I see lots of videos where police apprehend a suspect/perp with an “unruly” surrounding crowd. This is an extremely dangerous situation for all concerned. What’s up with that? Sorry, but I have to play the “race card” here . . .
Back in the day, in my home state of Rhode Island, I was witness to four examples of white police apprehending suspects/perps in public. Two of the men arrested were white, two were black. Not one of these cases involved protesting witnesses.
All of the videos I’ve seen where cops were surrounded by antagonistic onlookers have involved black participants.
Please note that I’m not blaming the onlookers’ ethnicity per se. I consider the relationship between the police and the community as the fundamental problem. This lack of respect for the police has historical roots, which may or may not be justified. And ongoing contemporary explanations — though not necessarily moral justification.
This behavior is regrettable on all sorts of levels. But the bottom line is clear: antipathy to the police in certain communities is a political/cultural issue. What can be done to improve community relations with the police, for the safety or all concerned?
Reparations! I mean, stop glorifying the ghetto lifestyle, strengthen the middle class, eliminate institutional racism. Nothing that can’t be solved in a few more generations, this stuff doesn’t happen over night.
Stop targeting ghettos for abortion clinics.
So more kids have to be born and raised in even worse poverty and grow up to commit even more crimes? Pure foolishness!
Cops need to get out of the car, walk neighborhoods, and treat to people with professionalism and respect.
People need to be helpful to cops and treat them with professionalism and respect.
When cops are disrespectful, threatening and rude, they should be treated as suspect and possibly dangerous. The same goes for people who are not cops.
^^^^This.
Back in the day when cops walked a beat they were inclined to hand out some corrective discipline to local youths caught breaking the law that did not involve arrest and a resulting criminal record. Officer friendly generally had support of the local community and the bad actor’s parents. That all has changed. We decided the police needed oversight so now the cops had to make an arrest. Then we eliminated parents. If you want to return to the old ways of community policing you have to give the cops more leeway and more importantly you have to replace baby mommas and sperm donors with mommy and daddy.
“That all has changed. We decided the police needed oversight so now the cops had to make an arrest. “- I guess the first question is why did that change? That answer probably changes a lot based on where you live and the color of your skin.
As for me, if a cop caught one of my sons being a thug and decided to whip his ass a bit, I’d say thank you and deliver coffee and tacos to that cop every day of his patrol.
Of course, no one would ever know a cop hit my son because they wouldn’t be able to see the bruises underneath the ones I gave him once I found out, which is your other point and I couldn’t agree more.
It changed because of some SCOTUS. decisions and because of run ins between the police and 1960’s versions of Michael Brown. Gang supporting race baiters didn’t just appear. We have been there before and the result wasn’t pretty.
jwt, when we were kids, other adults in the community kept an eye open on what was going on around them.
We could count on our parents knowing what we were doing before we we even got home by dark, and face those consequences.
The ‘no snitch’ culture has infected society to the point I doubt it will ever recover…
I have been suggesting this for years. Return the concept of the “beat cop”. Park the car, get out and walk around your beat. Go into all the shops and talk with the owners/employees briefly. Stop and talk with the lady watering her yard or the kid working on his car. Talk to them to talk to them, not as a way to skirt the 4th.
We could also do with a bit more discretion and common sense from those beat cops. The two kids who meet behind the gas station after school to have an honest fist fight don’t need to be booked with the same assault charges as some thug playing the knockout game. Maybe hauled down to the station and their parents called. Preferably sat down with their parents and a stern talking to. A cop who works a specific beat and gets to know the people on their beat will be able to know if those kids are perpetual trouble or not and then consequences can increase proportionately. Hell, there was a kid in Denver who was arrested for streaking at a football game about 15 years ago. He ended up on the sex offender registry for it. You want people to work with the cops that sort of shit has to end abruptly.
On the flip side of the same coin people in general (and parents in particular) need to be more objective and realistic in what they expect from the police. In the example above the one parent can’t insist that the other kid be charged and her poor baby left alone. Yelling at the media that the cops won’t make the streets safe, then cursing them and slamming the door in their face when they come to your door only makes matters worse too. I hear people complain all the time that some fucking cop gave them a speeding ticket . . . because they were speeding, or a ticket for running a red light. Yes it sucks. Yes it is your own damn fault. You can’t expect them to keep everybody safe while at the same time expecting them to ignore your contribution to what you want stopped.
It’s hard for both sides to build a relationship when the cops won’t get out of the car except to arrest you and the citizens won’t talk to the cops unless they are being arrested. Basic respect for one another being equals always helps too.
It would be helpful, IMHO, if at least some of the cops lived in the neighborhood they patrol. Different race, living 20+ miles away, massively different background, and at least perceived differences in opportunity and privilege, does not make for automatic trust. But a guy from down the street who is now walking a beat in the ‘hood, looking like a professional good guy and carrying a gun, taking care of his own wife and children for all to see, might be considered a worthwhile source of advice for youngsters.
I’m not suggesting any manner of rules, preferential treatment, or whatever, but opportunities could be pointed out.
