Live data from Hacker News

Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

niemanlab.org

251–260 of 835 posts

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently read that if you tend to think, "it's a shame that black people are being killed by cops like this, but the rioting and looting MUST stop," perhaps you should consider thinking more like, "it's a shame that there is rioting and looting, but black people being killed by cops like this MUST stop."

All ideas should be considered, but yours is not one I subscribe to. More people have been killed and had their lives destroyed as the result of non-protestors taking advantage of the protests to destroy communities. This is before the actual protests themselves have even been given a chance to succeed without violence. To subscribe to your perspective, I would have to believe that rioting and looting is the way to a…

> More people have been killed and had their lives destroyed as the result of non-protestors taking advantage of the protests to destroy communities.

[Citation needed]

I find it hard to believe that a few days of these riots has caused more damage and loss of life than generations of racial oppression and police brutality. If you’ve got a source, I’m all ears.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me, it was pretty clear that the police in Santa Monica and Long Beach allowed the looting to occur while treating the protesters like criminals from the outset. This isn't to say that other local precincts weren't significantly better in their treatment of protesters, but there's clear evidence that many police departments are either corrupt or completely inept in addressing violent crime. This has been a long ti…

The police seem to clearly be allowing looting on purpose. SoHo was looted two days in a row . Where were the NYPD? There are 10's of thousands of uniformed officers Maybe you can say the first day they somehow missed it, but two days in a row? Come on. I refuse to believe that they didn't see this coming - they brag about how they're "gathering intel" on terrorist groups, but they couldn't check twitter to see #soho…

What would you have preferred? If the police shows up and the looting does not stop, they can either use force (aka violence) to make it stop, or they can go home, essentially giving up the rule of law in the area.

Not showing up can be a tactical decision: you don't have to generate more bad press and more cries about police brutality and you also don't need to quasi-officially hand over the area to the looters.

The state's power isn't real as in "we can crush you", it rests only in everybody's fear of the state being able to crush them. If there's a chance that the state has to back down, not seeking the confrontation sounds like a smart choice to me, even if it comes at the price of a day or two of looting.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they aren't enforcing the law with many of these actions. See the first major publicized incident with the CNN crew. No laws were broken, the crew was compliant, they asked if they should move, explained they were in that spot because other police had told them to be there. The police have gone beyond the law in these cases, and their handling of protesters (not to mention the cases which precipitated this presen…

You are incorrect. The law does need to be changed. There is a specific law called Qualified Immunity which prevents officers from being brought to trial for these acts. Change or remove that law, and things will absolutely change as you see families taking officers to court for felony murder, assault and battery, and other felony charges.

Read my comment in context. The person I replied to implied that the police actions we're seeing this past week (in particular with their behavior towards the press) is itself legal, which it is not. That they have a way out for their illegal (or at least wrong) behavior is a separate, but related, issue. The thing I was discussing was that the law is already on the side of the press, the police are violating the law. Your comment is about the separate issue of why they are violating the law (the belief, validated repeatedly, that they are above the law itself). So yes, the law needs to change, but the police are not presently acting within the bounds of the law so the issue isn't just changing the law, but reforming the police forces.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#254
post #242
post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The argument does work in that context. It's the same across all topics as far as I know. The moderation question is always: what serves intellectual curiosity? https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... . Once a topic becomes repeated enough, there's a power-law-style dropoff in how interesting it is ( https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu... ), except to people who have a…

i see, so this topic is considered 'intellectually curious' while anti-ccp is 'loyalty to a cause' i am not really sure how you make that determination, i personally find accounts of what the ccp does to exploit its citizens intellectually interesting when it is not widely reported so, given you exponential drop off comment, i assume that means a small number of highly voted protest posts are allowed, and then past t…

The issue isn't the topic itself but the amount of repetition around it. Curiosity withers under repetition. You would see exactly the same pattern if the current topic ended up getting repeated a lot: the users who felt most strongly about it ('loyalty to a cause') would want every single article to be on the front page, and would feel like the mods and/or community must be pro-police-brutality if that didn't happen, just as some people feel like we must be pro-communist or pro-China or whatever.

