We're Going Backwards

Late on Friday nights when I’m safely home (admittedly after a few beers) I like to play music videos on the DVD player. Often they're 80s videos, some are hard rock, i.e. AC/DC (which annoys the neighbors because you have to play those loud), or sometimes just a few “chill music” vids because I need to calm down.

However, one of my favorites is Lionel Richie's “All Night Long.” Invariably though this depresses me. It reminds me how we are going backwards nowadays.

The song is about how you can be so strongly moved by something (music) that you just have to keep going. Party all night long. The dancers wear very colorful outfits, surely meant to make a subtle point, and are multi-racial. The dancing includes a wide range of styles with various mixtures of couples.

This was back in the 80s where it was slowly becoming common and acceptable to see a black man dance with a white woman, a white man tango with an Asian female, two males breakdancing together. It made it seem like things were progressing to where we could all live together in harmony.

Then Trump came along and infested the White House. 

Although we knew there were a lot of racists in our country, they at least had become reticent to express it in public. Unlike the old days where Jim Crow was normalized, racism had become a social deviation, something kept quietly amongst a person's cohort or family. Not something you could bring out in public without facing public derision.

Trump enabled racists. Emboldened them. He has tried to make it acceptable in polite society, and criticized those who challenge him as weak-wristed Libtards or overly PC elites.

Thanks to him, we see an increase in right-wing, racist organizations, demonstrators who are unafraid of public shame chanting abusive, racist slogans and public displays of offensive comments to anyone who looks foreign or of a different race than Anglo-Saxon whites. Even the Republican Party seems to have embraced the Trump vitriol and become largely the party of white males.

Although we've had problems with police interactions with civilians, as I noted in my blogs “Tips for Tourists” and “Police reform Part I & II” I don't think we've seen this level of police violence toward minorities since before the 70s. It's as if they are acting as Trump's agents of violence that he often spews at his pep, excuse me, "campaign" rallies.

I long for the days when we could dance the night away regardless of our race, religion, political affiliation or whatever.  

Sure, the video is a make-believe world, but it was a world where people lived together peacefully, where differences were immaterial, where people could dance together in harmony. A world we need to find again.

James Thurber believed in harmony and love.

Police Reform—Part II: Training and Testing

Police in the United States killed over 1,000 people in 2016. More than any industrialized country in the world. The need for police reform has never been more needed than today.

Hit the Brakes! An allegory

A 16-year-old tugs at his dad’s sleeve and begs to be taught to drive the car. Dad believes it is time, so promptly shows his son how to start the car, put it in gear, hit the brakes, etc.  He even takes his son to a nearby parking lot and lets the youngster drive around the empty lot.  After they get back home, dad jumps out of the car and turns to his son.

“Okay, boy, you are ready to drive. Go take it for a spin.”

As you might expect, the son promptly goes out and gets into a horrific traffic accident. For although dad taught him how to physically drive the car, he didn’t teach such concepts as who has the right-of-way, how to merge into traffic, what the various traffic signs represent and more.

The boy knew how to drive a car, but he didn’t know how to drive with other people around him.

From teenage driver to armed police

This is the same scenario that plays out with police in the United States as it relates to guns. They are taught to use a gun, allowed some basic target practice and given a few rules to obey, then get handed a weapon and sent out into the world. They have no experience in having a gun while other people are wandering around them. They have no knowledge about when and when not to utilize said gun.

In fact, if anything, they are encouraged to turn to using the gun any time they encounter trouble.

• This is why we see cops shoot a man who has been pulled over for missing a front license plate .  

• Or when a dog gets a little too unruly . 

•When an unarmed teenager flashes his car lights at an officer 

• Or if someone who the policeman has asked to see his license reaches into his truck to get it.

Watch your temper

When you watch a football game, look at the referee on the sideline. He's being constantly yelled at by fans or coaches, some standing right beside him. Typically, he does not respond at all as he's trained not to react. That's what we need with today's police.

A large number of police in this country do not have the temperament to wield a gun. They are often ex-high school football jocks who got all sorts of respect while in school, but now are shocked and angry when they don't automatically get that same respect today while on the force.

This is why today we see a large number of unarmed people shot and killed by police:

• Father is dragging son away from cop who then shoots the unarmed young man.

• Policeman shoots unarmed robbery suspect in who is lying on the ground wounded from another officer's shots.

• Policeman kills an unarmed teenager who is jumping on cars.

• Police kill unarmed man who has his hands raised up.

