LOL. Wat. Did you write #20?
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PoliceOne: 20 cop truths most people don't know
- Thread starter benjipwns
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LOL. Wat. Did you write #20?
The Faceless Master
Member
Gordon Shumway
Banned
Vita version? Shit..read Borderlands
I think he's specifically speaking on that one..
lol perfect
I don't buy #3, sorry. I've seen it too often. It's easier for cheaters to get to the top, and then they create a system of corruption. Once it takes hold, the good cops trying to "weed" the bad cops out get fired, demoted, transferred, etc. So people keep their mouths shut so they don't lose their jobs.
TheBryanJZX90
Member
#6 is true. It is horrible that it is true. And it's even worse that these officers accept that without any attempt to change it.
Relying on confessions is lazy, inaccurate police work. You know who doesn't "wait for all the facts to come in"? A cop who will "play the game" and do whatever it takes to get a confession from whoever they have in front of them, rather than investigate and get enough evidence to convict.
False confessions happen. And do you know why they happen? Because cops will do a whole lot more than just lie to a suspect to get them to confess. Brown v. Mississippi. The only evidence against the defendant was a confession. Why did he confess? Because he was beaten, whipped, stoned, and fucking hung from a tree until he confessed. Ashcraft v. Tennessee. Defendant was forcibly kept awake for 36 hours interrogated the entire time, before confessing. Payne v. Arkansas. Withheld food from the defendant until they confessed. And yes, they will lie. Lynumn v. Illinois. Cops lie and tell the defendant her kids will be taken away from her if she doesn't confess, but if she cooperates she won't be prosecuted.
Relying on confessions is lazy, inaccurate police work. You know who doesn't "wait for all the facts to come in"? A cop who will "play the game" and do whatever it takes to get a confession from whoever they have in front of them, rather than investigate and get enough evidence to convict.
False confessions happen. And do you know why they happen? Because cops will do a whole lot more than just lie to a suspect to get them to confess. Brown v. Mississippi. The only evidence against the defendant was a confession. Why did he confess? Because he was beaten, whipped, stoned, and fucking hung from a tree until he confessed. Ashcraft v. Tennessee. Defendant was forcibly kept awake for 36 hours interrogated the entire time, before confessing. Payne v. Arkansas. Withheld food from the defendant until they confessed. And yes, they will lie. Lynumn v. Illinois. Cops lie and tell the defendant her kids will be taken away from her if she doesn't confess, but if she cooperates she won't be prosecuted.
PAULINK
I microwave steaks.
While there have been a lot of shitty stories about cops, I can't imagine what they have to go through on a day to day basis. Obviously it's their choice to get into this field of work but depending on the area they work, I can't begin to imagine all the responsibilities they have. We don't ever hear good stories because they are doing their job.
also there was this one time where I should have gotten a speeding ticket but a coo let me go.
echoshifting
Banned
Several of these would be pretty funny if they weren't so scary and/or sad.
Except the firefighter envy, that one is truly completely hysterical
Except the firefighter envy, that one is truly completely hysterical
Gordon Shumway
Banned
Perhaps they need to make better calendars?
Let's not forget that a large number of cops end up getting divorced, they love alcohol and tend to become alcoholics and/or prescription drugs, and that they deal with depression issues.
I knew a cop that was dependent on prescription drugs. He was injured on the job, and end up with some damaged nerves on his right knee, and battles pain killers. Good guy, but has issues. One of my old friend's dad was divorced 3 times...affair and job hours.
I'd never be cop, too much shit to deal with....
I knew a cop that was dependent on prescription drugs. He was injured on the job, and end up with some damaged nerves on his right knee, and battles pain killers. Good guy, but has issues. One of my old friend's dad was divorced 3 times...affair and job hours.
I'd never be cop, too much shit to deal with....
Not all cops are murderers. Just like not all minorities are murderers. You shouldn't immediately think ill of someone just because they're a cop, just like cops shouldn't think ill of minorities just because they're minorities.
This is also messed up, discrimination is okay sometimes? People shouldn't choose to be cops because why? It's the same as saying minorities should choose to stay inside after dark. Don't be a hypocrite.
SliceSabre
Banned
They want me to feel bad for them?
Because I don't in addition to the fact some of those are just outright lies like the part about bad cops.
