If Mort Divine ruled the world

[Einherjar86]

The age I found was 14. If we put the shoe on a white foot, we'd be talking about what a sick fuck.

Probably. My main issue didn't have to do with whether or not he's guilty of rape, but of whether or not he's a pedophile, which is a very specific term.

Domestic abuse victims often think they are worse off without the person beating the shit out of them. I doubt you want to go down that route of justification.

My objection was to your appeals to "objectivity," not to your suggestion that the community might be better off. I wouldn't disagree that more people might be safer (from Sterling, as least); but to say that the community/world is "objectivity" better? Sorry, but that's just rhetoric, and I know that you know that.

Edit: In response to that Guardian link: Treating all police shootings as unjustified is pretty ridiculous. We've already said the job was impossible, but somehow doing so makes it more impossible. For decades (primarily young male) blacks have committed ~half of the countries homicides, despite being a fraction of the population - at 8 times the rate of the white majority. That doesn't even get into other crimes. That they are only killed in police altercations at a rate little more than doubling white suspects shows, again, a tremendous amount of restraint.

I think the PLoS piece is probably more reliable, but the Guardian at least gives a very generalized statistic.

Regardless of the correlation between blacks and homicide rates, all I'm saying is that you can't reduce the problem to: "blacks are more likely to commit criminal offenses." Sure, that's probably true. It's also probably true that white police officers are more likely to exhibit a socially inculcated racial bias toward black suspects. I don't think it's practically efficient to force ourselves to choose one of the other. I would say we need to consider and practically engage both aspects of the problem.

 

[Dak]

Probably. My main issue didn't have to do with whether or not he's guilty of rape, but of whether or not he's a pedophile, which is a very specific term.

My objection was to your appeals to "objectivity," not to your suggestion that the community might be better off. I wouldn't disagree that more people might be safer (from Sterling, as least); but to say that the community/world is "objectivity" better? Sorry, but that's just rhetoric, and I know that you know that.

Fair enough on pedophile, but the term does get used in pretty blanket fashion when the victim is under the age of 16, since 16 is the lowest age of consent in many places in the west. Objectively when used rhetorically is used to distinguish a difference of opinion about some things related to the human condition (like assaults, abuse, etc) from the mundane "I like chocolate but you like peanut butter" or "I like his sense of humor but some people don't". Otherwise we have to say "well I guess if you like female genital mutilation, tomato-tomahto".

I think the PLoS piece is probably more reliable, but the Guardian at least gives a very generalized statistic.

Regardless of the correlation between blacks and homicide rates, all I'm saying is that you can't reduce the problem to: "blacks are more likely to commit criminal offenses." Sure, that's probably true. It's also probably true that white police officers are more likely to exhibit a socially inculcated racial bias toward black suspects. I don't think it's practically efficient to force ourselves to choose one of the other. I would say we need to consider and practically engage both aspects of the problem.

Well the Castile incident is simply inexcusable based on the available information. So was the Garner incident. But they get lumped in with Brown and Sterling. In fact it seems the outrage is more about the killing of the Browns and the Sterlings by police than guys with no "cred". Maybe if guys like this were cultural role models for young black males instead of being considered a stiff at best and the enemy at worst.

 

[Einherjar86]

Maybe so.

I don't want to get into an argument concerning the veracity of the following story; if you don't buy into it, then fine. But these kinds of stories do surface from ex-law enforcement, and based on the amount of testimony and other write-ups on law enforcement, I'm inclined to believe that incidents like this are common:

As a new officer with the St. Louis in the mid-1990s, I responded to a call for an "officer in need of aid." I was partnered that day with a white female officer. When we got to the scene, it turned out that the officer was fine, and the aid call was canceled. He'd been in a foot pursuit chasing a suspect in an armed robbery and lost him.

The officer I was with asked him if he'd seen where the suspect went. The officer picked a house on the block we were on, and we went to it and knocked on the door. A young man about 18 years old answered the door, partially opening it and peering out at my partner and me. He was standing on crutches. My partner accused him of harboring a suspect. He denied it. He said that this was his family's home and he was home alone.

My partner then forced the door the rest of the way open, grabbed him by his throat, and snatched him out of the house onto the front porch. She took him to the ledge of the porch and, still holding him by the throat, punched him hard in the face and then in the groin. My partner that day snatched an 18-year-old kid off crutches and assaulted him, simply for stating the fact that he was home alone.

I got the officer off of him. But because an aid call had gone out, several other officers had arrived on the scene. One of those officers, who was black, ascended the stairs and asked what was going on. My partner pointed to the young man, still lying on the porch, and said, "That son of a bitch just assaulted me." The black officer then went up to the young man and told him to "get the fuck up, I'm taking you in for assaulting an officer." The young man looked up at the officer and said, "Man ... you see I can't go." His crutches lay not far from him.

The officer picked him up, cuffed him, and slammed him into the house, where he was able to prop himself up by leaning against it. The officer then told him again to get moving to the police car on the street because he was under arrest. The young man told him one last time, in a pleading tone that was somehow angry at the same time, "You see I can't go!" The officer reached down and grabbed both the young man's ankles and yanked up. This caused the young man to strike his head on the porch. The officer then dragged him to the police car. We then searched the house. No one was in it.

These kinds of scenes play themselves out everyday all over our country in black and brown communities.

It's from Vox - obviously not a respectable news source, but a platform for opinions that aren't necessarily journalistic...

http://www.vox.com/2015/5/28/8661977/race-police-officer

 

[Dak]

Sure I imagine it happens to some degree across the country. Wonder how often it's a woman doing it though . I did think it was amusing that someone I knew at one time, who was this huge rahrah police and military person, had their practically new car totaled by a police car PITing a car into it - and then the police department refused to pay damages. Not exactly the same thing but just to say that uh, the police can be dicks.

