Flex Your Rights

[JohnReaper]

I was roaming the news and saw that a sex offender was arrested by police because his girlfriend liked the police facebook page. Alright, all well and good. But this made me decide to post something that had been rolling around my head for a while now.

There is a website,DVD,Book called Flex your rights. it covers much more than I care to post, BUTTT the fact that it's main message is never talk to police, and that the police are out to get you.

One thing that sticks out is when they talk about a Party, and how the police are not allowed to come in unless invited. But in the same breath it says that the cops will try to trick you into letting them in.

My question that was bouncing in my head was, What do Police officers Feel about these types of movements, such as Flex your Rights, Don't talk to police, Police are not your friends.

 

[Korolev]

I don't think many police officers visit these forums.

I agree that the police are not our "Friends" - at best, they are government officials and functionaries. They shouldn't be our friends OR our enemies.

Don't talk to police? Hm.... well, that depends on what questions they are asking. If they're asking you if you saw anything suspicious near a murder scene, then you should probably tell them. Most police officers are not out to "get you" - they have enough to deal with during the course of their everyday job. They usually won't harass you for no reason. Yes, there are police officers that do harass citizens - but does every police officer harass citizens? My experience has been that the majority of police officers do not - every single police officer that I have passed in real life has barely noticed me at all.

In regards to the "Party" situation, the police (in Australia) ARE allowed to enter if the neighbours complain of very violent or loud or disruptive behaviour, of if the police see signs of under-age drinking or fighting. Which is sensible. A few parties in Australia have gotten out-of-hand and required the police to intervene.

The police are not your friend - but they're not necessarily your enemy and like it or not, society needs law-enforcement to function. Every large, functioning society has needed police. You could point to a few anarchist communes or tribal societies that don't have police, but 1) these societies are usually small, and 2) they're not as peaceful as advertised.

 

[Dusty Donuts]

The court system has so many policies in place to protect things that it's left itself vulnerable. In Dirty Harry, a murderer gets away with killing people because he entered his house without a warrant. They know he killed those people, but "all the evidence is no good" because they didn't go through the proper official manner to go in.
Same situation here with "Flex your Rights", sounds like they're trying to help people game the system. Which ain't cool, to me anyway.

 

[artanis_neravar]

I was roaming the news and saw that a sex offender was arrested by police because his girlfriend liked the police facebook page. Alright, all well and good. But this made me decide to post something that had been rolling around my head for a while now.

There is a website,DVD,Book called Flex your rights. it covers much more than I care to post, BUTTT the fact that it's main message is never talk to police, and that the police are out to get you.

One thing that sticks out is when they talk about a Party, and how the police are not allowed to come in unless invited. But in the same breath it says that the cops will try to trick you into letting them in.

My question that was bouncing in my head was, What do Police officers Feel about these types of movements, such as Flex your Rights, Don't talk to police, Police are not your friends.

Well if you aren't breaking the laws, then they can't arrest you for anything. It is actually rather simple

 

[Lazy]

The problem with the justice system, at least in NA, is that it's less focused on accuracy and more on simply getting results. As long as someone goes to jail, they're happy.

 

[Souleks]

Most are pretty chill and if your not doing anything wrong you usually won't get in any trouble personally I think unless you have a reason just saying no and refusing requests out of spite seems dickish.
But of course some are fishin' dicks and it is your duty to make their job as hard as possible.

 

[manic_depressive13]

One thing that sticks out is when they talk about a Party, and how the police are not allowed to come in unless invited. But in the same breath it says that the cops will try to trick you into letting them in.

Heh, kinda like vampires.

Yeah, the majority of police aren't out to get you, but harrassment, corruption and abuse of power does happen, so it doesn't hurt to inform people about their rights- particularly if they belong to poor/marginalised groups.

 

[ohnoitsabear]

The court system has so many policies in place to protect things that it's left itself vulnerable. In Dirty Harry, a murderer gets away with killing people because he entered his house without a warrant. They know he killed those people, but "all the evidence is no good" because they didn't go through the proper official manner to go in.
Same situation here with "Flex your Rights", sounds like they're trying to help people game the system. Which ain't cool, to me anyway.

Just an FYI, in the US at least, they've made it so that evidence that is obtained illegally can still be used in a court case as long as that evidence would have been discovered anyway, for exactly this reason. That still leaves the question of how do you know that the evidence would have been found anyway, but it is much better than just immediately throwing out all illegally obtained evidence.

On-Topic: The idea that, assuming if you're living in a country with a halfway decent police force and you aren't wanted for something, the police are out to get you is ludicrous. Sure, sometimes police officers make stupid decisions, aren't careful enough with their power, or forget to think about what it's like for the person on the other end, but that doesn't mean that the police system is fundamentally flawed.

But really, this just seems like another "the system's out to get us" conspiracy. And I like to think that acknowledging these conspiracies only gives them more power, which can only lead to bad things.

 

[Dags90]

All of my encounters with police so far have been sympathetic, professional and respectful. The people in my life who are most vociferous in their disliking of police have extensive criminal backgrounds (mostly for drugs). Make of that what you will.

 

[lacktheknack]

My mother works in the police department.

Apparently, the police AREN'T out to get us. Unless they suspect you're doing something illegal. Then yes, they are.

