Comment by DoreenMichele | Hacker News Reader

Comment by DoreenMichele | Hacker News Reader

I've been hospitalized twice on a suicide watch. I've also had supposedly "well meaning" strangers call the cops on me when I was homeless to "check on me."

The cops advised me I shouldn't be walking in the bike lane that everyone walked in because there was no sidewalk on that side of the road. Having advised me of this, had they stopped me again, they would have ticketed me. I then had to routinely expend extra energy to go out of my way going "home" every single day.

No, the cops absolutely weren't going to help me solve any of my actual problems. No, they absolutely didn't care about me, no.

Calling the cops on a stranger because you supposedly care about their welfare is asshole behavior. I don't care at all about your supposed justification or algorithms etc.

If you care, you check on them yourself or maybe call an ambulance. If you don't know them well enough to do that without it going weird and shitty places, then mind your own damn business.

That's terrible about the policing of walking in the bike lane. It reminds me of the woman in Georgia whose child was hit and killed by a driver (who had been drinking) in a hit-and-run when she crossed a road without a crosswalk. There was no crosswalk nearby. She received a much harsher sentence for crossing the street without a crosswalk than the driver received for the hit-and-run. https://usa.streetsblog.org/2011/07/14/mother-convicted-of-v...

Our institutions are failing us. https://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_using_our_practical...

I just read the first link. Disgusting. She crossed the street with her children and saw one of them run over in front of her, and she was charged? And did more time the one who ran them over? Wow.

I guessed the usual reason for absurdly punitive judicial decisions in the the American system, and after finding a photo of the mother I was sadly proved right.

In mostly places there's no difference between calling police or an ambulance. Everything is handled out of the same dispatch center, and the dispatcher will send whichever first responders they think are appropriate based on policy.

I didn't actually like it when strangers called an ambulance on me when I was homeless either. But the ambulance driver at least didn't threaten to ticket me if he ever saw me again in that spot.

Also, the remark about ambulances wasn't in my original comment. I added it after the fact, perhaps a mistake.

Some places they habitually send a cop and an ambulance, even if there's just a medical emergency.

Former EMT. If you called in that you had suicidal ideation and had the means to harm yourself, it would be treated like a hostage situation, where you are both the hostage and the captor--especially if you have a weapon like a knife or gun.

I can see few situations where they would send only an ambulance. The closest is if you said you simply overdosed on pills. However, at this point you need to go to the hospital. The ambulance has no ability to force you if you change your mind. Police would likely be sent along to make sure you didn't change your mind.

> In mostly places there's no difference between calling police or an ambulance.

At least in Germany, there historically is/was (even though this is not always the case anymore as far as I am aware). 110 for police and 112 for ambulance service and fire department.

There is a good reason for this: if you and a group of friends did some experiments with, let us call it, substances that did not go well, you want to call an ambulance to get them medical help. But under no circumstances you want that the police to be informed of this accident.

firstnet.gov - Now that you mention it, I was browsing a topic, and one thing led to another to another and led me to firstnet.gov. But, you're right. Where there's an ambulance, there's police.

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