example of police militarization?

it's pretty obvious that leo's have become increasingly aggressive in their tactics in recent years. they've gone from just having patrol cars to having $500,000 armored transports with .60cal mounted machine guns, and a slew of other heavy weapons.

i'm curious about when it went from "to protect and serve" to "to punish and enslave"....even here where i live i've witnessed police militarization....



the patch on the left is the old sheriff's office patch, during that time the cars had "serving pasco" on the sides, the patch on the right is the new one, and the cars have that same slogan on them that the patch has...on top of that their uniforms have changed from the black slacks and brown shirt to an olive drab bdu...

what an unfortunate world that sees it's "law enforcement" turn into a paramilitary group

Unfortunately it's part of an escalating cycle. They become more militant to respond to increasingly militant threats. Criminals get big guns, cops get better armor and bigger guns, criminals then get better armor and even bigger guns, cops get...etc. As to who started it, it's kind of a chicken and egg thing. No one knows and the answer really doesn't matter at this point in the cycle.

It is still a terrible thing though.

Goken wrote: Unfortunately it's part of an escalating cycle. They become more militant to respond to increasingly militant threats. Criminals get big guns, cops get better armor and bigger guns, criminals then get better armor and even bigger guns, cops get...etc. As to who started it, it's kind of a chicken and egg thing. No one knows and the answer really doesn't matter at this point in the cycle.

It is still a terrible thing though.

Pretty much sums it up. I understand the need for tactical teams when it really hits the fan. I wouldn't really mind if the cops were militarized if I wasn't paranoid about them basically trashing our "rights" and taking advantage of their status with all the fancy gear and equipment. Cops already carry a shotgun and AR15 rifle in their cars, camouflage and military style looks are just for intimidation and I don't think that's cool. All the new vehicles they get is just so the military and DoD can get money for new stuff as those MRAPs have proven to be junk anyways. I really think they need to invest money into training them better, how to interact with the public, how to actually shoot and when it's okay to shoot.

So I'm in Russia right now and have been here a few months... the police here all have AKs on their backs even regular traffic cops. Then there are always many foot patrol police in groups of 3 dressed in black with AKs and vests. I am in the north caucasus where there's a history of insurgency and stuff so that's their response. Then outside the towns and going through different state borders there are checkpoints and the cops there are fully dressed in camouflage some with light machine guns. The police here in town will sit on the side of a random road and flag down who they please to check papers and trunks. At night going through different states you have to stop, let them search your car, and go through a metal detector into a building where they log your passport. Cops don't kill people here though, like in America.

Been seeing it alot around here as well. A month or so ago we were heading out to go shopping only to find our roads blocked off by tanks No one was at the tanks and no one was moving around patrolling or anything. Just this big freaking tank in the middle of the road.

In August we went down to Ohio's boarders to go to a Water Park. On our way home we were stopped at a light for a good 20 minuets watching huge military trucks file from a point A to a Point B base. It was crazy...

Get your own Rifles, Pistol and food supply ready. It's looking pretty ugly in the future.

i probably wouldn't have as much of an issue with police militarization if there wasn't so much corruption...i frequently see them abuse their authority, there are constant news reports of leo's getting into serious trouble, and of course the reports of racism etc...

there was a time when people could trust the people that enforced the laws and there was no need for them to be militarized...now it's often safer to avoid leo's...

http://www.activistpost.com/2015/11/american-cops-now-steal-more-property-than-all-us-burglars-combined.html
(this site presents information in a biased way, but its informations is factually accurate from what i have seen and is not being presented in the mainstream)

"According to the US Department of Justice, the value of asset forfeiture revoceries by US authorities from 1989-2010 was $12,667,612,066, increasing on average 19.5% per year."

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2014/03/civil-asset-forfeiture-7-things-you-should-know

3. But don’t police target only criminals?

Unfortunately, no. There are many stories of innocent people having their property seized. For example, between 2006 and 2008, law enforcement agents in Tenaha, Texas, engaged in a systematic practice of seizing cash and property from innocent drivers with absolutely no evidence of wrongdoing. In Philadelphia, police seized the home of two sisters whose brother, who did not live there, showed up while trying to evade the cops. In Detroit, cops seized over a hundred cars owned by patrons of an art institute event—because the institute had failed to get a liquor license. You can be totally innocent and still be unable to stop the government from seizing your property.

i've been saying for years, that laws and law enforcement is no longer about "right and wrong" but about making money for the state....

