TrickstaPriest

Yes, this nation harbors a deeply anti-intellectual sentiment; unless you're coincidentally attractive or wealthy, people rarely want to listen to what you have to say. I could expound upon this statement, but I am tired of rehashing the same points and I don't want to delve into politics (more than I already have...I broke my own rule). That said, if comedians are using their powers for good rather than (purely) profit, I am fine with their actions. It should be noted that the most effective comedy often contains a hearty kernel of truth.
 
  
 
That was one of the most bizarre posts I've ever seen on this forum. I have witnessed the Red Scare tactic being used elsewhere, but I never thought I'd see it here.
 
  
 
Oftentimes, whenever the discussion of how European nations - on the whole - are more civil than the United States of America crops up, you'll see the occasional racist using innuendo (or not...some of them are quite up front about their biases) to indicate that the only reason why their societies function relatively well is because they're all white. I commend you for pointing out part of the problem doesn't stem from some innate vague quality that can be attributed to ethnicity, but rather a history of hatred.

I will always agree that more training is helpful.  However, I don't believe Scandinavian countries are good examples to use for the subject of police brutality.  As I understand it, they have little to no racial, ethnic or cultural divisions whatsoever in the past or present.  Nor do they even deal with sticky immigration or refugee issues such as Germany.  These are massive underlying causes of the problem.  Also, more training does not fix the main factor - abusive and/or flat out bad cops are almost completely untouchable thanks to police unions, lobbyists and internal politics.

Well, the Texas Rt number is back to 1.0 so not good, but not a disaster.
 
The two week trend is flat, but the daily case number is now averaging 1500 instead of 500-600 like it used to.
 
Deaths are not soaring yet, but there's usually a 10 day-ish lag between sick enough to get tested and dead.
 
That being said - the rate of mask usage in public - minus businesses/hospitals is damn near zero.  Like 5-7% tops.
 
I guess we're going for herd immunity here.  😐
 
 

I saw tons of masks at the protests...
 
Which I have mentioned many times, I believe are so big because (and not in spite of) unemployment.

Well,unfortunately the Biden presidency scares me almost as much, only for different reasons. 
 
It has occurred to me that the 2020 election is like circa 1580 Russia, who is better Ivan the terrible or Fyador the bellringer 
 
I guess I await the False Dmitri. (Of course the birther say we already got that one.) Really don't know who to root for (other than the asteroid)
 
I guess I should stay away from the polling. Biden ahead will depress me. Trump ahead will depress me.
 

Corporations may spout idealistic slogans from time to time, but we all know their main concern is their profitability. NASCAR must have realized most of their paying customers want that change.
 
If the current movement can stay firm and committed for long enough to show corporate America that backing reactionaries will damage their bottom line, the corporations will pressure their political lapdogs to at least act like they're the people's representatives.

Body cameras are awesome if for no other reason than it gives a jury and the public a chance to see what's happening.
 
It's also useful for officer training.
 
Not sure how many are familiar with the James King case but that one looks to be headed to the supreme court.
 
Basically it goes like this:  Two cops and an FBI agent are looking for a guy.  They're plain clothes.  They approach James King and ask him his name.  He tells them.  They ask if he's lying.  He says he's not.
Then one guy grabs him and another takes his wallet.  James King believes he's being mugged and runs for his life.  They tackle him and beat him half-to-death.  Including choking him to the point where he blacks out.
 
Then because they realize they've screwed up they charge HIM with three felonies related to resisting arrest (nobody said they were arresting him.  He should have just known that when 3 plain clothes guys assault you it's arrest.).
 
He beat the original 3 felony charges in court because unlike most people facing decades in jail he wouldn't take a plea deal.
 
It's SIX years later and he's trying to get some basic justice for what happened.  As far as I know the two cops and the FBI agent who smashed a man who looked nothing like the suspect picture to pulp have faced no repercussions.
 
 

Yes, sentiments like that have been expressed in America prior to the last few years... but they were expressed openly by only a few, high-profile enough to feel they were insulated from direct retaliation, and even then expressed in environments where they felt safe and supported. This kind of brazen public display of hostility and contempt by "regular Americans" has not been seen in decades. Even people who felt this way were afraid to say it outside their circle of like minds. I attribute that change directly to being emboldened by the sometimes tacit, sometimes overt approval they sense from Donald Trump.

In the case of police in America, what I see and hear indicates the "us against them" mentality has been firmly entrenched for some time. I strongly doubt anything can be done to diffuse that at this point, so that positive change can happen -- it's a fight that's just going to have to be fought.

Faked his fall?
 
I don't have words for this that won't get me banned.
 
Anyone thinking it was faked, should re-listen to the audio. Sounds like a ripe melon being split open when the guy falls. I winced when I heard it.

Acknowledged, and appreciated.
 
There's still the underlying issue of emotion-driven policy decisions being dangerous.
 
Tearing something down and starting over is an appealing idea, but you really need to have both a broad and deep understanding of what you're dealing with.
 