For that to happen, we would have to put in a pretty high stipend for housing for many officers. Imagine what it would cost for a cop to live in downtown Austin? I’d actually be willing to support that, through my tax dollars, but we should be aware of the significant cost.
A lot of cops don’t want to run into their “customers” at the kids’ soccer game, at dinner, or at the market. It makes a lot of sense for cops to live elsewhere.
Some “progressive” police administrators in San Francisco want to do just that. The problem is that if you pull a black officer working a cush gig and drop him in a black ghetto to hump a beat simply because he’s black, then that cop has grounds for an EEO complaint and law suit. If you’re hiring only white cops to work in neighborhoods because they are white neighborhoods, then you have EEO issues and lawsuits. Etc etc etc…… Oh,… And the white SF cop is going to get a larger cost-of-living adjustment because a house in the Marina (white neighborhood) casts $2 million. A house in the Bayview (black neighborhood) costs $400k…… EEO lawsuit.
For the most part cops are going to work where the culture suits their individual personality. If the neighborhood doesn’t like that cop’s personality then that cop (for the most part but not always) will get put somewhere else.
160 years of policing and this is where we are…. It isnt perfect but has been borne out through trial and error.
NO ONE wants to live in a crappy high-crime area. And yet these are the places with the most pressing need of cops. Unless you pay them like royalty and, spoiler alert, these places are also financial black holes, cops will no work there. You will then have to drastically lower standards to fill uniforms. How do you think that will go?
Just continuing examples of the left’s denial of personal responsibility agenda.
Exactly. When cops are held accountable for their transgressions, they will earn they trust they have so deservedly lost.
Stop fvcking with us to get your jollies, for one. Out the bad cops, get them fired or jailed. Don’t be dicks when you pull us over. We’re already not having a good time, you don’t need to make it worse to stroke your tiny dick. Stop shooting our dogs. Stop breaking down the wrong doors and shooting the people inside. I’m sure I missed a few.
Militarization of the police. Receiving bearcats and select fire weapons from the Feds. The out of control use of SWAT. Using SWAT to conduct health inspections and raiding Friday Poker Nights. Police immunity. Failure to uphold their Constitutional oaths when it’s when it suits them.
My two cents.
All of this.
How about officers behave more like our Fire and EMS services, stay at the station until called. When you are a true public service (instead of armed revenue generators) the way people look at you changes drastically.
+1…. Except people see a “lazy” cop doing nothing and expect him to be “doing something”….. Turning police in to a group of “reactionaries” is a surefire way to alienate the police from the comunity and only exacerbate bad relations.
I would be perfectly happy with this. I sometimes look with jealousy on my firefighter colleagues as they watch a football game on the big screen TV in the station until they get a call. It’s basically the opposite of ‘broken windows’ (proactive) policing. Reduces budgets, interactions, and therefore liability.
But before we go back to that we should at least remember why we, as a society, have demanded that cops do more and more.
I remember the 70’s.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Stop shooting dogs.
How about we lock up criminals and keep them locked up.
I know. Sounds harsh.
How many times do we hear about some robbery or other that goes bad and ends up with the deaths of multiple innocents, and then hear that the perp has a record that is ten pages long and includes multiple felonies for which he has been let out on early release or parole or some other such nonsense.
Lock them up and keep them off the streets. Return illegal aliens to the country they belong to.
Is this really so difficult?
Criminals belong in prison. Instead, they end up on the streets.
Criminal cops also belong in prison. Instead, they end up on the streets wearing their unis.
What’s sauce for the goose . . . .
Keeping criminals in the klink isn’t up to the cops. That’s on the “legal” system and politicians.
It’s not ‘up to the cops’ but it effects them and the communities around them. Career criminals who get locked up every other week are not helpful to the police-citizen relationship.
“Men are respectable only as they respect.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“There is no respect for others without humility in one’s self.” -Henri Frederik Amiel
These two ideas and how they relate to each other are the rotten, corrupt source of this issue.
Only when the bad actors in the police are fired routinely, when the wife beaters are prosecuted, when the drunk driving is not overlooked, when excessive force is met with consequences, when “protect and serve” is meant for the communities that pay them instead of themselves…
I think is it impossible for individuals to have the “humility in one’s self” when one is trained to never, ever, under any circumstances, admit mistakes or ignorance. Compounding this shortcoming is a bureaucratic machine designed to shield the bad apples from any consequences.
How the hell are they supposed to be humble when every mechanism in place shows that we, the people, are less equal than they? And how can you expect respect to reside in their departments when they are told and shown they are better than everyone else?
It’s really a stretch to imagine someone would give up such a sweet gig unless forced to. So disbanding departments or butchering them seem the only realistic options. In fact, that is what Jefferson said to do with a rogue government.
The problem is that most people want to take a nation wide approach to local problems. There are departments with serious issues involving flagrant abuse of authority and racism, but trying to come up with a blanket solution for every department is not the answer. Each jurisdiction needs to, with the involvement of its citizens, look at if there are any issues and if so, how to address them.