I tried to explain that above, and linked to past explanations of the same points. If you want to take a look at those past explanations, and still have a question that isn't answered there, I'd be curious to know what it is. Perhaps it would be helpful to describe what these links contain more explicitly:

(1) We try to optimize HN for intellectual curiosity: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

(2) Curiosity and repetition don't go well together: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

(3) With submissions on a MOT (major ongoing topic), the main thing we look for is SNI (significant new information): https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

As far as I can tell, the complete answer to your question follows from those three points.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#255
post #133

Disclaimer: I am a bleeding heart liberal and this may filter my observations. I have been to a few rallies/vigils/marches lately and all incidences of violence that I have witnessed either in person or through media has been instigated by the police. As far as I know,every documented case where a formerly peaceful crowd turns into chaos has been started with police shooting pepperspray, teargas, or whatever into the…

Welcome to Russia . Actually, since 1993 police actions in Russia were never that outright violent and cruel as they are now in the USA . I'm watching news coverage with disbelief and anger, and I'm wondering if the pot will continue calling various kettles around the world black.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#256
post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly cannot tell if you're trolling. If journalists are getting roughed up more because of sensationalism (still well within their 1st amendment rights) that is _completely_ the fault of police. One side has cameras. The other side has guns. When violence happens, who's fault do you think it is?

Do you agree that police have the right to declare a gathering unlawful and can clear the area?

Clear the area how? I think people have forgotten this doesn't need to mean your first step is pulling out the batons. If you tell a journalist they are under arrest, they will always comply. They won't fight back. So yes, still cops' fault.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#257
post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The police seem to clearly be allowing looting on purpose. SoHo was looted two days in a row . Where were the NYPD? There are 10's of thousands of uniformed officers Maybe you can say the first day they somehow missed it, but two days in a row? Come on. I refuse to believe that they didn't see this coming - they brag about how they're "gathering intel" on terrorist groups, but they couldn't check twitter to see #soho…

I'm not sure what it is you're suggesting they do. If they arrest the looters, you will complain of "police brutality", since as a rule, criminals do not go into custody willingly. If they do not, you will complain of "looting". They also can't individually go after looters in this situation - too dangerous. Whatever they do they have to do as a group, without dispersing.

We have no information about their action or inaction, we could only guess that ; judging now seems pointless.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#258
post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, for the safety of myself, my fellow demonstrators, and my family I am not going to state the actual events I was at. Others have already shown examples, however here is an news article covering some incidents: https://www.newsweek.com/fbi-asks-evidence-individuals-incit... I have so far not seen any evidence of the opposite taking place, I would certainly appreciate some counter examples.

I certainly don’t think the police cars in NYC going through those pedestrians - the first example on the page - is a good example. People crowded around the vehicles and starting throwing things at them. While I would expect police to have more restraint/less fear than they did, that wasn’t the police starting violence. I would expect almost anyone to have the same reaction they did. There was another NYC incident t…

There is clearly a lot of space behind them when they drive through the crowd.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#259
post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you agree that police have the right to declare a gathering unlawful and can clear the area?

The police? Not so much. Police don't make law, they shouldn't get to decide very many things at all. The state (or city, or nation, where appropriate)? Absolutely, but only when absolutely necessary. (like curfew orders which follow widespread disorder and destruction)

In practice, they do have that right. And they have the right to use reasonable force to enforce that. So arguing that police are always wrong to use force to clear an area, regardless if media are there or not, is an argument against the laws as they are.

That's a hard argument to make.

Re: Police attacks against journalists across the U.S. since May 28

#260
post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you won't be punished unless you act particularly egregiously like the one officer in Louisville reassigned to desk duty (big whoop) Isn't this honestly largely due to the police union rules and contacts, which (unions) are a key part of leftist labor relations?

Don't you think it's curious that only the police are allowed to have these super-effective unions with literal stay-out-of-jail clauses in their contracts - while Amazon workers who want proper toilet breaks will simply be fired? Does that answer your question?

Maybe not as extreme but teacher's union is pretty bad about protecting members when accused/convicted of abuse. In any case, I was pointing out "reassigning to desk job" might be largely out of the hands of sergeants, and not just cronyism or racism.
Post reply on HN