The fact you Americans think this is normal for a protest says more then anything I can comment.
A good test is to think of a private entitiy doing this and if that passes the smell test. I don’t think deploying snipers at events has ever saved anyone (correct me if I am missing an incident) and in this case if they are there to protect the students why does the school not hire their own sharpshooters?
You bring up a good point. The prevention part - snipers are seemingly ineffective. The reaction/response portion however, does point to guns being used to prevent further damage. 2016 dallas shooting - police used a bomb to take out the shooter after the fact. LA airport shooting in 2013 - taken down with regular guns.
Overall, I think you make a good point, they’re ineffective at prevention, and even response can be handled w/o the need of long range or automatic weapons. There’s always the argument that “well there aren’t any attacks because we have these” that I can see people making but that feels fallacious somehow, just not sure how exactly.
I am still left to wonder, how do you actually prevent the bombing and other attacks from happening. What is effective?
I think you might be mistaken as to the point of the police being on site. Its not really the job of police to protect (and extra so for protesters). The risk of a terror attack on any large group of people is a weak excuse for this sort of response from police.
Something about those who give up liberty for safety deserve nether…
I sorta agree, but wanted to ask for some clarification - what liberties do you see being given up here? They didn’t really take anything away, they were just there. It’s definitely intimidating, and nobody trusts the police (for good reason, namely lack of appropriate oversight, action, and training) but I can’t see how anything was taken away or given up here for the illusion of saftey that the snipers would hypothetically be providing, know what I mean?
You have normalized a police state where as a people you now think it is normal to have things like sniper teams set up at all major events with a lot of people. This has been done as you have stated; “to handle the threat of suicide bombers and other mass-population terrorist threats” even though sniper teams have almost no ability to stop or even just not make the situation considerably worse.
The thing about trading liberties for extra safety is not only about the liberties lost but that it is a fools journey since the things done for safety are more likely to be ether useless, or just bad (think TSA vs militarizing the police).
You are not stopping a mass casualty event at the time and place of the event itself but well before it. This show of force is just control, theatre, a waste of taxpayer money and in the worst case the cause (ironically enough) of a mass casualty event.
Dude I’m not gonna repeat myself. Go through my comments. I’ve said time in and time out that I don’t agree with this practice. Why is this so hard for people to grasp lol
Edit: And you didn’t even answer my question:
what liberties are lost by having these snipers there
I did answer you question and have been the only person willing to engage with you politely. So I will break it down at a lower level, all caps:
YOU DO NOT STOP MASS SHOOTINGS BY SENDING ARMED GOONS.
YOU HAVE TO STOP THESE THINGS BEFORE THE EVENT NOT DURING.
YOU HAVE ARMED GOVERNMENT AGENTS POINTING LOADED FIREARMS AT PEOPLE WHO ARE EXERCISING THEIR FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS. THIS HAS REMOVED THE LIBERTY OF THE STUDENTS BY CHILLING THE ABILITY TO PROTEST (A RIGHT) AND ACTIVELY DISCOURAGED ASSOCIATION WITH PEOPLE WHO SHARE THE SAME POLITICAL VIEWS (THIS IS ALSO COVERED IN YOUR CONSTITUTION).
The very idea you could not pick up on the liberties at direct risk here has me thinking you are ether so oppressed that you don’t even know what basic human freedom is, or more likely you are not arguing in good faith and know full well what is going on.
No one (other then I guess your police and governor) wants this stupid, useless, dangerous, Patriot act level show of force.
Edit: And I for one will repeat myself, over and over in different ways since you have stated no one has addressed your question when after reading the replies, they have, and done so in many nuanced and different ways. It just happens no one has given you the answer you are fishing for.
I’ve been saying this repeatedly (I literally just said it to you in the prior comment but you’re ignoring it ig? Who’s fishing for responses?) I don’t believe in the practice of using intimidation as a deterrent. Especially when it comes to weapons that can kill someone (and probably multiple people at once) instantaneously.
