This again, only different. Kind of. Follow

Sure. But the underlying narrative going on is about police abuse of black people (kinda why there are riots and protests going on), and how the equipment the police are using is somehow amplifying that perception. I'm just pointing out that this perception is false. This is the gear that police would use regardless of the situation. If it's a tactical situation, they use this gear. It's the same whether they're responding to a shooting in a school, armed bank robbery, terrorists holding hostages, searching for a bombing suspect, or responding to a protest that has gotten violent.

We can debate how they got the equipment, but ultimately that isn't the issue. The question is whether it's fair to blame the police for using that equipment in this case, and I honestly don't think it is. As I pointed out earlier, should we really care more about what the cops look like than what they do? And by any objective account, the Ferguson police have been remarkably restrained. Far more injuries have occurred as a result of the riots than the police response. So one could actually argue that the police are responding strongly enough. We could even make the case that all the cries about police over reaction are actually causing more injury because the police are being overly cautious and perhaps waiting too long to intervene in the violence going on around them.


I just think that some of the claims being made are pretty unfair. That's not to say I think the cops are perfect, but that also doesn't excuse what appears to be massive exaggeration of police violence and over reporting of the same. It's hard to watch the news reports and not get the sense that the reporters are salivating over the opportunity to find anything that they can paint as police abuse and put it on the air. And in that environment, the truth is usually the first casualty.

You do realize that the equipment being standard and the equipment amplifying the situation are in no way mutually exclusive, right?

Wait, nevermind, did it again.

Sure. Do you realize that continually telling people how the police are militarized amplifies the situation as well? It's the tail wagging the dog. It should be pretty obvious by now that there's a faction here who actually *want* this to escalate right? And that's not the Ferguson police department.

Do your co-workers get tired of you getting involved in their private conversations to point out things? Or do you have so many co-workers that you haven't burned through them all yet?

Edited, Aug 20th 2014 5:41pm by stupidmonkey

You over-estimate the existence of these coworkers.

Edited, Aug 20th 2014 9:32pm by idiggory

You also don't hear about military as often because of ridiculously high amounts of patriotism bias.

Well, that's a legitimate part of it. You assume the military will be using this stuff to cruise around some other foreign place where they need it because the foreigners in question are trying to blow them up or have their own stuff. Little different when you're using it domestically.

Of course, we have people who love the idea of militarizing the domestic civilian population and then using that as a pretext for needing more military style police equipment. I wonder what their reaction would have been if a couple hundred police in military vehicles, fatigues, helmets, masks and body armor swarmed good ole Cliven Bundy's ranch. I mean you had civilians like this and yet the law enforcement looked more like this. No MRAPs driving around or armored Humvees with a cop manning a machine gun on top, no gas mask wearing urban warriors... just a bunch of state and federal cops looking like cops. Were they magically in "less danger" from the civilians? Isn't it supposed to "always" be the way its done to go balls out with the SWAT teams and armored vehicles? Would that response have helped calm the situation on the Bundy ranch? Did it help in Ferguson?

Edited, Aug 21st 2014 8:25am by Jophiel

Sure, but if we're going with the "Gotta wear it all because it might get violent" mode of thinking, Bundy's ranch should have been crawling with everything up to and including Abrams tanks. Instead, the decision was made to NOT blow in there looking like an armored battalion. Of course, the Usual Suspects howled that even having officers there was akin to the Fascist-Communist Monster killing all good patriots.

I'm not knee-jerk opposed to cops owning body armor or anything. I defended the response in Boston, although in retrospect, I can admit it was perhaps a bit overdone. I can't say that the last couple weeks have done much to reinforce my faith though and I'm increasingly of the mind that there's a legitimate debate to be had here.

I disagree. I think going in all military-style would have greatly increased the chance of violence.

Not that I wouldn't have liked to see some weekend warrior militias get their asses kicked, but not at the expense of people getting hurt or killed.

The difference is that the Bundy folks were just itching to kill them some Feds. They wanted to be Real Patriots (tm.) The low key response to the situation was basically mocking them - they weren't enough of a threat to be treated seriously.

The situation in Ferguson - the protesters don't want to kill federal agents, they want the local DA to step down from the case. They want justice. They want their concerns to be acknowledged. It's a different kind of anger, and one that needed to be taken seriously. Unfortunately "take seriously" was interpreted to mean "pretend we're at war with our own people."

It wasn't mocking them. The alternative was a shooting match, which would have benefited absolutely no one.

I think most people would acknowledge that there's times a SWAT team is useful. That's "team" though, as in a small group of specialists for special situations, not seemingly every officer dressed up like Urban G.I. Joe [Edit: hell, not even 'urban' as numerous people have asked why you'd need jungle camo in suburban St. Louis aside from 'to look intimidating'] and cruising around in vehicles designed to assist in occupying Baghdad. Also, I doubt most people would put "minor pot busts" and the like on their list of times you'd need to utilize that specialist team.

Edited, Aug 21st 2014 9:00am by Jophiel

I was hoping they'd use drones at the Bundy ranch, but I suppose that only works when there's a wedding.

Boom! Mean Samira is the most fun.

Ok, fine. It would have benefited no one except Smash....

Maybe Hannah? Have you taught her about why people lose fights with the ATF yet?