Because I don't in addition to the fact some of those are just outright lies like the part about bad cops.
You missed the point. The cops are not a protected class of citizen, they're an organization, a profession, an institution. Discriminating against them doesn't mean anything because they've chosen to be that, they were not assigned that label from birth. The cops are a group that has a documented reputation for corruption and systemic oppression of minorities. Look at these two statements:
I hate black people.
I hate cops.
There's a clear reason only one of those statements would get you banned from NeoGAF. Reasonable people understand the difference.
Gordon Shumway
Banned
Heh..have a buddy who makes a call to his pal every couple of months to make his mom's tickets disappear. I mean, good for them, but come on..
hodayathink
Member
Most other professions they don't shoot a nigga to death once every 28 hours and keep getting away with it.
hodayathink
Member
Vicetrailia
Member
Not just news stories, but disproportionate statistics, personal experiences and shared tales. It has never stopped, nothing has changed.
That is New York City, bro.. that isn't as much as it sound considering the standard of living.
All of you trying to get on #1, posting how they are paid a lot in certain cities, are incorrect in that use. For example, here in Danville, VA, cops make around 30K. The state troopers make in VA make 40K after leaving the academy and a 1 year probation period. The thing that is good is the benefits.
The average pay of 50K a year in U.S for police officers, makes it seem like a lot since the biggest departments are in huge cities where they get paid decently according to their standard of living (and the fact many of them are unionized).
I interpreted #20 as being meant for people who think they can be tough as if they would get away with it. I didn't take it as "I am mooooore powerful!" I could be wrong though..
You're right. There are huge differences, and it is vital that citizens scrutinize the cops (and the rest of the government) in order to keep them in check. Being a cop is not a special class of citizen nor is being a cop on the same level of being of a race of people. Some cops do have a documented history of corruption and oppression, but cops as a group also have a documented reputation for risking their lives to help people, positive community involvement, enforcing rules that maintain order and safety for everybody even though it's not popular to do so.
Look at those same two statements and tell me they don't both come from a place of generalizing the behavior of a few and projecting it onto the many.
Lets stop pretending like we don't all generalize everything about everything. There is not enough time in the day to gather all the facts about every little fucking thing. You can look at statistics, watch the news, look at the generally accepted everyday truths, and then you fill in the gaps with your personal biases and prejudices formed from your own experiences, because to do otherwise would be prohibitive to actually living your life. So please, stop with the "generalizing is wrong" bullshit. There is such a thing as a well informed generalization and we're not the snowflakes we love to pretend we are.
We don't have to share someone else's experience to be able to empathize with them. If you're a straight, white, middle class, Christian male in this country, there's a fairly good chance you don't get what everyone else is complaining about all the time, life is probably not that bad for you. That doesn't mean you can't try to understand, but I don't always get what's keeping you from trying. It's not a coincidence that most of the people who primarily stick up for cops in these discussions are usually not minorities or just not capable of empathizing with the victims for some reason.
In my community, New York City, the cops don't have a reputation for "positive involvement." They have a reputation for disproportionately harassing, assaulting, and murdering minorities without consequence. If you look closely at the other ten or twelve places in the country with largest concentrations of black and brown people, you'll find the same to be true in those places. It's not a coincidence. Here's the generalization: cops are distrustful of minorities. We've seen evidence that they are instructed to target them more than whites. We've seen evidence that minorities are disproportionately killed by cops even though cops still kill a larger total of white people yearly.
I don't know how else to convince you that I'm not screaming fuck the cops at the top of my lungs for no reason.
We don't have to share someone else's experience to be able to empathize with them. If you're a straight, white, middle class, Christian male in this country, there's a fairly good chance you don't get what everyone else is complaining about all the time, life is probably not that bad for you. That doesn't mean you can't try to understand, but I don't always get what's keeping you from trying. It's not a coincidence that most of the people who primarily stick up for cops in these discussions are usually not minorities or just not capable of empathizing with the victims for some reason.
In my community, New York City, the cops don't have a reputation for "positive involvement." They have a reputation for disproportionately harassing, assaulting, and murdering minorities without consequence. If you look closely at the other ten or twelve places in the country with largest concentrations of black and brown people, you'll find the same to be true in those places. It's not a coincidence. Here's the generalization: cops are distrustful of minorities. We've seen evidence that they are instructed to target them more than whites. We've seen evidence that minorities are disproportionately killed by cops even though cops still kill a larger total of white people yearly.
