though it was a predictable result of the heavy-handed approach that the police have been taking that somewhere something like this would happen). What is absolutely not forgivable, though, is lying that he "tripped and fell" on the police report. And it's even more outrageous that dozens of officers are coming together to defend that egregious lie!
    - lreeves 6y ago
      That is incorrect; the police continued to walk past and a member of the National Guard ended up attending to him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFeewU0HhNE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFeewU0HhNE
- gridspy 6y ago
  How about when a pregnant couple driving home stops at a red light and comes under fire with pepper bullets due to nearby police?
  - ta17711771 6y ago
    RIP Dorner
    - tartoran 6y ago
      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings_and_manhunt https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings...
    - gowld 6y ago
      RIP the 4 innocent people Dorner murdered.
      - ceejayoz 6y ago
        Certainly, but the case also illustrates serious issues with policing. During the hunt for Dorner, the LAPD shot up three separate sets of innocent people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings_and_manhunt#Truck_misidentifications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings_a...
        ta17711771 6y ago
        Bingo. Alllllso, they burned the house down that he was in, so he wouldn't get his day in court to tell everyone the whole thing was over him reporting excessive force.
    - harryh 6y ago
      I think you might have meant Dorn (as in David Dorn, the ex-cop who was recently killed during looting in St Louis) not Dorner.
- tanilama 6y ago
  Doesn't feel the consequence is enough. The old man could have been dead.
- non-entity 6y ago
  I'll have to try and find the comment, but there was a reddit comment I saw linking to several stories from various media outlets describing the 75 year old man as a "violent agitator", which is apparently also the cities story. Ok apparently the original comment must have been edited, as its now deleted and removeddit shows less content than I remember this morning, but here's an article noting how the mayor framed things: https://nypost.com/2020/06/06/buffalo-mayor-calls-protester-shoved-by-police-an-agitator/ https://nypost.com/2020/06/06/buffalo-mayor-calls-protester-...
  - nickt 6y ago
    They also said he tripped until the video emerged.
    - chillacy 6y ago
      That's what bugs me so much. We'd never know if it weren't for video evidence. Police testimony is treated with high regard in the legal system too, maybe in the age of hard video evidence that should go away.
- ojbyrne 6y ago
  It hasn't been clear to me what "resigned from a riot group" means. Why aren't they all fired for refusing an assignment?
  - ceejayoz 6y ago
    My understanding is it's a task force you volunteer for. Presumably you can un-volunteer.
    - ojbyrne 6y ago
      Yes after a little research I see that. The use of the word “resign” seems like impressive PR though, like they were actually sacrificing something for principles.
- ComputerGuru 6y ago
  I’m afraid the two cops weren’t even fired, they had only been suspended pending investigation. So the rest of the force wasn’t protesting a result in favor of the protestors, they were protesting against even a review of the situation by their peers.
  - poidos 6y ago
    This is where people get the "All" from.
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 6y ago
    Yes, but the case is officially in national spotlight. There will be careers made on the way it is handled one way or another. Right now the pendulum is not on the cops'side so average politician's choice is obvious. It will be hard to sweep it under the rug. Not impossible. Just hard. The public is weary and between Epstein hitting Netflix and current waves of protests with all the surrounding circumstances ( brick pallets come to mind ), I would not be sure what the result would be.
    - samcheng 6y ago
      The "brick pallet" rumor has been thoroughly debunked. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/investigating-bricks-at-protests https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/investig...
      - A4ET8a8uTh0 6y ago
        I won't respond to the debunked claim as I did not read enough on it. That said, the fact that bricks may have always been there does not take anything from my argument. The perception of the existence of spontaneous bricks appearing is already part of today's audience. Lie can go around the world faster than truth can put its shoes on.
      - burgerzzz 6y ago
        Thoroughly? Really?
- twright 6y ago
  It's further been reported that the officers that resigned did so not in solidarity but because the union refuses to legally back them [1]. With the caveat: > “Some of them probably resigned because they support the officer,” said another officer with whom we spoke. “But, for many of us, that’s not true.” [1]: https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-police-ert-members-say-resignation-was-not-in-solidarity-with-suspended-officers https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-p...
  - icpmacdo 6y ago
    There is a lot of support for the officers to be clear though https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1269322620316442625 https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1269322620316442625
- dorkwood 6y ago
  There's another video of a man who approaches a line of police at a protest, likely exchanging a few words but clearly unnarmed and walking very slowly. One police officer walks up to the man and pepper sprays him. As he turns to avoid it, a second police officer approaches, and fires what appears to be a tear gas canister at the man's head from point blank range. Even not knowing what happened leading up to this, it's completely unacceptable behavior. The sheer number of videos just like this one make me ashamed that I ever gave the police the benefit of the doubt in the past. https://mobile.twitter.com/jusalotofpain/status/1267638427723296768 https://mobile.twitter.com/jusalotofpain/status/126763842772...
  - fiblye 6y ago
    God, actually shooting the guy in the head was just disgusting. Spraying him is bad enough. The final shot is nothing more than the officer saying he can do absolutely anything he wants up to and including murder (a projectile to the head like that could easily kill a person) and there's nothing that can stop him. And the worst part is he's right. I've been on the fence about giving up my US citizenship and taking on citizenship in my new home. Seeing the rapid decline in freedom these past two decades, and the absolute mess recently has helped me make up my mind. I can't let myself return to such a place. I can't be happy with myself knowing that my tax dollars are supporting human rights violations. I'm just done with it. Sorry for ranting, but man, it's just frustrating seeing everything that's been happening these past few weeks, and seeing everything that's been happening for so long but ignored until recently.
    - bilegeek 6y ago
      I'm actually curious about your thought process. Not trying to be confrontational. I'm not sure which country you are moving to, but the question is the same. With how much power the US has, and how intertwined the world is, do you believe that you are permanently better off out of the country? Sure, the US is by no means all-powerful; but if the US joins China and Russia's descent into the throes of outright authoritarianism, what leads you to believe you are safe? In this scenario, you would arguably be better off at the onset, but these three countries would surely take the rest of the world down with them? Not even outright invasions and occupations, but bog-standard bullying and destabilization, a la South China Sea or Iraq? EDIT: Iraq was invasion and occupation. That maybe wasn't the best example of mere "destabilization" on my part.
- junyoon 6y ago
  My gosh that’s horrific
- 29athrowaway 6y ago
  Tear gassing pregnant women, shooting at an old man on a wheelchair, attacking journalists, pepper spraying 10 year olds, etc. All this crap while covering their name, badge numbers and turning cameras off. Police unions and their code of silence have enabled all sort of abusive behavior. Also, this: https://theintercept.com/2019/08/30/nypd-anna-chambers-rape-probation/ https://theintercept.com/2019/08/30/nypd-anna-chambers-rape-... Technically in NY and a few other states, the police can legally kidnap you and rape you without any liability.
  - scruple 6y ago
    Police unions are running a protection racket with the cities and municipalities they engage with. I'm at a loss for words for understanding how this even happened. It's a national embarrassment.
- pmorici 6y ago
  This article from a local news station claims the real reason for the resignations is because the union said they wouldn't provide free legal defense to that particular units officers any longer and the two accused had to pony up for their own defense. Doesn't make any of them look better but an interesting wrinkle. https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-police-ert-members-say-resignation-was-not-in-solidarity-with-suspended-officers https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-p...
  - wutbrodo 6y ago
    > Doesn't make any of them look better but an interesting wrinkle. Of course it does. The pragmatic decision not to be without a legal safety net (which even a hypothetical innocent cop would want) is way better than resigning at the first hint of legal accountability.
    - pmorici 6y ago
      Not really. It makes it sound like they know that professional misconduct happens with such frequency in their unit that they can't control themselves. It also turns the story from one of misguided support for a colleague to one of craven self interest. Few if any professions I've ever heard of get blanket legal defense from their union or professional association to defend them against their own blanket misconduct. Soldiers for example manage without it.
      - wutbrodo 6y ago
        > to defend them against their own blanket misconduct. Do they expect defense from blanket misconduct, or from accusations of misconduct while performing their professional duties? There are plenty of rotten cops, and significant institutional rot in police depts, but it's seems unworkable to suggest that they should be on the hook for legal fees to defend against complaints filed in the line of duty. Any system that takes seriously legal complaints against police will inevitably have false positives, which means that even a hypothetically-perfect cop who never does anything wrong risks being exposed to legal fees. > Soldiers for example manage without it. I'm not sure this is a great example; the limiting of rights that soldiers are subject to is pretty despicable IMO; there are plenty of phenomena we'd consider horrific in civil society that have been the norm for thousands of years of military history (hell, the rape problem in the military was treated with as much apathy as the rape problem in _prison_, of course until women started being victims in non-trivial numbers).
- webscalist 6y ago
  They were telling him to back off. But the old man still approaches. Whatever motives you have, it's better to comply to law enforcement first.
  - adrian1973 6y ago
    But it's sad that apparently the reason it is "better to comply to law enforcement first" is not because they will arrest you but because they will pummel you.
  - ramblenode 6y ago
