The Morale of the Baltimore Police Force is lower than a snakes belly do the way they've been treated during the recent riots and or demonstrations many have stated they won't make any arrests unless there's a media crew on hand .

Originally Posted by tetvet

The Morale of the Baltimore Police Force is lower than a snakes belly do the way they've been treated during the recent riots and or demonstrations many have stated they won't make any arrests unless there's a media crew on hand .

News just in... research shows that if police forces act responsibly the public wont rise up against them.

I think it is time for a good debate on what the role of a police force is, is it:

A) To do nothing but eat donuts and drink coffee.
B) Enforce laws and protect the public interest at large.
C) Defend the status-quo against the public at large.

My guess is that many people now see the police as how businesses and the wealthy get their way over the masses which they did not like but could tolerate until the police started killing people and getting off scott free in the process of doing this.

Personally I think the protests in Baltimore and Ferguson are good things as it shows people have had enough and will stand up at least for the right not to get killed by a public official for shits and giggles, had their been genuine, independant and credible investigations of these acts I doubt you would have seen trouble on the scale you now have it but as with most police investigations they are a foregone conclusion with the usual "justifications" trotted out and the case closed.

I was once told by an old boss I hated that right and wrong are irrelevant as perception will always dictate action so whether these police actions were right or wrong is irrelevant as it is the public's perception of those actions which are now driving the protests.

I see that there was a protest march in London recently. What the hell has London got to do with the actions of police in the US?

Having spoken with a few guys I know from or still living in Baltimore, the police are considered more or less the status qou holders.

You have minority communities more or less pressed into living in and staying put inside neighbor hoods with no serious development or economic investment in decades left to decay from a local job market that has been dried up for 20 years.

No real social services exists here, and the only ways to make a decent living is the drug trade or prostitution or burglary.

In many places you have 60 year old two lane streets as the only entry or access to these areas and the "nice" part of town. It's almost social engineering, keep the poor brown people in poor brown people town and have the cops keep em there. And sadly enough this is the status qou that we have quietly engineered since reconstruction, whether on purpose or not in inner cities all across America.

Just every time it comes to light either the message we all need to look for gets buried in looting, and over hype of said looting to boost ratings by the media.

Now a days any protest is nothing more than late night entrainment, "oh I wonder what business they will burn next?" And that garbage flashes on the news every night for weeks.

This all will drop off the public mindset until the next city has it's scheduled ethnic riots in 5 to 10 years. Just like it always has.

Originally Posted by Yossarian

Having spoken with a few guys I know from or still living in Baltimore, the police are considered more or less the status qou holders.

You have minority communities more or less pressed into living in and staying put inside neighbor hoods with no serious development or economic investment in decades left to decay from a local job market that has been dried up for 20 years.

No real social services exists here, and the only ways to make a decent living is the drug trade or prostitution or burglary.

In many places you have 60 year old two lane streets as the only entry or access to these areas and the "nice" part of town. It's almost social engineering, keep the poor brown people in poor brown people town and have the cops keep em there. And sadly enough this is the status qou that we have quietly engineered since reconstruction, whether on purpose or not in inner cities all across America.

Just every time it comes to light either the message we all need to look for gets buried in looting, and over hype of said looting to boost ratings by the media.

Now a days any protest is nothing more than late night entrainment, "oh I wonder what business they will burn next?" And that garbage flashes on the news every night for weeks.

This all will drop off the public mindset until the next city has it's scheduled ethnic riots in 5 to 10 years. Just like it always has.

I still do not believe it is colour related I think it is social class based ie rich v poor and it just happens to be that ethnic groups make up a large proportion of the poor but I suspect police will shoot a poor white guy just as fast as they will shoot a poor black guy.

But I don't agree that it is going to drop off the public mindset at all, in fact I suspect it will escalate every time it happens as things near critical mass.

Originally Posted by BritinAfrica

I see that there was a protest march in London recently. What the hell has London got to do with the actions of police in the US?

Because the problem is a world wide one and while the UK police are not shooting people they are still seen as enforcing the status-quo which I believe is the crux of the matter.

Originally Posted by MontyB

Because the problem is a world wide one and while the UK police are not shooting people they are still seen as enforcing the status-quo which I believe is the crux of the matter.

They have shot people as it happens.

The case that sticks in my mind is the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes who was shot on the London Underground just after the 7/7 bombings. Witnesses including a serving police officer stated that the shooting was an execution.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) launched two investigations. Stockwell 1, the findings of which were initially kept secret, concluded that none of the officers would face disciplinary charges. Stockwell 2 strongly criticized the police command structure and communications to the public, bringing pressure on the Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair to resign. In July 2006, the Crown Prosecution Service said there was insufficient evidence to prosecute any of the officers, although a corporate criminal prosecution of the Metropolitan Police was brought under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. This alleged that the police service had failed in its duty of care to Menezes. The service was found guilty and fined. On 12 December 2008 an inquest returned an open verdict.