How do we prevent this from happening (this is the question I’m asking repeatedly and the question that only one person responded to directly, and who’s solution was to “create a just society” which I don’t need to tell you is incredibly vague and utopian.) Again. My question is how do we prevent this from happening
This is a threatening action, agreed. This does not remove our liberty to peacefully protest, but it creates an unjustly hostile/threatening environment. That I agree with (see point 1)
Stop assuming I’m being an assholr on purpose when I’ve very obviously for ACAB, understand the police state problem, and am trying to have civil conversation despite being accused of being some Tucker Carlson crayon muncher. That’s bad faith. Assuming the worst of me, is bad faith.
My frustrations are valid. Your attempts to gaslight me into some kind of troll, when all I’m trying to do (as a “good liberal”) is to get to the fucking bottom of things and have a civil conversation about police reform, is dangerous.
The tolerant don’t need to tolerate trolls, assholes, and other forms of intolerance. That’s why I was fine with not repeating myself. Not for lack of effort or care, but because this is lemmy.
Where all the users are anonymous.
And any of one these responses could be from one or multiple troll conservative groups.
If you’d like to continue the conversation in a constructive and respectful way? I’m all for it.
How do we prevent this from happening (this is the question I’m asking repeatedly and the question that only one person responded to directly, and who’s solution was to “create a just society” which I don’t need to tell you is incredibly vague and utopian.) Again. My question is how do we prevent this from happening
This is the part that I have issues with buying your arguing in good faith. This has been covered by myself and others, even in the reply above and in all caps. But once again, the best way to stop mass casualty events are before the event happens. As in you have to address/assess risk before the event. And also as pointed out the trade off of “preventing” any and all bad things from happening in a society is not worth it unless you like living under big brother.
This is a threatening action, agreed. This does not remove our liberty to peacefully protest, but it creates an unjustly hostile/threatening environment. That I agree with (see point 1)
They have arrested over 40 people so far, this does indeed remove the liberty to peacefully protest. If you have america brain so bad that you don’t think government agents pointing loaded firearms at you does not impede your liberty then maybe detaining people for exercising their rights will.
Stop assuming I’m being an assholr on purpose when I’ve very obviously for ACAB, understand the police state problem, and am trying to have civil conversation despite being accused of being some Tucker Carlson crayon muncher. That’s bad faith. Assuming the worst of me, is bad faith.
I think you have me confused with another person who accused you of asking loaded questions. I made no assumptions until you repeatedly ignored many answers to your question leading me to now believe you are fishing for a talking point.
Your attempts to gaslight me into some kind of troll, when all I’m trying to do (as a “good liberal”) is to get to the fucking bottom of things and have a civil conversation about police reform, is dangerous.
Once again, I am astonished by your ability to just ignore the responses to your question. You asked what can be done, you got more then one answer (mostly that a police response of this size and style was unwanted and dangerous) but proceeded instead to repeatedly proclaim that “No one is answering my question”. This caused people (quite rationally) to question your motives in this.
And any of one these responses could be from one or multiple troll conservative groups.
Yes, clearly these conservative groups who are well known for using the same fear mongering “Won’t someone think of the children” argument for more police powers that you are using would be just jumping at the chance to prove you wrong.
And this now has me wondering about trolls and arguments, I noticed something typing this out.
(as a “good liberal”)
Where have I seen this sort of language before?
The tolerant don’t need to tolerate trolls, assholes, and other forms of intolerance. That’s why I was fine with not repeating myself. Not for lack of effort or care, but because this is lemmy.
Yes, good thing I am not that tolerant so we can continue.
When the bomber intends to die in glory, there is no deterrent possible. Death isn’t any deterrent. It can only be stopped before they get to the scene.
Reeducation or incarceratin of zealots.
Large investment in mental health.
Prosecution of group’s and individuals that call for violence or have violent philosophies.
Reduce access to weapons and materials.
High bounties for reporting suspicious activity or behavior.
Promotion / enforcement of a homogeneous society.
None WILL be done. Many are undesirable. But they can be used to prevent. Does that help you?
Yes absolutely. These are most definitely actionable and are also excellent conversational pieces that can be discussed further, which was all I wanted instead of outrage commenting basically.
I think healthcare in general (including mental health) services would be hugely impactful to the general population.
