The Shooting Gallery: Police Violence MEGATHREAD

[Barrister]

Some of these police shootings that garnered police attention have generally shown police actions to be justified (see Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson).  Some of these police shootings appear to show police actions to be unjustifiable (see Philando Castille a few days ago).  But it's wrong to immediately criticize each and every police shooting without waiting for all the facts to be known.

You are completely ignoring the context of decades of this kind of thing going on. The benefit of the doubt is wearing thin. If we felt confident that police were going to responsibly deal with every shooting then there would be no issue.

This was a specific response to Timmy's gif of the radio guy wanting police to condemn each other.

If you think polcie don't investigate police shootings appropriately then set up some kind of independent oversight.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Bullshit, this has nothing to do with unions. There are plenty of cops who are not in unions who have this same problem.

This is about a police culture, not a union culture.

Actually it's definitely a union problem, you just don't want to attack a leftist sacred cow and enrage your Daily Kos buddies. All cops are either in formal unions, or have some level of FOP relationship (which in non-unionized departments still exists as a "Fraternal Organization.") You actually see all the problems of police forces in all other unionized work places, it's just no one writes articles about the factory worker who is a lazy fuck up but can't be touched because he's a 25 year seniority union guy.

People do sometimes write articles about bad school teachers who get protected by unions, but much less often. But you see this in all unionized work forces, the union protects bad members. It's almost their key function.

[Valmy]

If you think polcie don't investigate police shootings appropriately then set up some kind of independent oversight.

And how would I go about this?

I have been calling for training and oversight to be reviewed for years but I seem to lack the authority to do that.

[garbon]

Fair.

No, it actually isn't.

Cops have no problem saying another cop screwed up - once all the evidence is in.  But the radio guy doesn't want to wait for due process or investigation - they want "hot takes" in the immediate aftermath of a tragedy.

Some of these police shootings that garnered police attention have generally shown police actions to be justified (see Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson).  Some of these police shootings appear to show police actions to be unjustifiable (see Philando Castille a few days ago).  But it's wrong to immediately criticize each and every police shooting without waiting for all the facts to be known.

And yet they have no issue immediately defending them.

[OttoVonBismarck]

look at the numbers. US has nation of 318 million, rounded down. there are 240 million 911 calls. there were 986 people killed by police last year. how many were caused by mistakes? etc., etc. you break the numbers down and you get an insanely small percentage of people killed by mistakes. you're never going to reduce it to 0%, not with the factors US police deal with. by no means are they perfect, but I don't see concrete evidence that there's a big problem in the US.

The problem though is that US cops shoot a much larger number that cops in other comparable Western countries, on a per-capita basis. That provides some evidence that there is a problem.

To give one example, here's an article from the start of 2016 complaining of police shootings in Canada:

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/samir-shaheenhussain/police-killing-youth_b_8914048.html

This guy is outraged that there have been 150 shootings "since 2005". That's around 15 a year on average.

Canada's population was roughly 35 million in 2013, compared with 316 million in the US. So if Canada had cop shootings at the same rate as the US, it ought to have roughly 109 per year, rather than 15. That's a pretty big discrepancy.

I do think there is a police shooting problem, but I also wouldn't necessarily expect two different cultures to have similar shooting rates. America is a more violent place than Canada.

[Malthus]

People do sometimes write articles about bad school teachers who get protected by unions, but much less often. But you see this in all unionized work forces, the union protects bad members. It's almost their key function.

My drunken, stoned lout of a brother in law is a prime beneficiary of that. 

[OttoVonBismarck]

I'm not saying it's unions that makes cops pull the trigger, I'm saying the culture they foment is a big part of why other cops don't stand up and do the right thing when a bad cop is on the force.

[Malthus]

I do think there is a police shooting problem, but I also wouldn't necessarily expect two different cultures to have similar shooting rates. America is a more violent place than Canada.

To my mind such explanations have some merit, but only go so far.  Not the same? Sure. Seven times as high? That's hard to explain as simply a cultural difference.

[Barrister]

I do think there is a police shooting problem, but I also wouldn't necessarily expect two different cultures to have similar shooting rates. America is a more violent place than Canada.

To my mind such explanations have some merit, but only go so far.  Not the same? Sure. Seven times as high? That's hard to explain as simply a cultural difference.

The question is always whether the US is just a more violent place, or whether given the access to firearms it is simply a more deadly place once violence breaks out.

