Along with becoming one of America's most popular and prolific comedy websites, Cracked.com has also developed a serious side that has tackled such serious issues as bizarre legal loopholes, surviving childhood cancer, the ugly reality of being a woman visitor to India, getting mauled by bears, and life as a prostitute in Vietnam (spoiler alert: No Fat Tourists Allowed).
Today, author Adam Todd Brown, one of Cracked's crack staff of crackerjack writers, proposes the idea that a state of war already exists between police and American citizens. And not just those of color. He discusses the two sides; those who complain that the police are getting short shrift:
If you are one of those people and you find yourself constantly bemoaning the fact that public opinion is coming down against the police, remember that your favorite argument works both ways. People shouldn't run from the police if they don't want to get shot/tased/choked? Well, maybe the police shouldn't shoot/tase/choke people just because they're running. There'd probably be a lot fewer riots if they could adhere to that fairly basic rule. Handing out justice is not their job. We have an entire legal system in place for that very purpose.
And those who are concerned with increasing militarization of the police:
When police are tooling around town in military vehicles and deploying military technology to break up crowds, how is that any different than having the actual military there? They don't have the same power to abduct you and disappear you to some shady government facility? Tell that to the Chicago police, who operate a Guantanamo-Bay-like "dark site" where alleged criminals can be held for days without being charged and without anyone knowing what's happened to them.
Mr Brown has presented a very cogent argument that is more than a little frightening.
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