this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2025
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THE POLICE PROBLEM

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    The police problem is that police are policed by the police. Cops are accountable only to other cops, which is no accountability at all.

    99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.

    When cops are caught breaking the law, they're investigated by other cops. Details are kept quiet, the officers' names are withheld from public knowledge, and what info is eventually released is only what police choose to release — often nothing at all.

    When police are fired — which is all too rare — they leave with 'law enforcement experience' and can easily find work in another police department nearby. It's called "Wandering Cops."

    When police testify under oath, they lie so frequently that cops themselves have a joking term for it: "testilying." Yet it's almost unheard of for police to be punished or prosecuted for perjury.

    Cops can and do get away with lawlessness, because cops protect other cops. If they don't, they aren't cops for long.

    The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.

    All this is a path to a police state.

    In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.

    Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.

    That's the solution.

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Our definition of ‘cops’ is broad, and includes prison guards, probation officers, shitty DAs and judges, etc — anyone who has the authority to fuck over people’s lives, with minimal or no oversight.

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ALLIES

!abolition@slrpnk.net

!acab@lemmygrad.ml

r/ACAB

r/BadCopNoDonut/

Randy Balko

The Civil Rights Lawyer

The Honest Courtesan

Identity Project

MirandaWarning.org

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INFO

A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions

Adultification

Cops aren't supposed to be smart

Don't talk to the police.

Killings by law enforcement in Canada

Killings by law enforcement in the United Kingdom

Killings by law enforcement in the United States

Know your rights: Filming the police

Three words. 70 cases. The tragic history of 'I can’t breathe' (as of 2020)

Police aren't primarily about helping you or solving crimes.

Police lie under oath, a lot

Police spin: An object lesson in Copspeak

Police unions and arbitrators keep abusive cops on the street

Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States

So you wanna be a cop?

When the police knock on your door

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ORGANIZATIONS

Black Lives Matter

Campaign Zero

Innocence Project

The Marshall Project

Movement Law Lab

NAACP

National Police Accountability Project

Say Their Names

Vera: Ending Mass Incarceration

 

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MODERATORS
 

What would you do if ICE agents approached the kids on your youth sports team at practice?

Youman Wilder, the founder of Harlem Baseball Hitting Academy, said that he found himself in that exact position. And he didn’t hesitate.

“I heard them saying, ‘Where are you from? Where are your parents from?’” Wilder told MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace. “And I just stepped in and said this is very inappropriate to ask these kids anything ... I’m just going to have them implement their Fifth Amendment right, and not say anything to you.’”

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[–] saltesc@lemmy.world 208 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (3 children)

I love everything I read. The success he's had with kids too. What an incredible role model. This guy bleeds America and what it's supposed to be.

“I just said to myself, ‘I’m willing to die to make sure you get home.” He even doubled down on his statement, saying, “I’m willing to die today.”

Wilder wants to make it clear that the kids who play baseball with him are upstanding kids with bright futures, not victims. In fact, 45 of his players have been drafted to the Major League.

What an amazing contrast of an American vs whatever the fuck ICE is.

The funniest part was at the start...

He said that one of the agents responded, “Oh, another YouTube lawyer.”

Oh, the irony. Even people that have never set foot on US soil know what the fifth amendment of the US constitution is. Apparently a prerequisite of being an ICE agent is knowing nothing about and being in direct opposition of America's most basic foundations.

Where's all the patriots at to exercise the second amendment?

[–] Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world 87 points 3 days ago (2 children)

whatever the fuck ICE is.

The word is "nazi".

[–] Clepsydrae@lemmy.world 17 points 3 days ago (2 children)

In future history books, it'll be read with all the same context as the SS.

[–] Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world 5 points 3 days ago

Future history books? Hell, that's how I'm reading it right now.

[–] amorpheus@lemmy.world 4 points 3 days ago

Depends on who writes them.

