No amount of training will prevent this sort of thing, ever. There is nothing anyone can do to stop travesties like this from happening. We can likely limit it, some of it, but not outright stop it from happening.
No amount of training will prevent this sort of thing, ever.
Really, like not even prevent some of it?
We can likely limit it, some of it
Oh so some amount of training will prevent this from happening just not completely eradicate it.
Your statements are directly contradictory - idk why I’m pointing this out just that it bugged me I guess but I agree with you that elimination of all violence carried out by the state is impossible. We can definitely limit it!
My point is that there are far too many people who have different views, beliefs, and levels of thinking to find a sure-fire method of ensuring all agents of the state have sufficient “training” for this and anything else they might come across that’ll be in tomorrow’s news.
And when placed into a delicate situation where your fundamental job is answering the call to and making arrests, full-well understanding that every perpetrator is a potential threat to themselves and those around them (as you work in these situations every day), it can become very stressful if placed into a situation such as this.
Now don’t get it twisted, I’m not in any way saying these cops are in the right - they are not. What I am saying is if you had 2 years of training I don’t think things would universally change much. I own firearms for example and I go shooting, and nothing is ever going to prepare me for a day if I ever needed to use one of those firearms. I don’t ever want to be in such a situation. I don’t want to shoot anyone, I just want to protect my family, myself, and the innocent, in that order. I couldn’t imagine how awful it would be to have to make split second choices filled with anxiety, fear, and fight or flight responses in the heat of a moment such as that. Could I make a mistake? Of course! I mean, what if there’s a shooting somewhere and suddenly I have to consider so many variables. Where’s the shooter? Is my family in danger? Where do we go? Should I draw my weapon? If I do, could police or another armed individual think I’m the shooter? If I saw the shooter, how safe would it even be to shoot them to try to stop them? Could I hit an innocent person? What if I do? Will I go to prison for murder? What if I hit the shooter and take them out? Will I be a hero, or marked as a villain and imprisoned so I never see my family again?
I can think about these things time and again (and I have), but I know nothing I could do would fully prepare me for being in that moment.
And again, I’m not saying that any of that means the cops in this example were justified. I’m just saying I can see how impossible this task could be. Up training to 2 years and you’re going to need to increase what we pay cops or many people are going to just go into other professions. What would the value of say, 2 years of training be, exactly? Does it actually reduce the level of police killings? I got this off a quick web search:
“Specialized and targeted training—such as de-escalation, procedural justice, and reality-based tactical training—can reduce police use of force, but simply increasing total training hours alone does not automatically or reliably eliminate fatal police shootings.”
That’s apparently from NBC News. And the data isn’t being very concrete here. It says that better training provides a “measurable drop” in use of force, but it won’t say by how much. Deeper searches reveal a reported 28.1% in overall use-of-force incidents, but use-of-force isn’t only use of deadly force. Stats say that cops in the US kill an average of 1,150 people annually. A 28.1% reduction (let’s assume that’s all deadly force, but it wouldn’t be), would be roughly 323.15 people. Around 300 people die each year from ladder-related falls. So not only would this reduction be negligible, but what would the cost be? Why not invest that into say, cancer research, traffic safety awareness (39,254 people died in 2024 to traffic accidents), or so many other things.
We look at situations like this - which are egregious, don’t get me wrong - and we ask ourselves as if we ARE the collective, “what could WE do?” But there isn’t a collective, and there is no “we”, there is only what can YOU do. One thing I do is not put myself in situations where police may be involved. Now that doesn’t mean this woman deserved what happened, I’m not saying that at all, nor do I believe that, but as terrible as this kind of thing is, rationally as I said, there’s often not much that can be done about it, and watch, nothing will be done about it.
People will scream about it for a while, politicians and talk about what we’re going to do about it, things may even be put into place around it, but it won’t change anything, and if it does, it’ll be so negligible that the next time it happens even AFTER the proposed changes are put in place, it’ll seem like nothing was ever done at all.
Making what change, exactly? You and I cannot control the choices that other people make, we can only control our own choices. I flex my control by teaching my children how to live a moral life, by myself, living by that example and living a moral life. I come to boards like this one and try to convince people through well thought out and articulated arguments what is objective, logical, rational, and moral, without dodging to emotion.
You could start by voting for politicians who want to enact laws requiring more police training. Or at least not saying nothing ever will change, because if that were true the world would look a hell of a lot different.
Do I expect one person to make systemic change from the bottom up happen? No, I’m not a total moron. However, being defeatist and saying police reform, or any other thing that needs to happen, is simply impossible is not helping anyone.
No amount of training will prevent this sort of thing, ever. There is nothing anyone can do to stop travesties like this from happening. We can likely limit it, some of it, but not outright stop it from happening.