I’ve worked in my department for several years now. I’ve never seen anyone mistreated based on the color of their skin. No one I know has shot any dogs, and the majority of my co workers treat people with courtesy and respect, because it works out better for everyone that way. Those that do not are quickly identified and corrected. Our internal affairs department takes complaints very seriously and will come down hard on those who abuse their power or infringe on the rights of citizens, to include criminal charges. And yet more and more we get sensitivity training shoved down our throats because it is needed in other jurisdictions.
I know that not all departments are like the one I work for and those that are not need to be addressed and corrected, but trying to come up with a one size fits all answer does a disservice to departments and both ends of the spectrum.
Additionally, while I have seen people complain that officers are overpaid and over benefited (this may be somewhat true in some northern states), we cannot forget that quite simply, you get what you pay for. In order to recruit a well qualified applicant with a good head on his shoulders and give him a reason to stay longer than a couple of years, the pay needs to be good enough to be a forceful enough incentive not to jump ship. While no officer should expect to become wealthy from working a public service job, altruism alone does not put food on the table. There needs to be a balance struck in order to not only hire qualified applicants instead of departments taking what they can get just to maintain staffing, and not making the job so lucrative that officers will start covering for each other to avoid losing benefits.
Just my .02
Well stated. My county sheriff’s office sounds similar: honest, selfless individuals that I often see stopping to help folks out. Whenever we have heavy rain or snow, some cattle escape through a broken fence. The deputies are always there to round them up and contact the owner. One time a buffalo escaped from a game ranch and it was quite a feat for the deputies to corral that huge of an animal. They stop for all cars parked on the side of the road, to ensure everyone is ok. They’re open to striking up a conversation when grabbing a meal. The sheriff himself makes time to talk to county residents for individual concerns.
It all starts with attitude: the sheriff and his deputies know that they exist to serve the community, and they act in that manner.
Want to improve Police-Community relations?
(1) Take a seriously hard look at Qualified Immunity as it is practiced today.
(2) Repeal all laws having anything to do with Asset Forfeiture.
(3) While you’re at (2), take a good hard look at any and all malum prohibitum laws and fiat felonies in general.
(4) Return to “beat cop” doctrines. Cops are members of the communities they serve, so they should know those communities intimately (as neighbors, not ‘watchdogs’ or whatever).
(5) Mandatory and continuous training on the protection of Constitutional Rights rather than institutionalized strategizing on how to circumvent them.
A start anyway…
A start, and a very good one.
If both parties know one another, and have some level of mutual respect, interactions will go a lot more smoothly.
I interacted with a Missouri highway patrolman yesterday as we were cleaning up after shooting at an old mine pit. He had seen our trucks parked at the top of the hill in a county that has issues with drug cooking and wanted to make sure everything was kosher. Announced himself as he came down, we set all firearms down and talked for five minutes or so. Everyone was honest and respectful; things turned out fine. That is how policing should be done.
Perhaps Officer Friendly was polite and respectful because you and your friends outnumbered him 4 to 1 … oh, and you and your friends were armed.
What is that saying? Something about, “An armed society is a polite society.”
In contrast; once years ago a pair of cops heard us shooting at the local gravel pit/public range. Everybody in the county used it as such, so it wasn’t unusual.
They snuck up on us, with guns drawn, and ordered us to step away from our own firearms. They then cuffed us “for their own protection”, searched us, and made us sit as they ran all of our licenses and the serial #’s on our guns. When all that checked out, they called for a canine unit to sniff out our vehicles. Finally after coming up empty, they cut us loose with a stern warning to only shoot at the one commercial range in the county.
That kind of treatment is what has to stop. Hand cuffing non-criminals “for the cops own protection” is not acceptable. No one there left with a good opinion of the cops.
Stories like this figure into the calculation of how we citizens interact with civilian police. I regard them with suspicion until they prove themselves individually. But I would prefer not to interact at all; there’s just no upside.
You’re lucky they didn’t drive right up next to you, hope out, and shoot you on the spot. Then again, you’re probably not a 12 year old black kid.
You make some good points.
(1) Asset forfeiture has become nothing more than a funding mechanism for many cash-strapped law enforcement agencies, both local and state. There is a natural tendency to overreach as a result. In many cases it is used as leverage in the associated criminal action – eg defendant agrees to surrender assets in exchange for more lenient disposition of criminal charge..Real reform is needed in this area.
(2) Repeal certain laws. At the rate we’re going, every possible human act will be criminalized at some point in the future.Many of the new laws are driven by lobby groups or the public’s demand that legislator’s ‘do something’. The police are put in the unenviable position of having to enforce poorly designed or unnecessary laws. It’s a no win situation for them.
(3) Beat cops. Many agencies have already adopted community policing strategies.
(4) Requiring police to live in the communities they patrol would in many cases put their lives, as well as their family members’ lives, at grave risk. Some of the so-called communities are irredeemable – no matter how many police you put into them. I sometimes think we should simply withdraw the police from them and let the thug inhabitants cannibalize each other. I hate to see officers’ lives risked in these hell holes.
