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The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

economist.com

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Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#101

Post by Crito »

res0nat0r wrote: post #45
poulsbohemian wrote: post #38

I've been reading the Economist for 20+ years now and it never ceases to amaze me that while there is some excellent journalism, they really don't get the United States. Statements like "If America did not have 300m guns in circulation, much of this would change." show their bias, rather than having anything to do with the way the US turns everything - drugs, immigration, poverty - into a policing issue infused with…

The actual title of this article is "America's Police on Trial" so I don't think this editorial is trying to apply itself to every area of US law. They qualify the above statement in the prior paragraph: "One reason why so many American police shoot first is that so many American civilians are armed."

Even with that qualification that is still crap logic. There are lots of guns in America, but the number of Americans who own guns are at all-time lows. The "number of guns in America" figure is deceptive because of all of the people who own dozens to hundreds of guns.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/06/04/a-minority-o...

Arresting somebody who owns one or two guns is really not inherently safer than arresting somebody who owns a few crates of guns, so the number of guns in the country is irrelevant. The number of gun owners is relevant.

The apparent upward trend in police militarization and the number of Americans that own guns simply do not correlate. The Economist's unfamiliarity with American culture (particularly American gun culture) explains how they could make this mistake.

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#102

Post by elwaz »

Crito wrote: post #94
elwaz wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"London has far more gun crime than much of the US does" Can we get a figure to back that up please? The MET places gun crime figures in greater London at 1570 ( http://www.met.police.uk/crimefigures/ ) with a population of approx 8 million. Which American populations would you compare this to and what are their figures? I've spent a significant amount of time in London and have never once run into any firearms incid…

There is no shortage of small communities across America that have not had a gun crime in decades. Zero stays zero, even when you make it per-capita. Whether or not this is a fair comparison is another matter.

Fair call. To clear that up I would count urbanised centres of a similar population size and density would be a reasonable basis of comparison. I imagine England would have a large number of small communities with zero gun crime as well.

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#103

Post by jonah »

Anechoic wrote: post #23
mc808 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm guessing they mean a shooting may not show up in the statistics as "shot dead" if someone dies from complications 6 months later, even if the shooting was responsible for the death.

No, the police do not report any shooting statistics. The numbers we have are based on press reports, but police are not required to report to any central authority (DOJ or FBI) about how or when their officers shoot someone.

There is _some_ reporting, but it's very incomplete.

Google link to WSJ article: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=newss...

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#104

Post by tim333 »

thrownaway2424 wrote: post #80
ericd wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you use an explicit throwaway account to post crappy comments? You clearly know it's a crappy comment. Why post it?

This is my only account! Anyway I'm not even trying to make crappy comments. I'm trying to point out the absurdity of the parent's self-entitled windshield perspective. His entire complaint can be condensed to "I don't like the police because after I repeatedly broke the law and ignored the process of justice, they had the temerity to tow my car." That's ridiculous. People need to take responsibility for their own ac…

Many countries enforce these things more reasonably including the UK where I live where you are unlikely to get your car towed after being late doing up your seat belt and we have about half the road deaths per mile. I'm not convinced it's infantile to complain about it.

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#105

Post by Sir_Substance »

I would like to remind everyone that the US gun ownership rate is not the cause of US gun crime.

A key assertion of this article is that guncrime is high because guns are common, and thus police have a somewhat justified reason to shoot first to defend themselves.

I would like to remind everyone that ownership of a military assault rifle is mandatory for 2/3rds of all men between 20 and 34 in Switzerland, and the rifle must be kept at home, by law. Once their service is complete, they may elect to keep their weapon.

This results in one of the highest gun ownership rates in the world. Despite this, gun crime in Switzerland is almost the lowest in the world.

US gun crime and police aggression is the result of unhealthy gun culture and an unhealthy attitude towards mental health, not ownership rates.

One of the unhealthy aspects is that the population fears the police will shoot them, so they prepare to defend against the police. The police respond by preparing to preemptively defend themselves, and the cycle escalates until someone thinks it is reasonable to give US police forces mine-proof trucks.