• Police officers shoot naked man wielding a stick.

The European Example

In contrast, in Europe the police typically disarm people without shooting or killing them:

• Two police in the UK disarm a man threatening them with a knife.

• Four Swedish policemen vacationing in New York City break up a violent fight without harming anyone.

• German police use broom to disarm man wielding a sword.

In fact, the police in other western countries seldom fire their weapons at all and killing of civilians is almost unheard of in Europe. For example, in 24 years police in Wales and England killed 55 civilians, while in 24 DAYS in 2015 U.S. police killed 59 civilians.

The difference: Training

The reason for this disparity of outcomes is training and mentality.  

To become a police officer in any of the other western industrial nations (Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand) it requires from two to three years to get certified to join the force. For example, in the UK it takes a minimum of two years of training to become a police officer.  In Northern Ireland, the training requires those two years plus candidates must complete a 25 hour online course before that training even begins. In Norway, police must earn a degree from a three-year college before becoming officers.

Likewise, In Germany the training and education last three years, and it includes training in using a weapon—stressing NOT TO SHOOT.  A quote from this article explains this concept: “In every head of every policeman, there is the aim not to shoot,” says Col. Uwe Thieme, the four-star senior police director at the state’s office for education, training, and human resources.

Meanwhile in the U.S. the average amount of training is 15 weeks. Each city can be different, for example, Sacremento requires 23 weeks, while in North Carolina it’s 15 weeks. It actually requires more training to become a barber or hair dresser than to become a policeman in the U.S.  The training for cosmetologists ranges from 25 to 40 weeks.

Another difference: Attitude

Besides training, the other major factor for why police in the U.S. use their weapons more than other industrialized police forces, is due to mentality and attitude. By this I mean here in the U.S. police are trained to think that the best alternative in a dangerous situation is to use deadly force.

As mentioned above, police are given training in how to use a weapon and practice using it. Some get up to 60 hours of training like this. Often this training includes a computer simulation, a form of a gauntlet scenario. They must wander down a street filled with miscreants and a few innocent bystanders. The police must wisely shoot the bad guys but not the innocent civilians.

Yes, this training can help a person to learn to respond quickly to a situation. And admittedly, police are often in situations where they must make split-second decisions. However, this type of training also begins to plant a seed in the officers head that whenever he walks down the street, he’s in a battle zone. That just around the corner is some evil guy waiting to shoot him. 

As noted above, this is different overseas. Sure, they are taught how and when to use a weapon, but more importantly, their training stresses how to avoid that situation ever happening. They realize that once you get in your head that you must react a certain way in stressful situations (pull your gun, shoot the evil guy) you are likely to fall back on that instead of trying some alternative.

How to correct the problem

The United States must change how police officers are trained. As noted above, too often police departments rely on the easiest and cheapest way to train officers: they require less time for training.  The best way to have a more efficient and less violent police force is to implement this:

• Each state must have a standard for training of police officers to be licensed within the state. It cannot be left up to individual cities/counties. In other words, the training for a police officer in Austin would be the same as one in Dallas.

• Training would be for a minimum of two years at a state sanctioned academy. At least 1/4^th of the training should be actual fieldwork. A large portion of this should include training to interact with the community—without the use of a weapon.

• Increase training in self-defense without use of a weapon.

• Increase training in how to diffuse a dangerous situation.

Step 2: Mandatory test to use a weapon

In the movie “Blade Runner” people were given the “Voight-Kampff test”  to see if they were human or android. In one scene, a person taking the test gets so angry at the question, he kills the man giving the test. Yes, he was an android. (for fun, take the test here to see if you are a replicant).

Although we don’t need to test people to see if they are human or not, we do need to test a person who wants to become a police officer to determine suitability for carrying a weapon. So besides improving training of police officers we need to ensure that the person we allow to join a police department isn’t a hothead who will use a weapon on someone else because his wife yelled at him before he left home that day.

The test would be some form of psychological evaluation to determine attitude as well as likelihood that a person might be unsuitable to carry a weapon.

Failing this test should not necessarily keep a person from joining the police force. It should only prevent the person from carrying a weapon. If the person passed the above academy but failed this test he/she could still be employed.

With this in mind, half of today's police force should be disarmed. Not just because they are not mentally stable enough to use it wisely, but also because the majority of encounters with civilians does not require a weapon. If the person wanted to carry a weapon, the person could be eligible for a retest after six months if he/she performed without incident in the field. Also, although current police officers should be "grandfathered in" so they don't need to go through the new training standards--they should be required to pass the psychological assessment in order to continue to carry a gun. If they don't pass they are not dismissed, just reassigned to a non-weapon division.

