Thread: The loss of common courtesy?

Originally Posted by Joe Chandler

I dunno...I can understand some of the antipathy towards law enforcement; it's just that I know I'm honest, as are the guys I work with, and I treat the people I serve with as much respect as their behavior dictates they deserve, and I hate to see the good ones lumped in with the bad.

You wanna see fighting between LEO and non LEO check out the concealed carry websites sometime...lol...man that can get UGLY. I personally cannot imagine how frustrating all the red tape must be, and I dont think I have the self control to stay within that red tape. I just want to be able to protect my family, and stay out of other peoples business. For the most part most of the LEO's I have met (mostly at the range) have been great guys. There are some that seem to be on a power trip, but that comes with positions of power quite often.

The only major problem I have with law enforcement is that if I need assistance while I am being robbed (more likely Id need help cleaning up the bodies), I do not want a 5'1" 98lbs girl showing up who couldnt wrestle a pre schooler to the ground. Unless a woman is more of a man than I am...she should become a nurse, not a cop. I feel the same way about women in the military. All the femenists and equal rights advocates can kiss my fat ass. I appologize in advance to all of you whom I have just offended, but I'll stick by these beliefs till my dying day.

It sucks to be on this side of it, too...I'm a firm believer a man (or woman, as the case may be) has a moral (and should have a legal, as well) obligation to protect his/her family by whatever means necessary, yet there are all kinds of laws restricting that (particularly in the Peoples' Republics of California and New York). Police are reactive...they only come after the fit has hit the shan. Unfortunately, certain groups have convinced the politicians the predators have the same standing as the prey. To use a trite truism (hey...alliteration) "I'd rather be judged by twelve than carried by six." I've let folks go who were carrying concealed weapons if they weren't committing a crime, or felons (who lost that right).

I'mma stay out of the women argument. I will say this, though: I once was the FTO for a female officer. I explained early on that I would test her every chance I got. We were at the station and I attempted to take her weapon from her. She did right, and followed police academy weapons retention training. I picked her up by her pistol, and shook it out of her. And I wasn't even angry, or really trying to hurt her, like a real criminal would. In the real world, that gun would be used against her or another officer. Scary. I'm a firm believer in equal pay for equal work...I just haven't found one (in law enforcement or my 9 years in the military) who could, or would, do equal work.

Originally Posted by Joe Chandler

I'm a firm believer in equal pay for equal work...I just haven't found one (in law enforcement or my 9 years in the military) who could, or would, do equal work.

Female officers have been instrumental in getting more domestic abuse cases to go to court. The battered wives simply respond better to women. You guys are right that men tend to be bigger and stronger than women and that frequently that is a primary concern, but critical thinkers don't stop there.

X

Originally Posted by Joe Chandler

(particularly in the Peoples' Republics of California and New York). Police are reactive...they only come after the fit has hit the shan. Unfortunately, certain groups have convinced the politicians the predators have the same standing as the prey. To use a trite truism (hey...alliteration) "I'd rather be judged by twelve than carried by six."

"I'd rather be judged by twelve than carried by six." That is a comforting one, but might not have as nice a jingle to it if you were serving a life sentence for defendind yourself from serious bodily harm. However, I still live by it and use it quite often in debates.

Dont forget to add PRNJ to your list...I think they should just succeed from the union since they continue to ignore our constitution. They should not be entitled to any federal aid or military protection by the USA. Just my opinion.

Originally Posted by xman

Female officers have been instrumental in getting more domestic abuse cases to go to court. The battered wives simply respond better to women. You guys are right that men tend to be bigger and stronger than women and that frequently that is a primary concern, but critical thinkers don't stop there.

X

Not saying they're not effective (and even indispensable) in certain circumstances. I worked primarily narcotics, though. Thankfully, I have a different assignment now, and work mostly solo, so it's a non-issue.

I've dealt with some women who could kick most guys' behinds without any difficulties. They look like your average ladies, but they can bust through 4" of layered wood and very intelligent in conflict situations.
Size isn't that important either. I had a KO against a guy who had 50lbs of muscle on me and the only time I knocked down was when I got hit by a guy who looked like the smallest dweeb a schoolyard bully could pick on without feeling guilty. He even wore glasses lol. Therefore, don't judge by appearances.
Our police force does have some physical standards that you have to pass before they send you to a PFC. Therefore, if the 98lb girl can drag a 150lb dummy after doing 20min of hard cardio, she's strong enough for the job.
In any case, a gun is the "great" equalizer. You don't need years of physical and mental training to shoot someone with a gun. As long as you have a good hand-->eye coordination, it's a point and click kinda thing. Therefore, a 98lb girl can easily save me from a drugged up 250lb roid-freak.

Originally Posted by FiReSTaRT

Btw Kyle, do you have any issues with your company going "Big Brother" on you? ... I'm sorry for the digression but I am STRONGLY opposed to my privacy being slowly suffocated by the government and corporate interests. The one that has me scared is the introduction of biometric identification for immigration purposes at one of our airports. The justification was "to expedite the process". If it becomes a major initiative and then they make it so that it takes 5 hours to go through passport controll unless you give them your retinal scan/voiceprint/fingerprint/dna, I will do whatever it takes to kill that initiative on constitutional grounds. In my line of work, we handle confidential personal data, but we have a heavy onus on privacy. So if one of my subordinates sees a grow-op or a meth lab (while on the job) and reports it to the police, not only can he end up in jail for 6 months, but I'll make sure he gets sentenced to the maximum amount of time and that he gets the additional fine of $1000. Then I'll show up at the parole hearing to make sure he/she doesn't get out early. It's time to draw a line and tell both the governments and the corporations "no more".

