dudalb
Penultimate Amazing
And we had just as many who were in a "racist cop guns down innocent black man without reason" mode as soon as the news broke. So convieent memories works both ways.
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DOJ: Ferguson PD descrimination against blacks is routine
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And we had just as many who were in a "racist cop guns down innocent black man without reason" mode as soon as the news broke. So convieent memories works both ways.
In addition to the blatant racism, the cops and the courts were encouraged to write citations and impose fines because a big percentage of the city budget was financed by traffic tickets and related "failure to appear" etc. penalties. People went to jail because they couldn't afford to pay trivial tickets.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...can-turn-into-a-plundering-collection-agency/
Foolmewunz
Grammar Resistance Leader, TLA Dictator
Perhaps you could explain the mechanism to me. I'm not too bright, as you know. I was commenting on the number of posters in this thread who were claiming that the discussions of the Ferguson riots and the shooting contained no knee-jerk blind defense of the police.
Do I have to state both sides? I have buddies on these forums who I can count on to jump in on either side of the argument with automatic knee-jerk responses. Tu-Quoqiness is not necessary as I'm not discussing the question of whether "they done it, too!" but pointing out to the attendees in the thread that several posts had been made, and several posts had passed after them with everyone seeming to give a tacit nod of assent to the contents... which were blatantly incorrect.
Sadly yes. This is what a lot of social/political debate has devolved into. You can't give one side a cookie without giving the other side a cookie and all statements have to be addended (that needs to be a word) with statements about things people from other social/political ideologies did.
So every "Here is a thing a Democrat Did" must immediately be followed with "But a Republican did this thing!" Every "Famous Conservative caught doing X" will always produce a "But what about that time that famous Liberal got caught doing Y?" If you stub your left big toe just go ahead and lightly smack your right big toe with a ball peen hammer.
It's not a demand for context as I'm sure will be the defense, but a state of constant perpetual hijack where everything that happens exists not as problems we as a society have to solve but as points on the scorecards of opposing ideologies. When you cease having mere opinions and start having causes and movements earning points starts to become very important.
Now in honesty I do find it sorta... interesting that while DOJ was so critical of the FPD they were actually much less severe in their review of the actual shooting case that started it all, leaving us perhaps looking at one of those rare occasions where a watershed moment that brings a lot of problems to light in hindsight not have been the prime Ur example of it that was assumed at the beginning.
But that's all it is to me, interesting. Not the sign of any greater meaning.
dudalb
Penultimate Amazing
I was pointing out that as soon as the news broke , people in this forum were already saying this was a case making this into a "innocent black kid gunned down by evil cop" scenario without waiting for the facts. Just check the posting history of the first Brown thread.
dudalb
Penultimate Amazing
I more I read about the DOJ's report, the more I think that Ferguson is a modern version of Hazard County in the DUkes of Hazzard. The shakedown racket the police were running would make Boss Hawg Proud. And if it's ture the town treasurer was telling the cops to increase the money they take in by 10% the corruption goes way beyond the police department.
Yes there was. And plenty of the other side as well. That's the point.
Far too many social/political arguments begin with the dog chasing it's own tail. There's so much baggage between the sides once an event occurs that we all know is going get split down our traditional sides the argumentative loop is practically there before the argument is.
Far too many social/political arguments begin with the dog chasing it's own tail. There's so much baggage between the sides once an event occurs that we all know is going get split down our traditional sides the argumentative loop is practically there before the argument is.
And that's why, while I of course don't discount the racial inequalities as a prime motivating factor, the trend of police forces using law enforcement as a revenue generator bugs me more and might actually be a better place to focus reforms.
Even assuming a hypothetical 100% perfectly pure and honest police force operating under nothing but good intentions where every individual arrest, search, seizure and conviction is totally justified a police force directly monetarily benefiting from its own law enforcement actives is simply a by definition conflict of interest.
Making money off of how much law you enforce puts a police department, even as I said one operating under 100% the right intentions, in direct competition with it's own reason for existing. You make more money by stopping more crime when your goal is to have less crime to stop in the first place.
Then throw into that mix other issue like we obviously had in Ferguson and... well you see what we get.
You mean the black mourners shooting in an apartment complex and threatening to kill police?
Upchurch
Papa Funkosophy
That's a pretty broad brush ya got there. You don't think that maybe there is a distinction you are glossing over?
And that's what we're talking about. It seems like every social/political conversation is nothing but a constant loop of:
Bob: A Left Hander did The Bad Thing!
Ted: Yeah but a Right Hander did The Bad Thing as well!
Bob: Not all Right Handers do The Bad Thing!
Ted: Not all Left Handers do The Bad Thing either!
