American police kill a lot more people than our OECD peers do, but again, it is worth noting that overall gun violence is higher is the US. US police killings are 3.5X that of Canada, and the US gun homicides are 6.5X that of Canada.
>it would be unreasonably deferential to cops to presume that they have no part in the problem, especially with so many high-profile anecdotes of cops escalating or using force unnecessarily.
I think that the cops are one cog in a poorly designed machine, and in my opinion, not the most impactful one. Changing police policy is necessary, but not sufficient change to reduce police violence. We live in a relative police state, and it is convenient to place the bulk of the blame the replaceable enforcers opposed the system of laws and policies which perpetuate violent crime and violent police. Only changes to the latter will result in lasting change. To tie in the Canada comparison, The US also has 6.5X the incarceration rate.
>it would be unreasonably deferential to cops to presume that they have no part in the problem, especially with so many high-profile anecdotes of cops escalating or using force unnecessarily. If using violence is traumatic, then doesn't a lot of the blame for that trauma fall onto the same people who decide to use it unnecessarily, and onto the same people that have willingly adopted a warrior mentality
There are some cases where there is obvious misbehavior by officers and they should be held accountable for their actions, although I think this effect is overstated by focusing on the most outrageous examples. Most often, my understanding is that police shooters are acting in accordance with police training and policy to use lethal force when they perceive lethal threat from others. In these cases, think much of the "blame" falls on the policing institutions. The question becomes if a different policy exists would result in fewer unnecessary civilian deaths, with minimal increase in officer deaths. Perhaps there are win-win solutions where both death rates are reduced by avoiding dangerous scenarios entirely (e.g. avoiding unnecessary no-knock raids).
>it would be unreasonably deferential to cops to presume that they have no part in the problem, especially with so many high-profile anecdotes of cops escalating or using force unnecessarily.
I think that the cops are one cog in a poorly designed machine, and in my opinion, not the most impactful one. Changing police policy is necessary, but not sufficient change to reduce police violence. We live in a relative police state, and it is convenient to place the bulk of the blame the replaceable enforcers opposed the system of laws and policies which perpetuate violent crime and violent police. Only changes to the latter will result in lasting change. To tie in the Canada comparison, The US also has 6.5X the incarceration rate.
>it would be unreasonably deferential to cops to presume that they have no part in the problem, especially with so many high-profile anecdotes of cops escalating or using force unnecessarily. If using violence is traumatic, then doesn't a lot of the blame for that trauma fall onto the same people who decide to use it unnecessarily, and onto the same people that have willingly adopted a warrior mentality
There are some cases where there is obvious misbehavior by officers and they should be held accountable for their actions, although I think this effect is overstated by focusing on the most outrageous examples. Most often, my understanding is that police shooters are acting in accordance with police training and policy to use lethal force when they perceive lethal threat from others. In these cases, think much of the "blame" falls on the policing institutions. The question becomes if a different policy exists would result in fewer unnecessary civilian deaths, with minimal increase in officer deaths. Perhaps there are win-win solutions where both death rates are reduced by avoiding dangerous scenarios entirely (e.g. avoiding unnecessary no-knock raids).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-r...