Why Are NYPD Cruisers Playing the Ice Cream Truck Jingle? | Hacker News Reader

Why Are NYPD Cruisers Playing the Ice Cream Truck Jingle?

atlasobscura.com

It's interesting that anti-fascists (the demonized "antifa" whose beliefs boil down to "Fascism has caused millions of innocent deaths and violent force is sometimes necessary to prevent its rise again") are labelled terrorists in America, whereas the police, who often employ what can only be described as actual domestic terrorism (unless you think playing a song associated with blackface in black neighborhoods at 4:00AM is entertaining), are labelled heroes.

Police are more accurately labeled as antiheros.

Not to single you out and I assume you had innocent intentions, but we shouldn't keep standing silent when people describe degradation of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as they would House of Cards or Breaking Bad. Our loss of freedom and rights is not a TV show and it's absurd and alarming to keep talking about it that way.

We have long passed the threshold for what is absurd or alarming.

Without commenting on the groups themselves, I think it's important to note that the name a group gives themselves frequently has nothing to do with their activities. See Democratic People's Republic of Korea, etc.

This is particularly true for anything of a political nature, such as your example and things like the PATRIOT act. It’s named intentionally so that people can call you anti-democratic/anti-patriotic/whatever without even thinking and just pointing at the name. Things may even start with good intentions, lose sight of their goals given enough time, but cling to a name to divert criticism.

You are entirely correct! It just strikes me as a bit, well, fascist to dub people who are (at least claiming to be) in opposition to fascism fascists. Especially considering most "Antifa" in practice are exactly what they profess to be. These aren't some big mean ol' terrorists, these are often young people who play video games on the weekends and talk to their friends on Instagram.

You are correct, in Europe where there are literal fascists, antifa fights them. In the USA antifa is mainly a protest group against the republican party.

These are not the same class of target although they share the same name by those in the group. The definition of fascism is key to the identity of antifa.

They are using unlawful violence and intimidation towards the pursuit of political aims. Whether or not you feel those aims are justified, their means by definition have earned the “terrorism” label.

A previous commentor made a great point about the naming of things. Often the labels for highly political movements are euphemisms at best. Some of the least democratic countries in the world include the DPRK, DRC, and the PRC. And just about every violent revolutionary movement has similar naming, like the PLO and so many others. Look to their actions, not their name or stated mission, to make your own assessment.

Antifa is in the same position as many other early stage revolutionary political movements rooted in socialist ideals. I’d characterize them as highly volatile, anti-establishment, anti-police, with many autonomous factions, and so forth. Because of this disorganized and volatile nature, their initial steps can only be disruption to the incumbent political and police forces they stand against, not to create their own. They’re too chaotic at this stage to stand any chance of supplanting the status quo with anything better on their own. Their best hope is for the current political forces to enact better policies as a reaction, but it won’t be anything created by antifa itself. Because to create order requires a unified vision, and besides sharing a common enemy, unity is something their many factions lack at this time. That being said, the brief attempt at creating something in the CHAZ was illustrative of the challenges any early stage political force faces. In it, for example, the ratio of police (or armed militia) to civilians has to be extraordinarily high. And when their police force is as young, hot-blooded and untrained as it is today, it will be more violent than that of the stable government they oppose. Such an early stage government faces external threats, obviously, but because of the elevated level of chaos within it there are substantially more internal threats than a later stage government has to deal with. And so, were antifa to successfully implement its own government it would necessarily be fascist (in the police-force dominated, no room for dissent aspect of fascism) or it would fall apart. Despite their name and mission, and despite their far left position, if they are like any of the similar movements in history their authority early on will stem from a threat of violence, which your post doesn’t attempt to deny—only that for this cause, that fascist response, to you, would be justified.

For those who might be inclined to give the NYPD the benefit of the doubt:

There are two major ice cream truck companies in NYC: Mr. Softee and New York Ice Cream. Mr. Softee uses their own (extremely recognizable) jingle, and New York Ice Cream uses a version of "Pop Goes the Weasel."

