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[Police brutality] American injustice, yet again.


Ragitsu

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They're not supposed to be that realistic anymore.  They should have some bright orange part on them, so you can tell it's not a real gun.  Heck they had to recolor a reissue of G1 Megatron for that reason.

 

So the big attraction with airsoft is that they're supposed to be realistic replicas.  My M4 and HK51 have detachable magazines and the mag release, safety, and charging handles all work like they do on the real steel guns.  They are of foreign origin, and in order to avoid problems with customs, they 1) had their replica trademarks puttied over and 2) each had an inch of barrel painted orange.  It took me about half an hour per gun to take the orange off with some solvent.  Then I threw on some nice optics, three-point slings, uprated springs and pistons... but I digress.

 

However, it's important to remember that BB and pellet guns are not actually required to have orange tips by federal law.  State and city laws vary, of course--depending on the state, airsoft guns may be required to have orange tips, may be considered real firearms, may be outright illegal, or may have no additional restrictions whatsoever.  My M9 (since stolen) and my Benelli shotgun did not come with orange paint, as they were procured locally.  And of course BB and paintball guns are not sold with orange tips. 

 

Anyway, the point is that replica guns do not necessarily have to have orange on them, and that they can, as a result, be a kind of Darwin Award catalyst when mixed with jittery cops.  Still, it's important to remember that skin color seems to have a big impact on police response--white douchebags open carrying with real guns might get questioned by police, whereas black kids with toys get gunned down without warning.

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I don't know what your point is. That was a bad shoot. No disagreement there. However, you posted it in response to a simple statement of fact, so I don't understand your reasoning.

 

I believe I went over this earlier in this thread, but I'll reiterate: Police have no requirement to warn someone before shooting. It's entirely discretionary and for good reason.

 

Do you remember the Tacoma mall shooting in 2005? Well, Brendan McKown does. He was carrying his concealed weapon and confronted the shooter, ordering him to drop his weapon. McKown is now paralyzed as a result, and the shooter is now happily married in jail. (That last link isn't really germane to the discussion, but included because it's rather odd news.)

 

McKown made two errors in judgment: First, he engaged a long arm with a handgun. Second, he did what we see TV cops doing every night, what we expect from the good guys: He gave fair warning before opening fire. I don't know what made him do the latter, but it cost him dearly.

 

If you require police to give verbal warnings in every case, you put them at risk. It is always better to be the actor than the reactor and issuing commands and waiting for them to be followed puts you into the reactor role. This isn't always a good idea.

 

Police are expected to use good judgment and discretion when applying force. They're expected to use reasonable force. The problem with all of these cases are the officers themselves. The standards of use of deadly force and the use of force continuum that have been commonly been used for decades are both effective tools.

 

The bottom line is we need better men behind the badges.

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PatternGhost, in response to the mall shooting: those were two very different situation. In the case of the mall shooting, the guy had a gun. It was known - not suspected. The man also had the gun drawn and ready - not stuffed away somewhere. So, even on the face of it it is inappropriate to compare the two instances. 
 

Cops are taking a "Shoot first and never question" stance when it comes to these incidents. Too many people give police too wide a berth when it comes to murdering us. A cop is suppose to de-escalate a situation, not escalate it. And always resorting to maximum force to achieve a goal is what is leading to us having so many death by cop situations. 

Worse yet, cops think they are above the law. Be it cops who steal personal photos of naked (semi-naked) women. Sexually harass and rape people. Gun down little children. Or the countless other incidents. And those are only the major ones. We still have police using their powers to steal from us (legally!!), harass exes, drink and drive, etc.

 

The whole system is messed up. And too many of us are still gong to defend to the death absolutely any cop just because he wears a badge. That is sick. It is like a cow defending the butcher who is about to kill him. 

 

La Rose. 

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Sorry, Rose, you're missing the point completely.  You need to look at the context here.

 

Ragitsu seems* to be suggesting (posts 426, 430) that police should be required to give a verbal warning.

 

My post was a refutation of that. The example was exactly the correct one for the point I was actually making.

 

That point: You cannot require an officer give a verbal warning in every case. Use of deadly force and the use of force continuum are very well established. They work. They're ignored all too often by bad cops. This is a training issue, not an issue with the rules themselves.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*Seems to. He'll have to weigh in to be certain.

