Police Behaving Badly

[Sirshredalot]

Whenever the conversation hovers over the race element, invariably white men over 45 come out en masse decrying misplaced focus and a desire to reset focus to something more palatable. Why the unease?

It's a fact blacks are hit the hardest and most often by this nonsense. It's a fact black/Hispanic upward mobility is hit much harder than white upward mobility by police overreach. Relative impact should guide the push for reforms.

These problems started in places like Baltimore and are deeply rooted in the drug war. End the drug war, improve access to education for the poor, reevaluate what the line is for police protocol and ensure the updated standards are uniformly implemented. Those three would make this thread dry up.

Not sure if this has already been posted:

http://www.vice.com/read/david-simon...went-wrong-429

FYI, I am a white guy but I'm more like grays age than 45. The topic of race and economic inequality absolutely is important, but it is ultimately a tough nut to crack. We've been trying for decades. We need to keep trying to improve things. This set of issues is complicated and it invites everyone to project their biases as public policy solutions, because solutions aren't obvious. i have my policy preferences, and serious progressives would love them, but they won't make the shitty parts of Baltimore nice for a long time, even if I'm right.

Keeping cops from murdering the people who pay their salaries SHOULD be straightforward. Solving that problem SHOULD be easy. The fact that this is a part of the above problem is outrageous. Holding cops accountable for maiming and killing their constituents is a change that can be made overnight and have immediate results.

[Bromontana]

I think the drug war is the single biggest driver of police overreach, and a big part of how it is continually justified. Seems like you can't separate the two. And race/drug war are twins. We're fine with prohibition on a humanitarian basis despite millions of deaths in Mexico...

[old goat]

I don't agree. I think it reinforces the racism.

Cops are bullies, white or black. Who do bullies pick on ? The powerless. And our racist society has made urban blacks powerless. So who is a black bully cop going to pick on ? Other blacks.

It is still racism. Can you imagine Fox News if black cops were murdering white citizens ?

well said

[Sirshredalot]

I think the drug war is the single biggest driver of police overreach, and a big part of how it is continually justified. Seems like you can't separate the two. And race/drug war are twins. We're fine with prohibition on a humanitarian basis despite millions of deaths in Mexico...

This speaks to my point above. I totally agree with you that the war on drugs has done more harm than good and that our country needs to make sweeping changes. I totally support that. Big reforms that I support. But probably not a cure for all the social ills of west Baltimore.

But none of that is necessary to stop cops from murdering people. We could just wake up tomorrow and enforce existing laws to keep cops from maiming and murdering.

[NoPostholio]

Whenever the conversation hovers over the race element, invariably white men over 45 come out en masse decrying misplaced focus and a desire to reset focus to something more palatable. Why the unease?

It's a fact blacks are hit the hardest and most often by this nonsense. It's a fact black/Hispanic upward mobility is hit much harder than white upward mobility by police overreach. Relative impact should guide the push for reforms.

These problems started in places like Baltimore and are deeply rooted in the drug war. End the drug war, improve access to education for the poor, reevaluate what the line is for police protocol and ensure the updated standards are uniformly implemented. Those three would make this thread dry up.

Not sure if this has already been posted:

http://www.vice.com/read/david-simon...went-wrong-429

That was some good read - Simon seems to get BPD better than anyone.

[Tippster]

I was gonna multiquote but there were too many.

This was never a White vs. Black thing, despite what many online and on air claim. None of the protests - in Ferguson, NY, or B-more - were about white people fucking up black people. Literally it was about the COPS vs. Black people. In every one of those 3 cases there were black cops present and the protesters understand that, even if the echo chamber doesn't.

The highest penalty charge in the Freddie Gray case is against a BLACK cop. He deserves the charge. That man tried to hurt that boy who was trussed up like a chicken in the back of his van, unsecured, and he purposefully took turns and stopped short to hurt him. This isn't a new thing.

The two white cops on bikes tried to hurt that boy when he ran away from them. They had NO probable cause, and their justification, that he had a switchblade (that they didn't find until after the arrest) turned out to not be a switchblade after all and a completely legal weapon to have. Imagine if he'd had a gun in TX.... Running away from the cops IS NOT ILLEGAL unless they have a reason to detain you. There is no law in the land that says if you look a cop in the eye and they move forward that you cannot run away. Even if they tell you to stop there is no reason why you should.

Imagine if any of you who post here walked up to a cop, stared at them, and then turned and ran away... did you break a law? Do you deserve to be detained, much less arrested and thrown in a paddy wagon? Of course not.

Again, this isn't a problem the black community has with all of our white asses, this is a problem they have with COPS. Police these days think that they are the law, and they are not.

[Bromontana]

How do you reward cops? Two ways: promotion and cash. That's what rewards a cop. If you want to pay overtime pay for having police fill the jails with loitering arrests or simple drug possession or failure to yield, if you want to spend your municipal treasure rewarding that, well the cop who's going to court seven or eight days a month—and court is always overtime pay—you're going to damn near double your salary every month. On the other hand, the guy who actually goes to his post and investigates who's burglarizing the homes, at the end of the month maybe he's made one arrest. It may be the right arrest and one that makes his post safer, but he's going to court one day and he's out in two hours. So you fail to reward the cop who actually does police work. But worse, it's time to make new sergeants or lieutenants, and so you look at the computer and say: Who's doing the most work? And they say, man, this guy had 80 arrests last month, and this other guy's only got one. Who do you think gets made sergeant? And then who trains the next generation of cops in how not to do police work?

