Another article in the same vein is this one, criticizing the increasing role of former special officers people in military planning roles: https://secretaryrofdefenserock.substack.com/p/the-triumph-o..., seeing it as catalyzing a lot of destruction of US military capabilities.
People need to be bigger on efficacy. If it worked, we'd see evidence of it. No one's bringing that evidence forward and frankly its questionable if US officers are better than their international peers.
I don't think it's accidental the overlap between lack of accountability and the fact that warriors historically are a class, not a job.
This is a price the US pays for the right to keep and bear arms. US cops have to assume that everyone is armed. That leads to a paranoid style of policing. As gun laws have become less restrictive, cops have armed and armored up.
I suspect this fear of guns largly explains the additional risks police face.
assuming everyone has a gun and is willing to use it, raises the stakes of every encounter.
so instead of a police encounter starting at a very low risk level (casual conversation), it starts a very close to deadly force risk.
This causes both sides to be a lot more tense, with a lot less room for mistakes.
It also makes any encounter feel very risky.
I don't think people having a gun prevents police from starting an encounter at a casual level. But the assumption everyone is out to harm them, and has the means to do so, does.
It’s possible it’s a bit of an “arms” race, the police are more aggro but so are the public. At least in public perception back before the 70s its was perceived that by and large there was “respect for authority” but that’s eroded over the decades for various reasons among them court cases asserting more rights for individuals where cops can’t just up and arrest willy nilly. But also movements like “sovereign citizen” leaks in places enough to affect behavior elsewhere.
Also weapons are relatively cheaper today than decades ago.
There's an insane number of police shootings where it turns out the person was looking at an insanely large sentence and they "weren't going back to jail." From that perspective it's not even clear they're acting irrationally -- if the penalty for third-striking for stealing a TV and murder is the same then some criminals are going to make it worth their while.
There’s not much to back this up, at least that you’ve included as reference.
The bigger issue that comes to mind and that you can actually look in to is the practice of teaching police departments about “Killology”. This is (or was) a kind of seminar that taught departments this mindset of “everyone that an officer interacts with is a potential threat”. Add this to the “super criminal” bs that was popular in the 80s/90s, the constant right-wing fearmongering about dangerous criminals in blue cities, and the militarization of police, and it feels more like they’ve been primed for violence from the power structure more-so than any actual threat from the public.
At the range nearly all casual police interactions like traffic stop happen happen at (<20ft), a knife has to be treated just as deadly as a gun. So even if you remove the guns you'll still have to treat everyone as a deadly threat under such a model.
Look at some cities Animal Control officers - athletic guys, black uniform, black high boots - real Warriors-Stormtroopers protecting the defenseless community from that kitten.
Yes, the days of Andy Griffith is long gone, at least in the US the country is slowly turning the local police into storm troopers.
But even back then, some groups of people were treated badly by the local police in some areas. Now it seems the bad treatment is has become "DEI" instead of good treatment expanding to everyone. :(
Those days never existed. In real life Andy Griffith would be an alcoholic who beats his wife and lynches black people who don't get out of Mayberry before the sun sets.
There's an old report (like from the 1990s) on this that put the DV rates at 40%. That's probably high but it's the source for a lot of the "cops beat their wives" claims.
A fundamental problem with cops is the thin blue line is very real. The rise of cameras on cops shows pretty clearly that a decent number of cops bend over backwards to protect their own. I find it pretty easy to believe that cops won't arrest their fellow officers on a DV call.
Police unions fight HARD to stop any sort of accountability or tracking of misbehavior of cops.
While I don't disagree with the sentiment, since you have a friend who's a cop I'm compelled to ask the uncomfortable question, is an otherwise good cop who protects bad cops still a good cop?
American police forces evolved from slave patrols. The image of the benevolent police officer only ever existed in media. If ever there was an officer or sheriff that hewed to those ideals they were a unicorn among burros.