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PatternGhost:

I don't think that is a fair assessment of Ragitsu point. At best (for your assumed side) Ragitsu is saying that there are situation in which Cops should give orders to  stop something before opening fire. That is a point you would seem to clearly agree with. That is why your providing of that Tacoma mall incident is not in keeping with the topic. It was a clear situation were the guy with the gun already had it out and it was clear he had intent to use it. The incidents Ragitsu and many others take issue with are ones where the cops get away with killing us because they think there is a chance, no matter how small or stupid, that the suspect might just possibly have a gun. And take action to kill that person without ever allowing people to question that decision because 'authoritah!'. 

 

La Rose. 

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Rose, I think we're talking past each other here.

 

 

PatternGhost:

I don't think that is a fair assessment of Ragitsu point.

 

La Rose. 

 

Why don't we let him answer for himself if he feels the need to?

 

 

 

At best (for your assumed side) Ragitsu is saying that there are situation in which Cops should give orders to  stop something before opening fire.

 

I don't see how his posting a link to the Pasco shooting applies at all, then. The Cops not only gave orders to the guy, they also attempted to tase him and the Taser prong didn't stick. And neither of these things is where they went wrong.

 

 

 

That is a point you would seem to clearly agree with.

 

I would agree that in pretty much every single case of a killing by police in this thread, the deaths could have been avoided had better cops shown up to the scenes.

 

 


That is why your providing of that Tacoma mall incident is not in keeping with the topic.

 

You don't get to decide that. The topic being discussed was whether or not police should be required to give warnings. The post wasn't meant to address the Pasco shooting AT ALL in the first place. Ragitsu brought that in. Neither of us can tell exactly what he meant by posting a link with no commentary.

 

In fact, that link was completely irrelevant because 1) a warning WAS given and 2) the man was very likely incapable of understanding any warning. Warnings weren't really the issue in that shooting. The fact that they went to a lethal level of force AT ALL is the issue. The fact that they murdered a person who wasn't in his right mind, and endangered many bystanders is the issue in Pasco. I hope to hell they hang for it, too.* The guy who got shot was the guy the police were supposed to be protecting, if only from himself.

 

Here's the bottom line: Police have to be entrusted with a certain amount of discretion in doing their jobs. They have to have a certain level of indemnity to be able to do their jobs without constantly second-guessing things. The unfortunate truth is that when you take a large number of people (ie, all law enforcement officers in the US) and give them a large amount of discretionary power, you will have many who will abuse that power. Even if the percentage is relatively small, the raw number is large. That's before factoring in various levels of institutionalized corruption and protectionism, particularly in several large departments. And something needs to be done about all of this.

 

 

 

 

*Actually, WA got rid of hanging some time back.

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PatternGhost, I think this a great point for a mea culpa. I have a bad habit of visiting this site, opening a few windows and then on casually reading over it over the course of several hours while doing other things. I miss-remember who exactly posted that link. Realizing that now, I can see why you were caused undue confusion by Ragitsu and myself. I am sorry for my part in that. 

That said, I do stand by my later points about bad policing. 

 

La Rose.

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No problemo! I think we can both agree that there are a lot of examples of bad policing in this thread. No arguments there.

Word, I think much of the disagreement comes from the reasoning "The 10%, makes the 90% bad" it is human nature, but it is wrong. And it needs to be overcome.

 

Many over zealous cops suffer from the same error, only 10% of the public are knuckleheads, but they spend 90% of their time interacting with that 10%. It can skew perceptions (badly).

 

Most cops are good hearted folks, who want to help. But they are as prone to error as any human being.

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I don't know what your point is.

 

There are exceptions to a rule? Well, knock me down with a feather.

 

Thing of it is, a significant portion of my ire with modern police officers in the US (in these stories that we post here) stems from the fact that they're taking the exceptions to the rules and turning them into the exceptions that *are* the rules.

 

---

 

By the way, while I can appreciate your sentiment that we just need more good police officers, a few conclusions come to mind, and they're all at least semi-depressing.

 

1. We have the "good" eligible personnel already, so this is as good as it's gonna get (I hope this isn't the case).

 

2. The good folks that would have become a part of law enforcement are staying away because they see what the institution is really all about.