Conclusion

In many cases in which police shoot civilians, those police officers state that they "feared for their lives." Since a large percentage of those shot are unarmed, it means that police training is embedding in the recruit's minds that they will be constantly under attack; that they are going out into a war zone; every encounter could be dangerous. They are taught to be fearful. On the other hand, the training in other countries teaches recruits how to be prepared for dangerous situations, but also how to face common day-to-day encounters that are not dangerous and how to better interact with the civilian population.

What all of this boils down to is that police departments need to change the structure of how they carry out some of their duties. In Police Reform—Part 1 I talked about removing traffic duties from the police department and giving them to an unarmed city department. Part 3 of police reform will include suggestions on how a police department should be structured. For example, half of the department should be unarmed; there should be a rapid-deployment division that includes armed officers (not a SWAT team), etc. Current police forces have detectives, swat teams, police in uniform and other groups/divisions. Maybe there should be a different way to organize police forces.

Ahh, James Thurber

 

Well, I had Part I, so it makes sense that sooner or later I'd include Part II.  This article originally was written as a HUB page.  However, they removed one of my other pages so to ensure this article is still floating around the internet, I thought I'd include it here at The Thurber Brigade. I'll get back to The War Between Men and Women (relationships) real soon. Really.

Women Say the Darndest Things, Part II

The previous blog about the same subject garnered so much interest and comments/arguments that of course The Thurber Brigade had to have a further discussion.  A perfect example of one of those darndest things happens when women begin to talk about sex.  Often, they act like they may really like...

WE INTERRUPT THIS BLOG FOR SPORTS!

This is Coach Jay, breaking in once again on what I’m sure is a fascinating topic that will surely inflame feminists and perhaps result in countless verbal and physical assaults on the author, but I need to ask:

Why aren't you watching the World Cup?

Right now the Women's World Cup is going on in France. There have been plenty of exciting and explosive games, but most importantly, the US team is kicking ass and taking names. During the first three games not a single goal was scored by the opponents! In the game versus Thailand the U.S. scored a record setting 13 goals!

Coach Jay is impressed.

In their first match of the Knockout Stage they squeaked by against an aggressive Spanish team with a score of 2-1.  This will set up a mind-numbingly exciting game against the host team, France, on Friday, June 28. 

As during the last World Cup (playing on artificial turf) there is a brewing controversy this year.  The U.S. women have sued the U.S. Soccer Federation for unequal pay. The men’s team makes far more money than the women, even though the WNT is much more successful.  While the WNT has won several World Cups, the men’s team often has difficulty even qualifying. The reasons the U.S. federation has presented for this disparity are pretty lame, but we’ll see how this plays out in court.

On the field though the women’s team should continue to dominate.  Although the offense seemed lackluster during the Spanish victory, they will be able to correct that and continue on to the finals.  Yes, even though playing in front of a hostile home crowd, the U.S. will crush the Frenchies.  Coach Jay is quite sure about this.

So don't miss out on these exciting games. Tell your boss that Coach Jay has said it's the Patriotic thing to do to take time off to go watch the USA team at a nearby sports bar.

Now, back to the regularly scheduled blog already in progress. 

Surely radical feminists will be hounding me once again, but how can there be any doubt about it?  I think it is very obvious.  Now, aren’t you glad The Thurber Brigade fostered an intriguing discussion on this rather than taking some strange sidestep into politics or other issue? 

(Yes, I admit, I love soccer. I've played, coached, reffed and even wrote a book about coaching. Next time, I promise to get back to the usual blog stuff. Really)

American Idiot

Way back in the Fifties, America woke up one morning to an alarming beeping sound. Not from an alarm clock, but a little satellite sent to space by the Soviets called Sputnik. We were shocked that our biggest enemy had proven that they were better than us. How could a country that could barely be called a second world country be so advanced that they could send something to orbit above our heads?

America panicked.  Fingers were pointed trying to lay blame, but the ultimate result was that our country made a big push in math and science. In education. We began to spend more money on education, and stressed to our next generations how important having said education was to our country’s future.

And it worked. In a matter of years we sent Americans to the moon.

So did America keep on this upward spiral of knowledge?  Nope.

