Stacey Patton and David J Leonard at the BBC look at why some victims get blamed for being killed by the police.
“You had a 350lb (158.8kg) person who was resisting arrest. The police were trying to bring him down as quickly as possible,” New York Representative Peter King told the press. “If he had not had asthma and a heart condition and was so obese, almost definitely he would not have died.”
This sort of logic sees Garner’s choices as the reasons for his death. Everything is about what he did. He had a petty criminal record with dozens of arrests, he (allegedly) sold untaxed cigarettes, he resisted arrest and disrespected the officers by not complying.
It’s as if the cops were a chainsaw or a cliff edge or an erupting volcano – unconscious things that human beings need to be careful of.
According to Bob McManus, a columnist for The New York Post, both Eric Garner and Michael Brown, the teenager shot dead by a police officer in Ferguson Missouri, “had much in common, not the least of which was this: On the last day of their lives, they made bad decisions. Especially bad decisions. Each broke the law – petty offenses, to be sure, but sufficient to attract the attention of the police. And then – tragically, stupidly, fatally, inexplicably – each fought the law.”
As one might fight a chainsaw or a volcano. If you get killed, well, what did you expect?
But why not talk instead about the choices the cops made, they ask.
There is plenty of blame to go around. The NYPD’s embrace of stop-and-frisk policies rooted in the “broken windows” method of policing is a co-conspirator worthy of public scrutiny and outrage.
Yet, we focus on Eric Garner’s choices.
Such victim-blaming is central to white supremacy.
Emmett Till should not have whistled at a white woman.
Amadou Diallo should not have reached for his wallet.
Trayvon Martin should not have been wearing a hoodie.
And so on, for a long list of examples.
The irony is these statements are made in a society where white men brazenly walk around with rifles and machine guns, citing their constitutional right to do so when confronted by the police.
Cliven Bundy pointed his gun at a bunch of federal cops and drove them away. Cliven Bundy is not a person of color.
Strange, isn’t it.
The Metropolitan Police managed to arrest two men who had just beheaded a soldier in a London street ,and who intended to be shot and killed by the police. Both men were shot and injured, but both were able to be tried and convicted of murder.
If the Met can do that with suspects who were attacking them with machetes then it makes the NYPD and other US police forces look incompetent.
There’s a Common Law principal that you have to take people as you find them (or something like that). The cliché is someone with an eggshell skull. You kill that person in an assault and the eggshell skull is no excuse.
The grave site of Eric Garner, a man loved by both his family and community…
http://www.vocativ.com/usa/race/eric-garners-grave/
Sound familiar? She wore a sexy dress. She had too much to drink. She went to his apartment.
The aggressor is always forced into his actions by the oppressed. Right. They have no control over their responses to simple “provocations”. So which one is the greater danger to society?
Decker
You’re weird.
Seconded-
Decker
You’re weird.
Checking sources, police academy and military training, all of them seem to use one standard for shooting; aiming at the center of mass and rapid aimed fire. Police are trained to look for a short checklist of conditions and when those conditions are met they fire, center of mass and as rapidly as consistent with aimed fire.
In this sense the police do, in fact, act as non-negotiable hazards. If you hold something that resembles a weapon in a way that means the weapon could be immediately used and the muzzle is pointed at an officer, even a in joking or casual way, you can expect to get shot in your center of mass. Police practice this until it becomes reflexive.
Keep this in mind when around police. When around police do not handle anything that might resemble a gun in a way that makes it appear that you could use this notional gun. Do not do anything that might make it appear that this notional gun is pointed anywhere near their direction. Remember that reciprocal directions look alike in silhouette.
Nowhere within any police training manual is there any training or recommendation for shooting to wound or disable. That sort of thing is very strongly discouraged. Shoot to wound is a movie myth. For rank and file police it does not exist as an option and it is not included in their training.
As far as I can tell the only police personnel that might be trained to shoot to disable or wound are tactical team snipers. That training is widely considered non-standard and is controversial. The most common target for snipers is the base of the brain.
That the men in England were not killed likely has more to do with poor shooting, aiming at center of mass but hitting less vital areas (possible lack of practice under stress), and/or the effectiveness of the public health service hospitals.
@lorn
To add to what lorn said. If we imagine a world where police have no more right to self defense than an average non-police citizen, this is how it would work. You could shoot in self defense. However, there is no such thing as shoot to wound. It is a hollywood myth. For example, if you shoot someone in the thigh and you hit the main artery, they are dead in minutes.
For a “responsible citizen” with a gun, or a cop with a gun, they have to decide when to shoot. If they shoot when they are not immediately and exactly in that moment in a situation where they are justified in using potentially lethal self defense, we have another term for that: assault with a deadly weapon. If you shoot too early, doesn’t matter where you’re shooting: in case law that’s assault with a deadly weapon, and in fact there’s a good chance you will kill them.
If you find yourself in a situation where you are legally and morally allowed to shoot the person, I would favor my own preservation over the person I feel morally entitled to potentially kill in self defense, and I would take the option that best insures my safety, which is to shoot at center of mass with rapid fire.
Having said all of that, I’m sure I would have lots of problems with the particulars of police training in this area. Perhaps not the general principle.
[meta]
EnlightenmentLiberal,
I noticed the pronoun person shift.
—
Perhaps the culture is even more important than the training.
@John Morales
As for culture vs training: I have no idea. I am no expert in sociology, and I do not have possession of the facts. I’m all for good evidence-based and reason-based approaches to fixing our problems, and I’m not afraid to admit that I know too little about the problem right now.