 

3. Good folks sign up and become corrupted by the system despite their best intentions. We all know that internal reformation is one hell of an uphill battle, so perhaps this conclusion has a degree of truth to it. Institutionalized discrimination against certain civilians and enmeshed profit motives need to be uprooted and chucked squarely into the garbage.

 

4. The "good" police officers cover for the bad police officers. Again, the system is partly to blame here: there is simply too much incentive to not speak out against one's brothers in blue...unless the evidence against them is clear cut or they've already pissed off the brass in some prior incident. Still, with anything in life, eventually a point is reached where enough is enough.

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I'm really tired, so instead of messing with breaking up the quote, I'll comment in blue below.

 

There are exceptions to a rule? Well, knock me down with a feather.

 

I'm not sure what rule you're referring to. Or that I may have referred to. I'll look at the thread again after I wake up. It's way past time for me to get some shuteye.

Thing of it is, a significant portion of my ire with modern police officers in the US (in these stories that we post here) stems from the fact that they're taking the exceptions to the rules and turning them into the exceptions that *are* the rules.

 

Since the thread is largely dealing with use of force rules, I'll say that I agree with you, but that what we're seeing aren't exceptions so much as people making poor (to chose a mild version of a phrase) decisions. If you view the use of force continuum as decision-making tool, then you might say it's just sitting rusted at the bottom of the toolbox for these guys. This can be corrected, but the second problem of protectionism and abuse of indemnity status comes into play.

---

By the way, while I can appreciate your sentiment that we just need more good police officers, a few conclusions come to mind, and they're all at least semi-depressing.

 

We need more than just more good police officers. We need better accountability. We need to reign in unions that are out of control (I'm generally very pro union, but not so much with teachers and police unions, whose sole purpose seems to be to keep incompetent and dangerous people employed in positions of public trust). We need better guidelines and policies in many cases. We need better race/class relations. We need to demilitarize (though that term irks me, as we'd be better off with some military discipline, and as a vet it always sounds like a slight on the military when the military doesn't show their ass nearly as much as civilian LE) police and get them out of their cars, into neighborhoods, and getting to know their communities and interact with them in a positive manner. We need better training. We need officer safety training that doesn't center around fear-mongering but still somehow manages to make sure officers make it home in one piece (a very fine line). We need lots of stuff. Good people are just raw materials. We can possibly use some of the "bad" people as raw materials too, as many of them can benefit from a slight tune up.

 

1. We have the "good" eligible personnel already, so this is as good as it's gonna get (I hope this isn't the case).

 

I have a theory that one of the reasons garbage men are so well-paid compared to the relative skill level of their job is because it's a filthy job, and therefore hard to fill. I think the same applies to police work. I know the last city I lived in actually ran recruiting ads on the side of buses. So, it may be as good as it's going to get, but people can benefit from guidance, training, and accountability.

 

2. The good folks that would have become a part of law enforcement are staying away because they see what the institution is really all about.

 

No argument there.

3. Good folks sign up and become corrupted by the system despite their best intentions. We all know that internal reformation is one hell of an uphill battle, so perhaps this conclusion has a degree of truth to it. Institutionalized discrimination against certain civilians and enmeshed profit motives need to be uprooted and chucked squarely into the garbage.

 

Agreed. I think the piece about Serpico posted earlier is a great example.

 

 

4. The "good" police officers cover for the bad police officers. Again, the system is partly to blame here: there is simply too much incentive to not speak out against one's brothers in blue...unless the evidence against them is clear cut or they've already pissed off the brass in some prior incident. Still, with anything in life, eventually a point is reached where enough is enough.

 

Ditto the Serpico comment.

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Word, I think much of the disagreement comes from the reasoning "The 10%, makes the 90% bad" it is human nature, but it is wrong. And it needs to be overcome.

 

Many over zealous cops suffer from the same error, only 10% of the public are knuckleheads, but they spend 90% of their time interacting with that 10%. It can skew perceptions (badly).

 

Most cops are good hearted folks, who want to help. But they are as prone to error as any human being.

 

I think these ratios vary greatly by precinct. There's a lot of systemic corruption in a lot of precincts.

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And not one of these perverters of justice are going to jail.

 

 

And they never will. Why? Because police and prosecutors are all collectively corrupt SOBs. The guy should thank the heavens the police didn't decide to go for a no-knock warrant that 'accidently' lead to his death. Such would be par for the course for most police it seems. 

 

La Rose. 

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