6 ms·

If you genuinely believed the police are there to protect you, and not to ensure the status quo is enforced and continues, you are naive, or you are not part of

If you genuinely believed the police are there to protect you, and not to ensure the status quo is enforced and continues, you are naive, or you are not part of a marginalized group. That is not meant to be an overly hateful statement. Police (and other law-enforcement) are an exercise of the power of government. The former exists to ensure the latter can continue to exist. Therefore, police (and law-enforcement) exist to enact laws to preserve the status quo and whatever accepted social mores happen to be in vogue at the time via statute. Protecting you and your loved ones only occurs when your needs align with the desires of the state. If you happen to be part of a marginalized group, often, power structures dictate that the desires of the state run contrary to your needs, or, more often, the desires of the state are literally enacted to make your life more difficult. For example - Where I live, we have a saying, "No cops, no problems." This is because a) police take 45+ minutes to respond because we're very rural, b) police generally only respond by taking notes and harassing anyone they find on the scene, regardless of their role, and c) police, once they respond, are well known to run warrants on anyone around just to be able to say they've arrested someone that day (the second part of that is my conjecture, but I also can't come up with a reason they would run warrants on an innocent bystander, regardless of said bystander's past). My need of having my car not be stolen apparently does not align with the government's need to ensure my father is prosecuted for low-level drug offenses from many years ago. (to use the next word too much, I think) Therefore, police do not have my interests at heart. Please apply this lesson to any other marginalized group to see where the problems with police come from, and why I called you naive.

