zlacker

It's worth noting hundreds of police officers lose their life a year in the line of duty: https://www.odmp.org/search/year and many more than that receive serious injuries, even permanent spinal damage:

One cop was paralyzed from the neck down in Vegas protests: https://www.bostonherald.com/2020/06/14/police-officer-shot-...

Retired police chief killed at 77 by looters in St. Louis: https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/500839-retired-st-l...

A federal agent was killed in Oakland in connection with the protests: https://patch.com/california/alameda/fbi-ids-federal-agent-4...

The one-sided narrative against cops is getting out of hand. It's an extremely dangerous job and you cannot treat gangsters with kid gloves while they pack serious weaponry. It's a joke to talk of nerfing or defunding the police for the handful of bad incidents that occur meanwhile over 15K people a year are murdered in the country. It's completely disproportionate and not aligned with statistical reality: cops often have to make split second life or death decisions and they don't get a second shot.

>>chrisc+(OP)
Policing is not a dangerous job.

According to the FBI, which publishes the data in the Uniform Crime Reports, from 1980–2018, an average of 85 law enforcement officers were feloniously killed per year.

In 2018 there were 686,665 police in the US.

>>alex_y+D
This is correct. In fact, landscaping and groundskeeping workers (among many other categories) suffered more fatalities than police officers in 2018 according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics: https://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cftb0326.htm

>>alex_y+D
Not even in the top 10, apparently.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/27/the-10-most-dangerous-jobs-i...

>>chrisc+(OP)
I consider police to be heroes. But that's not what we're seeing here.

The sides here are decent folk (police and protesters) against the racists and the violent criminals (police and rioters and looters).

And the police agree: "Three big California police unions release national reform plan to remove racist officers" https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/3-big-California...

Their plan includes "a national database of former police officers fired for gross misconduct that would prevent other agencies from hiring them."

>>chrisc+(OP)
This is not a case of a few bad apples.

75 year old man thrown to the floor for no reason: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4f4dXXbfEg

Two of the officers responsible were suspended. In response, the /ENTIRE DEPARTMENT/ resigned: https://nypost.com/2020/06/05/buffalo-emergency-response-tea...

American police need to be disarmed and fired. The idea of a professional police force (especially an /armed/ police force) makes about as much sense as a professional jury service.

>>chrisc+(OP)
The post is a huge list of links of police brutality on innocent protestors, bystanders, and media well within their rights. This post has nothing to do with how the police treat "gangsters", unless you mean something different by that word.

>>alex_y+D
I'd be interested to see a breakdown of deaths, injuries, and trauma(PTSD and such) per capita for police officers versus various US Armed Forces MOSes as well as common civilian trades/occupations.

I imagine in general it's safer in most regards than many trades and MOSes but until I see the data I wouldn't want to make an actual assertion.

I'd put this together myself if I felt competent enough to do this properly but by no means am I a data scientist or anyone actually qualified to do this.

>>chrisc+(OP)
> It's worth noting hundreds of police officers lose their life a year in the line of duty

From your own link it shows less than 200 deaths of police per year from the last five years. Hundreds as you've used it imho is misleading. Furthermore those stats include accidents which makes them even more misleading. Do you honestly think deaths from cancer related to 9/11 should "count" in the context of this debate? And yet they closely trail and sometimes even eclipse the death of cops by gunfire in the past 5 years.

I do agree that it's a dangerous job but I don't agree that they're "required" to be heavy handed because of "gangsters" with "serious weaponry". The weaponry issue is a gun control one, not a "gangsters" one. There's absolutely NO NEED for so many ARs over there. NONE WHAT-SO-EVER. And I say this as a reformed red-stater expat who had a AK under my bed as a teenager and a 40 smith in the night stand.

From my perspective I think the narrative for cops is disproportionate and out of hand. The ample, arguably overwhelming, footage of cops beating, maiming, shooting, and killing people in the past month alone is ridiculous and should be evidence enough that the police have lost their way. Instead you're in here defending them in spite of overwhelming video evidence to the contrary.

In Australia and NZ the police are legally bound to these key principles.

• Police should only use force that is reasonable, necessary, proportionate and appropriate to the circumstances.

• Police should use no more force than is reasonably necessary for the safe and effective performance of their duties.

• Individual police are accountable and responsible for their use of force and must be able to justify their actions at law

Do you think the video below is a good example of the use of proportionate force? Do you think that shooting was justified? https://twitter.com/i/status/1272177941519257600

On a related note I found this an interesting read.

https://medium.com/@OfcrACab/confessions-of-a-former-bastard...

>>carapa+c1
The police have never done anything for me, and I can't think of a time they've done anything for anyone I know. I don't really see how they are heros.

