patrick.net

Heck, I would support a citizen using force, even deadly force, to defend himself against assault and battery committed during a legal and legitimate arrest. If the police get out of hand and assault a person, they are criminals no different than someone without a badge.

leo707 says

Yeah, not the response I expect from Kevin.

Fort I don't think you are a moron, but I do think that your scale of perspective is a bit off here. You are talking about possibilities of what may happen. I agree that we seem to be heading down the road to a more totalitarian government, but I would certainly not put that on Feinstein or even the Democrats in general. There are some very totalitarian elements of the Republican party these days, but at this point I think it is very premature to call anyone a Nazi.

Anyone who equates even the worst of our currently elected officials with the evils of the Nazi regime isn't an intelligent person.

There's plenty of room to disagree with policies. There's plenty of room to have rational arguments. There's plenty of room to think that somebody is a bad person.

But Nazis? No. Not even close. That's why I say anybody using this line of reasoning is a moron: They don't want to actually debate an issue, they're just lashing out.

The gun control proposals on the table today are extremely mild compared to what we see in the rest of the developed world. If that makes our politicians "Nazis", then I guess the rest of the world is worse than the Nazi regime?

It's such an absurd argument that there's just no point in continuing to engage with people who use it.

I feel the same way every time some fucking idiot on this board compares taxes to slavery or a minor inconvenience to rape. Taking everything to the extreme is such a low form of debate that only an incredibly stupid person would use it as a serious form.

Dan8267 says

Heck, I would support a citizen using force, even deadly force, to defend himself against assault and battery committed during a legal and legitimate arrest. If the police get out of hand and assault a person, they are criminals no different than someone without a badge.

I live in seattle, so excessive force by police officers is something I've seen all too often, but this is really murky territory. Determining what qualifies as "excessive" can be in the eye of the beholder, and the officers definitely are entrusted with a different standard than the suspect (that's something essential to maintain rule of law).

I've heard it argued that the modern US police system is essentially derived from plantation / colony security: It's a model of containment rather than protection. Keep a certain group from harming another group. That's why cops don't really help protect people in bad neighborhoods in many cities, they protect wealthy people FROM the people in bad neighborhoods.

We definitely need a cultural shift to one where the role of a police officer is that primarily of problem solver and mediator.

I think adopting something like the British constable system might help: Have uniformed, minimally armed officers patrolling the streets and responding to situations where danger is minimal. Armed officers only get brought in on an as-needed basis.

Of course, we live so far apart here that this might not be practical. If calling for armed backup requires a 20 minute wait, a lot of things can go badly.

Kevin says

I've heard it argued that the modern US police system is essentially derived from plantation / colony security: It's a model of containment rather than protection.

like Irish cops maybe ... back as early 1840s