So the Question is Why? Why Does This Keep Happening?

Victim blamers are a significant portion of those who post on the intertubes, as are compliance fetishists. I noticed this many years ago, somewhat to my shock, since supposedly the intertubes were a bastion for free-thinkers, liberationists and outright libertarians, generally "left-leaning" whatever that meant.

But so many of those who posted on message boards and internet fora were deeply imbued with an authoritarian spirit, no matter what they professed to be their politics, and they practically worshipped at the feet of police and military (thus the pejorative, "bootlicker.")  We've all heard of "Comply or Die" as the underground motto of the police. It was clear that many of those who posted to the internet were dedicated followers of just that belief.

Of course these things are skewed because the internet is attractive to certain kinds of people, not so much to others. How representative the internet is of the general population is hard to know. It seems to be quite a cesspool at times and I'd rather not believe that it is representative of much more than a tiny segment of the population. But what do I know?

Meanwhile the killing by police continues seemingly unabated. WTF? Other murders also continue seemingly without let up, no matter the violence of the police -- or perhaps partly because of it. That's a separate but related topic. It's related in part because police are modeling violent reaction to disrespect and disobedience which has a ripple-effect in society, particularly in affected communities. But it is a separate topic I might be able to get to in another post.

Scholars have pointed out that the number and rate of police killings  (and killings of police) is WAY down compared to earlier times, as are murders in general. Despite appearances, this is actually a far less violent era all around than -- say -- the idyllic '50s I grew up in. I'm aware of that from personal experience. I was shot twice when I was a kid, and many other kids I knew went through worse. My mother was practically raped by a neighbor. There was much more general violence of all kinds in society and in US enterprises overseas -- where wars, overt and covert, were a constant. While I use the '50s as a nostalgic touchstone, I don't romanticize the era. It could be and often was rough. Just to note, we lived in relatively quiet, in some cases new suburban neighborhoods that were considered then and are considered now to be typical lower-middle class to middle-middle class, not in poor or notorious neighborhoods at all.

Crime was not so much an issue in part because not so many acts and activities were criminalized, and there wasn't such an intense need to punish rather than rehabilitate those who violated the law. Filling the prisons was not considered necessary or wise. On the other hand, mental health facilities were prevalent and often full to bursting. While we decry the absence of mental health care facilities in today's society -- and the substitution of punishment and imprisonment and summary execution for what's missing -- we may not understand how the mental health care system was formerly used -- abused? -- as a kind of warehouse for those who didn't "fit in" to society, as well as warehousing all kinds of genuinely mentally ill and mentally challenged individuals. The system was not exactly a prison system, but very often the inmates could not leave the asylum. Many were there for life. And in the '50s that meant that millions were being held indefinitely or for life, many more millions were cycling in and out of the system.

That system held about twice the number of today's vast prison system, 4 million as opposed to 2 million. It is often claimed that half or more of those in prison today are mentally ill, and that American prisons and jails are used as substitutes for mental health facilities (absent "care") far more than they are used to house criminals.

That's one reason why I think we see so much violence in policing -- even though it's less objectively violent than it once was, just as society as a whole is less violent. The problem is that the typical police -- and "corrections" -- response to disobedience, misbehavior, and signs of mental illness is punishment/violence. There is no alternative except death.

They'll either beat you bloody, electrocute you,  or they'll kill you. They have no other viable options for control. They do not have or use de-escalation tactics, they do not know any way except through dominance to approach someone in the midst of a mental/emotional crisis, and they are conditioned not to have empathy or compassion for those in crisis -- particularly if they disobey "lawful orders."

Lack of obedience together with "furtive movements" -- the infamous "reaching for his waistband" -- is interpreted as an existential threat to be neutralized, and that generally means killing the subject (not at that point a human being, only a subject.)

Police are trained and conditioned to react to visual/verbal cues, react almost robotically, no matter the objective reality of the situation. When they detect particular cues, they will kill. If they don't they might be fired from their jobs or otherwise disciplined. That's the reality of the field of policing. Let's not fool ourselves.

Internet apologists will say that all the individual has to do is "obey" and nothing bad will happen to them, forgetting (conveniently) that people in crisis or otherwise disabled cannot necessarily obey promptly or at all, and that even people with their wits about them cannot promptly or properly obey contradictory shouted "commands."

If police are determined to kill you, they will, no matter what you do or don't do, and they will generally get away with it.

