Why Are Americans Ok With Bad Policing?

wallyj84

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The cops in the US get away with a lot. Civil forfeiture, forced confessions, police brutality, etc. The list of horrible things the cops can do is almost endless, but why? Why aren't more Americans bothered by civil forfeiture or forced confessions or police brutality?

What is it about American culture that allows the police to behave the way that they do?

This will inevitably turn into a discussion about race, so I'll just put this question out there. Why are black people the only Americans concerned with police brutality? Innocent white people get killed by the cops as well, but white people don't make any noise when it happens. Why is that?
 

Klingsor

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The cops in the US get away with a lot. Civil forfeiture, forced confessions, police brutality, etc. The list of horrible things the cops can do is almost endless, but why? Why aren't more Americans bothered by civil forfeiture or forced confessions or police brutality?

What is it about American culture that allows the police to behave the way that they do?

This will inevitably turn into a discussion about race, so I'll just put this question out there. Why are black people the only Americans concerned with police brutality? Innocent white people get killed by the cops as well, but white people don't make any noise when it happens. Why is that?

We figure the odds of it happening to us are much lower, so we look the other way.
 

twoton

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But that’s almost entirely true. There are 328,000,000 people in the U.S., 800,000 officers, and nearly 18,000 law enforcement agencies. Of course there are going to be bad people in every profession and walk of life. Heck, we’ve got one in the White House.

It’s becoming glaringly obvious (especially with media reporting on covid-19): “Dog Bites Man,” isn’t news. “Man Bites Dog,” is news.
 

keenobserver

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But that’s almost entirely true. There are 328,000,000 people in the U.S., 800,000 officers, and nearly 18,000 law enforcement agencies. Of course there are going to be bad people in every profession and walk of life. Heck, we’ve got one in the White House.

It’s becoming glaringly obvious (especially with media reporting on covid-19): “Dog Bites Man,” isn’t news. “Man Bites Dog,” is news.

There are two issues here - one, you mentioned - getting rid of bad police. That's not the biggest problem. Even if all bad police are immediately and forever purged, the way we police is fundamentally bad and causes a host of problems.

1. We need to stop treating neighborhoods like occupied territory. These are our fellow citizens, not enemy combatants.
2. Police need to walk neighborhoods, on foot, all the time. Cars isolate them. Cars disconnect them from learning the people and habits of a neighborhood - who goes where and does what when. When cops know this, they can know when someone is not where they should be, know when something is wrong. It takes time for cops to learn a neighborhood and earn trust by his presence in that neighborhood.
3. We need to stop buying heavy artillery for policing. No police department needs anti-tank guns and military grade weapons in police cars. The need for SWAT is limited, so we can reduce the size dramatically and save money.
4. We need to get rid of 'qualified immunity' - police should be accountable to the rule of law like any other citizen who sometimes get caught up in the heat of the moment.
5. We need to bring back a variation of the old Police Athletic League only do more than teach boxing. Police and / police funded social workers needs to be a presence in challenged areas to mentor and be a resource for kids without home support. Build the bridge, offer hands up and you won't build as many lock ups.

No one seriously wants to defund down to penniless existing police departments, but we need to but less armor on the street and more resources to help keep people seeing results if they are working to go in the right direction. Better schools are critical and so is much better health care and access to it - especially for younger people. The solution needs to holistic, not piecemeal.
 

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The cops in the US get away with a lot. Civil forfeiture, forced confessions, police brutality, etc. The list of horrible things the cops can do is almost endless, but why? Why aren't more Americans bothered by civil forfeiture or forced confessions or police brutality?

What is it about American culture that allows the police to behave the way that they do?

This will inevitably turn into a discussion about race, so I'll just put this question out there. Why are black people the only Americans concerned with police brutality? Innocent white people get killed by the cops as well, but white people don't make any noise when it happens. Why is that?

It appears your are asking a question for which you have an answer... Why do you care so much? More importantly do you think you are actually going to change anyones view?
 

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Over 17,000 different agencies doing what they want for which ever local fiefdom they work for. If you want police reform it has to start by placing central controls and oversight over them following a single code of conduct, enforcing laws equally. Of course no one likes that approach because it infringes on the state and local government "rights", so you are left with private army's answering to local officials until they lose control and then they want state/federal support or protection.

Look up gun control, medical care,education, etc., and the same problems stem from some of the same people embracing and creating their own liberal interpretation absent any common sense of a 300 year old document as sacrosanct to meet the needs of their particular argument for continuing down the path of "fucked up".
 