I also think our educational system is being eroded and a lot of kids are pushed away from continuing education (in any form, not just traditional university which fails a lot of people) in favor of blue collar work
Now I’m not saying blue collar work is bad, but I do think continuing education is important, especially as our life expectancies are increasing. It’s important people stay educated and continue to practice things like the scientific process so that we don’t lose that information and become disinformation spreaders.
Without solid education, we can’t possible expect a “bright” future imo.
What did you mean about the homogenous society? In what ways? Looking forward to any examples/explanation you could give!
In a homogeneous society, everyone has the same background. No differences of traditions, religions, art, music, etc. They all look roughly similar. They have no fuel to make another member into the “other”. As I understand, Iceland has something approaching this. I expect the Sentinalese do, to. The ways to get to this from a large and diverse society are, of course, appalling.
Yeeeeeahhh, not sure if I agree with this one. To me it feels sort of lazy and skirts around the true nature of accepting people for who they are and learning to be more tolerant of people not exactly like us
Sorta feels lazy to say, well let’s get rid of what makes us different/unique.
Nature doesn’t really believe in the homogeneous, I don’t see why we should strive to make it so
I agree. But you wanted (insisted) on solutions. Thorough and complete genocide eliminates all opponents. Very few of my suggestions are desirable. Diversity with ignorance, inequality, and poverty breeds distrust and resentment - leading to civil strife. This is elementary.
I think the resistance you are getting on this thread is due to an overly naive view of “solutions” combined with a bit of unintentionally arrogant phrasing. You seem to want to discuss at a high level while ignoring the complexity of the problems involved. You strike me as young and thoughtful, with good intentions - but still inexperienced. Ease back on the pressure - no one owes you an answer. This (and all anonymous forums back to Usenet) is a crowd of semi-hostile strangers with nothing to lose. If you want engagement you need to sell yourself as worth engaging first.
I’m sorry people are being so reactionary and taking your questions as being pro sniper or whatever way they’re taking it. Rational discourse is generally better on Lemmy than other places but is still on the Internet, so people don’t actually give anyone credit for trying to be calm and rational about events like these.
And like, to an extent, I understand the outrage. I do.
But if people can’t act like adults, know they need to simmer down a bit before having these conversations, lemmy is in no way better than Reddit. It’s just a Reddit that’s wider and under the control of more people.
This interaction (while in the original thread my words were flung without frontal lobe usage, and that’s entirely my fault) I had hoped to reset after I had apologized but I guess a lot of people were still upset.
Maybe it was my fault. Idk. All I can do is continue to move forward and do better. Simple as that. Thank you for the empathy, I appreciate it.
The fact you Americans think this is normal for a protest says more then anything I can comment.
A good test is to think of a private entitiy doing this and if that passes the smell test. I don’t think deploying snipers at events has ever saved anyone (correct me if I am missing an incident) and in this case if they are there to protect the students why does the school not hire their own sharpshooters?
You bring up a good point. The prevention part - snipers are seemingly ineffective. The reaction/response portion however, does point to guns being used to prevent further damage. 2016 dallas shooting - police used a bomb to take out the shooter after the fact. LA airport shooting in 2013 - taken down with regular guns.
Overall, I think you make a good point, they’re ineffective at prevention, and even response can be handled w/o the need of long range or automatic weapons. There’s always the argument that “well there aren’t any attacks because we have these” that I can see people making but that feels fallacious somehow, just not sure how exactly.
I am still left to wonder, how do you actually prevent the bombing and other attacks from happening. What is effective?
I think you might be mistaken as to the point of the police being on site. Its not really the job of police to protect (and extra so for protesters). The risk of a terror attack on any large group of people is a weak excuse for this sort of response from police.
Something about those who give up liberty for safety deserve nether…
I sorta agree, but wanted to ask for some clarification - what liberties do you see being given up here? They didn’t really take anything away, they were just there. It’s definitely intimidating, and nobody trusts the police (for good reason, namely lack of appropriate oversight, action, and training) but I can’t see how anything was taken away or given up here for the illusion of saftey that the snipers would hypothetically be providing, know what I mean?
