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Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

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Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#181

Post by NeedMoreTea »

laumars wrote: post #138
tempguy9999 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your suicidal point is a separate topic though. That's a mental illness rather than an action someone chooses or is lead into. What are you saying, and what do you think should happen if someone is suicidal? Please think very carefully before answering. Edit: have you any experience with desire for suicide, or any experience with anyone you know well who wanted to, or succeeded in suicide?

> What are you saying Literally all I'm saying is suicide is a separate topic because it's a mental illness rather than an action someone chooses or is lead into. > what do you think should happen if someone is suicidal? I don't really want to get into an off topic discussion about mental health which is why I didn't go into more detail in my previous post. However if you want more information about mental health the…

> it's a mental illness rather than an action someone chooses

Sometimes. It can equally be something someone chooses with full faculty.

"It is" as opposed to "sometimes it can be" makes me uncomfortable in the manner of DanBC's comment. A sweeping generalisation of cause can lead to a sweeping generalisation of response. Neither is helpful.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#182

Post by antepodius »

mcv wrote: post #120
icebraining wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Police are just humans, they have their biases and grudges and bad days like everyone else. But the power they hold means those bad behaviors can harm you quite a bit, in the same way it can help you when you need it.

Exactly, and that's why you need to invest in training and guiding them, in holding them accountable for missteps and bad behaviour. The point of police is not to give untrained regular people unchecked power over others.

Your vague broad-scale social prescriptions are irrelevant to the question of optimal individual behaviour towards the police.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#183

Post by turk73 »

emptybits wrote: post #4

FTA: The Ontario Provincial Police say, “We can knock on someone’s door and say, ‘We’re so worried about you, can we come in and chat?’” Yikes. I understand the positive spin is the police care about the wellbeing of at-risk people with these visits. But wouldn't it also be true that anything and everything the police observe and believe as a result of such a visit could also be used against the resident or others in…

We have to get control over our technology and its applications or else we're going to suffer a far worse fate than those of the people depicted in "Brave New World" or "1984."

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#184

Post by mcv »

mattlondon wrote: post #76
emptybits wrote: post #4

FTA: The Ontario Provincial Police say, “We can knock on someone’s door and say, ‘We’re so worried about you, can we come in and chat?’” Yikes. I understand the positive spin is the police care about the wellbeing of at-risk people with these visits. But wouldn't it also be true that anything and everything the police observe and believe as a result of such a visit could also be used against the resident or others in…

What I find weird about all of this is that people actually answer their door to unexpected & unknown visitors?! Do you also answer your phone to unexpected & unknown callers?! My rule of thumb built up over years of annoyance & bullshit is: if you don't know who it is, or aren't expecting anything, ignore it; 99.9% of the time someone unexpected/unknown on the phone or at your door are just going to be wasting your…

I open the door. In my experience, 99% of the time it's either a delivery person with a package for my wife, or a neighbourhood kid who wants to play with my son.

I also pick up the phone. 99% of the time it's a recruiter. Less enthusiastic about those odds, but it's occasionally useful.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#185

Post by lreeves »

acchow wrote: post #30
taneq wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, without some pretty strong new protections in place there is absolutely no upside and likely a significant downside to letting them in. The police are not your friends.

> The police are not your friends As a Canadian, I disagree with this sentiment.

Wow, I couldn't disagree more. I've watched police in Toronto:

* Gleefully wear masks and remove their name tags during the G20 summit and harass me for daring to work on a Saturday - friends of mine were arrested for being in the area and kept in cages (later there was a large lawsuit involved).

* They've happily accepted carding minorities in this city for a decade, ignored the cries of a community where a serial killer (Bruce McArthur) was preying on them and in fact had him in custody but let him go.

* Persecuted the LGBTQ community for decades with bathhouse and related arrests

And on a personal note the several times I've needed their assistance they have gone out of their way to victim-shame and victim-blame me. I was assaulted and robbed and the police on the phone laughed out loud at me asking if I should go in to a station or come to me. This is just the recent-most experience, my entire 20 years of adult life in Ontario has been peppered by experiences like this. And full disclosure I'm a white straight male, I cannot imagine what it would be like to be an underrepresented group dealing with the police.

So TLDR they are 100% neutral. I'm not sure after all these years what their actual guiding mission or statement is but it sure fucking isn't protecting and serving and I would never speak to them or open my door to them without a warrant and a call to a lawyer.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#186

Post by antepodius »

mcv wrote: post #44
Causality1 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canadian police have their fair share of psychopathic bullies and systemic racist murder. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saskatoon_freezing_deaths https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2014/03/30/football_player_... https://globalnews.ca/news/1608030/new-video-shows-another-c... https://www.thestar.com/news/crime/2014/07/30/toronto_cop_ch...