I've just described for you the culture of the Baltimore police department amid the deluge of the drug war, where actual investigation goes unrewarded and where rounding up bodies for street dealing, drug possession, loitering such—the easiest and most self-evident arrests a cop can make—is nonetheless the path to enlightenment and promotion and some additional pay. That's what the drug war built, and that's what Martin O'Malley affirmed when he sent so much of inner city Baltimore into the police wagons on a regular basis.

http://www.vice.com/read/david-simon...went-wrong-429

[splat]

I feel like the public discussion of the gray killing and the Baltimore riots went to a high level discussion of race and why some of those neighborhoods in Baltimore are such a pit, etc. really quickly.

That's a worthy discussion to have, but I feel like the simple fact that the cops are apparently murdering people almost gets glossed over.

[Benny Profane]

I was gonna multiquote but there were too many.

This was never a White vs. Black thing, despite what many online and on air claim. None of the protests - in Ferguson, NY, or B-more - were about white people fucking up black people. Literally it was about the COPS vs. Black people. In every one of those 3 cases there were black cops present and the protesters understand that, even if the echo chamber doesn't.

The highest penalty charge in the Freddie Gray case is against a BLACK cop. He deserves the charge. That man tried to hurt that boy who was trussed up like a chicken in the back of his van, unsecured, and he purposefully took turns and stopped short to hurt him. This isn't a new thing.

The two white cops on bikes tried to hurt that boy when he ran away from them. They had NO probable cause, and their justification, that he had a switchblade (that they didn't find until after the arrest) turned out to not be a switchblade after all and a completely legal weapon to have. Imagine if he'd had a gun in TX.... Running away from the cops IS NOT ILLEGAL unless they have a reason to detain you. There is no law in the land that says if you look a cop in the eye and they move forward that you cannot run away. Even if they tell you to stop there is no reason why you should.

Imagine if any of you who post here walked up to a cop, stared at them, and then turned and ran away... did you break a law? Do you deserve to be detained, much less arrested and thrown in a paddy wagon? Of course not.

Again, this isn't a problem the black community has with all of our white asses, this is a problem they have with COPS. Police these days think that they are the law, and they are not.

Yeah, but, all this never happens to white people.

[Bromontana]

Yeah, but, all this never happens to white people.

Tipp's trying to say the animus within the Baltimore communities isn't directed towards whites, it's towards the power structure. For them this translates to police almost exclusively.

[Benny Profane]

I know what he's trying to say, and I'm not arguing with all that, but, bottom line, I never see white people getting killed by cops as much as black men. Actually, not at all. Not even in poor, trashy white communities, which I'm pretty sure are filled with hate for cops, and the cops have no love for them, either.

[Bromontana]

There have been two I know of in SLC in the last year.

[Benny Profane]

Broken neck while cuffed in a van? Shot while running away from a cop?

[Bromontana]

Unarmed guy shot outside 7-11 while his two brothers watched. Justified shooting.

Unstable guy weirdos out neighbor. Neighbor calls slcpd. Slcpd threatens the guy with arrest even though there is no crime, no reasonable cause to arrest or even detain unnecessarily. Guy flips out and starts screaming at the cop, cop plays the "stfu" card. Guy hits cop with shovel, cop puts a half dozen into his torso. Justified shooting.

[Benny Profane]

We'll, fuck, he hit him with a fucking shovel, for gods sake. I'd shoot the motherfucker.

[Benny Profane]

I spend a lot of time in the gym lately rehabbing the knee, and Fox is usually up on a big screen. Boy, are they being assholes about all this. It's pretty amazing how they are spinning this as the cops are the real victims.

[old goat]

I spend a lot of time in the gym lately rehabbing the knee, and Fox is usually up on a big screen. Boy, are they being assholes about all this. It's pretty amazing how they are spinning this as the cops are the real victims.

you need to find a different gym. I thought they all showed CNN.

[Benny Profane]

Equal oppurtunity in mine. Fox, CNN, and MSNBC all in a row.

I don't get the demographic of Fox. I think it's something like an average of high sixties, 70s' which means their audience will die soon. All alzheimers and reverse mortgages and arthritis and joint aids and Medicare supplements and life insurance for the burial advertisements.

[stuckathuntermtn]

I think the drug war is the single biggest driver of police overreach, and a big part of how it is continually justified. Seems like you can't separate the two. And race/drug war are twins. We're fine with prohibition on a humanitarian basis despite millions of deaths in Mexico...

Qft

Equal oppurtunity in mine. Fox, CNN, and MSNBC all in a row.

I don't get the demographic of Fox. I think it's something like an average of high sixties, 70s' which means their audience will die soon. All alzheimers and reverse mortgages and arthritis and joint aids and Medicare supplements and life insurance for the burial advertisements.

It's funny because it's true.

[neufox47]

I know what he's trying to say, and I'm not arguing with all that, but, bottom line, I never see white people getting killed by cops as much as black men. Actually, not at all. Not even in poor, trashy white communities, which I'm pretty sure are filled with hate for cops, and the cops have no love for them, either.

I'm sure your perception is highly accurate.

End the war on drugs
Put a camera on every cop
De-unionize the police

[Benny Profane]

I don't know about the last one. The last person I would want as a boss is a politician looking to get re elected. They need protection from that.

[neufox47]

I don't know about the last one. The last person I would want as a boss is a politician looking to get re elected. They need protection from that.

I think the officer's should answer to elected officials. How else can voters control them?

[snoqpass]

Elected officials don't listen to the voters

[Harry]

The Washington Post has done some shitty journalism on this issue, but this article nails it:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...entrandom_1_na

[Benny Profane]

If there is an anti Pulitzer, The Post should be awarded one for putting that shit on the front page implying that the victim hurt himself.