7 ms·

Why the sarcasm? Someone does a bad job, get rid of them. How do you imagine cop culture will change? By letting them get away with everything and sticking your

by atoav 4y ago

Why the sarcasm? Someone does a bad job, get rid of them. How do you imagine cop culture will change? By letting them get away with everything and sticking your head into the sand? Ah and before you answer: most of use who are not in the US live in places where police misconduct is much less of an problem, so obviously it can work better. The entire German police force fires less bullets during their patrols and missions in a year than e.g. the NYC police force alone. Sometimes single cops in the US fire more bullets alone than the entire German police force. This is even hard to compare, because the Germans have numbers for every bullet fired at a person during service, bullets fired for warning shots, bullets that hit, bullets that did not etc. That data is wildly mixed and unreliable in the US depending on the state. If you want to have a police force you can trust they must not be above the law and the law must be even stricter, the standards even higher for them than for the rest of the population. That means longer and better education and training, knowing the law, but also strict measures when police officers break the rules or there is even just the slightest doubt about their version of events. In many police departments in the US the problem is essentially that there are so many bad apples that every good apple that comes is spoiled or cannot do good. This can only be changed be decisive action from the top.

bambax 4y ago
[flagged]
- rhn_mk1 4y ago
  > Because there are no good cops? Seriously, this is the mother of all generalizations.
  - bheadmaster 4y ago
    Here's the grandmother: There are no good people with power. Also known as, "power corrupts". You give a person power without consequences, you turn them into a ticking time bomb, and the timer determines when will they turn into a self-serving piece of shit.
    - thisisabore 4y ago
      That's the thing, the statement "there are no good cops" doesn't mean that no individual person that is police can be an ok person, it means that police as an institution will make people bad. My understanding is that it should be seen more as the starrtng point of a reflexion about the police (what should we therefore do?) rather than a conclusion.
      - bheadmaster 4y ago
        I see it as a fundamental problem of humanity - we cannot trust people to do "good" by themselves, because doing "good" often requires giving up personal benefits that would be gained from doing "bad". The best example I know is videogames. Ever see anyone play GTA without shooting everyone on the street? In GTA, there are no real consequences for your actions, so our true nature comes out. I imagine that, in the real world, when a person has power without consequences, it starts feeling like a game of GTA to them after a while - not exercising the power available just feels "lame". > what should we therefore do? Restrict power, increase accountability. The only way to train (human) animals is through punishment when they piss on the rug.
        swayvil 4y ago
        Voting, lying, moderating. That's certainly a more immediately relevant answer. Here in social media land. They are the corrupting powers and avenues of expression for this bad human nature, here.
        mafuy 4y ago
        > Ever see anyone play GTA without shooting everyone on the street? I disagree. The game is built to favor this behavior. If you wanted to, say, make a living in the game by selling pancakes, the scenario would not be supported to the same degree (in this case: not at all). Look at flight simulators. Most people try to fly properly. Occasionally, people explore "what if" scenarios. But most certainly most people do not use it to practice or experience another 9/11.
- psychphysic 4y ago
  The only upper hand we have in Europe is far less reverence to the police and armed forces in general. The military is so intertwined with US national identity that it's embedded in just about everything from sports to science. The US police forces are the closest to military turned inwards.
  - eru 4y ago
    Armed forces are a pretty big deal in Finland and Switzerland as well as far as I can tell. South Korea probably, too. For the German situation in regards to sport and the military, see https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sportsoldat https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sportsoldat (You might need Google Translate or so, if you don't speak German.)
    - another2another 4y ago