 

We have so many billionaires in the world today.  Many of these problems would go away if just one in each major city would step up and endure 10 years of intense training, invest in cutting edge gadgets and vehicles, and construct a secret lair.

Do not ignore the prison-industrial complex; they'll be doing their part as well.

not from violence. "Risk from Violence" gets calculated differently from "Risk from Accident" or "Risk from Disease" by our monkey brains. Farmers and construction workers have a higher workplace mortality, but from accidents. Police and soldiers are at higher risk of death by violence (although I think nurses have a higher rate of getting assaulted). (I don't think prostitutes get logged on those stats)
 
It's not that ACAB, nor that all cops are heroes. Cops are human. Cops want to live. We don't get heroes. We have to make policies and procedures (and really a civilization) that make it less likely those humans will feel the need to kill.

I remember that story. The cop sued and won.
 
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/feb/12/stephen-mader-west-virginia-police-officer-settles-lawsuit

I appreciate you taking your time with your response.

I haven't heard about shooting, but I know they vandalized some first aid stations.
 
 
If they get sent in if and when those disputes turn violent, it could already be too late for whoever is already in there.

Yes! There is a racism problem in policing in the US, and there is also a violence problem. I was on reddit, and a New Zealander was commenting on a video where a cop was getting yelled at for having had his hand on his weapon as he approached a vehicle. The New Zealander commented that in his country, the police keep their weapons in their cars until they think they need them. I told him, in the US, we shoot a lot more cops than they do. Take a look at the correlations between police shooting people, people shooting police, and the general murder rate:

 
again, it's pretty easy to crunch numbers and show that violence is applied in a racially prejudiced way. Even so, we can't fix the US police violence problem until we figure out the US violence problem.

You're making a lot of assumptions that aren't true.
 
Due to a series of unfortunate events, I'm running on about three hours of sleep at the moment, so I'm not going to attempt a lengthy response, but I'll say this much for now:
 
If you think that your intervention teams can call for the police after a violent encounter starts and have your people be safe, you are naive at best. This is the assumption I was addressing in the post you quoted. It's simply wrong, and defies all logic.
 
Also, I've worked with social workers from hospital staff, to county, to city crisis intervention team members. By "work," I mean I stand watch over them as they do interviews to prevent them from being harmed. I work healthcare security in a large city. I can unequivocally state that our Seattle PD officers are far better as a group than any of these folks at de-escalation. This is because they are better trained, and because they are constantly practicing their skills. If you think social work in any way entails extensive training in de-escalating people who are both violent and psychotic, you're wrong. They aren't the same as workers who are employeed by in patient psychiatric facilities.
 
If a department has a problem with de-escalation skills, then you raise their standards. And there are many out there who do need to improve. But you don't send people into a volatile situation without protection of some kind. You'll just end up with dead and injured social workers, and shortly thereafter a shortage of people in a field that's already seriously short staffed.
 
You can't make blanket statements about the scope of work of another person unless you've done the same work, in the same environment. Suggesting we replace police with civilians for the types of calls outlined above is shortsighted at best. Seattle has started intervention teams of social workers and police officers working together, and this has been effective in bringing help to people with the lowest possible risk to all involved. You should probably start looking at solutions already working within the system before talking about tearing the system down wholesale.
 
Snark doesn't help improve things. Thought experiments without first hand knowledge doesn't help things. Shouting for change without an informed plan doesn't solve things. There are real safety concerns here that need to be considered -- and I'm talking about from all sides, from the public, to the subjects of police calls, to social, medical and other support services, to the police themselves -- before running off half-cocked. You can't burn everything to the ground then claim a victory for equity because everyone's now living in ashes.
 

I'm left to wonder exactly what you think libertarians believe.  Libertarians have been against police abuse of power since there have been libertarians.  They aren't just another flavor of Republican.

One point I've seen repeatedly raised recently, is that contemporary police departments in America have expanded in large measure because they're often used to deal with people and situations that could probably be more effectively handled by other services with different training: domestic disputes, drug addicts, the homeless, the mentally ill. Funds and resources for those activities could be diverted to social services and health care, reducing the number of police by focusing them on tasks they're better suited for.

Don't worry I just thought you were pointing things out. Nothing more or less tone wise

Of course it's important that hospital capacity is not overwhelmed, but it should also be clear that people taking proper precautions in order not to carelessly spread the disease in the first place are still quite necessary.  Taking measures to reduce the chance of contracting the virus is the name of the game.  The day when a safe and approved vaccine is available will be a great one, but in the meantime anyone who shrugs their shoulders and decides not to do anything about it until that time comes is being selfishly irresponsible, not only for their own sake but for the sake of anyone they may come into contact with.

https://cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200605223951-02-opinion-weekly-column-0606-exlarge-169.jpg

This is sort of an aside, but I remember getting tired of reading harry bosch because in every book at least one of the other cops was the villain, or had done something wrong. Now I am thinking Connelly was underselling how bad the LAPD actually is.
CES