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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsRetraining the Police - Hug a Thug
Actually this would be excellent training for young boys with a martial arts component. This kind of required training might also discourage a certain type of person (one who is prone to violence) from
joining the police force. This is an example of what someone of the female persuasion can
bring to institutions in this country that could result in REAL reform.
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Sue Rahr, Ex. Dir., Wash. St. Criminal Justice Training Commission
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BURIEN, WASH. The police recruits arrived in pairs in the woods outside Seattle. For days, they had been calming their minds through meditation and documenting lifes beauty in daily journals. Mindful and centered, they now faced a test: a mentally ill man covered in feces and mumbling to a rubber chicken.
The feces was actually oatmeal and chocolate pudding, the man was another recruit, and the goal of this mock training exercise was to peacefully bring him into custody. The first recruits approached gingerly, trying to engage the man in conversation. When that failed, they moved in and wrestled him to the ground.
For the past three years, every police recruit in the state has undergone this style of training at the Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission, where officials are determined to produce guardians of democracy who serve and protect instead of warriors who conquer and control.
Gone is the military-boot-camp atmosphere. Gone are the field exercises focused on using fists and weapons to batter suspects into submission. Gone, too, is a classroom poster that once warned recruits that officers killed in the line of duty use less force than their peers.
If your overarching identity is Im a warrior, then you will approach every situation like you must conquer and win, said Sue Rahr, the commissions executive director. You may have a conflict where it is necessary for an officer to puff up and quickly take control. But in most situations, its better if officers know how to de-escalate, calm things down, slow down the action.
Training is at the heart of the national debate over police use of force. So far this year, police have shot and killed more than 900 people, according to a Washington Post database tracking such shootings more than twice the number recorded in any previous year by federal officials. Anti-brutality activists and some law enforcement leaders argue that if police were better trained to de-escalate conflict, some of those people might still be alive.
Rahr, the former sheriff of King County, is one of the nations foremost authorities on this type of training. In April, the Harvard Kennedy School published a report she co-wrote, From Warriors to Guardians: Recommitting American Police Culture to Democratic Ideals, which warns that too many academies are training police officers to go to war with the people we are sworn to protect and serve.
The Presidents Task Force on 21st Century Policing, of which Rahr is a member, has embraced many of these principles. In August, the Police Executive Research Forum, a law enforcement think tank, followed suit.
The goal of the guardian officer is to avoid causing unnecessary indignity, said Seth Stoughton, a law professor at the University of South Carolina and a former police officer in Tallahassee. Officers who treat people humanely, who show them respect, who explain their actions, can improve the perceptions of officers, or their department, even when they are arresting someone.
cont'd
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2015/12/10/new-style-of-police-training-aims-to-produce-guardians-not-warriors/
Response to Lodestar (Original post)
imari362 This message was self-deleted by its author.
Lodestar
(2,388 posts)not sure what your shaming smilie is about.
Response to Lodestar (Reply #2)
imari362 This message was self-deleted by its author.
Lodestar
(2,388 posts)My thoughts were more generic than that, although I can't speak for the people
who coined that phrase.
What comes to mind for me when I hear "thug" is a petty criminal, a punk,
or gangster type who leans on someone for a cut of their earnings. I wonder
what the dictionary says?
TipTok
(2,474 posts)... And says something about folks who think it is.
Response to TipTok (Reply #9)
imari362 This message was self-deleted by its author.
PersonNumber503602
(1,134 posts)I've always wondered if being a cop was something I could ever do. My thoughts usually led to no, because the typical environment in police forces tend to run counter to how I would instinctively handle situations. Which I figured would either make me be pushed out, or even worse, change me into something else. This sort of stuff is nice to hear though. I also like the idea that it caused certain types to quit or be dismissed. Hopefully they will attract some good people from all over the country to work in their departments. Unfortunately there will be people itching for any opportunity to attack it and declare it a complete failure.
Response to PersonNumber503602 (Reply #4)
CompanyFirstSergeant This message was self-deleted by its author.
47of74
(18,470 posts)They want a heavily militarized police force to keep "them" under control. They do not want police forces that serve and protect, despite all that bullshit they paint on cars and all the hot air they expend. They want police forces that punish, enslave, and kill. That is why it is important to vote in all elections, to get these teabaggers out of government at all levels and replace them with people who will demand improvements and not be the least bit afraid of doing so.
Lodestar
(2,388 posts)Ironically this same group is strongly ANTI-authoritarian, anti-gov.
That's why many back Trump...he is the epitome of maverick authoritarian
who bucks anyone else's authority.
And while it's certainly alive and well in this country those types are
still not the majority.
Lodestar
(2,388 posts)Response to Lodestar (Original post)
CompanyFirstSergeant This message was self-deleted by its author.