(5) Training is designed by state accreditation agencies. Increasingly, this training has been affected by the PC crowd. Diversity training, sexual harassment training, lessons on the evils of racial profiling are now standard fare. And, remember, training is expensive and takes an officer out of service
I would retain qualified immunity laws. First, it’s qualified, not absolute, immunity. The officer still has a demonstrate a certain degree of reasonableness in his actions to escape liability. And, second,officers would adopt an overly cautious and unsafe mindset on the street that could result in unnecessary deaths. Just look at the Baltimore PD after the DA indicted 6 officers. Those officers now play it safe, and as a result, crime has increased.
“I would retain qualified immunity laws. First, it’s qualified, not absolute, immunity.”
That is why I mentioned “as it is practiced.” Perhaps I should have said “as it is generally practiced.”
The meaning is: qualified immunity is abused. There are cases where cops that have clearly violated the law get off completely (not even charged and tried in court) on the basis of QI.
I agree on returning to beat cops. It’s a bit harder to act hostile towards someone you interact with daily, whether you are a cop or citizen. Also, cops are like any other group of people- many are solid, upright folks and others are @$$holes. As far as the race card goes, it’s the same thing really. I’m a Southerner (like any other group, lotta good folks, some a-holes) and not that geography really has much to do with it, I guess, but as a kid I learned from old-timers that you had black people and you had people within that group who were called something else. If you acted like that certain term, people think of you as that certain term. If you acted decently and admirably, people would look at you as being such. Flip side, if we (white, btw) acted a certain way, expect to be thought of as “trash”. So if a cop is going to act like a “pig” that is only going to create distrust and animosity in the community. If black folks are going to behave like “n*****s” towards police, that is only going to create contempt and animosity among the police towards the black community.
Sounds good to me JR-but in my neighborhood we DO have cops living here. One right around the corner. They never get out except to give tickets out and harass. And it’s FAR from the worst po-leece department in the area-southern Cook co.,IL. The immunity thing is #1 in my book…
“They never get out except to give tickets out and harass.”
Then they don’t really “live” there.
i think these would help tremendously
1) INCREASE PAY RATE
2) More indepth, thorough hiring procedures
3) MORE TRAINING ( force on force, situation DE-escalation, negotiation tactics, basic psychology)
psychology will seem unreal to some but it would be essential in knowing the triggers of a violent person and help them figure a way to rationalize with that person, hopefully.
These would help the PD’s hire more competent, caring officers and that is the only real way to improve police/public relations. no amount of fake PR is going to do it.
“INCREASE PAY RATE”
I think you would be really surprised then at the salaries of many officers. The average salary of a detective with the Austin Police Department is over $100,000 per year. The starting salary, right out of the academy in Austin is over $50k per year, with benefits on top of that.
JWT It goes both ways though,
The starting salaries around where I work average 36-40k per year. I have been here 5 years and am making 47650. While that’s not exactly chump change, after retirement, health insurance, etc. come out my take home pay is usually 1230ish or so per paycheck. Again, its not like I’m scraping by, but I’m not living in luxury either. But like you said, it just depends where you are.
In my smallish city in MA, cops make about $50K salary with just a couple of years experience, and then they double that or better by doing such onerous chores as directing traffic during construction or at the mall. One of the senior cops made $160,000 last year. That’s not bad.
Hey, I know that opportunities for graft are limited around here, but they’ll just have to struggle through.
What first caught my attention 30 years ago was learning that starting pay at my university PD was $28,xxx, at a time when a good job with a BS in computer science would get me $30k, a not-so good job would be at or below the campus cops’ starting wage.
Most of the campus cops were pretty decent people just trying to keep the peace, some could be hard-ass (arresting two freshman honors students for a paper bag with a 12pk of beer in it after watching them until they’d both carried it), and at least one was a perjuring piece of feces who wrote seemingly random traffic tickets and told the most ridiculous stories in court if you challenged them.
This is a tough one. Cops can’t give protection. Thugs in the hood can give protection…for a price. Thug gets arrested, the weak lose protection they get upset with the cops. Don’t have all the answers but here are some ideas that have been kicking around for 50 years or so.
Fire cops on steroids.
Don’t hire cops that were fired or quit under pressure from another PD.
Do not have cops patrol have them respond to calls.
Completely separate traffic enforcement from crime investigation.
Make guns as easy to buy as crack cocaine.
Make gun safety and marksmanship mandatory courses in public schools.
1. It would be a logistical/financial nightmare, but pair more cops to the department that covers the town in which they live so they patrol among their neighbors and friends. Also, bring back beat walkers.
2. Cops need to understand that part of their job is to put themselves in mortal danger. You’re not special, you’re not “above” everyone else. You die on the job so I don’t have to and that’s the way it works. Don’t like it? Then quit, nobody forced you to sign up. Yes that’s cold and unsympathetic, but every volunteer soldier I’ve met understood this reality to some extent. If more cops did, the rampant use of “whatever I have to do to get home safe tonight” as an excuse for thuggery would surely decrease. There will always be bad apples, but the orchard would be somewhat forgiven. I understand mentality shifts like this are extremely difficult and directly tied to culture.
