12 ms·

There was a notable absence of opposing views in the article so I looked up "echelon security portland" and found a lot of objectionable actions they've taken.

There was a notable absence of opposing views in the article so I looked up "echelon security portland" and found a lot of objectionable actions they've taken. According to this article https://www.opb.org/article/2021/12/02/part-two-police-prosecutors-downtown-portland-wary-role-of-private-security/ https://www.opb.org/article/2021/12/02/part-two-police-prose... they've been unaccountable to the public, they've lied about what people do (pretending they've attacked them), they've lied about their use of force, and attacked people in tents to displace them. This is all just from the first quarter of the second part of a report so there is a lot more.

WarOnPrivacy 4y ago
Yeah. My son was detecting hints of positivity in my reaction to the story; he cautioned me that the opening blurb smelled like crafted propaganda.
- pleasantpeasant 4y ago
  The author works at The Federalist Society. A conservative online magazine. Honestly, why is this article even on HN? It's copaganda but with an even worst twist of being a pro-private military force. The militarization of the police has been an on going issue since the 90s and now we're jumping to having corporations hiring random goons as a private police force for the wealthy and their corporations.
  - pmarreck 4y ago
    [flagged]
    - nucleogenesis 4y ago
      You’re right - whether being oppressed by people with the veneer of accountability or by a private military force without any, we should just shut up and accept it all as-is because there can’t possibly be any other way to have security.
      - pmarreck 4y ago
        Compare the track record of US police to the police in nearly every other country, and then get back to me.
        harimau777 4y ago
        I'm not sure what you mean. This suggests that the per capita rate of police killing people is much higher than in the rest of the developed democratic world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforcement_officers_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforc...
    - pleasantpeasant 4y ago
      You're putting in a lot of words in my mouth and it's a bit weird how aggressive you're coming off here. There's nothing I'm proposing here at all. I'm only critical of the obvious pro-private militarized police force, which every American should be. And this article is blatant propaganda for that agenda. The author herself works at The Federalist Society, a far-right conservative magazine.
      - pmarreck 4y ago
        I didn't see much particularly pro- about it, other than the fact that they seem more focused on treating people like people and not like case numbers. Was that part not true?
        mikem170 4y ago
        I think they were referring to how the article seemed to be one-sided. It didn't mention any of the controversy around their activities, like the article link [0] provided by the (currently) top rated comment in this discussion, which talked about how poorly trained these security people are, how they have broken the law, beat up and shot people, how the local prosecutors are not happy with some of this stuff, etc. It would have been a more fair article if they mentioned this other stuff, but they didn't, it only painted these private security people in the best light possible. Call that a lie of omission. Some people feel this is manipulative. [0] https://www.opb.org/article/2021/12/02/part-two-police-prosecutors-downtown-portland-wary-role-of-private-security/ https://www.opb.org/article/2021/12/02/part-two-police-prose...
        pmarreck 4y ago
        That's fair. And balanced. Too bad our media seems to have given up on that.
    - DoctorOW 4y ago
      I dislike the binary of "completely pristine" and the current state of police. One of the professions more likely to be a victim of violent criminals are delivery drivers. Still, if heavily armed delivery drivers started killing innocent people one would be allowed to critique that without being labeled "anti-pizza". That statistic is one of a number of things that are disallowed in conversations before being offered my "effing pick" between accepting no accountability for the actions of the state or no laws ever.
      - nibbleshifter 4y ago
        > heavily armed delivery drivers Protagonist from Snow Crash!
    - culi 4y ago
      > copaganda Police budgets are higher than they've ever been in history and they're spending millions on social media and "strategic communication" https://therealnews.com/police-departments-are-spending-millions-on-copaganda https://therealnews.com/police-departments-are-spending-mill...
      - leeroyjenkins11 4y ago
        Maybe because some moron on Twitter can have people calling for the head of cops who shoot people trying to stab other people. And maybe they need to pay police more because no cop wants to make life and death decisions and have uninformed people asking why they couldn't shoot the knife out of their hands. Couple this with DAs unwilling to prosecute crimes and reclassifing crimes to hide how bad things are, also having no cash bail, why would a cop stick around for what used to be a decent salary?