I don't like things like "Flex Your Rights", it invariably translates to "here's how to be as big of a douchebag as possible to the system, because screw the system". Plus, that all leads to more work for my mother. I like her coming home HAPPY in the evenings, you know?

 

[sethisjimmy]

I've seen some of these types of videos, and I like what I see. It's just information, they're not really telling you to go piss off the police legally, but there's a lot of legal tidbits that most people don't know or aren't sure of. For example, in many places, it's completely legal to film the police in public, so when they tell you to turn off the camera as they're doing some shady business you can tell them that you're within your rights.

A lot of the time police officers themselves don't know the details of the law, they think that citizens must do whatever they tell them to, but it's more nuanced than that.
The idea that the police are out to get you comes from sensationalism I think. You always hear about when a cop beats up an innocent man, but never when one is just a nice guy. On the other hand, there are lots of petty things an officer can fine you for, and might do so just because he's an asshole or having a bad day, so these videos seek to inform you about what you can do when being confronted by the police, because that's generally a scary situation where most people don't think rationally anyway.

I guess overall I like the idea that ordinary citizens are monitoring police behavior as much as vice versa, to keep them in check.

 

[lunavixen]

It's technically true.

The police are out to get you, 'technically'.

They wanna catch you doing something wrong and punish you for it at any moment. Big Brother is watching. :>

Fact is though, a good bit of us prolly commit a crime or two every other day. Jaywalking for instance is illegal. I cannot imagine how many people break that law on a daily basis. Police just ain't around to witness it mostly and nobody is gonna call the police over it.

Anyways. I personally do not like the police. I find the good police are the exception rather than the rule. And it absolutely tears me when police get away with brutality.

Most of the time they don't get away with it here (Australia) the ICAC is quite good at finding and stopping corruption within the police force, even if it does take some time.

I'm planning on applying to the police force next year, my moral compass is pretty much immovable, i'm going to do my damndest to make sure i stay on the right side of the law, ploice officer or not.

 

[Imthatguy]

The police are your enemy. They don't represent you. They rarely protect you. They're more than happy to fuck around with your head and try to screw up your day. They serve to protect the state's monopoly on violence and enforce it.

Screw 'em.

 

[LobsterFeng]

Not sure if relevant, but here's a funny police story:

So I was hanging with my friends and waiting for one of our friends to arrive for a surprise party. Because we were bored we started having a shaving cream fight in the front yard. Suddenly this grouchy old guy from across the street came out and started yelling at us. He was telling us things like "Some of that shaving cream could wash down the river and pollute the lake!" and then he told us to clean it up or else he'd call the cops.

We just shrugged and started cleaning it up because we were planning on anyway. So while we cleaning up the grouchy old guy apparently called the cops on us anyway because they arrived right when we were done cleaning up.

The cops said they were called in by a guy that said we were polluting the streets. And when we told them that we were just being stupid with shaving cream (on our friend's property) and that we just finished cleaning it up because that old guy threatened to call the cops on us and stuff.

The cops were all like "...okay" and then they went over to the grouchy old guy's house and talked to him for like 15 minutes about how it was really dumb of him to call them on us when we weren't doing anything wrong. I don't think the conversation was intended to go on for that long, but the old guy just wouldn't shut up and kept rambling on about how terrible they were as cops and such.

Once the cops were done talking to the old guy, they gave us some temporary tattoos that they had in their car for some strange reason.

Anyway, I guess what I'm trying to say is that we may indeed have rights, but having that attitude towards all police is kind of rude, don't you think? I mean there are some really good ones out there, and they're laying their lives on the line for us.

 

[PunkyMcGee]

i laugh at at a lot of your misguided hatred. your opinions change if your TVs gets stolen.

OT: however i do think that even though they caught a criminal. they still used social media to know their exact address. what does that mean for the rest of us?

 

[Imthatguy]

i laugh at at a lot of your misguided hatred. your opinions change if your TVs gets stolen.

I laugh at you believing that police departments actually pursue low-level theft such as that.

 

[Worgen]

The court system has so many policies in place to protect things that it's left itself vulnerable. In Dirty Harry, a murderer gets away with killing people because he entered his house without a warrant. They know he killed those people, but "all the evidence is no good" because they didn't go through the proper official manner to go in.
Same situation here with "Flex your Rights", sounds like they're trying to help people game the system. Which ain't cool, to me anyway.

Ugh dude, never ever quote a movie if your looking for an excuse as for how something is broken, I would be dubious even of documentaries but dirty harry is entertainment, its bullshit concerning realism. Our court system is more likely to condemn an innocent person then let a guilty one go like that, much more likely, fuck, I live in a state that has killed more than a few innocent people because we didn't want to appear soft on crime.

 

[PunkyMcGee]

i laugh at at a lot of your misguided hatred. your opinions change if your TVs gets stolen.

I laugh at you believing that police departments actually pursue low-level theft such as that.

yeah there are cops that suck. police brutality, questionable interrogation tactics. but there are good ones.

i had my home robed a while back. the police helped me get the stuff back. the crooks almost got away with taking nearly $10,000 worth of computers and electronics.

 

[Daemonate]

This video answers your question: it gives you the police counterpoint in part 2:

part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8z7NC5sgik

part 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08fZQWjDVKE