“Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book” • Hacker News Board

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#101

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:04 PM UTC

benihana wrote: post #16

wavefunction wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to take away from your message but you can just say "Native Americans" and leave the "Indian" part off. Otherwise I totally agree with your post.

This comment sums up what Hacker News has become perfectly. Front and center is the sentence correcting some slight, inconsequential anachronism that has nothing to do with the overall point of the comment and only serves to show the perceived intelligence of helpfulness of the commenter. Then there is a short sentence, more of an afterthought, addressing the point of the comment.

[deleted]

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#102

Post by wavefunction » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:06 PM UTC

seiji wrote: post #63

benihana wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment sums up what Hacker News has become perfectly. Front and center is the sentence correcting some slight, inconsequential anachronism that has nothing to do with the overall point of the comment and only serves to show the perceived intelligence of helpfulness of the commenter. Then there is a short sentence, more of an afterthought, addressing the point of the comment.

Well, have you met these people? It's common in work/life too. "You're smart and do good work, but stop being so pedantic and socially inept!" You can't break out deep thinking from the surface layer aspie absent-social-mindedness. Just smile, accept them for what they are without pitying them, and keep making the world a better place together.

Maybe I made a simple mistake of unintended rudeness in a post, how does that make it worthy of me being autistic? Fuck you douches!

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#103

Post by mikeash » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:06 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #98

mikeash wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly, yes, it is the America that America wants, as far as I can tell. I think this is where efforts to fight these problems fall down. They're almost all based on the assumption that the populace doesn't want this stuff to happen, but that the government pushes it through by abusing power, subverting democracy, etc. But from what I see, this is not the case. Most Americans want this. Whether it's gun-wielding mania…

> Sadly, yes, it is the America that America wants, as far as I can tell. Many young people coming out of school seem to have no conception of rights. To them, it's excusable for rights to be violated if they feel enough justified anger. They are unclear on the concept that rights apply to people and situations in ways they may not like.

Is this any surprise for people who grew up in a country where invading countries on false pretexts was seen as the right thing to do, where criticizing the government was seen as bad no matter what the reasons are, and where the threat of terrorism is somehow hyped up far beyond the perceived threat of nuclear annihilation in the Cold War?

I saw this coming when the WTC rubble was still smoking. The government could have potentially worked to calm down the populace, but instead they amplified the fear. We've been paying the price ever since.

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#104

Post by wavefunction » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:09 PM UTC

_yields wrote: post #26

benihana wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment sums up what Hacker News has become perfectly. Front and center is the sentence correcting some slight, inconsequential anachronism that has nothing to do with the overall point of the comment and only serves to show the perceived intelligence of helpfulness of the commenter. Then there is a short sentence, more of an afterthought, addressing the point of the comment.

thank you for saying this.

Why, you couldn't say it yourself?

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#105

Post by anonymous » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:10 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #71

PavlovsCat wrote: post #39

"Botched Paramilitary Police Raids": http://www.cato.org/raidmap

From the description of one of such "botched raids": "With an accidental weapon discharge, police fatally shot the 68-year-old retiree, who was not the target of the warrant. Police instructed Mr. Stamps to lie on the floor, and Mr. Stamps complied. One officer moved towards Mr. Stamps to check for weapons. The officer's tactical equipment made his movement awkward, and he lost his balance and fell. As he did so, his…

I concur. Even edgy teens on 4chan know about trigger discipline.

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#106

Post by sophacles » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:12 PM UTC

kdeberk wrote: post #49

maxerickson wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the crime involved is not violent and the suspect has no history of assaulting police officers (or perhaps any history of violent acts), it should basically be a criminal act for the police to initiate the use of force during the apprehension. You are making a huge leap from the presence of weapons to the use of violence against other people.

> If the crime involved is not violent and the suspect has no history of assaulting police officers (or perhaps any history of violent acts), it should basically be a criminal act for the police to initiate the use of force during the apprehension. I think I agree. > You are making a huge leap from the presence of weapons to the use of violence against other people. I think police officers has to put their lives on t…

Firefighters/EMTs also put their lives on the line - responding to medic calls in the wrong neighborhood is dangerous, combative patients (such as those with weird blood sugar levels or medication issues), mean dogs, and so on are risks. Perhaps we should grant them special protections and reasoning to start putting people and animals down at will too. Right now if an EMT killed a combative patient or a dog, all hell would break loose on them, yet they are in danger too. Yes, police are in a different situation, but not IMO different enough to warrant free reign.

