John wrote: ↑Mon Jan 30, 2023 10:28 pm
I've been watching coverage on both Fox News and CNN of the body cam video from the five black policemen who killed Tyre Nichols in Memphis earlier this month.
it had been feared that there would be massive street riots in cities across the country just as there were in the summer of 2020, but so far that hasn't happened, in the few smaller riots have fizzled out , at least so far.
All the media are describing the events depicted in the video as absolutely horrific, much worse than anything we've seen before. not only did the policemen beat and torture Tyre, leading to his death, but they joked about it with the paramedics who came to the scene. apparently, everyone involved in this, including the policeman. the paramedics and their various supervisors were all black, a fact which is confounding commentators.
For once I will agree with the bulk of John’s post, the third paragraph in particular.
As an aside, I was watching the MSNBC political news recently, and a prosecutor from Arizona made a specific distinction between GOP people and MAGA people. There are GOP people who may be strong on defense and want small government, and MAGA people who may be fascist and terrorists. As a Democrat, the prosecutor had many GOP people helping him win the recent election against a MAGA election denying opponent. This seems to be a valid observation. Republicans are pretty well divided. If some Republicans are trying to rescue the party, I would applaud anything like a GOP effort to oust the MAGA.
The violent bad cops of Memphis and elsewhere are similarly divided between the elected folks trying to develop trust between the police and the people and those who are trying to intimidate and use tremendous violence by police on civilians. I can see how John is seeing a similarity to African tribal violence. If you take a page from Generational Dynamics, you look at a group whether it be an African tribe or a group of Memphis locals, threat them as other, as scum, as the proper victim of violence. The divide is generally between the mayor and a few senior cops nominally in charge of a police force and on the other side the police unions and veteran police. You have formal coursework telling people how they can properly gain trust of the locals, countered back in the precinct by senior cops telling you how to intimidate, beat people, and get away with it. All the good done in the lecture halls is undone when you get back to the precinct.
I don’t know if John will find his tribal links, but he will certainly find Generational Dynamics others. If you see a bunch of people beating and killing others without remorse, look for Generational Dynamics others.
I do believe that a ghetto mindset exists. Some believe only pushers, mothers and sports stars can get ahead. There are pushers and criminals sure enough. There is a belief by the police union people that you can’t win against these people playing by the book, you have to beat the [expletive deleted] out of them. If people live in a certain area, they do just that. You can drag everybody into a classroom and lecture people not to do that, but they are absolutely sure they are doing the right thing. This belief is worldview strong. You would need a march to the sea or a nuke like incident to convince them that they are wrong. Just classroom lectures won’t do it. They will listen to the force veterans about their reality on the street and take that over the reforms of the mayors and police chiefs.
So I can see where the bad cops are coming from while deploring their actions as much as John does. And while it might be tempting to take the law into your own hands against someone deep in the ghetto mindset, decent people live in these areas too. You can’t just beat up everyone that lives in a certain area.
Personally, I’m with the reformers, for the federal police reform acts. Somehow this has become more than a little political. The Republicans have been against minorities and have been staunchly blocking letting the federal government put in an oar. In various areas, the violent police union people are dominant, and it is considered proper to beat people up. The establishment protects those who do the beating. You need an outside bunch of feds who will step in when the locals support a violent solution.
But that doesn’t answer Memphis. They
are trying to diversify, they
have elected their reform minded authority figures, they
are implementing their training. Still, the beatings continue. The police violent mindset continues to dominate.
I don’t see the answer in defunding the police or more reform oriented lectures. If you could somehow identify and get rid of the senior cops who are passing on the violent mindset you might get somewhere. Easy said. You might try to be particularly watchful, to reprimand or fire cops for small offenses to prevent the big offenses. That is probably not enough, but it is a start.
There is one other titbit of note. The videos have the bad cops yelling ‘give me your hands’ as they show the hands already being controlled by the police. This is attempt to avoid guilt. You try to establish a reason for the violence when none actually exists. This is a trick passed on that any bad cop knows. I would establish that using this trick is an indication of guilt, that if you give an order while preventing the execution of that order you are guilty. Again, not a miracle cure, but it might help.
Another note. If a bad cop can use excessive violence at whim and expect to get away from it, why shouldn’t a spree shooter take an assault weapon into a minority safe place and do the same?
You should not let Generational Dynamics hatred of the other develop in one’s own culture. One should be accepting of minorities, of those a little different. If one looks at the Memphis brutal cops and the recent string of California spree killings, think deeply on the principles of Generational Dynamics.