Police in the United States killed more people in March 2015 than the entire UK has since 1900. That statistic alone should be enough to make people realize that we are in fact living in a police state. Asa, a CopBlock.org Contributor, published the blog referencing the over 100 people killed by police in March, stating: Despite the recent convening of a federal task force on ’21st Century Policing,’ which delivered more than 59 policy recommendations to the White House on establishing collaborative relations between police and the public; an average of over three people were killed by police in the United States each day last month.
The recommendations included implementing independent investigations of police shootings, greater diversity in police forces reflective of the communities they serve and increased civilian oversight over police and community policing initiatives.
The ACLU says however, that these recommendations, some of which that were provided by the civil rights organization itself, have for the most part not been implemented.
Police departments should adopt use-of-force policies that emphasize de- escalation, while the public needs data collection practices to report cases of unreasonable use of force by police, the civil rights organization said. De-escalation training, and incident review are necessary components to any use-of-force policy.
The text in bold is what I would like to bring your attention to (obviously). Can United States officers de-escalate situations instead of resorting to force – whether that be justifiable, excessive or deadly? Police will often say things like, “It’s easy for a person to say but try doing it?” Or, “at any moment their life could be in danger, so acting with force first is necessary.”
Yet, I’ve seen video after video of police officers who pull the taser out too soon. Who’ve thrown punches while several officers are on top of a suspect and some who’ve shot at people who had their backs turned to them. The video below is of police officers in the Netherlands whom are dealing with a drunk person. As you watch this count how many times this guy would have been beaten, tased or shot by United States police officers.
Notice how the officers are calm, cool and collected? Instead of using weapons they talk to the guy, keep their distance when it permits and even laugh at him. In fact, it seem their belts lack more, if not all, of the usual tools that adorn the belts of their USSA counterparts. Now compare this to the USSA version.
After watching these two reactions to nearly the same encounter how can one not see, and question, the level of force police officers in the USSA are willing to use on people? Sure neither man should have been trying to punch or kick anyone but in the Netherlands the situation was handled much more professionally than that of the USSA’s. The drunk Netherland’s man even attempted his kick move a couple of times but the USSA drunk only got to swing once and the gun came out. Luckily that officer didn’t fire but the point is proven regardless.
The police in the USSA need to realize that there are other options to using force each time. What are your thoughts? Are the police militarized? Do they use force too quickly? What would you say the cause of this aggression is?
If you’d like to become more active in stopping the police state consider visiting CopBlock.org’s Groups page, to connect with other police accountability minded folks, or support those who strive to spread the message that “Badges Don’t Grant Extra Rights” here via the CopBlock Network.
