State of Emergency: Baltimore Edition

[The Question]

Far too many variables to make that a plausible side by side comparison.

What are those variables?

 

[\S/JcDc\S/]

What are those variables?

Nope, not engaging on this one bud. I have a feeling any variable I mention you will refute. You aren't asking out of care for another opinion, you are coming across as knowing every answer and it is getting kind of annoying. It is just as bad as those who view every case of police brutality the fault of a black criminal. You are being the other side of this extreme. Every case involving the cop is systematic oppression and Americans are evil. Justification for only one side in literally every case is such a blatant agenda.

 

[BatmanVSuperman]

Nope, not engaging on this one bud. I have a feeling any variable I mention you will refute. You aren't asking out of care for another opinion, you are coming across as knowing every answer and it is getting kind of annoying. It is just as bad as those who view every case of police brutality the fault of a black criminal. You are being the other side of this extreme. Every case involving the cop is systematic oppression and Americans are evil. Justification for only one side in literally every case is such a blatant agenda.

 

[Evelisse]

hmm I don't know, so if you took 300,000 americans to go live on a land mass the size of Iceland with all the mixed cultures and the law enforcement system we currently have, I don't trust in that hypothetical that suddenly they'd be right in line with Icelands type results.

 

[The Question]

Nope, not engaging on this one bud.

If you don't want to engage me, then why are you engaging me?

I have a feeling any variable I mention you will refute.

Yes, that generally happens when people disagree about things. You can choose to defend your argument and you can choose not to, both are entirely valid options, but don't avoid defending your argument by claiming that the other person is being unreasonable because they might disagree with your argument.

You aren't asking out of care for another opinion, you are coming across as knowing every answer and it is getting kind of annoying.

I do believe that the things I believe to be correct are correct. Everyone thinks that way. What exactly is annoying about people who don't immediately fold on their stance when someone else says that they're wrong without offering any evidence to back it up?

It is just as bad as those who view every case of police brutality the fault of a black criminal. You are being the other side of this extreme. Every case involving the cop is systematic oppression and Americans are evil. Justification for only one side in literally every case is such a blatant agenda.

Oh hey, look, twisting my words again.

Awesome.

I never said Americans are evil.

I never said that ever case involving a cop is systematic oppression.

What I said is that America, as a political and cultural entity, has the entirely wrong approach to crime prevention, and that the problem in law enforcement has nothing to do with the moral character of individual officers and is instead the result of systematic oppression and bias on a cultural and institutional level.

 

[The Question]

hmm I don't know, so if you took 300,000 americans to go live on a land mass the size of Iceland with all the mixed cultures and the law enforcement system we currently have, I don't trust in that hypothetical that suddenly they'd be right in line with Icelands type results.

Yes, I agree. But I never said that Iceland's results were because of the size of their land mass. I said that it was because they have a radically different law enforcement system and social welfare system. So for course putting our law enforcement system in a place the size of Iceland would not result in the same outcomes seen in Iceland.

 

[Kar]

Even if a wrongful death, a thug is still a thug. A guy (not even talking about Gray) has a rap sheet for drugs, theft, battery, etc... they are a thug. A guy just robs a store, tries to take a cop gun and fights with him... thug. A wrongful act of a cop doesn't change that.

Selling/possessing drugs doesn't make you a thug.

So say you have you a potdealer like Saul from "Pineapple Express"...is he considered a thug? Cause I don't feel like guys like him would get that label.

Just a question.

 

[Sithborg]

Except that even when you adjust for the differences in population, our rate of deaths-by-cop are still outrageously high than theirs, because we have had 388 in the past five months and they have had one since 1944.

The only way their rate would be at pace with ours, even if you take population difference into account, is if they had 3 deaths-by-cop in the past five months. Not one since 1944.

And we've had 38 police officers killed in the line of duy this year, while Iceland has had one, two years ago, since 1944.

You can't just compare us to another country to rant about how we are doing it wrong. There are significant socio-economic issues that can't easily be compared to other nations.

 

[Kelly]

If the person selling/possessing drugs is violent, then yes I see him as a thug. But the guy in the apartment below me that likes to smoke a joint on the weekends? No, he's not a thug...at least not in my opinion anyway. NOW, if he grabbed an old ladies purse, hurting her to get the money to buy the weed...then yes he is a thug.

 

[Erzengel]

I don't know how one "gauges" the amount of force that one should be allowed to bring someone down. Outside of arguing extremes like half a dozen cops to take 1 suspect down, I know cops who have told me how difficult it is just to handcuff someone who doesn't want to be handcuffed.

 

[The Question]

And we've had 38 police officers killed in the line of duh this year, while Iceland has had one, two years ago, since 1944.

I'm not sure how that number refutes my point at all. Our aggressive policies on law enforcement and crime prevention also put the individual police officers at greater risk by creating an environment of aggressive policies that naturally escalate violence. Our system may be worse for people who are on the receiving end of police justice, but our system is still pretty bad for individual police officers themselves. It's an unnecessarily low pay/high risk job that results in mental illness and burnout where the officials only protect you in cases where it is in their own interest to do so, like not wanting to look bad if you screw up and hurt somebody.

You can't just compare us to another country to rant about how we are doing it wrong. There are significant socio-economic issues that can't easily be compared to other nations.

