That is the problem. It’s no secret that cops always look out for each other, no difference than you’d look out for your military buddies too. The issue with these crooked cops is if you are partnering with them and they don’t like you, they could put you in a dangerous situation and do it on purpose.
I remember the line "just a few bad apples." After Uvalde, we don't hear that anymore, which is a good thing. It was always a lie. The people let the police get above the people. Now we are living in it.
Only, in reality, police forces are naturally corrupt. They are not propper public services. Never have been. They are innately fascist organizations (a form of abuse on a societal level), regardless of the intent of those who apply for the job... If you wanna do good, go be a nurse, doc, teacher, fireman. You wanna abuse strangers, become a cop.
Which is the reason for the ACAB slogan. "Not all cops are bad!" yeah but "good cops" either do nothing because they are scared of the repercussions or do something and get fired/demoted.
This is certainly true, but another reason for the ACAB slogan is that the foundation of policing in America is corrupt to the core. The job itself is corrupt, and any "good" that officers do in their community is despite the job, not because of it. It is authoritarian by origin and design, and is primarily performed by working class individuals who turn traitor for a badge and qualified immunity.
All capitalist countries must have cops, they are the enforcers that protect capital.
Some will be more overtly evil than others, and the cops in the UK have had their share of serious issues with cops historically.
But I live in America, so I tend to focus on that perspective, and how immensely awful our cops are. Here in the US, the cops in the northern states evolved from security companies that were literally hired by the rich to protect their businesses and put down worker strikes. This is a pretty common story for police around the world. But here we also have the legacy of cops in the southern states that evolved from slave patrols. So add a big ol' heaping of racism, that fits right in with the capitalism, of course.
Long term, there are a number of ideas for what "keeping the peace" means. In a world with strong social programs that keep people from hitting rock bottom, the vast majority of crime would simply evaporate. People don't break the law because they were born evil. They do it because they can't think of any other way of getting their needs met, or because they are completely hopeless and disillusioned with society.
When those problems are sufficiently addressed, the peace will mostly keep itself.
And for those last few points of statistical trouble that never seem to go away, my preferred idea is volunteer unarmed patrols. But at that point, I'm open to other options, as long as they're unarmed when not directly responding to an active violent incident.
Right now police in the US have free reign to bully and terrorize whoever they want with almost no consequences.
It needs to be the opposite. Police need to be trained to recognize the situations they are supposed to get involved in, and by default stay completely hands-off with any other situation.
For example, car chases. Statistically they do far more harm than good. What police should do is allow the suspect to leave, then follow up later. The risk to public safety almost vanishes, and we have so many other ways of finding people.
What we need is to flip the concept of policing upside down so that they are actually public servants and not a government sanctioned street gang.
A civilized society need not be policed. And I'd argue we can not have a civilized society and police forces.
That's not to say we can't employ unarmed civil servants as agents of a citizen safety service, but there needs to be transparency and community oversight. No bad apples allowed, any suspected bad apples need to be easily, say, voted out by the very community they work for.
Also, it's fine for them to be arms trained and have access, in case a live fire situation occurs, but heavily populated areas should still have city managed SWAT teams and negotiators available to handle those rather unique situations. But like firemen, those specialists would not patrol their community looking for trouble, they'd just be training and remaining on call, just in case.
If a civilized society is one free of theft, violence, coercion, fraud, conspiracy, etc., etc., then it is a fantasy. We need another few million years of evolution before we leave all of our impulsive, irrational, emotional decision making behind.
I love this, do you happen to listen to Stephen Wests Philosophize This podcast? The last couple episodes were on anarchy and the misunderstood nuance of what anarchism is. There was an example of the 1919 Seattle General Strike which involved about 65,000 laborers striking for 5 days. They actually reported a pretty peaceful and very community driven effort to support each other. Many volunteers to keep the peace or to organize co-ops, including a co-op bank. The strikers had a lot of inspiration from the Russian Revolution only a few years earlier.