    No, he was standing still talking to the officers in front when the lieutenant saw him and told him to move back, at which point he was pushed by the officers in front.
- __blockcipher__ 6y ago
  The police helmet narrative is actually false. Supposedly he rides a motorcycle and that’s his helmet.
  - post_break 6y ago
    If that's true does it make the story any better?
    - 23B1 6y ago
      Do we care about truth or narrative?
- roenxi 6y ago
  The police are expecting an extremely stressful day where they will be outnumbered by the protestors; possibly by up to an order of magnitude. There is a high risk of physical violence, there is a high risk that the police are going to be attacked politically whatever happens. There is a mood in the air of "believe no cops". Their mindset will be combative, they will be on edge. The old man has to shoulder at least some responsibility here. It was wildly imprudent to get all in-the-face of a police in a civil-unrest situation. He shouldn't have been doing what he did.
  - post_break 6y ago
    If that's what we're jumping to, an old man walking up to police, deserves to be pushed to the ground with enough force for him to almost die, then why don't they skip rubber bullets and switch to live ammo? I mean he was just standing there, menacingly right? Think about your grandpa, imagine if he was the one pushed to the ground and now in ICU and tell me again how stressful it must be to stand in full riot gear and have him approach you, alone.
    - roenxi 6y ago
      Things happen to people that they don't deserve. Life is profoundly unfair. I don't know what a US cop looks like on an ordinary day, but that group look like they are expecting trouble. There might be riots or unrest in their recent history. If you approach a group like that, things might happen that you don't deserve. > Think about your grandpa, imagine if he was the one pushed to the ground and now in ICU and tell me again how stressful it must be to stand in full riot gear and have him approach you, alone. Police aren't lab technicians, they work in an environment where they routinely have to deal with violent criminals who have no respect for the law. It would remain a stressful job, even if I don't like the police. And they should have been stressed; they did the wrong thing and are now in a lot of trouble. If anything, they should have been more stressed.
      - seamyb88 6y ago
        >Things happen to people that they don't deserve. Life is profoundly unfair. Yeah let's build more into institutions.
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  The LAPD shot a homeless man in a wheelchair in the face with a rubber bullet. https://twitter.com/sarahimages/status/1268223068255612930 https://twitter.com/sarahimages/status/1268223068255612930
- scruple 6y ago
  Watched a video of a girl essentially abducted off of the streets last night in San Diego. 3 unmarked minivans pull up to a family walking home from protests and plain clothes cops pull up and grab her right off the street and threaten to shoot the group if they try to follow. It's literally impossible to tell from the video if this person was just grabbed as part of a human trafficking crime or if they really were cops. It _was_ the cops, in the end, and she was eventually released on bail, but that shit is _nightmarish_. All of these videos that we have been seeing on social media are exposing how this style of policing that we live with today has absolutely no place in our society. edit/ Found a link: https://www.kpbs.org/news/2020/jun/05/san-diego-police-officer-threatens-shoot-protester/ https://www.kpbs.org/news/2020/jun/05/san-diego-police-offic...
  - ramblenode 6y ago
    > a human trafficking crime or if they really were cops It can also be both [1]. Sex while being detained by the police is not illegal in 35 states and this was really only brought to light after two plainclothes NYPD detectives took an 18 year old woman in an unmarked van and took turns having sex while the other drove. She claims it was rape and that she was handcuffed the entire time. [1] https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police/theres-no-such-thing-consensual-sex-when-person-police https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-poli...
    - scruple 6y ago
      I feel like I can't even process what you're telling me here. Why would it be legal? What is the purpose? How could that _not_ be abused? I do remember hearing / reading about this case but this whole "sex while detained by the police is not illegal in 35 states..." thing is not something that I recall and is beyond disturbing.
trumpwillwinlol 6y ago
can't wait until this data sci fad passes. tired of seeing horrible interpreted data spread as fact.
jumelles 6y ago
It has been terrifying and astounding to see the police response to protests against brutality with... more brutality.
- koolba 6y ago
  Versus what though? Outnumbered 25:1, rampant looting and mayhem all around, and seeing your mates hit with bottles of water filled with quikcrete, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to me. Just because something makes you feel bad for society doesn’t mean the actions at an individual basis are purely malicious or unreasonable.
  - save_ferris 6y ago
    There have been numerous videos recorded of police brutally assaulting peaceful protestors without any kind of provocation. Just look at Buffalo PD shoving an elderly man to the ground and creating a distraction as the cameras start turning on, or the bystander in Austin who was watching away from any crowds and was sniped with a bean bag round that fractured his skull. There’s been an unbelievable amount of violence perpetrated by police these last few weeks. You cannot stand by this argument if you’ve been watching the footage.
    - koolba 6y ago
      > There’s been an unbelievable amount of violence perpetrated by police these last few weeks. You cannot stand by this argument if you’ve been watching the footage. There’s no way you can say with a straight face that the police have committed more acts of violence and destruction than the rioters.
      - augustt 6y ago
        One side is state sanctioned, you don't see why that might be important? And I'm absolutely willing to bet that more _people_, not property have been injured by police than protesters.
      - 6y ago
saalweachter 6y ago
[EDIT: For context, this was detached from post_break's comment: "When a 75 year old man is trying to return a police helmet to them, and they push him down causing him to bleed from his head and ears, and they fire two officers who did it, and the rest resign from the riot group in purpose in support of the two who pushed him, what else could you possibly expect?"] You can only have one absolute moral principle; everything else must ultimately be contingent on not violating that core principle. I am usually bringing this up on HN in the context of free speech, because I think free speech is a poor choice to make your absolute moral principle. In this context, there's another example of a poor choice for an absolute principle. Brotherhood, fraternity, loyalty to your group is frequently a good thing. Many things only work with trust. But this is what it looks like when brotherhood -- loyalty to your fellow police officers, in this case -- is your absolute moral principle. Upholding the law and protecting the innocent come second to protecting your own.
- crazygringo 6y ago
  There's an entire strand of philosophical thought that disagrees with you about any single core principle existing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_pluralism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_pluralism And modern psychology and neuroscience appear to back it up.
  - danharaj 6y ago
    They didn't say there is one global unique absolute moral principle that anyone can hold. They're saying you can only hold one, because necessarily everything else must be compromised in favor of it.
    - crazygringo 6y ago
      Right. Value pluralism says that's not true. That you can (and do) hold many. And that we make compromises between our different values all day long every day -- within ourselves.
      - 6y ago
RickJWagner 6y ago
Interesing article. Some study should be given to policing at the local level, as that's where policy is actually made. Minnesota is a great example. It's been under Democrat control for decades, but it's where the murderous cop got away with bad behavior for a long time. This is not a problem we can pin on Trump or Republicans.
- shreyansj 6y ago
  We don't have to pin the problem on anyone. But we can agree that the (lack of) solution to the problem lies with the person in-charge at the moment.
  - RickJWagner 6y ago
    I agree. But since policy is set at the local level, isn't the governor or mayor the more logical choice? Why should the article mention the president, but not the governor or mayor?
    - briandear 6y ago
      Because that wouldn’t further the narrative necessary to win back the White House. Some of the most violent cities with some of the most corrupt police forces have been Democrat-led for decades. But somehow Republicans get blamed for Democrat mayors, their puppet police chiefs. Omaha is about the sane size as Minneapolis but it happens to have a Republican mayor. San Diego has a Republican mayor and has far fewer police incidents per capita than LAPD. It’s worth challenging commonly held assumptions, because from my chair, all of the most violent and corrupt cities are deeply Democrat.
  - briandear 6y ago
    The person in charge isn’t in charge of the cities or their police forces. We could ask what prior presidents did to help solve the problem. Under years of a Democrat congress and presidency, there was exactly zero reform. The cynic in my thinks that certain politicians actually like these sorts of problems so they can string together some words that convinces people that they have to vote for them. If everything was great, there wouldn’t be much incentive to vote for the opposition.
A4ET8a8uTh0 6y ago
It is a difficult watch, but the past days brought up a lot of videos that probably would not be more than a blip on a regular day. It is possible that what we are seeing is a straw that broke the camel's back. As I may have disclosed before, I have some cops in my family and I do think they have too much power compared to Europe. edit: corrected the idiom
tw000001 6y ago
I won't deny that there are corruption and accountability problems among US police forces, but I also can't help but feel like many people, especially now, don't appreciate the fact that American police deal with people who are violent, disrespectful, and frequently mentally ill on a sometimes daily basis. These are humans too and they're watching society (and especially media) totally dehumanize them. To some degree their anger is arguably justified. I feel like it's impossible to get an accurate feel for how many people are protesting and what proportion of the population supports the protests. But I have a feeling it's a minority, maybe 10-30% of the population, in which case you cannot let a fraction of your population hold your entire city hostage, especially when opportunists are simultaneously looting and burning, though that seems to have calmed down recently. Point being, if the protestors won't listen when asked to leave, and if they are disrupting the lives and livelihoods of 70-90% of the population, I don't see any option other than gradual escalation, which typically precedes gas and rubber bullets. The police in a city in Canada went on strike in the late 1960s[1]. Things didn't go well. And we've already seen that American demographics are willing to burn and loot even with police present...so I don't mean to defend police but I really don't see anything good coming from police standing down or refusing to use force. 1.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray-Hill_riot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray-Hill_riot Edit: Downvotes are intended for discouraging low effort or otherwise poor comments, not to shame people for disagreeing. Whether you like it or not at least half the country supports police, they play an important role in society, and that makes this a discussion worth having.
