Off duty, black cops in New York feel threat from fellow police | Hacker News Reader

Off duty, black cops in New York feel threat from fellow police

reuters.com

32 pointsgeorgecmu15 comments

I think this really cuts right to the problem which is two fold, first is racial profiling and the second is the presumption of guilt that is going on. It is the latter which I find really disturbing.

In a better world an officer might stop someone and ask what they are doing and some id, but they must presume that the person is innocent. My favorite quote from my sister (who is a public defender) is "Being a minority is not probable cause." Once the officer has read the id, they should be on their way.

Completely off topic, but the comma in the title feels very out of place.

It's short for "When they are off duty" and is a common construct in old-school headline writing.

You would think logical people are here. If 80% of crimes is done by Blacks in a neighborhood isn't it more efficient to look for criminals in this group even if it is just 15% minority?

Why males don't complain about being targeted by the Police compared to women?

I don't think it's so much the fact that predominantly black neighborhoods are looked at, as it is the manner with which they're targetted.

Which is based on subjective feelings alone.

I was treated by the byc cops really bad. I can easily imagine how much more worse I would feel if I were Black with all that PC propaganda fed into my head since birth

If you're focusing on policing a subset of people, that subset will be charged with a disproportionately high number of crimes.

Charged isn't convicted. Somehow Blacks are 70% of prison population. So it looks like the cops are right. Unless we will buy now into a conspiracy theory that Blacks are convicted based solely on the skin color.

> Charged isn't convicted.

> Somehow Blacks are 70% of prison population.

Enter the plea bargain.

Those are not necessarily inconsistent. They will throw down the book at you and say you face 199 years in prison unless you plead guilty. Have you already forgotten Aaron Swartz?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz

That would be a good argument if you have a legal system based upon efficiency. But most legal systems are based upon _correctness_, so you cannot effectively make that kind of argument. I'm not saying it's a useless argument: I'm saying a justice system making decisions that are inconsistent with its goals and with societal expectations is going to be inefficient no matter how you slice it.

If you want to go that way, you really should think of some compensation for being over targeted. It shouldnt be free for a society to over target an individual for being part of a minority.

1st sentence - "have experienced the same racial profiling that cost Eric Garner his life".

How narrative gets created before your eyes.

His death being an unfortunate accident, how does racial profiling explain it?

When does it stop being an unfortunate accident and start being a crime? How many incidents does it take before we can agree on the existence of a pattern of abuse against visible minorities?

Each incident is itself an unfortunate accident. Together though, I argue they already are indicative of racial profiling, racism, and an a pattern of problematic behaviour among law enforcement professionals.

The death was an unfortunate accident, but the circumstances in which it occurred were not an accident. It is the circumstances that people are protesting.

By analogy, say I get drunk and go for drive, miss a stop sign and kill a pedestrian. Even though it was an accident, I'll be charged for at least manslaughter because I created a situation in which such an accident was more likely.

Some police officers habitually create confrontational situations with black men, even in the absence of any evidence of serious wrongdoing. Eric Garner was selling cigarettes illegally (a very minor crime) yet was tackled by officers and put into a dangerous chokehold. The situation was far more likely to result in death or injury than just writing him a ticket at arms length.

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