3. No more unquestionable qualified immunity for SWAT teams.
A few years ago, my spouse was in the hospital for more than a week. My inspection sticker had expired, as he had been ill for some time before surgery. My daughter and I were pulled over for the sticker. I pulled into the dead end street, leading to the hospital. Daughter, at 15 years old was calling the cop a few choice names before he approached. Told her she needed to be quiet, while I did all the talking. Explained we were going to visit spouse, who had his second emergency surgery the night before. The cop asked me to promise to get the inspection done as soon as everything calmed down, didn’t lecture, didn’t give me a warning. Said he hoped everything was better, soon.
Daughter learned that not all cops are “such a-holes, after all.” I knew I wasn’t getting a ticket. If I did, I had plenty of “ammo” (medical bills) to fight the fine.
Take that story to the next step and ask yourself why you need an “Inspection Sticker” anyway.
At one time JR, it was ‘supposed’ to be an assurance vehicles met basic safety standards (brake condition, etc), but now a vehicle ‘inspection’ is literally and figuratively a vehicle ‘anal probe’ (emissions testing).
What a country. (Yakov Smirnoff)
My point entirely. Glad to see it’s a well known concept.
In SC back when I was in LE, there was no “inspection” of vehicles. If a cop saw a car with a light out or whatever, he could stop the car and write a ticket.
Generally, if the person could later show a receipt for the repair, the ticket was dropped. This may not be a ‘perfect’ system, but it worked for the intended purpose:
(a) Person was “informed” their vehicle had a potential safety issue (though admittedly not ALL potential safety issues could be caught this way)
(b) Person sustained no penalty for same after repair
(c) No revenue for the City/County in the form of “fine.”
The end game in this was that the a fault on the vehicle was repaired with no penalty to the owner. Seems like not a BAD outcome.
“Inspections” are a scam across the board. Say my tail light goes out the day after an inspection. What has the inspection done to insure the systems of my vehicle are operational? Precisely dick.
And in NC at least, the emissions inspections are a scam in a much bigger way. One can buy a waiver for about 5x the cost of the inspection. So, in theory at least, everyone could buy the waiver and drive ‘polluting’ cars and be in compliance with the law. What is the emission inspection doing for the “environment?”
I can’t speak for the police or African American communities, but there is a mistrust of authority within the Asian community especially with older generations. Part of it comes from the first Chinese immigrants to settle in the United States, which received little to no support from police, where they had to fend for themselves. I’ve noticed this theme being common among the formation of virtually all gangs and mafia. Although it’s been generations, this sentiment lingers to this day.
As for newer generations of immigrants, experience with corrupt officials at the home country paints their attitude upon arrival. Sadly, this is largely cemented with stories of those who can’t before, albeit outdated.
“…experience with corrupt officials at the home country paints their attitude upon arrival.”
Had a real good example of that when a Brazil company came to Florida to run a citrus processing plant, and discovered to their shock the Brazil public official payoff/graft model didn’t quite work that way here…
Off the top of my head:
In urban areas police should walk a beat and not just be confined to their cars
Camo and APCs have no place in the world of law enforcement
Police officers should not be revenue agents. I have heard some localizes limit how much of their budget can come from fines . That is a good start
More so than camo and APC, face masks (other than breathing apparatus) have no place outside of death squads.
And there is no justification for civil servants to carry full auto weapons. They spray too much lead from semi auto handguns as it is.
i had always liked cops, then one day one of them harassed me, tried to arrest me(luckily his senior came and told him to let me go). then he told me not to come back to “his” town, so i asked him if he was meeting me every time someone needed a pizza in “his” town since that was my job. in the end he stole then lost my driver license for a month(in PA only the state boys can take it unless your under arrest) and i had to threaten to call the state police to report it stolen. he found it in 5 minutes after i had to stoop to his level. since then i dont go outta my way for them besides the normal yes sir no sir
My dad was a newport RI cop.
Ive seen my fair share of cops arresting people.
One white guy that got caught trying to break into the first floor of my apartment building got handcuffed and was talking shit to the two officers, the one cop knew this kid by name and the cop open handed slapped him.quite a few times.
So what…talk some shit…get some back.
No crowds formed.
In our day if you fought a cop you could expect to get shot.
End of story.
Let cops do their jobs.
“In our day if you fought a cop you could expect to get shot.’
So much for the “Use of Force Continuum” and “imminent threat of death or bodily injury,” eh?
Guess it all depends on what precisely you mean by “fought a cop.”
As for someone talking sh1t to a cop while under arrest (and in cuffs…you said he was handcuffed)…what happened to “ignore it.” We used to freaking TRAIN for that. What POSSIBLE difference can it make if someone is mouthing off?
Oh, and before we get back to a “My Dad was a cop” appeal, so was mine. So was my uncle. So was another uncle. So was my sister. And so was I.
Slapping someone (in cuffs already? yeah, that’s what you said) solely for talking trash is the HEIGHT of thuggish cop behavior. Let ’em talk; it ain’t hurting anything. Sometimes you gotta be the bigger man…or just a man.
Police: need to treat citizens like citizens and equals, not like enemies of the state or sources of revenue. Be respectful and polite, with a focus on public safety.
Community: be respectful to each other and to police, stop glamorizing thugs, stop embracing the “thug life”, stop defending the thugs that get what is coming to them. Pull your pants up, quit blaming Whitey, and get a job.