why else do they feel the need to hide when monitoring traffic?....if they were in plain site most drivers would drive safer, to me that is a better method of "protect and serve" than hiding behind signs and trees with radar guns etc...i've even heard it from several officers mouths that they do in fact have ticket quotas...and if they don't meet their quotas they get counselled....

about quotas
they are not even legal in many (not all - maybe not even MOST) districts but the reality is that they exist as unwritten (but NOT UNSPOKEN) expectations

theres a lot of examples of cops coming out and exposing this happening and even suing their departments for being punished for defying them or not meeting them

im not going to post a bunch of links to back that up unless someone asks but here is an example of a story thats easy to find

http://www.npr.org/2015/04/04/395061810/despite-laws-and-lawsuits-quota-based-policing-lingers

New York City Officer Adhyl Polanco

"The culture is, you're not working unless you are writing summonses or arresting people,"

Back in 2008, Officer Polanco was determined to expose the NYPD's alleged quota system. So he secretly recorded conversations inside his precinct house in the Bronx.

"Next week, it could be 25 and one. (this means 25 tickets and one arrest) It could be 35 and one," says a man Polanco identifies as a sergeant. The man heard in the recording is pushing his officers to get their numbers up. If they don't, he threatens, it could get even worse: The quota could be 25 tickets a month, or 35.

"Until you decide you're going to quit this job and become a Pizza Hut delivery man, this is what you're going to be doing until then," the man says.

---

a little more sinister

"The prison industrial complex (PIC) is a term we use to describe the overlapping interests of government and industry that use surveillance, policing, and imprisonment as solutions to economic, social and political problems.

http://www.publiceye.org/defendingjustice/overview/herzing_pic.html

companies we all recognize that benefit from PIC

https://www.popularresistance.org/12-mainstream-corps-benefiting-from-the-prison-industrial-complex/

mcdonalds

wendys

starbucks

sprint

verizon

victorias secret

american airlines

fidelity investments

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-prison-industry-in-the-united-states-big-business-or-a-new-form-of-slavery/8289

"At least 37 states have legalized the contracting of prison labor by private corporations that mount their operations inside state prisons. The list of such companies contains the cream of U.S. corporate society: IBM, Boeing, Motorola, Microsoft, AT&T, Wireless, Texas Instrument, Dell, Compaq, Honeywell, Hewlett-Packard, Nortel, Lucent Technologies, 3Com, Intel, Northern Telecom, TWA, Nordstrom’s, Revlon, Macy’s, Pierre Cardin, Target Stores, and many more. All of these businesses are excited about the economic boom generation by prison labor. Just between 1980 and 1994, profits went up from $392 million to $1.31 billion. Inmates in state penitentiaries generally receive the minimum wage for their work, but not all; in Colorado, they get about $2 per hour, well under the minimum.

And in privately-run prisons, they receive as little as 17 cents per hour for a maximum of six hours a day, the equivalent of $20 per month. The highest-paying private prison is CCA in Tennessee, where prisoners receive 50 cents per hour for what they call “highly skilled positions.” At those rates, it is no surprise that inmates find the pay in federal prisons to be very generous. There, they can earn $1.25 an hour and work eight hours a day, and sometimes overtime. They can send home $200-$300 per month.

Thanks to prison labor, the United States is once again an attractive location for investment in work that was designed for Third World labor markets. A company that operated a maquiladora (assembly plant in Mexico near the border) closed down its operations there and relocated to San Quentin State Prison in California. In Texas, a factory fired its 150 workers and contracted the services of prisoner-workers from the private Lockhart Texas prison, where circuit boards are assembled for companies like IBM and Compaq.

[Former] Oregon State Representative Kevin Mannix recently urged Nike to cut its production in Indonesia and bring it to his state, telling the shoe manufacturer that “there won’t be any transportation costs; we’re offering you competitive prison labor (here).”

some names we dont recognize

http://www.vice.com/read/whos-getting-rich-off-the-prison-industrial-complex

hey heres one for ya

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/08/26/first-state-legalizes-armed-drones-for-cops-thanks-to-a-lobbyist.html

The Daily Beast has reported that North Dakota has enacted a drone bill that permits law enforcement drones to be equipped with weapons such as Tasers, rubber bullets, tear gas, and sound cannons.

ever see the southpark episode with drones....yeah...

And yet the first people to be in high demand in any crisis situation are the police.

The way things work in our country has changed drastically. We now have more mass shootings and attacks than at any other point in our history, and we are now at the greatest risk for a terror attack since post 9/11.

This thread has come up before in many different ways, and I will again say I dont agree with nor do I appreicate the sentiment that the police have some kind of murder quota to fill, or that their default response to any incident is to "pop one off".