The social/political debate has become an endless loop of "You too!" and "You can't bring up the fact that my side did X without bringing up that your side did X" and constant accusations/defense of hypocrisy and score keeping that any discussion of the actual issue is drowned out.
Bob: A Left Hander did The Bad Thing!
Ted: Yeah but a Right Hander did The Bad Thing as well!
Bob: Not all Right Handers do The Bad Thing!
Ted: Not all Left Handers do The Bad Thing either!
The social/political debate has become an endless loop of "You too!" and "You can't bring up the fact that my side did X without bringing up that your side did X" and constant accusations/defense of hypocrisy and score keeping that any discussion of the actual issue is drowned out.
TragicMonkey
Poisoned Waffles
I don't know which side of the political spectrum you fall on, but clearly your side is guilty of the above but mine is not! Also: my side is rubber and yours is glue, so whatever you say bounces off of us and sticks to you!
Monketi Ghost
Confusion Reactor
- Joined
- May 21, 2003
- Messages
- 25,141
Listen it is highly hypocritical of you to bring that up without also bringing up that time at Josie's Diner in Albany, New York in 1974 where someone from your political spectrum clearly referred to the red clam chowder as "New England Style."
12AX7
Banned
This. ^^^^ Excellent post.
Whoa whoa whoa. You can't even begin to argue that. Remember that time in July 1983 when your side entered the chili competition with a chili that had beans in it?
Beans?
Hypocrite.
eeyore1954
Philosopher
- Joined
- Jun 9, 2006
- Messages
- 6,811
I do find it likely. Maybe it is just media reporting although I believe the facts uphold the view. I do not believe there is something inherent in African-Americans that would make it so.
qayak
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- Jul 31, 2006
- Messages
- 13,844
So any reaction to years of systemic police abuse against blacks only results in an opportunity for police to abuse/kill more blacks?
Courts have disagreed in other cases, like when a white woman murders her husband after years of systemic abuse. That's self defence but if you're a black male and it's abuse from police you've just gotta quit being uppity and take it.
The DoJ explicitly rejected that idea, and the stats also undermine it.
Missouri's report into vehicle stops:
http://ago.mo.gov/divisions/litigation/vehicle-stops-report
|Disparity Index|0.38|1.37|
|Search Rate|47 / 686|562 / 4632|
|Contraband Hit Rate|16 / 47|122 / 562|
|Arrest Rate|36 / 686|483 / 4632|
By my sums, corrected per head of population, blacks were 3.6 times as likely to be stopped (1.37/0.38)
12% of stops involving blacks involved a search
7% of stops involving whites involved a search - the actual numbers mean that a black who was stopped was 1.77 times more likely to be searched.
By my reckoning, a black motorist is 6.4 times more likely to be searched than a white motorist.
When searched, contraband was found in 22% of stops involving blacks and 34% of stops involving whites.
In itself, I would say the above would be grounds for suspicion of bias.
I also take issue with what Dan Jackson said (Thanks to the link from LTC8K6 in this post) where he claimed " The actual legitimate racial profiling states collected by MO attorney general show that Ferguson is better than the state average and has been improving over the last 3 years"
Here are the disparity index results for 2011, 2012, 2013 (the last year with data)
http://ago.mo.gov/divisions/litigation/vehicle-stops-report?lea=161
|1.30|1.31|1.37|
I do agree that it looks better than the state average, but that doesn't answer whether there is a problem.
dudalb
Penultimate Amazing
Agreed. I am willing to bet that a few white citizens of Ferguson have been the victims of a police shakedown as well.
Like I said, it's like something out of "The DUkes Of Hazzard".
It also shows that a small town government can be just as corrupt as a big city. The only difference between the current government of Ferguson and that of Chicago is that the official in Chicago are a bit more sophisticated in their opearations.And Chicago is equal opportunity corruption. The Windy City Machine has plenty of corrupt Afro American officials. Greed is universal.
I maintain the that City Police being used primarily as a revenue source would be outrageous enough even if there was not racial discrimnitation involved.
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I would think that small forces would be more prone to corruption. There are fewer people who need to be corrupted for it to work. Someone in charge of 5,000 officers would hopefully be paid more than someone in charge of 50 officers, so at the least, one would hope their price would be higher. Potentially corrupt officers probably need to be in the right environment, with either little effective oversight, or sympathetic oversight. Because the chain of command is longer in a large force and spread out over more sites, oversight of a potentially corrupt cop is likely to have their own superior. With a small force, a family working in the force would represent a disproportionate fraction of the total force whilst they would be far less influential in a large force.
Because they cover a larger area, the chief officers will be higher profile and subject to wider scrutiny by the press.