This discussion of strategies for reducing the use of force by police is more constructive and sensible than most on this issue:
http://harvardlawreview.org/2015/04/law-enforcements-warrior...
In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
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Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#12This is a really well written article. This also echo's alot of the sentiment that many people have. I remember reading recently about the differences in police training from Germany vs the US. One of the things that stuck out at me was the huge amount of hours they spend training to "not" shoot, and learning how to de-escalate situations. It's no wonder we have so many issues here in the US, it makes me sad.
Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#13I sometimes find ex-military folks analogies between their wartime service and situations in civilian life rather forced, but this analysis is exactly right. I used to ask myself why the Israeli Defence Forces would risk innocent palestinian civilian lives to kill the terrorists who hide among them by using drones or airstrikes instead of the kind of techniques they would no doubt use if the terrorists were surrounde…
> The simple answer is that the life of an Israeli civilian is considered (by the IDF) to be worth more than that of a palestinian civilian.
It's important here to draw a philosophical distinction between the claim that the lives of some groups are more important than the lives of others, and the claim that a particular person or organization has a greater duty to some groups than others. It's perfectly consistent to think that each parent has a greater duty to protect their own children (possibly at the expense of other lives), and that each military has a greater duty to protect its own civilians, without actually thinking that anyone is more intrinsically valuable than anyone else.
Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#14I feel like if the author had been black he wouldn't be around now to write that article.
Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#15I'm confused as to why a report of a squatter requires any kind of raid to begin with...
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Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#16I'm confused as to why a report of a squatter requires any kind of raid to begin with...
I'm going to go full-on cynical here: A) because they can, and B) because it counts towards SWAT gear maintenance To expand on point B, I would not be the least bit surprised if police departments' beancounters actually kept tabs on the average cost of SWAT gear maintenance costs. Higher number of conducted raids means a lower bolded number in metrics spreadsheet. ... which actually brings up another item. Do the per…
I don't think the article said it was a SWAT team conducting the raid.
I mean, I could see some off-hand justification by saying that they get to practice for real raids in an unfamiliar situation... but raids are prone to inciting over-reactions and media attention, which clearly doesn't provide long term value.
Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#17I'm confused as to why a report of a squatter requires any kind of raid to begin with...
I'm going to go full-on cynical here: A) because they can, and B) because it counts towards SWAT gear maintenance To expand on point B, I would not be the least bit surprised if police departments' beancounters actually kept tabs on the average cost of SWAT gear maintenance costs. Higher number of conducted raids means a lower bolded number in metrics spreadsheet. ... which actually brings up another item. Do the per…
I believe SWAT duty does get extra pay.
Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#18Now that whites are far more directly endangered by police, one sees articles like this pop up all the time.
"In a very real sense, the 'middle class' is not an economic category, it's a social one. To be middle class is to feel that the fundamental institutional structures of society are, or should be, on your side. If you see a policeman and you feel more safe, rather than less, then you can be pretty sure you're middle class. Yet for the first time since polling began, most Americans in 2012 indicated they do not, in fact, consider themselves middle class." http://gawker.com/ferguson-and-the-criminalization-of-americ...
The author still argues in favor of policing. (Just like he doesn't question whether he had any right to invade another country.) Advocating that police return to his side, against the common domestic enemy.
Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#19I'm both disappointed and not all that surprised. I grew up here, and this is the product of something that has been brewing for twenty years.
The citizens here are to blame. The police are just giving the public what it wants. It's a county full of McMansions and extreme paranoia. Lots of upper middle class people terrified that their fragile existence might be upset by [Mexican immigration, terrorism, ].[1] I'm not sure if 9/11 was a turning point per se, but planes crashing into the Pentagon in neighboring Arlington didn't help.
It wasn't always like this. When I was growing up you'd almost never see a Fairfax County cop. Vienna was always a police state, but the small-bit speed-trap kind. Today, there are cops crawling around Tysons (where the biggest danger is rowdy teenagers).
[1] It's notable that this story takes place just across the Potomac from where those parents got in trouble with the police for letting their kids walk home less than a mile from school.
Re: In Iraq, I raided insurgents. In Virginia, the police raided me
#20I'm both disappointed and not all that surprised. I grew up here, and this is the product of something that has been brewing for twenty years. The citizens here are to blame. The police are just giving the public what it wants. It's a county full of McMansions and extreme paranoia. Lots of upper middle class people terrified that their fragile existence might be upset by [Mexican immigration, terrorism, ].[1] I'm not…
"Lots of upper middle class people terrified that their fragile existence might be upset by [Mexican immigration, terrorism, ]"
It probably doesn't help that your average Northern Virginia McMansion is owned by a .gov / defense / national security contractor who under a variety of scenarios might see himself on one indictment / target list or another.