3 ms·

American police forces seem to acquire a lot of surplus military equipment. Coming to a town near you!

• josephcsible 5y ago
  I'd rather my town's police department have a bunch of gear they don't need than for there to be a SWAT situation that they have to wait an hour for another department to come handle.
  • Sebguer 5y ago
    Even when the evidence shows they'll start inventing new reasons to use it?
  • donw 5y ago
    There's this thing called "weapon pull". The more different weapons you give somebody, the more likely they are to use all of them. Beat cops need service pistols, batons, and a patrol rifle (AR-15) in the cruiser. That's it. OC spray isn't that useful. It's a weak area-denial weapon, which means that it usually hits the user as well as the target. Tasers are downright stupid. You get one shot and that's it. Having those extra options on the duty belt is (a) a pain in the ass, and (b) results in more deadly use-of-force. Same goes for non-police, by the way.
  • ecf 5y ago
    How often do you imagine SWAT scenarios occurring? Get out of your bubble of fear.
    • josephcsible 5y ago
      Not very often. But should we all drop our homeowners' insurance and get rid of our smoke detectors and fire extinguishers too, since house fires don't happen very often either?