Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Peace with Force?




More disturbing video of a person tasered... Again, the situation gets outta hand quickly, so the police resort to violence. It seemed as though it could have been handled much better.
I also just lost all respect for Kerry for not stepping in and saying anything. As the guys is screaming in agony on the floor Kerry, starts to pick up the conversation as if nothing is wrong.
[via boingboing]

UPDATE:
I just went back to boingboing to read some of the comments.
I'm going to re-post this comment by "thecynic"

At first glance, this all sounds like good advice. Especially the part about not resisting. But to me, it brings up that pesky word of "rights" and morals... But first, read his comment...

Do not run from the police. Do not resist arrest. Even if you feel you are being arrested improperly, do not resist -- take it up with your lawyer after you have been arrested. If you do not have a lawyer, one will be appointed for you.

It's sad to me to see that the passive resistance techniques of Ghandi are being abandoned by this latest trend in active resistance.

Although it should rarely come to that. If you want to air your issue, make a YouTube video. Rent out a lecture hall and talk all you want. Hand out leaflets. Blog about it. You have a wide variety of ways to air your opinions in such a way that the police cannot hassle you.

Do not invade convention halls, run from the police, disrupt the event and then resist arrest. I split the blame for this scene between the guy and the media: Him for acting like that and the media for encouraging this type of active resistance. Resist the police, get tasered, scream a lot and bam, instant internet celebrity! BB should be ashamed for promoting this behavior.

You'll note that none of these cases ever goes to court. No lawyer will take it up because they don't have a case. You resisted arrest, you assaulted a police officer, you're going to jail.


So, what I'm wondering is... do we have a "right" to resist - ever? IF you see a cop beating someone (like the rodney king episode) do you have a moral responsibility to intervene? Do you wait until AFTER someone is beat to a pulp, or possibly killed, then later depend on the justice system to work? I'm just throwing this out there to think about. It's not really related to the issue. Perhaps, its all too soon after seeing the vigilante movie this weekend :)

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