Don't let perfect be the enemy of good, though. There will always be something wrong. The point is to address it and reduce how often it goes wrong. I'm not denying these incidents are terrible; they are. And even if you do address them and punish the perpetrators, you'll still occasionally have police officers that do the wrong thing. But that doesn't mean it's pointless to hold police accountable, or to train them…

'We should hold police accountable and train them better' is orthogonal to 'you shouldn't talk to or interact with the police if you can help it'. You do the first to reduce the probable number of- let's say 'possibly evil police'. You do the second to reduce the probability of being damaged by 'possibly evil police'. Being for the first idea doesn't give a reason to be against the second idea. In fact, if your goal is to minimise the chance of getting fucked by police, you want to take both measures.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#187

Post by turk73 »

maccard wrote: post #172
whatshisface wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They might be trying to sell you something. How often would an unannounced visitor be unwanted vs. wanted?

Or it might be someone from a few doors down with some badly delivered mail, a courier with a parcel your partner/roommate ordered or a new neighbour introducing themselves, someone felling you theyre having a party and would appreciate you not calling the cops at 10pm. I get maybe 4 sales knocks a year, I just say not interested and close the door!

We get tons of a-holes cruising our neighborhood trying to hawk home repairs, driveways, roofing. It's constant and annoying as hell. I have a "No Soliciting" sign up, but that doesn't deter the idiot political campaign people, for one. Also, if we're outdoors working in yard or the kids are playing, you get the walk-up treatment. It's so annoying--you work all day, you get home, you just want to do your thing and here's some idiot you don't want to talk to showing up trying to sell you something. Also, more than a few have been downright creepy encounters where I thought I was possibly being cased by a burglary crew.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#188

Post by laumars »

tempguy9999 wrote: post #166
laumars wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What are you saying Literally all I'm saying is suicide is a separate topic because it's a mental illness rather than an action someone chooses or is lead into. > what do you think should happen if someone is suicidal? I don't really want to get into an off topic discussion about mental health which is why I didn't go into more detail in my previous post. However if you want more information about mental health the…

I am being antagonistic because I have the suspicion I'm being antagonised, though out of an abundance of (misplaced) goodwill. > suicide is a separate topic because it's a mental illness DanBC replied succinctly. I can't add to it. I'm getting badly uptight because ISTM you may have defined suicide into something you are morally required to intervene in, and prevent. From your orig post: "...given support to help en…

> I'm getting badly uptight because ISTM you may have defined suicide into something you are morally required to intervene in, and prevent. From your orig post: "...given support to help enable them to grow into better people..."

You're obsessing over one sentence, pulling it apart and taking it completely out of context - even after I have already clarified what I meant.

I have repeatedly made the case that support for "at risk" people (in terms of criminal activity) should be non-interfearing and in a way that offers them choice. This is the exact opposite of the example you gave regarding the persecution of homosexuality.

I've also said I'm not even going to engage in a debate about mental illness. I've supplied a link for you to read up on - if you want to know more. However if you do have suicidal thoughts then please do talk to someone - trust me, it helps. And even if you're not suicidal but generally feel like your mentally unwell, talk to someone. If you don't feel comfortable talking to a friend then there are also support contact details on that charity I linked to (https://mind.org.uk). They wont interfere nor intervene. At least not unless you ask them to.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#189

Post by mcv »

antepodius wrote: post #182
mcv wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, and that's why you need to invest in training and guiding them, in holding them accountable for missteps and bad behaviour. The point of police is not to give untrained regular people unchecked power over others.

Your vague broad-scale social prescriptions are irrelevant to the question of optimal individual behaviour towards the police.

No, but they are relevant to the question of how to improve your society. Accepting problems as a normal state of affairs is not going to fix them.

Re: Police in Canada Are Tracking People’s ‘Negative’ Behavior in a ‘Risk’ Database

#190

Post by bmmayer1 »

mcv wrote: post #133
bmmayer1 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that's true, then there's a problem with this statement: > In my opinion, a police that's feared rather than trusted, is a sign of a police state or totalitarian regime. If that's not what the country wants to be, then it's a problem that needs to be fixed The assumption is that if the police is feared / overly militaristic, then by definition that country must 'want' to be a police state. Given that Americans ove…

If Americans don't want to live in a police state, then they should demand that the behaviour of their police changes. That police officers are held accountable, and are better trained to perform their job in the interest of the people, rather than merely their own interest or that of the government. If you have control over your police, then please exercise it. I think the problem that's holding Americans back, also…

> I'm just going by what Americans themselves are telling me about their country

Ah, this makes sense then :)

Definitely visit the US...I can tell you that the Americans who travel tend to lean heavily "liberal" in their politics (in other words, anti-police), which would explain that your perception of American life is definitely skewed in favor of this view.

Note that yes, of course, we do have major problems with our police, especially with regard to militarization of the police and abuse of power, especially in poor communities. But the actual reality of the relationship between Americans and the police is nuanced and complicated, not as obvious as your well-traveled American friends would have you believe :)

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