I think a lot of people who still support stop and frisk are mistaken about how it really works. They think that people, like myself, who object to it want to cripple the police so that they will be forced to second guess every judgement call when it comes to who needs to be stopped and questioned and (if that questioning says anything) possibly searched.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Police need to be able to identify suspicious people and they need to ask questions and generally do their job.
The whole issue is that there is a lot of evidence that the NYPD is not operating in this sane way, but rather stoping people en mass in hopes that something will turn up.
See this difference?
They've put the goal of stopping lots and lots of people above the goal of finding criminals. It's become and end to itself and it makes life really unpleasant for the people who are stopped most of whom have never committed a crime in their life.
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I much prefer it when the police walk beat on foot and ask people about what's going on, it'd be nice if the officers assigned could stay in the same place for like 5 years so you could know their name and get to trusting them more
But, I feel like it's a new set of guys every week and they ALWAYS assume that the young men who hang out at the bodga down the street from the skate park are criminals and bug them. But, those are good kids, the criminals tend to work over twitter now and there is MUCH less activity on the street. I'd like to assume the cops know this. (I mean I know it and I'm about as street as a lace hanky...)
Most gaggles of young men or teens are really harmless. Most get harassed anyway.
I've also seen cops valiantly busting up sidewalk picnics.
Really.
Sidewalk picnics.
And they yell at me and threaten me if I try to take a photo or make a video.
It's really frustrating.
http://www.nytimes.com/...