Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thread

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Rico
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Rico » Tue Nov 25, 2014 8:53 pm

I apologize if the terseness came off as aggression.

And likewise.

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zaratustra
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby zaratustra » Wed Nov 26, 2014 6:20 am

Now see, I was feeling angry about Darren Wilson, but according to his testimony he's actually some sort of tiny halfling that doesn't use tasers because they are uncomfortably large and cannot interact with a black teen without feeling like he's facing fucking Ultraman.

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Thad
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Thad » Wed Nov 26, 2014 12:15 pm

Classic wrote:
Thad wrote:A police officer engaging with a civilian doesn't have a right to privacy. Just this once, "the innocent have nothing to hide" is a reasonable argument to make.

Except you don't have to make it.


Well, obviously SOMEBODY has to make it.

Classic wrote:Police are public servants and privacy or anonymity has made police demonstrably worse at discharging the duties of their office.
Public servants, while performing their functions as public servants, need to justify the necessity or usefulness of privacy. They don't get it as a de facto right.


I can't say as I'm comfortable with the categorical statement. There are rather a lot of government employees whose jobs I don't think really rise to the level of "should be monitored by camera at all times". The difference between monitoring a private employee and a government one is that the latter comes with some creepy "government surveillance" overtones -- I can't think of a good 1:1 privacy analogy, but it bears noting that government employees DO have free speech protections that private employees don't, by their employer's nature. (You want to publicly and vocally criticize your employer if you're in private industry? That's your right, but keeping your job is not. You want to publicly and vocally criticize a government agency you're working for? That's your right and, in many cases, the government doesn't have the legal right to punish you for it.)

Police aren't just public servants, though, they're public servants given monopoly access to the legal use of deadly force. Fuck yes they should be monitored every time they leave the station.

(I also wouldn't mind putting cameras on lawmakers.)

Esperath wrote:The problem is that this is how the telephone effect starts. One person summarizes an article with a link, and then 95% of people don't actually read through the whole article. "11 out of 160000" starts getting blindly passed around and is quickly divorced from the original source.


And it's really not a good article from a "just glance at it and get the gist" perspective; the headline ("It’s Incredibly Rare For A Grand Jury To Do What Ferguson’s Just Did") does not accurately communicate its message, and the lede ("Or at least, they nearly always do so in cases that don’t involve police officers.") is the fourth sentence and second paragraph in the article.

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Büge
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Büge » Wed Nov 26, 2014 1:46 pm

Thad wrote:You want to publicly and vocally criticize a government agency you're working for? That's your right and, in many cases, the government doesn't have the legal right to punish you for it.


Not in Canada, thanks to Harper. -_-
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Classic
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Classic » Wed Nov 26, 2014 5:29 pm

Thad wrote:There are rather a lot of government employees whose jobs I don't think really rise to the level of "should be monitored by camera at all times".


Yes, but the public has a right to monitor the actions undertaken in their name is what I mean. Like I said, there's some public functions that benefit from or need secrecy, and it's the obligation of the public servant to demonstrate the need for that privacy. Without a demonstrated need for privacy, the decision about what oversight the public should employ gets a similar cost-benefit analysis to any other feature of a public service.

In short, if the Police really were public servants the only reason to not equip every officer with a camera would be the impracticability or the unjustified costs of procuring that equipment. But... you know, with how much military hardware the police are sporting lately...

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Mongrel
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Mongrel » Wed Nov 26, 2014 7:18 pm

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zaratustra
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby zaratustra » Thu Nov 27, 2014 8:16 am

Turns out the grand jury was handed copies of arrest law that was struck down from Missouri annals thirty years ago because it was unconstitutional

http://t.co/KGCF4cJrjh

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Mongrel
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Mongrel » Thu Nov 27, 2014 9:03 pm

Minor, semi-related incident.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch wrote:Two men indicted last week on federal weapons charges allegedly had plans to bomb the Gateway Arch — and to kill St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch and Ferguson Police Chief Tom Jackson — the Post-Dispatch has learned.

Sources close to the investigation were uncertain whether the men had the capability to carry out the plans, although the two allegedly did buy what they thought was a pipe bomb in an undercover law enforcement sting.

The men wanted to acquire two more bombs, the sources said, but could not afford to do it until one suspect’s girlfriend’s Electronic Benefit Transfer card was replenished.