      >and Switzerland as well as far as I can tell. Where on earth did you get that from? Armed forces are definitely not a big deal, in fact there's hardly any mention of them in public discourse, no parades or events involving the military, you hardly see them except occasionally you'll see soldiers going to their training on weekends on the train since Switzerland has national service. There's also very little jingoism or mention of historical military activities. Really, hardly at all. And that's a good thing, and as far as I can tell that's how the Swiss like it.
    - jounker 4y ago
      I’m an American. I lived in Switzerland. There is no glorification of the military. It’s a job that people have to do. It’s less, “I proudly serve my country,” and much more, “Aw crap. It’s time for my annual marksmanship certification.”
  - klibertp 4y ago
    Well, the popular and deep support for armed forces did not, by and large, make Europe any better off. On the contrary, last time we glorified armed forces it led to some 80 million dead and unimaginable destruction across the continent (and world). On the other hand, the US seems to have been served well by their army, so it's not strange for normal people to support soldiers and such.
- sofixa 4y ago
  > Lucky you. I live in France and police "misconduct", brutality, utter incompetence and systematic lies are a huge problem, compounded by the fact that all politicians refuse to even consider the possibility that not everything is perfectly fine. Everything is relative. Hearing comments and watching investigations in police abuses in France is chilling (e.g. there was recently a video of a cop, without his number prominently shown on the uniform, which is illegal for them dragging away and beating a protester), until you look into comments and investigations about police abuses in the US, and you're downright reassured things aren't that bad. Yeah, reforms are needed, the IGPN (authority that surveils and investigates the French Police) needs to be redone from scratch, and the first steps for that are non-crazies running the Interior Ministry (the last two guys were... special and hardliners), but seeing that extreme care needs to be taken, I completely get why no active politician wants to touch this issue. Remember when police were protesting due to working way too many hours without pay (basically they have an overtime budget for the year, and due to multiple long running protests, the budget was blown through in the first couple of months of the year and they had to work weekends for free) and how tense the situation was, with the Gendarmerie having to police the police protest? Nobody wants to piss off the police forces, because they are necessary and powerful.
- msm_ 4y ago
  > Because there are no good cops? Do people honestly believe this? Maybe in your country police force is completely broken, but it's still statistical impossibility. In my country, I believe, police is generally good and does their job reasonably. Of course they're not the most beloved job, because if you have to deal with them you probably have a problem, but given that situation they're OK. Maybe fix your police, fire the incompetent ones and replace your polititians that allow this instead of generalising.
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
    I live in US and I might be a little biased, because I have cops in my extended family and my parents were friends with local sheriff equivalent in the old country. In short, I agree with you. It is unreasonable to claim to that there are no issues ( and maybe even systemic issues ), but it is also unreasonable to claim that there is no such thing as a good cop. Cops are just people and people respond to the environment they are in. I think parent may exaggerating for brevity ( or at least I hope so ). The solution is what it has always been, correct to the extent that you can until you get what you want in terms of results. Naturally, this line of thinking opens rather uncomfortable set of questions, because: What if the system works as intended given current incentives? And that is a hard question I have no idea how to answer.
    - tehwebguy 4y ago
      One question I consider: is a cop that never violates anyone’s civil rights, but also does nothing when their coworkers do, considered a good cop? For instance, are there any good cops in Louisville? Any good state cops in Kentucky? Seems to me they would’ve done something, anything, about the Breonna Taylor case instead of waiting for the feds to come in. There were even active coverups, Kentucky’s Attorney General went to great lengths to push the idea that the entire thing was perfectly legal! Edit: and maybe the federal charges are to some extent the result of an actual good cop in KY blowing a whistle, hopefully we’ll know someday
      - hooverd 4y ago
iacvlvs 4y ago