Disobedience is a cue to take more domineering or violent action, but obedience will not necessarily save you, as so many individuals find out.

But why do police so often only have domineering or violent -- or deadly -- options, when there are so many more effective an positive alternatives available, alternatives that are based on a respect for the sanctity of human life.

It has to do with how they are expected to see their role in civic life post-Columbine and post-9/11.

This is due essentially to the ravings of two consultants and their teams who go around to police departments all over the country lecturing and training on concepts of use of force and killing.

These men, (Dr.) Bill Lewinski, and (Lt. Col.) Dave Grossman, are probably more responsible for the current state of violent policing than any other two individuals in the country. And they're proud of it.

They make no apologies whatever for the death dealing and violence that goes on every day in police work. They celebrate it, and they defend and celebrate the killers. No matter who they kill or under what circumstances. They are reaching their highest level of accomplishment when they kill -- according to Grossman. And they are serving the public by killing according to Lewinski. Every killing by police is defensible, necessary and ultimately for the good of all. They are removing threats, wolves as Grossman calls them, who would otherwise be preying on the sheep (ie: you 'n' me) . Every kill is a good kill, without exception. After all, a sheepdog would never kill without reason or necessity, no? Even when, sometimes, a sheep is caught up in the crossfire or targeted. No one who is killed by police is truly innocent in any case. All are worthy of death for one reason or other, without exception. They are criminals and threats, now or in the past, and society has no place for the likes of them. None.

This is what Grossman and Lewinski teach. It's what they believe. And it is a belief shared by enormous numbers of cops and chiefs of police and sheriffs and public officials throughout the land. It is the interior culture of policing, indeed, the interior culture of rule. More importantly, it is a belief shared by elites, Our Betters as it were, almost universally.

You and I, the Rabble, have no right to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness, no rights at all that police are bound to respect, once you or I are targeted for liquidation. And when they decide to kill, there is essentially nothing we can do to stop them from carrying out their bounden duty.

Many of the examples of police killings we've seen recently demonstrate that belief as clearly as possible. Some are outright murder/summary executions, others are a little more complex, involving stages of force but inevitably leading straight to the morgue. "There is no alternative" once police have decided to kill their quarry. And that's a truism. Once the decision is made, they will kill, guaranteed.

We hear a lot about "split second decisions" but it is rarely that way at all. Police will go into a contact/confrontation having already decided to kill, or sometimes they are designated to do just that. Police departments all over the country employ snipers and shooters whose job it is to kill. When they are deployed, that's what they do. It is not a "split-second" thing at all; their deployment is itself the "decision" to use lethal force.

In other cases, beat cops or special purpose cops -- who are not necessarily or ordinarily assigned to kill -- take it upon themselves to "neutralize the threat" (ie: kill) based on what they are told via dispatch or their supervisors. That is not a "split-second" decision at all; it is a built in requirement of their dispatch to the scene. (Cf: John Crawford III, Tamir Rice and others, killed on sight without the least consideration of the facts but based solely on reports which are often inaccurate or downright false, sometimes purposely so.)

We could go on and on listing other incidents -- recent and historic -- where police kill and get away with it when there is no objective threat to them or anyone else. That's not the point of this post, however. Instead I'm not looking so much at what happens as why it happens, and why it is so difficult to change the pattern of police killings.

Inherent bias and racism is a fundamental and apparently intractable part of the problem of policing in general as well as police killings. The proportion of black and brown men killed by police is way out of proportion to their population, and it is due largely to training and conditioning which assumes a threat from these populations -- and to inherent cultural bias and racism that is fostered in society and particularly within police culture. There is no greater threat to police and society in general than raging and armed white men, but police typically approach them with deference. Black and brown men on the other hand are seen a inherent and existential threats by their nature. They are approached aggressively and often lethally with no recourse for the victim at all. This is racism and cultural bias, but it is also something else: it is a demonstration of Othering, something that is very deep seated in American culture and society.

Black and brown men, especially, are not seen by police as full "members" of society, and they are typically seen as inherently threatening to the "good order" of that society, no matter what they do or don't do.

There are other categories of the population who are "Othered" in the same way, and they are often treated as badly or worse by police, but it is the constant killing of black and brown men by police that gets the majority of the attention. That's not inappropriate at all, though I sometimes see complaints that this or that white victim of police is not being highlighted or featured by the media, and it's so "unfair!!!!" No it isn't, and no these incidents are not ignored. The problem is the proportion of police killings is vastly greater among black and brown victims, and no, it is not because they are all criminals nor does it have anything directly to do with crime in their communities. It generally has absolutely nothing to do with previous accusations or convictions -- often cited in excusing the killing of a black or brown victim -- because police typically don't know anything about that when they kill, and even if they did, it should have no bearing on their current encounter.