- augustt 6y ago
  The majority of Americans feel protesters' anger is justified https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/documents/monmouthpoll_us_060220.pdf/ https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/documents/monmout.... And by the way, the point of protests is not to leave when people ask you to.
  - jariel 6y ago
    You are not responding to the comment. It's not surprising that Americans feel 'anger is justified' however, that's very different from saying for example that 'riots' or 'protests past curfew' are supported. "And by the way, the point of protests is not to leave when people ask you to." No - it is absolutely not. Neither you nor I get to decide what is lawful and what is not. The 'rules' are a 'social contract' that we all get a say in, you don't get more of a say because you want to hold a sign up past 10 pm or block a street. It's disturbing to read this because I don't think people grasp the real variety in American opinion out there, and what some others might want to 'protests beyond what the community wants them to'. You might find yourself on the other side of the fence. Not only this - it's counterproductive. Things like 'million man march' do a lot more good than the Watts riots, which are both directly damaging to the community, and probably very damaging to the movement. If the point is to 'make change' - people are losing tons of allies by stepping outside the bounds of civility. Everyone is fine with signs in parks, and possibly a march through town - beyond that, it's just bad.
jariel 6y ago
So the keyword here is 'perception' - which is ultimately a game of populism, which dry realists may loathe a little bit. There are some very good arguments for 'critical masses of sentiment' necessary to effectuate actual change, at the same time, populism is a war for 'hearts and minds' and the first casualty in every war is of course the Truth. Personally, I'm far more interested in real nature of every day policing, which is a complex and nuanced subject, not likely suitable for the narrative-driven vignettes proposed to use every night on cable news. I believe that 'narrative and populist driven change' is usually not the best way forward. We've seen this very poignantly with the rise of the 'doctors and bureaucrats' to the fore of public display during the Covid epidemic. It's been mostly heartwarming to hear from the dry, mundane, secular, academic mandarins managing our pandemic responses behind the scenes. Dr. Bonnie Henry managing British Columbia's COVID response as a fairly good example; we're now getting actually charts and data to explain and validate the inherently complex nature of COVID, and the impetus for the resulting action. On TV, the narrative-drivers and those trying to make big statements completely drown out a much-need opportunity for dispassionate discussion about this issue. I feel that people are being highly misled one way or another to the point that when real facts and hard evidence don't align with a narrative, they become anthemic to the presentation, and anyone proposing to discuss them becomes a heathen to the cause. A lot of people are spending a lot of time, decades even, in bubbles of 'very incomplete information'. America has made huge strides in all sorts of areas, and in most ways 'it's better than it's ever been'. I wouldn't for a second give Trump (or any incumbent president) credit for this but as avg. Black income, wage-gap, and unemployment-gaps become historically low even during his tenure, this is saying a lot. If you look at the broad measures of ostensible progress, they don't really jump at points of social contention, really, it looks mostly good over broad units of time. Progress is mostly a steady grind, made by a lot of thoughtful people. Particularly disturbing is the entrance of major brands, deciding to participate in the situation - though sometimes it's hard to see how earnest intention may be exploited ... it definitely is. Master marketers don't sell you products really on the basis of function, rather an aspiration - and if that aspiration has moved off the court onto the streets, you can be sure that someone hustling you shoes because of a deeply held political or social conviction ... it's a huge red flag. It takes a real kind of mindfulness to 'see something bad in a video or tweet' as a data point, instead of an emblem. A quick gander through Pew polling, actual police stats, victimization reports, and decent research paints a totally different picture than one would form from reading headlines or drowning in Tweets.
nickt 6y ago
If you're in a position of appointed authority, then surely special rules must apply. How about starting with 3x the sentence of a normal citizen for breaking the same rules?
- Mirioron 6y ago
  I'm not sure that increasing the punishment would help. They need to actually be punished for breaking the rules. Not sometimes, but every time they break those rules.
  - NotSammyHagar 6y ago
    I advocate we make a specific law that witnessing a felony action by a fellow police officer and not reporting it become a chargeable offense on its own. We also make it illegal to not make the officer investigations private after some threshold, like 5 diff cases. I get that there are false accusations but they have too much power and we need to go the other way.
- abootstrapper 6y ago
  I’d settle for 1x the sentence of a normal citizen. Right now they can literally get away with murder. Not to mention infractions like drinking and driving and speeding, that they let each other off for.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
softwaredoug 6y ago
I think a lot about how so many police officers are Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. How much has this experience altered departments perception of what it means to police? Or influenced to baddest actors to behave like they do?
- jetti 6y ago
  There is an episode of Behind the Bastards[0] that covers David Grossman, the creator of Bulletproof Training which has trained thousands of police. Grossman’s training involved instilling a sense of fear in the officers which promotes a mentality of fearing for their safety even when it is apparent the officer isn’t in danger. Using made up phrases such as “killology” which Grossman claims to study and using false data (saying it is more dangerous to be a cop now than ever before despite evidence of the contrary). The training materials even use bible verses to justify why it is ok for an officer to kill, even when the situation wouldn’t necessarily warrant even a draw of the gun. [0] https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/the-man-who-teaches-our-cops-63257870/ https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236...
- battery_cowboy 6y ago
  Honestly, when I was in the Navy training in a security squadron, we were basically taught to deescalate, use the lowest force we could, be it hands, mace, a baton, a pistol, the machine gun, etc. We were drilled never to use deadly force unless it was very clear we were in danger, were told to shoot second, because it's better to risk ourselves than risk killing an innocent person, that our backup would ensure the security of the ship or base so we didn't need to get trigger happy. I remember, strongly, the great fear I had about accidentally hurting the wrong person whenever we had live security events and i had to unholster my pistol. I just don't get the way police are trained, they are there to risk themselves to ensure others are safe, even the criminals. Instead, they're trained to treat them worse than i was trained to treat literal terrorists.
  - bmn__ 6y ago
    The parent post was censored. I "vouched" it so it becomes visible again. The censorship that HN readers bring to the forum disgusts me. To those responsible for censoring the parent post: get bent. You cowards have no place here.
creative_bud 6y ago
Imagine isolated anectdata determining people's opinions of police! One of the first rules of understanding the world is to not let emotionally charged anecdotes, isolated events and individual mistakes determine how you judge groups, trends and collectives. What's happened in the last week is that targeted propaganda has flooded people with a few isolated examples of bad things happening and letting people's emotional response mechanisms do the rest. Did you know that tens of thousands of people die from medical malpractice and medical errors each year? There are many thousands fewer people suffering from police brutality, yet somehow the police have an infinitely worse reputation than doctors and surgeons yet your chances of being killed by a surgeon is far higher than being killed by a cop. The police do one of the hardest jobs in the country, dealing with the worst elements of society every single day. It's shocking to me that there isn't far more "brutality" every year than there is, and I commend the police for keeping us safe while having to deal with people that hate them and want them dead every day. The judgement callously meted out on police on HN and elsewhere is completely unjustified.
- Someone1234 6y ago
  Your analogy kind of works against you: Doctors have their own personal liability insurance, if they make too many mistakes they literally cannot afford to continue working in medicine (or have to move to a lower risk sub-field that have lower base premiums). If police held their own individual liability insurance, and it too could become uneconomical for them to continue to practice law enforcement, I'd consider that a huge improvement over the status quo. If you want law enforcement to be comparable to medicine, then oversight is going to raise tenfold.
  - creative_bud 6y ago
    Police act in a hostile environment which can't be compared to the environment in which surgeons and doctors operate. Where their lives are not at risk. Mistakes are more understandable and more likely in hostile environments, which makes it a wonder that there are not more instances of police making serious errors given all the interactions police have with hostile and combative people.
- 6y ago
ngngngng 6y ago
A lot of people are talking about changing the laws so that officers aren't protected by qualified immunity or unions, but as far as I understand, one of the main problems is prosecutors. Prosecutors require police to bring them people to prosecute. If a prosecutor starts going after cops, they've now pissed off a group of people they rely on the get their job done, so most prosecutors won't prosecute cops. I imagine this could be fixed by states having a special prosecutor specifically for those that are now considered protected by qualified immunity, which is more than just police. Also we should get rid of qualified immunity, which is an insult to the constitution.
- graeme 6y ago
  Qualified immunity is for civil lawsuits actually. On the criminal side I think prosecutors + police union negotiations for more lenient investigations are the big issue.