In many police departments in the US the problem is essentially that there are so many bad apples that every good apple that comes is spoiled or cannot do good. This can only be changed be decisive action from the top. How many bad apples does it take, to spoil the whole barrel? I'm not disagreeing with the comment I'm replying to, just trying to challenge the perception that there's anything ok with "just" a few bad apples. The acceptable number of bad apples is zero.
- msm_ 4y ago
  > The acceptable number of bad apples is zero. This is obviously idealistic and impossible in the real world (given the size of a police force). What is needed is a system that gets rid of bad apples with time, instead of letting them thrive and corrupting other apples.
  - ilovetux 4y ago
    The problem with getting rid of bad apples with time is the amount of damage even one bad police officer can do given half a chance, and even if they are punished for what they did it would not erase the bad things they have done. Policing violations are often violent and the effects long lasting.
    - A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
      Yes, but punishment sets the tone and people do not like being punished; especially if it goes on a record that follows them throughout their career.
      - themitigating 4y ago
        Does a negative record have the same impact as other jobs?
      - mrguyorama 4y ago
        This is an industry where you can murder someone, get paid leave for it, eventually let go without losing retirement benefits, and then get hired the next county over. WHAT PUNISHMENT?
bravura 4y ago
Correct, but also many German police are associated with hard right-wing / Nazi adjacent political beliefs. These are deep rooted issues that are not as easily quantified and discouraged. Reducing gun misuse is one thing, but reducing police discrimination, selective policing, and misconduct is a much larger ball of wax.
- kevviiinn 4y ago
  Many police in the US are associated with far right wing white supremacy, basically the same as those nazis
- porbelm 4y ago
  And in Norway the police had to be told to quit strip searches, "squat and cough", searching homes, and other invasive practices just for catching someone with a joint. They have never been allowed to use means so disproportional to the crime like this, but have been for years. And people think that they need those means (which they never had) "back." Also institutional racism and all the other shit that's true for most police across the world. ACAB.
- hnbad 4y ago
  The police in Germany burned Oury Jalloh to death (or burned his corpse after he died in police custody) and every officer involved got away with it. The German government decided there doesn't need to be an external investigation into police violence because the police can be trusted to have correctly investigated itself finding that police violence is not a problem. The NRW state minister of the interior abolished ID badges for riot police, then insisted that there had been no evidence of misconduct during police riots because no individual officers (wearing full helmets and no individually identifying features) had ever been charged despite video evidence of excessive use of force. Demonstrators hospitalized due to police violence routinely receive police visits in hospital because their injuries are taken as evidence of resisting arrest as all police violence is presumed to be justified. The NRW police literally used the energy company's transport vehicles to detain and transport arrested demonstrators during the raid on Lützerath, where the police was explicitly instructed to show full force to deter future protests at similar sites. Police officers were found to be part of a neo-nazi group called Combat18 (18 = Adolf Hitler) that had maintained kill lists using police records and a stash of assault weapons and body bags. It's a whole thing, yes.
voganmother42 4y ago
Body cams have been so hard, if it were not for cell phones there would be no accountability at all.
pawelmurias 4y ago
I seems reasonable to expect the police force of a country where the populace is heavily armed to shoot more people.
- eru 4y ago
  I don't know. Maybe? We can look at statistics from eg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_guns_per_capita_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_g... and compare with statistics on police shootings.
- Clubber 4y ago
  There has been a downward trend in gun ownership since at least the 1980s. https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/gun-ownership.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/gun-ownership.html https://www.norc.org/PDFs/GSS%20Reports/GSS_Trends%20in%20Gun%20Ownership_US_1972-2014.pdf https://www.norc.org/PDFs/GSS%20Reports/GSS_Trends%20in%20Gu...
7952 4y ago
I think we should get into the habit of changing leadership on the basis of results alone. So a serious incident would result in the commander being reassigned or demoted. And leadership would be held directly accountable for events regardless of their own culpability.