This is a shallow piece, if ever there was one. Sure the word "warrior" and its connotations are dangerous, but that barely skims the surface of the problem. Why are police given military ranks? Corporals and sergeants and captains. Hell, some are majors and colonels too. Why are their uniforms styled to look martial at all? Has anyone considered that perhaps they shouldn't be armed like soldiers? There doesn't need to be an assault rifle in the trunk of each squad car (isn't this the point of having SWAT? why bother if everyone is SWAT?). Can we even safely call them officers? We call the command structure of the army and navy "officers", but we also use that term for those who aren't military, so maybe it's safe.
why not? if its a professional force. plenty of other countries people use as models have military and police linked together, imo we're (USA) just missing the punishment part. Need to court martial police more :).
Whole point of police is internal force application right. Can't really enforce any laws without use of force.
I think a lot of the questions you pose have some interesting psychology behind them. Other countries don't have this same level of policing, but also have different prison systems.
I think a large amount of the danger American police face is due to how easily a single arrest can ruin your productive life. One facing the loss of their home, pets, job, important documents, sentimental items might not see the difference between losing everything, and losing everything and taking the guy who's taking it from you, with you.
If we had an actual system based on reform rather than punishment, I think the danger police would be in would be greatly reduced.
You also have things like qualified immunity and general protections for police against being sued for an unlawful arrest. An officer can incorrectly arrest you and you could lose everything and be simply shit out of luck.
If there's no repercussions for bad cops, there's no justice. If there's no justice, why would one play nicely with the law, therefore police are in danger.
> I think a large amount of the danger American police face is due to how easily a single arrest can ruin your productive life. One facing the loss of their home, pets, job, important documents, sentimental items might not see the difference between losing everything, and losing everything and taking the guy who's taking it from you, with you.
I don't think it's that complicated. Rather, I think that a lot of cops think they're in more danger than they really are. The vast, vast majority of people aren't going to gun them down for a traffic stop or for providing a warning about something. The situations where they're likely to get shot are exceedingly rare. By treating policing as some tremendously dangerous job we're completely ignoring the actual statistics, which show that firefighters and construction workers are far more routinely in physical danger.
The police then get carte blanche to walk around treating everyone like some dangerous creature ready to explode at the slightest provocation when most of us are just trying to get by and are pretty accepting of the benign law enforcement interactions we get.
The biggest danger American police are traffic accidents. Mostly because they spent a lot of time on the streets and accidents happen. They don't get shot at all that much.
What actually happens is that American police is basically unaccountable. It must be really egregious and on multiple camera for them to face any scrutiny. And even then it is easy for them to engineer situation where it is actually ok for them to kill or be violent. Meanwhile, non-cop is supposed to have perfect self control, perfect awareness of situation and be able to follow mutually exclusive instructions yelled at him from multiple cops simultaneously.
Unaccountable groups of people always end up behaving badly. Be it priests, isolated cults or cops.
this right here, our issue is mostly the accountability. Accountable people are much less likely to apply force when not needed. Trying to remember some citations, but there's really interesting data out there on citizen involved shootings v police ones. and I suspect the accountability is key.
Actual military officer (at the time of writing) doesn't thing much of "warrior mindset" even _in the army_: https://angrystaffofficer.com/2016/12/14/stop-calling-us-war...
Worth reading together with the OP article.
Another article in the same vein is this one, criticizing the increasing role of former special officers people in military planning roles: https://secretaryrofdefenserock.substack.com/p/the-triumph-o..., seeing it as catalyzing a lot of destruction of US military capabilities.
People need to be bigger on efficacy. If it worked, we'd see evidence of it. No one's bringing that evidence forward and frankly its questionable if US officers are better than their international peers.
I don't think it's accidental the overlap between lack of accountability and the fact that warriors historically are a class, not a job.
This is a price the US pays for the right to keep and bear arms. US cops have to assume that everyone is armed. That leads to a paranoid style of policing. As gun laws have become less restrictive, cops have armed and armored up.
