... and therefore evil. They are, however evil in more of a "I'm stealing your money to prop up and antiquated and unecessary bloated bureaucracy" type of way rather than evil in a "I am shooting you in the face" type of way.
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356 people killed by police this year as of April 21, 2015
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... and therefore evil. They are, however evil in more of a "I'm stealing your money to prop up and antiquated and unecessary bloated bureaucracy" type of way rather than evil in a "I am shooting you in the face" type of way.
ronburgundy
Contributor
No, I am pointing out this his post, the OP, the number cited, and his evaluation of "unacceptable" are all meaningless drivel because they completely ignore the context and circumstance under which people were killed. How can the number "365" be deemed "unacceptable" without knowing the % where the killing saved innocent lives, or was an accident (some which have nothing to do with them being cops but just being people doing things like driving where other might get accidentally killed)?
ronburgundy
Contributor
Yes, that's exactly what I'm insinuating. The bitch probably burned his Earl Grey so she had it coming.
It is in fact the inherent logical presumption underlying what you said. The fact that you have no clue what your knee-jerk reactions to meaningless decontextualized numbers logically implies is not my fault, no at all surprising.
laughing dog
Contributor
I think the simple answer is that the default is that killing someone is unacceptable until shown otherwise.
Yes, that's exactly what I'm insinuating. The bitch probably burned his Earl Grey so she had it coming.
It is in fact the inherent logical presumption underlying what you said. The fact that you have no clue what your knee-jerk reactions to meaningless decontextualized numbers logically implies is not my fault, no at all surprising.
nah
ronburgundy
Contributor
A conclusion you might have some other basis for, but which the OP number provides absolutely no evidence for whatsoever.
The linked instances only begin to speak to the question of "unacceptable" or "trigger happy" classified into accidents (reckless and non-reckless), protecting others from harm, self-defense, and unjustified over-reactive intentional use of force.
Also, you assertion of "no corresponding benefit to reduced crime as a result" is utterly baseless and a result of logical error. Since you have no other basis and you mentioned Canadian numbers (which I bet do not include accidents), I am guessing that your claim of no crime reduction is based in the higher crime rates in the US than Canada. That is ass-backwards reasoning. The two countries are not remotely comparable in terms of non-police factors contributing to crime rates, including gun prevalence and the fact that US cops encounter criminals with illegal guns at many many time the rate that Canadian cops do. The fact that the US has more crime and much more crime involving the deadliest weapons available is precisely why the do (and should be) killing people at a higher rate than Canadian cops. The reality is that they kill only a miniscule fraction of a percent of the violent criminals that will kill and harm others. Thus, there is no reason to expect that their neccessary greater violent response would bring the crime rates back down to Canadian levels, even if many thousands of innocent lives are saved and even more protected from harm by the shooting of hundreds of people per year. It may well be and likely is the case that a % of the people cops kill are innocents posing no threat to others killed needlessly in what could have just been a routine non-violent questioning or arrest. But nothing presented in this thread or in almost all threads on this board actually speak to what that % is.
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At least the quality of your arguments and reasoning is consistent.
ronburgundy
Contributor
Most of those cases do show otherwise, and no one has shown that any of them fail to show otherwise. Thus, the claim has zero support from the simple number of people that cops have killed.
They do?
You looked at 3 random examples and found that 2 out of the 3 had questionable justification. That doesn't sound like "most".
Yeah, it's a few high profile cases, generally with a black victim that wasn't actually shooting that make the news. They're the outliers, not the typical examples.
Jimmy Higgins
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1 in 10 is an outlier... is over 100 people in the US annually. White chick was killed and we bitched about that here too. So you put that race shit away.
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laughing dog
Contributor
There has been no evidence presented to substantiate the claim that "most of those cases do show otherwise", so your argument is unconvincing. And if the default is that police killings are unacceptable unless they are shown otherwise, it is simply illogical to point to "no one has shown that any of them fail to show otherwise".
As an experiment I too clicked three random links in the list:
http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2015/03/27/stockton-man-who-exchanged-gunfire-with-officers-dies/
Man shot by the police after they say he "allegedly" shot at them. The story uses the word "allegedly" so I guess there's been no independent corroboration of the officers' stories.
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Sunnyvale-police-shoot-liquor-store-robbery-6186999.php
Man shot to death after robbing a liquor store with a knife. The man fled to an alley and was ordered to drop the knife. The officer stated the suspect had the knife out but was stationary 50 feet away from the officer. Shots fired, suspect dead.
http://www.kansascity.com/news/local/crime/article14023826.html
US Marshals serving an arrest warrant found an armed man inside the house and a marshal shot him dead in "response to the subject’s actions." However we are not told what the subject's actions were that caused the marshal to shoot.
So in 3 out of 3 random clicks there is no clear justification for police killing these 3 people.
http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2015/03/27/stockton-man-who-exchanged-gunfire-with-officers-dies/
Man shot by the police after they say he "allegedly" shot at them. The story uses the word "allegedly" so I guess there's been no independent corroboration of the officers' stories.
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Sunnyvale-police-shoot-liquor-store-robbery-6186999.php
Man shot to death after robbing a liquor store with a knife. The man fled to an alley and was ordered to drop the knife. The officer stated the suspect had the knife out but was stationary 50 feet away from the officer. Shots fired, suspect dead.
http://www.kansascity.com/news/local/crime/article14023826.html
US Marshals serving an arrest warrant found an armed man inside the house and a marshal shot him dead in "response to the subject’s actions." However we are not told what the subject's actions were that caused the marshal to shoot.
So in 3 out of 3 random clicks there is no clear justification for police killing these 3 people.