An indictment, with no mention of bombs or killings, was returned in federal court here Nov. 19 and unsealed Friday upon the arrest of Brandon Orlando Baldwin and Olajuwon Ali Davis. Their addresses and Baldwin’s age were not available; Davis is 22.

The arrest came three days before McCulloch revealed that a grand jury would not indict Ferguson police Officer Darren Wilson in the controversial killing of Michael Brown. The announcement triggered looting and multiple arsons in Ferguson.


All I want to know is... what kind of idiot buys a pipe bomb?
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Thad
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Thad » Fri Nov 28, 2014 12:53 am

Indictment, huh?

Makes sense. They didn't actually kill anybody.


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Mongrel
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Mongrel » Wed Dec 03, 2014 5:28 pm

In a situation with eerie parallels to Ferguson, including unusual Grand Jury, No charges in Eric Garner case.
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Joxam
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Joxam » Wed Dec 03, 2014 5:57 pm

I honestly don't know what I think on the subject but I think a real discussion needs to be had about whether or not size should be a legal basis for 'threatening'.

I'm kinda tall and I don't really think tall people are scary or anything, but I can see how someone WOULD, AND on the other hand I've had people tell me basically since like 18 forward that I am intimidating just standing around.

Basically I'm kinda tall, bigger and I have the male equivalent of bitchy resting face, it's actually so bad at work I have to tell myself to smile, actively, three or four times a night and I think that kinda sucks.

BUT that's not my point really. My point is should 'He was a big black dude' really be a legal argument that carries weight when you're armed and you outnumber the person? Really?
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Thad
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Thad » Wed Dec 03, 2014 11:55 pm

And this case is even simpler than that.

Coroner says victim was choked to death. NYPD officers are not allowed to choke people.

The "Well police are authorized to use lethal force" fig leaf does not apply. The police quite clearly did something they are not authorized to do.

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Friday
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Friday » Thu Dec 04, 2014 4:55 am

Yeah, this seems like a really clear cut case. There's a video, it shows the guy getting put in a choke hold, cops can't do that cause it can kill people, it killed him.

The Grand Jury finding "insufficient evidence" in this case is stark evidence of something else entirely. Not that the evidence is new. It just seems so absolutely black and white (GET IT) in this particular case.
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Mongrel
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Mongrel » Thu Dec 04, 2014 5:00 am

It seems sort of absurd that we're reaching a point where I've heard people object to mandatory body cameras for police on the basis of "Well, cameras won't do anything because they'll just disregard the video in court like they do now."

But then again, this is also a world where a cop can run out and shoot of beat up someone in an utterly one-sided way and so long as they repeat "Stop trying to grab my gun, Stop trying to grab my gun!" or "Quit resisting! I'm telling you to quit resisting." while they pummel the unconscious body, they'll get off.

Was is Brentai who referred to it as "The 'quit hitting yourself!' school of policing"?
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Thad
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby Thad » Thu Dec 04, 2014 11:58 am

Mongrel wrote:It seems sort of absurd that we're reaching a point where I've heard people object to mandatory body cameras for police on the basis of "Well, cameras won't do anything because they'll just disregard the video in court like they do now."

If they even GET to court.

I heard somebody argue on NPR yesterday that both parties are less likely to escalate if they know they're being filmed, which is probably accurate. They used the "hands in my pockets" video as an example -- no, that officer shouldn't be stopping a black guy for walking down the street with his hands in his pockets in the first place, but it was at least a mild exchange that didn't end with anybody hurt or arrested.

(I ever tell you guys the story of the time someone called the cops on my dad for being too loud at a jazz concert? It ended in the officer asking Dad "What about the other people who were trying to enjoy the show?" and Dad responding, "I guess they don't get out much." The policeman stifled a laugh and let him go.

It really was a pretty terrible mismatch of an act and a venue. Jerry Gonzales, a guy who's used to playing packed New York bars with raucous crowds, at Scottsdale Center for the Arts, a place where snooty white people go to clap politely. In fact I think the guy who called the cops was mad because Dad's shouting had woken up his wife.)

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beatbandito
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby beatbandito » Thu Dec 04, 2014 5:46 pm

Don't worry guys, Eric Garner's death had nothing to do with race. Michael Savage pointed out that there was a black cop in the video who didn't side with Eric over the other officers so clearly no issue here. We can all carry on.
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zaratustra
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Re: Sadly, we still need a "white guy shoots black teen" thr

Postby zaratustra » Fri Dec 05, 2014 6:27 am

probably because they were going to choke him too


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