‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science • Hacker News Board

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#21

Post by AnthonyMouse » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:35 PM UTC

crooked-v wrote: post #4

ponker wrote: post #2

I hope that the people who want to stop police from using this as a defense are also willing to stop murderers from using it when they are begging to not get life without parole.

What are you even talking about?

Presumably a reference to the "temporary insanity" defenses used by criminal defendants to try to evade responsibility (without much success in general).

The asymmetry obviously being that arguing you shouldn't be responsible for what happens when the pharmacy runs out of your anti-psychotic medication is very different then arguing that you shouldn't be responsible for beating down some distressed mentally ill civilian when the pharmacy runs out of their anti-psychotic medication.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#22

Post by Simulacra » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:36 PM UTC

I wouldn't call it junk science. I am not a scientist but I do know of times I've gotten so emotional (and really, pick an emotion here) that I've lost myself. IMO there is a breakpoint for most people when we either get too depressed, or too manic, to fully appreciate and control our behavior. With the fight or flight response kicking in, I think we can find ample evidence of people under extreme stress or duress just...losing themselves and going on autopilot.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#23

Post by ve55 » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:36 PM UTC

triceratops wrote: post #15

ve55 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you've misunderstood, excited delirium is claimed to be present in the individual the cop is arresting, not in the police themselves. The reason they attempt to justify greater force is in order to protect themselves from someone in such a state. I'm not agreeing with this, just stating what they would say.

Oops. Completely misread the article. I'll leave my comment up with a note, and wear my shame.

It happens, appreciate the friendly response

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#24

Post by ve55 » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:38 PM UTC

jirdperson wrote: post #20

ve55 wrote: post #5

Excited delirium is a very well-known and documented phenomenon, primarily in individuals that are on excessive doses of stimulants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excited_delirium#Cause However, nothing about its existence implies anything about police brutality. For some reason the article thinks it needs to deny the existence of something that obviously exists in order to argue against police brutality. This is a s…

> However, nothing about its existence implies anything about police brutality. As I read it, the article didn't seem to be implying that the existence of "excited delirium" itself implies something about police brutality. I took their argument to be that police departments' misapplication and/or overuse of the concept had led to increased instances police brutality. Not knowing anything else about this issue, it doe…

Even so, people give a lot of credence to the title, which is obviously very clickbaity.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#25

Post by Simulacra » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:39 PM UTC

triceratops wrote: post #7

ve55 wrote: post #5

Excited delirium is a very well-known and documented phenomenon, primarily in individuals that are on excessive doses of stimulants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excited_delirium#Cause However, nothing about its existence implies anything about police brutality. For some reason the article thinks it needs to deny the existence of something that obviously exists in order to argue against police brutality. This is a s…

From the Wikipedia article you linked: "The condition is not recognized by the American Psychiatric Association, American Medical Association or the World Health Organization." It's under the section titled "Controversy_related_to_policing_techniques".[1] Just because something is well-known and documented doesn't mean it's recognized as a medical or psychological condition. Sometimes it can be that medicine hasn't c…

It is curious that the section you identified was added June 17th, 2020.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#26

Post by ve55 » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:40 PM UTC

cat199 wrote: post #17

ve55 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it is controversial for being used as a justification for police brutality and having been involved in a lot of bad incidents. But the existence of it is not controversial, as it is basically a subset of affects of substances such as methamphetamine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methamphetamine#Adverse_effect... . Does it need its own specific name and label? perhaps not, and that is part of why some organizati…

there is already amphetamine psychosis, etc. i think the issue is inventing some quasi-illness which might really be one or several other things, but conveniently describes the exact set of symptoms that can be used to justify use of force (so basically it's a way to dress up 'he was acting crazy' and sound legitimate by calling it an 'illness' when you over react)

Yes, that would have made for a much better article+title I think. They would also make a better case by mentioning cases where the substances involved do not have such effects (for example, weed) rather than methamphetamine. But with such a poor clickbait title it's too much to expect.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#27

Post by AnthonyMouse » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:41 PM UTC

Might save everyone some time with a generic template:

________, used by police to justify ________, is junk science.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#28

Post by mikkergp » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:44 PM UTC

Simulacra wrote: post #22

I wouldn't call it junk science. I am not a scientist but I do know of times I've gotten so emotional (and really, pick an emotion here) that I've lost myself. IMO there is a breakpoint for most people when we either get too depressed, or too manic, to fully appreciate and control our behavior. With the fight or flight response kicking in, I think we can find ample evidence of people under extreme stress or duress ju…

The philosophy of this is interesting. As we start to understand more about genetics and psychology, we'll probably be able to more closely pinpoint why people do what they do. But that doesn't mean people shouldn't be held accountable. (Affluenza)[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affluenza] may be a real "condition"? that impacts people, but even if we eventually discover the genetic and neurological reasons behind it, it still shouldn't excuse behavior.

I've had similar experiences where I "lose control" because I'm angry, or excited, or "emotional", but I think it's my responsibility to work to make that better. I don't know what this means in terms of consequences, but I know it shouldn't mean letting cops off the hook for brutality.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#29

Post by 1as » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:46 PM UTC

rsynnott wrote: post #16

ve55 wrote: post #5

Excited delirium is a very well-known and documented phenomenon, primarily in individuals that are on excessive doses of stimulants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excited_delirium#Cause However, nothing about its existence implies anything about police brutality. For some reason the article thinks it needs to deny the existence of something that obviously exists in order to argue against police brutality. This is a s…

This is a very oddly written article. > Excited delirium is not recognized by some professional medical associations If you go to the reference for that, it mentions that it's not recognised by _any_ professional medical association.

It is recognized by https://www.acep.org/. Hopefully not for long.

Re: ‘Excited delirium’, used by police to justify brutality, is junk science

#30

Post by refurb » Fri, Jul 17, 2020, 6:50 PM UTC

Science doesn’t have a great explanation for everything, but that doesn’t make it junk science.

Suffice to say it’s not uncommon for people to die suddenly when they encounter stressful situations, even not related to police interactions. I remember reading about a case where a person fell through the ice on a lake, the water never going over his head. He was pulled out immediately, but died of cardiac arrest. What happened? Not unusual to label it vasovagal syncope that resulted in sudden death. Is it a great explanation? No, but it’s the best we have.

Similar to excited delirium, we have folks who exhibit similar symptoms and some of them die. Do we know exactly why? Not always, but it doesn’t make “excites delirium” junk science.

Not excusing police brutality at all, but it shouldn’t be surprising some of these sudden deaths happen in police interactions too, especially when you’ve got drugs involved and/or mental illness.