Republicans decided it was more important that those with wealth should be able to make even more money. Starting with Reagan they began cutting away at funding for anything that would advance our culture and society. They drastically cut taxes to the rich and in turn slashed spending on education, the arts and social programs designed to aid the welfare of society.

This concept creeped down to the local level too and shortly state legislatures were cutting back on their funding to public schools and universities. This resulted in the cost to students skyrocketing and to get an advanced degree now meant the person would be saddled with debt for years to come.

People of lower social status and wealth recognized this de-emphasizing of education and began to respond in kind. They began to embrace the idea that not being smart was not a bad thing, even something to be admired and exalted.  I remember during the George W, years his devotes bragged about being “knuckle draggers.”  When I worked in a local school district, I remember kids from the lower social-economic class who would tease other kids for wanting to do well in class by calling them "school girl/boy."

 It grew even more with the Trump campaign that had crowds of angry white men shouting how proud they were to be deplorables. He purposely targeted the feeble-minded by playing to their prejudices and promising to enrich them—even though he didn't care for the lower classes at all and sought little more than a new means to enrich his personal bank account.

The GOP recognized this change in thinking and soon coyly changed the perspective of “elites” from those of wealth who looked down on the lower classes, to those who were intellectually advanced. Now the so called elites are the educated.  Sound familiar? That's because dictators often put the intelligent up against the wall first. That's why you'd see book burnings in Nazi Germany as well as professors in jail for not following the party line (also popular in the Soviet Union.

So are we destined to become the decaying society satirically portrayed in the movie “Idiocracy?” A country so stupid they don't even know you use water to grow plants, not some popular fizzy soda? A place so brain-numbed that it votes in leaders who are better at flexing muscles than their brain? As it stands, I'd say very likely.

Ahhh, James Thurber (he was smart)

Will #MeToo Destroy Civilization?

Here in Austin there is a bird that has taken over the skyline. It's called a Grackle (Great-Tailed Grackle) and although when they mass in one area they're considered a nuisance, individually they are quite interesting. The male is bigger than the female and jet black compared to her brownish/grey.  To attract the female the male will squawk loudly, thrust out his chest and raise his wings to make himself look bigger, then circle around the potential mate in a frenzied dance.

In other words, it's pretty much the same way we males must go about meeting a woman.

As I've mentioned before, female humans are afraid to make First Contact, so it's all up to the males. However, it's more than just first contact, it's also pretty much the first move. That includes not just which way to take the relationship, but more importantly, the first move for sex.

The male must appraise the situation, the woman's mood, her thought process and decide if tonight's the night. Also as I’ve blogged before, this can be a challenge for we guys get some odd signals or signs from females. They are often difficult to decipher.

I bring this up not to rehash old blogs (although I like to link back to them) but because of recent events in the news. The #MeToo “thing” as well as the Joe Biden shoulder touching incident.

First off, let me point out that Biden is one of those touchy-feely types.  He's like your cheek-pinching aunt on steroids, or the Hollywood starlet smoocher wannabe who plants fake kisses on everyone she meets. Plus, he doesn't just touch females, but males too. There are countless pictures of him wrapping an arm around a male's shoulder or giving him a friendly hug.

So him just touching someone shouldn't be an issue. However, the response was over-the-top. Some women saw it almost on the level of assault. Luckily, not all believed that and recognized Biden for what he is (touchy/feely). But the #MeToo adherents came out in droves and pretty much did the modern day burning at the stake by attacking unrelentingly.

This attitude goes against what I mentioned earlier about First Contact. I've also mentioned before that some women take offense at males flirting. If males must be afraid of any contact, even the non-emotional greetings or lighthearted come-ons, then civilization could be imperiled.

Soon, men would fear for their lives if they attempted to convince that cute waitress out on a date. If they magically were able to get a date in the new #MeToo world, heaven forbid they seductively suggest she come back to his place. And the married man who craved a night of romance better set his sights instead on getting excited over a football game instead. For even if there were a change in how men approached a female, it'll be centuries before women evolve to the point where they might take responsibility for making that move.

On a positive note, at least it might solve the overpopulation problem.

Ahhh, James Thurber

We at The Thurber Brigade apologize if you believe this is taking things a little over-the-top.  It's sort of what we do though.  As noted before, we do not condone sexual assault of any type/level, but also think it's possible to go too far the other way too. If nothing else, just be thankful we didn't devolve the blog into another topic as we're prone to do in an attempt to hide the true reason for the blog. We just like being sneaky.