“Unaccountable paramilitary death squads”.
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LOL! You’ve just proved the point!
I was agreeing and expanding upon @LemoUtan’s comment that there are two different types of “I’m sorry”: the kind where you apologize because you’ve done something wrong and are willing to admit it, and the kind where you are simply showing empathy with someone who’s had a bad situation even though you weren’t specifically involved in causing the problem.
There’s a major difference between men and women in U.S. culture on this issue. Women are significantly more likely to say “I’m sorry” despite not being personally culpable. They’re not taking ownership of a mistake; they’re showing sympathy, that’s all.
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My mother forwarded us a group email with a photo of a dog and that exact hashtag. Can’t even remember what it said because I deleted it so quickly. It was clearly meant to be dismissive (insulting) to the BLM movement, not supportive at all.
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I suppose if there was an intruder on their property twenty years ago, they’d be lauded as heroes for shooting the cop today.
/s
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Does anyone else find it interesting that THIS thread about police brutality didn’t draw a round of cop apologists, in the same way a thread about another black man being shot would be?
Just wanted that in the record.
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It is:
but it bears repeating.
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Oh! Sorry I missed it!
Signal boost for @GilbertWham’s comment.
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Oh, FFS. Why did I click that link…
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I come from a law and order family (2 RCMP and a lawyer for siblings), so I feel the need to speak for the police.
What disgusts me is the amount of time in training devoted to maintaining authority, shooting, and marching up and down done at the RCMP training campus. More time is spent on teaching them how to gain control of a situation than de-escalating it. From what my brothers tell me, most of their job is talking to people and filing paper work, which is barely covered in their training.
One of my brothers went into the RCMP with a criminology degree and the other with sociology degree. Guess what? The brother with the criminology degree is more likely to automatically delineate the world into good guys and bad guys and if you are categorized into the bad guy group, he believes he can do anything he must to catch the bad guy. His approach to law enforcement is to go in the situation, assert his authority and if you don’t automatically summit to his authority, he bullies them until he does. He started his career all gung-ho about beating up bad guys and being involved in all the cop tv action drama stuff. He has never shot anyone, and he would never shoot a dog (he loves dogs), but I feel like if he was a cop in the US, the culture there would crystallize his authoritarian streak and he probably would end up shooting someone.
On the other hand, my brother with the sociology degree is more likely to respond to a call by talking to the involved parties and defuse a situation. I’ve seen him talk circles around an angry drunk until the guy does exactly what he wants him to. It is like magic to see him sympathize with all parties and treat them with respect and rarely does he need to resort to force. It takes him a lot longer to complete a call, and he is much more likely to let people off with a warning rather than putting them in the system. Unfortunately, I think he is burning out and will likely be looking for another career soon. His method of policing does not get as much support and my other brothers, and I think that is a cultural thing.
My point is, I think training, support, and culture goes a long way in how police do their jobs. As others have pointed out, the police in the US feel like they are in enemy territory and act accordingly. They feel like they are under attack and so respond by neutralizing any threat, let it be the family pet or a guy that says he has an open carry permit.
We need to treat police like people doing an unpleasant job and police need to remember that everyone else are people too. Us vrs Them mentality won’t help anyone. Everyone deserves respect until they prove otherwise.
We need to encourage police training that emphasizes talking over guns. We need to encourage psychological support for all first responders so that the stress they are under do not take them past the breaking point. We need to hold police accountable for their actions and not allow them be authoritarian pricks. Police culture needs to change to serving the people instead of sorting people into bad guys and good guys.
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Of course your bird would be considered threatening. Birds go for the eyes, man. Everybody know this.
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Amen.
Thanks for the personal share 
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I’ve been thinking about this topic for a while - what I would do if a LEO shot one of my dogs.
BK: my dogs are my best friends. I’ve had a lot of loss in my life (everyone I love or care about has died and my birth year only starts with a seven) so I’m pretty attached to them. I’ve also had a K9 in my life pretty much uninterrupted since I was in 4th grade - so yea, I’m biased.
ITE: I think it might very well break me, I may have to take it upon myself to enact revenge.
Somewhat related: someone once asked me what I thought it would take for LEO’s to stop abusing those they arrest. I totes don’t agree with the recent turn of events, but I do think it will take civilian intervention. By that I mean, any time a LEO steps out of line (slamming children to curb, shooting the defenseless, beating an already detained individual) citizens need to step in then - consequences be darned- to stop the LEO’s from abusing another citizen. If all people did that every time a LEO crossed the line, I think we would have change.
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We know what’s wrong; the question is how to fix it.
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obvious psychopath is obvious
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Police officer’s excuse: "I felt threatened."
Okay. Apparently, in the US, that counts as an excuse for a police officer to use excessive violence.
In other places, the test would be whether he had reason to feel threatened, or whether a reasonable person with his knowledge of the situation would feel threatened. Where “his knowledge of the situation” includes all the training about not shooting things (and people) that police officers get in other places.
But going back to his car to fetch a rifle? How has that not ended the threat that supposedly required him to shoot the dog?
Is he denying that he went back to the car?
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I can’t help thinking that would rapidly end up the equivalent of the Miranda
I [insert name] am sincerely sorry that this [bad thing] which happened to you [for the nth time]. Please accept my sincere and/or heartfelt and/or deepest sympathy and/or condolences [strike out all which do not apply] for your distress. However please note that in offering my sympathy and/or condolences I accept no legal responsibility for its cause(s), either for myself or the organisation which I represent.
All to be said in a deadpan monotone.
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In fairness to your criminologist RCMP brother, the Mounties are used to dealing with some unequivocally Bad Guys.
Not a lot of nuance there.
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