
The Long, Painful History of Police Brutality in the U.S. - samizdis
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/long-painful-history-police-brutality-in-the-us-180964098/
======
rcurry
We have a systemic problem in this country when it comes to policing, and it’s
not about racism - it’s far worse than that, if there even is such a thing.
It’s called “qualified immunity” and it’s NOT in our country’s constitution.
It’s a fabrication, a lie, a horrifying farce that allows our cops and DAs to
operate with near total impunity for any malicious activity they choose to
engage in. Our “system” is hopelessly broken and we have an obligation to
rectify it. I don’t want us to engage in more “dialogue” with law enforcement,
I don’t want more “transparency”, I don’t want more “synergy” with “the
community”, I just want this shit to STOP. There is no excuse and I’m sick of
it.

~~~
raincom
I always wonder why Democrats, while in power, don't something about this and
other problems that African Americans face? It is okay to accuse Republicans
for blocking some reforms. Why can't Democrats address systemic injustices
when they had numbers? Leaving everything to the Supreme Court does not help,
as it takes 100 years for SCOTUS to make a change, as Justices take baby
steps. Politicians can take a faster route, yet they don't. For instance, the
State of Minnesota can get rid of "qualified immunity", and that state is not
in the hands of Republicans.

~~~
erentz
They have half of Congress at the moment, holding a majority in the House by
the way. They could pass a bill right now addressing anything (pick your
favorite issue that is broadly supported by the Democrat voter base) and send
it to the Senate to be debated. Yet they don't. People need to wrap their head
around the possibility that Democrat party leadership doesn't actually agree
with their "base" on the issues, they just pretend to. The evidence is there
in the record.

~~~
dragonwriter
> They could pass a bill right now addressing anything (pick your favorite
> issue that is broadly supported by the Democrat voter base) and send it to
> the Senate to be debated.

The word you are looking for is “ignored without hearings, debate, or votes”,
not “debated”.

> People need to wrap their head around the possibility that Democrat party
> leadership doesn't actually agree with their "base" on the issues, they just
> pretend to.

The Democratic Party leadership agrees almost entirely with the base of the
faction that has dominated the Party for the past ~25 years, the center-right
neoliberal faction whose powerbase was in the conservative (compared to the
party mainstream) Democratic Leadership Council — openly founded in the 1980s
to reverse the progressive direction of the Democratic Party — before it took
over the party apparatus rendering the DLC itself superfluous.

It's not a secret to anyone in the party, whether in the progressive or
neoliberal faction, that those two factions have a deep and abiding conflict
of values and are only, when their relationship is at its strongest, in an
uneasy alliance of necessity against the Republican Party and the far right.

------
Ididntdothis
I think to a large part this is a consequence of the racist policies the
country had for a long time creating a permanent underclass. This will
probably take some more generations to heal.

I also think that the US in general celebrates violence much more than other
developed countries (on TV nudity->bad, violence->good). I am always horrified
when even very liberal people seem to be OK with people being raped in prisons
"because they deserve it". And I think a lot of people are totally OK with
rough treatment by police.

~~~
wpietri
I think that's reasonable. I strongly recommend Kendi's booked "Stamped from
the Beginning", which is basically a history of racist ideas. One of the
things that's really striking about it is the extent to which the ideas
commonly in circulation are ones useful to the powerful.

One clear example from the book is the various theories of natural
inferiority. During long periods when white slavery of Africans was common,
Europeans claimed that Africans were naturally inferior because of the much
hotter climate. But earlier, Greeks thought that northern peoples like the
Slavs (from whom we get the term "slave") were inferior because they were from
a cold climate.

The US had a lot of that going on, with different ideas about religion,
culture, biology, and society shifting to be what was convenient for the rich.
Given how much US wealth came from chattel slavery and after that labor
exploitation, it's not a stretch to suspect that police, whose basic job is
using violence to enforce the status quo, would have a lot of ideas and habits
that match.

~~~
groby_b
The history of the US police is firmly rooted in slave patrols, so your
suspicion is pretty much spot on.

~~~
gamblor956
That is wrong. Police forces originated in North, where slavery was outlawed.
Slave patrols were not formed until nearly 70 years later.

[https://plsonline.eku.edu/insidelook/history-policing-
united...](https://plsonline.eku.edu/insidelook/history-policing-united-
states-part-1)

~~~
wpietri
If you think the North's lack of slavery means a lack of officially supported
anti-black violence, you should think again. Loewen's _Sundown Towns_
documents widespread ethnic cleansing across the US in the 1890-1920 period.
Prominent examples include the Tulsa Race Massacre, but in smaller places than
Tulsa they had an easier time of it.

Then as white flight took hold in the 1950s, there are plenty of examples of
anti-black state violence. Especially when newly-created all-white suburbs and
towns were eager to kick out any black people who might want to move in.

~~~
gamblor956
Way to create a strawman there pal. My point was that informal police
organizations were the basis for the formal police organizations that
followed, not the slave patrols.

The North _also_ had slave patrols for several decades and was almost as
racist as the South during the post-Civil War era. They just did a better job
of hiding it. (By the way, Oklahoma was below the Mason-Dixon line and would
have been considered a slave state if it had been a state at the start of the
Civil War. As it was, Oklahoma was then known as the Indian Territory and most
of the tribes owned slaves and fought on behalf of the Confederacy.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Territory_in_the_Americ...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Territory_in_the_American_Civil_War))

------
7532yahoogmail
The following enters into the OP's link somewhat sideways, but in an important
way I think.

There's an old 60's analogy attributed to Fritz Pearls: you can touch the
menu; you can read the menu; you can lick the menu; you can eat the menu. But
you didn't each the meal. That is, let's not confuse the model of experience
with experience.

Extending that analogy I cannot argue that my life experience is similar,
equivalent, or exchangeable with African Americans because I haven't lived
their experience under, say, American police. Still I am concerned that if
this analogy is taken too far, there will arise an insuperable gap that will
work against binding each party into the whole we seek or ought to be seeking.

Our -- or THE - American Constitution sets forth equality among us all
regardless of creed, color, sex, or religion, but when some of us go to the
restaurant we aren't served or, worse, there's no food and no kitchen for us.
America is not living up to the goal despite having fine goals. I recall
Cornel West saying civil rights was due not because the Blacks wanted a piece
of the pie -- a backhanded reference to government handouts for undeserving
people -- but because preferential treatment based on color was never part of
the deal. There's no white guilt at play here anymore than there's handouts
going on.

So, let's be clear: violating civil rights is morally, ethically wrong. And
all the more when it's perpetrated by sections of society that have greater
power, money, and institutional agency. And all the more when cops are
supposed to hold the line on justice. Justice is the good line: if you're on
the wrong side, you should have to pay in the criminal or civil penalty. And
if you're on the right side then all to the good. Either way, then, there's no
room to take offense.

As I understand it the cop with the knee on the throat of a handcuffed black
man was finally charged. Well, big deal: it took them long enough to get to
the stunningly obvious. I am hoping the FED charges will follow. And then
civil charges. There's also the issue of the other officers on the scene and
whatever games were played by the DA and its affiliates.

Hackernews is primarily about technology, tech corporations, and business.
However, let's over master the lesson so that we realize the ultimate money
lesson with plenty of banked savings to boot: money is not the measurement of
all things. We can and must insist there's equality under the law for each and
everyone of us. Let's all work to make sure there's enforceable norms which is
also, beyond income, an important piece of security for us and our families.

I have kids; I know why their skin color is like mine. They had no choice in
the matter. And for those parents, sisters, or brothers of African Americans
who fell into this society, we cannot be using and abusing and violating their
rights. Standing by in a dismissive stance --- a Canadian guy who works as a
FTE at my/our American company said we Americans need to get our ____ together
like it wasn't his problem too --- is not help.

Maybe I cannot eat the menu. But I am not helpless, nor am I apart from this
problem. I also have agency. Let's not lost in silos here.

------
2019-nCoV
Where were the riots after white woman Justine Damond was brutally killed by a
black police officer in Minneapolis just a few years back?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Justine_Damond](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Justine_Damond)

~~~
dang
You've been flaming up a storm on HN. That's against the rules and I've banned
this account. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email
hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules
in the future.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
beloch
I'm not an American, but there does seem to be some value in a contrarian
opinion here.

Namely, it isn't just police brutality that's the problem, but the whole cycle
of violence. Yes, the officer who killed George Floyd needs to be prosecuted.
Yes, the officer who wantonly pepper-sprayed protesters while driving past
needs to be fired and charged. However, the riots and burning of police
precincts have reinforced an "Us vs Them" mentality in the police and primed
officers for the next round of brutality. Imagine that a mob of people of
mostly the same ethnicity came to your place of work, threatened you with
violence, and burned the place down after you and your co-workers fled. No
matter how justified the mob's anger may be, this is how you _create_ racist
cops.

The riots in Minneapolis are rooted in _mutual_ suspicion and lack of respect
between the black community and police. Both sides can point to awful things
the other side has done, but _both_ sides need to be better in order to break
the cycle.

~~~
ookblah
no, i don't agree with this take. it's just chicken/egg then and figuring out
who started it first.

i don't condone the riots or excuse the people obviously trying to take
advantage of the situation sow chaos/loot stuff, but the spirit of riots are a
manifestation of a failure of a system. people don't just riot as the default
response to injustice.

imo, cops that are "racist" didn't become that way because of mobs like this.
they joined the force because, like other positions of power, it allows them
that arena to act out their beliefs. you remove these people by removing the
structures that allow them to proliferate.

i feel like no matter what black people do to protest there is always someone
critical of how they protest. had this been an open letter from the community
nobody would pay attention. look at the repeated times this has happened in
the country and what eventually happened to the perpetrators, even after going
thru the formal legal process. look at the ire drawn toward kaepernik for
kneeling.

in the end it is a complex issue and it's not like we can just put everyone
onto a "side" and make it one-dimensional. and i agree that there has to be a
mutual respect among the community. but, i'm of the belief that if you're in
an elevated position like a cop you need to be held to a higher standard than
the average citizen.

my .02

