The Partisan Divide on Issues

[pbrower2a]

(06-06-2020, 07:24 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(06-05-2020, 06:18 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Pushing back, CNN tells of Buffalo officers quit special team after 2 officers suspended for allegedly shoving 75-year-old to ground.

First report lately of the police resisting the new drive for them to reduce excessive use of force.

Let them quit?  Fire them completely?

Self selection has to occur if the anti-social cops need to move on. The alternative is mass firings, and that seems unlikely.  Even NYC and LA, both with histories of bad cops, will opt for ease out over throw out.  Change a few policies, and let the bad to marginal cops decide to comply or quit.  If firing is needed, keep it rare.

I suspect that police work is becoming more attractive. It pays well enough to attract college graduates who think that they can do more good by ameliorating a family argument than by hustling underwear in a store or busting drunk drivers instead of plying drinks to people on the margin of drunkenness. By attracting more college graduates it might attract more people with humanistic learning and values. Police work of attracts authoritarian types who seek to order others about. So you make the swift arrest of drug dealers and haul the suspects to the jail... and maybe some other cop will find illegal substances deposited in the back seat of the squad car. That doesn't take much authoritarianism -- just obedience. Procedures save trouble, and when procedures aren't adequate... attack a cop and die.

It has been fashionable in the recent past to hire 'tough cops' to fit the politics of the time. All cops must at some point confront someone who has done a particularly heinous crime and expect the worst. But much of the time the cop's job is to defuse a bad situation, maybe as the equivalent of a the dog who breaks up a cat fight.   Maybe cops are not quite social workers with a badge, but sometimes that is the role. We need cops who will take that role.  

Cops need to recognize that the safety of someone under arrest is part of the job. That is where the failure occurred. Cops need also take responsibility to monitor dangerous situations for criminal suspects as for themselves. Several cops failed in Minneapolis, or so it seems, one who put a knee on a suspect's throat and three others who did not urge that cop to relax the knee. 

It is easy to forget that as humans we are large, dangerous creatures. We are almost bears by size; we simply lack the horrible claws and teeth of bears. We certainly have the weight, so we can do much harm just by placing it upon another creature in a harsh way. We are also vulnerable at our throats, as is the case for almost all mammals. It may be crude to put it this way, but some of the most effective ways of killing someone involve the throat and neck -- ligature strangulation, throat-cutting, beheading, and of course one of the most venerable ways of execution and suicide... hanging. Hanging either breaks the neck, severs the spinal cord, shuts off the carotid artery, or stops the jugular vein, any of which either stops blood from flowing to the heart or the brain or stops the brain from sending signals to vital organs including most immediately the heart and lungs. I once saw mentions of two animals as possible enemies, and the main principle was the same: protect your neck. The two animals were lions and dogs. I regret that I needed be so explicit in this paragraph.  

Cops need conscience if they are to do their job well. Note well -- one of the favorite jobs for future offenders is... police officer. Just think of the "droogs" in A Clockwork Orange who go from being partners in the criminal violence of "Alex  De Large" to persecuting him as brutal cops on the police force.