“I see lots of videos where police apprehend a suspect/perp with an “unruly” surrounding crowd. … What’s up with that?
— Police have become “law enforcement” vs. “peace officers”: what’s their mission?;
— working for distant officials vs. the people they “patrol”: who makes the laws, policies, standards?;
— enforcing rules that aren’t seen as just or beneficial by the enforced-upon: selective enforcement and worse;
— as part of a system seen as exploitative and corrupt: why are fines and fees a planned part of the budget?
Really, with the local cop, known to us, who works for us, for our good, in ways we understand and agree with, there is no problem. The relationship gets more sketchy as those erode. I’m from NY State so the fundamental corruption of localities funded by traffic enforcement fees is just how it has always been. (Highway safety my muscular buttocks.) And the corrupt collusion between the 0state, who make the egregious law — “For the children” — and the localities who enforce it “just following orders”, nicely separates blame and the balancing. You wanna reduce crime, drugs, speeding, whatever, people are gonna get nicked, and sometimes not so deservingly: is that worth it?
Even a valuable mission is seen as illegitimate when seen as a money maker.
Humans have had de facto localized law forever. For example, some neighborhoods you’re loud and rowdy, you’ll get arrested; others just don’t break anything. Some neighborhoods it seems that lighting fires is OK. The disconnect is the local compact, and broad law. You just can’t say: “This is a a quite neighborhood.” Yet there’s some laws made from far away that *have to be* enforced.
The pivot, which will take generations, is realizing that not everything “governed” is universal or needs to be.
Abolish them. Period. Go fully private.
1. Other than county Sheriff’s dpt, they’re unconstitutional: http://www.constitution.org/lrev/roots/cops.htm
Modern police is literally a foreign concept to America. Prior to mid 1800’s Peel’s London Metropolitan Police model import 1st adapted in Boston and NYC.
WhyTF are we still using a RedCoat Kingsmen vs subjects model, in America, where our founding Common Law legal regime makes each American a sovereign individual?
2. Even the Sheriff’s Dept. become unconstitutional the minute they receive Fed Govt funds, abide by DoJ diktats, mandate their guidelines (NOT laws), same to similar Rules of Engagement, wartoys, BDU, command/rank hierarchy.
They’re a de jure standing army. And standing army is explicitly unconstitutional.
Which is why to this day, technically the ONLY legit military in America is the Navy and the Marines who are under their auspices of, and why even the air force fleet are considered ‘air SHIPS’ to legally justify Maritime Admiralty.
Military was SOLELY meant to fight FOREIGN enemies, and foreign 5th columnists within.
NEVER vs the citizenry.
And, the police are an occupying military in de facto look, and in de jure legalese.
Army and state-controlled militia are only to be authorized and activated BY CONgress in the event of a war, and/or to suppress rebellion, for limited period of 2yrs, subject to vetted renewal.
The Constitution could not be more clearer.
Which, frankly is why USSA has been under a constant state of war since the founding of the Republic. And why domestically, we’ve been under a ‘soft’ martial law, euphemistically called “state of emergency” declared by FDR in a series of executive diktats since the 1930s in series of acts collectively now referred to as National Emergencies ActS, renewed annually by EVERY subsequent POTUS, including oBUSHma.
Google it.
3. Even at the height of the post-9/11 Nazi DHS policestate in 2007, according to DoJ’s own numbers, this nation barely had 800,000 armed police, lording over aome 315MILLION-ish Americans.
Literally 99% of America’s security concerns are addressed via priavte security companies and individuals.
Govt police are an UNnecessary evil, and a myth perpetuated by GovtTerrorists and State Theist CargoCultist cuntards who may as well hut snap to and salute the USSR Red Army military parade at the Red Square, whose support keep the policestate alive, enough to make the Nazis blush.
Our safety and security concerns are too important to be left up to an inherently evil and incompetent entity as the State, who solely excel at robbing wealth and destruction, who never build anything lasting of virtue and good.
People routinely confuse human activity, vs organized humans who conduct activities x, y, z.
If private industry is better at everything else, it’s sheer insanity to leave the most important thing in your life: your life itself and those of your loved ones, to be decided by the state.
MYTH of needing govt police force, is a barbaric PRE-Magna Carta feudalist relic tyranny mindset that has not evolved since the 18th century, along with rest of self goverNANCE (NOT: governMENT) ideas of the Enlightenment Period that birthed the Founders of the American Republic.
UNLIKE private security services, you can rarely fire them, even when they’re repeat offenders/beaters/killers, you permanently pay for their pensions, when sued and judgment ‘won’ you still end up paying for that very settlement, worse: they have legal immunity unafforded to ANY OTHER profession, period.
Why in the world wouldn’t free humans want to rid the world of such degenerate, aberrant, cuntardary, that generations from now, our progeny would look upon as immorally unfathomable and disgusting as not abolishing slavery??
Abolish the cunts. Once and for all.
Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Would you happen to tell us how you made it to this planet, Mr. Space Cadet? We’re still struggling with just interplanetary spaceflight.
I ‘get:” you’re illiterate, can’t google, or are too stupid and/or lazy to, and shove and suck on dildo with “pig ointment” written on it, daily.