read_if_gay_ 6y ago
It's total absolute bullshit to say all police don't care about protecting you. You might have had poor experiences, but generalizing from that is a mistake.
- Loughla 6y ago
  Police care about protecting you just as long as your interests align with the interests of the state, is what I said. For most people, these two things align. Most. Not all. That is my point. I live in a community that the police absolutely have no interest in protecting. We are a problem to be dealt with, not a community to protect. Not everyone has that experience, I understand that. But police are, by virtue of who pulls the purse strings, an extension of the power of government. I never said all police don't care about protecting you. I said they absolutely care about protecting you, as long as your wants align with the needs of the state.
  - read_if_gay_ 6y ago
    I don't think it's a necessary condition that your interests are aligned with the state for the police to protect you, unless you're applying a very flexible interpretation as to what the interests of the state are, in which case the point becomes pretty weak.
- content_sesh 6y ago
  Good thing that poster was talking about police as an institution and power structure and not making your strawman argument about about what is in the heart of each and every cop
  - read_if_gay_ 6y ago
    Good thing that literally their first sentence says police aren't there to protect you, which I literally cited in my post, and not some strawman argument about what is in the heart of each and every cop. > If you genuinely believed the police are there to protect you, and not to ensure the status quo is enforced and continues, you are naive, or you are not part of a marginalized group.
- sonotathrowaway 6y ago
  You’re ascribing a lot of emotion to a pretty disinterested argument. The purpose of police is to enforce laws, not protect people. This isn’t a hateful statement, it’s a fact that has been affirmed in court. If there is a shooter at your local high school, police are entirely within their rights to cordon off the area but not go in and intervene (this is precisely what happened in Florida). That’s not to say that those same police officers were indifferent to the lives and plights of those students, but their goal is to enforce laws, not save all lives by any means necessary. Trying to generalize your experience of police into their policy is a mistake.
  - scudd 6y ago
    How does cordoning off the area and not going in reflect enforcing the law to the best of their ability? Mainly in contrast to cordoning off the area, and then sending at least someone in.
    - sonotathrowaway 6y ago
      Because it is to the best of their ability. Sending someone in sounds good, unless of course you’re that someone, and then you get to worry about either dying or killing someone innocent. Police have no duty or responsibility to risk their lives in order to save someone else, just like an emt, firefighter, lifeguard, etc.
mshanowitz 6y ago
Since the beginning of time, civil societies have had police and a justice system. I know it's in the old testament. Society needs an authority to turn to to resolve disputes or injustice and to maintain order, the alternative is chaos. That authority may not be perfect, it may have certain biases that need to be worked on, but without it, disputes will be won by the superior marksman.
- Loughla 6y ago
  Absolutely, 100% with you on that. I guess, then, at the heart of the 'defund the police' movement is an attempt to move toward working on those biases. That is what is lost in much of the conversation - we need to fix certain things in the policing of the US - because people immediately turn to 'what will we do if there are no police'. I guess, how do we turn the conversation from 'defund the police' to 'fix this shit' without losing people along the way? I don't have answers for any of this.
  - ip26 6y ago
    I wonder if busting the police unions would be a place to start. Allegedly the unions have positioned themselves as the chief obstacle to any & all reforms.
- akimball 6y ago
  Justice system, yes. Police? Not so much. Find an Old Testament reference to a police force, if you wish to be credible on this point.
  - username90 6y ago
    Police and military was the same thing. Today we have decoupled them for many good reasons.
    - ip26 6y ago
      See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_police https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_police
Wolfenstein98k 6y ago
Most Americans have a positive experience with police and with police protecting them. This is true in minority communities too.
- hintymad 6y ago
  Yeah, and stats showed exactly that. If we are talking about stats and facts and truths, I wouldn't need to rant like this.
- colinmhayes 6y ago
  Really? I find that very difficult to believe based on the sum of my interactions with police. Maybe they're lying, but most of the people I've spoken to have nothing but negative things to say about the way they've been treated by police.
  - naniwaduni 6y ago
    Most people have nothing to say about positive interactions with the police.
    - colinmhayes 6y ago
      I mean I specifically ask them if they have ever had an interaction they would characterize as positive and most say "no." admittedly I've only talked to 15-20 people about this so my sample could be skewed.
  - Wolfenstein98k 6y ago
    How many people have you asked? This is like the review site problem... people don't tend to walk around giving random anecdotes about good experiences with routine or common services. But the polling is what I based my comment on. Even in minority communities, increased police presence polls significantly higher than decreased presence - and that's before proposing any reforms.
- nobody9999 6y ago
  > Most Americans have a positive experience with police and with police protecting them. This is true in minority communities too. I'm not a minority and I grew up solidly upper middle-class. But even as a child, I knew that it was really dangerous to piss off the police. Because the police were generally considered to just be the biggest and best armed gang. Because they acted that way. Things have gotten much better in the ensuing 35-40 years here, but there are still serious, structural problems with police impunity -- especially if you're a minority[0][1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop-and-frisk_in_New_York_City https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop-and-frisk_in_New_York_Cit... [1] https://theintercept.com/2020/10/13/nypd-stop-frisk-warrants-lawsuit/ https://theintercept.com/2020/10/13/nypd-stop-frisk-warrants...
hintymad 6y ago
Yeah, I'm well aware of Warren v. District of Columbia. That said, in reality most police do respond to 911s, they do help communities, and they do fight crimes. Oh, the police in our town do catch mail thieves. In another word, they do protect us by upholding the law.
mensetmanusman 6y ago
“ If you genuinely believed the police are there to protect you, and not to ensure the status quo is enforced and continues, you are naive, or you are not part of a marginalized group. That is not meant to be an overly hateful statement. Police (and other law-enforcement) are an exercise of the power of government. The former exists to ensure the latter can continue to exist.” Do you know this is just regurgitated political theory from Karl Marx and wasn’t considered even remotely true for thousands of years? Is it true now? Probably not, but you seem convinced it’s true...
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

read_if_gay_ 6y ago

It's total absolute bullshit to say all police don't care about protecting you. You might have had poor experiences, but generalizing from that is a mistake.

Loughla 6y ago
Police care about protecting you just as long as your interests align with the interests of the state, is what I said. For most people, these two things align. Most. Not all. That is my point. I live in a community that the police absolutely have no interest in protecting. We are a problem to be dealt with, not a community to protect. Not everyone has that experience, I understand that. But police are, by virtue of who pulls the purse strings, an extension of the power of government. I never said all police don't care about protecting you. I said they absolutely care about protecting you, as long as your wants align with the needs of the state.
- read_if_gay_ 6y ago
  I don't think it's a necessary condition that your interests are aligned with the state for the police to protect you, unless you're applying a very flexible interpretation as to what the interests of the state are, in which case the point becomes pretty weak.
content_sesh 6y ago
Good thing that poster was talking about police as an institution and power structure and not making your strawman argument about about what is in the heart of each and every cop
- read_if_gay_ 6y ago
  Good thing that literally their first sentence says police aren't there to protect you, which I literally cited in my post, and not some strawman argument about what is in the heart of each and every cop. > If you genuinely believed the police are there to protect you, and not to ensure the status quo is enforced and continues, you are naive, or you are not part of a marginalized group.
sonotathrowaway 6y ago
You’re ascribing a lot of emotion to a pretty disinterested argument. The purpose of police is to enforce laws, not protect people. This isn’t a hateful statement, it’s a fact that has been affirmed in court. If there is a shooter at your local high school, police are entirely within their rights to cordon off the area but not go in and intervene (this is precisely what happened in Florida). That’s not to say that those same police officers were indifferent to the lives and plights of those students, but their goal is to enforce laws, not save all lives by any means necessary. Trying to generalize your experience of police into their policy is a mistake.
- scudd 6y ago
  How does cordoning off the area and not going in reflect enforcing the law to the best of their ability? Mainly in contrast to cordoning off the area, and then sending at least someone in.
  - sonotathrowaway 6y ago
    Because it is to the best of their ability. Sending someone in sounds good, unless of course you’re that someone, and then you get to worry about either dying or killing someone innocent. Police have no duty or responsibility to risk their lives in order to save someone else, just like an emt, firefighter, lifeguard, etc.