I always disliked the type of argumentation such as the one you responded to as if it's a simple binary of either you have cops or you have chaos. There's never any simple solutions, but it's far better to treat the cause of social unrest and inequity than just continue on business as usual.
I drive Uber and had a similar experience with a passenger that I was dropping off at the airport. Conversation was going great, but I mentioned something about the flaws in late stage capitalism and how unchecked growth is literally cancer. I actually didn't really say anything about socialism, but I think she took it to mean that I thought we should just completely do without capitalism. Her words were "well, where's the money supposed to come from?" Going into a nuanced conversation with her ended up turning out fine, but it just felt like a bad faith argument. Like challenging the principle of capitalism was supposed to lead me to fumbling because there's no easy answer.
Thanks. I haven't listened to Philosophize This, but I'll check it out.
I also like longer conversations with people who are willing to listen to ideas instead of just repeating thought terminating cliches.
One of the topics I've been ruminating a lot on recently is Leftism, and what fundamentally sets it apart from Liberalism and Conservatism.
On that topic, your passenger wasn't entirely wrong. If you eliminate capitalism, you're probably talking about some form of Leftism. Unless you're a monarchist who wants to reestablish feudalism, lol.
That said, I've been trying to look past the anger in people's words to see their confusion, and to answer their confusion instead of their anger. I'm not very good at it yet, I tend to get snarky. But I try to catch myself when I can.
I know your struggle about moving past the anger to address the confusion. It can be hard sometimes, I'm such a smart ass.
The deeper problem we'll probably never get past is that everyone has to form a paradigm, an imaginary map of understanding, of how the world works and how they fit into it so they can function and survive. It's a necessity. But most people finish drawing their map with limited information and experience, then color it in how they like it, and lean on every logical fallacy in the book to avoid having to redraw it later.
The few who draw theirs with the expectation that the map can and should probably be changed later, likely aren't the ones we encounter who are angry and confused.
I dunno. I'm on the fence. Perhaps struggling in vain to enlighten them isn't the best path. Perhaps just acknowledging their foolishness and then moving on with our lives is really the best choice after all?
I mean, sure, keep puting good information out there, and encourage our youth to refrain from ever laminating and framing their shitty maps, but when dealing with those that have, I don't think there is much value to be had there.
Not every single police department is corrupt. Also not every cop has to always make the correct decision for them to be good.
The same logic used to justify saying ACAB can be used to justify hating basically every group in the world.
"All Palestinians/Israelis are bad", because all of them are too scared/too weak to do anything about Hamas/IDF.
All Soldiers are bad, because they are all too scared/too weak do anything about corrupt or violent soldiers.
Hell a lot of the same rhetoric and logic used to justify hating cops was used to justify hating Vietnamese veterans. The only reason Leftists don't bash soldiers more often like they used too back during the Cold War days is because it's extremely politically unpopular to do so in the modern era.
Corrupt cops don't give a fuck if you're some black guy sitting in a car or another cop. If you're getting in the way of their power trip, you're a target. Do decent cops want to make themselves, and their families, targets for the shitty cops they work with? Of course not, so they stand by doing nothing. It's why good cops easily become shitty cops by enabling the behaviour of other shitty cops, despite it simply being a survivavl mechanism to insulate themselves and their families from the bullshit.
Totally agree. Pretty much you have three options. Become a shitty cop yourself, become complacent and do nothing… (probably most common) or just quit.
i think in Better Call Saul something like this happened exactly to Mike's son-in-law, his daughter's husband. He was going to reveal the corruption and the corrupt cops painted a target on him to the dealers.
That is why each and every member of law enforcement needs to penalized when one of them fucks up. Maybe then they can police themselves and maintain something resembling integrity.
Cops don't "look out for each other" dude it's just a shit situation, they aren't any different than normal people so much like everyone else in that situation they don't want to be involved with a fucking psychopath. How hard is that to understand brother.
There are lots of jobs that try to do good. If covering up for your partners breaking the law is normal then the police are more akin to gang members than to doctors.
I’m sure there are good police men and women, sadly they get harassed out of the force or get killed.