by atoav 4y ago

bambax 4y ago

[flagged]

rhn_mk1 4y ago
> Because there are no good cops? Seriously, this is the mother of all generalizations.
- bheadmaster 4y ago
  Here's the grandmother: There are no good people with power. Also known as, "power corrupts". You give a person power without consequences, you turn them into a ticking time bomb, and the timer determines when will they turn into a self-serving piece of shit.
  - thisisabore 4y ago
    That's the thing, the statement "there are no good cops" doesn't mean that no individual person that is police can be an ok person, it means that police as an institution will make people bad. My understanding is that it should be seen more as the starrtng point of a reflexion about the police (what should we therefore do?) rather than a conclusion.
    - bheadmaster 4y ago
      I see it as a fundamental problem of humanity - we cannot trust people to do "good" by themselves, because doing "good" often requires giving up personal benefits that would be gained from doing "bad". The best example I know is videogames. Ever see anyone play GTA without shooting everyone on the street? In GTA, there are no real consequences for your actions, so our true nature comes out. I imagine that, in the real world, when a person has power without consequences, it starts feeling like a game of GTA to them after a while - not exercising the power available just feels "lame". > what should we therefore do? Restrict power, increase accountability. The only way to train (human) animals is through punishment when they piss on the rug.
      - swayvil 4y ago
        Voting, lying, moderating. That's certainly a more immediately relevant answer. Here in social media land. They are the corrupting powers and avenues of expression for this bad human nature, here.
      - mafuy 4y ago
        > Ever see anyone play GTA without shooting everyone on the street? I disagree. The game is built to favor this behavior. If you wanted to, say, make a living in the game by selling pancakes, the scenario would not be supported to the same degree (in this case: not at all). Look at flight simulators. Most people try to fly properly. Occasionally, people explore "what if" scenarios. But most certainly most people do not use it to practice or experience another 9/11.
psychphysic 4y ago
The only upper hand we have in Europe is far less reverence to the police and armed forces in general. The military is so intertwined with US national identity that it's embedded in just about everything from sports to science. The US police forces are the closest to military turned inwards.
- eru 4y ago
  Armed forces are a pretty big deal in Finland and Switzerland as well as far as I can tell. South Korea probably, too. For the German situation in regards to sport and the military, see https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sportsoldat https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sportsoldat (You might need Google Translate or so, if you don't speak German.)
  - another2another 4y ago
    >and Switzerland as well as far as I can tell. Where on earth did you get that from? Armed forces are definitely not a big deal, in fact there's hardly any mention of them in public discourse, no parades or events involving the military, you hardly see them except occasionally you'll see soldiers going to their training on weekends on the train since Switzerland has national service. There's also very little jingoism or mention of historical military activities. Really, hardly at all. And that's a good thing, and as far as I can tell that's how the Swiss like it.
  - jounker 4y ago
    I’m an American. I lived in Switzerland. There is no glorification of the military. It’s a job that people have to do. It’s less, “I proudly serve my country,” and much more, “Aw crap. It’s time for my annual marksmanship certification.”
- klibertp 4y ago
  Well, the popular and deep support for armed forces did not, by and large, make Europe any better off. On the contrary, last time we glorified armed forces it led to some 80 million dead and unimaginable destruction across the continent (and world). On the other hand, the US seems to have been served well by their army, so it's not strange for normal people to support soldiers and such.
sofixa 4y ago
> Lucky you. I live in France and police "misconduct", brutality, utter incompetence and systematic lies are a huge problem, compounded by the fact that all politicians refuse to even consider the possibility that not everything is perfectly fine. Everything is relative. Hearing comments and watching investigations in police abuses in France is chilling (e.g. there was recently a video of a cop, without his number prominently shown on the uniform, which is illegal for them dragging away and beating a protester), until you look into comments and investigations about police abuses in the US, and you're downright reassured things aren't that bad. Yeah, reforms are needed, the IGPN (authority that surveils and investigates the French Police) needs to be redone from scratch, and the first steps for that are non-crazies running the Interior Ministry (the last two guys were... special and hardliners), but seeing that extreme care needs to be taken, I completely get why no active politician wants to touch this issue. Remember when police were protesting due to working way too many hours without pay (basically they have an overtime budget for the year, and due to multiple long running protests, the budget was blown through in the first couple of months of the year and they had to work weekends for free) and how tense the situation was, with the Gendarmerie having to police the police protest? Nobody wants to piss off the police forces, because they are necessary and powerful.
msm_ 4y ago
> Because there are no good cops? Do people honestly believe this? Maybe in your country police force is completely broken, but it's still statistical impossibility. In my country, I believe, police is generally good and does their job reasonably. Of course they're not the most beloved job, because if you have to deal with them you probably have a problem, but given that situation they're OK. Maybe fix your police, fire the incompetent ones and replace your polititians that allow this instead of generalising.
- A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
  I live in US and I might be a little biased, because I have cops in my extended family and my parents were friends with local sheriff equivalent in the old country. In short, I agree with you. It is unreasonable to claim to that there are no issues ( and maybe even systemic issues ), but it is also unreasonable to claim that there is no such thing as a good cop. Cops are just people and people respond to the environment they are in. I think parent may exaggerating for brevity ( or at least I hope so ). The solution is what it has always been, correct to the extent that you can until you get what you want in terms of results. Naturally, this line of thinking opens rather uncomfortable set of questions, because: What if the system works as intended given current incentives? And that is a hard question I have no idea how to answer.
  - tehwebguy 4y ago
    One question I consider: is a cop that never violates anyone’s civil rights, but also does nothing when their coworkers do, considered a good cop? For instance, are there any good cops in Louisville? Any good state cops in Kentucky? Seems to me they would’ve done something, anything, about the Breonna Taylor case instead of waiting for the feds to come in. There were even active coverups, Kentucky’s Attorney General went to great lengths to push the idea that the entire thing was perfectly legal! Edit: and maybe the federal charges are to some extent the result of an actual good cop in KY blowing a whistle, hopefully we’ll know someday
    - hooverd 4y ago