[Malthus]

I do think there is a police shooting problem, but I also wouldn't necessarily expect two different cultures to have similar shooting rates. America is a more violent place than Canada.

To my mind such explanations have some merit, but only go so far.  Not the same? Sure. Seven times as high? That's hard to explain as simply a cultural difference.

The question is always whether the US is just a more violent place, or whether given the access to firearms it is simply a more deadly place once violence breaks out.

I certainly think that the prevalence of handguns specifically is a major factor. Cops are understandably a lot more trigger happy if they are more worried that the guy reaching for his pocket is reaching for a gun.

That doesn't explain why Blacks are twice as likely to be shot, though.

Upthread, I said I thought there were three factors (in no order) that explained the stats:

1. More handguns

2. Historic racism/racial antagonism

3. Black historic poverty

[DGuller]

Bullshit, this has nothing to do with unions. There are plenty of cops who are not in unions who have this same problem.

This is about a police culture, not a union culture.

Actually it's definitely a union problem, you just don't want to attack a leftist sacred cow and enrage your Daily Kos buddies. All cops are either in formal unions, or have some level of FOP relationship (which in non-unionized departments still exists as a "Fraternal Organization.") You actually see all the problems of police forces in all other unionized work places, it's just no one writes articles about the factory worker who is a lazy fuck up but can't be touched because he's a 25 year seniority union guy.

People do sometimes write articles about bad school teachers who get protected by unions, but much less often. But you see this in all unionized work forces, the union protects bad members. It's almost their key function.

It could be both.  The mindset of cops is to stick together, view it as "us vs. them".  But unions are definitely an organized way to accomplish that.  In NYC they don't even have a sense of shame in hiding it, the union gives every cop a number of cards to give to their friends so that "courtesy" can be extended to them (with "courtesy" obviously meaning carte blanche to commit minor violations of the law).

Cops, without strong leadership, are liable to display "professional courtesy" to other cops.  But unions are a mechanism to make those who don't display it pay dearly.

[CountDeMoney]

Fair.

No, it actually isn't.

Cops have no problem saying another cop screwed up - once all the evidence is in.

Oncr again, foreign country backwoods courtroom boy doesnt know what the fuck he's talking about.

[CountDeMoney]

I'm not saying it's unions that makes cops pull the trigger, I'm saying the culture they foment is a big part of why other cops don't stand up and do the right thing when a bad cop is on the force.

Plenty of non-unionized police departments do the same thing. And quite frankly, it isn't unions that fail to charge and prosecute officers when they break the law--state's attorneys offices and local prosecutors are the ones that drop that ball, either by not charging or tossing softballs to grand juries.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I certainly think that the prevalence of handguns specifically is a major factor. Cops are understandably a lot more trigger happy if they are more worried that the guy reaching for his pocket is reaching for a gun.

That doesn't explain why Blacks are twice as likely to be shot, though.

Upthread, I said I thought there were three factors (in no order) that explained the stats:

1. More handguns

2. Historic racism/racial antagonism

3. Black historic poverty

I think there's probably (obviously) different reasons about why more people are shot by police in America vs why more blacks (versus their share of population) are shot.

I think more guns in America than essentially anywhere else is probably the #1 reason we have so many police shootings in general. Fuck, regular British patrol cops don't even carry.

I think the reason more blacks are shot is pretty simple down to two reasons:

1) Police have a racist predisposition to viewing blacks as more dangerous and treat them as so, even when it isn't justified. [A fix for this would be to get police to respond more to the situation, not the skin color of the person.]

2) Police have vastly more interactions per capita with blacks than whites. The more interactions, the more "chances" of a bad outcome like an unjustified police shooting (or maybe even a legally justified, but possibly preventable, police shooting.) More roll of the dice, so to speak.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I'm not saying it's unions that makes cops pull the trigger, I'm saying the culture they foment is a big part of why other cops don't stand up and do the right thing when a bad cop is on the force.

Plenty of non-unionized police departments do the same thing. And quite frankly, it isn't unions that fail to charge and prosecute officers when they break the law--state's attorneys offices and local prosecutors are the ones that drop that ball, either by not charging or tossing softballs to grand juries.

Yeah, I'd think elected prosecutors factor in to a degree as well. In a lot of localities only a few hundred people even vote on prosecutor, especially if he is elected in an off year election. Even in big cities if it's an off year local election (or even worse, one scheduled on some odd ball month not in November when more important elections are held), the turn out is very very low, like 15-20%. In that context having the unwavering support of the police community can literally be make or break in getting elected.