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TallSilhouette said:
sundin13 said:
I have to wonder: What is the point of this conversation?

Yes, some protesters were not peaceful.

Yes, some officers were not peaceful.

There shouldn't be any argument about either of those points, so what exactly are we arguing?

I posted a video about Tennessee trying to pass a bill that would criminalize peaceful assembly on government grounds. Zoom proceeded to claim that no one but the protesters were to blame, then went off on a tangent about violent protesters. I have asked him to support his claims and how they are relevant to the Tennessee bill.

Yeah, sounds about right.

Whether or not there were non-peaceful protesters should be completely irrelevant to that point...



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We shouldn't fall into the false equivalency of violent protesters and violent police. Those are by no means equal. Brutality by police is magnitudes more disturbing and morally wrong than whatever the protesters did. They are not beholden to keep up the law or protect citizens, policemen are. So not only should police be punished the same for their crimes, but even harder. Any wrongstep in their duties should yield immediate dismissal from the force. If you cannot follow the law you should be in no position to enforce it. That's not even mentioning that any police officer who is not able to deescalate a harmless situation without violence is unfit for their job anyway.



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Hiku said:
KiigelHeart said:

I'm interested to see how the hearing goes. My guess would be 3rd degree assault at tops (judging by this clip) because I don't see anything suggesting it was the intent of the officer to cause serious injury. Pushing somebody backwards with a batong isn't considered excessive force per se, especially in crowd/riot control where de-escalation is done beforehand by ordering people to disperse. In this situation, the use of force can be considered excessive and reckless though considering the man's age. He doesn't look like a fragile elderly man though, I would've thought he's in his 60s and officers had no way of knowing his exact age. A fit man who's 60-70 is more than capable to put up a fight. Hell, a 85-year-old granma nearly stabbed my buddy with shears once. And the officer doesn't push him as hard as cops are trained to.

Point of bringing up this video wasn't to justify officer's actions, it's just to add context. And (imo) it gives a reason to futher question the way the man falls down, because he was clearly looking to get something on video. Also considering how worked up he got those protesters I'd say he doesn't come off as a harmless, fragile elderly man. He also knows well he shouldn't approach the police at that point.

I'm not an expert on US justice system and law but 3rd degree assault seems reasonable to me. The whole thing is more of a bad choice of action which leads to much worse outcome than intented and anticipated. We'll see.

Have you considered why criminal negligence is a thing, and why intent is irrelevant there? If someone drinks and drives, they can't just look at the intent and give them a slap on the wrist just because they didn't mean to crush that 3 year old baby. The knew the risks when they drank and then got behind the wheel.

Everyone knows that old people are fragile. A simple fall that doesn't even phaze a 20 year old can shatter the bones of a 60 year old, and they may never heal from it properly.

This situation was completely avoidable. The officer did not have to risk the elderly mans health and safety like that. This wasn't a crowd or a riot btw. It was one old man standing in front of him.
You can't hold a civilian protster and police to the same standard here either when one of them is trained to handle these situations and is paid by us to handle it as their job. And it's not asking much to not recruit idiots that push over old people first chance they get.

Eh, intent is a level of negligence as far as I know. How can you say it's not relevant? Some crimes can be punished only if there was intent, it was done knowingly. Some can be punished because of recklessness and gross negligence. 

I don't know about US law but here, if you accidentally crush someone with your car, whether you were drunk or not, you won't be charged with murder. It wasn't your intention to kill anyone but your actions showed gross negligence, you will be charged with involuntary manslaughter. A slap in the wrists compared to murder or intentional homicide I know, but that's finnish justice system for you. If you want to kill someone here, get drunk and crush them with your car. If the police and prosecutor fail to show you intended to do it, you'll get away with a slap.

vivster said:
We shouldn't fall into the false equivalency of violent protesters and violent police. Those are by no means equal. Brutality by police is magnitudes more disturbing and morally wrong than whatever the protesters did. They are not beholden to keep up the law or protect citizens, policemen are. So not only should police be punished the same for their crimes, but even harder. Any wrongstep in their duties should yield immediate dismissal from the force. If you cannot follow the law you should be in no position to enforce it. That's not even mentioning that any police officer who is not able to deescalate a harmless situation without violence is unfit for their job anyway.

Well, police are beholden to keep up the law and how they do their job is largely dictated by citizens themselves. This sometimes means split-second decisions on limited information of all the details. Law doesn't give you a definitive rule to every possible circumstance. Ultimately it should be up to court to decide what is considered the use of force and what is considered excessive force or brutality. And no, I don't agree any wrongstep in duty should yield immediate dismissal, some are surely better handled with disciplinary action or official warning. 

Last edited by KiigelHeart - on 21 August 2020

Hiku said:
KiigelHeart said:

Eh, intent is a level of negligence as far as I know. How can you say it's not relevant? Some crimes can be punished only if there was intent, it was done knowingly. Some can be punished because of recklessness and gross negligence. 

Well you were talking about the intent to harm the old man. That's irrelevant when it comes to whether or not it was criminal negligence.
I don't think the prosecution will try to frame this as intentional harm.

I don't know about US law but here, if you accidentally crush someone with your car, whether you were drunk or not, you won't be charged with murder.

Yeah, since the legal definition of murder is 'an intentional killing'.

Well they are charged with 2nd degree assault and in the state of New York "in the first degree and second degree assault cases, the prosecutor must prove that the defendant specifically intented to cause serious physical harm to the victim. This must be proven beyond reasonable doubt." So I'd say intent is pretty relevant here. Then again, the US law seems to be all over the place so I can't be certain about this description.  Crazy sentences I must say, minimum of two years in prison for punching someone geez.. Here you can be quilty of aggravated assault and not spend a day in prison.

