Police Officers Are Mostly Parasites

[Gregg]

You get pushback because you attack people and often distort what they're saying. Several posters have acknowledged that you offer valuable contributions and insights, but unfortunately they're drowned out. And it's a continuing pattern so understandably people are defensive (and resistant). It's not helping advance your message.

Exactly.

In addition I come here to have some fun (debate can be fun), maybe learn some things, share some things. When it becomes angry and attacking my knee jerk response is to fight back, then in quieter moments I decide it is often too much effort to participate.

Thank you for posting this. It is constructive criticism stated in a kind but truthful way. Better than I could have explained.

[Steve 2.0]

I have interacted with police officers in various capacities over the course of my life: as a fellow first responder when I was a volunteer EMT; as a volunteer with the NYC Civilian Complaint Review Board; and as the COO and liaison to law enforcement for a suburban public school district. I've also been pulled over around six times for speeding and questioned as a suspect in a hit-and-run/abandoned vehicle (funny story in retrospect - running late for a conference at the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City and somehow didn't successfully engage the emergency brake in my automatic car when I hopped out and ran to register - unwitnessed by me the car rolled out of the spot and down the ramp where it hit another parked car).

In my experience, there are a lot of wonderful, dedicated police officers who take their civic responsibilities very seriously. And yes, there are far too many police officers who harbor seriously problematic bigotries, who abuse their power in their interactions with civilians, and/or who protect colleagues who abuse their power from being held accountable. While I think the police officers who abuse their power are in the minority (albeit too large a minority not to question the vetting, training and monitoring), the prevalence of police officers at all levels of the hierarchy who will protect that minority from being held accountable is what makes the problem an institutional crisis that demands action. The remedies that have been discussed in this thread already are worth implementing, and we probably also need to expand the use of empowered civilian complaint review boards to field and investigate charges of police misconduct and cover-ups of police misconduct.

You were a volunteer EMT? Wow! You rock!

[Steve 2.0]

Exactly.

In addition I come here to have some fun (debate can be fun), maybe learn some things, share some things. When it becomes angry and attacking my knee jerk response is to fight back, then in quieter moments I decide it is often too much effort to participate.

Thank you for posting this. It is constructive criticism stated in a kind but truthful way. Better than I could have explained.

Yeah....cause you're a doofus. (I kid....I think very highly of you and your opinions and you do a fine job explaining your points, Gregg!)

[Ken]

Let's say a poster on here posted a horrible crime committed by a black man, and used that crime as a jumping off point about how "blacks are mostly parasites." What if when challenged about his unsupported statistics and sweeping stereotypes, part of his explanation for his beliefs is that he was attacked and brutally beaten by black gang members who said he needed to get off their streets.

TW, you shouldn't have had to experience that power-tripping cop hurting you any more than someone else shouldn't have to accept being beaten by criminals. But neither experience is strong evidence to support broader claims about a large group. It still isn't strong evidence to take it a step further and say, well, I have had friends with similar experiences, and I see stories like mine in the news all the time. Using such experiences that may not be proportionate to larger data sets to make such claims is dangerous and divisive. It is also disturbing when such claims seem to suggest that the group in question is irredeemable, and just rotten to the core, with no measures we can take to improve things. DMT provided solutions, which is one reason his post was more well received. I haven't seen you even acknowledge the necessity of their job to a functioning society. I hope you agree that police are necessary, and if so, what can we do to make policing better? Focusing on that rather than maligning/stereotyping the group as a whole is much more productive.

TW I thought Sour Masher made some great points here, and I was interested in hearing your counter. What were your thoughts on this angle?

[Teenwolf]

TW I thought Sour Masher made some great points here, and I was interested in hearing your counter. What were your thoughts on this angle?

I'm at work, so I need to avoid a longer response until later. But I think the narrative that I'm using 1 negative experience to colour my view is honestly insulting to my intelligence. Will detail some stories later.

