What I dont understand is this:
The role of the police officer is to protect and serve. His lawful duty is to uphold the law and ensure people can be bought to justice. Their role is to not to pass sentence, or carry out vigilante justice. If required, they should utilise appropriate force in order to detain or arrest people suspected of committing crimes. A police officer must have due cause to detain and make an arrest. They cannot demand people comply with their requests UNLESS they have valid reason. If a cop walks up to me and says "what's your name?" I can lawfully say "I dont need to tell you". I could then ask if I am being detained and for what purpose. If there is none, I should be allowed to walk free.
Here's what people have said in this very thread:
People should fear police. They should give up their rights to police just so that they wont be shot. That police should be able to shoot people simply for resisting arrest.
In case people havent noticed, this type of policing is WHY cities are on fire right now. That's not policing, that's over extension of unlawful power.
Any cop I know would 100% agree to the above. I know people who police in the UK who would agree to this. I know people who police in Norway who would attest to this.
I can agree here - police's role is narrow - and should not include judge, jury and executioner. However, their role IS to apprehend bad guys, and take them under their control. It is easy to look at a lot of these situations out of context and come to a conclusion that is completely different than when you consider the proper background.
For instance, a lot of people look at the Wendy's killing in Atlanta and say, "Why didn't the cops just let him go home and then go back the next day?" Um - so now we are going to let drunk drivers walk free after assaulting police officers and resisting arrest and who knows what they do after they walk away? If they are doing something that stupid, they are out of control and it is the officers' job to bring him under control. And once he has a potentially deadly weapon that he stole from a police officer, things have become extreme.
Or more recently, a child rapist shows up at his ex-gf's house unwanted, she calls the cops, he has a warrant, he resists arrest, fights back, has a knife, gets hit with a taser to no effect - should they just give up and let him leave with a knife?
The fact is, these shootings are VERY rare, as you say. But they seem more prevalent because they are all in the news. How many of these situations ARE defused successfully without guns? As you admit - YOU never had to shoot anyone, and I would wager that of the almost 1M police officers in the US - the vast majority is in the same boat as you. But those aren't news stories.
But if a cop is trying to arrest you for a legitimate reason - drunk driving, warrant, assault and battery, whatever- and you fight back and are armed, YOU are putting yourself in danger. I'm not saying that it should lead to your death 100% of the time, but it's risky. And it isn't something that most law-abiding citizens are doing. If you're fighting that hard to resist arrest, there is a reason. I don't trust cops who are trying to arrest me, but I don't distrust them that much that I'm going to escalate the situation.
It's like we are fine with the perp being the victim. A perp does something to warrant the police's attention, then THEY escalate and fight back, and then the COP is in trouble for not deescalating the situation? They weren't the one that escalated it to begin with, they were doing their job and trying to apprehend and take control of the situation and make it safe for bystanders. That IS their job. Make the arrest, control the situation and send it off to the jury.
But more importantly, why is the media so convincingly spinning all of this to upset people? Look at George Floyd. The full footage was withheld for weeks, only to finally be released and show that he was complaining about his breathing AS he was resisting arrest while they tried to get him into the back of the car and nobody was doing anything to him. Then it turns out he had a high level of Fentanyl in his system (a respiratory suppressant) and maybe even some other drugs. The cop may not have even killed him - the guy may have OD'd. And now we're burning down buildings over this and wanting to defund the police?
Not at all. Some amazing cops out there who police exactly like been saying this whole time.
But check out this:
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I agree - I think the majority of American police would agree with you in 99% of the situations. I think they probably DO try to do what you're saying. The fact that in these situations, you often have MULTIPLE officers simultaneously deciding to shoot is often used against them - "Why did they have to shoot him 20 times!" - but it is really a sign that multiple people made the decision that the threat was escalated and needed to be ended. I bet the majority of those cops have been in these situations dozens of times and NEVER fired a shot. They had to make a tough judgement call and I doubt they all took it lightly.
And just because 100% of the cases on a video show American cops acting poorly and UK cops acting righteously doesn't mean that is an accurate sampling. Cops often get out of line, go on power trips, etc. I deal with town officials daily and we all know that even the receptionist who has the smallest sliver of power will wield that any chance she can.
But I think people are backing themselves into a corner on both sides here. Shooting every person who resists arrest isn't right, and neither is expecting a cop to disarm someone with a deadly weapon by taking unnecessary risks. How many cops are killed by knife-wielding criminals every year? Why don't we hear about that? You want to trust the cops more, fine - but they don't really trust the people they see either and I doubt the criminals are going to agree to try to improve their trust with the police force.
I don't. They're a product of their environment.
Just winding you guys up because you kept misrepresenting my stance. Like I've said 100000 times, all for lawful, appropriate use of force. I didnt really that would be so controversial, but here we are.
I think it is more that these cases that are being brought up in the media ARE most often lawful and appropriate use of force - but they are being spun to create distrust and more violence. Honestly, show me a case here where it is BEYOND a reasonable doubt that the shooting was unjustified. Out of all the talk we have since March about this, I bet you'd have a hard time finding 2 cases of just outright abuse of power.
Yes, the Breonna Taylor thing was a mistake. It was a bad situation all around. A big F-Up and cops make that mistake too often. But they make that mistake with white people too, and I'm not sure why it is being spun into such a racism debate. How about, it's wrong for anyone and we are all equal - so how do we stop it?
Fact: if you don’t engage in illegal activities your chance of having a hostile encounter with a police officer drops to zero.
Not understanding what is so complicated about that or hard to understand.
This is not true, unfortunately. As someone who was arrested once, because someone with a LONG rap sheet made false claims to the police, I can see all kinds of people getting tied up in things where they did nothing wrong. In my case, the criminal accusing me was such a mess that my attorney let him tell his story to a judge and then whispered in my ear - "I think we should just let his story stand on it's own and not even defend ourselves." and the Judge found me not guilty because he was obviously lying and making sh1t up. But I didn't resist arrest, the fact I was innocent gave me little reason to resist. My attorney wasn't happy with me for being so compliant, but hey. I didn't get shot.
The kiwis and brits would obviously use "Verbal Judo" and the bad guys would cuffs themselves...
haha - you remind me of Team America, "Oh no! Not Hans Blix!"
Hans Blix: Kim, if you don't let us in to inspect your facilities, we will become very angry, and we will send you a letter telling you just how angry we are!
Ironically, I live 30 minutes from Greensboro...small world!
Great area! I actually transferred to Elon my sophomore year. I was back a few years ago briefly. I miss it down there.
