Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

muckrock.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 216 posts

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#151

Post by specialist »

zo1 wrote: post #143
mirimir wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that motorcycle helmets with active noise control would help a lot. Also maybe padded bodysuits. But there'd be downsides for protest groups to show up wearing such gear, no?

I think protesting is a largely useless endeavor. It's nothing but a "show of force" in meat-space, that allows the possibility of violent encounters between individuals that have opposing world-views/opinions. Rather, allow people to vote directly on issues that they are passionate about. This leads into direct democracy and is arguably a whole lot more ethical than what we have now.

Agreed. Time and place matters.

My (minor) successes on policy work happened when my whole tribe showed up to testify at hearings, repeated.

To see how this works, attend any public hearing regarding puppies, kittens, kennels, etc. Whereas most hearings have no audience, attendees, the kittens pack the chambers. And the advocates will get their way.

(I've done the street level protests. It feels nice, validating to be around others who agree with you. But mostly it just makes you a target.)

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#152

Post by randallsquared »

twobyfour wrote: post #142
tatersolid wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. You don’t get to wire up NYC at the expense of all taxpayers.

NYC pays far more in both state and federal taxes than it receives in services. NY State pays far more in federal taxes than it receives in services. Rural parts of the US receive far more in services than they pay in taxes. The rest of the country isn't paying for a thing in NYC - it's the other way around. Just leave us more of our own tax money and we could do all sorts of things that aren't currently considered p…

> Just leave us more of our own tax money and we could do all sorts of things that aren't currently considered possible.

At (roughly) what number of people does that argument stop working? 5M? 500K? 50K? 5?

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#153

Post by specialist »

zo1 wrote: post #141
omegaworks wrote: post #58

Hacker News, can we come up with clever ways to undermine this growing trend toward authoritarianism? How effective are ear plugs as a countermeasure? Parabolic mirrors? How can we divest from organizations employing these anti-populist, anti-democratic measures?

I've often suggested a form of "humble-bundle"-like funding model for government functions. An application of a bit of free-market capitalism to an otherwise involuntary system. So if you wished to punish or scale-back or defund the police because they were preventing protesting using means that are too-violent for your liking, then you can simply reduce the funding that you allocate to policing in the next cycle. Yo…

A positive step would be publish all expenditures, appropriations, contracts, etc. By default. Bypassing the sunlighting/FOIA charade.

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#154

Post by twobyfour »

randallsquared wrote: post #152
twobyfour wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NYC pays far more in both state and federal taxes than it receives in services. NY State pays far more in federal taxes than it receives in services. Rural parts of the US receive far more in services than they pay in taxes. The rest of the country isn't paying for a thing in NYC - it's the other way around. Just leave us more of our own tax money and we could do all sorts of things that aren't currently considered p…

> Just leave us more of our own tax money and we could do all sorts of things that aren't currently considered possible. At (roughly) what number of people does that argument stop working? 5M? 500K? 50K? 5?

I'm not clear on what it is you're asking.

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#155

Post by TheCoelacanth »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #106
wallace_f wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, one of the remaining only ways "doing the right thing" ever gets done in the States these days. Why can countries like South Korea, Taiwan or Japan provide public services like roads, internet infrastructure, police and healthcare at an incredibly small fraction of the cost that is lightyeaes ahead in quality and competency (for the 99%)?

Path dependence? US went a bit too far in the "individual liberty" direction, and it now can't get out of the mess. In principle, things could be fixed, but good luck getting enough lawyer mass on this.

Surely allowing police to use excessive force to control protestors is the exact opposite of "individual liberty".

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#156

Post by dboreham »

icelancer wrote: post #62
djsumdog wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

becoming? It's been this way for a very long time. Very few major media outlets cover the Democrat/Republican National Conventions, but you can watch videos online of the protests from past years going back quite a bit. Rage Against the Machine use to do protests at both the DNC and RNC which I thought was hilarious. It's very common for protesters to be smoke bombed, herded, arrested and detained. There are several…

>>whenever people call out Anderson Cooper caught in front of a green screen Huh? A quick Google Search shows only sources from absurd places like InfoWars. Have any conclusive evidence that can't be easily explained by motion compression algorithms?

And there we have the real Fake News. The term originated as a label for crackpot/tinfoil-hat/state-actor misinformation ops. It was picked up by Trump who presumably misunderstood the meaning, and used by him to describe MSM he didn't like. Sort of Fake News squared...

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#157

Post by dboreham »

nostrademons wrote: post #55
djsumdog wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

becoming? It's been this way for a very long time. Very few major media outlets cover the Democrat/Republican National Conventions, but you can watch videos online of the protests from past years going back quite a bit. Rage Against the Machine use to do protests at both the DNC and RNC which I thought was hilarious. It's very common for protesters to be smoke bombed, herded, arrested and detained. There are several…

Little known fact: 1984 is based on WW2 and immediate post-war Britain. Orwell was a propaganda correspondent for the BBC; his wife worked for the Censorship Department. 1984 was based on his experiences then, and the disillusionment of the Cold War immediately following WW2. He had initially intended to title it 1948 . Actually, this is not that little-known: it's in the Wikipedia page for George Orwell and easily a…

Hmm...hard to believe this is not commonly known when the book is taught in schools, even in the US. I suppose the students need to be awake and paying attention..

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#158

Post by ataturk »

djsumdog wrote: post #26
Sephr wrote: post #17

High power directed ultrasound can potentially cause brain damage from induced mechanical strain in brain tissue. I feel like parametric ultrasonic speakers should be more stringently regulated before every single police department starts using them as if they were regular loudspeakers. I support requiring something akin to an amateur radio license to operate high powered parametric ultrasonic speakers.

I support them not being allowed ever. But just like the totally ineffective body scanners at airports, too much money has been sunk in for officers not to use them. No one actually cares about the sunk cost fallacy.

The body scanners were a huge profit center for Level 3 Systems. It was always about making billions off of government contracts. So what is a few more people get cancer? It can never be directly traced back to where the exposure came from.

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#159

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

Sephr wrote: post #17

High power directed ultrasound can potentially cause brain damage from induced mechanical strain in brain tissue. I feel like parametric ultrasonic speakers should be more stringently regulated before every single police department starts using them as if they were regular loudspeakers. I support requiring something akin to an amateur radio license to operate high powered parametric ultrasonic speakers.

LRADs don't generate ultrasound. The worst they can do is create the brown note.

Re: DC police used sonic cannon to direct crowd flow during Women's March

#160

Post by ataturk »

jonlucc wrote: post #101
emodendroket wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They used water cannons on people in Standing Rock in some seriously cold temperatures just last year.

And dogs on protestors in Ferguson in the hours after the police shooting of Michael Brown.

As bad as that sounds, I ask "do the people whose property was damaged by the rioters matter at all?" If the riots had gotten even further out of control and lethal force had to be employed, would the use of dogs or water cannons, or whatever else be more palatable?"

People taking part in riots do have a choice--they can behave if they so choose. Their victims are merely caught up in the ordeal, though. Protecting public safety is a delicate balance.

Post reply on HN