You have normalized a police state where as a people you now think it is normal to have things like sniper teams set up at all major events with a lot of people. This has been done as you have stated; “to handle the threat of suicide bombers and other mass-population terrorist threats” even though sniper teams have almost no ability to stop or even just not make the situation considerably worse.
The thing about trading liberties for extra safety is not only about the liberties lost but that it is a fools journey since the things done for safety are more likely to be ether useless, or just bad (think TSA vs militarizing the police).
You are not stopping a mass casualty event at the time and place of the event itself but well before it. This show of force is just control, theatre, a waste of taxpayer money and in the worst case the cause (ironically enough) of a mass casualty event.
Well said. Thank you.
Dude I’m not gonna repeat myself. Go through my comments. I’ve said time in and time out that I don’t agree with this practice. Why is this so hard for people to grasp lol
Edit: And you didn’t even answer my question: what liberties are lost by having these snipers there
I did answer you question and have been the only person willing to engage with you politely. So I will break it down at a lower level, all caps:
YOU DO NOT STOP MASS SHOOTINGS BY SENDING ARMED GOONS.
YOU HAVE TO STOP THESE THINGS BEFORE THE EVENT NOT DURING.
YOU HAVE ARMED GOVERNMENT AGENTS POINTING LOADED FIREARMS AT PEOPLE WHO ARE EXERCISING THEIR FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS. THIS HAS REMOVED THE LIBERTY OF THE STUDENTS BY CHILLING THE ABILITY TO PROTEST (A RIGHT) AND ACTIVELY DISCOURAGED ASSOCIATION WITH PEOPLE WHO SHARE THE SAME POLITICAL VIEWS (THIS IS ALSO COVERED IN YOUR CONSTITUTION).
The very idea you could not pick up on the liberties at direct risk here has me thinking you are ether so oppressed that you don’t even know what basic human freedom is, or more likely you are not arguing in good faith and know full well what is going on.
No one (other then I guess your police and governor) wants this stupid, useless, dangerous, Patriot act level show of force.
Edit: And I for one will repeat myself, over and over in different ways since you have stated no one has addressed your question when after reading the replies, they have, and done so in many nuanced and different ways. It just happens no one has given you the answer you are fishing for.
I’ve been saying this repeatedly (I literally just said it to you in the prior comment but you’re ignoring it ig? Who’s fishing for responses?) I don’t believe in the practice of using intimidation as a deterrent. Especially when it comes to weapons that can kill someone (and probably multiple people at once) instantaneously.
How do we prevent this from happening (this is the question I’m asking repeatedly and the question that only one person responded to directly, and who’s solution was to “create a just society” which I don’t need to tell you is incredibly vague and utopian.) Again. My question is how do we prevent this from happening
This is a threatening action, agreed. This does not remove our liberty to peacefully protest, but it creates an unjustly hostile/threatening environment. That I agree with (see point 1)
Stop assuming I’m being an assholr on purpose when I’ve very obviously for ACAB, understand the police state problem, and am trying to have civil conversation despite being accused of being some Tucker Carlson crayon muncher. That’s bad faith. Assuming the worst of me, is bad faith.
My frustrations are valid. Your attempts to gaslight me into some kind of troll, when all I’m trying to do (as a “good liberal”) is to get to the fucking bottom of things and have a civil conversation about police reform, is dangerous.
The tolerant don’t need to tolerate trolls, assholes, and other forms of intolerance. That’s why I was fine with not repeating myself. Not for lack of effort or care, but because this is lemmy.
Where all the users are anonymous.
And any of one these responses could be from one or multiple troll conservative groups.
If you’d like to continue the conversation in a constructive and respectful way? I’m all for it.
This is the part that I have issues with buying your arguing in good faith. This has been covered by myself and others, even in the reply above and in all caps. But once again, the best way to stop mass casualty events are before the event happens. As in you have to address/assess risk before the event. And also as pointed out the trade off of “preventing” any and all bad things from happening in a society is not worth it unless you like living under big brother.
They have arrested over 40 people so far, this does indeed remove the liberty to peacefully protest. If you have america brain so bad that you don’t think government agents pointing loaded firearms at you does not impede your liberty then maybe detaining people for exercising their rights will.
