
Police Overwhelmingly Responsible for Attacking Journalists - jessaustin
https://theintercept.com/2020/06/04/journalists-attacked-police-george-floyd-protests/
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linsomniac
It seems an odd, self-defeating choice, for police to attack journalists who
are documenting a protest against police brutality, doesn't it?

It makes you wonder, if they are so willing to attack someone who is obviously
broadcasting the attack, with clearly marked "Press" identification, how they
are likely to act when there is less scrutiny...

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jessaustin
A similar question could be raised about why they're overwhelmingly
brutalizing and arresting (not necessarily in that order) peaceful protesters
rather than "looters" who even when they're not actually undercover cops are
allowed to loot without interference. We know the police are not smart or
well-organized enough to have some sort of national master plan. So, either
these choices reflect local incentives that are intelligible to officers on
the scene but not to us on the outside, or their decision process is so
degraded that they don't possess the ability to act in even their own best
interests. Can we please just fire all these clowns already?

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jessaustin
This is an interesting study in HN ranking penalties. Two hours in, there are
25 points and we haven't sniffed the front page. Currently ranked #126.
Meanwhile links of similar vintage with 5, 15, 12, 6, and 6 points are at #9,
#11, #17, #20, and #28 respectively. b^) I guess we're lucky not to be flagged
out of existence.

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_bxg1
I think it also factors in the velocity of upvotes. I.e., I've seen things
with 3 upvotes make the front page, presumably because they happened very
rapidly.

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jessaustin
Velocity is change over time, right? 25 votes divided by 2 hours is greater
than 6 votes divided by 2 hours: velocity is not the explanation. The
explanation is either an inherent penalty on "theintercept.com", which I
wouldn't even fault given their over-the-top Russiagating and their sordid
history of burning confidential sources, or as seems more likely we have a lot
of bootlickers on HN who are overusing the "flag" button.

