Maniac Pittsburgh cop notorious for that sort of thing

It may not be reassuring, but I don’t think this should rule out Pittsburgh, but not because Pittsburgh cops are good. They are every bit as awful as the story says, but so are cops in pretty much any other place you would be considering. Violent armed gangs employed by cities with strong contract protection is the norm rather than the exception. Judge the school based on its merits and work to change the systemic problems wherever the little one lands.

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Lots of people with small penises aren’t raging assholes.


All we are asking for is some fucking accountability. This guy shouldn’t be a cop. Best case scenario, he runs a Cinibon franchise in Omaha in 6 months.

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Legal advice from Mr. S. Duh! esq. to Pittsburgh: To address budget shortfalls and possibly help mitigate police violence, have violent, recalcitrant cops pay the settlements… stupid.

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Come on now, that’s not the Murkan way. Perps in police, schools, any government outfit – they do bad and, at best, taxpayers foot the bills. Personal responsibility? Pish.

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He’ll keep his job until he kills someone or retires. That’s only if he doesn’t do his killing in the line of duty though.

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Personal responsibility is precisely the point.

We do want people doing these jobs don’t we? In some form or other? The reason taxpayers foot the bill is because these people are acting for (in the sense of instead of) us. They are acting on our behalf not their own.

If they act improperly, that is our responsibility since we (collectively) chose these people to represent/act for us, decided on their training and equipment and set up the environment and culture in which they operate.

The remedy is to remove/replace/improve them, their training and their environment.

Pushing for personal financial responsibility mistakes the cause of the problem and, worse, weakens social cohesion and democracy and plays into the hands of those who want to turn us all into rugged individualists, pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps and busily trying to outcompete everyone around us in all things.

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it’s all my fault

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Well I’m glad you’ve owned up. Now I won’t have to keep the entire class back after school.

I’ve already confessed to everything. Except Jimmy Hoffa.

It’s worse. Fired means you just go get another job. The unions have made sure that if accountability accidentally actually happens, then the records don’t follow the poor “victim”. I’m sure there is room for abuse on the other side of harassing police who leave a bad force or get targeted by a loony, but right now it’s way one-sided.

Well, no. Not as shown in the video. I don’t think that’s a job that needs doing.

I’m pretty sure this cop didn’t have anyone else’s behalf in mind. Citing the federal flag code at someone, even if he’s a cop, doesn’t warrant this type of treatment.
I don’t think you were trying to excuse this guy, but fuck this guy. Fuck him and the barrel that’s kept his rottenness rotting for so long.
I do think you’re correct in that he, individually, being made financially liable isn’t the best solution. Make the police force that’s kept him employed be responsible. Then they’ll think twice about keeping guys like him on the force.
And if there’s any way we could bring that irresponsible judge who has let him get away with these abuses into the pool of responsible parties, all the better, in my book.

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I agree with most of what you say but again - the sentence quoted above also seeks to push the responsibility into some other group. These people (and that includes the judge) are our collective and individual responsibility as citizens of our respective polities. The organisations and systems that exist are there because enough of us accept them as they are.

I don’t understand what you’re getting at. By your framework, was it wrong for people to hold Bill Cosby or Harvey Weinstein legally accountable for their transgressions, because after all, the film and tv industries exist as they are because we, as a public, accept them?
And speaking of a civic structure, like a police force, I think it’s unfair to say they exist as they are because enough of us accept them as they are. At some point the power balance shifts and fighting to change them means a lot more than a majority of people not accepting them. It means not accepting them to the point that you will put yourself and your loved ones in great danger.

That’s hardly surprising - I’m barely intelligible to myself at the best of times. :slight_smile: I’ll try and do better.

I would posit that those situations are fundamentally different in that neither Cosby or Weinstein were appointed to positions of public responsibility. They were private individuals acting in their private capacities on their own behalfs (behalves? huh, turns out either is fine, which I suppose is fair enough since both look equally wrong to me)

I am also not arguing for freedom from personal consequences for the officers, etc. in question. There should be personal consequences but not in a way that absolves the polity (i.e. us) from its responsibility for the acts of its servants which is what is mostly proposed (as in "why should the city/tax-payers have to pay for bad cops?).

Cops and other public servants who break the law should obviously face consequences - the fact that they often don’t is our failing as members of our respective societies. And therefore something we should do something about.

To which I can only respond that it is not unfair since it is in my view true.

Which does not mean it is not our responsibility, it ‘merely’ means it is difficult and dangerous.

Whether one thinks that one should nevertheless take action becomes a question of moral philosophy.

I suppose one way of putting it would be to say that if one is prepared to accept the existing institutions despite their flaws because one is afraid of violence or death to oneself or one’s loved ones, one is literally ‘prepared to live with’ the corrupt institutions.

Thanks for clarifying. I think we disagree on some fundamentals, or communication is just imperfect (more likely), but I appreciate whenever someone’s willing to take the time to help someone else understand their viewpoint.
And I trust we agree in the most important fundamental related to the OP: fuck this guy, amiright? :slight_smile:

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