Opinion on the police

[£]

Every breath you take
Every move you make
Every bond you break
Every post you make
They'll be watching you.

They're mostly okay but idk how I feel about how twitter/internet posts are leading to lawsuits etc. 8D It's all heading down a 1984 sort of road innit

 

[Lotus the Cat]

When did I say anyone should feel anything? I never told anyone how to feel, it's everyone else upset that they can't control how I feel, not the other way around. :)

The point of my post was more so to point out the inconsistency of your opinion. Within all professions that involve power or community trust you will find individuals who use that power and/or trust to do nefarious things. You have fire fighters that start fires, police brutality, murdering doctors, corrupt politicians, rapist priests, etc. If you're so willing to condemn all police officers for the minority of the corrupt, why not condemn all other professions of power and trust as well?

 

[Klippy]

In 2013, there were about 5,000 individual officers reported for misconduct (abuses including violence). [1] There are around 800,000 police officers employed in the United States. [2] If this number is similar every year, then less than 1% of officers are reported for misconduct, but the public perceives this number as much higher due to media coverage and sensationalism. It's why some people will say, "The police are abusive and out of control!" despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of law enforcement officers are extremely professional and responsible for the power they wield in society. There are bad eggs in any profession and law enforcement has not been the exception, but perspective and media-influence really shape what many people believe about the police in America.

This isn't to say that the 5,000 abuses reported are great or a number law enforcement should continue to maintain, but compared to the 30,000 firings of Mexican police officers in 2010 for corruption, things look a bit less grim. [3] There are about 500,000 police officers in Mexico, so roughly 6% of their officers were fired for corruption that year. Take into effect their terrible pay and how many more officers are reportedly bribed by drug cartels and you get a good picture of real distrust in police, of which only 1 in 1,000 criminals are punished. [4] That's a 99.9% chance of successfully getting away with a crime in Mexico. In the United States in 2012, violent crimes and property crimes were cleared (by arrest or by exceptional means) 46.8% and 19%, respectfully. [5]

Just a little perspective.

Sources:
[1] [2] [3] [4] [5]

 

[Oryx]

The point of my post was more so to point out the inconsistency of your opinion. Within all professions that involve power or community trust you will find individuals who use that power and/or trust to do nefarious things. You have fire fighters that start fires, police brutality, murdering doctors, corrupt politicians, rapist priests, etc. If you're so willing to condemn all police officers for the minority of the corrupt, why not condemn all other professions of power and trust as well?

When did I say I condemn them? All I said is that I don't by default trust them. I also don't trust all doctors by default, because I've interacted with them enough that I know a lot of them have biases they don't recognize, are just out for money, or are just not competent and I have to be my own advocate. I don't interact with priests but if I did I wouldn't have any reason to particularly trust them just because I'm not religious so there's nothing I would say to them that required trust. As far as fire fighters, honestly I don't think I've ever even seen a fire fighter outside of a firehouse so they're just not relevant to my life and probably won't be unless I'm actually in a fire, in which case they can't set the fire because it's already there. There is no link between "put trust in fire fighter -> fire fighter sets your house on fire", because there's no causation from trust that allows that to happen. Is there some rash of firefighters doing fire investigations that turn into arson or something?

Geez people get so worked up when I simply don't automatically trust a group of people just because they have a shiny badge.