7 ms·
So 100s of cops have done their jobs?
by 2OEH8eoCRo0 4mo ago
So 100s of cops have done their jobs?
- saghm 4mo ago> "For the first eight or nine years I was the most pulled-over man in America," he said. "It was constant." > Often officers simply wanted photographs. > Other times they invented reasons to start a conversation. > His favorite stop happened in a small mountain town in West Virginia. > A traffic light turned red. Braithwaite stopped. The light turned green and he made a leisurely turn through the intersection. > A few moments later, flashing lights appeared behind him. > A police officer marched up to the banana and delivered the news. > "'The reason I pulled you over, that light back there, you peeled out.'" Their job is to take advantage of their authority to have fun at the expense of the time of citizens?
- williamdclt 4mo agoI'll happily live in a world where this is the extent of police authority abuse.
- tomalbrc 4mo agoIf only.
- teraflop 4mo agoIf you tolerate small abuses, and let people get accustomed to abusing their power in small meaningless ways, the abuses will only grow.
- lazide 4mo agoI can assure you, pulling over the banana stand is not the road to death camps. The death camps are.
- zmgsabst 4mo agoRoads don’t start at their end. And it didn’t start there in Germany, either banana cars or death camps.
- lazide 4mo agoEh, most roads start where other roads end or meet. The wheel turns, regardless.
- deleted 4mo ago[deleted]
- wat10000 4mo agoMaybe not death camps, but it is inextricably tied to real abuses. I don't see how you ban "driving while black" stops without also banning these.
- lazide 4mo agoYou also can’t ban these without making it impossible to stop 99% of real issues either. A giant banana car is the definition of unusual behavior, after all.
- mrguyorama 4mo ago"Unusual" behavior should not be justification for any police interaction. Society doesn't benefit from policing "Weird".
- lazide 4mo agoSociety (broadly) disagrees, and even trivial examples would have you agreeing with them if you thought it through. If a cop saw someone hiding in your bushes at 2am - stop and check it out, or nah?
- 4mo ago
- overfeed 4mo ago> ... the abuses will only grow. SCOTUS made race-based Kavanaugh Stops legal. Stipping a banana on wheels is a much lower bar
- kube-system 4mo agoThe problem isn't the severity of the infraction, it's the lack of respect for the rule of law, and an institutionalized acceptance of that practice. The prioritization of a respect for authority over a respect for the rule of law is notoriously problematic in small town america in very real ways.
- pak9rabid 4mo agoSounds like a fun way to make a lot of friends in law enforcement :)
- saghm 4mo agoRight, there's definitely not a bunch of pressure from the fact that they can throw you in jail for basically anything and probably get away with shooting you if they really wanted that would get in the way of a real meaningful relationship...
- kube-system 4mo agoThe police can only stop a driver if they believe they have committed a primary traffic offense.
- sidewndr46 4mo agoNo? Not even close. If the police "smell weed" they can stop you. If the police believe you have active warrants they can stop you. If the police believe you have committed a criminal act of any kind, they may stop you
- kube-system 4mo agoI'm speaking about a traffic stop specifically, I am aware other crimes exist.
- sidewndr46 4mo agoyour statement was "The police can only stop a driver". This is completely false. It is based off the belief of the officer, not fact or reality.
- deleted 4mo ago[deleted]
- kube-system 4mo ago> It is based off the belief of the officer, not fact or reality. A belief that they have violated some law. They cannot do it for these reasons, from the article: > Often officers simply wanted photographs. > Other times they invented reasons to start a conversation.
- deleted 4mo ago[deleted]
- petcat 4mo agoThat's not true at all. The police can stop a vehicle for any suspicion of unlawful activity. For instance, to question a driver about the street-legal-ness of their homemade banana car. You can, however, refuse questioning and refuse any inspection of the interior of the vehicle and just ask them to cite you for what they pulled you over for.
- 4chandaily 4mo agoMore like 100s of cops have abused their authority to harass a middle aged artist. At even just 10 minutes a stop, that is over 30 hours of this poor man's life he has spent staring at the berries and cherries just because some entitled cop thought he deserved a photo op.
- petcat 4mo ago> harass a middle aged artist This man is driving a homemade banana car across the continent specifically because he wants the attention it garners. It's the whole point.
- Arodex 4mo agoYeah, the attention of armed people with the authority to order him around. See how ridiculous that sounds?
- petcat 4mo agoI would advise you not drive a homemade fruit car around your town if you are this terrified of the attention it will bring. He clearly said in the article that he enjoys the encounters. He is doing this on purpose.
- sixothree 4mo agoYou seem to have misunderstood the reason this country was founded in the first place.
- 4chandaily 4mo agoHim enjoying the attention doesn't make the actions of the police right or just. He enjoys the attention, they are abusing their authority, Both things are true.
- petcat 4mo ago> they are abusing their authority It's perfectly reasonable to question whether that vehicle is street legal when it passes by on the road. It would be my first thought. It looks like it's mounted on a boat trailer chassis, and the windshield appears to have questionable effectiveness at high speeds. Pulling him over to ask about it seems like they are doing their jobs. Especially when I am also a driver on the same road.