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Comment by IG_Semmelweiss | Hacker News Reader

I actually don't get this at all.

Read the article, clearly the actions by police go against the order by the judge.

So what is the point ? Why assume the risk ? What is the goal from law enforcement, and what is being achieved by the picture taking?

Do cops think there are thugs cloaking themselves in fake press gear ? Do cops think press staff is actively participating in the riots? Where cops ordered to intimidate ? Who is the beneficiary from such a campaign ?

So many questions, and the article explores almost none of them. Come on gents.

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Because there is no risk for the police. the risk / reward payoff-function is a flat line.

do good job: same pay just grind to pension.

do bad job: same pay, just grind to pension

many govt employees have this issue because there is no risk when they screw the public. its more than police that lack accountability (but the guns and traveling in packs makes them a bit more dangerous)

> many govt employees have this issue because there is no risk when they screw the public.

It is even worse. In many jobs the only time the public employee takes any risk is when they actively try to do some good for the public they serve. Whoever that is benefitting from the status quo, often with significant resources amassed from those benefits in the past, comes down hard on that employee. The public shows very little concern or support when this happens. So we get the situation you mention.

Why is this being referred as intimidation?

That's answered in the article:

"Colt described police then corralling protesters and media into one group and yelling for them to get “flat on our stomachs.”

“They were the ones with the guns, so we were like, ‘OK, well, we have to do this,’” Colt said."

There are more descriptions further on.

Press means accountability - a dangerous threat to LEO

Who is Leo? You capitalized it like you intended the abbreviation of "Law Enforcement Officers", but there are none of those here. Just a gang of lawless thugs in costumes.

I mean, for all the attempts to mock them, they are law enforcement officers. They do have legal rights of ones, they do have power and they have different set of laws that applies to them. They are not in costumes, those are really uniforms and they are really real cops.

It just so happens that real cops are real people. And real people don't create pristine pure organizations straight from Hollywood movie. So what happens when the organization gets too much benefit of doubt and too little accountability is descent toward abusing power more and more.

It's not mocking, but rather pointing out that they're doing the exact opposite of what they claim authority for, and are thereby false. We have to stop contributing to this idea that these crimes are some exceptional behavior apart from their norm - they've chosen the Punisher as their symbol because violating the law is the straightforward way to obtain what they perceive as justice.

Only the ones who speak up against (or ideally arrest) their corrupt coworkers deserve to be called Law Enforcement Officers. If the rest stopped existing, law and order would actually increase.

I think that such comments do opposite. Because of this implication:

> Only the ones who speak up against (or ideally arrest) their corrupt coworkers deserve to be called Law Enforcement Officers. If the rest stopped existing, law and order would actually increase.

This sort of thinking is what prevents real steps to stop abuse of power. Because it assumes these are individual issues, that those doing something bad are different and apart from the rest. That if we removed bad apples, all would be good.

In fact all are law enforcement, including bad ones. Being named law enforcement is not badge of honor that makes you better person then everybody else. It does not make you less prone to abuse power, to act on peer pressure or to act on irrational fear. As long as people assume that law enforcement is or should be composed of better people, they wont be able to implement proper limits on their power nor proper checks on what they do.

I see where you're coming from, but what are you thinking could be "proper limits on their power" ? The original cases of murdering cops could be solved by prosecuting the specific murderers and the system would likely hold, and I agree we need that kind of accountability nation wide.

But this mass action is different. Here, they are acting together to defy a court order as well as the Constitution. Even the mayor is powerlessly criticizing them with "gassing is not a human way of policing". The entire organization is in open rebellion against our civil society. At this point, it seems the only things that could contain these lawless thugs are actual "law enforcement", the national guard, a citizen militia, or maybe cutting their funding.

And one of the necessary steps to doing any of those is to delegitimize this group of goons. They're no longer called "law enforcement", because they've chosen to not respect the law. They're wearing those uniforms to fuel their own ego, not because they're granted any authority by our society - their abuse should bother all legitimate law enforcement. And they need to be treated like any other lawless paramilitary force.

> I actually don't get this at all.

> Read the article, clearly the actions by police go against the order by the judge.

Yes but they (the police) are the coercitive part of the law. > So what is the point ? Why assume the risk ?

There is no risk or the risk is very low.

> What is the goal from law enforcement, and what is being achieved by the picture taking?

Intimidation. (take care we know who we are). If it worked so well in USSR why should not work in US ? (I know: US is a "democracy")

> Do cops think there are thugs cloaking themselves in fake press gear ? Do cops think press staff is actively participating in the riots?

No. The cops know exactly who they are.

> Where cops ordered to intimidate ? Who is the beneficiary from such a campaign ?

The state and the repressive apparatus.

> So many questions, and the article explores almost none of them. Come on gents.

Do you really expect quality journalism. It is good that they report something is happening.

It sounds very similar to a “police riot”

It's threats and intimidation. It's that simple. It's mobster tactics.

They hope to benefit by making journalists a bit more scared about writing something too negative.

> Do cops think there are thugs cloaking themselves in fake press gear ?

That happened last year, didn't it?

I think it was even bragged about in online forums that I had access to, most likely HN or Reddit.

Only comment on the entire thread that makes sense.

It’s amazing that every comment seems to imply sinister motives to every action by every police officer, when the more obvious answer is that most police actually do their jobs well and there are circumstances they must deal with that commenters here are not privy to or want to perpetuate a narrative.

The same commenters of they met police or had friends who were police would think very differently. Police are dehumanized to the extent that people want to go out and attack them in the streets

I don’t think any officer goes out wanting to attack people and start fights. Look at videos of police. They stand in a line and have projectiles thrown at them and verbal abuse yelled at them. 90% of the time they have to stand there and do nothing. And if it gets too much they clear the protests.

The vast majority of society do not want to go yell at police in the street.

The biggest problem is takeovers of protests by anarchists and I don’t know the solution to this. If anarchists consistently escalate protests then it takes away people’s rights to protest. But I see this as a problem to be solved by protestors.

Lawyer answer: They can't know who the press is without detaining them to verify their credentials.

You can in fact check someone’s credentials without detaining them.

That seems like an oxymoron. Isn't it considered detaining someone as soon as a cop goes up to someone and asks questions like "can I see your press pass?"?

Fair enough, the word is ambiguous (it can either mean “keep under restraint or custody” or “delay”). Checking someone’s ID should be the second, not the first.

> Do cops think there are thugs cloaking themselves in fake press gear ?

Yes. Everyone has phones now. Everyone can claim they are press or they have a YouTube channel. These people don’t wear press gear.

A lot of the time the police are not suspecting press and they get more access so people claiming they are press are more of a threat, which is why they must verify.

Say you are trying to light a fire in a police station or break a barricade. Should police allow you to loiter and go wherever you want rather than stay with the crowd?

If you think it through you will realize that unless identification is done it creates immense risk.

Journalists will always complain on an individual level, but police are working on reducing threat level and maintaining order of a wider context.

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