Well, how many of those 365 were car accidents? If it's 10, then it doesn't affect the conclusions. If it's 100, then it points to an entirely different problem alongside the shootings. A quick glance at the data looks like the vast majority of them are shootings with the odd car accident interspersed here and there, so it seems more irrelevant to the conclusions than a separate problem in and of itself.
The context and circumatance are generally given by the police doing the shooting. That makes parsing out the facts around them difficult except when they're on camera.
arkirk
Veteran Member
I don't place much stock in the number given in the OP. It is obviously way lower than reality. The problem as I see it is that our society, its leaders, its law makers, and its cops have mistaken the law enforcement for the law. When I was a boy, nobody had ever heard of the "felony position." This is the standard submissive pronation of the body on the pavement with arms and legs spread....usually dictated by cops before handcuffing dangerous felons.
"The Rule of Law has been interpreted to mean specifically ABSOLUTE obedience to police. While police routinely overlook petty crimes committed by white people or obviously wealthy people of any race, and indeed sometimes ignore these crimes, the poor and minorities get no such courtesy. I live in a neighborhood where cops swarm whenever a guy steals a sandwich from 7-11...or several hispanic kids in white tee shirts walk down the street together after midnight. The sirens wail and the mighty force of justice descends on some location where a ragged homeless guy just stole a sandwich and a drink from a convenience store. The parking lot fills with cop cars and the Crime Scene SUV arrives to photograph the half eaten sandwich. The entire area takes on a Kafkaesque circus atmosphere and cops exchange in civil chit chat while the dangerous unarmed "felon" sprawls on the pavement at gunpoint waiting for bracelets.
Lord help the guy who strays into this scene with a CAMERA! He might get it confiscated or destroyed on the spot...and find himself in the felony position. The public is not allowed a record of what our cops do? This is all a response to MINOR CRIME, but our cops make no distinction in our SECURITY STATE between major and minor or even for that matter between lawful and unlawful. Selling single cigarettes on the street should get nobody killed. The problem as I see it is the absolute power law enforcement personnel are trained to exert in every situation regarding MINORITIES....this applies to rag tag whites as well as minorities. They are relegated to a lower status and okay to shoot if they even question any order a cop may choose to shout. Whatever happened to those so called inalienable rights?
The truth is that we are living with a leadership in this country that is afraid of the people. They transfer this fear to the cops they send out on the beat. When the cops kill somebody, they rush to justify almost everything a cop does. A cop has no right to arrest anybody merely because he has a vague fear of that person...or even worse, contempt. While he has no right, our current SECURITY STATE has closed ranks with it own storm troopers and protects them till it is obvious the people will not allow it past some point. Unfortunately, that point is moving progressively into more and more violent territory when it comes to poor people and minorities.
We have had ample samplings of the intense security state reactions to disadvantaged minority people posted here on this forum.
"The Rule of Law has been interpreted to mean specifically ABSOLUTE obedience to police. While police routinely overlook petty crimes committed by white people or obviously wealthy people of any race, and indeed sometimes ignore these crimes, the poor and minorities get no such courtesy. I live in a neighborhood where cops swarm whenever a guy steals a sandwich from 7-11...or several hispanic kids in white tee shirts walk down the street together after midnight. The sirens wail and the mighty force of justice descends on some location where a ragged homeless guy just stole a sandwich and a drink from a convenience store. The parking lot fills with cop cars and the Crime Scene SUV arrives to photograph the half eaten sandwich. The entire area takes on a Kafkaesque circus atmosphere and cops exchange in civil chit chat while the dangerous unarmed "felon" sprawls on the pavement at gunpoint waiting for bracelets.
Lord help the guy who strays into this scene with a CAMERA! He might get it confiscated or destroyed on the spot...and find himself in the felony position. The public is not allowed a record of what our cops do? This is all a response to MINOR CRIME, but our cops make no distinction in our SECURITY STATE between major and minor or even for that matter between lawful and unlawful. Selling single cigarettes on the street should get nobody killed. The problem as I see it is the absolute power law enforcement personnel are trained to exert in every situation regarding MINORITIES....this applies to rag tag whites as well as minorities. They are relegated to a lower status and okay to shoot if they even question any order a cop may choose to shout. Whatever happened to those so called inalienable rights?
The truth is that we are living with a leadership in this country that is afraid of the people. They transfer this fear to the cops they send out on the beat. When the cops kill somebody, they rush to justify almost everything a cop does. A cop has no right to arrest anybody merely because he has a vague fear of that person...or even worse, contempt. While he has no right, our current SECURITY STATE has closed ranks with it own storm troopers and protects them till it is obvious the people will not allow it past some point. Unfortunately, that point is moving progressively into more and more violent territory when it comes to poor people and minorities.
We have had ample samplings of the intense security state reactions to disadvantaged minority people posted here on this forum.
Of course they said "allegedly". This is normal legal CYA behavior of the news media and should not be taken as evidence of something shady.
As for the second case--nothing in that article precludes him preparing to throw the knife. This one has to be undecided at present.
As for the third one--in response to the subject's actions probably means he made some quick and threatening move. Without a clear indication of exactly what the guy was trying to accomplish they aren't going to say exactly what the move was. Thus, again undecided based on the current data.
Well, I can't say I've heard of the "felony position" until now--but that's not the same thing as not being aware of the position, I just hadn't heard it called that before. I would think awareness of this would be a fairly modern thing--the prevalence of reality TV and the huge amount of amateur video about now that didn't used to be there.
It's not like it's a new way of handling a felony arrest, it's just not something the average person would have been likely to be aware of in the past.
fast
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Edited out
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Throwing a knife from fifty feet?!? Really, Loren? Hell, even Bill The Butcher in Gangs of New York wasn't that good. Your fantasies aren't even up to Hollywood standards.