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#107

Post by citizens » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:12 PM UTC

danbruc wrote: post #92

wavefunction wrote: post #7

Again and again we see questionable or outright illegal police shootings of dogs and people and nothing ever comes of it. The responsible parties are never charged with manslaughter or even fired. I want to support the police, but the thin blue line bullshit has to stop! I get that police work is often dangerous but individuals that have shown poor judgement are retained on the force. That police officer that shot th…

Are there any reliable statistics quantifying this? I found some numbers for Germany on Wikipedia [1] but not for the US. The article states that per year for the period of 2007 to 2011 the German police fired between 36 and 57 bullets at humans killing between 6 and 12 of them. Older numbers are less reliable but similar regarding the number of people killed (peak since 1970 24 in 1983) but with a larger number of b…

Some numbers from a 2011 NYPD report (only New York City):

Situations where firearms were discharged

36 - Adversarial Conflict

36 - Animal Attack

15 - Unintentional Discharge

02 - Unauthorized Use

03 - Suicide Attempt

---

124 - Total officers firing

416 - Total shots fired

003 - Total officers shot and injured by subject

001 - Total officers shot and killed by subject

019 - Total subjects shot and injured by officer

009 - Total subjects shot and killed by officer

http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/downloads/pdf/analysis_and_plan...

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#108

Post by nhangen » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:12 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #87

Ovid wrote: post #23

Is this really the America that America wants? The article mentions one case where a judge refused to issue a search warrant for a narcotics investigation and instead the police brought representatives from the Virginia Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control and raided the place with a swat team to conduct an alcohol inspection. What did they find? Two sample bottles of beer that weren't labeled as samples and a bo…

Sadly, yes, it is the America that America wants, as far as I can tell. I think this is where efforts to fight these problems fall down. They're almost all based on the assumption that the populace doesn't want this stuff to happen, but that the government pushes it through by abusing power, subverting democracy, etc. But from what I see, this is not the case. Most Americans want this. Whether it's gun-wielding mania…

It's not that America wants this, it's that the politicians we elect do not keep their promises. Those that try are forced out, shaken down, relegated to stay at the bottom of the ladder. In our current political climate, a politician must barter ethics and morality for the power to do what they promised. And by then, it's too late, they're already gone.

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#109

Post by fnordfnordfnord » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:13 PM UTC

kdeberk wrote: post #11

To me it seems that there are a lot of issues at play that led to the death of this man, but temporarily ignoring the fact that it seems hypocritical for a state to both punish gamblers while promoting a state lottery, it appears necessary that SWAT teams are required to arrest people within their own homes given the fact that people are free to own weapons and use those for protection. I'm not saying that firearms n…

>it appears necessary that SWAT teams are required to arrest people within their own homes given the fact that people are free to own weapons and use those for protection.

No. The guy was an optometrist with a local business, your suggestion that he was some undercover cop-murderer waiting for the slightest provocation is absurd and insulting. He had every incentive to maintain civility in his neighborhood/town. There is very little reason to believe that he would have reacted violently to any of the following alternative tactics:

- A phone call from an investigator requesting a meeting.

- A knock on the door from a pair of polite/professional investigators.

- Police could have waited for him to leave in a car and had patrolmen stop him on the street.

>I'm just arguing that when people need to be arrested (lawfully or otherwise)

How can you defend SWAT as a valid way to make an unlawful arrest? Have I misunderstood you?

SWAT is only appropriate for hostage and other situations where danger is imminent. In other cases of people "needing arrest", the use of SWAT is abusive.

Re: “Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book”

#110

Post by smky80 » Sun, Jul 07, 2013, 5:13 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #87

Ovid wrote: post #23

Is this really the America that America wants? The article mentions one case where a judge refused to issue a search warrant for a narcotics investigation and instead the police brought representatives from the Virginia Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control and raided the place with a swat team to conduct an alcohol inspection. What did they find? Two sample bottles of beer that weren't labeled as samples and a bo…

Sadly, yes, it is the America that America wants, as far as I can tell. I think this is where efforts to fight these problems fall down. They're almost all based on the assumption that the populace doesn't want this stuff to happen, but that the government pushes it through by abusing power, subverting democracy, etc. But from what I see, this is not the case. Most Americans want this. Whether it's gun-wielding mania…

They do not "like" it. It's just that, to be very blunt, most people are basically peasants at heart. They're going to go along with whatever the king says. Twenty years ago, on that side of the line on a map, the people believed in capitalism, while on the other side the people believed in communism. On this side of the line people believed in this god, on that side, they believe in that god.

It has nothing to do with some kind economists' "rational utilization maximization" function and everything to do with basically a "k-nearest neighbours" algorithm on their social graph for assigning beliefs.

And that is precisely why control of the media is so important.