Really, like not even prevent some of it?
Oh so some amount of training will prevent this from happening just not completely eradicate it.
Your statements are directly contradictory - idk why I’m pointing this out just that it bugged me I guess but I agree with you that elimination of all violence carried out by the state is impossible. We can definitely limit it!
My point is that there are far too many people who have different views, beliefs, and levels of thinking to find a sure-fire method of ensuring all agents of the state have sufficient “training” for this and anything else they might come across that’ll be in tomorrow’s news.
And when placed into a delicate situation where your fundamental job is answering the call to and making arrests, full-well understanding that every perpetrator is a potential threat to themselves and those around them (as you work in these situations every day), it can become very stressful if placed into a situation such as this.
Now don’t get it twisted, I’m not in any way saying these cops are in the right - they are not. What I am saying is if you had 2 years of training I don’t think things would universally change much. I own firearms for example and I go shooting, and nothing is ever going to prepare me for a day if I ever needed to use one of those firearms. I don’t ever want to be in such a situation. I don’t want to shoot anyone, I just want to protect my family, myself, and the innocent, in that order. I couldn’t imagine how awful it would be to have to make split second choices filled with anxiety, fear, and fight or flight responses in the heat of a moment such as that. Could I make a mistake? Of course! I mean, what if there’s a shooting somewhere and suddenly I have to consider so many variables. Where’s the shooter? Is my family in danger? Where do we go? Should I draw my weapon? If I do, could police or another armed individual think I’m the shooter? If I saw the shooter, how safe would it even be to shoot them to try to stop them? Could I hit an innocent person? What if I do? Will I go to prison for murder? What if I hit the shooter and take them out? Will I be a hero, or marked as a villain and imprisoned so I never see my family again?
I can think about these things time and again (and I have), but I know nothing I could do would fully prepare me for being in that moment.
And again, I’m not saying that any of that means the cops in this example were justified. I’m just saying I can see how impossible this task could be. Up training to 2 years and you’re going to need to increase what we pay cops or many people are going to just go into other professions. What would the value of say, 2 years of training be, exactly? Does it actually reduce the level of police killings? I got this off a quick web search:
“Specialized and targeted training—such as de-escalation, procedural justice, and reality-based tactical training—can reduce police use of force, but simply increasing total training hours alone does not automatically or reliably eliminate fatal police shootings.”
That’s apparently from NBC News. And the data isn’t being very concrete here. It says that better training provides a “measurable drop” in use of force, but it won’t say by how much. Deeper searches reveal a reported 28.1% in overall use-of-force incidents, but use-of-force isn’t only use of deadly force. Stats say that cops in the US kill an average of 1,150 people annually. A 28.1% reduction (let’s assume that’s all deadly force, but it wouldn’t be), would be roughly 323.15 people. Around 300 people die each year from ladder-related falls. So not only would this reduction be negligible, but what would the cost be? Why not invest that into say, cancer research, traffic safety awareness (39,254 people died in 2024 to traffic accidents), or so many other things.
We look at situations like this - which are egregious, don’t get me wrong - and we ask ourselves as if we ARE the collective, “what could WE do?” But there isn’t a collective, and there is no “we”, there is only what can YOU do. One thing I do is not put myself in situations where police may be involved. Now that doesn’t mean this woman deserved what happened, I’m not saying that at all, nor do I believe that, but as terrible as this kind of thing is, rationally as I said, there’s often not much that can be done about it, and watch, nothing will be done about it.
People will scream about it for a while, politicians and talk about what we’re going to do about it, things may even be put into place around it, but it won’t change anything, and if it does, it’ll be so negligible that the next time it happens even AFTER the proposed changes are put in place, it’ll seem like nothing was ever done at all.
That is so many words to say you’re okay with the status quo and making no changes.
Making what change, exactly? You and I cannot control the choices that other people make, we can only control our own choices. I flex my control by teaching my children how to live a moral life, by myself, living by that example and living a moral life. I come to boards like this one and try to convince people through well thought out and articulated arguments what is objective, logical, rational, and moral, without dodging to emotion.
You could start by voting for politicians who want to enact laws requiring more police training. Or at least not saying nothing ever will change, because if that were true the world would look a hell of a lot different.
Do I expect one person to make systemic change from the bottom up happen? No, I’m not a total moron. However, being defeatist and saying police reform, or any other thing that needs to happen, is simply impossible is not helping anyone.
What would I want, personally? Reduction in government and taxation across the next 50-100 years until the government is completely gone.
This would give the market the opportunity to move into those sectors that the government currently controls.
This along would slowly solve many of these problems - at least to some degree.