I fully recognize that my 80% estimate is pulled from my ass, based on moral judgment and impossible to quantify. But I will detail stories when I have time.

Anybody else blown away to hear that police seize more money in civil asset forfeiture than all assets seized in all burglaries by criminals? Police stealing more than criminals isnt insane to you? Isn't that the definition of "parasite"? Leeching off people through an unjust application the law? That's systemic parasitic abuse of the public's good faith.

[In the Corn]

Anybody else blown away to hear that police seize more money in civil asset forfeiture than all assets seized in all burglaries by criminals? Police stealing more than criminals isnt insane to you? Isn't that the definition of "parasite"? Leeching off people through an unjust application the law? That's systemic parasitic abuse of the public's good faith.

I've already stated agreement with DMT about ending civil forfeitures. The reality is this is a legislative issue that needs resolution. Just like ridiculously long prison sentences for minor drug offensives. In some ways, you can't blame cops for doing what's legal.

[Kevin Seitzer]

I've already stated agreement with DMT about ending civil forfeitures. The reality is this is a legislative issue that needs resolution. Just like ridiculously long prison sentences for minor drug offensives. In some ways, you can't blame cops for doing what's legal.

I don't think you can blame them for using civil forfeiture against major drug dealers. You can blame them for abusing civil forfeiture against petty criminals and especially against innocent people. Civil forfeiture is a major criminal justice reform issue for me. But I'm skeptical of the claim that civil forfeiture amounts exceed that from burglaries.

In Texas, police seize about $50 million per year in civil forfeitures. Criminals in Texas steal about $65 million per year in robberies, another $390 million per year in burglaries, another $740 million in property thefts, $785 million in motor vehicle thefts, and destroy $120 million in property lost to arson. So to imply that the police as a cure are worse than the disease seems deeply inaccurate to me.

Sources:

https://www.texastribune.org/2018/12/07/texas-civil-asset-forfeiture-legislature/

https://www.dps.texas.gov/crimereports/17/citCh3.pdf

[DMT]

Thanks for sharing those facts.

[Teenwolf]

I don't think you can blame them for using civil forfeiture against major drug dealers. You can blame them for abusing civil forfeiture against petty criminals and especially against innocent people. Civil forfeiture is a major criminal justice reform issue for me. But I'm skeptical of the claim that civil forfeiture amounts exceed that from burglaries.

In Texas, police seize about $50 million per year in civil forfeitures. Criminals in Texas steal about $65 million per year in robberies, another $390 million per year in burglaries, another $740 million in property thefts, $785 million in motor vehicle thefts, and destroy $120 million in property lost to arson. So to imply that the police as a cure are worse than the disease seems deeply inaccurate to me.

Sources:

https://www.texastribune.org/2018/12/07/texas-civil-asset-forfeiture-legislature/

https://www.dps.texas.gov/crimereports/17/citCh3.pdf

This from The Washington Post, noted conspiracy theorist rag, and personal fave...

Cops Took More Stuff From People Than Burglars Did Last Year

Includes a handy-dandy chart of the totals seized by federal law enforcement and burglary loss, showing 2015 the first year civil asset forfeiture outpaced burglary losses. That's nationally.

[Kevin Seitzer]

This from The Washington Post, noted conspiracy theorist rag, and personal fave...

Cops Took More Stuff From People Than Burglars Did Last Year

Includes a handy-dandy chart of the totals seized by federal law enforcement and burglary loss, showing 2015 the first year civil asset forfeiture outpaced burglary losses. That's nationally.

According to that article, $1.7 billion of that total was from the Bernie Madoff scandal. So I don't really trust either your accounting, or what you are implying from it.

The Texas Tribune I trust for criminal justice reporting. The burglary amount I quote for Texas is about 10% of the national total, which is in line with Texas population being 9% of the national population. But the national civil forfeiture number quoted in your WaPo article is 100x what is quoted for Texas by the Tribune. It doesn't add up. I suspect it's because of including stuff like the Madoff scandal money in the national total in order to inflate the total and make the issue seem scarier.

