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Each one of these has a knee-jerk European response that either completely ignores reality or violates a half dozen or more laws. Two examples: 1. "Police vio

by pc86 1y ago

Each one of these has a knee-jerk European response that either completely ignores reality or violates a half dozen or more laws. Two examples: 1. "Police violence." What violence? Against whom? In a year approximately 50 million people have a police interaction (not the total number of all interactions). About 75,000 people are taken to a hospital following police use of force and about 600 people (0.001%) are killed. Of course the ideal number is zero but 0.001% doesn't seem like there is an epidemic of police violence sweeping through the country. 2. "Alternative (public) transportation." Again you're not being particularly clear on what the fix is here. Most major cities have some form of transit, be it busses, subways, or above-ground rail. If you're talking about major city-to-city high speed rail an LA-to-NYC rail system would be like putting in rail from Paris to northern Kazakhstan. San Diego to Chicago would be like London to Kazan (845km east of Moscow). Iowa is a medium-sized state most in the US never visit and never think about, and it's almost twice the size of Austria. Europeans who rail (pun intended) about how it's so dumb the US doesn't have high speed rail haven't taken the requisite 5 minutes to understand the difference in scale when you're talking about connecting the east and west coasts of the US. What's more likely? That the US with ~350 million people just decides to ignore these "issues," or that there's something the average person who doesn't live here is misunderstanding?

potato3732842 1y ago
.001% does seem kinda high in a context where a huge fraction of the police are going out and initiating interactions all day. Now, if it were .001% for situations where the police are actually dispatched as the result of a call I think that'd be pretty ok.
- pc86 1y ago
  Why does the differentiation matter? There is this tone in a lot of these discussions that the police are going out and hunting young unarmed black men and it simply doesn't line up with reality.
  - potato3732842 1y ago
    >Why does the differentiation matter? Because the millions upon millions of traffic stops water down the fact that the police go guns blazing into petty BS way too often. >There is this tone in a lot of these discussions that the police are going out and hunting young unarmed black men and it simply doesn't line up with reality. Worse, they're hunting us all. Anyone who isn't a cop is at best a mark to be shaken down to them.
vladms 1y ago
Not sure how we define violence, but I found 2 links that show that in USA there are quite some more police killings per capita than in western Europe. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1124039/police-killings-rate-selected-countries/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1124039/police-killings-... https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/police-killings-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/police-ki... Of course some killings might be reasonable (very dangerous people, etc.) and violence is more than killings, but there does seem to be some signal there. The reality and the laws are what people ask repeatedly. Maybe if they don't think it can be different they will not ask.
- pb7 1y ago
  Pointless to compare when Europe doesn't have the same demographics. Police killings are not random.
  - vladms 1y ago
    My reply was directed to someone that seemed to suggest "there is not so much violence". I think the first step to discuss a topic is to understand what is there. If the statement would have been "I am fine that police in the USA being (potentially) more violent than in Western Europe", I wouldn't have checked anything because everybody is entitled to an opinion. I did check though because I wondered "is it true that there is not much violence in the USA compared to Western Europe?". I can't say I am sure after searching 5 minutes, but it does look like there is a probability that it is the case.
alabastervlog 1y ago
> If you're talking about major city-to-city high speed rail an LA-to-NYC rail system would be like putting in rail from Paris to northern Kazakhstan. San Diego to Chicago would be like London to Kazan (845km east of Moscow). Iowa is a medium-sized state most in the US never visit and never think about, and it's almost twice the size of Austria. Europeans who rail (pun intended) about how it's so dumb the US doesn't have high speed rail haven't taken the requisite 5 minutes to understand the difference in scale when you're talking about connecting the east and west coasts of the US. I find these "but it's so big!" excuses really lame when the crown jewel of our rail transit network, the Acela, in a large and very dense region... still kinda sucks. Who cares about coast-to-coast when we can't even get Boston-DC to reach the lower edge of the same category as what's considered good developed-world passenger rail? This is clearly an area we could improve on significantly, and the excuse of "it's not dense enough" doesn't apply there.
cadamsdotcom 1y ago
Your high speed rail argument is valid but it’s also a classic misdirection. I doubt you meant to say this, but it came across as “we can’t solve the hardest cases so no one should be trying to solve any of them - and everyone who wants them solved is clueless”. Saying things like that dooms big problems to stay unsolved forever. Probably couldn’t get it done the exact way they do in Europe, but no need to give up before starting. LA to San Diego? Portland to Seattle? Or a slightly harder one, Chicago to Austin TX?
- 0xffff2 1y ago
  Just to take the low hanging fruit that I'm directly familiar with, there _is_ rail service from LA to San Diego. Just keeping the existing service operating is a massive challenge costing millions of dollars per year to keep the existing train lines operational in the face of coastal erosion. Meanwhile, there are literally dozens of proposals ranging from hundreds of millions to billions of dollars to implement a long-term fix by relocating the rails and realigning them to support HSR. Cost aside, _all_ of these proposals are being met with strong NIMBY and/or environmentalist resistance. Do NIMBYs and environmental protection laws not exist in Europe?