Neither uses this song; the NYPD's usage of it is intended to convey the racist subtext.

The only thing I can think to add to the discussion here is to say that this behavior by the police force of New York City is simply intolerable.

Am I the only one surprised at how calm this article seems to be about this? Is there any reasonable doubt that this is racism? Shouldn't we be rioting in the streets about this? Oh wait...

The ice cream truck jingle has been sampled in popular music.[0] The article suggests in a correction that the song should never be played.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SBN_ikibtg

Incredibly dumb that they're arguing we need to dump the ubiquitous ice cream truck jingle. Leave it to an outlet called "obscura" to find reasons to jettison innocent, enjoyable, commonplace aspects of childhood for all kids.

That is fucked.

That makes me believe scrap the whole organization and start over, aka a version of refund the police, is the only way to fix in short time. Years instead of multiple generations.

But clean slate scrapping seems impossible.

The article keeps calling what's obviously institutional racism and aggression as "NYPD’s historic sense of humor". It gives a few examples of such "jokes" that just appear to be very public displays of racism and bad taste, like "wearing blackface while tossing fried chicken and watermelon into a crowd from a Labor Day Parade float in 1998".

It's not "sense of humor" if it was never meant as a joke. Just because a racist hick with a badge thinks it's a joke doesn't make it one.

I’ve been on a news diet for a couple months. Kind of a relief to see this at the top of HN after hearing someone in one of my classes talk about how it felt like the world was ending, because if this is what Hacker News is worried about, the world is probably gonna be fine.

Btw, try doing a news diet. I highly recommend it.

This seems like some pretty shaky logic, to put it mildly.

You’re right, it’s not logic. I would classify it as wisdom.

jquery: ...after hearing someone in one of my classes talk about how it felt like the world was ending, because if this is what Hacker News is worried about, the world is probably gonna be fine.

Popular but divisive articles on current events are consistently flagged and hidden/locked by moderation. Hacker News is a great forum but not an indicator of all current events, however tragic they may be.

If that's actually going on, that is horrifying.

Like it'd be one thing if squad cars had seen heavy vandalism, sirens were damaged across the board, they can't get new ones shipped in/repaired units so they're using the closest damn thing that makes a loud noise.

They can't exactly borrow from ambulances and fire trucks because each of those is specifically designed to not interfere with each other to make it possible for uninvolved people to know where they are coming from in acoustically complicated areas, and I wouldn't be surprised if the demand for new units weren't that elastic.

Then again, you'd think there would be international suppliers to buy from. Though I could totally understand if only the French had extra stock. Better to sound like an Ice Cream truck than a French Police car. (Sorry guys, I just can't stand that sound).

If it is intentionally being done as some sort of psychological warfare tactic. What in the hell is with reaching back so far for a reference? Short of stumbling across this article in particular, or having a Gran around with primary insight of the time... It just seems like a stretch to me that a whole precinct of cops would be huddled together plotting to unleash an entire police force's worth of Ice Cream Truck siren equipped psychological warfare mobiles intended to strike fear into the hearts of 19th century black folk.

Then again, maybe there's a lot of history majors on the force? Bloody world is gone mad, and I'm not certain anyone is worth taking seriously anymore.

EDIT: I quit. I just can't even reasonably process the simultaneous horror /absurdity factor with this. Absolute madness.

Unless there’s a simple answer like a supply chain issue and defective sirens(not very believable tbh) all these coincidences sure do add up to smell like systemic racism.

The police cars of the NYPD have a little microphone attached to a loudspeaker that officers can speak into to project their voice clearly to people outside the vehicle on the street. It is loud enough to be heard over midtown traffic on a busy day.

It doesn't require every cop to be "huddled together plotting". One leader making that decision unopposed would be all it takes for the bunch to become spoiled

Also, the impact of that psychological warfare is what you may have heard described as "generational trauma"

The police car is playing the "ice cream truck song" through external speakers on the police car – the same is done for actual ice cream trucks. There is no specific "ice cream truck siren."

Reply on news.ycombinator.com