The Cookout

[MR-D-ROB]

Do we really need police?

That's a fairly simple question. Most people are going to say yes we do need them.

I argue against that notion. And I'd like to spell out why.

Do cops help deter some petty crimes like theft, drug dealing, prostitution etc. Yes. But let's be honest they typically target black people for the drug dealing crime so over half of that goes un-deterred.

For the most part police don't do a lot to deter major crimes. This would include crimes like rape, murder, and mass shootings. They just show up after the crime has been committed.

So for deterrence I would argue a hard NO.

Let's look at something else though. Are cops effective? Effective has a definition of "successful in producing a desired or intended result" according to Websters dictionary.

It would be unfair to police if I were to base my judgement on convictions. After all what if the cops do a good job but the prosecutor screws up.

So instead I'll be going over case clearance rates. This is simply that cops solved the case. They have charged someone with the crime or they know who did it and maybe the person killed themself or fled the country but they know who did said crime.

The numbers I'll be using are from 2017. This is to be fair since that year had rather good numbers for them.

Let's look at murder: 61.6% clearance rate. That's not very good to begin with. However, this doesn't include people who came up missing and were never found but were likely murdered. If you include those that number likely drops 50% or less. So only half. Not very effective. If you're care started only half of the time you would get rid of it or at least take it to get fixed.

Next, rape stood at 34.5%. That's horribly ineffective, but if you consider the fact that rape is the most underreported crime that number drops to less than 10%. That's like a microwave that only heats your food up 3 days out of the month! Obviously we would get rid of it or not use it.

Robbery 29.7%

Aggravated assault : 53.3%. Keep in mind this usually occurs between people who know each other. So it shouldn't be that difficult to identify the perp.

Burglary: 13.5%. This is also heavily under reported because people generally feel the cops aren't going to do anything or find who did it so they don't bother even calling. Black people don't call because they don't want to deal with the cops. Considering the under reporting this is probably closer to 5% or less.

Larceny theft: 19.2%

Motor vehicle theft: 13.7%

If this were your report card would you be nervous to show it to your parents?

Police aren't effective so why do we need them. They don't deter crime. They just give traffic citations costing taxpayers money. When they are called they are hostile and use brutality.

My opinion society would be better off without them!

 

[Sapphire]

We need police but we need the system they operate in to change.

I think all police should be voted in by a local community like sheriffs are and if they do a shit job, we can vote them out. There are ways to ensure they stay on law and not feed their own egos. Racism will always be an issue no matter how much we try to fight it but we need ways of preventing it when it comes to positions of power like in police.

 

[RCNAL]

Interesting. I tend to think its not if there is a need for the police, its how the police are acting. The police in many countries are fine. You don't fear them, they don't have much to do, but that also reflects that society.

If you've ever been to Dubai, Korea, Spain, the police there are benign, friendly, as a black man you don't get that feeling you have in America.

White Americans couldn't lynch you like they did pre 60s, so now they have unofficially granted the police the right to do it. It's why they back the blue so much. They know the police ain't shit. You talk to any random young white boy in his teens and 20s and he doesn't like the police either.

True police reform should be a demand for our vote. The police are thoroughly infested with white supremacists all over the country and I would suggest, inside the FBI as well. FBI warned of white supremacists in law enforcement 10 years ago. Has anything changed?

The reason why having a black chief of police won't change things is because to get to the point where you are chief, by definition that person is not a reformer and have let bullshit slide his or her own career. You rarely seen chiefs chosen who were from Internal Affairs and if you do, its someone who looked the other way and made IA a benign department.

One possible suggestion? Get a retired military officer who commanded large numbers of MPs. You rarely hear of the same police abuses from the Military Police. There are areas with very large bases, Korea has about 25,000 US military and you rarely heard of the MPs there unfairly abusing the soldiers. Get one of the ones that have commanded large squads of MPs as the chief of police in a major urban PD. Give him or her one task. Reform the police and get the bad apples out. This person, in theory, would have no loyalty to the blue line.

Push for the FBI to actually follow up on its own report. The report was put out by a Republican administrations FBI, the Bush administration. Obama didn't do anything with it. Didn't expect Trump to do it and we should have made that among other demands a requirement for our vote.

Require police to be insured. Doctors, and other professionals are insured. Why shouldn't cops? This would eliminate the bad ones because each incident and payout would increase his or hers premium to the point they can't afford it.

