(no subject)

[trinityvixen]

What the FUCK!?

No, really, what the fucking fuck!? I'm appalled. This...jesus. I don't care what you think about "kids these days," the fact is that incidents of juvenile crime are almost across the board substantially fewer. You've a better chance at throwing a stone and hitting water in the desert than you have of calling a kid a criminal and being right. Christ, FIRE THIS COP.

I'm beginning to regret giving Three Guineas such a hard time. When we read it in college, I thought Virginia Woolf was smoking something, but I look at the guy in this video and I have to wonder: if his precious manhood and badge of authority weren't undermined by his dorky outfit and even dweebier egg-mobile, would he feel the need to take out his replacement cock (that is, the other proof of his AWESOME MANLINESS aka his legal authority) and beat the kid with it? HE GRABBED THE KID BY THE THROAT AND SHOVED HIM TO THE GROUND. After repeatedly calling the kid a juvie reject. WHAT THE FUCK!?

Comments

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I think the big picture, long-lasting effect is the problem here and in those other cases, too. You're creating a generation (literally in the case of the kid--he and his age folk seeing the video on YouTube) that won't trust the police. This means they won't seek legal means of redress for injuries and that scares the pants off me. It also means that they might not call when they're hurt (like the woman who was stripped) which could lead to serious complications or deaths. My God.

I do blame the police if they keep this guy around without MAJOR retraining. He's ready to throw 250 pounds (my estimate) at a 100-odd pound unarmed kid? What do you want to bet he'd have pulled a tazer or a gun if the kid in question weren't so obviously pre-pubescent? You want this asshole being the one giving you a ticket? He gets jumpy, you end up worse off. Maybe worse than worse.

This to me is a clear case of power-tripping. I agree that it seems as though he's bringing baggage into this from someplace else, but he is NOT allowed to half-choke a kid for skateboarding, for Christ's sake. I can't demand he do the inhuman and leave it all at home, but if he's carrying baggage that he can't manage, he can't have a badge. Period.

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

I agree that it seems as though he's bringing baggage into this from someplace else, but he is NOT allowed to half-choke a kid for skateboarding, for Christ's sake.

Oh, of course not. It's interesting to speculate, though. (There's a story in there!)

If this guy is my age, he grew up in a world where Joe Clark -- the principal who carried a baseball bat around his school -- was considered a national hero. (That was before all the unpleasantness with the strippers...) It was part of a common narrative in the 1980s that if we just used Tough Love we could turn delinquents into model citizens. It didn't work any better than love and understanding, but it was a seductive fantasy nonetheless.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

The part that frightens me is that his inappropriate behavior might have been, even for one second backed up by the mother getting on the phone and hearing what happened. Because parents are going to trust that the police would tell the truth more than their kids. I sincerely hope that's not the case.

[chuckro.livejournal.com]

From the perspective of someone who fears (perhaps rightly) that calling 911 in an actual emergency will lead to 20 minutes of hold music followed by an operator in India who I can't understand; and who's seen power-tripping cops firsthand; this behavior is terrifying. These kids have no recompense; even most adults don't because, as we've seen in many of edgehopper's posts, even an open-and-shut rape or harrassment case requires a hundred lawyer-hours of time. The police, and the legal system in general, serve to protect the rich/famous/powerful/connected and screw over the rest of us.

The police commissioner in charge of that guy could fire him or have him submit to no-pay suspension and mandatory classes. But he's probably on an overstretched budget with the politicians breathing down his neck to be "tough on crime", with a dearth of new recruits and a police officer's union that'll have his ass if he does anything without a damn good reason. So it's not a fight he's willing to have (or given limited reasources, should have) over this kind of incident. Not when he's probably got a closet full of illegal strip-searches to crack down on, certainly...