Why Are Police So Bad at Their Jobs?

Being a policeman is one of the toughest jobs there could be. IMO, it should require a 4-year college degree in policing/criminal justice. Then to advance, a masters degree should be required, and a PHD to get to the top.

 

Perhaps in the south, but in the north, police forces were used to control immigrants and the gangs they formed. The police in the north were the enforcement branch of the executive and legislative branches of government.

The fact that police were used to further the slave industry, really has nothing to do with what their value is now. Horses used to be the primary means of transportation for individuals, now they are used for racing and parades. The functional and intended use of something changes with time, and while some of the problems with policing are related to race and the abuse of rights of people of color, crime would overrun this country if there were no police.

The fact that we are even debating this topic is mesmerizing to me. You must have grown up in a municipality with a population of 85 where people could leave their doors unlocked overnight. Grow up in Harlem or East New York or Brownsville or Washington Heights in New York, and then you will see the importance of police in our society.

 

Your neighborhood is not the frontline. Your neighborhood is where people play laser tag, hunt rabbits, and shoot paintballs at each other. As you said, the cops are where people don't shoot paintballs. They are where they shoot hollow points and armor-piercing rounds at each other. And if the cops were not there, it is safe to say that the usage of such weapons would not be confined to such neighborhoods. In fact, there would be some in your neighborhoods who would show you their other side if cops were at least not in the proximity of your abode.

 

You are part of the capitalist regime. So they are inseparable. You cannot live or go to work safely without the presence of police. I don't know why this is such a complicated issue for you? Are there abuses? Yes. Are there corrupt cops? Yes. There are corrupt NCAA coaches. There are corrupt politicians. Are you saying that because there are corrupt coaches in college football we should get rid of all college coaches?

Should we blame the vast majority of college coaches that are not corrupt for the few that are simply because of the evil that the few commit?

Pay the police what they are worth (because people like you are not going to go into Brownsville to investigate or try to effectuate an arrest of a suspect wanted in a homicide - you aren't so let's not kid ourselves). And if they don't go, that murderer will continue to murder until he comes to your doorstep. You won't take the risk, but you want others to do so for a pittance. Life doesn't work that way. If someone is protecting my life and my family every day at risk to their own and their own family, then they should be highly compensated- certainly commensurate with someone who gets a hit against pitchers throwing a ball 100 miles per hour 30% of the time.

We have misplaced priorities in this country, and those who are paid exorbitantly do not have to witness the cold bloodiness in the inner city that is the daily routine of a uniformed police officer. When people show hatred and disdain for the sacrifices that these public servants make every day of their lives, some say f**k, I am going to get paid one way or the other. Some say I am going to make sure that I am going to make it home to my family every night so I can keep earning this meager salary that I am being paid, and if that means shooting first and asking questions later, so be it. Many police would rather be judged by 12 than carried by 6.

 

This is a big one. I read somewhere after the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas shooting that the on site resource officer retired. $108K a year.

 

I was born and raised in the jungles that they have to patrol. Riker's Island which is in between two counties of New York City (Bronx and Queens) holds about 11,000 plus inmates, gives you an example of the work police do in one city. Rikers makes the Château d'If look like an amusement park. More people get murdered there in a year than in most cities in this country or the entire country of Japan. 15 last year and 6 already this year.

These are the people getting locked up by the police you show utter contempt for. You take them, the ones that are locked up in state facilities, the ones locked up in Federal facilities in NY, and the ones out on probation, parole, and who have finished their sentences, and you have over 80,000 many of which have engaged in atrociously violent crimes. There are 36,000 New York City Police spread over 77 precincts.

You do the math. The bad guys are armed more heavily than the police whom you call bad guys, but who are in essence, the only ones that stand between them and civilization as we know it.

The fact that you don't grasp this concept only underscores the problem. The portrayals in the news of police abusing people's rights could be paralleled in the medical profession, the legal profession, the insurance industry, car sales- you name it. No one has a problem paying a doctor 700K a year to perform 5 surgeries. No one has a problem paying a lawyer 1.6 million to try a personal injury case.
We are not going to talk about the other 31,000 in state correctional facilities in the counties in upstate New York many of which were put there by NYC police officers or police from other municipalities like Yonkers, Mt. Vernon, White Plains, Buffalo, Peekskill, etc., etc., etc.

But mention paying the only barrier between us and life in this country as we know it their just wages, and it is like we are opening the doors of the vault in the bank.

It would be great if we could instantly solve the crime problem in this country, but we can't. Until then, there must be people that we can trust to limit its impact of it on overall society. In a capitalistic society, trust is built by compensation. When a person gambles in basketball or baseball, they are kicked out of the league. If they beat up their significant others- see ya later. They are not going to get 15 million a year and be wife abusers or pathological gamblers.

By paying cops what they are worth, there would be a greater supply of labor and more accountability. We can adopt a zero-tolerance with over-policing and abuse by police because there will always be a waiting list for highly qualified candidates to fill the shoes of the abusers and those police who sympathize with them.

 

Have to say that even with the crazy GOP Christian Nationalist Movement

There are some folks that sure make me want to vote straight GOP. Ymmv

 

If criticizing a broken and ineffective institution does that, so be it.