Except for the part where the significant socio-economic issues were a huge part of my "rant" about how we're doing it wrong. Iceland puts their focus on addressing the socioeconomic causes of crime at their root, so crime doesn't even happen in the first place, whereas the united states focuses on (very aggressive) enforcement first and prevention as a distant second.

That's why I went into detail about how their social safety net, socialized medicine, and rehabilitation-model corrections system is a huge part of why their crime rate is so low and use-of-force by police is so rare. The socioeconomic factors that cause America to experience a higher rate of violent crime is a problem of our own making.

 

[Kelly]

Until the autopsy is released its very hard to give a full opinion. Just speculating, the one thing that has stayed in my mind from the first minute that I heard about this was how officers sometimes put their knee just below the neck when handcuffing people that are resisting. Then it came to mind when my dad was in a car wreck, he went to the hospital, was discharged, went to work the next day and then got a call from the doctor who told him to immediately get flat on his back, to not move until an ambulance came, secured him properly and got him to the hospital. Another doctor viewed the x-rays and saw something that was missed before that could have killed him had he been hit wrong, shoved, tripped, etc. So, remembering all of that....the scenario I mentioned above seemed very possible, and very possible that he was walking, got into the van and very well could have either been tossed around or tossed himself around that did the further damage to what damage was inflicted on him by the handcuffing.

I have no clue, I have not seen any evidence to that....it was just something that came to my mind first when I heard about this.

I think what I'm tired of seeing the most is the knee jerk reaction that seems to be as big of a knee jerk reaction of those that said the officers did nothing wrong, the guy was a drug addict, and probably did it to himself....the knee jerk reaction of people to say that the cops did it on purpose, officers are too aggressive today as a whole, etc....is just as ignorant.

With all of that said, I think the Prosecutor has set a standard too high and she may have just set up the city for more violence. She has to prove, when, where, how and by who the actions took place. motive etc. That is going to be VERY DIFFICULT....IMO, it would have been better to push it to a Federal case of Civil Rights which very well could have been proven in this case I believe. They are making the same mistake that they did in the Rodney King case... Right now the only thing she can truly prove beyond a shadow of a doubt is Negligence and Failure to Render Aid, and that is against the driver.

 

[The Question]

the knee jerk reaction of people to say that the cops did it on purpose, officers are too aggressive today as a whole, etc....is just as ignorant.

I don't see how that is either a knee jerk reaction, as it is a statement about long-term nationwide trends and not about any individual case, or ignorant, as it can very easily be backed up with facts and data.

 

[AndrewGilkison]

Is it true that knife Grey was carrying was legal as opposed to illegal (which is why he was arrested, for carrying an illegal knife)?

 

[Kelly]

Is it true that knife Grey was carrying was legal as opposed to illegal (which is why he was arrested, for carrying an illegal knife)?

Yes...

The arrest is getting weaker and weaker and weaker...

 

[Kelly]

I don't see how that is either a knee jerk reaction, as it is a statement about long-term nationwide trends and not about any individual case, or ignorant, as it can very easily be backed up with facts and data.

Of course you would react to that comment...

But I'm sorry, your diatribe is getting really tiring. So, I'll just leave it at that.

 

[Sithborg]

Yes...

The arrest is getting weaker and weaker and weaker...

Yeah, the state attorney flat out called it illegal.

 

[The Question]

Of course you would react to that comment...

But I'm sorry, your diatribe is getting really tiring. So, I'll just leave it at that.

If you're not actually going to respond to what a person has to say, then why bother commenting at all?

 

[Kelly]

If you're not actually going to respond to what a person has to say, then why bother commenting at all?

yeah, why do I bother...good question.

 

[DJ Kornphlake]

If you're not actually going to respond to what a person has to say, then why bother commenting at all?

Probably didn't want a diatribe response of why she isn't responding to you.

 

[The Question]

Probably didn't want a diatribe response of why she isn't responding to you.

Yeah, because that's a thing that I do.

 

[chaseter]

What exactly is that supposed to mean?

How many threads on here or social media movements happening for dead white kids? It's disgusting that there is a black lives matter movement and someone here actually tried to rationalize it. ALL LIVES MATTER. But of course continue the riot over Freddie. Open the dialogue for everyone. Quit debasing all cops, other ethnicities, and hijacking actual needed movements like police brutality into a racist mouth diarrhea that evolves into riots that will be smashed by the media and forgotten in 6 months by everyone else. That benefits no one except the usual suspect race baiters that make money off of racism (Sharpton, Fox News, Jackson, etc).

 

[chaseter]

People mistaken #BlackLivesMatter as us/people saying "only ours matters and no one else's" but that's not the case at all. Its a reminder that our lives aren't worthless like the way they're treated. A black kid/woman/person is dead at the hands of a system that is supposed to protect us and the media decides to bring up things like rap sheets and criminal pasts to make it appear as if because they had these charges or records their lives don't mean anything. We say "black lives matter" when we see blacks getting shot up in Walmarts by police for having a toy gun, but then you have white criminals/suspects who aren't met with the same lethal force.

Yes, all lives matter. But yall didn't start saying that until everyone else started saying "black lives matter". Because there isn't really a need for white people to reassure the media or themselves that their lives matter over others cause that's practically been proven, if you ask me.

Such a sad, warped bias.

 

[DJ Kornphlake]

Better than having an ignorant one.

 

[chaseter]

If you get shot by a cop, no civil rights leaders will be at your family's house. No riots will follow. No news coverage. Now tell me whose life matters more.