- ardy42 6y ago
  > A lot of people are talking about changing the laws so that officers aren't protected by qualified immunity or unions, but as far as I understand, one of the main problems is prosecutors. It's all connected. The police unions push back hard against reforms in the prosecutors' office that might subject them to more scrutiny. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/06/us/police-unions-minneapolis-kroll.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/06/us/police-unions-minneapo... > In St. Louis, when Kim Gardner was elected the top prosecutor four years ago, she set out to rein in the city’s high rate of police violence. But after she proposed a unit within the prosecutor’s office that would independently investigate misconduct, she ran into the powerful local police union. > The union pressured lawmakers to set aside the proposal, which many supported but then never brought to a vote. Around the same time, a lawyer for the union waged a legal fight to limit the ability of the prosecutor’s office to investigate police misconduct. The following year, a leader of the union said Ms. Gardner should be removed “by force or by choice.”
  - corty 6y ago
    I think police unions is the one instance where union busting or just plainly making unions illegal would be justified.
corty 6y ago
Public perception of the police degrading is a first good sign. What is important are the next steps: the police needs accountability, police misbehaviour must be investigated independently. Not by the police, not by the prosecutor they work with every other week. The police must be made to understand they are being watched, very closely, by technical, legal and human means. Only then will they think twice before stepping out of line. And each misstep needs to have proportionate consequences that take into account the misuse of power as well as the crime itself, so punishment must be harsher than for mere mortals, not the usual slap on the wrist. Changes in training or authorized uses of force are useless smoke and mirrors without proper accountability. Quis enim custodiet ipsos custodies?
- tartoran 6y ago
  This is obvious and I really hope things will change. But I wonder if they will change meaningfully not just superficially
  - corty 6y ago
    It may seem obvious, but I think this needs to be repeated over and over again. Otherwise nothing will come from this mess, just warm words and symbolic measures
    - tartoran 6y ago
      Yeah, random riots whenever they are prepared the least. Im so angry at how cops can legally hit, punch, injure, shoot and how they use their power and do so indiscriminately on whoever they are angry at the moment and face no repercussions. And when repercussions are possible they hide their badges...
aswanson 6y ago
I'm black, got my license to drive the year Rodney King got assaulted by cops that got exonerated by an all white jury. Glad some of my fellow Americans woke up to my reality.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- tartoran 6y ago
  We knew about your reality but were as powerless as you were. Look who became president in 2016 because we had the nerve to vote a black president. And I really do wonder what they’re up to next. After Bush I thought it cannot go lower but it did. I really want to be positive but am still shocked by whats been happening
  - viklove 6y ago
    You'd be shocked if you looked into how little (read: nothing) Obama did about police overreach and lack of oversight. Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump... when it comes to police brutality they're all the same. This isn't a partisan issue, the color of your tie does not wash your hands of blame here. The Dem party's marketing dept should all get raises, though. For some reason you seem to believe that having a black president who did absolutely nothing for black people was better for black people than Trump. When it comes to policy or enforcement changes, this could not be further from the truth.
- tzs 6y ago
  Probably not relevant, but the jury was mostly white, not all white. It included a biracial man, a Latino, and an Asian.
- masonic 6y ago
  That jury wasn't all-white; 9 of 12 were white. In the Federal jury that later convicted Koon and Powell of Federal civil rights violations, there were likewise 9 of 12 white jurors. Modern American jurors don't inherently judge on race. For another example, the jury that convicted congressman Mel Reynolds on all charges was half black: https://www.nytimes.com/1995/08/23/us/congressman-convicted-of-sexual-assault.html https://www.nytimes.com/1995/08/23/us/congressman-convicted-...
moneytide1 6y ago
In Total War: Rome II, you can commission the training of "spy" agents with multiple abilities that can be exercised against opposing faction cities. One of these abilities is "incite unrest". Across several turns, this can enable a war of attrition ( a turn represents a year or a season I cannot remember). Death by 1000 cuts is a way to reduce the morale and economic output of a city in order to eventually conquer it. Here is an excerpt from a forum dialogue about the game: "Incite Unreast give "X" public order penality, depending on your agent skills and traits. Army gives "X" public order boost depending on army size and general traits and skills. So yes. The best tactic would put as many agents as you can get into far positions, champions can decrease public order as a passive, spy like you already know they pay for it, armies can raid, which decrease their upkeep and steal some of their income for youself." https://steamcommunity.com/app/214950/discussions/0/619569341074772436/ https://steamcommunity.com/app/214950/discussions/0/61956934...
- noobermin 6y ago
  Real life isn't a video game.
  - moneytide1 6y ago
    Here's an excerpt from an article: “It is an open secret,” he said, “that secret services of imperialist powers and foreign anti-Soviet centers actively join extremist nationalistic actions. Later on, they start playing the part of open instigators of hostile actions aimed at kindling hostility among nations. One should not underestimate the danger of this method of subversive activity.” https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-04-14-mn-1958-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-04-14-mn-1958-s... (a red flag here is that the word "secret" is repeated rapidly in succession. Timeless "click" bait before Jobs ever visited Xerox). We must first consider credibility of a dot com site. LA times does not represent vast majority. But this is from 1988. Fear mongering conspiracies can get tongues flapping. This is also before digital proliferation of media injection into cultures (click). Behind "video games" are 20-50 year old minds digesting their environment and historical records made available to them by their coordinated government(s). My "real life" has not been affected by rioting and widespread respitory pandemic (destroyed storefronts are not selling things I want, economic furlough gifts me spare time and empty streets to hone new skills and more quickly traverse new domains). I am interested in the Phoenix that rises from this reset (dust is still in the air and must settle). From the wikipedia article for Principle of Charity: "The first to state this hermeneutic principle was Rabbi Meir ... 'A person does not say things without reason'." The video game designers are steadily sculpting their audience's perception of "real life" via their own art form.
tamaharbor 6y ago
So I guess politics is acceptable here as long as it fits the democrat narrative?
codeddesign 6y ago
Why is this even on HN? Leave this stuff to google news. The great part of HN is that it’s an amazing space for tech news, rather than political, sociological, or world news. Deviations like this just bring down the original purpose and integrity of going to HN.
- codeddesign 6y ago
  As per guidelines, wouldn’t this be considered “off topic”? “ Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.”
- camel_Snake 6y ago
  So don't click on it? I respect your opinion, it's a common one on this site, but I don't see how it's any different than a post about a technology you're not interested in.
  - codeddesign 6y ago
    See my second comment as per the guidelines of HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html The argument is the type of content, not the content itself. This content falls into mainstream events which would be against HN guidelines. *edits for grammatical errors
l0b0 6y ago
This situation reminds me of an interesting series on the first UK police force, how basically it grew out of robber gangs and went back and forth between a force for good and a force for consolidating power at the cost of ordinary citizens. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvMQY_y4qx8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvMQY_y4qx8
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
irrational 6y ago
My 10 year old son keeps saying, "I thought the police were our friends?" Frankly he is traumatized by the actions of the police he is seeing on the news. Yesterday we were driving to the pharmacy to get some medicine and he suddenly started crying and freaking out. It turned out that he saw a police car and was convinced we were going to be pulled over and killed. Thankfully my state has just passed a law making it illegal for police to enter elementary or secondary school grounds except in the case of an emergency. At least he will probably be safe from the police at school.
- robotron 6y ago
  I feel as if I should explain something to my child but have been kind of shielding them. I'm seriously conflicted.
- mnm1 6y ago
  Why would he think "police are our friends?" I did not think that at 7 let alone 10, but I grew up in a place where being mistaken about the reality of police could get you or your family arrested or killed. So a place not much different than America. Why is your son so delusional? Why not teach him to know better? Then he won't be afraid, he'll be informed and cautious.
alerighi 6y ago
So after all of that, still 61% of white americans stands by the side of the police? As a normal european citizens, americans what is your problem? Something like that here would have been considered unacceptable by everyone, beside some stupid neo fascist parties that fortunately are a small minority: not only killing a person for nothing, but then using violence against peaceful protesters.
- nojvek 6y ago
  The issue runs deeper. America is really divided amongst the political lines. People either identify as Democrats or Republican. The Racial injustice and protests are seen as Democratic and mostly happening in coastal states that vote blue most of the time. The inner states (which are mostly white) vote the opposite. This really doesn’t surprise me. America like its political polarization is also quite divided racially. Our president further propagates this with Xenophobia. We’re quite backwards compared to Europe like that.
- mnm1 6y ago
  Stupid neo fascist parties make up at least half of America and currently hold the presidency and Senate. That is the problem. Europe is racist as fuck but America's racism is on a whole new level. It's so ingrained into American culture, we have monuments glorifying it. Many Americans are proud of it. It's a core part of their identity. The entire society is based upon it. Entire industries depend on it (police, prison, etc.). And this goes back hundreds of years. That's the problem. It's hard to be a normal person in the US and denounce this history and stand up for what's right. So half are not and do not.