At that inquest the jury were told they had two choices

(1) The shooting was lawful

(2) Open verdict.

The verdict of "Unlawful shooting" was taken off the table by the Judge, basically tying the hands behind the backs of the jury. The jury didn't find the shooting lawful.

After this shooting I don't remember riots or protest marches in the US.

Originally Posted by BritinAfrica

They have shot people as it happens.

The case that sticks in my mind is the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes who was shot on the London Underground just after the 7/7 bombings. Witnesses including a serving police officer stated that the shooting was an execution.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) launched two investigations. Stockwell 1, the findings of which were initially kept secret, concluded that none of the officers would face disciplinary charges. Stockwell 2 strongly criticized the police command structure and communications to the public, bringing pressure on the Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair to resign. In July 2006, the Crown Prosecution Service said there was insufficient evidence to prosecute any of the officers, although a corporate criminal prosecution of the Metropolitan Police was brought under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. This alleged that the police service had failed in its duty of care to Menezes. The service was found guilty and fined. On 12 December 2008 an inquest returned an open verdict.

At that inquest the jury were told they had two choices

(1) The shooting was lawful

(2) Open verdict.

The verdict of "Unlawful shooting" was taken off the table by the Judge, basically tying the hands behind the backs of the jury. The jury didn't find the shooting lawful.

After this shooting I don't remember riots or protest marches in the US.

I would defend police actions in the Jean Charles de Menezes case as I think it was more a mistake made due to the circumstances at the time and I think both parties are at fault in this.

Don't get me wrong it should never have happened but I think had it been any other day it would not have happened, you don't pick the day of a major terrorist attack to try and outrun armed police.

Originally Posted by MontyB

I would defend police actions in the Jean Charles de Menezes case as I think it was more a mistake made due to the circumstances at the time and I think both parties are at fault in this.

Don't get me wrong it should never have happened but I think had it been any other day it would not have happened, you don't pick the day of a major terrorist attack to try and outrun armed police.

Thats the point he didn't try and out run armed old bill, if he was running he was running to get on the train. If a serving copper stated on oath that it was more like an execution, I'd take him seriously.

There has been numerous occasions where British armed police have shot dead innocent civilians. I've seen an example of their training, I was not impressed.

I have been on both sides of this equation. Most US police in American big cities are just trying to do their jobs. It's so easy to get caught up with headlines and hoopla when you haven't been their. Have any of you been in the holding center, back of a squad car or ? If so you are in a better position to talk about how the police behaves in general towards criminals. What you see is plain and simple hysteria worked up by the media. They do the same thing when a solder fires on a civilian, in a war where there bound to be casualties.
Yes there's a few bad apples there is in any profession. And they need to be removed from the force and punished. However this percentage is very small.

Originally Posted by MontyB

News just in... research shows that if police forces act responsibly the public wont rise up against them.



I think it is time for a good debate on what the role of a police force is, is it:



A) To do nothing but eat donuts and drink coffee.

B) Enforce laws and protect the public interest at large.

C) Defend the status-quo against the public at large.



My guess is that many people now see the police as how businesses and the wealthy get their way over the masses which they did not like but could tolerate until the police started killing people and getting off scott free in the process of doing this.



Personally I think the protests in Baltimore and Ferguson are good things as it shows people have had enough and will stand up at least for the right not to get killed by a public official for shits and giggles, had their been genuine, independant and credible investigations of these acts I doubt you would have seen trouble on the scale you now have it but as with most police investigations they are a foregone conclusion with the usual "justifications" trotted out and the case closed.



I was once told by an old boss I hated that right and wrong are irrelevant as perception will always dictate action so whether these police actions were right or wrong is irrelevant as it is the public's perception of those actions which are now driving the protests.

REALLY! THE PROTESTS THAT TURNED INTO RIOTS ARE A GOOD THING!!!! There is no good that came out in either of those riots at all. In Fergison most of the people rioting were from out of state they came in and looted stores assulted police and burned down buildings and set objects and cars on fire causing a trauma that that neighborhood might never recover from. And in Baltimore almost the same exact scenes were seen across the country, cars burning, police being forced to retreat under a hail of bricks and buildings burned down. And in baltimore it was mostly local! They even burned down the ONLY PARMACY IN THE AREA! CVS put that pharmacy there to help the community by providing jobs and medicine to the neigborhood but it was looted and burned down now guess whos probably not going to try that again. I can understand that some of the police officers joined the force for the wrong reasons and have a bad attitude and do bad things. But that does not give anybody the right to harm their own community and other police officers that, as far as we know have done absoulutley nothing wrong except for trying to do their jobs. No matter how you look at it people should see that these riots were and still are wrong. The people who were involved and live in those areas need to learn that those riots dont do anything but harm themselves no matter what the police do.