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Comment by furyofantares | Hacker News Reader

My dad was a biker. He lead a clean and sober biker club, but you can't really tell the difference between that and a gang unless you know the symbols ("colors") on the jackets.

When I was maybe 11, we were in eastern Washington, I was on the back of the bike, and we got pulled over for failing to signal when pulling out of a gas station. Which I don't think is a violation? And also we did signal. But in any case, the cop approached the bike with gun drawn and pointed at us.

It's not about the suspected violation. These are cops willing to aggressively threaten lethal force when they are experiencing fear/anxiety/uncertainty based on what the suspect looks like, be it their skin color or their clothing.

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> These are cops willing to aggressively threaten lethal force when they are experiencing fear/anxiety/uncertainty based on what the suspect looks like, be it their skin color or their clothing.

There are also a fair amount of bully cowboys out there hiding behind the badge.

I was a teenage passenger in a car when a friend of mine held up his wallet in the light of the back window to see if he had his bank card or w/e. Cop car was behind us in traffic, pulls us over, and two cops get out guns drawn instructing everyone to get face down on the pavement.

Turns out they thought they saw a knife/gun when my friend had held us wallet up in the light, and they figured we were brandishing a weapon at them. We all got searched and when they found half of us Boy Scouts were carrying pocket knives things got really stupid really fast. We had to beg them to be rational with us, nose down on the pavement. Still makes my blood boil.

This is anecdotal in rural small-town Iowa.

It’s no wonder there’s so much call to “defund the police” in the US with te number of anecdotes that come out

It feels to me that the only solution is to completely shut it down

Similarly exchange student classmates in college committed a road violation, either speeding or moving violation, I don’t recall. In any event they didn’t know the protocol for pulling over in their rented car.

The CHP called for backup forced them over and drew their weapons on them.

Same for friends at a University. High, and in possession they tried ditching the cops; bad move. Cops caught them drew weapons extremely infuriated at them.

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