I don't know how else to convince you that I'm not screaming fuck the cops at the top of my lungs for no reason.
Massive Duck. C.M.
Banned
That's actually not a bad idea.
Gordon Shumway
Banned
hodayathink
Member
You want the real generalization: PEOPLE are distrustful of minorities (in general) in this country. White, black, or brown. To pretend that people in law enforcement (or even people in power in general) are the only ones guilty of this is just not correct. In theory, the people chosen to be law enforcement officers are supposed to trained to be better than that, but the truth of the matter is that they very clearly aren't.
I suggest you reread the entire thread. The majority of the posters in this thread seem to be blasting all cops. It's not a thread about cops doing bad things, it is about a list of things that people may not know about cops. But really, it is just a thread for people to dogpile on all cops, a celebration of a shared hatred. If we are just creating threads for that now, why not just make an official thread for it? Let people voice their resentment for the police in one place. It's obviously something people want to talk about.
Massive Duck. C.M.
Banned
I've been in the thread since the first page
like, actually reading posts and not assuming what they say
And yeah, the "distrust" or selective targeting of people of color ties into class based issues, even if the person of color is actually middle class to outright bourgeois. Most reasonable people these days do at least acknowledge that poverty will often correspond with higher "crime" rates within segregated communities, racialized communities where poverty has been historically cumulative. The issue isn't so much with all laws as they were, even if ethics aren't always derived from or even practically contingent upon law, or with the good cop or primarily just the problematic one; it's with the police as an institution for which one of their purposes is to make sure that economic disparities do indeed remain disparate.
There's an entire public sector that provides many middle class, unionized white Americans with jobs from the outcomes of this disparity. It's why even as people become more accepting of soft drugs, although I doubt it'd reduce incarceration rates much, cops still lobby against decriminalization or less harsh penalties with their organizations and try to sell people on their brand of moralism that isn't at all disinterested. Racism and classism reinforce the other, it influences people's perceptions of people of color as if this were the natural order of things or something and which they use to justify discrimination or police brutality.
I'm not white, but I can't say that I myself have ever experienced the type of discrimination or oppression at either the institutional or cultural scales that some other ethnic groups have in the US, although I'm not saying the any of this from an armchair either. FTP, we could live without them were we to choose to.
dreamghost
Member
It's his ninja way!
Fenderputty
Banned
Cops deserve fat pensions IMO. Same with any public servant position. Then again, I think most/all Americans deserve some level of comfort in retirement.
Put cameras on them. Punish them appropriately when they do fuck up, and I think this discussion dies out for the most part.
Put cameras on them. Punish them appropriately when they do fuck up, and I think this discussion dies out for the most part.
While true, that's easier said than done. Which is the problem.
Rastafarian42
Member
That last part comes off as a action movie punchline not the words of a person who is meant to protect and serve.
Orbis Tabula
Member
Well firefighters shoot less people to death :/
Someone actually tried that?
Like the scene goes
"Hey dude I gotta take back my car but I'm smashed"
"Don't worry dude you can suck my dick and the breathalyzer will totally not catch you"
...pennies...
D
Deleted member 1235
Unconfirmed Member
20 is one of those dickhead cops what a dickhead
This is odd. If someone calls for your help they most likely will say thank you. I doubt people in this country are that rude and the cops are just conflating the situations where they are doing their job without getting a call like those traffic stops. :|
This bothers me a lot because while I always had the sense that police departments are underfunded (hence why certain counties aggressively shake down speedsters (and I use this term loosely) for cash) it reminds me that the police are being militarized by the federal government because they couldn't afford buying this excessive gear on their own. The feds should be providing better equipment for police work instead of gear to combat terrorism or the police departments should be allowed to flip the military they get but don't need for equipment they actually do need.
I searched for this quote through Google and only neogaf comes up. What was this from?
The rest of what you said is fine but this is laughably wrong. This level of pay is way beyond what you need to be middle class in NYC.
I think what should be pointed out is that this is for senior officers. The pay when you start out is much lower than this but it still isn't a pittance even if you have a family of 4.
