41–50 of 137 posts
This was posted previously and drew a mountain (793) of comments [0], including mine [1]. 0: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7233730 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7235079
Does hacker news not flag/block duplicate posts urls. Especially when first one was clearly recognized?
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There's police corruption, etc. But there's also the fact that American cities are war zones. The homicide rate in San Francisco, a relatively safe city, is 8 times higher than the homicide rate in London. It's 31 times higher in Oakland. Police in the U.S. are surrounded by violence.
Police in the U.S. are in no sense surrounded by violence. The United States in 2014 is one of the safest, least dangerous societies the universe has ever known.
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They made a (EDIT: seemingly) nonsensical request and used his confusion as an excuse to abuse their discretionary powers. Sounds like a strategy they use to bag naive bystanders. Power tripping / stats-boosting, plain and simple.
What was nonsensical about their request?
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> "I then walked home." should have been the next line Unless it's against some kind of law for someone to observe police, you should know better than that. And seeing the way these animals acted, I'd say being concerned for the welfare of the downed biker is a perfectly legitimate reaction. > Being nosy is the part that didn't end well. Not illegal, and certainly not worth violent treatment and solitary confinement.…
By his own account, he was ignoring police officers while interfering with their work at the scene of an accident. You can't do that and expect to not get physically removed.
Stop making excuses for bad behavior!
The HN lens has certainly been showing the US police force in a bad light over the last year or so. What are the origins of this strange behaviour? Why is force regularly used against people that verbally query the police? Even the army is trained to use dialogue where possible. It does sound like cameras will help but surely good and regular training programs should encourage good engagement with citizens.
Good engagement with citizens? The power is the draw to the position, not the responsibility that comes with it. Take away the power from the job, and see how many superheroes exist in the world.
Sadly, I have many friends with similar stories from police departments in different places. I attribute the officer's behavior to constantly being surrounded by violence. If everyday, most people around you are violent unreasonable delinquents that want to hurt you, then you start developing personality characteristics to compensate and survive that environment. Add to this the types of personalities that are attrac…
As I get older I wonder if there are certain jobs that everyone in society should cycle though, because they can be soul-crushing to do them long term.
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Yeah, this guy comes off as really smug and obnoxious in his own words . I have no doubt the police overreacted and acted unjustly, but I also think there's more to this story than we're getting. Is there a lawsuit pending? What's the cops' account of these events?
I have to ask.. why does it matter? I find the sequence of events the author was subjected to is impossible to justify with any conceivable amount of being "smug and obnoxious". This is behavior that should be reserved for dangerous, combative criminals (and probably not even then), certainly not bystanders who are merely annoying.
(not saying the police report is 100% of the story either of course)
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He reports doing plenty that would unreasonably "justify" the response he received. The causal void that you object to (which would shed doubt on his story) simply doesn't exist.
>He reports doing plenty I'm not sure how essentially "hanging around" justifies violent treatment, solitary confinement, etc. Perhaps you could explain?
a) you comply voluntarily;
b) you get made to comply;
c) there is no option c. (a) and (b) are both reasonable options, allowing to not comply is not a reasonable option.
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When cop 1 says to cop 2 "I think he's going to be a problem" cop 2 probably says "oh yeah, he's going to be a problem" regardless of what the suspect says.
If a cop says that about you and you are able to walk away without issues. That should be the moment you shut up and go home. Or at least cross the street down a block away from them...
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And yet your reply condones the violence and abuse of authority. Why is that? Here's the basic rule: as a police officer, you must be polite, fair, kind, and law-abiding, even if the public you deal with is rude, nasty, entitled, somewhat drunk, and otherwise unpleasant. Period. If you can't do that, you're in the wrong profession. And if the profession permits people who can't do that, the profession has systemic is…
I disagree. As a police officer, you must be fair and law-abiding. Why must they be kind and polite?