Police have been quitting in droves in the last year • Hacker News Board

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#121

Post by revscat » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:08 PM UTC

smileysteve wrote: post #11

_fat_santa wrote: post #3

Policing has to be one of the hardest jobs in our modern society, I honestly couldn't event imagine the stress. Imagine picking up a JIRA ticket at work and not knowing if that ticket is going to a run of the mill bug fix or something that can kill you. That's just out of the realm of possibility for an SWE but for a cop it can be any one of the calls they take on a daily basis. I've always had respect for cops becau…

And if you make the incorrect commit in the moment -- or don't check with compliance, then a person is dead, you're on trial by the public; and possibly at risk for jail time. [Addendum: And you're being promoted based on arrests, while sharing frustration with management about compliance, and likely seeing other cowboy coder style actions]

However, qualified immunity would protect me from being held responsible.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#122

Post by lostcolony » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:08 PM UTC

roenxi wrote: post #53

ijustlovemath wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The meaning of "diverting funding to other resources" has been a consensus in the community for a very long time. It's only recently that "defund" has been conflated with "abolish," which has always been a very very small niche of the police reform community.

Is there a consensus committee that announces what 'the community' thinks? Because in my experience the community is quite divided on most topics and tends to come to a consensus using the literal meaning of words. There is always a risk that people chanting "defund the police" mean they want to, simply and literally, defund the police. If they want something different they should be chanting that instead.

"There is always a risk"

I think there's an easy way to figure out what people mean when they chant a slogan. Talk to them.

"In my experience the community is quite divided on most topics and tends to come to a consensus using the literal meaning of words"

Well, even if your experience is correct, so what? Defunding the police -as it currently exists-, in its entirety, and directing those funds to different agencies, including what the current police would turn into, is still removing 100% of the funds from the existing organization and redirecting them. No one is arguing to remove that funding and then setting that money on fire.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#123

Post by Hamuko » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:08 PM UTC

busterarm wrote: post #54

nradov wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Law enforcement can be dangerous but it's only #22 in occupational death rates. Lumberjacks and roofers are far more likely to get killed. https://www.ishn.com/articles/112748-top-25-most-dangerous-j...

Police are in the top 5 in suicide rates. As are construction workers.

I don't really know what that represents other than stress. Your average veterinarian is as likely to kill herself as your average police officer is to kill himself.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#124

Post by brutusborn » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

roenxi wrote: post #53

ijustlovemath wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The meaning of "diverting funding to other resources" has been a consensus in the community for a very long time. It's only recently that "defund" has been conflated with "abolish," which has always been a very very small niche of the police reform community.

Is there a consensus committee that announces what 'the community' thinks? Because in my experience the community is quite divided on most topics and tends to come to a consensus using the literal meaning of words. There is always a risk that people chanting "defund the police" mean they want to, simply and literally, defund the police. If they want something different they should be chanting that instead.

Our language is full of ambiguities, and this is one. Both interpretations are listed in the Cambridge dictionary.

The truth is: clarity require lots of words, and that makes a terrible slogan. Most people react stronger to a slogan than a nuanced discussion, so the messy slogans will remain.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#125

Post by treis » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

I don't think enough people are talking about the huge change in the crime landscape. Here in Atlanta, violent crime is up 50, 60% while arrests are down 40%. We're down hundreds of cops and morale is terrible.

Cops aren't doing their jobs because they fear politically motivated prosecution. And for good reason given that a handful of them faced politically motivated prosecution.

We're still below the worst days of violent crime but it's an extremely worrying trend. It took US cities decades to recover from the high crime of the last century and we really don't want the cycle to start again.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#126

Post by macksd » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #7

Guys, police are self-abolishing. Victory is within grasp. But seriously. Why is this surprising? This is a completely rational reaction of people who feel they're being unfairly demonized as a group despite most of them being professional and doing their jobs the best they can with the training and incentives they're given. Enjoy the crime wave.

> This is a completely rational reaction of people who feel they're being unfairly demonized as a group

That also explains the public backlash against police in the first place, doesn't it? We can't keep speaking with this perspective of police always being the good guys / bad guys and protesters / rioters always being the good guys / bad guys, otherwise we've just given up on any societal sense of right and wrong and all we're doing is picking sides to fight for the sake of it.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#127

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #10

Sounds like 'defund the police' is stupid, self-defeating sloganeering that makes no sense given what its apparent settled-upon meaning (only settled upon many months after becoming popular).

[deleted]

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#128

Post by dfxm12 » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

bairrd wrote: post #81

TheFreim wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please be polite, this is not adding anything to the conversation.

Enjoy the crime wave seems similarly inflammatory and impolite, but I find HN moderation frequently falls on a certain "if you say something rude/inflammatory but phrase it a certain way it's okay" which drives me up the wall.

Yeah, as a meta comment, I've seen personal insults thrown around (including at me) that don't get flagged, but what does get flagged sometimes leaves me baffled.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#129

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:09 PM UTC

joejerryronnie wrote: post #101

yardie wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We know different cops. The only cops I've met are mildly racist and intellectually lazy. Sure they were occassionally nice to have a beer with. But then they'd start talking and leave no doubt they aren't one of the good apples. Imagine getting a JIRA ticket thinking, "fucking Java bug, again. Only way to fix this is to yank the power cord out." Honestly, delivery people have to put up with way more shit and don't h…

I’ve had a completely different experience than you. Cops who I’ve known have been pretty normal, compassionate people. They routinely tell me the most important skill in effective law enforcement is your ability to communicate.

[deleted]

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#130

Post by RankingMember » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:10 PM UTC

blacktriangle wrote: post #74

plank_time wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The paranoid mentality that any call could kill you is the exact reason why so many unarmed black people are shot. If you can’t carry out a day’s work without the unreasonable fear that you will be shot, and any action makes you “fear for your life” so that why you emptied your clip into a car, then you shouldn’t be a cop. Cops needs to have cooler heads and this should be measured and verified before allowing them t…

Except "so many unarmed black people are shot" is a lie. A larger per-capita percentages of unarmed whites are shot than blacks.

Got a source on that? I do, but it doesn't bear out your assertion:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-de...

> Sadly, the trend of fatal police shootings in the United States seems to only be increasing, with a total 371 civilians having been shot, 71 of whom were Black, in the first five months of 2021. In 2020, there were 1,021 fatal police shootings, and in 2019 there were 999 fatal shootings. Additionally, the rate of fatal police shootings among Black Americans was much higher than that for any other ethnicity, standing at 36 fatal shootings per million of the population as of May 2021.