[fugalfervor]

I am so terribly disturbed by the ICE shootings (and killings). There is no justification for them. This is supposed to be a nation of laws and the rights of those shot (to say nothing of those abducted and harassed, beaten, or removed without due process) has been so grossly violated that it's hard to believe.

My heart aches for the countless victims of this band of fascists in the executive branch.

[tombert]

The killings are horrifying in their own right, but the most disturbing part to me is how quickly the Trump administration will just declare these people as "terrorists" before any kind of investigation has happened.

This suggests to me there is some level of systemic intent (or at least ambivalence) with this administration's use of ICE's use of lethal force. It is beyond concerning. This admin is now very literally murdering us and will immediately try to justify it.

[fallinghawks]

It's appalling how they go straight to making things up to suit their narrative, as if video evidence doesn't exist. They know the MAGAs will believe them, and may shed doubt on interpretation for people who aren't that curious about truth. A lie can travel halfway around the world, as they say.

[michaelbarton]

"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command."

I remember reading 1984 when I was a kid and enjoying it, at no point did I think it was more than sci-fi though. I suppose it goes to show how much we took for granted the last 80+ years.

It also makes me respect Orwell so much more. Which was already very high based on how he makes tea. How was he able to see you presciently?

https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...

[drcongo]

If you haven't already seen it, I highly recommend the documentary film "Orwell: 2+2=5", it's considerably better than its IMDb rating would suggest and frames a lot of his writing around recent / current events. It also gives a little insight into his prescience.

[michaelbarton]

Sounds doubleplus good! Will try to find it streaming somewhere!

[tim333]

Like a lot of 'sci-fi' it's really about the time it was written in, extrapolated a little. Orwell came up with 1984 in around 1943 when Hitler and Stalin were hard at it.

[tombert]

I find it so surreal that people are so willing to believe the lies of someone who was literally convicted of lying in order to make himself look better.

[gorbachev]

There's nothing surprising about it given US history.

The US administration has always labeled any resistance against it as terrorism at least ever since 9/11. You might remember the justification of killing young Afghani males, who were posthumously labelled as terrorists. They drone strike an apartment complex and report 25 dead terrorists, conveniently omitting to report on dead children or women, because there were 25 males between the age of 15 - 25 among the dead. No evidence of terrorist activity required.

The only change is that the same justification is now being used within the US borders.

The dead are still, however, The Other, which is how it's being justified now as it was when the dead were foreigners in a war zone.

[scarecrowbob]

Since before then, as well.

think of ELF/Earth First in the 90s with "ecoterrorism"... plenty of stops between that and, say, the Haymarket affair. Or hell, much of the anti-indigenous genocide could probably be described using the term "counter-insurgency", which is closely related to how the US gov. thinks of terrorism.

[mickle00]

>some level of systemic intent

It's 100% the intent of this admin to use their secret police to drive fear and terror

[C6JEsQeQa5fCjE]

> the most disturbing part to me is how quickly the Trump administration will just declare these people as "terrorists" before any kind of investigation has happened

Imperial boomerang. After enabling Israel/IDF which routinely just shoots unarmed people and officials on all levels simply justify it with "Terrorists.", and also routinely denies ambulance access to victims shots, it was only a matter of time until such and similar tactics come back home. Because politicians back home saw that the world was okay with it, so why not do it home.

People are supposed to defend their rights from far away, so that they don't have to defend them uncomfortably close when it's too late to avoid many casualties.

[midlander]

Well done on finding a way to link this story to your favorite scapegoat.

[falseprofit]

The U.S. itself has been engaging in similar behavior around the world for a long time. The specific relevance of Israel may only be a combination of recency and amount of U.S. attention.

But “scapegoat”?

“Israel did 9/11” is treating them as a scapegoat. “IDF often calls men they killed terrorists with no justification” is just stating a fact.

[scarecrowbob]

Yeh, the poster should have also at least name checked the administrative detention system of CIA's Phoenix program in Vietnam, which seems like a reasonable test-bed for many of the recent and horrific systems and a kind of common ancestor to both of the US ICE agency and its cousins in the Levant.