“Cuckoo” is the primate who deludes being free of govt Praetorean Guards slave massas, is cray cray.
Then again, you should more appropriately be called a “CUCK-kook! CUCK-kook! CUCK-kook!:
xD
Do refrain from #SheDothProtestsTooMuch, umkay, little slave? Now go back to riding your fave Hugo Boss boots up your ass, Cuck-kook.
You really think we live in a totalitarian police state. That makes you completely insane. Here’s a tip: Turn off the Alex Jones for 10 minutes and take a stroll outside. The Sovereign Citizen thing is a lie. Police powers are consitutional. Do you know why? Because our founders were smart enough to realize that ennumerating everything in the Constitution would have been pointless and taken too long, so instead they were sure to write that powers not given to the federal government were reserved for the states. Early American law enforcement worked by Posse Comitatus, which allows for a law officer to conscript citizens into the duty temporarily. The rise of professional policing actually improves law enforcement by putting it in the hands of trained professionals rather than effectively conscripted people who have no training and are likely out for revenge. You really want law to be enforced by the equivalent of revenge mobs? It’s practically built upon abuse potential. Professional policing is part of why we have such low incidents of crime. I’m a militia man, and I wouldn’t want to see policing returned to just sherrifs and posses.
The war on drugs as well as cops resembling stagecoach highwaymen, makes everyone think they are in business for themselves… for their own fun and profit…. not public good. A lot of cops strike me as adrenaline junkies too pussified to be marines, they feel safer bullying their own communities. They have set themselves up as immoral, extralegal, tyrants!
1. Respect the constitution. Yes, I get that Stop and Frisk made neighborhoods safer, but it’s still unconstitutional. And that being said, respect the 2A. An armed citizenry is more effective than any amount of beat cops. Stop it with the BS phrases like “if you’re innocent, you have nothing to hide” and stop calling people uncooperative if they choose to exercise their 5A right.”
2. Respect The People. Deescalate when possible. Yeah, we get that it grinds your gears when a person of interest is disrespecting you. We get it that you don’t like it when people lie about speeding infractions. By simply being the better person and NOT throwing the book at anyone unruly, you gain more respect from the community and possibly even the suspect.
3. Get rid of Police Unions and special treatment. It’s no secret that many police get their own justice system. We’re not stupid and we notice, no matter what your spokesperson says. Policing is one of the very few businesses I know where the response to a “customer” complaint is “you are wrong and this is why you are wrong” instead of “we are sorry for your inconvenience. This is how we will make it better next time”. Get rid of PBA/FOP cards and window decals. We notice when those cars have illegally tinted windows and don’t get pulled over. We notice when those cars speed and don’t get pulled over.
4. Stop it with the CivilianTeam6 crap. Don’t be surprised when citizens react negatively to you wearing a plate carrier and other milsim gear during a routine traffic stop or a response to a dog barking too loudly. Just like we tell young urban fellows, if you dress respectfully then you will be treated with respect.
The majority of the public knows your job can be dangerous. The majority of the public would not do your job. The majority of the public looks up to you, so don’t tarnish your reputation by hiding behind the danger. Be the better person by acknowledging your faults and addressing them.
Well said. Good job.
I’d of shot the cops in the video.
The one one the right for repeatedly punching the man on the ground. The other two for not stopping the first.
You cannot fix a system that grants special the rights to one group, and then permits that group to rule over everyone else.
HOLD POLICE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR ACTIONS ! The law must apply equally to everyone, if not then there is no law.
Some would call you a “cop hater” for such sentiments.
The good people in those neighborhoods need to be airlifted out like Ethiopian Jews.
“This lack of respect for the police has historical roots, which may or may not be justified.”
In some places it’s THOROUGHLY justified. Take the Chicago PD for instance.
Any big city police force that has operating within its own most “elite” unit, a home invasion, burglary and kidnapping ring, deserves NO respect.
As the joke goes, “What does a Chicago cop call a Black brain surgeion?” Hint: It rhymes with “trigger”.
The owner of a Chicago police blog actually banned the word “savage” because so many of his readers used it to describe ALL Black people. It was apparent to him that the public was getting FAR too accurate an impression of what the cops thought about them. He of course referred to the victim of a kidnapping by the aforementioned police home invasion crew as an “opportunist” when he sued the city. Perhaps he would have preferred that the victim just shoot the perpetrators instead.
But the saying is, “The fish rots from the head down.” Chicago had as its mayor one of the instigators of the 1919 race riot, in which the Chicago PD REFUSED to intervene to stop attacks on the Black community. His son then spent 20+ years as mayor… following him benefiting politically from police torture. At the same time, Black voters elected and reelected this same enabler of torture for over twenty years.
I’m all for EVERYBODY obeying the law. Needless to say, some consider that the hallmark of a “cop hater”…
You can use the names Richard J. and Richard M. Daley. How either avoided prison(even
now) is beyond me. Chicago’s Boss Tweed’s. Little Rahm is the perfect successor…I am amazed their aren’t more Chiraq riots.
“I am amazed their aren’t more Chiraq riots.”
