81–90 of 301 posts
I feel like if the author had been black he wouldn't be around now to write that article.
This 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.
What does it mean for us Europeans, who still have, for the moment, more lenient police? Should we expect that America uprises against their own police? Draw a Fergusson every 3 months? Becomes either less economically stable or more economically agressive? Should we expect that US' political influence requires us to step up our police, the same way France escalated an NSA-style law six months ago? It worries me that…
I have never been to the US, and although a trip to California would be an obvious to-do in my profession, the main reason I don't consider it is the death penalty.
It sounds so unattractive to visit countries stuck with such laws. Despite all the nice things they have to offer.
It might be easier to understand from a European perspective. [1]
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Europe
I'm confused as to why a report of a squatter requires any kind of raid to begin with...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_c...
In Switzerland every male has a military type machine gun and two magazines at home and in my country, Austria, there are regions that rival Texas in terms of gun ownership.
Today I tend to believe that this might be a problem of city planning (and preventing ghettos). The US has cities that are much larger than the largest cities in the countries cited by me. But I might be wrong here.
Anyways, I do not doubt that police in Austria and Germany would act no differently than in the US if they had reason to expect that they could be shot every time they stopped a car. Thankfully this is not the case.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Within about 3-5 feet, a knife is just as dangerous as a firearm.
Lets try a metal experiment, you have your knife and 3 enemies attack you at the same time. How many can you neutralize from 5 feet with your knife ? Suppose you have special training and you can throw your knife and kill one of them, you still have 2 ... Try the same mental experiment when you have a firearm in your hand ... You can inflict much more damage with a firearm even without special training (not everybody…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Within about 3-5 feet, a knife is just as dangerous as a firearm.
Lets try a metal experiment, you have your knife and 3 enemies attack you at the same time. How many can you neutralize from 5 feet with your knife ? Suppose you have special training and you can throw your knife and kill one of them, you still have 2 ... Try the same mental experiment when you have a firearm in your hand ... You can inflict much more damage with a firearm even without special training (not everybody…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Lets try a metal experiment, you have your knife and 3 enemies attack you at the same time. How many can you neutralize from 5 feet with your knife ? Suppose you have special training and you can throw your knife and kill one of them, you still have 2 ... Try the same mental experiment when you have a firearm in your hand ... You can inflict much more damage with a firearm even without special training (not everybody…
The context of the thread was police officers being trained to be wary of knives. Imagine two comparable traffic stops where in one case the "perp" has a concealed knife, and the other has a concealed gun. A single officer in each case faces a very comparable risk at close range. I'd argue that at three feet, the officer is much more likely to be killed by a concealed knife than a concealed gun, assuming that is the…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Within about 3-5 feet, a knife is just as dangerous as a firearm.
Lets try a metal experiment, you have your knife and 3 enemies attack you at the same time. How many can you neutralize from 5 feet with your knife ? Suppose you have special training and you can throw your knife and kill one of them, you still have 2 ... Try the same mental experiment when you have a firearm in your hand ... You can inflict much more damage with a firearm even without special training (not everybody…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think the amount of bullets used by the police in different places can be meaningfully compared without knowing the number of bullets fired at the police. Edit: a sister comment cites numbers according to which almost 8 times as many police officers are killed in the US than in Germany per capita. Of course the real question is how many are attacked ; if the police is better at gunfights than the criminals it…
Don't overlook the very likely strong coupling between the bullets fired 'at' and 'by' police and how it likely goes both ways. People want to shoot at police because police shoot at people so often is probably just as true as the converse. This is likely both true at the macro and micro level. That is, police behavior escalates individual situations into shootings which otherwise, with better training, could have en…
But neither does ignoring the problem. I do wish we saw more responsible journalism on the topic, but apparently that doesn't generate the clicks...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Switzerland almost every adult male has a fully automatic military riffle at home. Yet Police will not barge in shooting, de-escalation is key.
In Switzerland almost every adult male also doesn't have any ammunition for his rifle at home. So realistically the worst police officers can expect is to be being hit over the head with that rifle.