        orwin 4y ago
        Certainly not to protect the children, else Ulvalde wouldn't have happened.
        culi 4y ago
        The average cop in the San Jose PD makes $131k and has great benefits compared to other jobs you can get without a degree IMO less cops is a good thing. We put too much on them. They shouldn't be the ones responding to mental health crises, cats stuck in trees, and suicide attempts, muggings, car accidents, etc all at once. Many cities are already experimenting with mental health first responders and similar things. This definitely seems like the right direction and will also alleviate concerns about less people wanting to become cops. It'll also mean people with more expertise can focus on specific needs of a specific situation. Police already have some of the most powerful unions and are able to use taxpayer money to fund their own lobbying (to be funneled more taxpayer money, sigh). Many departments already have tanks, drones, and other military equipment that they only got because some "defense" contractor managed to convince a politician to subsidize them. Departments like NYPD also include fines and ticket fees into their budget expectations creating a strong incentive to be overly punitive. All of these are signs of an institution that's grown far too strong and desperately needs to be broken apart
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
phpisthebest 4y ago
>>hey've been unaccountable to the public, they've lied about what people do (pretending they've attacked them), they've lied about their use of force, and attacked people in tents to displace them. So a normal police force then? This is a natural reaction when property crime goes unenforced by the government. I know this will be an unpopular take but property crime like shoplifting is not a "victimless" crime against evil "corporations" and when it allowed to occur unchecked it creates an over all unsafe condition for everyone. There needs to be ALOT of police reforms, not punishing crime should not be in that list of reforms but that seems to be the #1 action taken by "reformers" of late
- wahnfrieden 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - pmarreck 4y ago
    because taxation to fund a public good is not theft in your world there are only private security firms. if you're not up to date on your dues, oh well, they'll happily watch you get robbed I guess. EDIT: I was unaware of the "wage theft" problem and assumed this was angling at "taxation is theft," my bad
    - pixl97 4y ago
      What, you did not answer his question, and came up with some gibberish. https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-from-workers-paychecks-each-year/ https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-fro... >What this report finds: This report assesses the prevalence and magnitude of one form of wage theft—minimum wage violations (workers being paid at an effective hourly rate below the binding minimum wage)—in the 10 most populous U.S. states. We find that, in these states, 2.4 million workers lose $8 billion annually (an average of $3,300 per year for year-round workers) to minimum wage violations—nearly a quarter of their earned wages. This form of wage theft affects 17 percent of low-wage workers, with workers in all demographic categories being cheated out of pay.
DaveExeter 4y ago
So...exactly like government police! Well, not quite the same, because they can't payoff victims with other people's money.
pmarreck 4y ago
So let me get this straight: A few bad police apples create a mass left-wing media outrage which results in the withdrawing of a public good (police protection), which results in people needing to hire private security, which results in even more objectionable actions taken by this less-accountable private security, than there were previously by the taxpaid police force? You don't say. I guess the only relative improvement here is that some of these security firms aren't armed with anything more than billy clubs.
- rootusrootus 4y ago
  The Portland city government cut the PPB budget by less than 10%. Yes that's a relatively large cut, but it is not the main driver of officers leaving the bureau. The underlying reason is politics.
  - kodyo 4y ago
    They also had riots for several months straight for political reasons. I wouldn’t be a cop there either.
- rightbyte 4y ago
  Like the fate of mental institutions.
- harimau777 4y ago
  Saying that people pushing for police reform results in withdrawing police protection appears to be an unexamined logical jump in your reasoning. That's only the case because the police often choose to withhold police protection in response to police reform.
  - pmarreck 4y ago
    OK, I'll accept that criticism, that doesn't necessarily follow
  - SpelingBeeChamp 4y ago
    > the police often choose to withhold police protection in response to police reform I am not sure this is accurate, and it’s similarly unclear to me what exactly you are referring to. I don’t know what, specifically, you mean by “withhold police protection.” Would you provide some examples? And what evidence do you have that such action happen “often” as a response to police reform?

