[dropkick]

One thing about being an American living in another country has made me realize about the USA is that there are tons of police compared to other countries. This is a good and bad thing. It's a bad thing when you're being pulled over and harassed for looking suspicious. It's a good thing when you have bullies like this. If you call the police, they will usually respond promptly and eagerly looking to make an arrest.

[hugh3]

Really? My observation about the US is that there's hardly ever a policeman around. Oh sure, they exist and they'll turn up (often en masse) when called, but otherwise they don't leave their cars. There doesn't seem to be such a thing as a policeman walking a beat, at least not here in California, which tends to increase low-level antisocial behaviour.

For instance, if you walk down University Avenue in Berkeley you'll see all sorts of people engaged in various levels of borderline-illegal dickishness -- blocking the sidewalk, harassing passersby for money, standing on a street corner with a ghetto blaster on full blast, whatever. Police officers go past in their cars but don't stop unless something serious is happening. If they were patrolling up and down on foot then they'd have the ability to slow down and talk to the troublemakers and hopefully move 'em along.

[stcredzero]

My observation about the US is that there's hardly ever a policeman around.

I live in Houston, and most of my interactions with Houston police have been negative. The one time I encountered a cop on foot, I was walking on a concrete wall about 3ft high in the early evening in an almost empty park with a friend, and he ordered me off of it. Another time, I was with a girlfriend who reported a hit and run, who even memorized the license plate and had visible damage on her rear bumper. The policeman insisted on getting a description of the car, despite my protests that my girlfriend doesn't differentiate that information. Nothing was done. I also remember another occasion where, despite my neutral, polite, and factual answers, the policeman kept escalating his hostility.

How well cops treat males in the US has mostly to do with their evaluation of your social class in the first second.

[arethuza]

According to this list (and associated discussion) at Nationmaster the US doesn't have an unusually high number of police officers per capita:

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_pol_percap-crime-polic...

At 2.84 per thousand that's a bit more than the UK (2.04) but less than Germany, Italy, Portugal, Latvia and other countries.