SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-45739335/
This ^ should never have happened.
We've registered our son (despite my mis-givings) with the police as moderate to severely autistic, non-verbal, with slight cerebral palsy BECAUSE WE DON'T WANT THINGS LIKE THIS to happen to him (as well as for other reasons, explained below).
The police in Canada seem to be much better trained (or more patient) than in the States, but we don't want anything going wrong for him in any encounters.
He is rarely out of our sight or hearing and we got him a Medic-Alert tag for his running shoes that can point police to his info (supposedly, they are trained to look for tags like this), but registered him with the local police to let them have INSTANT info if he ever did go missing (they won't have to wait for us to get them pictures and info: they will be able to access it from their site).
They will know his name, any nick-names he will respond (possibly) to, how he might react to them, how to get calm him down, that he will probably want to be hugged, etc.
We want him to be trouble free if found by the police (the school has let him run a couple of times but have always caught up to him eventually.... so far).
But what happened in the video above is disgusting. He sprays water at them and they taze him over and over and over and over????
WTF?
If that happened to our son, they would be seeing a VERY expensive court case and disciplinary actions and HELL FIRE RAINED DOWN ON THEM and have their asses plugged with cement if possible.
Never. ever. ever. should. have. happened.
*****
Just read the rest of the story: the down syndrome kid being asphyxiated by police and the other shit.
No charges were laid against the cops who tazed the kid in the shower?
My God.
How do these people go on in their lives.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday October 05 2018, @10:54PM (6 children)
"I feared for my life."
"I feared for my life."
"I feared for my life."
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday October 06 2018, @03:42AM (5 children)
You say that with scorn because you're sitting in a position that does not afford you a view of the very real dangers they face every day. They very legitimately have reason to fear for their lives in any situation they're called in to. If you want to change anything, you need to change that first. Always go to the root of the problem.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday October 06 2018, @04:00PM (4 children)
Nobody else can credibly murder someone on a whim, stick around to tell (other) police about it, and get away with it.
Police can also arbitrarily detain people, stick them with bogus "contempt of cop" charges, steal drugs, and plenty more. But murder is final.
Body cams and cop convictions could help, but it will still take a long time to break the conditioning. Or it might never happen since they will continue to be trained to see everyone packing heat.
Luckily, violence is in decline [pewresearch.org]. I bet the prevalence of video games has prevented a good number of potential gang members from realizing their talents. Add a little weed and VR, and we'll have a generation of herbivores. The smart would-be gang members will join the police and enjoy power tripping before more reforms come into effect.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Funny) by Gaaark on Saturday October 06 2018, @04:12PM
"Nobody else can credibly murder someone on a whim ... and get away with it."
God does it all the time, and with the simple phrase "God works in mysterious ways" gets a pass.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday October 06 2018, @04:44PM
You're still focusing on a symptom far from the cause. I know that's how our medical practitioners do things nowadays but that doesn't make it any less silly.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday October 23 2018, @03:39AM (1 child)
There is epidemiological evidence that the general decline in violent crime is because of the switch to nonleaded gasoline. It has happened in different countries at different times, but tends to happen in each country about 20 years after they get rid of lead in gasoline.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday October 23 2018, @04:26AM
Yeah, I've read Freakonomics too.
However, even if we all become docile sheep, the police will still be gunning people down, fearing for their lives.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday October 05 2018, @11:28PM (2 children)
Look, espcially in the US, the police are selected to be low-IQ bullying thugs. And I mean it about the low IQ; IIRC anyone whose entrance exam scores are equivalent to 110 or above is automatically disqualified. Policing also attracts a certain kind of person, as well, the ones who like to lord it over others. It's dangerous work, which means it selects for people with high risk-taking personalities. It also doesn't pay too well from what I understand. Basically, they ain't America's Finest (TM) and I suspect there's not much difference in Canada.
Stay out of the US. Your child will be murdered by the police, not just for no reason, but because the child is an easy target and some psycho with a badge knows he can get away with it.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Sulla on Friday October 05 2018, @11:59PM (1 child)
I have wondered how much it has to do with the level of violence in the local population. It seems that places with large concentrations of rednecks (Texas, Florida, etc) and places with degenerated inner-cities (Chicago, Milwaukee, etc) have police that are more aggressive than in other locations. Aggressive population causes aggressive cops, aggressive cops causes an aggressive population, leading to a feedback cycle. Shootings seem to not really occur outside of major population centers or the south with any real consistency, and with how often cops move around I wonder how much cops which were trained/started out in cities end up causing problems when they move out to smaller cities/country.
