Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed • Hacker News Board

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#91

Post by jjulius » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:10 PM UTC

tvaughan wrote: post #79

jjulius wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>They maintained control with minimal personal risk to themselves. From a "policing realism" perspective that's exactly what police do. Preventing or ending any sort of crime or violence is optional at that point, and they opted not to. Absolutely untrue, and has been for decades. Their hesitation to react and go in is the complete opposite of what they were trained to do, which is go in and eliminate the threat imme…

> Absolutely untrue The police are under no legal obligation to protect and serve, https://mises.org/power-market/police-have-no-duty-protect-y...

You - and others - keep missing the part where I said "trained" rather than "legally required".

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#92

Post by wfhordie » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:10 PM UTC

drugstorecowboy wrote: post #37

woodruffw wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not, to my knowledge, an argument that anybody who is serious about gun control uses.

Isn't it implied? If you remove my ability to protect myself am I not forced to rely on the police to protect me? Unless they are arguing that gun control will solve all future violent crime I don't see how you could say this with a straight face. If they are "serious" about gun control or not would certainly be up for debate, but I have heard this argument many many times.

> If you remove my ability to protect myself am I not forced to rely on the police to protect me?

Gun control does not remove your ability to protect yourself. This is a false premise. Even in a world where the US government institutes mandatory buy backs of anything that looks like a gun, you are not completely devoid of options to protect yourself.

Statistically, aside from some very specific places in the US like the bad parts of LA/Chicago/New York, you are far more likely to die of suicide by firearm than you are of homicide by firearm.

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#93

Post by daenz » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:11 PM UTC

Apocryphon wrote: post #71

drugstorecowboy wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it implied? If you remove my ability to protect myself am I not forced to rely on the police to protect me? Unless they are arguing that gun control will solve all future violent crime I don't see how you could say this with a straight face. If they are "serious" about gun control or not would certainly be up for debate, but I have heard this argument many many times.

Why aren’t tasers and other nonlethal weapons ever suggested as an alternative to guns for personal defense?

>Why aren't [non-lethal weapons] ever suggested

They are suggested. Many people carry mace/pepper spray. Tasers are finicky and require a fortunate prong placement in the attacker, and the attacker to not be wearing thick clothing, or it just doesn't work. Stun guns require you to be upclose and personal with the attacker. If you're a smaller/weaker person, this is extremely risky.

Most non-lethal weapons are for you to get away from an uncommitted attacker as quickly as possible, not to stop a serious threat in its tracks. If someone has a weapon and intent on killing you, a firearm is your best bet in stopping them.

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#94

Post by manquer » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

kube-system wrote: post #66

jjulius wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't want to find yourself in harm's way, don't become a police officer. Legally required or not, they knew the risks when they signed up, they knew what they were trained to do, and then they... didn't.

This is just unreasonable. Humans have a natural desire to preserve their own lives. First responders aren't any different. The idea that first responders are superheros is a fallacious trope. The vast majority of police never use their gun over their entire career.

If it were adults your theory may hold, but not for children.

Evolutionarily we have even higher desire to protect our young(so does most of animal kingdom).

The instinct to protect young children is stronger than desire to protect self - the trait is easily strongly selected under evolutionary pressure.

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#95

Post by corrral » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

EricE wrote: post #10

It sort of blows up the whole pro gun control argument that citizens shouldn't be expected to have to protect themselves but instead rely on law enforcement :p

Other take: north of a dozen "good guys with guns" didn't do jack-shit.

Other other take: military bases have very strict gun control, far in excess of the civilian world, despite hopefully being far more reliable, stable, and law-abiding than the general population. It makes them more vulnerable in certain rare cases, but they judge it to make them far safer in general, so the rules stick.

Other other other take: pro-gun people and pro-gun organizations sure are eager to keep gun-toting randos way the hell away from themselves, most of the time. Super weird behavior if they think more guns make them safer. See also: most courthouses even in red states, et c.

