We expect all gun owners with a concealed carry permit to be better than that. Every single one. And for the most part? They are. So how can we ask everyone in America with a CCW permit - millions of people - to act with restraint and have it happen, then turn around and say "but the police can't"? I feel like I know CCW holders who are responsible people, and I don't want to think that they're all secretly just waiting to "wield their awesome power".Captain Crimson wrote: ↑Tue Jun 02, 2020 11:33 pmI'd agree with most of the points, except bits and bobs. To that, I will counter-retort.Fuzzy Necromancer wrote: ↑Tue Jun 02, 2020 11:00 pm So you got any thoughts on GreyICE's list of demands, Madner?
What do you expect from people charged with a duty who are carrying armed weapons, which demands a certain level of respect to the awesome power they possess? A military mindset is not going to be that far removed from them, and it is buried within all social settings, despite our peaceful veneer. And riot gear and kicking down doors has their place. As to civilian oversight, I'd agree here, but I'd also say that I would prefer an exception for genuine undercover cases, like detectives and the like.
In fact I'd like to say that many of them would prefer to never fire their gun at all except at the range or when hunting. Many have told me as much. I believe them. Some of them have been ex-military, and have wielded awesome power. One drove a tank - an actual M-1 Abrams. He enjoyed shooting, and is good at it (although I haven't spoken to him in several years, but I doubt he got worse). Good man. Sold most of his guns when his first kid was born because he didn't want his kids to grow up to do what daddy did. I don't think he ever wanted to fire a gun at a human ever.
Sure. But not for drugs. For weapons smugglers, maybe. For Al Qaeda. You don't even need a team in every city - you could have a handful of hyper militarized teams that trained on army bases and came in when shit got real (police Delta Force). That way there isn't pressure to use them either. Once your city spends two million dollars on SWAT, they have to do something with it. If a state (or for smaller ones, groups of states) fund a few highly trained squads, there's much less pressure to use them.Captain Crimson wrote: ↑Tue Jun 02, 2020 11:33 pmAnd riot gear and kicking down doors has their place.
There are "bad dudes" who need that. But they're rare, and they'll be made more rare by more peace, not less. Criminals ultimately don't want the sort of heat that being militarized brings, because they're a business (an unethical and violent one, but a business nevertheless). No one buys from you if you're in a shootout.
The war on drugs has cost our country so, so much. And I can only look at what we paid and say "we lost."
Definitely! Oversight when cases or over, or when things have gone sideways. The intent is not to sit there staring over a cops shoulder whenever they write a ticket. Just review times when force was used, when it was used, and look over major cases. Maybe a random sampling of other ones, make sure they're all in order, but the intent would not be to bury the police under paperwork or justifications.Captain Crimson wrote: ↑Tue Jun 02, 2020 11:33 pmAs to civilian oversight, I'd agree here, but I'd also say that I would prefer an exception for genuine undercover cases, like detectives and the like.
A better trained police would use force less anyway. Maybe eventually the civilian oversight begins to feel superfluous, and the special prosecutor spends most of their time playing golf because the rare times the police use force are obviously justified. That'd be a wonderful thing to waste money on, rather than wasting it on payments to people who have been wronged by the police, faultlessly imprisoned, beaten, killed.
I'd love to waste money instead having people check through the police's work and prepare reports showing us all was well. That strikes me as an ideal world, in many ways.