Still not sure what was the point of your drunk driving example though, but I guess it's ok. This has been off-topic for a while.



KiigelHeart said:
Hiku said:

Well you were talking about the intent to harm the old man. That's irrelevant when it comes to whether or not it was criminal negligence.
I don't think the prosecution will try to frame this as intentional harm.

I don't know about US law but here, if you accidentally crush someone with your car, whether you were drunk or not, you won't be charged with murder.

Yeah, since the legal definition of murder is 'an intentional killing'.

Well they are charged with 2nd degree assault and in the state of New York "in the first degree and second degree assault cases, the prosecutor must prove that the defendant specifically intented to cause serious physical harm to the victim. This must be proven beyond reasonable doubt." So I'd say intent is pretty relevant here. Then again, the US law seems to be all over the place so I can't be certain about this description.  Crazy sentences I must say, minimum of two years in prison for punching someone geez.. Here you can be quilty of aggravated assault and not spend a day in prison.

Still not sure what was the point of your drunk driving example though, but I guess it's ok. This has been off-topic for a while.

There are a lot of subheadings under second degree assault (in NY) and only one needs to be met to prove the charge. I am guessing that the prosecutor will aim for this one:

12. He injures someone aged 65 or older, and is himself at least 10 years younger than the victim; 



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KiigelHeart said:

vivster said:
We shouldn't fall into the false equivalency of violent protesters and violent police. Those are by no means equal. Brutality by police is magnitudes more disturbing and morally wrong than whatever the protesters did. They are not beholden to keep up the law or protect citizens, policemen are. So not only should police be punished the same for their crimes, but even harder. Any wrongstep in their duties should yield immediate dismissal from the force. If you cannot follow the law you should be in no position to enforce it. That's not even mentioning that any police officer who is not able to deescalate a harmless situation without violence is unfit for their job anyway.

Well, police are beholden to keep up the law and how they do their job is largely dictated by citizens themselves. This sometimes means split-second decisions on limited information of all the details. Law doesn't give you a definitive rule to every possible circumstance. Ultimately it should be up to court to decide what is considered the use of force and what is considered excessive force or brutality. And no, I don't agree any wrongstep in duty should yield immediate dismissal, some are surely better handled with disciplinary action or official warning. 

Yeah, I've seen too many policemen in the US shoving unarmed harmless people to the ground, using tasers on unarmed people, raising guns at unarmed people, shooting unarmed people, kicking, hitting and choking already pacified people to give any of them the benefit of the doubt. This of course includes the numerous colleagues that just stand by and do nothing about it. In any other civilized country police brutality like that would be national news, in the US it happens a hundred times every day. There is no point in using violence against an individual that is already on the ground and handcuffed, yet they do it anyway just for the fun of it.

And don't come with "but they're only doing it to be sure to keep themselves safe, the suspect could be armed and kill them any second" bullshit. If they can't tell if an individual is dangerous or not they're unfit for their job and should be fired due to gross incompetence. Same goes for their not intervening colleagues, who apparently are unable to detect if someone is breaking a law. If you as a policemen are unable to detect when someone breaks a law you are grossly incompetent at your job and should be fired.

I am an IT technician. If I attack my customers network out of malice or incompetence I will be fired or at least transferred to a duty where I cannot repeat that. Not sure why my unimportant job should be held to a higher standard than a fucking police officer. Would you not fire the bodyguard you hired to specifically protect you if he starts attacking you instead because he said he suddenly felt threatened by you?

Last edited by vivster - on 21 August 2020

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DeJoy refuses to release the data and analysis that any of his actions would supposedly improve Post Office performance rather than harm it in the run up to the election.



vivster said:

I am an IT technician. If I attack my customers network out of malice or incompetence I will be fired or at least transferred to a duty where I cannot repeat that. Not sure why my unimportant job should be held to a higher standard than a fucking police officer. Would you not fire the bodyguard you hired to specifically protect you if he starts attacking you instead because he said he suddenly felt threatened by you?

How many times in your IT job did you have to deal with heavily armed customers who want to shoot you dead?

Another tidbit that proofs how disconnected you people are from reality.



Hunting Season is done...

Zoombael said:

How many times in your IT job did you have to deal with heavily armed customers who want to shoot you dead?

Another tidbit that proofs how disconnected you people are from reality.

The fact that cops have been killed in the line of duty is a tragedy and obviously steps should be taken to protect police officers. However, that does not in any way mean that all of police misconduct can be entirely forgiven because some cops have been killed. While these issues certainly intersect, they are not mutually inclusive and we cannot as a society give police free reign to abuse their power because of the risks of their job. We must hold officers to a high standard in order to maintain the integrity of our police systems, and protect ourselves from government tyranny. That means that when an individual either shows poor judgement on the job, or acts in an inappropriate way, they should be either retrained or let go depending on the severity of the incident and their history. 



Zoombael said:
vivster said:

I am an IT technician. If I attack my customers network out of malice or incompetence I will be fired or at least transferred to a duty where I cannot repeat that. Not sure why my unimportant job should be held to a higher standard than a fucking police officer. Would you not fire the bodyguard you hired to specifically protect you if he starts attacking you instead because he said he suddenly felt threatened by you?

How many times in your IT job did you have to deal with heavily armed customers who want to shoot you dead?

Another tidbit that proofs how disconnected you people are from reality.

Well, if it is apparently not possible for normal people to handle police work maybe we should stop hiring normal people and instead people who can handle it?

Police isn't the army, you cannot just sent any idiot in there and expect them to do a good job. You select properly and train properly. Hell, I bet my job has a more strict hiring process and I'm damn sure that I had more training for my job than most police officers in the US.



If you demand respect or gratitude for your volunteer work, you're doing volunteering wrong.