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[Rolepgeek]

Don't forget the atmosphere of fear cultivated in police academies and training (iirc). If you're twitchy and on edge about the risks you're taking, overworked because we don't have enough police to cover everything, over-armed in an attempt to make up for those numbers, vilified by half the country for things you've never done, and yet the people who have are adored by half the country despite that, added onto the very real American culture of violence (I don't mean this as a buzz word; we love action, and have higher violent crime rates than most other developed countries , even in places where guns are few or well regulated), and policies that basically say that if you're even worried your life could be in danger, force is an acceptable response, and then there's 300+ million people in the country, thereby allowing a lot of shit to go wrong, and enough media coverage when it does for things to get blown out of proportion and polarize..

Basically there's a lot goin' on.

Yeah, I get it.  But we don't take understaffed/underfunded/undertrained as an excuse when teachers fuck with our kids, do we?  I totally get that they're in a shitty situation that isn't fair to anyone, but somehow that argument holds sway in the case of police far, far more than in many, many other similar situations.  To the point that we give police overwhelming benefit of doubt when they literally kill people.  We hold them to lower standards of expectation with more at stake than a vast majority of professions, and it doesn't make sense to me.

It ain't an excuse. It's an explanation. We have to hold our police at higher standards, that's my point, but expecting them to do so when they don't have the appropriate resources is kinda pointless. Teachers don't have a job where they're at the same level of risk, and they don't have the same capacity to screw people over, nor is 'screw people over' in their job description. 'Screw criminals over' is sortof part of being a cop. Getting arrested does that to you.

I look for the root problems so we know where to start. To a lot of people, from real life experience, that looks like finding an excuse. :/ I like solving things at the root of the problem, not simply trying to treat the symptoms. Telling people they're bad people for wanting to stop the bad guys (ask any kid under ten who wants to be a cop why they want to be a cop and I can almost guarantee you that's why) doesn't actually fix anything. Changing behavior is hard and a lot more complicated than I feel like a lot of people give credit for. It requires a lot more understanding and working with, which people usually don't like as much as mocking and attacking.

[Urlance Woolsbane]

According to ABC, "City officials said Sunday that 23-year-old Sylville Smith, who was black, was shot by a black police officer as Smith fled a traffic stop."

[mainiac]

but expecting them to do so when they don't have the appropriate resources is kinda pointless.

The US has more police officers per capita then Ireland, Poland, New Zealand, England, Norway, Australia, Iceland, Sweden, Canada, Japan, Denmark and Finland.  These countries do not have this problem.  So clearly it's is in fact possible with the current level of manpower.  So what's the issue?  Not enough bulletproof vests?  Not big enough guns?  Not enough armored personnel carriers?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

If there's anything that this problem is very clearly not, it's "too little sympathy for the plight of the poor killer cops". That they have so much fucking sympathy is a source of the problem. The presumption and bias in their favor, legally and socially, is a large part of why they can get away with it. Even be cheered on for it.

[Strife26]

Yeah, the state of our police armored units is pretty disgusting. We're seeing cops rolling with Bearcats MRAPs and AR15's in the turret. They clearly need something with tracks and something throwing 7.62 instead of a wimpy intermediate cartridge. 113's and m240's for every cop shop in the country.



On the other foot, this is a great article, although it only goes to June. I'd really like to see a follow-up.
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/06/17/23-things-donald-trump-has-said-that-would-have-doomed-another-candidate/

[mainiac]

We're seeing cops rolling with Bearcats MRAPs and AR15's in the turret.

If I was running ISIS, I would organize a terrorist attack to take out a single one of those vehicles with an IED.  Then sit back and laugh when the US would inevitably waste 100 billion dollars or so replacing all of those with sloped armor APCs.

[Rolepgeek]

All of those countries are also essentially monocultures, which tend to have little civil unrest, and the Scandinavian countries have been having some problems of their own recently. US is not in the same situation as those. In fact, the US has significantly more crime than every single one of those places.

My point is that more guns are not the appropriate resource. Training not designed around force, and enough people to cover everything, is an appropriate resource. Hating cops is not going to solve the problem. It's not about sympathy, it's about empathy. On their part and ours. Adjusting the prison system would also probably help.

Just throwing hatred at the police isn't going to fix anything, just like shoving more guns at them isn't going to fix anything.

[mainiac]

Hating cops is not going to solve the problem. It's not about sympathy, it's about empathy. On their part and ours. Adjusting the prison system would also probably help.

Has anyone ever said that hating cops is the solution?  I mean I guess there is the SLA back in the day and the weatherman.  But did you see the democratic convention this year for instance?  They were careful to never go more then three sentences talking about crime without saying something nice about cops.

It's fucking tiring hearing this same thing all the time...

[Cheeetar]

If I was ISIS, I would strike at the police and let the tension keep mounting up and up and up. I've actually avoided saying that and will probably delete this sentence in a few minutes because I don't want to give them any ideas.

You don't want to give ISIS, avid Dwarf Fortress English forum readers, any vague not really articulated ideas?

[mainiac]

Just to be safe, I'm going to ask everyone to answer these questions:

1) What is your name?

2) What is your quest?

3) What is your favorite color?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

1) What is your name?

"Barrack "Barry The Rock" HUSEIN "HUSEIN" HUSEIN Obama"

2) What is your quest?

To denounce the evils of truth and love, etc.

3) What is your favorite color?

Snorp

[mainiac]

Shit, looks like we have Barack Hussein Obama, founder of ISIS, on these forums.  He already has read my plan.  Please dont gitmo me

[Urlance Woolsbane]

Just to be safe, I'm going to ask everyone to answer these questions:

1) What is your name?
Jacques Street Germaine
2) What is your quest?
To promote awareness of synthetic singing.
3) What is your favorite color?
Let me tell you about my color...

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Shit, looks like we have Barack Hussein Obama, founder of ISIS, on these forums.  He already has read my plan.  Please dont gitmo me

I feel the worms of spacetime burrowing into my flesh, into my very essence, as the frankenstein god radio control machines sit upon their thrones of the end and the people scream at the skies in joyous terror for the coming of the new one, the mother who sheds her skin, the becoming of our dark mirror in the heads of all the burning pedophiles in your mind and in your buildings toppling the face of the slave.

Do you see?

[Frumple]

Do you see?

You certainly don't.

You don't because I have your eyes.

I have them right here: