cutuphalfdead wrote:The questions are, why was the cop scared for his life and what could the victim have done differently? If there's not a good, tangible answer for the first question, and the answer to the second question is nothing, then we have a problem.
I find it hard to believe he said "i have a gun" then put both his hands in the air and the cop shot him 7 times. But even if he did that, what should the jail time be? It's clear from the video he did not go into that situation wanting to harm the driver. It's also bizarre he thinks the guy is going to announce he has a gun and then take his gun out and kill the cop in front of his GF and her child in the backseat. I have no idea what the cop was thinking when he shot him. We all agree at best incompetence, at worst...
Someone who commits a DUI death should be jailed for years. A cop who kills someone cause he or she is incompetent should not. If there is even a hint of maliciousness or intent then it should be thoroughly investigated and if it can be proven, say there is a racist history, then the book should be thrown at him/her.
given2trade wrote:I find it hard to believe he said "i have a gun" then put both his hands in the air and the cop shot him 7 times. But even if he did that, what should the jail time be?
given2trade wrote:I find it hard to believe he said "i have a gun" then put both his hands in the air and the cop shot him 7 times. But even if he did that, what should the jail time be?
Life in prison.
Even based on that video? Which seemed to show the cop showed no ill intent? You just said intent is everything!
It sounds like you take issue with the concept of "involuntary manslaughter", which is a real thing that has lasting consequences. Intent isn't everything, and sometimes people have to be held accountable for the lives they ruin without meaning to.
Again, not sure what any of this has to do with the interesting conversation that could be happening around the topic of hate crimes.
Anders wrote:I do not have a «neoliberal assessment of geopolitics», so please stop writing that I do.
given2trade wrote:I find it hard to believe he said "i have a gun" then put both his hands in the air and the cop shot him 7 times. But even if he did that, what should the jail time be?
Life in prison.
Even based on that video? Which seemed to show the cop showed no ill intent? You just said intent is everything!
I said intent matters, not that it's everything. If a cop shoots a guy to death out of fear for his life, but it's not a situation in which he should have reasonably feared for his life, then he should be in jail. If guns are legal in this country, there has to be a way to get pulled over while legally carrying a gun and not get shot over it.
It's also highly subjective given the broad perspectives on what constitutes "hate" and modern interpretations of social power dynamics. Can you "hate" cops?
Sure, but the context of hate is different when it's toward a class of people in power instead of a class of people that's historically oppressed.
How? Is one hate righteous and the other evil? Who chooses who gets to be called oppressed? Are some groups more oppressed and thus more allowed to hate? I get what your saying, and I actually agree. I just can't explain why.
You think the difference of historical oppression between black people as a whole and police officers as a whole is a matter of opinion?
No, Im saying the way two people can see the power dynamics in a situation is highly fluid, for example if we had this exchange face to face over a heady topper or in a small group in a library or in front of a crowd of black people it would be quite different. This makes it very difficult to justly determine what rise to a "hate crime" vs what is a standard(?) crime. The thing is I feel like there is a difference when, for example, a black student was killed recently in College Park, MD by one of these alt-right freaks than if it had just been a whirte person and a black person in a fight. The race hate motive makes the crime worse to me. I struggle to justify it logically, it just feels worse.
"The fatal flaw of all revolutionaries is that they know how to tear things down but don't have a f**king clue about how to build anything."
Bi_3 wrote:The thing is I feel like there is a difference when, for example, a black student was killed recently in College Park, MD by one of these alt-right freaks than if it had just been a whirte person and a black person in a fight. The race hate motive makes the crime worse to me. I struggle to justify it logically, it just feels worse.
Some sort of felony conviction seems to be appropriate. Probably not a long sentence, because like the Oscar Grant shooter, this cop was guilty of incompetence rather than demonstrating malice.
I'm guessing the juror instructions were based on a number of previous shitty rulings that mean a 'reasonable' cop can be the jumpiest, most paranoid person alive and that we should still defer to their judgement.
simple schoolboy wrote:Some sort of felony conviction seems to be appropriate. Probably not a long sentence, because like the Oscar Grant shooter, this cop was guilty of incompetence rather than demonstrating malice.
I'm guessing the juror instructions were based on a number of previous shitty rulings that mean a 'reasonable' cop can be the jumpiest, most paranoid person alive and that we should still defer to their judgement.
different jobs should have different consequences for incompetence
asking of a cheeseburger with no pickles and getting a cheeseburger is incompetent
being a police officer and claiming you were scared for your life when the video shows no reason to be so is a whole nother level
Bi_3 wrote:The thing is I feel like there is a difference when, for example, a black student was killed recently in College Park, MD by one of these alt-right freaks than if it had just been a whirte person and a black person in a fight. The race hate motive makes the crime worse to me. I struggle to justify it logically, it just feels worse.
Yeah I think we see this the same way.
But you cannot (should not) legislate based on emotional reactions of the mob. That defeats the entire purpose of representative democracy and you might as well swap juries between Americans Got Talent and the courtroom. Seems like the right thing to do is not have hate crime laws, despite the emotional satisfaction they might bring in such examples.
"The fatal flaw of all revolutionaries is that they know how to tear things down but don't have a f**king clue about how to build anything."
