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George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

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Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#221
post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is Ba Sing Se levels of delusion for some people. A reference I never expected to see on HN. It's insane, but then you realize that a significant portion of the US population _still_ only watches television news media and refuses to spend extra time looking at other sources, like Twitter.

Why unexpected? The Last Airbender is as mainstream as NCIS today.

In fairness, that happened for many quickly over the past month or two as it hit Netflix. A good deal of people still don't know much/anything about ATLA.

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over the last week I have been starting to realize that what you said is true in general, and not just of protests. It seems that police inflame and instigate most of the violent situations they are involved in. We are literally paying to be abused. We shouldn't be trying to get that money back; we shouldn't even be paying it in the first place.

A 2500-year-old quote still relevant today: "When a nation hoards weapons, troubles arise from within and from without. When its leaders try to be cunning and clever, the situation spins further out of control. When they try to fix things by passing more laws, they only increase the number of outlaws." 民多利器、國家滋昏。 人多伎巧、奇物滋起。 法令滋彰、盜賊多有。

Very clever, but given the benefit of history I disagree with the first line. Weakness invites trouble, but strength is not the solution to every problem.

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#223

The fact that is even possible is insane. Imagine there being over 700 videos of pilots messing up in one month, 700 crane operator mishaps in a month, 700+ food poising by a chain in a month. The also imagine you believe there's no problem. This is Ba Sing Se levels of delusion for some people.

[deleted]

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#224
post #23
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just be a bit cautious with lists like this: Last time lists like this were posted, most of the links were false accusations, or just someone claiming something, with no way to know the truth. (I spent some time trying to verify until I realized there were far more false accusations than true, and then I give it up as pointless.) Of course even one instance of brutality is too much, but take numbers like this which a…

These are nearly all videos which are pretty self-explanatory (and horrifying).

I'm not arguing for or against the list being fake, but just because there's a video doesn't mean it's real or relevant.

For example, the other day there was a video being posted around of alleged police brutality, where an officer was using force to arrest some woman. The video was 1) from 2018 2) conveniently trimmed to exclude the first part where the woman was resisting arrest.

There are plenty of people trying to push a narrative right now, so just be very critical of the information presented to you.

Source: https://downtownbellevue.com/2020/06/05/video-surfaces-belle...

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah what is appropriate? Letting them take over entire city blocks as Seattle has done? Allowing mobs to burn down minority neighborhoods in Minneapolis?

The police abandoned the city blocks first. The intent was to purposefully set up a situation where cops can point to rioting in an area they intentionally vacated so riots could happen. Protestors have responded by sitting and watching documentaries about police brutality in that area.

Maybe this can set an example for the rest of the nation, then.

There have been calls to abolish the police. If Seattle can do it, maybe Atlanta and Minneapolis too.

I think that's the right answer: this should be a local decision and each community should decide the level of policing it wants (including none at all).

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#226
post #93

The fact that is even possible is insane. Imagine there being over 700 videos of pilots messing up in one month, 700 crane operator mishaps in a month, 700+ food poising by a chain in a month. The also imagine you believe there's no problem. This is Ba Sing Se levels of delusion for some people.

To be fair you are comparing an adversarial job with a cooperative one. A crane operator won't feel unsafe, or confronted by someone he calls hostile. This is no excuse whatsoever for the multitude of outraging problems in the system, but the comparison isn't straightforward.

Most of what a good police force should be doing isn't adversarial. The police should be trained like peacekeepers.

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in the last year or decade > what those perps and officers have experienced Both totally irrelevant to whether or not it's appropriate to punch a handcuffed prisoner in the face while they're not resisting. If a cop is suffering from PTSD or stress to the point where they can't keep themselves from assaulting a handcuffed prisoner, then I am genuinely very sorry for them, but they're still in the wrong job and they…

Have you ever had to restrain a person who might want to kill you? While wearing a firearm? I have done some grappling in MA myself, but I imagine the stakes are in another dimension on a real situation. I'm not totally certain there are any people who can be "good" at it in the sense that they'll never make mistakes or lose their cool. Then consider that there are over 10 million situations every year where somethin…

In the course of one thread, there's now a series of sequential arguments from several different commenters progressing from:

"A lot of these videos don't show anything wrong", to

"Well, here's at least two videos that show nothing wrong", to

"Okay, the video looks bad, but the full context probably justifies it", to

"Sure it was wrong, but keep in mind that in a stressful situation everybody makes mistakes".

I'm eager to see how these arguments continue to evolve once comments move away from isolated video clips and into the territory of police departments lying about video footage[0], or 57 other officers resigning in protest over basic disciplinary actions[1].

[0]: https://www.newsweek.com/buffalo-mayor-acknowledges-mistake-...

[1]: https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/05/us/buffalo-police-suspension-...

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is Ba Sing Se levels of delusion for some people. A reference I never expected to see on HN. It's insane, but then you realize that a significant portion of the US population _still_ only watches television news media and refuses to spend extra time looking at other sources, like Twitter.

Neither you or the parent poster explained what "Ba Sing Se" is. I quickly discovered that it is a reference to a city in "The last Airbender" [0]. I don't want to watch three seasons of it just to understand the reference. A very obscure reference might deserve an explanation to make the remaining 99.9% of the readers able to understand what you mean. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar:_The_Last_Airbender#Ba_…

Not really very obscure. It's an incredibly popular show and I would be willing to bed that at minimum 50% of coworkers would understand the reference.

I don't think it's very difficult to use context to understand what's being said by the commenter.

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#229
There needs to be a psychology study done with cops to understand why they act the way they do. I believe there's an underlying problem in how they are trained or something else because police brutality is kind of a global phenomenon. When someone kills or severely hurts the people they are supposed to protect, it seems like there's something else going on. I've been in a few protests and I can easily say that I have never seen more hatred in someone's eyes other than the cops that were beating up people.

Re: George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

#230
post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very unlikely. Fireworks use against the police more common that you think. You’re just not going to see that many videos of them as it doesn’t help the narrative. A buddy of mine is a cop who had the unfortunate duty of being one of the riot police in my city and it’s not easy to keep your cool while having rocks, fireworks, and almost a Molotov cocktail tossed at you.

Don't dish out what you can't take. I've never seen an example of riots breaking out in a city before police instigate violence with rubber bullets and tear gas. Also, if he can't keep his cool under those conditions, he has an obligation to change jobs because if he can't handle it he's just putting other people in danger.

>I've never seen an example of riots breaking out in a city before police instigate violence with rubber bullets and tear gas.

LA Riots in 1992. Police pulled out to avoid conflict and it resulted in looting and burning for days until the National Guard showed up.

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