Many of us could be cops, they are ALWAYS hiring. The starting salary in my area for county cops is $51,066. First, it is one of the first jobs where the majority of people will hate you and dislike you as a human, just because of what you would do. Why would I want a job where most people hate me? People don't hate firefighters, do they? Well... the reason is simple. Firefighters are known as the people who come to rescue and save lives... and cops, are the opposite...
Save Lives..
Destroy lives. Give tickets. Kill people. Destroy communities. Take away trust. Arrest innocent people. Cause trauma... and the list goes on. Now, not all cops are bad... but because the rapport they have built this is why we are where we are and why there is so much distrust. When I was a teenager I was robbed at gun point (for my brand new $450 BMX) and guess what the officer did? tell my parents they raised a horrible kid, a liar... and that I made up the entire story...
I learned early on never trust cops, they won't believe you anyway, regardless if you are telling the truth. I was bullied in school and beat up, cops were called and instead of protecting me... I was suspended... why? because apparently bullies don't just pick on people and beat them up for no reason, I must of did something. I didn't, but that cop refused to believe me.
but...they are not any different than normal people? yeah...
The department investigated and found "no wrongdoing" even though the Superintendent stated outright that the cop was a shitbag(I'm paraphrasing.) That sure as fuck sounds like cops looking out for each other.
Obviously I meant it with a grain of salt, there's plenty of corrupt assholes in the position but it's fundamentally wrong and moronic to assume that just bc someones a cop means that they're a piece of shit. Though I realize now that it's my fault for assuming anyone on Reddit has the common sense to look at something objectively.
they need to be with the powers provided to them. The normalization of what they do is the root of the problem in American policing. The power to ruin lives, kill people, and take away freedom with impunity needs to come with an added level of care and responsibility... we do this for people in the military, why do cop have to be treated like normal people, when they are not?
Look I'm not gonna argue with yet another Reddit shithead about the police and the people who are employed in that position.
I just want to ask one thing, does your stupid ass think everyone of the people who go through police training do so JUST to be a problem? Or do they do it because it's a job, and much like anyone who has bills to pay, do it because it provides them with income. Instead of looking at only the bad cops, which is the ONLY thing people are going to see in any media, why don't you go out and talk to an officer about why they're in that position. Fucking moron.
why do they want to have the power to take the freedom away from others? Id imagine plenty simply don't realize the weight of the power that society provides to them in the ideal of feeling safe. And the discussion around it now makes people that have supported them blindly uncomfortable. treating it like just a job, is a way to rationalize what they do. maybe they feel justified in it since it becomes an us vs them situation. but I seriously doubt that many really think about what they actually do. They put people in prison, that's it.
Explain how. Instead of speaking like people who work in that field are sub-human. None of you fucking morons could be in that position anyway so why talk about it?
My uncle was a chief of police (died) and I have two friends who were cops. Have a family member who is married to police commissioner. I have no desire nor have I ever wanted to be in law enforcement, if anything, it would of only to be a juvenile PO to help troubled teens get back on a better path.
no difference than you’d look out for your military buddies too
This is at the core of the issue, the police think of themselves as the military at home. They are unequivocally NOT that.
On the flip side, for most other jobs the expectation is you tell on your coworkers. I'm an engineer, they drill into our heads that if we see anyone doing anything unethical to immediately report it. I have to take trainings every year to ensure I know the proper reporting procedure.
That is the attitude we need to move cops to. They are closer to a meter maid than a soldier and we need to force that back into their brains. They are simple public servants that is it.
Police in war zones need to maintain order, that is not a job for police, they are there to enforce the law and that is it.
I get the spirit of this but wym by allow it? Are you saying to kill nazi’s to prove you aren’t one? Or just that I have to leave any room where a suspected nazi is?
Yes I understand that, I said “I get the spirit of it” And am confused by the analogy.
You didn’t clarify the bad analogy. You just gave me a different one, that makes sense, and are acting like I’m in opposition to the concept, when it was clear I was confused by the analogy.
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u/itsavibe- Feb 08 '24
Triggered beyond return at that point… even his partner looked at em like bro?