The police force is entirely volunteer based, there is no draft. Unfortunatly, people believe or seem to believe that police should have superhuman traits simply because they choose to enforce the laws that all the rest of us voted to put in place.

And you do vote....right?

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk

Kohadre wrote: And yet the first people to be in high demand in any crisis situation are the police.

The way things work in our country has changed drastically. We now have more mass shootings and attacks than at any other point in our history, and we are now at the greatest risk for a terror attack since post 9/11.

This thread has come up before in many different ways, and I will again say I dont agree with nor do I appreicate the sentiment that the police have some kind of murder quota to fill, or that their default response to any incident is to "pop one off".

The police force is entirely volunteer based, there is no draft. Unfortunatly, people believe or seem to believe that police should have superhuman traits simply because they choose to enforce the laws that all the rest of us voted to put in place.

And you do vote....right?

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk

do you read the information that is presented when this topic comes up?

would your opinion change if there were convincing evidence that this is a real problem?

i don't seem to recall seeing that many laws on the ballot last time i voted...at least not as many laws as what gets passed...i'd vote against a good many of the laws that somehow get passed without public consent...

there are a lot of good cops who believe in what they're doing and try to make a difference but there are definitely some bad apples and yes we hear mostly about the bad apples. honestly cops are put into a lot of messed up situations and its hard to judge what to do and whos right or whos wrong. unfortunately they do definitely take full advantage of their status and have a union and what not to back them.

in my neck of the woods in CA dealing with prop 47 which reduced penalties for a variety of crimes has given petty criminals a green light to do what they want because they know they wont get in trouble. also up here we just dont have enough police for our large rural county and neighboring counties. the cities like eureka are full of tweakers, homeless, petty criminals that get booked and released cause the jail is full. rural areas you have to be your own police there are armed robberies every week especially because of the marijuana industry.

i've personally been in one of the local california highway patrol stations for questioning and i saw the quotas written out on a giant marker board it said monthly quotas on the top and there was traffic, theft, and drug type categories. the guy who brought me in wore a CHP jumpsuit with his head and eyebrows shaved. a lot the police nowadays are all ex military cause its the only job they can get since all they know how to do is follow orders and treat people like the military occupuation overseas.

really every able member of the community should be able to police, like how the constitutional militias were back in the day. now the militia are the state and national guards which will be used against the general public in almost any event, in some counties they have a community militia like structure at it can be anything, first responders, police, army engineers style, just groups of concerned citizens who come together on their own funding and free will to determine their local problems and develop and act on solutions. constitutional homeland security the book is called, it's a great read. but of course the govt and media want to get everyone to think about the stereotype hooligan militias who walk around in camouflage and rifles so they're scared so they think the police are the best source of protection. the worst criminal is the criminal hiding behind the badge.

idk i dont like to bash cops but a lot of this makes me very angry. :evil: :evil:

EDIT: and that new sheriff badge that says "we fight as one" that's absolutely ridiculous!!

OB1Shinobi wrote:

Kohadre wrote: And yet the first people to be in high demand in any crisis situation are the police.

The way things work in our country has changed drastically. We now have more mass shootings and attacks than at any other point in our history, and we are now at the greatest risk for a terror attack since post 9/11.

This thread has come up before in many different ways, and I will again say I dont agree with nor do I appreicate the sentiment that the police have some kind of murder quota to fill, or that their default response to any incident is to "pop one off".

The police force is entirely volunteer based, there is no draft. Unfortunatly, people believe or seem to believe that police should have superhuman traits simply because they choose to enforce the laws that all the rest of us voted to put in place.

And you do vote....right?

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk

do you read the information that is presented when this topic comes up?

would your opinion change if there were convincing evidence that this is a real problem?

I read it, but that doesn't mean I agree with all of it.

I'm getting a "most police are militant" vibe from this topic, and posted my response accordingly. There is another thread going on the forum regarding refugees and Islamist militants, and the consensus seems to be in that thread, that you can't generalize an entire group of people based on the actions of a few extremists.

But maybe the same attitude doesn't, or shouldn't apply to police?

Lightstrider wrote: EDIT: and that new sheriff badge that says "we fight as one" that's absolutely ridiculous!!

Unless they mean all law abiding citizens fight as one against crime. If they mean as a Police Force (which would be the likely interpretation since it is a badge representing that Force) against everyone else, then yea its really inappropriate to use the word 'fight' in that context where proportionality deliberately is not meant to be balanced between them and everyone else IMO. Ya know, if you (not you you, general anyone you) consider Police need to have more firepower then the citizens...?