iacvlvs 4y ago

In many police departments in the US the problem is essentially that there are so many bad apples that every good apple that comes is spoiled or cannot do good. This can only be changed be decisive action from the top. How many bad apples does it take, to spoil the whole barrel? I'm not disagreeing with the comment I'm replying to, just trying to challenge the perception that there's anything ok with "just" a few bad apples. The acceptable number of bad apples is zero.

msm_ 4y ago
> The acceptable number of bad apples is zero. This is obviously idealistic and impossible in the real world (given the size of a police force). What is needed is a system that gets rid of bad apples with time, instead of letting them thrive and corrupting other apples.
- ilovetux 4y ago
  The problem with getting rid of bad apples with time is the amount of damage even one bad police officer can do given half a chance, and even if they are punished for what they did it would not erase the bad things they have done. Policing violations are often violent and the effects long lasting.
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
    Yes, but punishment sets the tone and people do not like being punished; especially if it goes on a record that follows them throughout their career.
    - themitigating 4y ago
      Does a negative record have the same impact as other jobs?
    - mrguyorama 4y ago
      This is an industry where you can murder someone, get paid leave for it, eventually let go without losing retirement benefits, and then get hired the next county over. WHAT PUNISHMENT?

bravura 4y ago

Correct, but also many German police are associated with hard right-wing / Nazi adjacent political beliefs. These are deep rooted issues that are not as easily quantified and discouraged. Reducing gun misuse is one thing, but reducing police discrimination, selective policing, and misconduct is a much larger ball of wax.

kevviiinn 4y ago
Many police in the US are associated with far right wing white supremacy, basically the same as those nazis
porbelm 4y ago
And in Norway the police had to be told to quit strip searches, "squat and cough", searching homes, and other invasive practices just for catching someone with a joint. They have never been allowed to use means so disproportional to the crime like this, but have been for years. And people think that they need those means (which they never had) "back." Also institutional racism and all the other shit that's true for most police across the world. ACAB.
hnbad 4y ago
The police in Germany burned Oury Jalloh to death (or burned his corpse after he died in police custody) and every officer involved got away with it. The German government decided there doesn't need to be an external investigation into police violence because the police can be trusted to have correctly investigated itself finding that police violence is not a problem. The NRW state minister of the interior abolished ID badges for riot police, then insisted that there had been no evidence of misconduct during police riots because no individual officers (wearing full helmets and no individually identifying features) had ever been charged despite video evidence of excessive use of force. Demonstrators hospitalized due to police violence routinely receive police visits in hospital because their injuries are taken as evidence of resisting arrest as all police violence is presumed to be justified. The NRW police literally used the energy company's transport vehicles to detain and transport arrested demonstrators during the raid on Lützerath, where the police was explicitly instructed to show full force to deter future protests at similar sites. Police officers were found to be part of a neo-nazi group called Combat18 (18 = Adolf Hitler) that had maintained kill lists using police records and a stash of assault weapons and body bags. It's a whole thing, yes.

voganmother42 4y ago

Body cams have been so hard, if it were not for cell phones there would be no accountability at all.

pawelmurias 4y ago

I seems reasonable to expect the police force of a country where the populace is heavily armed to shoot more people.

eru 4y ago
I don't know. Maybe? We can look at statistics from eg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_guns_per_capita_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_g... and compare with statistics on police shootings.
Clubber 4y ago
There has been a downward trend in gun ownership since at least the 1980s. https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/gun-ownership.html https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/gun-ownership.html https://www.norc.org/PDFs/GSS%20Reports/GSS_Trends%20in%20Gun%20Ownership_US_1972-2014.pdf https://www.norc.org/PDFs/GSS%20Reports/GSS_Trends%20in%20Gu...

7952 4y ago

I think we should get into the habit of changing leadership on the basis of results alone. So a serious incident would result in the commander being reassigned or demoted. And leadership would be held directly accountable for events regardless of their own culpability.