[simoncion]

A few things:

...do you live in the US?

> A civilian...

Police are civilians. Some people see this as hair-splitting, but it's a very important distinction.

> If I got that close to a traffic cop, I would probably be in jail.

In the US, if you're jailed just for being in close proximity to a police officer, then you've been jailed illegally. (If, however, you refuse to give the guy some room when he asks for it, then you can be detained and (maybe) jailed.)

[woodman]

> Police are civilians ... it's a very important distinction.

The misuse of the word is a symptom of the real problem, it is deeply ingrained in police culture that they are fundamentally different. I think it was one of Dave Grossman's books, an author that enjoys a military and LEO following, that put forward the idea that they are sheepdogs - protecting the flock from the wolves. So that is a big problem, as the idea has gotten picked up in popular culture.

I don't really mind cops insisting that they aren't civilians, because I agree with them to a point - the root word doesn't seem to apply anymore. That is unlikely to change without a major overhaul in the standard escalation of force model, where the officer is taught to control a situation by being one level of force above everybody else - making them aggressors by default.

[simoncion]

> The misuse of the word is a symptom of the real problem...

Agreed.

> I don't really mind cops insisting that they aren't civilians...

I do. ;) Because...

> [Police use as a] standard [situation control mechanism the] escalation of force model, where the officer is taught to control a situation by being one level of force above everybody else - making them aggressors by default.

Military police use de-escalation of force by default when interacting with non-combatants. It is drilled and drilled and drilled into their heads that the very fact that they are armed and/or armored automatically escalates the situation, so they MUST continuously work to de-escalate the situation from the microsecond that they arrive on the scene.

Civilian police would be so much more competent and so much more reasonable if they had the same training that actual military personnel receive.

[woodman]

The only difference between what I said and what you said is that you've added that MP training emphasizes deescalation. Both MPs and civilian police observe the same force continuum, but it seems to me that MPs are simply more disciplined. I don't think it is realistic to try and bring regular cops up to that standard of discipline, it would be much easier to simply provide a less flexible justification for violence. Many years ago when I was in USMC security force I remember being trained on actions that nudge the escalation of force - which was likely the first time I heard the phrase "furtive movement". While I'd seen a fair amount force applied subsequent to that period of instruction, I never heard that justification used. It seems to be the go to justification outside of the military.

My point is that giving cops the latitude that the escalation of force provides is like giving the CEO's 15 year old nephew the commit bit and letting him write safety critical software in non-MISRA C.

[simoncion]

Aside from your first sentence, and your (entirely reasonable!) opinions about the difficulty of providing proper training to civilian police, I agree almost entirely with your commentary. [0]

The core of my objection to police personnel calling non-police "civilians" is twofold:

* It lets police benefit from the competency halo projected by the military and their training when -in fact- most police get precious little training.

* It seeks to create a deep division between the police and the communities they serve. Police should be members of (and get to know) the communities that they police.

[0] It's important that cops be able to react with force to uncontrollable, imminently dangerous situations. However, I expect that those situations pretty much never actually happen. ;)

[woodman]

We generally are in agreement, just for different reasons. Whatever cache that halo might have bought them is long gone, thanks to the media's collective realization that stories of police misconduct are of public interest - with no ill effect on the popular opinion of the military (that I have noticed). I think civilian police are just trying to find a way of distinguishing themselves from those subject to their protection, which as you said, creates a deep division. I think they'd change their mind if the cost was trading their constitutional protections for the UCMJ... freedom has a flavor that those who have never been subject to an article 134 will never know :)

[kelnos]

I don't think it is realistic to try and bring regular cops up to that standard of discipline

Why is that? I can understand if you think there's a practical problem with doing so (but would still lament that), but I think that ideally "regular cops" should absolutely be held up to that same standard. I mean, look... these people are literally given life-and-death responsibility over the general populace. They should be held to a ridiculously high standard.

[woodman]

> Why is that?

It is a practical problem. The military has an extremely long institutional memory and has perfected the process of mental conditioning over hundreds of years, to the point where 18 year olds can be given the power to kill and dropped into situations with little to no supervision - and it generally doesn't result in an x-rated version of Lord of the Flies. The methods that the military uses to accomplish this would not work for police without a costly tear down and slow rebuild. The list of methods is far too long to list here, but they include a culture of self policing enabled by a meaningful shared experience (basic redefinition of family), and a mythology that requires a carefully managed narrative of history (Gen MacArthur's farewell address at West Point is full of examples).

[darpa_escapee]

Even if it wasn't life or death, they still determine the outcome of your physical well being, future and livelihood. Giving them access to lethal force with practical impunity is the icing on the why-give-them-so-much-power cake.

[dalyons]

...which they do in most other western countries. Trained in de-escalation I mean.

[tzs]

> Police are civilians. Some people see this as hair-splitting, but it's a very important distinction.

I've heard that before, but never seen any good support for it. I checked several dictionaries, and they say that police are not civilians. Here are the definitions of "civilian" they give.

New Oxford American Dictionary: "a person not in the armed services or the police force".

Merriam-Webster: "one not on active duty in the armed services or not on a police or firefighting force".

Cambridge English Dictionary: "a ​person who is not a ​member of the ​police, the ​armed ​forces, or a ​fire ​department".

Dictionary.com (which uses Random House, I believe): "a person who is not on active duty with a military, naval, police, or fire fighting organization"

Macmillan: "someone who does not belong to the military or the police".

There are some contexts in which "civilian" means anyone not in the military, but those are generally situations dealing with international laws of war or military law.

[woodman]

Dictionaries adapt to popular usage, so unless your argument is that popular usage is correct usage - dictionaries aren't good support either. Check the word origin, it originally distinguished those who are subject to civil law and those who aren't (US service members are subject to the Uniform code of military justice). Over the last couple hundred years it became less specific and was used to distinguish belligerents from the civil. More recently (as in I don't remember it being used this way 20 years ago) it has been used to distinguish those with authority from the lesser-thans.

I prefer the old definition, because now - due to the corruption of the word, we have no unambiguous word to describe the original concept. We already have plenty of words to describe those without authority.

[pbhjpbhj]

I'd say police aren't civilians because they're not acting in their own right; they're a specific designated extension of the state.

It probably depends on your state and your police force though. Gendarmes are military trained IIRC, also in Italy there are something like 7 different types of police.

[woodman]

You are describing an agent of the state, which is a different concept than what the traditional use of civilian addresses.