121–130 of 177 posts
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Yes, but Chicago seems to be a fairly unique place. Also, most of the police shooting incidents don't come out of Chicago. What are you trying to say by pointing out that gang violence is bad in Chicago?
The post guildwriter answered to specifically called out Chicago.
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>There's no reason to be polite about this. There is - the tone of the article affects the tone of the thread. Hacker News is supposed to be about intellectually gratifying discussion, but an article whose purpose is to spark outrage results in comments full of invective and tedious boilerplate. Cathartic for people who want to rant about Americans and guns and ACAB... but we've already been there and done that and r…
> Cathartic for people who want to rant about Americans and guns and ACAB How are such straw men intellectually gratifying? How is that not tedious boilerplate? How is you reading something a hundred times even a factor compared to hundreds of murders swept under the rug? Don't wanna read about it, put an end to it.
> How is you reading something a hundred times even a factor compared to hundreds of murders swept under the rug?
You have provided a perfect example of what this discussion does not need, and what articles like the above lead to, thank you.
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Er no. It's not. I'm not saying police conduct in Chicago isn't an issue. I'm saying that the issues of inner city Chicago are much larger than just police conduct. To properly understand the issue you need to consider all the angles.
Yes, but Chicago seems to be a fairly unique place. Also, most of the police shooting incidents don't come out of Chicago. What are you trying to say by pointing out that gang violence is bad in Chicago?
The parent poster was talking about how gangs become the law and order because of the lack of trust in police. I'm saying the issue is wider and deeper than that. If you read the article, it becomes clear that one of the large driving factors for these rappers is the notoriety and fame they get from doing this is oftentimes the only way they can feel significant. It's a way for them to get money, sex, notoriety. Maybe even a record deal so they can get the hell out of the place they are in. What kind of chances and opportunities does an inner city youth really have?
This notoriety can twist back in its own ways too: "The guy having the hardest time was Blaze. He seemed to be battling depression. At one point, after a shooting on a corner, he said to me, “Man, I’m so sick of this. I feel like a prisoner in my own neighborhood. I can’t go anywhere. I can’t go to my job because I don’t know if the opps will be there to come after me.” He was wallowing in how badly he wanted to be done with the gang life. He told me he wanted to move to California, but his reality felt inescapable to him. He started using PCP at an alarming rate. It was his way of coping. He became difficult to be around. He would stutter and trip over his words. His complexion got bad. His hygiene, too."
It's one hell of a life and not one that I could begin to imagine.
Body cams on police and actual consequences for misconduct. Some of the videos of people (of all colors) being unlawfully murdered have led to absolutely zero consequence for those responsible. Those with authority granted by the public should have HIGHER accountability and more severe consequences, not be able to subvert them altogether. It's not difficult to imagine the level of misconduct that is likely occurring…
The price for this should be massive. Doing this once or twice corrupts the justice system and destroys public trust in police. This invites gangs to become the law and order. Look how that’s worked out in Chicago.
I increasingly believe there are kinds of anti-system crimes which should be punished with highest sentences. I'm thinking of crimes that have disproportionate, negative impact on stability and security of society. Like this. Or fucking with vaccinations, like CIA people did.
(Incidentally, I also believe that the guy responsible for fake bomb detectors (from the other thread on the frontpage today) should get at minimum a murder-level sentence, for willfully putting lives of lots of people in danger.)
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> The problem goes way beyond the US borders Name one more western first world country besides the US, where cops shooting someone is hardly news. And no, the problem probably isn't guns. In the US there's about 1 gun per resident, Germany 0.3, UK 0.06, and Canada 0.3. Meanwhile there were about 987 fatal shootings by cops in the US in 2016, compared to 13 in Germany, 4 in the UK, and 9 in Canada. Even adjusting thes…
>And no, the problem probably isn't guns. The biggest factors do revolve around guns though. Not just numbers, but the culture which feeds into itself and the perception that guns are not a problem, but a solution ("The only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun"). Of course, this then provokes a "Have-a-go-Harry" take on confrontation where people who are woefully ill-equipped to deal with a situ…
I was reading a reddit discussion some time ago, where most commenters concluded that it's fine to shoot a burglar entering your house at night, which feels very alien to me. Sure, it's a frightening situation, but in my mind a burglary clearly doesn't justify the, potentially deadly, use of a gun. Those are not equal actions and measures.