I was going to post some videos of Lewinski and Grossman raving about the "science" of their kill--think, but it's really sickening to me. But if you're interested just google up Dave Grossman and Bill Lewinski and you'll find plenty of information and probably hundreds of videos between them. Their poison theories and "science" is a major driving factor in police killings. Changing the situation requires discrediting their bizarre and crazy theories and beliefs, but it also requires putting in place viable alternatives.

That's a subject for another post.

So The President's Police Commission [Interim] Report Was Released And...

I missed it. Well, no. I saw the headline but had to gloss over it due to more pressing matters. Turned out the news report I saw didn't link to the actual report anyway.

Apparently, its main recommendation is to form a task force to make further recommendations.

Punt!

Yeah, no real change at all, no real change likely, not now, not ever. The way things are is the way they are supposed to be and the way they will be for all time to come, world without end, amen.

Bill Bratton, Dave Grossman and all their acolytes and devotees have yet again won the day.

How and why does this happen over and over and over again? Just like police shootings, the same scenario plays out again and again, study after study is commissioned, excuses and made, nothing changes

I finally found a news report that actually links to the commission's findings and lists the major other recommendations made by the commission. It took some searching, and that tells me that the commission is being treated as irrelevant, its recommendations optional, and that the media-government has no particular interest in the matter. Things will stay as they are.

But these are the main recommendations of the Commission as listed by Philly.com in a post titled:

TLDR: Key Recommendations from Obama's policing task force

(Link to the actual report. 115 pg PDF. You be the judge.)

1. Embrace a guardian mindset to build public trust and legitimacy.

2.  Acknowledge the role of policing in past and present injustice and discrimination and how it is a hurdle to the promotion of community trust.

3.  Establish a culture of transparency and accountability in order to build public trust and legitimacy.

4.  Law enforcement agencies should promote legitimacy internally within the organization by applying the principles of procedural justice.

5.  Proactively promote public trust by initiating positive nonenforcement activities.

6.  Consider the potential damage to public trust when implementing crime fighting strategies.

7.  Track the level of trust in police by their communities just as changes in crime are measured.

8.  Strive to create a workforce that contains a broad range of diversity

9. Build relationships based on trust with immigrant communities.

10.  Collaborate to develop policies and strategies in communities disproportionately affected by crime.

11.  Develop comprehensive policies on the use of force that include training, investigations, prosecutions, data collection, and information sharing.

12. Mandate external and independent criminal investigations in cases of police use of force resulting in death, officer-involved shootings resulting in injury or death, or in-custody deaths. Report data on all officer-involved shootings to the Federal Government.

13. Adopt identification procedures that eliminate or minimize presenter bias or influence.

14. Release department’s demographic data.

15. Collect demographic data on all stops and arrests.

16. Implement response protocols to mass demonstrations that prioritize de-escalation.

17. Use civilian oversight of law enforcement to strengthen trust with the community

18. Refrain from quotas for arrests, tickets or summonses. Don’t use quotas to generate revenue.

19.  Seek consent before a search and explain that a person has the right to refuse consent when there is no warrant or probable cause.

20. Adopt and enforce policies prohibiting profiling and discrimination

21. Federal agencies should provide technical assistance and incentive funding to jurisdictions with small police agencies and encourage small departments to  consolidate.

22.  Establish national standards for the research and development of new technology, for instance, body-worn cameras and social media.

23. The Department of Justice should develop best practices that can be adopted by state legislative bodies to govern the acquisition, use, retention, and dissemination of auditory, visual, and biometric data by law enforcement.

24. Update public record laws.

25. Federal government should support the development of new “less than lethal” technology to help control combative suspects.

26.  Require both basic recruit and in-service training on policing in a democratic society.

 Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/TLDR-Key-recommendations-from-the-21st-Century-policing-task-force-report-Philadelphia.html#UcekdW3YCCytZRHL.99

Sigh.

Well, this is pure Bratton and Grossman, it has little or nothing to do with what the public has been trying to communicate to the Powers That Be about national problem of violent policing.

What this report tries to do is re-conceive the problem, not as one of violent policing, but as one of perceptions -- perceptions which can be changed by better communications and slight modifications in behavior.

