George Floyd Protest – police brutality videos on Twitter

I don't see much discussion of root causes here. But a lot of "police ought to be this or that".

Perhaps the best solution is to have more democracy or community input into policing. It seems like it's happening now in the US (it would be quite different in other countries, where the police is national and considered civil servants; in France you can't elect sheriffs, and police is beyond the responsibility of mayors).

In the end, some communities will vote for a police that's tough, and other communities will vote for a police that's less tough. There will still be issues when criminals used to non-tough cops cross into an area with tough cops, but that's life.

You're making this argument in a thread where police have been found brutally beating people who are already restrained and/or not resisting arrest. People without firearms. Or people that are protesting peacefully. Or a 75 year old man who was entirely harmless.

Come on.

Huh? I didn't say racism isn't real, and I also didn't say cops aren't tear gassing reporters in the face.

GP questioned how a profession can exist when it makes so many deadly mistakes. I pointed out that there is another profession, medicine, which also makes lots of deadly mistakes. Some are accidental oversights, but you can also do some searches and find some really bad medical errors. [1] but you can find lots more.

Again, what the media draws attention to, and what is going on in society on a daily basis, are not the same thing. Racism and police misconduct existed before 2020, but it just in the last few weeks really popped onto the media's attention.

And again, because of the sheer size of the United States, you have to look at statistics in addition to anecdotes when you think about policy.

[1] https://www.mdlinx.com/article/jaw-dropping-medical-mix-ups/...

We might not be able to agree about everything, but can we at least agree that it's in everyone's best interest to have an increasing amount of the world have a generally secure, stable, unconditional personal access to food, housing, education, healthcare, and a labor market and can lives in a society with reasonable laws that they can practically obey?

Even if we don't contribute to that personally, can we at least agree to try to avoid doing things to other countries that get in the way of doing that, in really obvious ways like not randomly bombing them and pretending? Can we just admit to ourselves that a lot of global military expenditure is just a certain kind of make work? As Americans, can we then really not think of a slightly more efficient way to allocate the $7.3T that the American government raises every year from tax revenue, much of which we just light on fire policing things parts of people's lives unnecessarily?

Come on. I'm sure we can. This is like taking your hand off the literal stove. I know how horrible this all looks, and it is horrible, but it's also really easy to propose a solution to it. Divest and reinvest. It could be so many flavors of divest and reinvest, and still be a good enough improvement over how things are right now that it would be the most impressive piece of legislation for probably a 100 year span of time if not 200 years. There has to be an opportunistic, ambitious K-street lobbyist or two reading this, right? Wanna take credit for bringing America out of the dark ages? Come on...you know you want to. Now's your chance.

The bar is at the floor. You could write the dirtiest honker of a bill you've ever seen that it could make the ACA look clean. As long as it achieves the right divestments (global windmill fighting) and reinvestments (domestic production infrastructure), you're on the right track. You don't even have to get it completely right the first time. Perfect is the enemy of done here. Just something major and timely, which lets you evangelize divest and reinvest. You can even rebrand it as "digital transformation" if you really want. I would promise to never judge it as management consultant grifting again.

Because if not...I don't know how long this situation will hold. Those riots are just a taste of unease to come, and eventually, the federal branches of the government will understand how much more powerless they are with dislocation of their local constituencies. Someone is going to figure out how to relocate those constituencies.

Pizza delivery driving is a dangerous profession because pizza delivery drivers are frequently racing to improve their tips and delivery numbers and drive dangerously, meaning they frequently cause their own deaths[0]:

> Of course, when a pizza delivery driver is injured in a car accident, it is not usually an isolated event; other drivers and passengers are also involved. All too often, the accident is caused by the delivery worker’s negligence. They are racing for tips, trying to uphold the company’s reputation for service, aiming for positive feedback at work, or they are simply checked out and bored because they spend so much time in the car.

Yes, cops frequently kill themselves in traffic accidents as well, but the difference is that they are usually not rushing to a place to put a few dollars in their pocket - but rushing to a place to protect or help someone who called upon them.

[0]https://southfloridainjurylawfirm.com/pizza-companies-take-r...