204 points by srameshc 6y ago

bovermyer 6y ago

Ancedote: my father-in-law is a prison guard in Minneapolis. HIS opinion of police has plummeted in the last week.

SN76477 6y ago
Powerful stuff.

reminddit 6y ago

graph is like unemployment. Several deviations drop from mean. Expert's models say they are rare, but they are always wrong. Now the anger is toward those experts whose models always break because they don't handle the extremes, while they are drinking coffee in their ivory towers.

rsynnott 6y ago
Rapid shifts in public opinion in response to high profile events aren’t at all rare, and I don’t think any experts were claiming they were...

post_break 6y ago

When a 75 year old man is trying to return a police helmet to them, and they push him down causing him to bleed from his head and ears, and they fire two officers who did it, and the rest resign from the riot group in purpose in support of the two who pushed him, what else could you possibly expect? https://twitter.com/WBFO/status/1268712530358292484?s=20 https://twitter.com/WBFO/status/1268712530358292484?s=20

Larrikin 6y ago
What about when they killed a hit by keeping they knee on his neck while arresting him and preventing anyone from giving him care?
- crooked-v 6y ago
  Unfortunately, for a lot of white people, oppression isn't real until it happens to white people.
  - SN76477 6y ago
    Very true.
  - creddit 6y ago
    Maybe the major point they’re conveying is that in contrast to the George Floyd murder which could be construed to show isolated issues with cops, it’s unavoidable to paint with a broad brush in the Buffalo incident? But still, feel free to assume their race and prejudices because you’re morally superior or whatever.
  - yyyymmddhhmmss 6y ago
    *poor people
  - mythrwy 6y ago
    Here's something I found interesting. I'm not sure how it got calculated because police kill around 1,000 people a year in the US and about 300 black people a year in the US. https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793 https://www.pnas.org/content/116/34/16793 According to this the chance of black male being killed by police (over lifetime?) is 1 in 1000. The chance of a white male being killed is 1 in 2000. The chance of a female being killed is 1 in 33000. I'm not sure what to say here. Are more men getting killed because men behave more violently (well probably)? Or are more men getting killed because of some bias?
    - komali2 6y ago
      > I'm not sure what to say here. Are more men getting killed because men behave more violently (well probably)? Or are more men getting killed because of some bias? If you're taking feedback here mine would be to avoid drawing such enormous conclusion from such a minimal, uncontextualized set of data.
mythrwy 6y ago
And before resigning, they all walk by the guy bleeding on the ground purposefully not looking. Hard to watch that and not be horrified. I guess this guy has been a constant gadfly at protests for some time. I don't know if that had anything to do with it or not but shocking.
- SN76477 6y ago
  That video is terrible. If even looks as if a second officer is about to strike him again until he is held back by a third officer. But the walking over his body maybe the worst part.
  - loeg 6y ago
    Yeah, at least the two national guardsmen (stuck behind the cop line) check on him as soon as they get a chance.
- non-entity 6y ago
  If I recall correctly, they also instructed other officers to grab the two witnesses. No not protestors, not rioters, witnesses
- rectang 6y ago
  > they all walk by the guy bleeding on the ground purposefully not looking. There's another video, slightly longer, which shows that the police stop after a few more seconds and attend to him. I think they were a bit shocked by severe consequences of the shove and uncertain for a moment (even though it was a predictable result of the heavy-handed approach that the police have been taking that somewhere something like this would happen). What is absolutely not forgivable, though, is lying that he "tripped and fell" on the police report. And it's even more outrageous that dozens of officers are coming together to defend that egregious lie!
  - lreeves 6y ago
    That is incorrect; the police continued to walk past and a member of the National Guard ended up attending to him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFeewU0HhNE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFeewU0HhNE
gridspy 6y ago
How about when a pregnant couple driving home stops at a red light and comes under fire with pepper bullets due to nearby police?
- ta17711771 6y ago
  RIP Dorner
  - tartoran 6y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings_and_manhunt https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings...
  - gowld 6y ago
    RIP the 4 innocent people Dorner murdered.
    - ceejayoz 6y ago
      Certainly, but the case also illustrates serious issues with policing. During the hunt for Dorner, the LAPD shot up three separate sets of innocent people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings_and_manhunt#Truck_misidentifications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dorner_shootings_a...
      - ta17711771 6y ago
        Bingo. Alllllso, they burned the house down that he was in, so he wouldn't get his day in court to tell everyone the whole thing was over him reporting excessive force.
  - harryh 6y ago
    I think you might have meant Dorn (as in David Dorn, the ex-cop who was recently killed during looting in St Louis) not Dorner.
tanilama 6y ago
Doesn't feel the consequence is enough. The old man could have been dead.
non-entity 6y ago
I'll have to try and find the comment, but there was a reddit comment I saw linking to several stories from various media outlets describing the 75 year old man as a "violent agitator", which is apparently also the cities story. Ok apparently the original comment must have been edited, as its now deleted and removeddit shows less content than I remember this morning, but here's an article noting how the mayor framed things: https://nypost.com/2020/06/06/buffalo-mayor-calls-protester-shoved-by-police-an-agitator/ https://nypost.com/2020/06/06/buffalo-mayor-calls-protester-...
- nickt 6y ago
  They also said he tripped until the video emerged.
  - chillacy 6y ago
    That's what bugs me so much. We'd never know if it weren't for video evidence. Police testimony is treated with high regard in the legal system too, maybe in the age of hard video evidence that should go away.
ojbyrne 6y ago
It hasn't been clear to me what "resigned from a riot group" means. Why aren't they all fired for refusing an assignment?
- ceejayoz 6y ago
  My understanding is it's a task force you volunteer for. Presumably you can un-volunteer.
  - ojbyrne 6y ago
    Yes after a little research I see that. The use of the word “resign” seems like impressive PR though, like they were actually sacrificing something for principles.
ComputerGuru 6y ago
I’m afraid the two cops weren’t even fired, they had only been suspended pending investigation. So the rest of the force wasn’t protesting a result in favor of the protestors, they were protesting against even a review of the situation by their peers.
- poidos 6y ago
  This is where people get the "All" from.
- A4ET8a8uTh0 6y ago
  Yes, but the case is officially in national spotlight. There will be careers made on the way it is handled one way or another. Right now the pendulum is not on the cops'side so average politician's choice is obvious. It will be hard to sweep it under the rug. Not impossible. Just hard. The public is weary and between Epstein hitting Netflix and current waves of protests with all the surrounding circumstances ( brick pallets come to mind ), I would not be sure what the result would be.
  - samcheng 6y ago
    The "brick pallet" rumor has been thoroughly debunked. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/investigating-bricks-at-protests https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/investig...
    - A4ET8a8uTh0 6y ago
      I won't respond to the debunked claim as I did not read enough on it. That said, the fact that bricks may have always been there does not take anything from my argument. The perception of the existence of spontaneous bricks appearing is already part of today's audience. Lie can go around the world faster than truth can put its shoes on.
    - burgerzzz 6y ago
      Thoroughly? Really?
twright 6y ago
It's further been reported that the officers that resigned did so not in solidarity but because the union refuses to legally back them [1]. With the caveat: > “Some of them probably resigned because they support the officer,” said another officer with whom we spoke. “But, for many of us, that’s not true.” [1]: https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-police-ert-members-say-resignation-was-not-in-solidarity-with-suspended-officers https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-p...
- icpmacdo 6y ago
  There is a lot of support for the officers to be clear though https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1269322620316442625 https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1269322620316442625
dorkwood 6y ago
There's another video of a man who approaches a line of police at a protest, likely exchanging a few words but clearly unnarmed and walking very slowly. One police officer walks up to the man and pepper sprays him. As he turns to avoid it, a second police officer approaches, and fires what appears to be a tear gas canister at the man's head from point blank range. Even not knowing what happened leading up to this, it's completely unacceptable behavior. The sheer number of videos just like this one make me ashamed that I ever gave the police the benefit of the doubt in the past. https://mobile.twitter.com/jusalotofpain/status/1267638427723296768 https://mobile.twitter.com/jusalotofpain/status/126763842772...
- fiblye 6y ago
  God, actually shooting the guy in the head was just disgusting. Spraying him is bad enough. The final shot is nothing more than the officer saying he can do absolutely anything he wants up to and including murder (a projectile to the head like that could easily kill a person) and there's nothing that can stop him. And the worst part is he's right. I've been on the fence about giving up my US citizenship and taking on citizenship in my new home. Seeing the rapid decline in freedom these past two decades, and the absolute mess recently has helped me make up my mind. I can't let myself return to such a place. I can't be happy with myself knowing that my tax dollars are supporting human rights violations. I'm just done with it. Sorry for ranting, but man, it's just frustrating seeing everything that's been happening these past few weeks, and seeing everything that's been happening for so long but ignored until recently.
  - bilegeek 6y ago
    I'm actually curious about your thought process. Not trying to be confrontational. I'm not sure which country you are moving to, but the question is the same. With how much power the US has, and how intertwined the world is, do you believe that you are permanently better off out of the country? Sure, the US is by no means all-powerful; but if the US joins China and Russia's descent into the throes of outright authoritarianism, what leads you to believe you are safe? In this scenario, you would arguably be better off at the onset, but these three countries would surely take the rest of the world down with them? Not even outright invasions and occupations, but bog-standard bullying and destabilization, a la South China Sea or Iraq? EDIT: Iraq was invasion and occupation. That maybe wasn't the best example of mere "destabilization" on my part.
junyoon 6y ago
My gosh that’s horrific
29athrowaway 6y ago
Tear gassing pregnant women, shooting at an old man on a wheelchair, attacking journalists, pepper spraying 10 year olds, etc. All this crap while covering their name, badge numbers and turning cameras off. Police unions and their code of silence have enabled all sort of abusive behavior. Also, this: https://theintercept.com/2019/08/30/nypd-anna-chambers-rape-probation/ https://theintercept.com/2019/08/30/nypd-anna-chambers-rape-... Technically in NY and a few other states, the police can legally kidnap you and rape you without any liability.
- scruple 6y ago
  Police unions are running a protection racket with the cities and municipalities they engage with. I'm at a loss for words for understanding how this even happened. It's a national embarrassment.
pmorici 6y ago
This article from a local news station claims the real reason for the resignations is because the union said they wouldn't provide free legal defense to that particular units officers any longer and the two accused had to pony up for their own defense. Doesn't make any of them look better but an interesting wrinkle. https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-police-ert-members-say-resignation-was-not-in-solidarity-with-suspended-officers https://www.wkbw.com/news/local-news/exclusive-two-buffalo-p...
- wutbrodo 6y ago
  > Doesn't make any of them look better but an interesting wrinkle. Of course it does. The pragmatic decision not to be without a legal safety net (which even a hypothetical innocent cop would want) is way better than resigning at the first hint of legal accountability.
  - pmorici 6y ago
    Not really. It makes it sound like they know that professional misconduct happens with such frequency in their unit that they can't control themselves. It also turns the story from one of misguided support for a colleague to one of craven self interest. Few if any professions I've ever heard of get blanket legal defense from their union or professional association to defend them against their own blanket misconduct. Soldiers for example manage without it.
    - wutbrodo 6y ago
      > to defend them against their own blanket misconduct. Do they expect defense from blanket misconduct, or from accusations of misconduct while performing their professional duties? There are plenty of rotten cops, and significant institutional rot in police depts, but it's seems unworkable to suggest that they should be on the hook for legal fees to defend against complaints filed in the line of duty. Any system that takes seriously legal complaints against police will inevitably have false positives, which means that even a hypothetically-perfect cop who never does anything wrong risks being exposed to legal fees. > Soldiers for example manage without it. I'm not sure this is a great example; the limiting of rights that soldiers are subject to is pretty despicable IMO; there are plenty of phenomena we'd consider horrific in civil society that have been the norm for thousands of years of military history (hell, the rape problem in the military was treated with as much apathy as the rape problem in _prison_, of course until women started being victims in non-trivial numbers).
webscalist 6y ago
They were telling him to back off. But the old man still approaches. Whatever motives you have, it's better to comply to law enforcement first.
- adrian1973 6y ago
  But it's sad that apparently the reason it is "better to comply to law enforcement first" is not because they will arrest you but because they will pummel you.
- ramblenode 6y ago
  No, he was standing still talking to the officers in front when the lieutenant saw him and told him to move back, at which point he was pushed by the officers in front.
__blockcipher__ 6y ago
The police helmet narrative is actually false. Supposedly he rides a motorcycle and that’s his helmet.
- post_break 6y ago
  If that's true does it make the story any better?
  - 23B1 6y ago
    Do we care about truth or narrative?
roenxi 6y ago
The police are expecting an extremely stressful day where they will be outnumbered by the protestors; possibly by up to an order of magnitude. There is a high risk of physical violence, there is a high risk that the police are going to be attacked politically whatever happens. There is a mood in the air of "believe no cops". Their mindset will be combative, they will be on edge. The old man has to shoulder at least some responsibility here. It was wildly imprudent to get all in-the-face of a police in a civil-unrest situation. He shouldn't have been doing what he did.
- post_break 6y ago
  If that's what we're jumping to, an old man walking up to police, deserves to be pushed to the ground with enough force for him to almost die, then why don't they skip rubber bullets and switch to live ammo? I mean he was just standing there, menacingly right? Think about your grandpa, imagine if he was the one pushed to the ground and now in ICU and tell me again how stressful it must be to stand in full riot gear and have him approach you, alone.
  - roenxi 6y ago
    Things happen to people that they don't deserve. Life is profoundly unfair. I don't know what a US cop looks like on an ordinary day, but that group look like they are expecting trouble. There might be riots or unrest in their recent history. If you approach a group like that, things might happen that you don't deserve. > Think about your grandpa, imagine if he was the one pushed to the ground and now in ICU and tell me again how stressful it must be to stand in full riot gear and have him approach you, alone. Police aren't lab technicians, they work in an environment where they routinely have to deal with violent criminals who have no respect for the law. It would remain a stressful job, even if I don't like the police. And they should have been stressed; they did the wrong thing and are now in a lot of trouble. If anything, they should have been more stressed.
    - seamyb88 6y ago
      >Things happen to people that they don't deserve. Life is profoundly unfair. Yeah let's build more into institutions.
Gibbon1 6y ago
The LAPD shot a homeless man in a wheelchair in the face with a rubber bullet. https://twitter.com/sarahimages/status/1268223068255612930 https://twitter.com/sarahimages/status/1268223068255612930
scruple 6y ago
Watched a video of a girl essentially abducted off of the streets last night in San Diego. 3 unmarked minivans pull up to a family walking home from protests and plain clothes cops pull up and grab her right off the street and threaten to shoot the group if they try to follow. It's literally impossible to tell from the video if this person was just grabbed as part of a human trafficking crime or if they really were cops. It _was_ the cops, in the end, and she was eventually released on bail, but that shit is _nightmarish_. All of these videos that we have been seeing on social media are exposing how this style of policing that we live with today has absolutely no place in our society. edit/ Found a link: https://www.kpbs.org/news/2020/jun/05/san-diego-police-officer-threatens-shoot-protester/ https://www.kpbs.org/news/2020/jun/05/san-diego-police-offic...
- ramblenode 6y ago
  > a human trafficking crime or if they really were cops It can also be both [1]. Sex while being detained by the police is not illegal in 35 states and this was really only brought to light after two plainclothes NYPD detectives took an 18 year old woman in an unmarked van and took turns having sex while the other drove. She claims it was rape and that she was handcuffed the entire time. [1] https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police/theres-no-such-thing-consensual-sex-when-person-police https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-poli...
  - scruple 6y ago
    I feel like I can't even process what you're telling me here. Why would it be legal? What is the purpose? How could that _not_ be abused? I do remember hearing / reading about this case but this whole "sex while detained by the police is not illegal in 35 states..." thing is not something that I recall and is beyond disturbing.

