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Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

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361–370 of 398 posts

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does population size really matter? We are talking about interactions at most of a few people to a few people. Whether it be Auckland with a population of circa a million or NY with their population - I don't think it matters when you are talking about the interactions of a few people. I am a kiwi, but have lived in Japan for two decades as well. You could just about swap out my mentions of NZ for Japan as a second e…

Points that I see different are: - there're terrorists, they have attacked the US and might try to attack again. Police is the 1st line of defense. - Both Japan and NZ are island s. Border control is easier to some extent. There criminals crossing borders with drugs and other illegal stuff - and illegal immigrants as well. - Social differences: hundreds of billionaires, billions of poor people. - Race differences: pe…

almost none of those issues are handled by local police forces beyond being manpower arm to other federal agencies.

and racial issues are a major component to what these protests are about our current policing system doesn't work well w/ diverse populations.

arrest related deaths top 1k/year (bjs.gov) in the US that means every 3 years police kill more people than the largest terrorist attack in US history. they are far more dangerous than any terrorist group to american lives.

so yeah reforming them is probably a good idea.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I was somewhat disappointed and sad by it, I assumed he was legally carrying it - obviously that assumption was wrong. Not necessarily, he could have had a CCW.

Only those with major political connections get CCWs in Santa Clara county, even 20 years ago.

This is true. However, the parent didn't specify who the person was or where he lived. So while unlikely it is still possible.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's admirable in theory, but sounds like a recipe for getting your head blown off. There really are unrepentantly awful people in the world, and sometimes we need to save innocents from them.

Community policing has been the basis of UK policing for the last 200 years. The violent US model of presuming crime is about "saving innocents" is dramatically at odds with the US's exceptional mental health crisis -- which forms the basis of most of its community policing issues. The lack of universal healthcare around mental health is a catastrophe. It's remarkable how tolerant US society is to overwhelming amount…

I used to regard UK policing, founded on the unarmed bobbie (sp?), with awe. The Rotherham scandal changed my thinking on that entirely. It's the worst failure of policing I've ever heard of, and seems to have caused by this sort of "light touch above all" trend.

Yes, "saving innocents" is the whole point of policing.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#364
post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For every wrong shooting, there's what, maybe a hundred righteous ones? A thousand? Yes, I'll take it for now, and advocate for improvements.

How can you possibly think so when there are about 25 police killings in Germany in the last 30 years and about 25 police killings in the US in the last month?

My family is recently from Germany, and at least 50 years ago, they had an extremely strong culture of social order and obeying laws. I suspect variations in crime rates have a lot more to do with that than with differences in policing style.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if you’re being sarcastic, but good stats. From #1 ranked dangerous country in 2012, a disbandment in 2013, and #10 today seems at least somewhat successful to me

Not sure how a steady decline in crime over a 10 year span is a failure! https://www.tapinto.net/towns/camden/sections/law-and-justic...

Hasn't crime declined in a lot of places though? What's the control?

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Community policing has been the basis of UK policing for the last 200 years. The violent US model of presuming crime is about "saving innocents" is dramatically at odds with the US's exceptional mental health crisis -- which forms the basis of most of its community policing issues. The lack of universal healthcare around mental health is a catastrophe. It's remarkable how tolerant US society is to overwhelming amount…

I used to regard UK policing, founded on the unarmed bobbie (sp?), with awe. The Rotherham scandal changed my thinking on that entirely. It's the worst failure of policing I've ever heard of, and seems to have caused by this sort of "light touch above all" trend. Yes, "saving innocents" is the whole point of policing.

We may need to wait for the report to be clear on where the failures were, but there's lots going on there.

Part of the context of that has to be a pretty systemic UK-wide issue affecting public institutions where child-abuse was ignored. It's not clear that heavy-handed policing, in that context, would lead to a different result. It certainly wouldn't in many high profile cases, where police had been strongly encouraged to ignore the issue.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#367
post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He led the city’s high-profile pivot to community policing from 2013 until last year and oversaw what turned out to be a steep decline in crime. Homicides in Camden reached 67 in 2012; the figure for 2019 was 25. That's significant improvement. Waiting until you can "solve crime" seems unproductive.

There is a pretty big difference between "solving crime" and reducing crime rate to a more typical level.

The city had already started out with an extremely high crime rate and it dropped significantly after the PD was disbanded and remade. It hasn't gotten to typical levels but I don't think people are expecting magical results here. People want a useful police that treat them with respect and that doesn't use any opportunity to terrorize them and murder them. You know, like the police in every other first world country.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#368
post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you possibly think so when there are about 25 police killings in Germany in the last 30 years and about 25 police killings in the US in the last month?

My family is recently from Germany, and at least 50 years ago, they had an extremely strong culture of social order and obeying laws. I suspect variations in crime rates have a lot more to do with that than with differences in policing style.

It's not just Germany. Police killings are significantly lower in many many other countries compared to the US.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to regard UK policing, founded on the unarmed bobbie (sp?), with awe. The Rotherham scandal changed my thinking on that entirely. It's the worst failure of policing I've ever heard of, and seems to have caused by this sort of "light touch above all" trend. Yes, "saving innocents" is the whole point of policing.

We may need to wait for the report to be clear on where the failures were, but there's lots going on there. Part of the context of that has to be a pretty systemic UK-wide issue affecting public institutions where child-abuse was ignored. It's not clear that heavy-handed policing, in that context, would lead to a different result. It certainly wouldn't in many high profile cases, where police had been strongly encour…

A lot going on, yes, but impossible to believe the police were not aware. In the US, if higher-ups tried to suppress this, it'd be leaked to the press, and all hell would break loose.

Re: Minneapolis City Council members announce intent to disband police department

#370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why there isn't a professional license required for LEOs. I'm a paramedic. If I harmed a patient once (let along 31 times), my card would get revoked and that would be that. A cop, meanwhile, is likely to face no consequences at all, and in the absolute "worst" case scenario, they would just get a job in the next town over.

They literally graduate from a Police Academy. Didn't you see the movie?

That academy doesn't result in a revocable license, managed by some external body (like the state Department of Health, in my case)
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