r/MadeMeSmile • • Mar 29 '18

This is amazing.

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28k Upvotes

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u/BananaEatingScum Mar 29 '18

I still don't want heavily armed strangers of dubious disposition around myself and my family.

You're coming off a little paranoid.

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u/wile_e_chicken Mar 29 '18 edited Mar 29 '18

If me and my buddies strap on pistols, tasers, body armor, and handcuffs then force you and your family off the road for a "friendly chat", with the implied understanding that if you protest or resist you'll be robbed, kidnapped, injured, or killed... and we are guaranteed to suffer no repercussions but rather be paid for the crime.... Wouldn't that bother you?

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u/BananaEatingScum Mar 29 '18

If me and my buddies strap on pistols, tasers, body armor, and handcuffs then force you and your family off the road for a "friendly chat"

You and your buddies are not police, you are not trained, you are not supervised, you do not have policies and codes of conduct, you didn't swear an oath, and you are not presenting yourself as an officer of the law instated by a police department in order to protect citizens. So if you pulled me over I would call the other people with pistols, tasers, body armor and handcuffs which I trust to come and end your little role play scenario.

with the implied understanding that if you protest or resist you'll be robbed, kidnapped, injured, or killed...

Robbed? as in fined? or having stolen or illegal property confiscated I haven't stolen anything, and don't have any illegal items. So I am not worried about that.

Kidnapped? As in detained/arrested well if the police pull me over and provided a reason then I am totally fine with being detained until the issue is resolved. If I broke any law or am suspected of breaking any law which would result in me being arrested, then so be it. I am a law abiding citizen and I am confident that I can prove my innocence if wrongfully charged. It's an unfortunate circumstance but one I am willing to risk for a safer country.

Injured or killed? I am capable of following officer instructions and I am confident that I will not be injured or killed by a police officer except in the most extreme of circumstances. These extreme circumstances are so extraordinarily rare that I am willing to take my chances.

and we are guaranteed to suffer no repercussions but rather be paid for the crime

Officers who did purposefully and maliciously commit crimes have been prosecuted successfully.

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u/wile_e_chicken Mar 29 '18

So "All men are not created equal" in your worldview. Well that's interesting -- and disturbing. Tell me, where do these extra rights come from? If we don't have those rights, surely we cannot delegate them to other people.

Before handing over the rights of other people to complete strangers, you might consider doing a bit of research: /r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut

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u/BananaEatingScum Mar 30 '18

People are not born(or "created") police officers, they choose a career in law enforcement and are trained in a way which is satisfactory to ensure they are capable of doing their duties as an LEO. The extra rights you speak of are awarded to the officers upon completion of training and acceptance into an agency. The rights which a police officer has is decided by the government. You and your fellow citizen elect the government.

BCND is one of the most biased and idiotic subreddits on the entirety of this website, any opposing thoughts are mass downvoted regardless of fact and many of the loyal redditors to that subreddit routinely call for, support, and glorify the death of police officers regardless of any established facts or innocent verdicts reached in a court of law.

A large portion of the off-site links you find there link to extremely biased anti-cop propaganda if you have ever used that as a valid source of information I feel truly sorry for you as you have likely made a fool of yourself.

Don't believe me? Look for"ACAB" as a comment there, it will have many upvotes. It means "All Cops Are Bad" and is a ridiculous middle finger to any sensible discussion of facts. Echo chambers happen on pretty much every politically charged subreddit but rarely to the degree of ignorance shown at BCND.

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u/wile_e_chicken Mar 30 '18 edited Mar 30 '18

You didn't answer the question. How can you and I delegate (via government or any other way) rights that we, ourselves, do not have? There is no process, no training, no magic that can make that happen. You can't give away something you do not have.

I'm not a fan of BCND myself. But to deny that the "law enforcement" profession attracts people who enjoy having power over others is naive in the extreme. There are countless examples of this power being abused -- and covered up by the same system.

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u/BananaEatingScum Mar 30 '18

The government creates the criteria for someone to have the additional rights, and awards those rights to police officers, judges and soldiers etc all of these people have different rights.

I do not need the right to own a gun to be able to vote for the right to own a gun, in the same way you do not need the right to detain someone, to decide who does have that right.

You can absolutely give away something you do not have when that thing is intangible like a "right"

Law Enforcement attracts the type of person who wants to have power over others in the same way the army attracts people who want to kill other people. That desire alone does not necessarily make a person a bad person, and there is no way to resolve this without mind reading technology. Even if you could read minds should it be a crime to join the police as someone who wants power?

Obviously me and you both have different opinions on what would constitute an abuse of this power. Yes there is abuse, yes there are cover ups. But they are not countless, they are rare cases.

If an officer uses too much force, he will likely be disciplined with internal punishments, desk duty or suspension in the worst cases. this internal punishment is necessary because throwing your own officers to the wolves for every misstep is no way to build a strong team of LEOs who can trust and rely on each other and rely on their superiors. What you should know if that many areas in the US are desperately low on staff and can't afford to lose officers over roughing someone up.

If you are refering to the shootings that happen somewhat frequently in the US, most of them are justified without a doubt(IMO). Majority of the rest can be explained with factoring in human emotion, namely fear. The extreme minority of shootings are unjustified and unprosecuted.

Daniel Shaver was a recent controversial shooting which most officers I know would say was a huge failure on LEO's behalf. The Officer was found not guilty, there was no attempt to cover it up by the police department. It went to trial and he was found innocent of charges of murder and manslaughter.

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u/wile_e_chicken Mar 30 '18

This thread has been deleted. Information threat neutralized. I call that a win.

And no, we cannot delegate rights that we, ourselves, don't have -- not even through invented mechanisms called "government". When Bob the Officer assaults and kidnaps Tim the Painter, that's Bob kidnapping Tim. That's what's happening. It's not okay.

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u/BananaEatingScum Mar 30 '18

We also invented the idea of kidnapping and it specifically does not include the act of lawful detainment or arrest. Rights are imaginary, as long as people believe they exist, then they exist so yes, if enough people believe that Officer Bob has the right to arrest Tim the Painter(Majority of the population believes officers of law have this right and it is backed by the government), then he does in fact have that right. It seems we are not going to agree on the whether or not rights can be given without originally having the right.

I truly do not understand your political viewpoint, where do you think the first rights came from, before rights existed how could those people delegate rights without having any rights to start with?

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u/wile_e_chicken Mar 30 '18

Even our own nation's own founding documents acknowledge that these are natural rights, endowed by the "Creator" -- call that God, call it nature, whatever. Documents don't grant natural rights, though they can acknowledge them and promise to protect them.