trumpwillwinlol 6y ago

can't wait until this data sci fad passes. tired of seeing horrible interpreted data spread as fact.

jumelles 6y ago

It has been terrifying and astounding to see the police response to protests against brutality with... more brutality.

koolba 6y ago
Versus what though? Outnumbered 25:1, rampant looting and mayhem all around, and seeing your mates hit with bottles of water filled with quikcrete, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to me. Just because something makes you feel bad for society doesn’t mean the actions at an individual basis are purely malicious or unreasonable.
- save_ferris 6y ago
  There have been numerous videos recorded of police brutally assaulting peaceful protestors without any kind of provocation. Just look at Buffalo PD shoving an elderly man to the ground and creating a distraction as the cameras start turning on, or the bystander in Austin who was watching away from any crowds and was sniped with a bean bag round that fractured his skull. There’s been an unbelievable amount of violence perpetrated by police these last few weeks. You cannot stand by this argument if you’ve been watching the footage.
  - koolba 6y ago
    > There’s been an unbelievable amount of violence perpetrated by police these last few weeks. You cannot stand by this argument if you’ve been watching the footage. There’s no way you can say with a straight face that the police have committed more acts of violence and destruction than the rioters.
    - augustt 6y ago
      One side is state sanctioned, you don't see why that might be important? And I'm absolutely willing to bet that more _people_, not property have been injured by police than protesters.
    - 6y ago

saalweachter 6y ago

[EDIT: For context, this was detached from post_break's comment: "When a 75 year old man is trying to return a police helmet to them, and they push him down causing him to bleed from his head and ears, and they fire two officers who did it, and the rest resign from the riot group in purpose in support of the two who pushed him, what else could you possibly expect?"] You can only have one absolute moral principle; everything else must ultimately be contingent on not violating that core principle. I am usually bringing this up on HN in the context of free speech, because I think free speech is a poor choice to make your absolute moral principle. In this context, there's another example of a poor choice for an absolute principle. Brotherhood, fraternity, loyalty to your group is frequently a good thing. Many things only work with trust. But this is what it looks like when brotherhood -- loyalty to your fellow police officers, in this case -- is your absolute moral principle. Upholding the law and protecting the innocent come second to protecting your own.

crazygringo 6y ago
There's an entire strand of philosophical thought that disagrees with you about any single core principle existing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_pluralism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_pluralism And modern psychology and neuroscience appear to back it up.
- danharaj 6y ago
  They didn't say there is one global unique absolute moral principle that anyone can hold. They're saying you can only hold one, because necessarily everything else must be compromised in favor of it.
  - crazygringo 6y ago
    Right. Value pluralism says that's not true. That you can (and do) hold many. And that we make compromises between our different values all day long every day -- within ourselves.
    - 6y ago

RickJWagner 6y ago

Interesing article. Some study should be given to policing at the local level, as that's where policy is actually made. Minnesota is a great example. It's been under Democrat control for decades, but it's where the murderous cop got away with bad behavior for a long time. This is not a problem we can pin on Trump or Republicans.

shreyansj 6y ago
We don't have to pin the problem on anyone. But we can agree that the (lack of) solution to the problem lies with the person in-charge at the moment.
- RickJWagner 6y ago
  I agree. But since policy is set at the local level, isn't the governor or mayor the more logical choice? Why should the article mention the president, but not the governor or mayor?
  - briandear 6y ago
    Because that wouldn’t further the narrative necessary to win back the White House. Some of the most violent cities with some of the most corrupt police forces have been Democrat-led for decades. But somehow Republicans get blamed for Democrat mayors, their puppet police chiefs. Omaha is about the sane size as Minneapolis but it happens to have a Republican mayor. San Diego has a Republican mayor and has far fewer police incidents per capita than LAPD. It’s worth challenging commonly held assumptions, because from my chair, all of the most violent and corrupt cities are deeply Democrat.
- briandear 6y ago
  The person in charge isn’t in charge of the cities or their police forces. We could ask what prior presidents did to help solve the problem. Under years of a Democrat congress and presidency, there was exactly zero reform. The cynic in my thinks that certain politicians actually like these sorts of problems so they can string together some words that convinces people that they have to vote for them. If everything was great, there wouldn’t be much incentive to vote for the opposition.