I can't even think of things they regularly do that can be called heroic? I know they do some good stuff, but nothing that comes close to the level of "hero" in my opinion.

Firefighters, EMTs, nurses, and doctors are all examples of actual heros, IMO.

>>joshri+s1
Defunding police because of police brutality is swallowing a spider to catch the fly. You do NOT want to live in a place without police.

I think it would be much more productive and realistic to have a really deep study of how policing in America is different from other countries, and what can be done to normalise it. America is pretty gun crazy, and that doesn't make a cop's life any easier. The flip side of that is that some gun crazy people become cops, and shoot people on their knees with weapons engraved with "you're fucked": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Daniel_Shaver

>>chrisc+(OP)
I disagree. The protests and the narrative around them are about highlighting injustice.

In those examples, I’m fairly confident the perpetrators will be arrested and likely justice will be served. In the first two, arrests have already been made and they’ve been charged. Meanwhile, those that murdered Breonna Taylor are still free despite the fact that the police know exactly who the perpetrators were.

We want justice for all.

>>Titano+71
Sorta meaningless unless you cross it against the actual count of people in the occupation (estimates in this list https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/emp-by-detailed-occupation.ht...)

I don't really want to get into the actual meat of the argument, but please use per-capita death stats so the numbers are actually comparable.

>>chrisc+(OP)
When someone kills a police officer, they are basically garunteed life in prison or death.

When a cop kills someone, they almost always go unpunished, no matter how unjustified it was.

>>pixelp+d3
> Defunding police because of police brutality is swallowing a spider to catch the fly. You do NOT want to live in a place without police.

This is a classic example of bad / misleading marketing on behalf of a reform movement. The "Defund the Police" movement has been poorly named. Yes, there are absolutely some folks on the extreme who truly want to disband the police and live in a place without police, but by and large, the major of people who are supporting this movement mean something else:

Defund == defund the CURRENT police organizational structure (militarized, etc.), reallocate funding for things like homeless support, domestic checks, etc. to other departments better suited to handle them, and KEEP a policing organization which is responsible for a much narrower scope of duty with a reformatted training program, etc.

It should be branded "Reboot the Police", not "Defund the Police"...

>>Miner4+w2
Isn't being the stick that causes laws to have meaning a good thing? A law is only words unless there's someone who will inflict a penalty if you don't follow it.

>>pixelp+d3
> Defunding police because of police brutality is swallowing a spider to catch the fly. You do NOT want to live in a place without police.

False dichotomy.

You can defund the police, by not sending armed, militarized police to do the bullshit parts of their jobs, while still responding to violent incidents.

For 99% of police calls, you don't need an armed gunman to show up. Of the 1% that you currently do, more often than not, that armed officer won't even show up in time.

>>nlh+e4
If that's really what it is, calling it "Defund" is like marketing Coke by calling it "Shitty Sugar Water" and then issuing a 10 page explainer that says "Shit not included".

>>pixelp+d3
The demand to defund the police the claim that policing is too much of the budget. The demand to disarm the police us the claim that not all cops need to carry a gun. Neither of these is a demand to get rid of police.

>>kipcha+y4
There are too many laws. If there are too many laws then their monopoly on violence becomes tyrannical.

>>alex_y+D
in 2019 there were a mere 89 deaths, and 41 one of those were vehicle accidents.

>>Miner4+w2
Maybe I'm just naive and sheltered. I'm shocked by what I've seen these past weeks. There is a serious problem and it's going to be addressed.

A moment with a search engine will turn up story after story of people in uniform putting their lives on the line to help others.

Personally, I think they're heroes because they're people just like you and me who are willing to risk their lives to help other people. At least most of them are, I believe.

>>bpodgu+J3
Sure, I combined the two tables in the spreadsheet linked below, and there are many occupations that are more dangerous than police officer if we look at fatalities by per-capita occupation.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dXtv2wnutujfXWUHB9Bm...

>>chrisc+(OP)
The fact that people instantly go to both-sidesing this is absolutely infuriating. This isn't some kind of red-team/blue-team dynamic bullshit sports thing. Police officers are the designated empowered representatives of the state and they absolutely must follow the law. There is no rule of law if they can beat your ass and kill you and then hide behind a wall of denial, a police union, unaccountable processes, and phalanx of defenders like this.

Police officers die in the line of duty. Yep. It's a dangerous job. You know who else dies in the line of duty? Truck drivers. Truck drivers die at 2x the rate of police officers in America. Do they get a free pass for beating the shit out of people and killing them? Hell no.

