this post was submitted on 17 Jun 2024
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Lefty Memes
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Do you really think all cops are bastards or is it like a easy thing to type instead of "corrupt cops are bad" or something?
All. Because the ones who aren’t corrupt fucks either look the other way, or try to report the bad ones and get bullied off the force.
You say "all" but I'm pretty sure you only mean the ones in specific countries. In most European countries they simply do their job and don't have a negative connotation (apart from people getting angry when they have to pay fines for speeding / parking wrongly / etc.).
Requirements and training also are much harsher here.
Just assume anyone making a post on the internet in English is American, because they have the majority of the publicly discussed issues and post most of the English content.
You'll be less confused and not lots people off by studying a "well aktchually" in where it's not needed.
Pretty much everyone is making posts in English because I'm pretty sure literally everyone on Lemmy can speak English. You can't assume someone's nationality / first language just because a post is in English.
Woo, I disagree. I mean, statistically that can't be true.
Do you have a proposed alternative to law enforcement?
There are all sorts of ways to make police less shit. Maybe police should not have the means and freedom to arbitrarily apply violence. It doesn't take much imagination to think maybe acorn cop shouldn't have a gun.
Regulate law enforcement.
That's a much more convincing and realistic way to improve law enforcementn than calling them names.
ACAB is some insecure schoolyard taunt that doesn't help anything or affect the social conscience.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Not my job to convince you of anything.
I don't even know what you're talking about.
Read again but actually try to understand
Southern Occupation style military police detachment,
A soldier fresh out of bootcamp has more trigger discipline and de-escalation training than your typical blue bastard anyways, and the federal military answers to the federal government, so they can't negotiate qualified immunity agreements or any of that shit, and their funding is already provided, so no quota meeting traffic ticketing.
I agree about trigger discipline and de-escalation training, don't they also have training to dehumanize their opponent?
Maybe I'm missing something, what exactly is " Southern occupation style military police detachment"?
I will say right off the bat that I completely support way more training for police officers and a far more rigorous screening.
The post civil war occupation of the south.
It was basically a brief golden age for black leadership in the south because that's how "not letting anyone fuck around" the union occupation force was with the traitors.
It was so effective at cock blocking the terrorist little shitbags that the red second they had enough political leverage they had them disbanded and proceeded to immediately kick off the first golden age of the klan.
ACAB isn't about corruption, it's about the fact that all police enforce all laws no matter how bad, as a condition of keeping their job.
That's absurd on its face. Cops routinely look the other way in tons of minor civil code violations they don't judge as damaging to society.
Cops have the discretion to enforce laws.
Some use that discretion poorly and they suck and some use that discretion well and they're fine.
Discretion is just selective enforcement. Lots of people do a thing. But cops only think it’s damaging to society when the wrong kind of people do it. That thing might just be existing.
Maybe that punishment involves jail time, but more likely it means being harassed, or put in cuffs for a while but let off, or just be intimidated by a guy who can legally whisper “I fear for my life” into a body cam and then kill you.
ACAB means cops either participate in that system, do nothing to stop it, or try to stop it and get forced out.
Okay, so then NACAB.
That's all I'm saying.
I understand frustration and even hatred toward law enforcement due to atrocities or idiot mistakes or qualified immunity, but making a blanket statement that depends on a misunderstanding of basic human discretion and personality demeans any legitimate facet of that argument.
If you say acab and believe it, then clearly you don't understand reality well enough to want or have the capacity to change it, you just want to yell at somebody and stamp your feet.
Which isn't very helpful.
It sounds like you’re breaking down cops into several categories:
Sure, group 3 cops may use that discretion for good. Maybe they don’t pull someone over for going one over the speed limit, or decide to look the other way when a homeless guy tries to sell cigarettes. I agree with you, this is the kind of discretion that’s supposed to happen.
But when people say ACAB, they’re saying that when cops that don’t do terrible things work alongside cops that do, they are complicit. One cop slowly, agonizingly kills a guy. Three cops watch and do nothing to stop him. That’s an extreme example. But there’s a million small versions of that, in every big city and small town, where a cop uses either their legal authority or “I’m a person with a gun” authority to do something bad, and their coworkers let it happen.
Cops that don’t stop their coworkers from doing bad things are just as bad as those doing the bad things. So, ACAB.
No, I didn't break cops down into those groups.
You did.
Holding a hammer, everything is a nail.
But keep your proprietary delineations to yourself, you know what they say about assumptions.