I don't feel my employer is being excessive or invading my privacy. It's the price you pay if you want to play. If you have a DUI (Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol, blood alchol content > .08%) you can't even get a job with us, even if you're not operating a company vehicle.

This is a business decision. You have a company with roughly $1 million a day in gross revenue. That means company vehicles might as well have a target painted on them. Tailgating, speeding, unsafe driving... any of those things affect the company's image negatively as well as the opportunity for an accident & impending lawsuit.

Now, if you'd like to talk about invasion of privacy, that's a whole different can of worms. I work for one of the competitve phone companies, and we've had a company install some "demo gear" in our switchroom and leave it, never showing up for over a year. It's a neat little box that captures all of the inbound & outbound calling information, saves faxes that were sent or received, and who knows what else.

I think biometric identification has its place, but I fear the government & private industry will rush to use this new technology without fulling thinking about how to secure that information. Injected RFID tags being mandated by employers for data center access is a bit much.

After market warning: this post turned into a rant before I was done.

Originally Posted by Joe Chandler

As for your statement that "a good majority of them (police/detectives) operate under the assumption that it's their job to prove someone guilty even when their innocent."...I respect your position, but I'll have to call bullshit on that one. Most are honest and hardworking, but you never hear about them.

Likewise I'll respect your opinion also. I can only go on personal experience as well as research I've done on different "innocence" projects. I realise it's limited but I can't see it being so vastly different in other areas. I'll also admit to being a cynic but after a life of eating lemons, I may not have scurvy but I sure as heck have ulcers.

I forget the exact numbers used to justify "standardized investigative" methods but all too often these statistically justified methods not only convict innocent people but give police, investigators, prosecutors, etc. "tunnel vision" If an "approach" works out 80 percent of the time you still have 20% out there that this method won't work for. You can cite work load, time constraints, abuse from suspects, etc. but there is NO justifiable excuse to chock up any single person in that 20% as a "casualty of war".

There's a case in the news now where some kid spent 3 1/2 years in jail for homicide in an accident that killed his friend. He pled guilty because he couldn't remember the accident and police convinced him he was driving. Forensic and dna evidence has shown that he was a passenger. Even though this came to light the prosecutors and investigators STILL blamed him for the accident. To avoid going through trial and to get out of jail he took another plea bargain that gave him time served. Now he's a felon for something he wasn't guilty on.

I had a police officer tail gate me with his lights on bright, blinding me. I didn't know at the time that it was a police officer. I slowed down, he slowed down I sped up, he sped up. After 6 miles of this, going down to as slow as 45 mph (freeway) for an extended period I made the decision I was dealing with a nut case and it was best to get to the next exit asap. I floored it. When he realized his machine was not set up to keep up with mine he put his bubblegums on. I was already 1/2 mile away. I stopped and he went bolistic, cuffing me and calling to impound my vehicle. After over 5 minutes of verbal abuse and unnecessary physical roughness I asked (yelled over him) if he was going to let me answer any of his questions or if he was just going to keep screaming. After he finally shut up I mentioned his techniques and asked if he had his camera on, which he did, and addressed his bright lights. His senior mentioned, after one of his colleagues checked and dimmed his lights, that if the camera backed up my story I could cause them trouble. Because he knew it did, he released me after more rants. This is one of my experiences with 'honest hard working' police.

I've seen kids who've have messed up once and become instant targets, constantly harrassed by police, eternally unforgiven even after they paid their pennance. I know first hand people who have been targeted because they were black or hispanic. I also know of a fair number of these targets that were disrespectful, refusing to give names and resisting arrest, etc. but that's not all of the cases. It's not even the majority from what I've seen.

I repeat the 'comradery' of the badge, etc. Have you ever seen a video of a locker room discussion from a police station? I have seen several. They remind me of military on steroids. It was always "civilians" and "us". "We" were always at odds with "civilians" for one reason or another, no matter the base; always with stories of how the community wanted the base out of there and how the base 'proved over 80% of the community cash flow' was military.

It's easy to feel "us" vs "them" but from what I've seen and heard it's even worse with police. A rose called "bull*" is still a rose.

I apologize again for any offense to anyone. I do believe there are truly honest hard working police officers out there. My opinion is that they either quit to stay honest or at the very least become jaded against the citizens ("them").

And sorry also, I don't mean to steer off the thread topic again.

Kyle, I believe this is excessive. If a kid made a mistake when he was 18, he still can't get a job 20 years later even though he kept his nose clean since then. I understand that the company has to cover its collective behind, but for that I blame the lawsuit-happy culture. Some people in the states "earn" a living with lawsuits against individuals and companies, without having to work. It's not as bad in Canada yet... I'm hoping it never gets that way.

Unless they REALLY protect biometric information so CSIS/DND-Intel/StatsCAN are the only agencies using BM for their employees and the law enforcement community CANNOT acquire BM information (including fingerprints) from people who have not been CONVICTED of a jailable offence, I cannot condone its use. Ofcourse checking the fingerprints of an arrested suspect is ok, but if the person does not get convicted in court, that information should be thrown out, according to strict guidelines.

Originally Posted by FiReSTaRT

. . . .Unless they REALLY protect biometric information . . .

Living in a dreamland dude, that's not going to happen. Biometric information is one of the key factors in modern legalized discrimination. While it has its uses the cons far outweigh the pros. Key and formost being legalized discrimination.