[steveeq1]

Guys, this might be a shill account. I've noticed a lot of shill/bot accounts on reddit lately. /r/losangeles and and /r/pics are super-super-super anti-cop right now, to the point of ridiculousness.

Are there PR firms out there trying to set public perception?

[dang]

Please don't insinuate shillage on HN without objective evidence. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. The reason it's in the site guidelines is that the overwhelming majority of these perceptions are imaginary, despite how convincing they feel. Plenty of past explanations at https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme..., for those who want more.

[Lewton]

> Guys, this might be a shill account.

WTF, there's zero reasons to believe this is a shill account. Looking at the commenters history it looks like a run of the mill HN account (Oh but that's just more proof of shilldom! right?)

Just because it's posting something critical to the police you jump to "shill"? Because posts critical of the police are so rare and not at all something that's been common on the internet for more than 25 years?

[steveeq1]

It's a new account with not much activity that's reporting outrage material. I don't know, I can't prove it or anything, but it seems shilly. I notice this a lot on /r/cryptocurrencies as well.

[Lewton]

It’s over a year old, with pretty average activity and there’s no other comments with outrage material??

[taurath]

Its the conversation that literally the entire country and the world is having. People are paying attention to this in a real way. I don't think there's anything ridiculous about talking about how common it is to have bad or frightening experiences with police.

They're being asked to do literally everything but are armed and trained for anti-violence first and foremost.

[steveeq1]

Yeah, but that's availability bias. That's my point. There's a lot of shill accounts on reddit posting this stuff with plenty of upvotes, but the comments are critical of the piece. These are obviously shill/bot accounts promoting this, probably by some PR firm out there.

The thing is, police brutality is heavily promoted on the news right now because, well, it outrages people, that's the point. It generates more ad revenue that way.

But if you hear it and see this every day, and someone says the word "police", your mind immediately thinks of "brutality". Not that it doesn't exist, but availability bias makes the issue seem much bigger than it actually is. This is why it's a bias.

And to put the danger of racist white police officers into perspective: https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/163/274/fbf...

Yes, racists are a problem, but not a very big one.

[taurath]

I emplore you, try to listen to the actual arguments being made by BLM. It seems like you're reducing the conversation to a tiny factor, and then claiming everyone else is "shilling".

I'll put this to you - people of color are absolutely justifiably fearful of any interaction with the police, and they have to experience it much more frequently. You need a source? Here - https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/06/03/us/minneapoli... Hope you'll read it.

[steveeq1]

The data does not back that claim: https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/163/274/fbf...

And this includes ALL white people, much less "white people who happen to be police officers". My argument is not saying police brutality doesn't "exist", I'm saying it's "overblown".

Finally, I am a "person of color" myself and I don't find the police behave to me in the way you describe. They don't act that way towards my father either, not even once in his life. Or any of my person-of-color friends for that matter. Admittedly, this is anecdotal, but my main point is the overall data does not point towards your premise.

[taurath]

Your chart creates its own premise that it’s only about white on black deaths, and you have ignored mine.