Even if the right changed, the main actual causes of police caution would remain:
- a land border with a large continent that has a lot of guns and violence and criminality
- millions and millions of existing guns, the criminal holdings of which would not decrease following a change in the law
- subcultures that glorify violence and teach it as a path in life, particularly how to be a man and what sort of man to be attracted to
I suspect this fear of guns largly explains the additional risks police face.
assuming everyone has a gun and is willing to use it, raises the stakes of every encounter. so instead of a police encounter starting at a very low risk level (casual conversation), it starts a very close to deadly force risk.
This causes both sides to be a lot more tense, with a lot less room for mistakes. It also makes any encounter feel very risky.
I don't think people having a gun prevents police from starting an encounter at a casual level. But the assumption everyone is out to harm them, and has the means to do so, does.
That doesn't explain the first ~230 years of US history though, where police weren't this way and we had the same Constitution.
It’s possible it’s a bit of an “arms” race, the police are more aggro but so are the public. At least in public perception back before the 70s its was perceived that by and large there was “respect for authority” but that’s eroded over the decades for various reasons among them court cases asserting more rights for individuals where cops can’t just up and arrest willy nilly. But also movements like “sovereign citizen” leaks in places enough to affect behavior elsewhere.
Also weapons are relatively cheaper today than decades ago.
There's an insane number of police shootings where it turns out the person was looking at an insanely large sentence and they "weren't going back to jail." From that perspective it's not even clear they're acting irrationally -- if the penalty for third-striking for stealing a TV and murder is the same then some criminals are going to make it worth their while.
There’s not much to back this up, at least that you’ve included as reference.
The bigger issue that comes to mind and that you can actually look in to is the practice of teaching police departments about “Killology”. This is (or was) a kind of seminar that taught departments this mindset of “everyone that an officer interacts with is a potential threat”. Add this to the “super criminal” bs that was popular in the 80s/90s, the constant right-wing fearmongering about dangerous criminals in blue cities, and the militarization of police, and it feels more like they’ve been primed for violence from the power structure more-so than any actual threat from the public.
If everyone is really armed, that's the single biggest reason why standard doctrine should be de-escalation first.
But US Cops always escalate instead. They want the fight, they aren't looking for safety.
>If everyone is really armed, that's the single biggest reason why standard doctrine should be de-escalation first.
See also: Game wardens during hunting season vs game wardens during fishing season.
At the range nearly all casual police interactions like traffic stop happen happen at (<20ft), a knife has to be treated just as deadly as a gun. So even if you remove the guns you'll still have to treat everyone as a deadly threat under such a model.
20 feet is approximately the distance a person can rush forward, and have a decent chance of engaging in a weapon retention challenge.
its also the effective range for most people snap drawing a pistol in a use of force situation.
When a Karen calls the cops you have to hope a Proctor doesn't show up.
(2015)
And more relevant with each passing year. This is a meme that seems to have infected every law enforcement organization.
And citizens become the "enemy".
Look at some cities Animal Control officers - athletic guys, black uniform, black high boots - real Warriors-Stormtroopers protecting the defenseless community from that kitten.
There's a war going on outside no man is safe from.
https://youtu.be/Dz5VzLz67WA?is=pLpKbcgZ59sJP7Co
Yes, the days of Andy Griffith is long gone, at least in the US the country is slowly turning the local police into storm troopers.
But even back then, some groups of people were treated badly by the local police in some areas. Now it seems the bad treatment is has become "DEI" instead of good treatment expanding to everyone. :(
Ref for non-US people and the very young:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Andy_Griffith_Show
Those days never existed. In real life Andy Griffith would be an alcoholic who beats his wife and lynches black people who don't get out of Mayberry before the sun sets.
Cops have always been this way.
Source?
I have a close relative that’s a cop, he’s a really good person, father and husband. I’ve known several other cops and never knew a truly bad person.
There's an old report (like from the 1990s) on this that put the DV rates at 40%. That's probably high but it's the source for a lot of the "cops beat their wives" claims.