In other words, keep doing what you're doing, only be smoother and less aggressive about it.

Keep on your killing spree because that's what's driven down crime rates. But do it with a bit more.... finesse. So as not to rile the peeps so much. M'Kay?

Recommendation #1, this "guardian mindset," is pure Grossman and his "sheepdog" bullshit. It's time to take the blinders off. Grossman uses that "sheepdog" analogy all the time and it's now emblazend on the minds of movie-goers thanks to its uncredited use in "American Sniper." It's been a factor in police culture for decades, and it is one of the reasons why there are so many killings by police.

The police are brainwashed to believe that their highest accomplishment is to "kill the wolf" -- and the "wolf" is defined as anyone who deviates from the fold, not someone who preys on the flock at all, merely someone who doesn't quite fit the standard set by the shepherd and ultimately by the owner of the flock.

The Guardian/Sheepdog doesn't work for and doesn't care about the flock per se. The Guardian/Sheepdog works for the shepherd -- who in turn works for the owner(s) of the flock, an the Guardian/Sheepdog's highest goal is the approval of the shepherd and the owner(s).

When the Commission says their first recommendation is for the police to adopt a "guardian mindset" all it means is that they are recommending that all police start with the insane premise Grossman has been promoting for decades.

It doesn't have anything to do with police violence and killing; it may in fact increase  the level of violence and killing overall.

Yes, indeed, let's have another task force with more recommendations. Let's have more Best Practices.

Sigh.

The Menace That Is (Lt. Col.) David Grossman

I've mentioned this man on these pages a number of times since I was clued to his ravings about "sheep, wolves and sheepdogs" last year.

Once I dug into some of his arguably puerile if not completely whacked out writings and statements -- after resisting for months because I considered him a crazy-maker -- I began to see him as the primary source of the quasi-religious "philosophy" of policing which is at the root of so much police violence and killing in this country, and forms the principle belief-system which justifies the various overseas military operations the country has engaged in since 9/11.

Apparently in the wildly popular (?) movie "American Sniper" released at Christmas last year, one of the characters expounds about the "sheepdog" theory without attributing it to Grossman, telling the character of Chris Kyle, American sniper, of his calling as a "sheepdog."

Chris Hedges puts it this way in his polemic against the film at TruthDig:

The camera cuts to a church interior where a congregation of white Christians—blacks appear in this film as often as in a Woody Allen movie—are listening to a sermon about God’s plan for American Christians. The film’s title character, based on Chris Kyle, who would become the most lethal sniper in U.S. military history, will, it appears from the sermon, be called upon by God to use his “gift” to kill evildoers.

The scene shifts to the Kyle family dining room table as the father intones in a Texas twang: “There are three types of people in this world: sheep, wolves and sheepdogs. Some people prefer to believe evil doesn’t exist in the world. And if it ever darkened their doorstep they wouldn’t know how to protect themselves. Those are the sheep. And then you got predators.”

The camera cuts to a schoolyard bully beating a smaller boy.

“They use violence to prey on people,” the father goes on. “They’re the wolves. Then there are those blessed with the gift of aggression and an overpowering need to protect the flock. They are a rare breed who live to confront the wolf. They are the sheepdog. We’re not raising any sheep in this family.”

The father lashes his belt against the dining room table.

“I will whup your ass if you turn into a wolf,” he says to his two sons. “We protect our own. If someone tries to fight you, tries to bully your little brother, you have my permission to finish it.”

I haven't seen the film and I won't -- at least not for quite a long time. As a rule, I don't get off on violence, and because so many American movies are saturated with blood and violence, I don't often go to the movies or even watch them on the teevee. But when I read that these words and attitudes are attributed to characters in "American Sniper," I recognized immediately the influence of Dave Grossman and his peculiar notions of "Killology."

Killing being the highest achievement of the... "sheepdog."

I don't know if Grossman is ever mentioned in the film, but he's been selling his claptrap quasi-religious nonsense to military and police forces around the country for decades, conducting hundreds of seminars a year with recruits and seasoned veterans of military and police forces, and he is regarded as something of a guru -- if not a god -- in the police and military fields.

Until recently, Groosman's existence seems to have been overlooked by the mainstream, though he is well-known in the circles in which he runs. I seriously doubt that Hedges has ever heard of him or has any knowledge of his beliefs.

Most Americans seem to be oblivious to him and the menace he represents.