Leaving that bit of history out certain seems like a missed point of history, and absent that your parent post's point might indeed seem a little reach-y.

[C6JEsQeQa5fCjE]

When going back into history, examples become too abstract, a thing that other people did, in different times. The example I used is not only recent, it is still ongoing. It is right there in front of domestic authoritarians, showing them how it can be done in this day and age. And it is right there in front of the general population, showing them what can and will be done to them if they do not make it clear to their governments that they will not tolerate such conduct. Therefore I insist that I used the correct example.

[scarecrowbob]

I think I agree with you- I was just adding in some context because, from my position your point is very fair.

[tim333]

It's not just declaring them terrorists before investigating - it's persisting after evidence is out that they are blatantly not. An unarmed mum and a male nurse assisting someone in recent cases.

[RealityVoid]

> I am so terribly disturbed by the ICE shootings (and killings). There is no justification for them.

I think they are simply poorly trained people that are given free reign. The results are disastrous. They probably don't wake up thinking "Today I'm going to murder someone" but they just don't realize what they're doing. I'm not sure how it's at the destructiveness scale at this moment, but these organizations can and it probably will get much worse as their internal culture morphs into more directly aggressive stance.

The shootings were incredibly dumb, and it's pretty much what one would expect when they create this kind of situation. Listening to the "Revolutions" podcast I realized situations like these are incredibly common all along history, you have armed people with tense spirits, a gun goes off and tragedy ensues. The most terrible part of all of this is the reaction of the authorities that lie, gaslight and support these people, get them off the hook and this reaction will only generate more violence and more deaths as ICE realizes they _really can_ act with impunity.

[fugalfervor]

They are also instructed illegally. They are told they don't need warrants signed by a judge in order to arrest someone.

The Stanford Prison Experiment is a good analogue to what we are seeing with ICE. People empowered to be cruel.

And they are given the message (from the president!) they have absolute immunity, and instructed to regard the law as a set of nonbinding guidelines.

The Supreme Court played a role in this too. They made it harder to stop by halting the long-established precedent of nationwide injunctions.

The people pulling the trigger are still not blameless. They are murderers no matter how badly misled. Your common murderer is misguided too. That doesn't mean they are absolved. I don't think that's what you were saying, but it bears mentioning.

[tombert]

I think the results of the Stanford Prison Experiment have been pretty heavily disputed, and it cannot be re-tested due to ethical concerns.

I personally don't think it's making the agents worse, but rather that it's very heavily selecting for very bad people. If you have a job where people can be violent and abusive with little-to-no oversight, you are going to select for people who want to do violent and abusive things. Keep in mind, these people aren't being "drafted" into ICE, they're voluntarily joining, meaning that they had to demonstrate some interest in it.

This doesn't imply that every ICE agent is a terrible person, just like how not every Catholic priest abuses children, but if you create a selection pressure then it isn't surprising when you get what you selected for.

Sample size of one but bear with me; I am an asshole but I am a decidedly non-violent person. I genuinely do not want to commit any form of violence on people. Law enforcement doesn't seem appealing to me because it pays worse than software and I wouldn't view physically attacking people with impunity as a benefit.

[CamperBob2]

Milgram's a better example, without the baggage that Zimbardo brought to the table. Milgram's lesson: if an authority figure calls for an illegal, harmful, or unethical action, they won't have to go very far down the line until they find someone willing to carry it out, even if the first couple of people refuse.

ICE is said to be paying signing bonuses up to $50,000 [1]. That must seem like a fortune to the sorts of people they are recruiting... people who would happily do stuff like this for free if given permission.

1: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cqle5newg0no

[_DeadFred_]

Lots of ICE were recruited from the BOP (Federal Prison). It's going to be interesting when they go back to that job with the current ICE culture ingrained. I foresee a lot of Bivens lawsuit payouts.