This video, which is a year and a half old, has been drug up and is blasting across FB now:



Reminded me of your comment about "I'd probably shoot".

 

[Funerary_Doom]

Just a few thoughts.

Pretty sure there's just aren't enough good people in the country willing to take on the job as a police officer. Part of the mistrust among people of color and cops is that cops are typically not held accountable for their actions. Any other job (doctor, teacher, postal worker for christsake) people are held accountable by their peers within the field (especially) and are constantly being criticized. Though, I do understand how hard it is to be a cop, other cops as well should look at events with a more critical lens and hold each other accountable the same way other jobs do, especially since there is so much mistrust between cops and black/urban communities.

The cop shootings is just as fucked up. I understand that they are supposed to be symbolic and make a point but that's far beyond Dallas and obviously just as bad and will just only fuel the "war on cops" narrative and probably serve the purpose of only making cops more trigger happy because they are even more fearful.

So many shootings to keep up with. Quite pathetic that there's a choice of which latest shooting to watch. Clearly there's a problem.

 

[SentinelSlain]

Cops just cover each others backs, a female one I very briefly went out with admitted it. One problem is probably that they actually exclude high IQ people from joining the police, both officially less officially. Frankly, I tend to think that's a sign of a very very bad country.

 

[Baroque]

This is madness, the crimes on both sides were equally fucked. There should be no sides.

It's surreal to be attending optimistic science talks about the future of humanity, and helping our future in some small way in my work, and then see people actively fucking up the present. This can't go on.

 

[Dak]

It's surreal to be attending optimistic science talks about the future of humanity, and helping our future in some small way in my work, and then see people actively fucking up the present. This can't go on.

It's only surreal when you have a linear view of history. But I'll agree all this shit isn't going away/can't go on.

 

[Funerary_Doom]

Cops just cover each others backs, a female one I very briefly went out with admitted it.

That's actually a little of what I mean. They do cover for each other when something bad happens instead of trying to rebuild the trust for the communities they are trying to protect. That's definitely a problem. Stop making excuses for that kind of behavior.

I actually didn't see the video of Philando Castile until Jimmy posted it, and I mean that was really chilling. The guy is bleeding and slumped over (basically dead) and the cop does nothing but points his gun at him. No immediate medical attention or anything.

 

[Krow]

At this point, you have to be mentally unstable to even want to be a cop.

 

[Dak]

At this point, you have to be mentally unstable to even want to be a cop.

If not yet it's getting to be that way.

 

[The Ozzman]

The black underclass is a net burden on American society. Ship 'em back to Africa.

You on the Disdain for Plebs facebook page perchance?

 

[crimsonfloyd]

At this point, you have to be mentally unstable to even want to be a cop.

Cop death rates are lower than they've been in ages. And even if you totally fuck up your job and murder someone, all that happens you get paid leave and it's unlikely you'll even get indicted.

 

[Krow]

I feel like you're underestimating being black listed for the rest of your life and your rebuttal is going to be something along the lines of "better than being dead lol"

 

[Baroque]

It's only surreal when you have a linear view of history. But I'll agree all this shit isn't going away/can't go on.

I'm saying the contrast between my work toward the future at NASA and watching the news in the present is surreal. Didn't mention history.

 

[crimsonfloyd]

I feel like you're underestimating being black listed for the rest of your life and your rebuttal is going to be something along the lines of "better than being dead lol"

If you murdered someone because you couldn't do your job right and all that happens to you is you get blacklisted you're lucky as fuck. Most people spend the rest of their life in prison for that sort of "mistake."

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Cops have an incredibly cozy job. It would be nice if the Dallas shooting resulted in movement towards independent investigation of police actions, and greater dispersion of bodycams and similar, but instead it will probably just militarize them further. Cops that defend other cops that kill innocents are no better than murderers themselves, and they should all be tried by the mob if the justice system continues to ignore the problem.

That being said, the guy shot in Louisiana was most likely still a shithead, although I think it's worth considering how being labeled a sex offender led to his later criminal activities (the numbers I saw were that he was 21 and slept with a 17 year old; not remotely immoral if there was consent). There are plenty of examples of black men in the south being put on sex offender registries because they were with a white girl slightly underage. That kind of thing fucks up your employment chances for life (unless you're a wealthy celebrity).

 

[Dak]

The level of coziness of being a cop depends on city, position, and rank. Kind of like level of coziness of being in the military depends on branch, job, and rank.

Cop deaths might be at historic lows, but so is violent crime in general. But no one feels any safer.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Cops generally abandon the worst neighborhoods. I'd rather be a cop in the ghetto than some random civ in the ghetto, because I'd have a gun and I'd be able to use it almost any way I'd like.

People don't feel safer because the media likes to rile shit up. To think all of this started because one piece of shit "child" decided to assault a man and was shot in self-defense. I'm strongly in favor of BLM and cops wiping each other out, neither contributes a net positive for society these days.

 

[Baroque]

I'm strongly in favor of BLM and cops wiping each other out, neither contributes a net positive for society these days.

You can't be serious. Black lives matter exists due to necessity, it's not some faceless wannabe protest like the 99% thing that happened awhile back. If the events of the past few days/years don't make you realize that racism is still a problem then you need to open your eyes and have a real hard look at the world. and not just your world. Look at the lives of those around you.

They're actively trying to pursue societal change for equal treatment among races. How is that not a net positive for society?

Also cops are not a net positive? Wtf? So Absence of cops would be better? No that's chaos. I don't see your logic at all