WarOnPrivacy 4y ago

Yeah. My son was detecting hints of positivity in my reaction to the story; he cautioned me that the opening blurb smelled like crafted propaganda.

pleasantpeasant 4y ago
The author works at The Federalist Society. A conservative online magazine. Honestly, why is this article even on HN? It's copaganda but with an even worst twist of being a pro-private military force. The militarization of the police has been an on going issue since the 90s and now we're jumping to having corporations hiring random goons as a private police force for the wealthy and their corporations.
- pmarreck 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - nucleogenesis 4y ago
    You’re right - whether being oppressed by people with the veneer of accountability or by a private military force without any, we should just shut up and accept it all as-is because there can’t possibly be any other way to have security.
    - pmarreck 4y ago
      Compare the track record of US police to the police in nearly every other country, and then get back to me.
      - harimau777 4y ago
        I'm not sure what you mean. This suggests that the per capita rate of police killing people is much higher than in the rest of the developed democratic world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforcement_officers_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_killings_by_law_enforc...
  - pleasantpeasant 4y ago
    You're putting in a lot of words in my mouth and it's a bit weird how aggressive you're coming off here. There's nothing I'm proposing here at all. I'm only critical of the obvious pro-private militarized police force, which every American should be. And this article is blatant propaganda for that agenda. The author herself works at The Federalist Society, a far-right conservative magazine.
    - pmarreck 4y ago
      I didn't see much particularly pro- about it, other than the fact that they seem more focused on treating people like people and not like case numbers. Was that part not true?
      - mikem170 4y ago
        I think they were referring to how the article seemed to be one-sided. It didn't mention any of the controversy around their activities, like the article link [0] provided by the (currently) top rated comment in this discussion, which talked about how poorly trained these security people are, how they have broken the law, beat up and shot people, how the local prosecutors are not happy with some of this stuff, etc. It would have been a more fair article if they mentioned this other stuff, but they didn't, it only painted these private security people in the best light possible. Call that a lie of omission. Some people feel this is manipulative. [0] https://www.opb.org/article/2021/12/02/part-two-police-prosecutors-downtown-portland-wary-role-of-private-security/ https://www.opb.org/article/2021/12/02/part-two-police-prose...
        pmarreck 4y ago
        That's fair. And balanced. Too bad our media seems to have given up on that.
  - DoctorOW 4y ago
    I dislike the binary of "completely pristine" and the current state of police. One of the professions more likely to be a victim of violent criminals are delivery drivers. Still, if heavily armed delivery drivers started killing innocent people one would be allowed to critique that without being labeled "anti-pizza". That statistic is one of a number of things that are disallowed in conversations before being offered my "effing pick" between accepting no accountability for the actions of the state or no laws ever.
    - nibbleshifter 4y ago
      > heavily armed delivery drivers Protagonist from Snow Crash!
  - culi 4y ago
    > copaganda Police budgets are higher than they've ever been in history and they're spending millions on social media and "strategic communication" https://therealnews.com/police-departments-are-spending-millions-on-copaganda https://therealnews.com/police-departments-are-spending-mill...
    - leeroyjenkins11 4y ago
      Maybe because some moron on Twitter can have people calling for the head of cops who shoot people trying to stab other people. And maybe they need to pay police more because no cop wants to make life and death decisions and have uninformed people asking why they couldn't shoot the knife out of their hands. Couple this with DAs unwilling to prosecute crimes and reclassifing crimes to hide how bad things are, also having no cash bail, why would a cop stick around for what used to be a decent salary?
      - orwin 4y ago
        Certainly not to protect the children, else Ulvalde wouldn't have happened.
      - culi 4y ago
        The average cop in the San Jose PD makes $131k and has great benefits compared to other jobs you can get without a degree IMO less cops is a good thing. We put too much on them. They shouldn't be the ones responding to mental health crises, cats stuck in trees, and suicide attempts, muggings, car accidents, etc all at once. Many cities are already experimenting with mental health first responders and similar things. This definitely seems like the right direction and will also alleviate concerns about less people wanting to become cops. It'll also mean people with more expertise can focus on specific needs of a specific situation. Police already have some of the most powerful unions and are able to use taxpayer money to fund their own lobbying (to be funneled more taxpayer money, sigh). Many departments already have tanks, drones, and other military equipment that they only got because some "defense" contractor managed to convince a politician to subsidize them. Departments like NYPD also include fines and ticket fees into their budget expectations creating a strong incentive to be overly punitive. All of these are signs of an institution that's grown far too strong and desperately needs to be broken apart
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]