by pc86 1y ago

potato3732842 1y ago

.001% does seem kinda high in a context where a huge fraction of the police are going out and initiating interactions all day. Now, if it were .001% for situations where the police are actually dispatched as the result of a call I think that'd be pretty ok.

pc86 1y ago
Why does the differentiation matter? There is this tone in a lot of these discussions that the police are going out and hunting young unarmed black men and it simply doesn't line up with reality.
- potato3732842 1y ago
  >Why does the differentiation matter? Because the millions upon millions of traffic stops water down the fact that the police go guns blazing into petty BS way too often. >There is this tone in a lot of these discussions that the police are going out and hunting young unarmed black men and it simply doesn't line up with reality. Worse, they're hunting us all. Anyone who isn't a cop is at best a mark to be shaken down to them.

vladms 1y ago

Not sure how we define violence, but I found 2 links that show that in USA there are quite some more police killings per capita than in western Europe. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1124039/police-killings-rate-selected-countries/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1124039/police-killings-... https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/police-killings-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/police-ki... Of course some killings might be reasonable (very dangerous people, etc.) and violence is more than killings, but there does seem to be some signal there. The reality and the laws are what people ask repeatedly. Maybe if they don't think it can be different they will not ask.

pb7 1y ago
Pointless to compare when Europe doesn't have the same demographics. Police killings are not random.
- vladms 1y ago
  My reply was directed to someone that seemed to suggest "there is not so much violence". I think the first step to discuss a topic is to understand what is there. If the statement would have been "I am fine that police in the USA being (potentially) more violent than in Western Europe", I wouldn't have checked anything because everybody is entitled to an opinion. I did check though because I wondered "is it true that there is not much violence in the USA compared to Western Europe?". I can't say I am sure after searching 5 minutes, but it does look like there is a probability that it is the case.

alabastervlog 1y ago

> If you're talking about major city-to-city high speed rail an LA-to-NYC rail system would be like putting in rail from Paris to northern Kazakhstan. San Diego to Chicago would be like London to Kazan (845km east of Moscow). Iowa is a medium-sized state most in the US never visit and never think about, and it's almost twice the size of Austria. Europeans who rail (pun intended) about how it's so dumb the US doesn't have high speed rail haven't taken the requisite 5 minutes to understand the difference in scale when you're talking about connecting the east and west coasts of the US. I find these "but it's so big!" excuses really lame when the crown jewel of our rail transit network, the Acela, in a large and very dense region... still kinda sucks. Who cares about coast-to-coast when we can't even get Boston-DC to reach the lower edge of the same category as what's considered good developed-world passenger rail? This is clearly an area we could improve on significantly, and the excuse of "it's not dense enough" doesn't apply there.

cadamsdotcom 1y ago

Your high speed rail argument is valid but it’s also a classic misdirection. I doubt you meant to say this, but it came across as “we can’t solve the hardest cases so no one should be trying to solve any of them - and everyone who wants them solved is clueless”. Saying things like that dooms big problems to stay unsolved forever. Probably couldn’t get it done the exact way they do in Europe, but no need to give up before starting. LA to San Diego? Portland to Seattle? Or a slightly harder one, Chicago to Austin TX?

0xffff2 1y ago
Just to take the low hanging fruit that I'm directly familiar with, there _is_ rail service from LA to San Diego. Just keeping the existing service operating is a massive challenge costing millions of dollars per year to keep the existing train lines operational in the face of coastal erosion. Meanwhile, there are literally dozens of proposals ranging from hundreds of millions to billions of dollars to implement a long-term fix by relocating the rails and realigning them to support HSR. Cost aside, _all_ of these proposals are being met with strong NIMBY and/or environmentalist resistance. Do NIMBYs and environmental protection laws not exist in Europe?