[samdamsamm]

Tonight I witnessed a young girl get knocked out cold by a tear gas canister shot into her face from about a 40 ft. range. She was holding her hands up.

There was nothing but peaceful protesters standing around, not blocking traffic. No vandalism anywhere in sight. This was in Louisville, KY.

The police fired rubber bullets at the group of people carrying her away to a place on the other side of the line of humvees blocking the street to where the ambulance could reach her.

Everything most middle-income Americans think about our police forces is wrong.

[dessant]

You don't even need to leave your porch to get shot. Police and National Guard are patrolling neighborhoods and shooting civilians with paint canisters on their own property in Minneapolis. In one case they yelled "Light 'em up!" before starting to shoot [1] with ammunition that could blind people.

It's legal to be outside your house during the curfew in Minneapolis [2].

> Can I be outside my house (on my property) after 8 p.m. and before 6 a.m.?

> Yes.

[1] https://twitter.com/tkerssen/status/1266921821653385225

[2] https://dps.mn.gov/macc/Pages/faq.aspx

[germinalphrase]

I’m a local. Here’s some additional context:

“Follow up on video of people getting rubber bullets shot at them in their doorway from a source that was there. This was personally texted to me. Source is a teacher that works at my elementary school.

Here’s what was posted.

‘That is my blue house across the street. Apparently this video has gone viral. What they didn’t show was the 20- 30 minutes of the rioters that surrounded the houses, were all over our neighborhood, the street, rioters running through my yard and screaming on the other side of my garden level bedroom window, and hiding in my alley. The neighbors are saying they were ‘just having a beer outside,’ as if this came out of nowhere and while it seems extreme from the national guard/police, the rioters were flooded in our neighborhood and they were trying to get them out. That was terrifying, and to be honest after being at the Minneapolis community clean up today and seeing all the burned down buildings, I am glad nothing was burned down or broken into. And they got them out. Idk who is out there at night! And yes black lives matter!!!! But these riots are scary AF. And they haven’t returned and are gone now and we are totally safe, and all had been quiet for hours. And apparently my upstairs neighbor had no idea the rioters were here at all ... #minneapolisriots #blacklivesmatter #georgefloyd #helpusall #feltprotected”

Edit: apparently, additional information is... controversial? I don’t agree with the police conduct, but there is additional context here.

[jagged-chisel]

> shooting civilians with paint canisters on their own property

Even if it weren't legal to be outside on your own property from 8p-6a, this isn't proper enforcement of the law.

[cariaso]

worth noting that MN National Guard seems to have replied to this specific video and say that it' is not them.

https://twitter.com/MNNationalGuard/status/12670051854922260...

This doesn't quite disagree with your statement, but I'd like to ensure the correct officers are identified and disciplined.

[crispyambulance]

It's a chaotic situation. They (the police/nat-guard) likely wanted people inside their homes to prevent further chaos and confrontations. It all becomes more volatile if everyone's on their porch, outraged, as the police "parade" comes through.

I know folks on HN like strict interpretations and reasoning of what's legal or illegal, but all of that gets very blurred during a riot when the situation at any given time is on the verge of getting out of control. It just isn't time for a high-school forensics debate when people are in riot gear.

If a group of highly armed police or military are marching through your street and demanding you go inside--- it's probably better to GO INSIDE at least until they're gone.

[roenxi]

> Everything most middle-income Americans think about our police forces is wrong.

That statement is a bit vague, everyone is going to substitute their own interpretation in. The police don't target racial minorities because they are racist. People who want power over others sign up for policing - and then go after groups who have the least ability to fight back.

The middle income might know the symptoms, but they are missing the cause. The cause is that if a fellow wants to hurl someone else to the ground, kick them and keep them down without a fair fight then their best chance as getting to that situation is to sign on to the police. This is an inescapable structural pressure that needs constant attention.

[michaelt]

> inescapable structural pressure

I agree it's a severe problem, but I don't agree it's inescapable.

It's a job that attracts brutal people only because it's a job that lets them get away with brutality. If the cycle of allowing brutality and attracting brutes could be broken, there's a good chance it'd stay broken.

The police fraternity knows all about getting other cops to fall into line - just look at the "blue wall of silence" and police union "get out of jail free" cards. That same pressure couldn't be applied against brutality.

