The Demonstrations in Minnesota (Update: Now Nationwide){Now International}

I lived in Minnesota. One of the most liberal places in the country...with Minneapolis/St. Paul being one of the most liberal cities. Their entire government structure is liberal. Their mayor, who elects the police chief is liberal. Heck...the police chief is probably also liberal. You'd think that philosophically Minneapolis would be one of the better cities to be able to handle a system problem like this...right?

We can have the best rules, training, and structure known to man...but if we have police officers that do not respect the value of human life...then we're in trouble. It's going to take a heck of a lot to convince me that with better training and a better system that it would prevent this cop from being a racist killer. You have to change hearts...we have to find a way to prevent those at risk of being killer cops to NOT. If that doesn't happen, then we will continue to struggle. And it will continue to be a struggle in spite of our efforts because now police recruitment became that much more challenging. Who in their right minds would want to be a police officer right now? It's going to be those who struggle to find other work or those LOOKING for power and confrontation. And not to mention...it's an incredibly difficult thing to fight history and people's preconceived biases. There is literally no margin of error, so I'm not even sure that there are reasonable acceptable outcome measures.


I agree it's not a cure all, but training does help to change those hearts and minds. It also helps to make sure that Police Officers who see others violating rights know that they have the right and obligation to stop them, even if they are superior officers, and to report it when it happens.

And an example of this is how NOPD has acted during this. They haven't been perfect, used tear gas once and the Police Chief said they are investigating the possible use of rubber bullets by some officers, but they haven't just gone off and started beating protesters. So, it's at least some progress as a result of proper training.