You are a coward for posting your snide comment on an attempt to look intellectually superior.
The state of the police in the US is a disease... Defend that if you're so inclined.
Your snipey comment to try to quell discourse is abhorrent, and shows you're incapable of actually talking about the issue.
I said it would be better for reddit, because comments like yours are common there, while fairly uncommon on HN
Relatives often call the police when someone with a mental health problem is in distress or has gone for a walk or whatever.
We don't know how many encounters with police end happily. We do know that Many of the encounters that end with a loved one being shot started when a relative called the police.
(Obviously this is in the US. Other countries have plenty of police involvement with mentally ill people, who are sometimes armed with similar weapons to the US cases, that don't end with the ill person being killed.)
I agree with you about how that point is being made.
That said, police in America are stuck dealing with the consequences of many short-sighted policy decisions. They are not properly trained for social work, mental health services, and so on.
Most cops aren't properly trained to shoot a gun. Some have 1 training session per year and they have to hit 70% on a target 3 yards away. Most don't seem to know how to react in a confrontation or high-stress situation.
The system is flawed but people have personal responsibility too. You can't absolve someone of criminal acts by saying oh it's someone else's fault.
Seems like another one of those short-sighted policy decisions here...
But what about Sanskrit?