[fsloth]

It's hardly inescapable. Police in the nordic countries acts and behaves more or less as a service branch of the government rather as a bully. But they have several years of training whereas US has only - what, a few months? I would say it's about skimping costs in the wrong place. US system is weird that in it's local search of frugal solutions it creates inefficient systems (like the medical sector).

[eyelidlessness]

> The police don't target racial minorities because they are racist.

This is false. There is a long history of police membership in, involvement and collaboration with explicitly racist groups.

[praptak]

"If you give the police unaccountable power to fight the criminals, the people who'd otherwise become criminals will join the police."

[bsanr2]

  The police don't target racial minorities because they are racist.

To the contrary, implicit bias has been shown to effect policing decision-making and outcomes. You're beginning from an inaccurate premise.

[pasquinelli]

I know a number of cops and don't believe any of them signed up to be cops because of what you're describing. you are missing the cause, and are misattributing it individual malice.

The police exist to preserve the established order. If you believed a social order can exist without being preserved by violence, then i'd call you an anarchist, (i'd call myself one too.) If you believe anything remotely resembling the present social order can be preserved without violence then you're naive, and very few people are that naive, least of all the police. Under what circumstances violence is required to preserve the established order may be shocking, but the individual police officers aren't pushing the system around, the system is pushing them around.

Sociopathic bully cops would ve weeded out. They are covered for instead. Video of them murdering people would prompt action from the system to get rid of them, but the system declines to prosecute them, and i'd guess a third of the country hmms and haws and theorizes about what the murder victim should've done to avoid getting murdered. The victims of these bad cops would be treated by the media the same as any other person whom tragedy befell, instead the media digs up dirt on them.

Individual bad cops can't exert the kind of pressure on the system needed to do all that. It's the established social order expressing itself.

[filoeleven]

> The police don't target racial minorities because they are racist.

Depends on what you mean by “they.” Individual officers are a mixed bag, but someone else mentioned the ties between police and right-wing/racist groups. “The police” as an institution however is definitely racist.

> The police don't target racial minorities because they are racist. People who want power over others sign up for policing - and then go after groups who have the least ability to fight back.

The fact that racial minorities have the least ability to fight back is a significant component of institutional racism. Why are they in that position in the first place? Because the USA has not yet excised from its culture the racist policies, values, and attitudes that it has held since before its foundation.

[rayiner]

> Everything most middle-income Americans think about our police forces is wrong

After moving to the suburbs, I realized that most Americans base their opinions on their own police forces. The last time I got pulled over in the exurbs where I live, the officer basically apologized for pulling me over. Things are very different an hour away from here in DC.

[Shared404]

This exactly. I have yet to hear any complaints about police in my town, but the next town over has one of the most corrupt police departments that I've ever heard of.

[seaknoll]

I think that's an extremely unhelpful oversimplification. There isn't some subset of humans (as a high enough percentage of the population to be considered) that's simply missing empathy. At least in their own minds they are good people, so that's where they have to be met.

So IMO we need to start by assuming that they DO care, but they have different assumptions about the difficulty and danger of police work. They live in safe communities and go into cities and see poverty and homelessness, mental illness on the streets, read about the gun crime, and think that it's scary. They're not entirely wrong.

Where they ARE wrong is in failing to realize how often police officers are the ones to create violent situations. Why did they use force over a counterfeit bill? Why would they bust into someone's apartment in the middle of the night over a drug charge? Unless there is an in-the-moment violent situation going on, they should not be entitled to use force. They should be required to wait, plan, and deescalate. The last thing they should be allowed to do is play out their masturbatory fantasy on the public. If that makes police work more boring, so be it.

[leetcrew]

it may seem that way, but I suspect it is a bit more nuanced than that.

I think most people understand, at least on some level, that the news is generally about outlier events. when every interaction you have with the police is polite or even helpful, it's tempting to think that these incidences of police brutality are just isolated events. if you live somewhere that you experience aggressive policing in your daily life, it might seem more like the stories that make the national news are merely the tip of the iceberg.

I think it's unfortunate that the national discussion centers so much around these high-profile killings. it obscures some of the more subtle impositions on marginalized communities and leaves gaps for motivated reasoning to reach a less uncomfortable conclusion.