Edit to add: that WaPo article is addressing DOJ civil asset forfeiture rather than state and local asset forfeiture. I'm less familiar with where the DOJ forfeiture money even comes from.

[Kevin Seitzer]

The data underlying the WaPo article comes from the Institute for Justice:

http://ij.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/policing-for-profit-2nd-edition.pdf

As a measure of federal forfeiture activity, deposits can sometimes be unstable. In a given year, one or two high-dollar cases may produce unusually large amounts of money—with a portion going back to victims—thereby telling a noisy story of year-to-year activity levels. Net assets, the amount of money federal forfeiture funds retain after paying various obligations, represent a more stable metric.

In the last 10 years, the DOJ net assets in the forfeiture fund have increased from $500 million to $4.5 billion. That is about $400 million net increase per year on average, which pales in comparison to the $4 billion per year in national burglary losses, not to mention the losses to other types of robbery and theft that I mentioned above.

[Kevin Seitzer]

Civil asset forfeiture represents a major area of law enforcement abuse. It's something that needs to be sharply curtailed and audited.

However, to make out that police on the whole, at a national level, are worse than burglars and thieves is ridiculous.

(And I shouldn't have to state, but I will, that some portion, presumably even some large fraction, of the civil asset forfeiture was justified. Whereas I doubt any of the burglaries were justified.)

[In the Corn]

Civil asset forfeiture represents a major area of law enforcement abuse. It's something that needs to be sharply curtailed and audited.

However, to make out that police on the whole, at a national level, are worse than burglars and thieves is ridiculous.

(And I shouldn't have to state, but I will, that some portion, presumably even some large fraction, of the civil asset forfeiture was justified. Whereas I doubt any of the burglaries were justified.)

I'm hoping you took my post as being in agreement with you.

[Teenwolf]

I've already stated agreement with DMT about ending civil forfeitures. The reality is this is a legislative issue that needs resolution. Just like ridiculously long prison sentences for minor drug offensives. In some ways, you can't blame cops for doing what's legal.

I just want to point out what a completely ridiculous notion it is to think that "we shouldn't hold cops accountable for abusing their power as long as that abuse is legal." That's basically what you're saying.

Do you really think that so long as police obey laws, they're acting in accordance with morality? So arresting homeless people for minor offenses to clean up city streets, or putting them on buses to other cities is moral because it's legal? This is a slippery fucking slope, allowing abuse of power and self-interest to harm the public, under the guise of legality. Cops BREAK the law, because they have no law that stops them. When they get pulled over for drunk driving at 140 MPH, do they go to jail, or are they put on desk duty, or paid suspension? I know what happens in my town. When they pick up Indigenous kids and drive them out to the country and take their shoes, making them walk back into town cold and miserable... is that okay? I mean, there's technically no law against it...

I'll tell you what, I DO blame those fuckers, who would use and abuse laws for their own benefit. I refer to them as "parasites", because that's what a parasite is, a bloodsucker, a leech, etc. They leech off the system that protects them from punishment for their own abuses of people and the abuse of their own authority.

Again, I'll provide more anecdotes later.

[Teenwolf]

I also want to point out that I face higher odds of receiving physical harm or loss of life than the average police officer. I understand the danger of being murdered is different than the danger of being killed in other professions, but police still use that perceived added threat of loss of life to justify their own cowardly actions, nearly every murder of an unarmed black person dismissed because of this perception. It's not innocuous, it allows officers to avoid accountability across the board.

Over the last month, I've spent 7 full work days cutting down giant trees that ran along a live power line, about a mile long. Most of the trees I was able to push in the right directions, but I had some bounce or get caught in the wires, some scary situations... I was being paid $100/hr with a helper, so it was too hard to turn down. I don't demand any added respect or anything, I just think the perceived threat is overblown given the statistics showing how relatively safe policing is as a profession.