>>chrisc+(OP)
It’s about 100 officers a year in the U.S. About half are homicides and the other half are car accidents on the job. It doesn’t rank in the top 10 most dangerous jobs (per capita) in the U.S. according to the BLS. The number of deaths will be much higher this year, at least double, due to COVID19 deaths. The job pays well and comes with a pension. It’s nearly impossible to get fired and if you do get fired, most officers get rehired elsewhere.

https://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/police-officers-2014.htm

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/cfoi.pdf

https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2019/05/08/the-nu...

https://www.policeone.com/coronavirus-covid-19/articles/covi...

>>chrisc+(OP)
Being a cop is less dangerous than being a pizza delivery driver, and pizza delivery guys don't get guaranteed pensions and a union to protect them when they purposefully beat the living crap out of someone because they had a bad day.

>>baggy_+Z4
It's not quite that, but it does sound like cutting all funding. How about "the police have too much money"? It's not an imperative statement though. "Cut police budgets" has the same problem as "defund the police." Any better slogans? Something snappy like "we send the EU £350 million a week. let's fund our NHS instead."

>>kipcha+y4
You're right that a 'law is only words unless there's someone who will inflict a penalty'. The question we've seen over the past few weeks however is 'who watches the watchmen?'

The answer is, apparently, nobody. The police should not be above the law they're enforcing. The only thing that's changed is that with the mass adoption of smart phones we're able to see from multiple angles how deep the corruption goes.

>>alex_y+D
That's only a function of how good they are at what they do. They have to engage in over 10 million incidents a year. Any one of those could be a routine traffic stop that suddenly turns into a gang bust and an attempt is made on their own life. They don't have the luxury of foresight of knowing if they're coming home today or not. They know they're a target. Contrast that with your average aeron chair programmer and I'd say their job is incredibly fucking dangerous.

Edit: It's number 15 and only because 2019 was a near record low year, following decades of decline and improved equipment and training. That's a function of how good they are. And if you make them worse or non-existent, crime will go up.

While the construction industry is accidentally dangerous, cops are victims of intentional violence and hatred. They have to deal with drugged out, abusive, angry people all the time. They have to console rape victims. They have to help assess suicides, murders, deadly car accidents and all kinds of unpleasant bullshit. They see death on the job every single day. It's not a walk in the park. It causes unbelievable stress (especially in high crime districts) and it pays 1/3 of what a junior JS dev makes and they don't get stock options or grants

It's 5x more deadly than average occupation and 6x more injurious. It also causes loads of psychological and emotional stress because they have to deal with people going through some of the worst episodes of their lives...all the time.

https://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/police-officers-2014.htm

>>pasqui+37
Something like "Rethink" is way better. You can't sell "Abolish" or "Defund" without explaining what comes next.

>>carapa+w6
Police have been systematically killing people, inciting riots, executing pets as a matter of course, and using chemical weapons of war on civilians. Many police departments have more funding than any other portion of the budget combined and they still can’t stop themselves from executing civilians, stealing their property, and lying about it. A black man is more likely to be killed by a cop than a cop is to be killed at all in the line of duty.

Law enforcement is necessary(strictly, a crime investigation unit, a force capable of handling armed/bomb situations, etc.) but something has seriously gone wrong with the way it’s been implemented in many cities, counties, and states.

>>chrisc+t8
Their job is not more dangerous than a pizza delivery driver.

>>Miner4+T3
They get automatic mandatory paid leave, kinda exactly like extra vacation. I would not be shocked to see flights booked in advance.

>>Titano+A6
This sounds like one arguing that playing russian roulette isn't dangerous, because one can name more dangerous activities. The fact that deep sea fishing is ultra dangerous doesn't mean that being a cop isn't dangerous.

>>Mister+U6
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...

>>Miner4+w2
Firefighters have never done anything for me, and I can't think of a time they've done anything for anyone I know. I don't really see how they are heros.

I can't even think of things they regularly do that can be called heroic? I know they do some good stuff, but nothing that comes close to the level of "hero" in my opinion. They squirt water on hot stuff? Cool.

>>oh_sig+Nb
Gotta chase those Civil Forfeiture tips.

>>oh_sig+6c
Firefighting is a job that actually has significant standards for licensing and criminal history.

They also don’t have a history of killing black people at 2.5x their usual rate of killing people. (They also by and large don’t kill people, in fact they’ve killed so few people there doesn’t exist case law that prevents liability of a firefighter for killing a person. Unlike cops.)

>>oh_sig+vb
"It's a dangerous job" is given as a reason for why so much policy brutality occurs. Pointing out how dangerous it is relative to other professions is absolutely germane.

>>chrisc+(OP)
It's not clear to me why "Policing is dangerous" means things like strangling handcuffed prisoners, raping detainees, attacking journalists and peaceful protestors, and stealing cash and other valuables (i.e. civil forfeiture) and so on have to be tolerated. None of these are "split second life or death decisions".