mshanowitz 6y ago

Since the beginning of time, civil societies have had police and a justice system. I know it's in the old testament. Society needs an authority to turn to to resolve disputes or injustice and to maintain order, the alternative is chaos. That authority may not be perfect, it may have certain biases that need to be worked on, but without it, disputes will be won by the superior marksman.

Loughla 6y ago
Absolutely, 100% with you on that. I guess, then, at the heart of the 'defund the police' movement is an attempt to move toward working on those biases. That is what is lost in much of the conversation - we need to fix certain things in the policing of the US - because people immediately turn to 'what will we do if there are no police'. I guess, how do we turn the conversation from 'defund the police' to 'fix this shit' without losing people along the way? I don't have answers for any of this.
- ip26 6y ago
  I wonder if busting the police unions would be a place to start. Allegedly the unions have positioned themselves as the chief obstacle to any & all reforms.
akimball 6y ago
Justice system, yes. Police? Not so much. Find an Old Testament reference to a police force, if you wish to be credible on this point.
- username90 6y ago
  Police and military was the same thing. Today we have decoupled them for many good reasons.
  - ip26 6y ago
    See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_police https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_police

Wolfenstein98k 6y ago

Most Americans have a positive experience with police and with police protecting them. This is true in minority communities too.

hintymad 6y ago
Yeah, and stats showed exactly that. If we are talking about stats and facts and truths, I wouldn't need to rant like this.
colinmhayes 6y ago
Really? I find that very difficult to believe based on the sum of my interactions with police. Maybe they're lying, but most of the people I've spoken to have nothing but negative things to say about the way they've been treated by police.
- naniwaduni 6y ago
  Most people have nothing to say about positive interactions with the police.
  - colinmhayes 6y ago
    I mean I specifically ask them if they have ever had an interaction they would characterize as positive and most say "no." admittedly I've only talked to 15-20 people about this so my sample could be skewed.
- Wolfenstein98k 6y ago
  How many people have you asked? This is like the review site problem... people don't tend to walk around giving random anecdotes about good experiences with routine or common services. But the polling is what I based my comment on. Even in minority communities, increased police presence polls significantly higher than decreased presence - and that's before proposing any reforms.
nobody9999 6y ago
> Most Americans have a positive experience with police and with police protecting them. This is true in minority communities too. I'm not a minority and I grew up solidly upper middle-class. But even as a child, I knew that it was really dangerous to piss off the police. Because the police were generally considered to just be the biggest and best armed gang. Because they acted that way. Things have gotten much better in the ensuing 35-40 years here, but there are still serious, structural problems with police impunity -- especially if you're a minority[0][1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop-and-frisk_in_New_York_City https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop-and-frisk_in_New_York_Cit... [1] https://theintercept.com/2020/10/13/nypd-stop-frisk-warrants-lawsuit/ https://theintercept.com/2020/10/13/nypd-stop-frisk-warrants...

hintymad 6y ago

Yeah, I'm well aware of Warren v. District of Columbia. That said, in reality most police do respond to 911s, they do help communities, and they do fight crimes. Oh, the police in our town do catch mail thieves. In another word, they do protect us by upholding the law.

mensetmanusman 6y ago

“ If you genuinely believed the police are there to protect you, and not to ensure the status quo is enforced and continues, you are naive, or you are not part of a marginalized group. That is not meant to be an overly hateful statement. Police (and other law-enforcement) are an exercise of the power of government. The former exists to ensure the latter can continue to exist.” Do you know this is just regurgitated political theory from Karl Marx and wasn’t considered even remotely true for thousands of years? Is it true now? Probably not, but you seem convinced it’s true...

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]