Require the federal government not to provide any funds to any department who hires fired cops. Push for it on the state level in each state. Especially in blue states.

 

[MR-D-ROB]

Interesting. I tend to think its not if there is a need for the police, its how the police are acting. The police in many countries are fine. You don't fear them, they don't have much to do, but that also reflects that society.

If you've ever been to Dubai, Korea, Spain, the police there are benign, friendly, as a black man you don't get that feeling you have in America.

White Americans couldn't lynch you like they did pre 60s, so now they have unofficially granted the police the right to do it. It's why they back the blue so much. They know the police ain't shit. You talk to any random young white boy in his teens and 20s and he doesn't like the police either.

True police reform should be a demand for our vote. The police are thoroughly infested with white supremacists all over the country and I would suggest, inside the FBI as well. FBI warned of white supremacists in law enforcement 10 years ago. Has anything changed?

The reason why having a black chief of police won't change things is because to get to the point where you are chief, by definition that person is not a reformer and have let bullshit slide his or her own career. You rarely seen chiefs chosen who were from Internal Affairs and if you do, its someone who looked the other way and made IA a benign department.

One possible suggestion? Get a retired military officer who commanded large numbers of MPs. You rarely hear of the same police abuses from the Military Police. There are areas with very large bases, Korea has about 25,000 US military and you rarely heard of the MPs there unfairly abusing the soldiers. Get one of the ones that have commanded large squads of MPs as the chief of police in a major urban PD. Give him or her one task. Reform the police and get the bad apples out. This person, in theory, would have no loyalty to the blue line.

Push for the FBI to actually follow up on its own report. The report was put out by a Republican administrations FBI, the Bush administration. Obama didn't do anything with it. Didn't expect Trump to do it and we should have made that among other demands a requirement for our vote.

Require police to be insured. Doctors, and other professionals are insured. Why shouldn't cops? This would eliminate the bad ones because each incident and payout would increase his or hers premium to the point they can't afford it.

Require the federal government not to provide any funds to any department who hires fired cops. Push for it on the state level in each state. Especially in blue states.

By that standard you rarely hear of police brutality with federal agencies like FBI, DEA, or ICE etc. That's because they have a very extensive and vetted hiring process. On the local level they just hire anyone with a high school diploma or GED.

That breeds bringing in racists when your hiring standard is that low. They will never change that though. Even when a racist and person unfit is identified they just make excuses and cover up for them instead of firing them.

For that reason I don't beleive in reform the police, defund the police or train the police etc.

I am completely behind ABOLISH THE POLICE!

 

[RCNAL]

FBI agents don't day to day policing of citizens. Their function is completely different. Same with the DEA and ICE. Different process. And its not like those agencies aren't without scandal and corruption once in a while as well.

Local police vary on requirements but the big city police, on average do a pretty decent background search. About 19 percent or almost 1 out of 5 cops are ex military.

There are areas where they have not had a murder for years. Policing is about the people you are policing. How many murders and street crimes do you think Beverly Hills PD sees in comparison to LAPD which is right next to it? Each area has its own unique issues and I still think in the large urban areas, the proposals above may...just may go a long way to ending the abuse. Not totally but make some progress.

 

[MR-D-ROB]

FBI agents don't day to day policing of citizens. Their function is completely different. Same with the DEA and ICE. Different process. And its not like those agencies aren't without scandal and corruption once in a while as well.

Local police vary on requirements but the big city police, on average do a pretty decent background search. About 19 percent or almost 1 out of 5 cops are ex military.

There are areas where they have not had a murder for years. Policing is about the people you are policing. How many murders and street crimes do you think Beverly Hills PD sees in comparison to LAPD which is right next to it? Each area has its own unique issues and I still think in the large urban areas, the proposals above may...just may go a long way to ending the abuse. Not totally but make some progress.

Being ex military doesn't preclude a person from being racist. And doing a very minimal background check doesn't come close to enough to weed out racists. The background check that city governments do just checks for criminal record, credit score and drug test. That's about the extent of it. So you can be racist so long as you don't have a criminal record, have good credit and don't do drugs. They don't do much to check for anger issues or bad temperament.

As someone who was a police officer before in the federal system (twice) I can tell you the federal system does a much more thorough background check. My background is white as snow and I was uncomfortable with how deep they dug into looking at my background. It was as if they were determined to find something to disqualify you!