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Thikn2velvet1

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How bad is police behavior? There are 11 million arrests made each year. If 10000 of them are unjustified and criminally invalid, thats .09%. But there are not anywhere near 10k invalid arrests.

The reverse is more true, there aren’t enough arrests. Most petty to moderate crime isn’t even prosecuted.

This little incident is illustrative.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost...x-woman-has-been-arrested-over-100-times/amp/

Most career criminals don’t even worry a speck about being arrested and convicted, or they wouldn’t be career criminals.

Only good people worry about being arrested. Look at today, cops have cut back on policing, and crime is skyrocketing.
 

Klingsor

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How bad is police behavior? There are 11 million arrests made each year. If 10000 of them are unjustified and criminally invalid, thats .09%. But there are not anywhere near 10k invalid arrests.

The reverse is more true, there aren’t enough arrests. Most petty to moderate crime isn’t even prosecuted.

This little incident is illustrative.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost...x-woman-has-been-arrested-over-100-times/amp/

Most career criminals don’t even worry a speck about being arrested and convicted, or they wouldn’t be career criminals.

Only good people worry about being arrested. Look at today, cops have cut back on policing, and crime is skyrocketing.

And here I thought we had a problem with mass incarceration and overcrowded prisons. Silly me.
 

Thikn2velvet1

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We figure the odds of it happening to us are much lower, so we look the other way.

If you comply with all laws and conduct yourself in an orderly way, you will never be arrested. If you
keep flaunting the law, you might get arrested, but not likely.

You can get arrested 100 times for public indecency, sex offense, petty drug use and be free in an hour. Rayshard Brooks would be alive today if he would have just taken a DUI, but he chose to fight it out over a DUI. Stupid. He was dead drunk behind the wheel of a car, and thats a really bad thing to do, but just take the arrest and fight the crime in court!

I bet 99.999% of posters here if arrested for a DUI just go to the drunk tank and get a lawyer to fight it, not the cop’s taser.
 

Thikn2velvet1

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And here I thought we had a problem with mass incarceration and overcrowded prisons. Silly me.

That is a sentencing issue, not a police issue, don’t you think? And actually, there are 2.3 million people incarcerated, most with sentences over 5 years, so if about 50 million arrests over 5 years, your odds of being imprisoned are about 5%. Those are rather good odds if you chose a life of crime.
 

Klingsor

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That is a sentencing issue, not a police issue, don’t you think? And actually, there are 2.3 million people incarcerated, most with sentences over 5 years, so if about 50 million arrests over 5 years, your odds of being imprisoned are about 5%. Those are rather good odds if you chose a life of crime.

Pretty shitty odds if you chose to be black.

FECJR_Illustrations_Additionals_779x409_4.jpg
 
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wallyj84

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But that’s almost entirely true. There are 328,000,000 people in the U.S., 800,000 officers, and nearly 18,000 law enforcement agencies. Of course there are going to be bad people in every profession and walk of life. Heck, we’ve got one in the White House.

It’s becoming glaringly obvious (especially with media reporting on covid-19): “Dog Bites Man,” isn’t news. “Man Bites Dog,” is news.

I'm sure most cops are fine people, but there are still huge issues with policing that need to be fixed. My question is why don't people want these problems to be fixed?

I remember in college I got into a discussion about forced confessions. My stance was and still is that they were wrong. When I said that, the person I was speaking to said the people forced into signing confessions for crimes they didn't do "shouldn't have committed the crime". When I pointed out that they didn't commit the crime and were coerced into signing a confession, their reply was to fold their arms and ask why they signed the confession.

Keep in mind this was after we both watched a news program about the dangers of forced confessions.

There is some deeper cultural or psychological thing that allows policing to be like it is in the US. What is it?
 

Klingsor

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Or you could look into the long, sordid history of incarcerating black men in this country, from the neo-slavery of chain gangs, to racially weighted discrepancies in convictions and sentencing, to the hugely lucrative for-profit private prison industry.

I'd recommend the Netflix documentary 13th.
 