To paraphrase a line from a show I’ve never seen, “Summer is coming…”
No idea. If you ask the communities who claim to be having trouble with law enforcement, they’d say “Stop assuming everyone is a criminal, don’t stop and arrest so many people, stop shooting people for no reason, hire more diverse officers, teach cops to use less force, fire cops who try to play God.” If you asked the police who deal regularly with such people, they’d say “Stop committing so many crimes.”
“If you asked the police who deal regularly with such people, they’d say “Stop committing so many crimes.””
The problem is they treat everyone the same whether they commit crimes or not. And when they can do it anonymously, they’re not at all bashful about saying so.
Maybe if cops quit acting as mindless enforcers and tax-collectors of politicians and stopped selling what little morality they had to begin with for a taxpayer funded paycheck, the public might treat them better.
First, the federal government needs to stop screwing with policing. Policing in Chicago is not going to be the same as San Francisco and as Alabama. No more federal ‘consent agreements’ with police departments. Either the department is violating civil rights- sue them- or they are not- leave them alone\to their local representatives.
And second, we need to figure out what we want from police and have an honest conversation about it. While I don’t agree with libertarians on their view of policing, at least they’re usually consistent. But then you get people in places like Baltimore who want the police to do everything and nothing. It’s not going to work. In Chicago the ALCU managed to drastically increase the time, paperwork and liability for a police officer stopping anyone and now people are surprised that stops are down and crime is up?
If we want the police to act like firefighters (wait until called) that’s fine, but let’s not pretend that it won’t impact crime in urban areas. There’s a reason that people wanted the police to go after ‘broken windows’ offenders during the last crime wave.
“In Chicago the ALCU managed to drastically increase the time, paperwork and liability for a police officer stopping anyone and now people are surprised that stops are down and crime is up?”
In Chicago the FOP demanded that convicted wife beaters be allowed to possess and carry guns… but only if they had badges. And they went on National Public Radio to do it too.
At times it’s not clear whether Chicago has a police department or an Islamist militia.
“Islamist” militia? Literally none in this country.
““Islamist” militia? Literally none in this country.”
When it comes to domestic violence, the Chicago Lodge of the FOP sure sounds like one. Their three point explanation of why wife beaters [with badges] should be allowed to possess and carry guns:
1. You can’t take the gun from a cop who beats his wife because it’s his “tool of the trade”. Being that the interview was on NPR, nobody thought to ask whether that applied to hitmen and liquor store robbers too.
2. Taking the gun from an angry, violent, wife beating cop would make him even MORE angry and violent. Again, nobody thought to ask how having his gun taken away would affect Sammy “The Bull” Gravano.
3. You can trust a wife beating cop with a gun because he’ll be “closely monitored”… just not closely enough to keep him from kicking her teeth down her throat.
It was easily the second weirdest and misogynistic interview I’ve ever heard on NPR, topped only by their pre-9/11 interview of the “roving ambassador” of the Taliban.
Won’t stop until white people stop pooh-poohing institutional racism. But since it doesn’t happen to them, it doesn’t exist.
It’s not strictly a racial issue. A Chicago cop had no trouble trying to stomp a White barmaid to death. His friends had no trouble trying to intimidate the victim and witnesses.
There’s plenty of racism in law enforcement. But there’s plenty of contempt by cops for ANYBODY who’s not a cop. You can ask Carolina Obrycka about that.
Well stated. I’ve known LOTS of cops in my life. Equal opportunity lowlifes…pretty sure she’s still messed up. She’s on You-tube too.
If you followed the case at the time, it was VERY interesting to see the reactions of Chicago cops to the beating.
They almost invariably started out with half-hearted, insincere, pro-forma “condemnations” of the beating… followed by PARAGRAPHS of whining about how the video was being shown “too much”. Of course we know that the Chicago PD didn’t want it shown AT ALL… nor did they want pictures of Abbate being arrested WITHOUT being cuffed, after DAYS of being allowed to hide out in “rehab”.
That of course leaves aside the seemingly coordinated campaign to JUSTIFY the beating on the basis of an unsubstantiated claim that she was an “illegal alien”. In context, they might as well have accused her of being a Yazidi.
Anybody who saw that whole loathsome spectacle and had ANY respect left for the Chicago PD probably ought to be flying the black ISIS flag on their front porch.
Didn’t say it was, but the thing is, until a majority of white people begin to realize just how abusive the police are, of which minorities are by far the largest target of this abuse, nothing will change. It’s always “well, they were a criminal, so they deserved it”, especially when it involves a person of color.
What I find MUCH more interesting is the reaction of “good cops” to INCONTROVERTIBLE police misconduct.
A cop could be captured on ten HD cameras from multiple angles, beating a Black toddler to death with a piece of rebar, and when the parents sued for damages, the “good cops” would all chime in in unison: “That’s the ‘ghetto lottery’ for you!” There are alternatives to civil litigation… but I don’t think they’d like or fare to well under the law of the vendetta…
The only way to make the police respect the citizenry above the government is to privatize the police. People answer to whomever signs their checks. If it’s the government, then cops are nothing but government enforcers, but if cops were privatized, their role would shift from government enforcer to protectors of their client’s property and safety.