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#106

Post by thrownaway2424 »

tim333 wrote: post #104
thrownaway2424 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is my only account! Anyway I'm not even trying to make crappy comments. I'm trying to point out the absurdity of the parent's self-entitled windshield perspective. His entire complaint can be condensed to "I don't like the police because after I repeatedly broke the law and ignored the process of justice, they had the temerity to tow my car." That's ridiculous. People need to take responsibility for their own ac…

Many countries enforce these things more reasonably including the UK where I live where you are unlikely to get your car towed after being late doing up your seat belt and we have about half the road deaths per mile. I'm not convinced it's infantile to complain about it.

They would let you drive home in the UK without a valid license? I am disbelieving.

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#107

Post by jqm »

I see part of the problem being an extreme lack of civility in our society.

At one point I suppose the police felt they were members of the community. So they treated people with some measure of respect and dignity while carrying out their duties. They would see these same people at church, at the store, at baseball games, at funerals etc. So it was different.

Now, the police are often unreasonably rude and hostile immediately and without provocation. For example, the case of M. Brown... sure, it's understood Brown probably did attack the officer and was shot. But, the officer pulls up squealing tires and shouts for Brown to get the F* out of the street. So he gets Brown angry and is physically attacked. Then he _has_ to shoot the kid. Certainly Brown shouldn't have been walking in the middle of the road. But what if the officer had pulled up and said "Fellows, how are you doing today? Can I get you to get off the street? I wouldn't want to see you get run over." Then, if they didn't comply, ramp it up a little bit at a time as needed. Chances are there never would have been a shooting. But as it is, the officers hostile speech and generally dickish attitude led to a situation in which deadly force eventually was used. That officer is morally in the wrong, he did help create this situation, he should be fired, he should be punished.

We should demand our officers act with politeness and basic respect even as they enforce the law. If they can't do the job without behaving like psychotic bullies, we should find some people who can.

On the other hand, looking at the people they deal with day in and day out, it's easy to understand how they could get this attitude. Many citizens officers deal with have no basic respect nor manners themselves. Still... officers should be held the a higher standard (and appropriately compensated if it comes to that). They are still nominally public servants and should be acting in the best interests of the community. A community which includes the people they may be arresting btw.

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#108

Post by [deleted] »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #38

I've been reading the Economist for 20+ years now and it never ceases to amaze me that while there is some excellent journalism, they really don't get the United States. Statements like "If America did not have 300m guns in circulation, much of this would change." show their bias, rather than having anything to do with the way the US turns everything - drugs, immigration, poverty - into a policing issue infused with…

[deleted]

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#109

Post by A_COMPUTER »

jqm wrote: post #107

I see part of the problem being an extreme lack of civility in our society. At one point I suppose the police felt they were members of the community. So they treated people with some measure of respect and dignity while carrying out their duties. They would see these same people at church, at the store, at baseball games, at funerals etc. So it was different. Now, the police are often unreasonably rude and hostile i…

This is a red herring. I lived around the KS City area for a year and people walking in the middle of the street intentionally obstructing traffic was a thing that happened on a regular basis. They walk in the street while you're driving and glare at you, basically trying to prove they can make you do their will by having to drive around them just walking there. Civility is already gone at that point, it is willful, aggressive disruption. Maybe the cop was dickish, but for the same reason you can't blame Brown's behavior for his homicide, you can't blame Wilson for escalation that would make brown figure he could win a confrontation against a law officer. If Wilson shouldn't have acted like an asshole because it escalated the situation, the it more applies to Brown that he shouldn't have been walking in the street.

Re: The United States needs to overhaul its law-enforcement system

#110

Post by A_COMPUTER »

brandonmenc wrote: post #82
TillE wrote: post #11

One problem among many is that US police are both allowed and trained to use deadly force very quickly, when under any kind of threat. German police will often (successfully!) shoot to disable, not to kill, even when confronted by someone armed with a knife. It's a common American meme that when police fire a gun, the only rational decision is to shoot to kill, but it's just not true.

> shoot to disable Proponents of this usually have no experience firing a weapon, let alone while in distress. It's nearly impossible to disable-but-not-kill a person by shooting them. > even when confronted by someone armed with a knife Again, usually someone who is not aware of how deadly a knife really is.

It is frequently claimed that in some European countries, it is standard practice to "shoot-to-disable" but I have been told by trainers in the USA that doing that makes you likely to miss and/or risk danger of hitting another person. if that is true, then it would seem to be a bad policy, but it's claimed it works better. Who is right? I wish some journalist would write an article on this.
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