Years ago it was routine to attribute some of the worst aspects of American behavior and government to specific individuals, whether it was Bill Kristol, Dick Cheney or whomever.  Individuals actually were the ones behind the appalling policies that were causing so much destruction and bloodshed around the world, especially after 9/11. But somehow, Grossman escaped notice.

A few days ago, though, Slate ran an article that exposed the connection between Grossman's claptrap and the lines in American Sniper that are taken from that claptrap -- claptrap which is, by the way, believed by many Americans in the police and military forces. It's still sort of their secret religion.

The Slate article puts it this way:

Grossman crafted this analogy in response to 9/11 and the war in Iraq. And it’s not enough to classify the human race into these three simple categories; Grossman—and those who parrot his metaphor—are issuing a call to action to defend yourself against your enemies. In a country where innocent, unarmed, mostly black Americans keep getting killed, it’s a pernicious worldview to hold.

In Grossman’s original essay, now available on his website, he credits an “old war veteran” with first telling him about wolves, sheep, and sheepdogs. He writes:

If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy productive citizen: a sheep. If you have a capacity for violence and no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an aggressive sociopath—a wolf. But what if you have a capacity for violence, and a deep love for your fellow citizens? Then you are a sheepdog, a warrior, someone who is walking the hero’s path.    

In Grossman’s telling, the wolves will do anything they can to hurt sheep. Grossman variously identifies wolves as school shooters, terrorists, criminals, and anyone looking to hurt the innocent. Internationally, think ISIS, al-Qaida, and Boko Haram.

Domestically, think gangsters, criminals, and thugs. Grossman makes it clear that, no matter how much society fears its sheepdog protectors, the sheep need their sheepdogs. That means that a sheepdog cannot “take out its teeth.” In gun rights terms, this means that gun owners should never go anywhere without a concealed firearm: “If you are a warrior who is legally authorized to carry a weapon and you step outside without that weapon, then you become a sheep, pretending that the bad man will not come today.”

And the wolf will come, says Grossman. “If you want to be a sheepdog and walk the warrior’s path,” he writes, “then you must make a conscious and moral decision every day to dedicate, equip and prepare yourself to thrive in that toxic, corrosive moment when the wolf comes knocking at the door.” He emphasizes practicing “when/then” thinking as opposed to “if/when” thinking. He encourages sheepdogs to view their surroundings with fear and paranoia. 

The authors describe Grossman's perspective as toxic, and it is. It's toxic, it's pernicious, and it's lethal. It is due to beliefs like this that people like Tamir Rice and James Boyd -- and so many, many others -- have been killed by police in the recent past, and why so many are still being killed.

It's not because of any actual threat, either to police or the public -- certainly Tamir Rice, John Crawford and Darrien Hunt didn't represent a threat -- it is because of the belief that killing is the highest achievement for an officer of the law or a sniper... They kill to be fulfilled, they kill because they must, they kill because it is who they are -- or who they have been convinced to believe themselves to be.

I've said Grossman is a cult leader, a guru not unlike the various Maha and Raj -Neeshi and other religious cult leaders who have come and gone throughout recent American history. His devotees and acolytes are in the military and the police forces throughout the land. And they kill, mostly without conscience or in many cases without even consciousness, because that's what they've been told they are there to do. It is their mission in life. They are told that killing is their highest achievement. They are convinced -- like Chris Kyle apparently was -- that every kill is a "good shoot." Every one is a "good shoot" because they have done the killing -- which is their highest achievement. It's circular, it's insane, but that's the belief.

Everyone they kill needed killing or they wouldn't be dead. You can't get much closer to a religious faith than that.

I've said that it's going to take a massive level of deprogramming to undercut and eliminate this faith-based killing spree by domestic police forces, and I don't know what it will take to turn the military around.

When even the killing of little Tamir Rice does not move the police to reform themselves but only leads to ever greater levels of rationalization and justification, we should recognize how deep-rooted this faith is among police forces and how difficult it is to change those deep-rooted beliefs.

Part of it will require exposing Grossman and what his nonsense has done to police forces and the military. Grossman must be exposed and rejected before there can be serious reform of police forces.

And then a very carefully designed and implemented de-programming effort will have to get under way at nearly every police department in the land.

It's a huge task. I don't know whether there is the will or the ability to carry it out.

The killing must stop. Stopping it -- when police are inculcated with the belief that killing is their highest achievement -- will be a monumental task.

But I'm glad others are recognizing how pernicious Grossman is.

He is a menace.