ACAB is a pretty poor descriptor for " I don't like corrupt or cruel cops"
I agree with what you say above. Some cops are bastards and some cops are not.
I similarly don't let unhelpful, inaccurate slogans govern reality.
It isn't much more difficult to accept and understand a complex reality than to forcibly ignore reality every second of the day just to hold on to unproductive anger
Keep it up man, you've obviously got more energy than most of us who think that slogan is shit.
ACAB is one of the things which give ammo to the conservatives on a silver platter. It makes us look stupid.
There are occasional stories about cops who risk their lives to save people. But, fuck them I suppose, because of that one time they heard a story about their colleague they knew was shady, shooting someone for smoking weed and they didn't organise everyone else in their department to protest outside the station until they were fired.
No room for nuance with these people.
Thanks, lot of time over here.
Accuracy is important, and so is making things better.
I have a big problem with authority and don't trust cops much myself, but mindless slogans like acab aren't going to fix anything any more than cultists screaming maga is going to fix anything.
Enabling the corrupt ones is almost as bad being corrupt.
People always try to invoke "just a few bad apples" forgetting the rest of that phrase.
One bad apple spoils the bunch. Doesn't matter if you've got a squad of Clark Kent boyscout types, the fact remains that if they can deal with even one Lex Luthor being a shitass in their uniform without actively trying to put a stop to that situation, they're all suspect.
Normally it's unreasonable to expect someone to stick their neck out just for the sake of doing the right thing alone, but these people menace society with military kit and weaponry under the premise that they're the exception to that. They tell us all the time that it is their job to risk their lives to stop people from getting victimized, so it's more than fair to judge them when they don't hold themselves to the same standard when dealing with their own.
Sure, let me know if you see someone using that phrase.
I don't follow your ensuing logic that because a cop could be corrupt you should treat them like they are corrupt.
"They're all suspect"? Okay. So is everybody else.
But the presumption that they're all corrupt or acab is silly and unrealistic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jswgEdJTrfU here's a really famous guy using that phrase, though I will admit he's got a few felonies under his belt.
Sure, works fine.
And yes, it's not literally wrong, haha
One would think being not literally being wrong would be fundamental to the developing and adoption of a slogan.
Further evidence acab is a taunt rather than a serious slogan.
These people have such an oversimplified view of the world that there’s no reasoning with them. They can’t comprehend that people would join law enforcement for any other reason than denying people civil rights.
Seems like you are trying to oversimplify their world view so you don't have to question your own.
Bullseye
There's nothing wrong with wanting to be a police officer out of truly caring about and wanting to improve your community. Sadly what happens is those good meaning people are the minority and there are countless cases of them being harassed and outed, sometimes even assassinated, by the bad cops who are the majority.
When you have an entire occupation, in every state, doing shady shit, killing bystanders, killing innocents, even killing the people they were sent to help, it is a huge problem that can not be ignored. They act without consequences and it needs to stop.
Good cops are awesome. I love good cops. I wish them the best and hope they make it home safe.
If you want to truly care and help people, be a firefighter. Be a medic. Get into the mental health industry. Feed people. Teach. Build. There are near infinite ways to help people, that don't involve walking around the city dressed, literally, to kill.
Violent crimes consistently trend down. We actually don't have too many people randomly killing others. When we do, it's a big fucking event, that could have probably been avoided entirely with some more of those mental health people I mentioned before. BEST case, a cop does something after blood has been spilled.
At best a cop thinks they want to help people, and thinks the best way to do that is with violence.
Bizarre.
The fact that anyone can say "all" this is that speaks to such a misunderstanding of their reality.
It's like choosing to refuse certain lengths of the spectrum. How many years are they going to force themselves to live colorblind?
Who are you referring to?
ALL cops are bastards, yes. It's in the title.
Each and every cop could have chosen not to be a bastard. Some of them weren't bastards when they started, but by the time they've been in it long enough to identify as a "cop" they're a bastard. They are either actively participating in the system that the state uses to violently enforce their whims, or are complicit by virtue of continuing to perpetuate the establishment. Some of them, a vanishingly small minority, have the moral character to go back to not being a bastard, of they quit the police force, but until then, they cop, they bastard.
So in your perspective not all cops are bastards.
They may become bastards over time or may become a complicit part of the system, and if they decide not to be bastards, they may be kicked out, but at any time there are non-bastard cops
I agree. That's what's so silly about this taunt.
It is unproductive and exposes your unwillingness to deal with the complex reality.
Chanting an obviously incorrect slogan backfires pretty hard upon every utterance.
It sure is here.