[formerly_proven]

> They probably don't wake up thinking "Today I'm going to murder someone" but they just don't realize what they're doing.

Jonathan Ross (the ICE agent who shot and killed Renée Good) is an Iraq war veteran who has served in military and paramilitary units (National Guard, CBP, ICE) for over two decades. He intentionally engaged in a behavior that has been documented as far back as 2014 [1] to manufacture a reason to shoot the person in front of him.

Did he premeditate killing someone while getting out of bed that morning? Probably not.

Did he make the decision to kill Ms. Good in advance? No reasonable doubt.

[1] Even by CBP internal reviews, no less: https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/us-border-agents-i...

[mold_aid]

>They probably don't wake up thinking "Today I'm going to murder someone" but they just don't realize what they're doing

They absolutely woke up thinking that. This is the happiest these monsters have been in their lives

[slg]

Bovino has said the agents involved in the shooting are back at work today. Even if you believe that they were 100% justified in their actions, they killed a man, any decent organization that cared about human life would believe that has an impact on people and would put those involved on some sort of paid leave to process it. But that isn't how this organization works. This organization believes that taking a human life is just something that might happen over the course of your average workday and you'll be back at work the next day like nothing unusual happened.

[tombert]

Yeah, I have felt guilt for not doing enough to prevent an acquaintance's suicide for more than four years now [1], and literally every day it bothers me a little bit. If I directly killed someone, even if it were 100% justified, I am quite confident that it would really fuck me up for years.

Granted, I've been accused of feeling too much empathy by people, but I don't think that that's an atypical reaction. The fact that this officer was able to brush it off without blinking is extremely concerning.

[1] If you want you can read about it: https://blog.tombert.com/Posts/Personal/July-2023/Guilt-and-.... That said, please do not feel compelled to tell me stuff isn't my fault. I know you mean well when you say that but my emotions are complicated and I am seeing a therapist about this stuff.

[burky]

I think it's more than just poorly trained agents. Also framing it as "a gun goes off" doesn't track with the video footage I saw.

[RealityVoid]

The point is, when tense situations happen, you need to have everyone keep their cool. If someone flinches, people die. Repeat this situation many many times over a day, and tragedies will happen.

The shooting of Alex Pretti was a long chain of escalatory and poor decisions on the part of ICE (well, assuming here that "good" is defined by not shooting people, I'm sure some in this admin might disagree). I might come off too sympathetic to ICE. I am not, but the real killers here are the ones creating these kinds of situations, the ones using ICE as a political gain machine. I'm sure that ICE has its shares of psychopaths, but giving them reign in the first place... those people empowering them have blood on their hands.

[throw0101c]

> The point is, when tense situations happen, you need to have everyone keep their cool. If someone flinches, people die. Repeat this situation many many times over a day, and tragedies will happen.

Except that "flinching" is not happening. An earlier comment of mine:

---

On the most recent event, a reduced-speed video showing one agent (centre, bent over at beginning) removing the victim's firearm from his waistband, then a second agent (left) waiting for the first to get clear, and then pulling his pistol (video stops before any shooting):

* https://x.com/TheWarMonitor/status/2015272806636736647

* https://xcancel.com/TheWarMonitor/status/2015272806636736647

The actual shooting of the victim; view discretion advised:

* https://x.com/TheWarMonitor/status/2015335743443378660

* https://xcancel.com/TheWarMonitor/status/2015335743443378660

---

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46754974

The second waited for the first guy to be clear, then drew, then started shooting. He was waiting for his opportunity.

[RealityVoid]

I saw the video, it was horrifying. My (admittedly, attempting to be as charitable as possible to murderers) take is that the one taking the weapon must have said he has a gun, and the first shooter reacted to that. It's a very sad day for the US, Alex Pretti seemed like a great person and what happened was disgraceful.

I still think that the most dangerous thing from this whole situation is how this admin frames it and effectively encourages ICE to kill people further, because there will be no consequence for them. Essentially, same thing they did with the Jan 6 protesters.