A4ET8a8uTh0 6y ago

It is a difficult watch, but the past days brought up a lot of videos that probably would not be more than a blip on a regular day. It is possible that what we are seeing is a straw that broke the camel's back. As I may have disclosed before, I have some cops in my family and I do think they have too much power compared to Europe. edit: corrected the idiom

tw000001 6y ago

I won't deny that there are corruption and accountability problems among US police forces, but I also can't help but feel like many people, especially now, don't appreciate the fact that American police deal with people who are violent, disrespectful, and frequently mentally ill on a sometimes daily basis. These are humans too and they're watching society (and especially media) totally dehumanize them. To some degree their anger is arguably justified. I feel like it's impossible to get an accurate feel for how many people are protesting and what proportion of the population supports the protests. But I have a feeling it's a minority, maybe 10-30% of the population, in which case you cannot let a fraction of your population hold your entire city hostage, especially when opportunists are simultaneously looting and burning, though that seems to have calmed down recently. Point being, if the protestors won't listen when asked to leave, and if they are disrupting the lives and livelihoods of 70-90% of the population, I don't see any option other than gradual escalation, which typically precedes gas and rubber bullets. The police in a city in Canada went on strike in the late 1960s[1]. Things didn't go well. And we've already seen that American demographics are willing to burn and loot even with police present...so I don't mean to defend police but I really don't see anything good coming from police standing down or refusing to use force. 1.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray-Hill_riot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray-Hill_riot Edit: Downvotes are intended for discouraging low effort or otherwise poor comments, not to shame people for disagreeing. Whether you like it or not at least half the country supports police, they play an important role in society, and that makes this a discussion worth having.

augustt 6y ago
The majority of Americans feel protesters' anger is justified https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/documents/monmouthpoll_us_060220.pdf/ https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/documents/monmout.... And by the way, the point of protests is not to leave when people ask you to.
- jariel 6y ago
  You are not responding to the comment. It's not surprising that Americans feel 'anger is justified' however, that's very different from saying for example that 'riots' or 'protests past curfew' are supported. "And by the way, the point of protests is not to leave when people ask you to." No - it is absolutely not. Neither you nor I get to decide what is lawful and what is not. The 'rules' are a 'social contract' that we all get a say in, you don't get more of a say because you want to hold a sign up past 10 pm or block a street. It's disturbing to read this because I don't think people grasp the real variety in American opinion out there, and what some others might want to 'protests beyond what the community wants them to'. You might find yourself on the other side of the fence. Not only this - it's counterproductive. Things like 'million man march' do a lot more good than the Watts riots, which are both directly damaging to the community, and probably very damaging to the movement. If the point is to 'make change' - people are losing tons of allies by stepping outside the bounds of civility. Everyone is fine with signs in parks, and possibly a march through town - beyond that, it's just bad.

jariel 6y ago

So the keyword here is 'perception' - which is ultimately a game of populism, which dry realists may loathe a little bit. There are some very good arguments for 'critical masses of sentiment' necessary to effectuate actual change, at the same time, populism is a war for 'hearts and minds' and the first casualty in every war is of course the Truth. Personally, I'm far more interested in real nature of every day policing, which is a complex and nuanced subject, not likely suitable for the narrative-driven vignettes proposed to use every night on cable news. I believe that 'narrative and populist driven change' is usually not the best way forward. We've seen this very poignantly with the rise of the 'doctors and bureaucrats' to the fore of public display during the Covid epidemic. It's been mostly heartwarming to hear from the dry, mundane, secular, academic mandarins managing our pandemic responses behind the scenes. Dr. Bonnie Henry managing British Columbia's COVID response as a fairly good example; we're now getting actually charts and data to explain and validate the inherently complex nature of COVID, and the impetus for the resulting action. On TV, the narrative-drivers and those trying to make big statements completely drown out a much-need opportunity for dispassionate discussion about this issue. I feel that people are being highly misled one way or another to the point that when real facts and hard evidence don't align with a narrative, they become anthemic to the presentation, and anyone proposing to discuss them becomes a heathen to the cause. A lot of people are spending a lot of time, decades even, in bubbles of 'very incomplete information'. America has made huge strides in all sorts of areas, and in most ways 'it's better than it's ever been'. I wouldn't for a second give Trump (or any incumbent president) credit for this but as avg. Black income, wage-gap, and unemployment-gaps become historically low even during his tenure, this is saying a lot. If you look at the broad measures of ostensible progress, they don't really jump at points of social contention, really, it looks mostly good over broad units of time. Progress is mostly a steady grind, made by a lot of thoughtful people. Particularly disturbing is the entrance of major brands, deciding to participate in the situation - though sometimes it's hard to see how earnest intention may be exploited ... it definitely is. Master marketers don't sell you products really on the basis of function, rather an aspiration - and if that aspiration has moved off the court onto the streets, you can be sure that someone hustling you shoes because of a deeply held political or social conviction ... it's a huge red flag. It takes a real kind of mindfulness to 'see something bad in a video or tweet' as a data point, instead of an emblem. A quick gander through Pew polling, actual police stats, victimization reports, and decent research paints a totally different picture than one would form from reading headlines or drowning in Tweets.

nickt 6y ago

If you're in a position of appointed authority, then surely special rules must apply. How about starting with 3x the sentence of a normal citizen for breaking the same rules?

Mirioron 6y ago
I'm not sure that increasing the punishment would help. They need to actually be punished for breaking the rules. Not sometimes, but every time they break those rules.
- NotSammyHagar 6y ago
  I advocate we make a specific law that witnessing a felony action by a fellow police officer and not reporting it become a chargeable offense on its own. We also make it illegal to not make the officer investigations private after some threshold, like 5 diff cases. I get that there are false accusations but they have too much power and we need to go the other way.
abootstrapper 6y ago
I’d settle for 1x the sentence of a normal citizen. Right now they can literally get away with murder. Not to mention infractions like drinking and driving and speeding, that they let each other off for.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

softwaredoug 6y ago

I think a lot about how so many police officers are Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. How much has this experience altered departments perception of what it means to police? Or influenced to baddest actors to behave like they do?

jetti 6y ago
There is an episode of Behind the Bastards[0] that covers David Grossman, the creator of Bulletproof Training which has trained thousands of police. Grossman’s training involved instilling a sense of fear in the officers which promotes a mentality of fearing for their safety even when it is apparent the officer isn’t in danger. Using made up phrases such as “killology” which Grossman claims to study and using false data (saying it is more dangerous to be a cop now than ever before despite evidence of the contrary). The training materials even use bible verses to justify why it is ok for an officer to kill, even when the situation wouldn’t necessarily warrant even a draw of the gun. [0] https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/the-man-who-teaches-our-cops-63257870/ https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236...
battery_cowboy 6y ago
Honestly, when I was in the Navy training in a security squadron, we were basically taught to deescalate, use the lowest force we could, be it hands, mace, a baton, a pistol, the machine gun, etc. We were drilled never to use deadly force unless it was very clear we were in danger, were told to shoot second, because it's better to risk ourselves than risk killing an innocent person, that our backup would ensure the security of the ship or base so we didn't need to get trigger happy. I remember, strongly, the great fear I had about accidentally hurting the wrong person whenever we had live security events and i had to unholster my pistol. I just don't get the way police are trained, they are there to risk themselves to ensure others are safe, even the criminals. Instead, they're trained to treat them worse than i was trained to treat literal terrorists.
- bmn__ 6y ago
  The parent post was censored. I "vouched" it so it becomes visible again. The censorship that HN readers bring to the forum disgusts me. To those responsible for censoring the parent post: get bent. You cowards have no place here.

creative_bud 6y ago

Imagine isolated anectdata determining people's opinions of police! One of the first rules of understanding the world is to not let emotionally charged anecdotes, isolated events and individual mistakes determine how you judge groups, trends and collectives. What's happened in the last week is that targeted propaganda has flooded people with a few isolated examples of bad things happening and letting people's emotional response mechanisms do the rest. Did you know that tens of thousands of people die from medical malpractice and medical errors each year? There are many thousands fewer people suffering from police brutality, yet somehow the police have an infinitely worse reputation than doctors and surgeons yet your chances of being killed by a surgeon is far higher than being killed by a cop. The police do one of the hardest jobs in the country, dealing with the worst elements of society every single day. It's shocking to me that there isn't far more "brutality" every year than there is, and I commend the police for keeping us safe while having to deal with people that hate them and want them dead every day. The judgement callously meted out on police on HN and elsewhere is completely unjustified.