Those benefits should be accounted for in the earnings analysis. While the departments do have budgeting problems their officers aren't struggling like a pittance would suggest.
MidgarBlowedUp
Member
Stephanie Sterling
​1. Cops make a pittance. They don't do this for the money.
2. The standard to make criminal charges stick is incredibly high. Knowing someone is guilty and proving it are very different things.
3. Bad cops do exist. The "power" aspect is attractive to a certain group of people. The good cops try their hardest to weed them out, but they don't always succeed.
4. Cops actually hate giving traffic tickets. In larger jurisdictions, traffic is something that you send rookies or the guys in the doghouse to do. In others, it is a duty imposed from above. It is like scrubbing your toilet. You don't do it because you want to do it. You do it because it has to be done.
5. It isn't fair that everyone likes firefighters more. Cops actually risk their lives more often (and probably save more kittens).
6. Most convictions stem from confessions. They will do everything in their power to convince you that you should confess. Cops will (and are allowed/encouraged by prosecutors to) lie. That is one of the rules of the game.
Richard Cavataio
12. Cops aren't mechanics, paramedics, firemen, judges, veterinarians or animal trainers.
13. Its legal to call a cop names. But it's also legal for a cop to decide whether you deserve a ticket. He won't give you a ticket for treating him rudely, but he might cut you loose if you're nice. A simple compliment might go a long way if you are sincere. Keep it light. They see right through a snow job.
Rick Bruno
14. We know that your "little angel" isn't one.
15. We know you pay our salaries. You have to it's not out of your generosity.
16. If I give you a break, it's because I chose to. Not because your mother's cousin is a cop.
17. We carry the job home with us. We remember the tragedies, traffic fatalities, hurt or dead babies, ruined lives, battered wives, bullied kids, suicides, and the insults. We remember.
19. We don't do this job for the power or prestige you might think it brings. We do it because we are tired of seeing good people suffer, and we want to help and protect them from the wolves.
20. You might be tougher than me, but I will win in the long run. Believe it.
That's all I got time for. I got homework to do.
​1. Cops make a pittance. They don't do this for the money.
2. The standard to make criminal charges stick is incredibly high. Knowing someone is guilty and proving it are very different things.
3. Bad cops do exist. The "power" aspect is attractive to a certain group of people. The good cops try their hardest to weed them out, but they don't always succeed.
4. Cops actually hate giving traffic tickets. In larger jurisdictions, traffic is something that you send rookies or the guys in the doghouse to do. In others, it is a duty imposed from above. It is like scrubbing your toilet. You don't do it because you want to do it. You do it because it has to be done.
5. It isn't fair that everyone likes firefighters more. Cops actually risk their lives more often (and probably save more kittens).
6. Most convictions stem from confessions. They will do everything in their power to convince you that you should confess. Cops will (and are allowed/encouraged by prosecutors to) lie. That is one of the rules of the game.
Richard Cavataio
12. Cops aren't mechanics, paramedics, firemen, judges, veterinarians or animal trainers.
13. Its legal to call a cop names. But it's also legal for a cop to decide whether you deserve a ticket. He won't give you a ticket for treating him rudely, but he might cut you loose if you're nice. A simple compliment might go a long way if you are sincere. Keep it light. They see right through a snow job.
Rick Bruno
14. We know that your "little angel" isn't one.
15. We know you pay our salaries. You have to it's not out of your generosity.
16. If I give you a break, it's because I chose to. Not because your mother's cousin is a cop.
17. We carry the job home with us. We remember the tragedies, traffic fatalities, hurt or dead babies, ruined lives, battered wives, bullied kids, suicides, and the insults. We remember.
19. We don't do this job for the power or prestige you might think it brings. We do it because we are tired of seeing good people suffer, and we want to help and protect them from the wolves.
20. You might be tougher than me, but I will win in the long run. Believe it.
That's all I got time for. I got homework to do.
TheChocolateWar
Member
To above; on the issue of cops making more money; you do realize they have to work 12 hour work days with some of the most ungodly hours with little to no vacation or sick leave? They get paid, on average, more than most retail positions. But that is a far cry from what they should be paid given the important role that they play in society. They should increase pay to attract more qualified candidates.
FinalStageBoss
Banned
They do make shit money. I already knew that. I certainly wouldn't put my life on the line for what they make.
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