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Comment by williamcotton | Hacker News Reader

> Don’t call 911. Obviously, there are exceptions, but the sad lesson is, there are fewer than you’d think.

Are you fucking kidding me? Do NOT listen to this advice. If you see someone injured, CALL 911!

Do NOT move the person if there is suspicion of spinal or head injury. Wait for the HIGHLY TRAINED emergency response team to show up.

> Call Lyft to take you to the hospital. (Worked well when I broke my elbow.)

Are you fucking kidding me? ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?

All of this is some sort of thinly veiled attack on our public servants and what seems to be public government infrastructure in general.

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Public servants. That's a good one. The only public the police serve are their own sick and cruel interests. If they served the public, perhaps they'd actually stop real crime.

I would say that is not a joke but rational reaction to police state. Why 12 police man has to come to bike accident?

All of this is some sort of thinly veiled attack on our public servants and what seems to be public government infrastructure in general.

Why would you think he's kidding? I don't see a veiled attack: I see desperation. He (and others in this thread) believe that you are putting yourself into greater risk by calling 911 than by solving the situation any other way you can.

I don't share their opinion, but I would think deeply before dismissing the sincerely expressed belief of those who feel the emergency response system in the US so broken that you are better of trying to make your own way to medical care rather than taking a chance on calling 911.

Again, that is terrible advice.

Literally all professional literature on the subject suggests the following:

Remain calm, be aware of your surroundings, and closely evaluate the scene to protect yourself and others from further injury.

Do not move a critically injured person unless instructed by emergency medical professionals.

Do not try to drive someone who is critically ill or injured to a hospital unless there is no way to summon emergency help.

Call 911 or ask someone else to call: - If you think there is a medical emergency, - If the crisis could get worse left untreated or not treated properly.

Listen carefully to the 911 dispatcher's questions. Answer them calmly and quickly.

Remain on the line until the dispatcher tells you it's okay to hang up.

Ask someone to wait outside to meet emergency personnel if it is safe to do so.

Paramedics may want to know a brief summary of the circumstances that caused the emergency. Remain calm and cooperative as they gather information.

You apparently missed the part where he did all of that, and then ended up naked in solitary for 12 hours.

He did all of that except for the part where once the emergency services arrive, get out of the way. Don't let someone bleed out in a cab just because you're too proud to go away once the cops tell you to; they might not have the right, but you can avoid the naked solitary.

All of this is some sort of thinly veiled attack on our public servants and what seems to be public government infrastructure in general.

I'm all for calling bullshit on general unfounded anti-government rhetoric in general. But law enforcement are not your friends. They're trained that the citizen is an untrustworthy crook, why should we treat them any better?

Dude, this is about someone getting in to a bike accident.

Please, for fuck's sake, if you see someone hit by a car or otherwise bleeding on the street, do the sane thing and call 911.

I can't believe we're having this conversation...

Someone should try this and document their experience.

Uhm, you know that paramedics get called to accidents on almost a daily basis in a city like San Francisco, right? I'm pretty sure it would be national news if everyone calling 911 was being thrown in solitary.

I didn't say don't call the cops. I was speaking to a single line of your post, the one I quoted.

The social contract is broken.

Your brain is broken. Close the laptop and go outside and walk around San Francisco. It should be pretty obvious that things are pretty free and pretty orderly. If you and the rest of your video game playing hacker buddies can't see that, I dunno what to say. Get some more life experience?

Even with "gold level" insurance a ride in an ambulance is $$$$. If your injury is not life threatening taking alternate transport to the Emergency Room is perfectly acceptable.

...call 911 and be assaulted and thrown in solitary for... well, some doubtlessly minor reason, if any at all? No thanks.

If someone's having a serious stroke and immobile, yes, of course call an ambulance. A broken arm or leg? A Lyft is probably your best bet. I'd draw the line at something like "minor heart attack."

Wow. In my country (Uruguay), you can and should call an ambulance for broken bones :(

And ambulance service costs U$ 50/month and is included with 90% of the populations' health services.

Hey dude, don't listen to these people.

The vast, VAST majority of people in San Francisco and the rest of the United States deal with emergency responders with no problems whatsoever.

You're just experiencing a bunch of whiny, self-entitled assholes who're making more money than their underdeveloped brains know how to deal with and now think that they literally shit gold bricks.

This is causing WAY more problems in San Francisco than the SFPD.

If there's going to be any sort of protests in SF it is going to be against these asshats, not the SFPD, mark my words.

You know America is in decline when Uruguay is out classing her!

To be honest, we're blowing everyone out of the water :) :

- Legalized marijuana

- Legal gay marriage and recognition of LGBT rights

- A much better healthcare system than the U.S. (ok that part isn't too hard)

- One laptop per child

- The Economist's country of the year :)

Do you people really think there is an epidemic of people being thrown in solitary confinement for calling 911 to report accidents? REALLY?

What the fuck is going on here? Is one of my office mates pranking me with a man-in-the-middle attack and then trolling me hard? Or are there really that many retards on this forum?

I don't know.

If the cops who did stuff like this were actually punished, if the dept. came right out and said, this shouldn't have happened, we're gonna do this and this to fix it.. I wouldn't be afraid.

Instead I see, well, he must have pissed them off somehow, just be quiet and maybe nothing bad will happen to you.

All my encounters with cops have been good, but I understand the police dept. where I am is a pretty good one. Still, it only takes one bad encounter, one bad cop, to ruin my life.

I'm not gonna stop from calling the cops because I'm afraid of them. Someone else's life, their health, matters more than what could or couldn't happen to me. But I can't support this system and I don't know what to do about it.

HN commentators are smart, but they are not above the effects of the limbic system, unfortunately.

Have you ever lived in that neighborhood of San Francisco?

99.9% of my interactions with the police have been entirely professional and exactly what I would expect.

The 0.1% occurred in the Tenderloin, Mission, and SOMA (neighborhoods of SF). A SFPD beat cop, at night, in one of those areas... Yeah, no.

I've had more pleasant and rational interactions while being mugged in the Mission than I ever had with cops on the Mission beat.

If you see someone injured, CALL 911!

Agreed. But then get away from the scene ASAP once anyone officious turns up.

Bad advice. Paramedics could obtain useful life saving advice from witnesses.

Perhaps the safest (certainly not right) thing to do is call 911 and get the fuck out of there rather than trying to help and being imprisoned/abused for it.

> If you see someone injured, CALL 911!

When the police arrive, stay out of their way. If they don't need a witness, go home.

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