When it actually matters, it's pretty clear what is regarded by basically everyone as making a place safer: fewer guns. It's only when people are talking a big game that they absolutely aren't willing to back up, that they claim to believe the opposite is true.

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#96

Post by falcolas » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

kube-system wrote: post #25

johndevor wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Accountability is the issue. If they can tax you by force, they're not going to put themselves in harms way. They already got paid. (Generalization of course, but true in many life-and-death situations.)

Most people won't willingly die at work for any amount of money or accountability, and I don't blame them. These kinds of situations are outrageous because people want to believe in superheros, but they don't exist.

When a group sees themselves superheroes, are treated like superheroes, put superhero slogans on their vehicles, are given weapons and armor and hazard pay based on their imminent superhero behavior, only to run and cower at the first sign of danger...

Perhaps it's not the rest of us who are the problem.

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#97

Post by maybelsyrup » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:14 PM UTC

jmyeet wrote: post #55

Are we afraid won't actually do their job when it actually involves putting themselves in danger? I think the cat is out of the bag on that one. Quite famously, the police are much better at shooting children [1] than they are at shooting to protect children. The Uvalde PD consumes 40% of the town budget ($4m of $10m exclusive of a $500k grant they got from the state of Texas months earlier). 19 police officers were…

> But nothing here will change.

It's hard but it's important to keep faith, and to keep working to change people's minds about police. Even your comment can make a difference: a place like HN is full of intelligent people who generally come here fairly open minded. Maybe your comment - the top one right now - can open someone's eyes to what cops really are. Stay in the fight!

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#98

Post by kube-system » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:14 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #84

kube-system wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just unreasonable. Humans have a natural desire to preserve their own lives. First responders aren't any different. The idea that first responders are superheros is a fallacious trope. The vast majority of police never use their gun over their entire career.

Putting themselves in harms way is the deal. It’s why they get to retire over a decade earlier than the rest of us with a nice pension. It’s why they get qualified immunity for a whole bunch of actions. They aren’t holding up their side of the deal here.

Yes, it's expected that first responders may do things that are generally dangerous but they're not on kamikaze missions, it's completely normal for them to back out when they believe their own life is in danger.

This is not any different for any first responder. Firefighters will run right back out of your house if they think it's required to save their own lives.

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#99

Post by ALittleLight » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:14 PM UTC

threatofrain wrote: post #82

ALittleLight wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saying that you shouldn't interfere with an ongoing crime implicitly assumes the police are doing something about the crime and not just watching children be murdered. Best case is parents stand back while the police engage - but if the police aren't doing that then all bets are off.

The police were doing something. They were threatening the parents with tasers and arrests if they interfered. Does "all bets are off" mean that parents should have enough tactical force to subdue the police? In evaluating potential scenarios, is a shootout with the police on the table of possibilities? The police even threaten parents with obstruction of justice and violating probation for merely talking to the medi…

If I happened to be on the jury for a case assessing the murder of an Uvalde police officer by an Uvalde school parent I would not vote "Guilty" under any circumstance.

Realistically, I think what this situation means is that the police, at least in Uvalde, need to be disbanded and reformed and serious steps need to be taken to ensure their failure is not repeated. I think such serious steps include charging the cowardly officers with murder. Future Uvalde officers should know it is more dangerous to refuse to face the school shooter - and one path for that is if they know they will get the death penalty for being complicit in the mass murder of children if they just cower outside while the massacre happens.

Re: Texas police want uvalde bodycam footage suppressed

#100

Post by pigtailgirl » Mon, Jun 13, 2022, 7:15 PM UTC

doodlebugging wrote: post #86

I thought body cam footage was public data, discoverable and releasable under the law. There is no one left to prosecute here since they killed the shooter so there is no reason to delay disclosure. That thin blue line looks more and more like a line for cowards to hide behind while they seek to escape accountability for actions they know would have them arrested if they had no badge. Simply holding their noses while…

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