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Despite being foreign, I think I can answer this. You see, the US lacked a police force up until the emanicaption of slaves whereas previously it was just sheriffs and deputised locals, the white majority was fearful of vengeful black people and so created police forces to maintain order and to some extent preserve white supremacy. Over time this led to disillusion within the black community from a lack of a protective force in the face of discrimination so gangs were formed. The orginal purpose of these gangs was to protect the predominantly black neighbourhoods. Lacking in funds they resorted to crime to self finance and well...im sure you can guess the rest. The reason why they "choose clumsy lives of crime" as you put it is primarily from these historical reasons but is perpetuated by a collapse of the nuclear family/the absence of good morals. Often case the dad is absent after having been incarcerated for some actual or percieved crime. This leaves the wife as the sole parent in the home. Lacking a strong father figure that can instil some sense of discipline, the sons join the gang to both escape issues at home and find that fatherly figure they lack, in turn becoming what their fathers were. The daughters become accustomed the less than gentlemanly men in the best case or the absence of a father in the worst. Again the lack of a good role model here leads to them making not so wise matches in their relationships. These two factors perpetuate the "clumsy lives" your refering to.
 
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Klingsor

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^^^ I would further emphasize the "perceived crime" point from an even more cynical--but historically accurate--angle. Post emancipation, there was a widespread perception, not only that black people were criminals, but that it was best to keep as many of them as possible in prison, even if there was no indication they had committed a crime.
 

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I'm sure most cops are fine people, but there are still huge issues with policing that need to be fixed. My question is why don't people want these problems to be fixed?

I remember in college I got into a discussion about forced confessions. My stance was and still is that they were wrong. When I said that, the person I was speaking to said the people forced into signing confessions for crimes they didn't do "shouldn't have committed the crime". When I pointed out that they didn't commit the crime and were coerced into signing a confession, their reply was to fold their arms and ask why they signed the confession.

Keep in mind this was after we both watched a news program about the dangers of forced confessions.

There is some deeper cultural or psychological thing that allows policing to be like it is in the US. What is it?

Americans love to punish people. We do it with police and we do it with Facebook. Everyone is guilty until proven innocent, whether we’re rounding up criminals or shaming Karens on social media. (As an aside, “Karen” is somehow an acceptably racist term, isn’t it?)

Everyone across the entire “progressive” to “conservative” socio-political spectrum is on 24/7 alert for anyone they can rage against.

Why should we expect anything different from our police? They’re individuals who are as much a part of our culture as anyone, whether social workers, burger flippers, protesters, doctors, activists, software engineers, politicians, entrepreneurs.....
 
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keenobserver

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Americans love to punish people. We do it with police and we do it with Facebook. Everyone is guilty until proven innocent, whether we’re rounding up criminals or shaming Karens on social media. (As an aside, “Karen” is somehow an acceptably racist term, isn’t it?)

Everyone across the entire “progressive” to “conservative” socio-political spectrum is on 24/7 alert for anyone they can rage against.

Why should we expect anything different from our police? They’re individuals who are as much a part of our culture as anyone, whether social workers, burger flippers, protesters, doctors, activists, software engineers, politicians, entrepreneurs.....

You make some excellent points. "We" mainly punish people for the crime of being different and more so the crime of being poor.
 
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Despite being foreign, I think I can answer this. You see, the US lacked a police force up until the emanicaption of slaves whereas previously it was just sheriffs and deputised locals, the white majority was fearful of vengeful black people and so created police forces to maintain order and to some extent preserve white supremacy. Over time this led to disillusion within the black community from a lack of a protective force in the face of discrimination so gangs were formed. The orginal purpose of these gangs was to protect the predominantly black neighbourhoods. Lacking in funds they resorted to crime to self finance and well...im sure you can guess the rest. The reason why they "choose clumsy lives of crime" as you put it is primarily from these historical reasons but is perpetuated by a collapse of the nuclear family/the absence of good morals. Often case the dad is absent after having been incarcerated for some actual or percieved crime. This leaves the wife as the sole parent in the home. Lacking a strong father figure that can instil some sense of discipline, the sons join the gang to both escape issues at home and find that fatherly figure they lack, in turn becoming what their fathers were. The daughters become accustomed the less than gentlemanly men in the best case or the absence of a father in the worst. Again the lack of a good role model here leads to them making not so wise matches in their relationships. These two factors perpetuate the "clumsy lives" your refering to.
. You see, the US lacked a police force up until the emanicaption of slaves whereas previously it was just sheriffs and deputised locals.


100% not true.
If you're going to try and give a history lesson, you should research your content s lot better than this.
First police force established in Boston, 1838.
Followed by: New York, Chicago, New Orleans, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Newark, Baltimore....
Slaves freed, 1865.

p.s sheriff is law enforcement.
They are actually over the local departments.
Police cover a city. Sheriff covers the county.
The term is result of two words: Shire (the township/county/etc... And Reeve (the person responsible for the law in the area)
Shire+reeve= sheriff.
 
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