I think you have me confused with another person who accused you of asking loaded questions. I made no assumptions until you repeatedly ignored many answers to your question leading me to now believe you are fishing for a talking point.
Once again, I am astonished by your ability to just ignore the responses to your question. You asked what can be done, you got more then one answer (mostly that a police response of this size and style was unwanted and dangerous) but proceeded instead to repeatedly proclaim that “No one is answering my question”. This caused people (quite rationally) to question your motives in this.
Yes, clearly these conservative groups who are well known for using the same fear mongering “Won’t someone think of the children” argument for more police powers that you are using would be just jumping at the chance to prove you wrong.
And this now has me wondering about trolls and arguments, I noticed something typing this out.
Where have I seen this sort of language before?
Yes, good thing I am not that tolerant so we can continue.
When the bomber intends to die in glory, there is no deterrent possible. Death isn’t any deterrent. It can only be stopped before they get to the scene.
Why won’t anyone answer my question, I know this.
What can be done to prevent
OK…
Reeducation or incarceratin of zealots. Large investment in mental health. Prosecution of group’s and individuals that call for violence or have violent philosophies. Reduce access to weapons and materials. High bounties for reporting suspicious activity or behavior. Promotion / enforcement of a homogeneous society.
None WILL be done. Many are undesirable. But they can be used to prevent. Does that help you?
Yes absolutely. These are most definitely actionable and are also excellent conversational pieces that can be discussed further, which was all I wanted instead of outrage commenting basically.
I think healthcare in general (including mental health) services would be hugely impactful to the general population.
I also think our educational system is being eroded and a lot of kids are pushed away from continuing education (in any form, not just traditional university which fails a lot of people) in favor of blue collar work
Now I’m not saying blue collar work is bad, but I do think continuing education is important, especially as our life expectancies are increasing. It’s important people stay educated and continue to practice things like the scientific process so that we don’t lose that information and become disinformation spreaders.
Without solid education, we can’t possible expect a “bright” future imo.
What did you mean about the homogenous society? In what ways? Looking forward to any examples/explanation you could give!
In a homogeneous society, everyone has the same background. No differences of traditions, religions, art, music, etc. They all look roughly similar. They have no fuel to make another member into the “other”. As I understand, Iceland has something approaching this. I expect the Sentinalese do, to. The ways to get to this from a large and diverse society are, of course, appalling.
Yeeeeeahhh, not sure if I agree with this one. To me it feels sort of lazy and skirts around the true nature of accepting people for who they are and learning to be more tolerant of people not exactly like us
Sorta feels lazy to say, well let’s get rid of what makes us different/unique.
Nature doesn’t really believe in the homogeneous, I don’t see why we should strive to make it so
I agree. But you wanted (insisted) on solutions. Thorough and complete genocide eliminates all opponents. Very few of my suggestions are desirable. Diversity with ignorance, inequality, and poverty breeds distrust and resentment - leading to civil strife. This is elementary.
I think the resistance you are getting on this thread is due to an overly naive view of “solutions” combined with a bit of unintentionally arrogant phrasing. You seem to want to discuss at a high level while ignoring the complexity of the problems involved. You strike me as young and thoughtful, with good intentions - but still inexperienced. Ease back on the pressure - no one owes you an answer. This (and all anonymous forums back to Usenet) is a crowd of semi-hostile strangers with nothing to lose. If you want engagement you need to sell yourself as worth engaging first.
I’m sorry people are being so reactionary and taking your questions as being pro sniper or whatever way they’re taking it. Rational discourse is generally better on Lemmy than other places but is still on the Internet, so people don’t actually give anyone credit for trying to be calm and rational about events like these.
And like, to an extent, I understand the outrage. I do.
But if people can’t act like adults, know they need to simmer down a bit before having these conversations, lemmy is in no way better than Reddit. It’s just a Reddit that’s wider and under the control of more people.
This interaction (while in the original thread my words were flung without frontal lobe usage, and that’s entirely my fault) I had hoped to reset after I had apologized but I guess a lot of people were still upset.
Maybe it was my fault. Idk. All I can do is continue to move forward and do better. Simple as that. Thank you for the empathy, I appreciate it.