As for the situation Gaaark brought up, I don't understand why an officer would ever need to taser someone who isn't attacking, isn't armed, and not showing any real aggression. A situation that happened locally a couple of years ago had a kid who called the police because his dad was on the front porch, really drunk, with a bb gun shooting at a tree and wanted to make sure a cop driving by didn't shoot him. The dispatcher sent a cop over, the guy shot the dad without a warning because he was "brandishing a deadly weapon".
I think as being a cop became a career you would go into for the money instead of something that you went into because you believed in the motto you have a group of people who don't give a shit about the community. I have always had much better experiences with old officers than young ones.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 1) by Sulla on Saturday October 06 2018, @12:54PM
Please elaborate on why offtopic, second paragraph seems to me to be very on topic.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @12:19AM (1 child)
Care in the community has failed, deinstitutionalization has failed. The other side of the comments here is that police are in fear of their lives. We have too many dangerous people walking around when in many cases there's history exposing the psychopaths for what they are. Deal with the dangerous people and this will not happen, allow the dangerous people to act with impunity and this is what we get.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Saturday October 06 2018, @12:35AM
He was not what i'd call 'dangerous'.
Unless water is suddenly acid.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday October 06 2018, @01:24AM (2 children)
The police are proud of the fact that they hire a large percentage of combat veterans.
I'm proud of being a veteran, and I'm proud of my fellow veterans. But, let's be honest. A young man whose training involves "shoot first" in a combat zone is NOT learning things like empathy, understanding, sympathy, or any of the other human virtues. Next, during his training as a cop, the emphasis is on enforcement, instead of peace keeping. Basically, it's more "shoot first", than "learn to empathize with people who have problems."
This culture isn't going to change overnight, or even within a decade. Even if the US were to make a committed effort to change that culture, it would take closer to fifty years to reach the goal.
And, meanwhile we have the gangs, and the real criminals, with whom proper responses to calls really are enforcement, and the threat of force. That complicates changing the culture.
Bottom line, cops aren't equipped to deal with the mentally handicapped, or even other handicaps. You can't expect them to be so equipped - they've never had training in the field.
I suppose a possible solution is to create police teams that include one real cop, and one soft cop. Someone who has had some training in dealing with people not in contact with reality. Or, maybe school teachers.
As already noted above, policing attracts people with issues of their own. Adrenaline junkies, control freaks, egotistical freaks, gun nuts who think all of life's answers grow out of the barrel of a weapon, and more. If/when we begin to truly understand that, then we may begin to change the culture.
Blue lives matter? Uhhhh - no. Not any more than any other life. Screw BLM, no matter which color is being touted as important. The cop who isn't willing to risk his own life for the sake of his fellow man isn't really a cop. He is certainly not a "peace keeping officer." He is just an enforcer.
All of the major gangs and criminal organizations have their enforcers.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Whoever on Saturday October 06 2018, @03:58PM (1 child)
Did you read the article? Because there is no way that the police in that case could be afraid for their lives.
What happened was that a mentally ill kid made the fatal error of not obeying the police. This should not be a fatal mistake.
The police are brainwashed to believe that their job is more dangerous than it really is and never punished when they overreact.
Remember that the police officers who handed that kid back to Jeffrey Dahmer were re-instated with full back pay. They ignored procedure, they ignored information before them, they got a kid killed and they suffered no punishment. What message does that send? This incident shows why the police act like this: judges are far too deferential to police officers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday October 06 2018, @04:27PM
Yes, sir - I did read the article. You are perfectly correct - those cops were in no fear whatsoever. The cops have gotten away with executing old and young, black and white, male and female, sane, insane, handicapped - none of that matters. Your state of health, mental capacity, age, none of that means anything. When a cop says he followed procedure and/or that he feared for his life, that is pretty much the end of the case. Limited immunity knows few if any limits.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @07:05AM (2 children)
Yes, expensive for you, and it will get dismissed because "they were following procedures".
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday October 06 2018, @02:17PM (1 child)
Procedure can be changed, without a lot of effort. The real problem is that "limited immunity" bullshit. There are few limits to the immunity. Do a web search for "police convicted". The vast majority of police who have been convicted of murder, are those who chose to kill a spouse, or a neighbor, or a parent - someone close to them, and they couldn't tie it somehow to "line of duty". And, even in some of those cases, the asswipe finds a slimy lawyer who manages to confuse the issues enough to convince a jury.
Limited immunity needs to be narrowly defined, with meaningful limits. Ditto with "fear for my life".
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @03:36PM
Don't forget the prosecutors who will sabotage the case, since they don't want to piss off the source of their cases which will get them reelected.