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The article is about people literally trying to get away with murder. The last two sentences are references to well-documented cases of police officers killing non-dangerous citizens. There's no reason to be polite about this.
>There's no reason to be polite about this. There is - the tone of the article affects the tone of the thread. Hacker News is supposed to be about intellectually gratifying discussion, but an article whose purpose is to spark outrage results in comments full of invective and tedious boilerplate. Cathartic for people who want to rant about Americans and guns and ACAB... but we've already been there and done that and r…
You're confusing "intellectually gratifying" with "apathy".
Body cams on police and actual consequences for misconduct. Some of the videos of people (of all colors) being unlawfully murdered have led to absolutely zero consequence for those responsible. Those with authority granted by the public should have HIGHER accountability and more severe consequences, not be able to subvert them altogether. It's not difficult to imagine the level of misconduct that is likely occurring…
Once the police start abiding by the laws, then I'll care what happens when they get themselves into a jam.
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The author is citing real events. When some cops are corrupt, does it matter that the rest might be decent? An individual police officer represents the entire force. They wear the colours and the badge as a representative of the whole establishment. Would you call the police if you knew there were such troubling corruption issues? It would definitely make me think twice - you just don't know which officer will turn u…
>When some cops are corrupt, does it matter that the rest might be decent? Of course, if you replaced "cops" here with "black people", you basically arrive at the attitude of the corrupt cops themselves, and those who justify their "zero tolerance" policies, including those mentioned in TFA.
> you basically arrive at the attitude of the corrupt cops themselves,
That's like saying kicking rapists in the dick causes rape, while doing nothing at all is somehow more helpful than that.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>There's no reason to be polite about this. There is - the tone of the article affects the tone of the thread. Hacker News is supposed to be about intellectually gratifying discussion, but an article whose purpose is to spark outrage results in comments full of invective and tedious boilerplate. Cathartic for people who want to rant about Americans and guns and ACAB... but we've already been there and done that and r…
> Cathartic for people who want to rant about Americans and guns and ACAB How are such straw men intellectually gratifying? How is that not tedious boilerplate? How is you reading something a hundred times even a factor compared to hundreds of murders swept under the rug? Don't wanna read about it, put an end to it.
Yes you might be able to solve police misconduct by forcing them to turn on each other and report and aggressively as possible. You probably will utterly destroy any semblance of morale and group cohesion and won't have a functioning police force at the end. Yes, we could ban guns from the population. Except that would not only require a constitutional amendment, but also solve the logistical issues of tracking down guns while simultaneously solving the problem of an armed criminal element who now has a helpless population in a massive country where response times can be 20 mins or longer. Body cams will help, but even if people trust police, how does that solve the problem where being a drug dealer is probably the best opportunity you have in the inner city? And it goes on and on.
It's a similar issue to homelessness. It's a multivariate problem that requires many different targeted approaches to deal with the entire thing. People unfortunately tend to focus on their pet issue of choice and ignore the others. Worse yet, political interests often will try to shut down each other from getting funding in order to push their own cause du jour.
Why not clean house? At this point I can't imagine the local community, particularly minorities, have any trust in the authorities. Isn't that failure, why not train a new police force with new uniforms and then phase out the old?
I think the Cosmological Principle can be applied to these situations. The CP roughly states that when we observe the Universe we are seeing a representative part. We are not living in some "special place." Applied here (and in other situations where groups of people act for good or for bad), it would mean that the bad behavior is not because the police are inherently any worse than anybody else, but rather the evolu…
Obviously there is an issue with the environment but that doesn’t really affect the current situation: namely bad behavior in the police department.
Corrupt and criminal cops need to be prosecuted. The system needs to change going forward (equipment, policies, training, community outreach, etc).