The inability of some posters to understand such a simple thing explains why we shouldn’t be surprised if one day we become a true police state. Americans talk a good game about civil liberties and FREEDOM, but it’s plain to me that we’re way too willing to ignore these abstractions as long as it’s not “regular people” being affected.
What these assholes forget is the definition of “regular people” is subject to change. One day it will change, and by then, it may be too late to cry about civil liberties and FREEDOM.
Shut the fuck up, you racist idiot. Trying to shut out people based on skin color is exactly what the KKK does, you sick fuck, and we don’t need your idiotic bullshit here.
Shut the fuck up. Not because of your skin color, which I don’t know and don’t care about, but because of the fact you spew racist shit whenever you fail to shut the fuck up.
Exactly. He was twelve. Twelve year olds are idiots. I know because I deal with them around here all the time. My daughter is about to become one just like half her friends. Cops who aren’t smarter than twelve year olds are too stupid to be cops.
Ok I’ll bite how do you* disarm a person with a loaded** handgun? Since you claim the police should have done this, you obviously know how
*yes you. You say it’s easy. Go ahead I’m standing a few feet away from you with a loaded handgun. Take it away from me before I fill you full of 9mm holes, 17 to be exact if the magazine is full.
**Airsoft guns look just like a real firearm, so if you want to live you must assume it is:
A) a real firearm
And
B) it’s loaded
To do anything else is stupid and quite likely will make you the guest of honor at a funeral.
Here is what you don’t do, according to someone who knows what the fuck he’s talking about: You don’t drive up to a 12 year old kid as fast as you can while yelling at him, jump out at him then shoot him down 2 seconds later. Now, you and others can keep describing these police training scenarios until the cows come home, but they have jack-all to do with what happened in this particular situation. Care to talk about what happened in this particular situation?
First off, the only reason why the cops were just a few feet away is because of their stupid decision to bum rush the poor kid.
Also, to disarm a potentially dangerous suspect is fairly simple, and you can witness how it’s done on about every other episode of Cops.
From a safe distance loudly and firmly give these commands:
Put your hands on top of your head.
Turn around and face your back towards me.
Now walk backwards to the sound of my voice.
Ok stop! Get down on your knees.
Cross your legs.
The cops then proceeds to put the suspect in cuffs while the suspect still has his hands on his head, and is on his knees with his legs crossed.
And if you are 200’ away and he starts shooting?
Now what?
If you are far enough back that he can’t hit you, you probably can’t hit him. Meanwhile there may well be civilians that are closer and in danger. You remember the civilians you swore to protect and serve. Yeah those people.
So now hero, what’s your next move?
Essentially every person the police encounter may potentially reveal a weapon and start shooting. If your position is that they have to engage each person from the default position of “what if he starts shooting” then there’s little point in doing anything but shooting people immediately.
The rush that the fucking psychopathic fascists on this board are in to justify every cop shooting we discuss here is disheartening. You all are sad, scared pathetic little people.
“Wherever there’s a cop beatin’ a guy,
Iook for me ma, I’ll be there,
masturbating like a motherfuck.”
Essentially every person I encounter may reveal a weapon and start shooting. Lest you think my point is absurd (folks that are about to be arrested have more incentive to commit violence), recall that we’re discussing a 12 year old wandering around in a park. Rick seems to think that the kid is going to take hostages or maybe spray bullets in every direction after being told to disarm. Sure that could happen and does quite often within the dreams of the typical gunnut. But it’s fucking unlikely.
Moron Support Groups
Remember, NRA propaganda is chock full of anecdote and avoids data presentation at all costs. So it’s no wonder that the resident gunnuts have pisspoor risk evaluation capabilities. They are like highway drunk drivers who avoid airplanes at all costs because they saw a crash last month on the news.
Question: do you believe that people who are not of African-American descent, especially the Caucasian majority, have a clear and accurate picture of not only what life is like for them, but (perhaps more importantly) THEIR PERCEPTION of what life is like for them, and why?
(ETA: in a sense, this point strikes me as similar to some of the recent debate over feminism and rape culture. It’s kind of interesting to see the parallels.)
Sadly, for those going in the killing trade, bullets lose velocity the further they travel, so whether as an assassin or because she picked up a toy plastic bow and arrow causing you to fear for your life, pointing a pistol at a 4-yr-old girl 300 metres away will not guarantee you a hit.
An American block appears to be about 100 to 300 metres. 3x100 = 300 metres.
Ranges for Specific Non-Sniper Weapons:
I think much of the issue in this particular case is that when some of the African Americans of Ferguson tell me what their perception is of their lives, then the clear and accurate picture I get is what life is like when one is a complete idiot.
The perception of racism can be wrong. Not always, but very often. Thus very often when someone says “they only did this to be because I’m black” it isn’t true. Very often they treated you that way because you didn’t pay your traffic tickets, or you sold drugs, or you were sitting in a park pretending to shoot people and reached for what the police had every reason to believe was a real gun when they told you to put your hands up.
Or because you were walking down the middle of the street blocking traffic, and then block the cop from getting out of his cruiser when he tried to question you about a convenience store robbery, punched him in the face, and tried to grab his gun.
In the video narrated by the Police Chief, funny how he goes strangely silent once the cops enter from stage right. What happened to all the freeze frames and circles we were treated with at the beginning and middle portions of the tape? We didn’t even get a voiceover explaining “…and this is when they told him to drop his weapon”. All we get is what we see. One minute the kid is sitting in the gazebo, the next minute he’s walking over to the car and is then killed. The police needs a new PR department.
I’m also wondering if the cop car had a dashcam and if so, what was picked up on it. Will we hear the voices of two level-headed cops, assessing the scene in a rational manner and agreeing upon a plan of action that makes sense given the available data? Or will we hear two trigger-happy idiots acting as though this is their big chance to shoot them one, with their minds made up about the kid before they even arrive to the scene. That’s the tape I’d like to see.
At least Shodan allows for the rare occasion that racism does occur in the US. That’s mighty white of him.
Of course, most of the time, black people claiming racism put themselves in a poor position with their failure to pay tickets, their drug sales and their firearms brandishing.
It’s so good we actually have so little racism going on in America, and almost none right here on the SDMB.
You’re not a 12 yo. Of course, you can kill someone trying to disarm you. What people are saying is that an adult shouldn’t fear confronting an armed 12 yo. Even though theorically possible, a 12 yo is extremely unlikely to shot you, even if the gun is real. And the gun is very unlikely to be real in the first place.
You don’t shot a 12 yo pointing a gun in your direction. You tell him to put down the weapon.