A fundamental problem with cops is the thin blue line is very real. The rise of cameras on cops shows pretty clearly that a decent number of cops bend over backwards to protect their own. I find it pretty easy to believe that cops won't arrest their fellow officers on a DV call.
Police unions fight HARD to stop any sort of accountability or tracking of misbehavior of cops.
While I don't disagree with the sentiment, since you have a friend who's a cop I'm compelled to ask the uncomfortable question, is an otherwise good cop who protects bad cops still a good cop?
They're still beating their wives and killing black guys for no good reason only except now they're also treating everyone else like shit too.
Progress(TM)
American police forces evolved from slave patrols. The image of the benevolent police officer only ever existed in media. If ever there was an officer or sheriff that hewed to those ideals they were a unicorn among burros.
[0] https://naacp.org/find-resources/history-explained/origins-m...
[1] https://nleomf.org/slave-patrols-an-early-form-of-american-p...
This is a shallow piece, if ever there was one. Sure the word "warrior" and its connotations are dangerous, but that barely skims the surface of the problem. Why are police given military ranks? Corporals and sergeants and captains. Hell, some are majors and colonels too. Why are their uniforms styled to look martial at all? Has anyone considered that perhaps they shouldn't be armed like soldiers? There doesn't need to be an assault rifle in the trunk of each squad car (isn't this the point of having SWAT? why bother if everyone is SWAT?). Can we even safely call them officers? We call the command structure of the army and navy "officers", but we also use that term for those who aren't military, so maybe it's safe.
There's an entire book on this topic if you want to read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rise_of_the_Warrior_Cop
why not? if its a professional force. plenty of other countries people use as models have military and police linked together, imo we're (USA) just missing the punishment part. Need to court martial police more :). Whole point of police is internal force application right. Can't really enforce any laws without use of force.
I think a lot of the questions you pose have some interesting psychology behind them. Other countries don't have this same level of policing, but also have different prison systems.
I think a large amount of the danger American police face is due to how easily a single arrest can ruin your productive life. One facing the loss of their home, pets, job, important documents, sentimental items might not see the difference between losing everything, and losing everything and taking the guy who's taking it from you, with you.
If we had an actual system based on reform rather than punishment, I think the danger police would be in would be greatly reduced.
You also have things like qualified immunity and general protections for police against being sued for an unlawful arrest. An officer can incorrectly arrest you and you could lose everything and be simply shit out of luck.
If there's no repercussions for bad cops, there's no justice. If there's no justice, why would one play nicely with the law, therefore police are in danger.
> I think a large amount of the danger American police face is due to how easily a single arrest can ruin your productive life. One facing the loss of their home, pets, job, important documents, sentimental items might not see the difference between losing everything, and losing everything and taking the guy who's taking it from you, with you.
I don't think it's that complicated. Rather, I think that a lot of cops think they're in more danger than they really are. The vast, vast majority of people aren't going to gun them down for a traffic stop or for providing a warning about something. The situations where they're likely to get shot are exceedingly rare. By treating policing as some tremendously dangerous job we're completely ignoring the actual statistics, which show that firefighters and construction workers are far more routinely in physical danger.
The police then get carte blanche to walk around treating everyone like some dangerous creature ready to explode at the slightest provocation when most of us are just trying to get by and are pretty accepting of the benign law enforcement interactions we get.
The biggest danger American police are traffic accidents. Mostly because they spent a lot of time on the streets and accidents happen. They don't get shot at all that much.
What actually happens is that American police is basically unaccountable. It must be really egregious and on multiple camera for them to face any scrutiny. And even then it is easy for them to engineer situation where it is actually ok for them to kill or be violent. Meanwhile, non-cop is supposed to have perfect self control, perfect awareness of situation and be able to follow mutually exclusive instructions yelled at him from multiple cops simultaneously.
Unaccountable groups of people always end up behaving badly. Be it priests, isolated cults or cops.
this right here, our issue is mostly the accountability. Accountable people are much less likely to apply force when not needed. Trying to remember some citations, but there's really interesting data out there on citizen involved shootings v police ones. and I suspect the accountability is key.