phpisthebest 4y ago

>>hey've been unaccountable to the public, they've lied about what people do (pretending they've attacked them), they've lied about their use of force, and attacked people in tents to displace them. So a normal police force then? This is a natural reaction when property crime goes unenforced by the government. I know this will be an unpopular take but property crime like shoplifting is not a "victimless" crime against evil "corporations" and when it allowed to occur unchecked it creates an over all unsafe condition for everyone. There needs to be ALOT of police reforms, not punishing crime should not be in that list of reforms but that seems to be the #1 action taken by "reformers" of late

wahnfrieden 4y ago
[flagged]
- pmarreck 4y ago
  because taxation to fund a public good is not theft in your world there are only private security firms. if you're not up to date on your dues, oh well, they'll happily watch you get robbed I guess. EDIT: I was unaware of the "wage theft" problem and assumed this was angling at "taxation is theft," my bad
  - pixl97 4y ago
    What, you did not answer his question, and came up with some gibberish. https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-from-workers-paychecks-each-year/ https://www.epi.org/publication/employers-steal-billions-fro... >What this report finds: This report assesses the prevalence and magnitude of one form of wage theft—minimum wage violations (workers being paid at an effective hourly rate below the binding minimum wage)—in the 10 most populous U.S. states. We find that, in these states, 2.4 million workers lose $8 billion annually (an average of $3,300 per year for year-round workers) to minimum wage violations—nearly a quarter of their earned wages. This form of wage theft affects 17 percent of low-wage workers, with workers in all demographic categories being cheated out of pay.

DaveExeter 4y ago

So...exactly like government police! Well, not quite the same, because they can't payoff victims with other people's money.

pmarreck 4y ago

So let me get this straight: A few bad police apples create a mass left-wing media outrage which results in the withdrawing of a public good (police protection), which results in people needing to hire private security, which results in even more objectionable actions taken by this less-accountable private security, than there were previously by the taxpaid police force? You don't say. I guess the only relative improvement here is that some of these security firms aren't armed with anything more than billy clubs.

rootusrootus 4y ago
The Portland city government cut the PPB budget by less than 10%. Yes that's a relatively large cut, but it is not the main driver of officers leaving the bureau. The underlying reason is politics.
- kodyo 4y ago
  They also had riots for several months straight for political reasons. I wouldn’t be a cop there either.
rightbyte 4y ago
Like the fate of mental institutions.
harimau777 4y ago
Saying that people pushing for police reform results in withdrawing police protection appears to be an unexamined logical jump in your reasoning. That's only the case because the police often choose to withhold police protection in response to police reform.
- pmarreck 4y ago
  OK, I'll accept that criticism, that doesn't necessarily follow
- SpelingBeeChamp 4y ago
  > the police often choose to withhold police protection in response to police reform I am not sure this is accurate, and it’s similarly unclear to me what exactly you are referring to. I don’t know what, specifically, you mean by “withhold police protection.” Would you provide some examples? And what evidence do you have that such action happen “often” as a response to police reform?