I held a few local positions in county government also and started the process for a sheriff's deputy position but declined it because a federal position came up that was better. I'm telling you as someone who went through it, local government hiring process was crap!

That isn't ever going to change at least not on an across the board level! So we abolish them altogether and start over with a better system.

Every police officer is fired. Good along with the bad. And they are required to go through a better and more through process to be hired. Criminal background is checked. Credit report is checked. Lie detector to determine racist views or severe bias against minorities. Psychological assessment and clearance by psychologist or psychiatrist. Those with a history of complaints and brutality are placed on probation for 5 years upon rehire and if they receive more than 3 complaints within that time they are fired.

Of course none of that will ever happen. The whole point of police is to be brutal against black people. So instead just do away with police altogether.

 

[RCNAL]

Totally agree that the military has racists. They have a huge white supremacy issue. Opinion | Enemies foreign and domestic: Inside the U.S. military's white supremacy problem
My point was that they weren't just hiring people with a GED. That the police departments of various areas do a fairly decent background check.

Philadelphia, Mississippi does a very different background check than Philadelphia, Pennsylvania comparatively. There are literally 1000s of police departments of various sizes and needs in different states. There is no one size fits all hiring process.

That said, I am agreeing that the various police departments are inundated with racists. The FBI report I linked with says that. What I don't think I agree with is that the racists are a result of hiring people with GEDs or a simple HS diploma. It may be an issue in some areas but not all over. People are in secret organizations. No one who is part of a white supremacist group openly isn't going to try and join the Chicago or New York PD because its too easy to be discovered.

Finally, policing can work and it works in other countries. One thing that I forgot to mention in my original post is that the local voters should have the PDs end being a tax on the people by encouraging them to write tickets in order to bring in revenue. It creates unnecessary negative interaction with the people. Ending that and initiating some of the suggestions might greatly reduce our exposure to police abuse.

 

[MR-D-ROB]

Totally agree that the military has racists. They have a huge white supremacy issue. Opinion | Enemies foreign and domestic: Inside the U.S. military's white supremacy problem
My point was that they weren't just hiring people with a GED. That the police departments of various areas do a fairly decent background check.

Philadelphia, Mississippi does a very different background check than Philadelphia, Pennsylvania comparatively. There are literally 1000s of police departments of various sizes and needs in different states. There is no one size fits all hiring process.

That said, I am agreeing that the various police departments are inundated with racists. The FBI report I linked with says that. What I don't think I agree with is that the racists are a result of hiring people with GEDs or a simple HS diploma. It may be an issue in some areas but not all over. People are in secret organizations. No one who is part of a white supremacist group openly isn't going to try and join the Chicago or New York PD because its too easy to be discovered.

Finally, policing can work and it works in other countries. One thing that I forgot to mention in my original post is that the local voters should have the PDs end being a tax on the people by encouraging them to write tickets in order to bring in revenue. It creates unnecessary negative interaction with the people. Ending that and initiating some of the suggestions might greatly reduce our exposure to police abuse.

Negative sir. When you water down the hiring process to requiring only a GED then you are going to get racist. That doesn't mean that people with more education aren't racist.


However it weeds out those who just want to be a police officer to brutalize black people. If they require an associates or bachelors degree then it isn't likely a white supremacist is going to go to college for 2 to 4 years and spend thousands to get that degree just to be a cop and brutalize black people.

Including processed to identify and prevent racists from getting hired in the first place is needed. It seems like you are saying that due to the fact that there are so many police departments that it is impossible so why try.


That's where holding our politician accountable come in. They need to pass federal legislation to enact these changes across the country.

Nurses are required to pass the NCLEX to be licensed. Why can't police have to pass a national licensure exam too? Sure states have certifications like TCLEOSE but those are received through police academy which more likely teaches how to be racist against black people and violate people's rights. Have you ever heard of an polices state certification being revoked. Rarely if ever.

I receive in the mail every 6 months a long list of nurses that have lost their licensed or had stipulations placed and if they mess up while the stipulation is there they will lose the license.

We need something similar for police. As a nurse you think about what you are doing and are careful because you don't want to screw up.

Police don't care. They shoot first and figure oh well. They likely won't be charged. They can't be sued due to qualified immunity. They won't lose their certification so even if fired they just go to another jurisdiction.


This is what you are defending!

 

[RCNAL]