[–] onslaught545@lemmy.zip 4 points 3 days ago

Gestapo would be even more accurate

[–] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 26 points 3 days ago

They're too busy cheering on the Nazis.

[–] okamiueru@lemmy.world 91 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (3 children)

Indistinguishable from some random masked dudes driving unmarked vans up to a group of kids, with the intention of kidnapping some of them? Sheeeesh. There has to be some serious nation wide lead poisoning over there.

[–] drsilverworm@midwest.social 54 points 3 days ago (1 children)

In the article an ICE spokesperson is quoting as saying there has been no recent activity in that area. So ICE is literally saying that these people claiming to be ICE were in fact random masked dudes.

[–] Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone 55 points 3 days ago (1 children)

They’re probably lying about it, both because they know it looks bad to be fucking with kids and because being unsuccessful makes them look worse in their eyes.

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 34 points 3 days ago

And eventually, someone's gonna shoot one of these totally-not-actually-ICE agents.

[–] basiclemmon98@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 points 3 days ago

Nope, just white suppremecy and nationalism. But with government cutting safety regulations, the lead poisoning will come. Source: I live in this shithole :/

[–] axEl7fB5@lemmy.cafe 12 points 3 days ago

Schrodinger's Ice

[–] Carvex@lemmy.world 126 points 3 days ago (1 children)

If ICE only arrests criminals and armed violent gang members, where are all the shootouts and injured/dead ICE agents?

[–] TherapyGary@lemmy.blahaj.zone 40 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Would love to see more of the last bit

[–] Deflated0ne@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago

I want a liveleak video. With a chainsaw.

[–] klu9@piefed.social 47 points 3 days ago

Remember when strangers approaching children and initiating inappropriate conversations with them would be the ones getting arrested, not doing the arrests?

Pepperidge Farm would remember but half its workforce was snatched up and the rest are in hiding.

[–] SabinStargem@lemmy.today 22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Considering that there is a $1,500 bounty per head, it is no surprise that ICE traffickers are sniffing around schools and playgrounds. Probably explains why the local kindergarten got a reinforced fence in the last several months.

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Considering that they're republicans, it's no surprise that they're sniffing around schools and playgrounds.

[–] Zink@programming.dev 11 points 2 days ago

Republicans be like

[–] captainlezbian@lemmy.world 46 points 3 days ago

Finally positive male role models for boys

[–] bytesonbike@discuss.online 73 points 3 days ago (4 children)

We keeping America safe by... Arresting kids?

[–] lurch@sh.itjust.works 41 points 3 days ago

The orphan crushing machine demands more orphans.

[–] slaneesh_is_right@lemmy.org 22 points 3 days ago (2 children)

These little brown kids will turn into brown adults and that is fucking terrifying to americans.

[–] phdepressed@sh.itjust.works 14 points 3 days ago

Haha jokes on them I'm a brown adult, what now? Oh, gulag anyway, welp...

[–] GreenKnight23@lemmy.world 7 points 3 days ago

These little brown kids will turn into brown adults and that is fucking terrifying to ~~americans~~ racists.

ftfy

[–] Mirshe@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

No no, they'll happily tell you they're literally using the kids as bait. You arrest the kid (who usually is a US citizen), the kid gets a phonecall with their parents, you arrest the immigrant parent(s) when they show up to say "what the fuck why did you drag my kid off". Depending on how lazy the ICE agent is, you might deport the kid with the parent (the parent has to request this IIRC), or place them in foster care (with admittedly no way to reunite them). If the kid isn't a US citizen, you don't even need to deport them to the same country as their parents, put them on the same flight, or ANYTHING.

[–] Katana314@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

Is this something communities could counter by having citizens partnered to immigrant organizations making the inquiry into the child's arrest?

[–] SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world 24 points 3 days ago (1 children)
[–] Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com 19 points 3 days ago

Terrorized.

[–] finitebanjo@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago

I've been pretty fortunate to not run into the new Gestapo. Or maybe they're fortunate to not run into me.

Only time will tell.