[fugalfervor]

Call me crazy, but I think the most dangerous thing about people killing people is that people are killing people.

[ajam1507]

>The point is, when tense situations happen, you need to have everyone keep their cool.

That's why we train law enforcement to de-escalate instead of doing what they are doing right now, which is antagonizing and brutalizing. You absolve them of their crimes when you pretend that this was all inevitable.

[palata]

I am totally against ICE, but I came here to say that I agree with the parent. In situations of stress like this, you never know how one may react. It takes a great deal of training to be able to stay calm and rational in such situations.

Obviously, the ICE agents have to rationalise what they do. "We are the good guy, we work against the bad guys". But I don't think that they wake up in the morning hoping that they will have an opportunity to hurt what they themselves consider "average americans".

Looking at the video, I could totally imagine that the first shot fired was a mistake, and then one or more of the agents panic and shoot... well... a LOT of times. That doesn't seem rational, or professional. I don't think that the agent thinks "ahah! Here is my opportunity, I'll shoot him 5 more times". Still, they killed someone for no apparent reason (it's not a proportional defense, quite obviously) and they should be judged for that.

[AlecSchueler]

> It takes a great deal of training to be able to stay calm and rational in such situations.

Then why are they letting people take these positions without specific training and why are they letting them return to work immediately after making fatal mistakes? Why are those above them immediately covering up their mistakes and why are their colleagues illegally tampering with evidence after the events take place?

[palata]

I totally agree.

[JKCalhoun]

"In situations of stress like this, you never know how one may react."

Yes, please don't give those people guns.

[queenkjuul]

They have made it so abundantly clear that they absolutely do not see these people as "average Americans" that i genuinely do not know how you can say so.

[burnto]

Yep, I also have been a bit alarmed how this is pattern matching to early phases of the many revolutions covered in the Revolutions podcast. A U.S. revolution is a frightening proposition, even if it’ll seem warranted at some future point.

[idiotsecant]

There are absolutely people in this group who woke up hoping they got an excuse to murder someone. You interact with the entire gamut of human experience every day, but you never know which ones are the secret heroes and which ones are the secret concentration camp guards until they're presented with the right set of circumstances. It's as much a mistake to assume that everyone is relatively moral as it is to assume that everyone is relatively evil.

[RealityVoid]

I agree with you, I just assume that the percentage of completely evil people is much smaller than most people think, but large enough that you interact with them regularly. And that you can get good people to do evil things if you put them in the right situation.

[defrost]

My comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46751234 and the link to a Coroner's report might be of interest.

Most LEO's are lawful well intentioned, but they do stand by and cover for a good many who are not, those that these days have encrypted chat groups dehumanising those they interact with and swapping notes on what they can get away with and come out smelling of roses.

Those rotten apples corrupt new recruits and normalise harshly putting the boot in, curb stomping, and other extremes.

An acquaintance of mine has seen the full roller coaster over the past 45 years, first defending police that were unquestionably exuberant in violence, later shunned for having had enough and pulling the rug.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Quigley_(politician)

[queenkjuul]

> They probably don't wake up thinking "Today I'm going to murder someone"

Oh they absolutely fucking do

[tombert]

> They probably don't wake up thinking "Today I'm going to murder someone" but they just don't realize what they're doing.

Maybe not explicitly, but I do think there's a selection bias towards people who do want to do that. If you know you can get away with exerting violence towards a group of people you don't like, then that career is going to be very appealing towards people who want to do that.

It's the same thing with priests and their abuse of children. It's not like being a priest turns you into a child-abuser. It's just that priests are in a situation that they're constantly surrounded by kids unsupervised, can live alone unmarried without anyone questioning it, and when they do something horrible and abuse their power then they're often just moved to another parish. Of course a job like that is going to be attractive to people who want to abuse children.

I think ICE is similar. I do think there are people who join ICE with genuinely noble intentions, like getting rid of cartels and whatnot, but the Trump admin has made ICE something extremely appealing to people who have worse intentions.

[analognoise]

These Nazis know what they’re doing.