Someone1234 6y ago
Your analogy kind of works against you: Doctors have their own personal liability insurance, if they make too many mistakes they literally cannot afford to continue working in medicine (or have to move to a lower risk sub-field that have lower base premiums). If police held their own individual liability insurance, and it too could become uneconomical for them to continue to practice law enforcement, I'd consider that a huge improvement over the status quo. If you want law enforcement to be comparable to medicine, then oversight is going to raise tenfold.
- creative_bud 6y ago
  Police act in a hostile environment which can't be compared to the environment in which surgeons and doctors operate. Where their lives are not at risk. Mistakes are more understandable and more likely in hostile environments, which makes it a wonder that there are not more instances of police making serious errors given all the interactions police have with hostile and combative people.
6y ago

ngngngng 6y ago

A lot of people are talking about changing the laws so that officers aren't protected by qualified immunity or unions, but as far as I understand, one of the main problems is prosecutors. Prosecutors require police to bring them people to prosecute. If a prosecutor starts going after cops, they've now pissed off a group of people they rely on the get their job done, so most prosecutors won't prosecute cops. I imagine this could be fixed by states having a special prosecutor specifically for those that are now considered protected by qualified immunity, which is more than just police. Also we should get rid of qualified immunity, which is an insult to the constitution.

graeme 6y ago
Qualified immunity is for civil lawsuits actually. On the criminal side I think prosecutors + police union negotiations for more lenient investigations are the big issue.
ardy42 6y ago
> A lot of people are talking about changing the laws so that officers aren't protected by qualified immunity or unions, but as far as I understand, one of the main problems is prosecutors. It's all connected. The police unions push back hard against reforms in the prosecutors' office that might subject them to more scrutiny. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/06/us/police-unions-minneapolis-kroll.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/06/us/police-unions-minneapo... > In St. Louis, when Kim Gardner was elected the top prosecutor four years ago, she set out to rein in the city’s high rate of police violence. But after she proposed a unit within the prosecutor’s office that would independently investigate misconduct, she ran into the powerful local police union. > The union pressured lawmakers to set aside the proposal, which many supported but then never brought to a vote. Around the same time, a lawyer for the union waged a legal fight to limit the ability of the prosecutor’s office to investigate police misconduct. The following year, a leader of the union said Ms. Gardner should be removed “by force or by choice.”
- corty 6y ago
  I think police unions is the one instance where union busting or just plainly making unions illegal would be justified.

corty 6y ago

Public perception of the police degrading is a first good sign. What is important are the next steps: the police needs accountability, police misbehaviour must be investigated independently. Not by the police, not by the prosecutor they work with every other week. The police must be made to understand they are being watched, very closely, by technical, legal and human means. Only then will they think twice before stepping out of line. And each misstep needs to have proportionate consequences that take into account the misuse of power as well as the crime itself, so punishment must be harsher than for mere mortals, not the usual slap on the wrist. Changes in training or authorized uses of force are useless smoke and mirrors without proper accountability. Quis enim custodiet ipsos custodies?

tartoran 6y ago
This is obvious and I really hope things will change. But I wonder if they will change meaningfully not just superficially
- corty 6y ago
  It may seem obvious, but I think this needs to be repeated over and over again. Otherwise nothing will come from this mess, just warm words and symbolic measures
  - tartoran 6y ago
    Yeah, random riots whenever they are prepared the least. Im so angry at how cops can legally hit, punch, injure, shoot and how they use their power and do so indiscriminately on whoever they are angry at the moment and face no repercussions. And when repercussions are possible they hide their badges...

aswanson 6y ago

I'm black, got my license to drive the year Rodney King got assaulted by cops that got exonerated by an all white jury. Glad some of my fellow Americans woke up to my reality.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
tartoran 6y ago
We knew about your reality but were as powerless as you were. Look who became president in 2016 because we had the nerve to vote a black president. And I really do wonder what they’re up to next. After Bush I thought it cannot go lower but it did. I really want to be positive but am still shocked by whats been happening
- viklove 6y ago
  You'd be shocked if you looked into how little (read: nothing) Obama did about police overreach and lack of oversight. Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump... when it comes to police brutality they're all the same. This isn't a partisan issue, the color of your tie does not wash your hands of blame here. The Dem party's marketing dept should all get raises, though. For some reason you seem to believe that having a black president who did absolutely nothing for black people was better for black people than Trump. When it comes to policy or enforcement changes, this could not be further from the truth.
tzs 6y ago
Probably not relevant, but the jury was mostly white, not all white. It included a biracial man, a Latino, and an Asian.
masonic 6y ago
That jury wasn't all-white; 9 of 12 were white. In the Federal jury that later convicted Koon and Powell of Federal civil rights violations, there were likewise 9 of 12 white jurors. Modern American jurors don't inherently judge on race. For another example, the jury that convicted congressman Mel Reynolds on all charges was half black: https://www.nytimes.com/1995/08/23/us/congressman-convicted-of-sexual-assault.html https://www.nytimes.com/1995/08/23/us/congressman-convicted-...

moneytide1 6y ago

In Total War: Rome II, you can commission the training of "spy" agents with multiple abilities that can be exercised against opposing faction cities. One of these abilities is "incite unrest". Across several turns, this can enable a war of attrition ( a turn represents a year or a season I cannot remember). Death by 1000 cuts is a way to reduce the morale and economic output of a city in order to eventually conquer it. Here is an excerpt from a forum dialogue about the game: "Incite Unreast give "X" public order penality, depending on your agent skills and traits. Army gives "X" public order boost depending on army size and general traits and skills. So yes. The best tactic would put as many agents as you can get into far positions, champions can decrease public order as a passive, spy like you already know they pay for it, armies can raid, which decrease their upkeep and steal some of their income for youself." https://steamcommunity.com/app/214950/discussions/0/619569341074772436/ https://steamcommunity.com/app/214950/discussions/0/61956934...

noobermin 6y ago
Real life isn't a video game.
- moneytide1 6y ago
  Here's an excerpt from an article: “It is an open secret,” he said, “that secret services of imperialist powers and foreign anti-Soviet centers actively join extremist nationalistic actions. Later on, they start playing the part of open instigators of hostile actions aimed at kindling hostility among nations. One should not underestimate the danger of this method of subversive activity.” https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-04-14-mn-1958-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-04-14-mn-1958-s... (a red flag here is that the word "secret" is repeated rapidly in succession. Timeless "click" bait before Jobs ever visited Xerox). We must first consider credibility of a dot com site. LA times does not represent vast majority. But this is from 1988. Fear mongering conspiracies can get tongues flapping. This is also before digital proliferation of media injection into cultures (click). Behind "video games" are 20-50 year old minds digesting their environment and historical records made available to them by their coordinated government(s). My "real life" has not been affected by rioting and widespread respitory pandemic (destroyed storefronts are not selling things I want, economic furlough gifts me spare time and empty streets to hone new skills and more quickly traverse new domains). I am interested in the Phoenix that rises from this reset (dust is still in the air and must settle). From the wikipedia article for Principle of Charity: "The first to state this hermeneutic principle was Rabbi Meir ... 'A person does not say things without reason'." The video game designers are steadily sculpting their audience's perception of "real life" via their own art form.

tamaharbor 6y ago

So I guess politics is acceptable here as long as it fits the democrat narrative?

codeddesign 6y ago

Why is this even on HN? Leave this stuff to google news. The great part of HN is that it’s an amazing space for tech news, rather than political, sociological, or world news. Deviations like this just bring down the original purpose and integrity of going to HN.

codeddesign 6y ago
As per guidelines, wouldn’t this be considered “off topic”? “ Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.”
camel_Snake 6y ago
So don't click on it? I respect your opinion, it's a common one on this site, but I don't see how it's any different than a post about a technology you're not interested in.
- codeddesign 6y ago
  See my second comment as per the guidelines of HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html The argument is the type of content, not the content itself. This content falls into mainstream events which would be against HN guidelines. *edits for grammatical errors

l0b0 6y ago

This situation reminds me of an interesting series on the first UK police force, how basically it grew out of robber gangs and went back and forth between a force for good and a force for consolidating power at the cost of ordinary citizens. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvMQY_y4qx8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvMQY_y4qx8

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

irrational 6y ago

My 10 year old son keeps saying, "I thought the police were our friends?" Frankly he is traumatized by the actions of the police he is seeing on the news. Yesterday we were driving to the pharmacy to get some medicine and he suddenly started crying and freaking out. It turned out that he saw a police car and was convinced we were going to be pulled over and killed. Thankfully my state has just passed a law making it illegal for police to enter elementary or secondary school grounds except in the case of an emergency. At least he will probably be safe from the police at school.

robotron 6y ago
I feel as if I should explain something to my child but have been kind of shielding them. I'm seriously conflicted.
mnm1 6y ago
Why would he think "police are our friends?" I did not think that at 7 let alone 10, but I grew up in a place where being mistaken about the reality of police could get you or your family arrested or killed. So a place not much different than America. Why is your son so delusional? Why not teach him to know better? Then he won't be afraid, he'll be informed and cautious.

alerighi 6y ago

So after all of that, still 61% of white americans stands by the side of the police? As a normal european citizens, americans what is your problem? Something like that here would have been considered unacceptable by everyone, beside some stupid neo fascist parties that fortunately are a small minority: not only killing a person for nothing, but then using violence against peaceful protesters.

nojvek 6y ago
The issue runs deeper. America is really divided amongst the political lines. People either identify as Democrats or Republican. The Racial injustice and protests are seen as Democratic and mostly happening in coastal states that vote blue most of the time. The inner states (which are mostly white) vote the opposite. This really doesn’t surprise me. America like its political polarization is also quite divided racially. Our president further propagates this with Xenophobia. We’re quite backwards compared to Europe like that.
mnm1 6y ago
Stupid neo fascist parties make up at least half of America and currently hold the presidency and Senate. That is the problem. Europe is racist as fuck but America's racism is on a whole new level. It's so ingrained into American culture, we have monuments glorifying it. Many Americans are proud of it. It's a core part of their identity. The entire society is based upon it. Entire industries depend on it (police, prison, etc.). And this goes back hundreds of years. That's the problem. It's hard to be a normal person in the US and denounce this history and stand up for what's right. So half are not and do not.