Quote:
Originally Posted by Knalus
But we can't, and we don't. Police officers are needed to ascertain what is happening, and then investigators and lawyers are necessary to provide checks and balances to the system after the fact. Which is why when police officers, either through poor training, poorly run and built systems, willful ignorance or disobedience, or unintentional errors, don't do the correct thing, the system fails.
|
I generally agree with your post and wanted to make a comment that builds on this paragraph.
Having lived in 3 distinct geographical areas of the US over the last 20 years, I've noticed that the perspective towards what is and isn't an example of a failed process is very stark.
By that I mean that a non-trivial percentage of the US population does
not consider a civilian death part of a system failing, and has a very acquiescent stance towards death as an outcome in civilian - police encounters. These people, for a variety of reasons, are very accepting of the fact that an unarmed civilian can lose his/her life even through the most routine of encounters with police. In effect, what many people would consider a system fail is regarded by many others as the natural order of law*. This attitude is in stark contrast to my general feel of Canadian society (from my experience through the mid 90s) and is also anathema to practically all of my foreign friends.
A significant number of americans still have very cavalier attitudes towards the well being of their fellow citizens. Until the population at large finds unanimous outrage over a 12 year old boy gunned down in under 3 seconds, I'm not sure anything can change.
* You can see this attitude manifest clearly in the Garner case. Pundit and citizen comments to the effect of "why didn't he just immediately shut up and submit to everything?" is the mental waiver people sign to wave Garner's life away.