Just as crimes against police are more serious than crimes against civilians (rightly, IMO), crimes by police should also be more serious.

>>chrisc+t8
Pizza delivery drivers have to deliver over 10 million pizzas a year. Any one of those deliveries could be cut short by a drunk driver that causes a head-on collision at 60 miles per hour. They don't have the luxury of foresight of knowing if they're coming home today or not. They know they're at risk. Contrast that with your average cop issuing citations and filling out paperwork and I'd say their job is incredibly fucking dangerous.

>>vkou+E4
In the UK if police need guns on scene, they clear the area and call a specialized sharpshooter team.

>>kipcha+y4
The police make a mockery of the law because they get away with murder. Protesters want reasonable laws enforced for everyone regardless of race or profession.

>>barney+d1
How do you provide security and protection in absence of police?

>>deathg+Zf
At least where I live in the UK half the police have guns, they're just locked in their car 99.999% of the time. A lot more UK police have guns than most people think. Any car with a 5 point star (orange in my area) is an armed response vehicle.

Maybe US cops need to just leave their guns in their cars more often?

Example: https://c8.alamy.com/comp/HXD0AX/windsor-uk-27th-march-2017-...

>>barney+d1
I think it's a case of several bad departments/cities/states. The response from the San Francisco PD (for example) was very different from Seattle. Policing is very different from state to state, and police cultures are very different across departments. Treating all police in the US as a single entity doesn't make much sense.

>>alex_y+D
I'm guessing that that cop in Vegas that was just paralyzed for life by some "protester" would not agree with you.

You don't have to be killed "feloniously" to be dead. And you don't have to be killed at all to have your life destroyed.

>>jowsie+tC
Great idea.

>>deathg+Kf
Pizza delivery can be dangerous in certain neighborhoods, for sure. At least one or two were killed in my home town. However, let's not pretend that the emotional and mental weight and responsibility of being a pizza delivery driver is anywhere close to what a cop has to deal with on a daily basis:

"Police respond to murder-suicide in Durham" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ei4D2toAHQ4

"Man shoots, kills police wearing body cam" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssARbfxqTh0

"Police respond to reported armed robbery on South Hill" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7iOelX_0kY

"Bodycam Footage Shows Woman Falsely Accused Cop of Sexual Assault | New York Post" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTv5VkX_T8o

"Police seek man who tried to rape elderly woman" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWPvXsUmZik

You let me know what pizza delivery driver has to deal with shit like that.

>>tricer+8f
That's exactly my point, and no it isn't. Policing isn't less dangerous because deep sea fishing is really dangerous. If someone said "It's the most dangerous job", then it would be germane.

Here's the same logic applied elsewhere:

It's not dangerous to be a black man in America. What's really dangerous is to be a El Salvadoran living in El Salvador(the country with the highest murder rate in the world).

>>oh_sig+aO1
It's not the same logic though. A black man in America didn't choose to be a black man, and has no way to change it. Ditto for an El Salvadoran - most can't legally emigrate.

Police officers are volunteers, not conscripts. They're free at any time to choose a less dangerous profession if they so wish.

Ultimately it doesn't matter if policing was more dangerous than working in an asbestos-uranium mine on a fault line. There's no excuse for law enforcement to be breaking laws without consequence. People who can't tolerate the risks should go do something else.

>>chrisc+zN1
This is bordering on the absurd. Almost all police officers go through their career without being in objective danger of dying. If they do run in to danger, they call for backup and are trained to handle it. You can find examples of death in any profession. Like it or not, policing is not one of the most dangerous jobs out there, it's just filled with scared people.

>>barney+d1
You sure about all of that?

Those 50 some police did not resign from being police. They resigned from emergency response duties because they were shown that their dept will not support them.

There is also more to that “poor 75yo man” story. He is a professional agitator with a now-deleted social media history of hating the police, despite this hatred he showed up hours early before police did with a police motorcycle helmet he wanted to return because it was the right thing to do, this stated by a Buffalo/NPR reporter who he happened to be there with, while BLM activists knew/recognized him as an agitator and told him to go home, asking him why he was there and replied a few times “just for fun”, then in the full video you can see he is using he is using his phone to scan over police radios (supposedly to skim Bluetooth advertising addresses and RSSI correlation, to get someone information to listen in on private band police traffic), all of this while not wearing a mask up until the interaction with police when suddenly he has “two” masks, one which appears mouth guard of some sorts with a mask over that.

But whatever... it’s a lot easier to just say the police beat this guy (pushed him back from an advancing police line)

https://twitter.com/ConservRachel/status/1268998560412033025...

https://twitter.com/PimpG18/status/1269328910988255232/photo...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CubkyIzygQ

https://twitter.com/Sep112001/status/1269696080230350849/pho...