[junaru]

This is not some footage issue, there apparently was a smear campaign online.

FTFA:

> After making the music video, Foreman allegedly continued putting up social media posts with names of the officers involved, the lawsuit states.

> Several of the posts allegedly falsely claimed that the cops “stole my money” and were “criminals disguised as law enforcement,” according to the suit.

> They also falsely stated that the officers are “white supremacists,” that Officer Brian Newman “used to do hard drugs” before “snitching” on his friends, and that Officer Lisa Phillips is “biologically male,” according to the lawsuit.

[ceejayoz]

> falsely claimed that the cops “stole my money”

That appears to have happened; they're claiming it was a miscount.

> were “criminals disguised as law enforcement,”

Seems fair. (And opinion, which can't be defamation.)

> They also falsely stated that the officers are “white supremacists,”

Statistically that's a pretty sensible assumption.

I'd note that the jury found Afroman not liable on all these.

[tt24]

> They also falsely stated that the officers are “white supremacists,”

> Statistically that's a pretty sensible assumption.

Interesting, is there a source or some data you’re aware of that suggests that it’s a statistically safe assumption?

[alpha_squared]

The American police force originally started as a formalized slave patrol to capture runaway slaves [0]. It's well-documented [1]. We can try to argue whether modern policing carries that tradition, but case [2] after documented case [3] keeps bearing out more of the same. It's been the topic of research [4] and pop culture [5].

[0] https://www.nas.org/academic-questions/36/3/did-american-pol...

[1] https://time.com/4779112/police-history-origins/

[2] https://www.britannica.com/biography/Rodney-King

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Floyd

[4] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7331505/

[5] https://genius.com/123154

[janalsncm]

Pretty clear issues with this line of reasoning.

One, even if all police in the U.S. did start as slave patrols it is a textbook case of a genetic fallacy.

Two, your article discusses several origins of police forces in the US. In Boston it had nothing to do with slaves because Massachusetts was not a slave state when they created a police system in the 1830s. And since Afroman was raided in Ohio, also never a slave state, it does not make sense to carry over southern slave-catching history into modern police culture.

[ceejayoz]

> In Boston it had nothing to do with slaves because Massachusetts was not a slave state when they created a police system in the 1830s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugitive_Slave_Act_of_1793

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugitive_Slave_Act_of_1850

"It required that all escaped slaves, upon capture, be returned to the slave-owner and that officials and citizens of free states had to cooperate."

Boston's police department was founded in 1854.

[janalsncm]

> The first publicly funded, organized police force with officers on duty full-time was created in Boston in 1838.

This is from your Time.com article.

Second, fugitive slave extradition was controversial in northern states and from your Wikipedia article several northern states even passed legislation to protect fugitive slaves.

And why would northern states spend their own tax dollars to fund police forces to capture slaves? It doesn’t make sense. They created police for public safety reasons in cities.

And even if none of that were true it still does not address the genetic fallacy. Just because some police forces started as slave patrols does not imply that all police today are inherently white supremacist.

[tt24]

> The American police force originally started as a formalized slave patrol to capture runaway slaves

I don't see how this supports the claim

[alpha_squared]

You don't see how an organization founded to enforce a cornerstone of white supremacy may have a statistical likelihood of its members being white supremacists?

[tt24]

No, I don't think that this supports the claim that it's a safe assumption that any given cop is a white supremacist.

[ahhhhnoooo]

You seem to be under the mistaken impression that the claim here is "majority of cops are white supremacists". Thats not the claim. The claim is that it is sensible to assume a cop is.

A very different bar. A minority of cops can be white supremacists and because of the power they wield it's still sensible to treat them like every interaction is with a a white supremacist. As an example, a cop can legally kill you in many cases (or deny you freedom or seize your assets). If you had, say, a 20% chance of encountering a cop who was a white supremacist it would be sensible to treat every interaction as if that were the case.

Consider how unevenly weighted the outcomes depending on whether you assume a cop is racist when factoring how sensible it is to assume they are.

[ceejayoz]

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/fbi-white-supremacists-i...

[parineum]

You understand that white supremacist groups existing as cops doesn't make the majority of cops white supremacists, right?

I'd hate to see someone use this kind of bad logic when deciding who is a criminal.

[ceejayoz]

> I'd hate to see someone use this kind of bad logic when deciding who is a criminal.

Oh dear. I have bad news about cops.

[parineum]

Which is, apparently, a strategy you wholly endorse.

[tt24]

Where in this article does it suggest that it’s a statistically safe assumption that most cops are white supremacists?

[ceejayoz]

It's one data point in a pretty large body of evidence; the FBI thinks they're infiltrating law enforcement in a widespread fashion.

A fascinating study from Stanford looked at police traffic stops nationally around the daylight savings switch (as a natural experimental control) and found pretty hard evidence cops treat black drivers very differently during the day (i.e. when they can see their skin color).

https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2020/05/veil-darkness-redu...

Additional aspect of this: "you're a white supremacist" is almost certainly a First Amendment protected statement of opinion that can't be defamatory.

[throw0101d]

Warnings going back to 2006:

* https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/media/24350/ocr

[kstrauser]

Behold, the sea lion in its native habitat.

[ethagnawl]

Do you personally know any police officers? I do and, as a group, I've found them to be more racist than the general population. I don't know what the working definition of "white supremacists" is in this context but it doesn't make me blink.

[Spivak]

This phenomenon happens with more than just police too—I've seen it happen with medical professionals, firefighters and EMTs as well.

0. Be a white person who has little to no interaction with non-white people in your day to day life.

1. Get a job where you interact with some of the dumbest people in the general public on the regular.

2. Some of those dumb people will invariably be, say, black. And you'll interact with way more black folks than the none you're use to interacting with.

3. Because you have no other association with that group your brain pattern matches and draws the connection.

4. Boom racism.

I find it hard to judge these people too hard because I haven't been "tested" in the same way. Like I want to believe I wouldn't fall down this pipeline but everyone says that.

[allan_s]

We can't on one side ask for people to not make judgment based on statistics and on the other side saying that making a shortcut based statistics is valid.

[mothballed]

Won't someone think of those who falsely accuse someone of kidnapping when they get a similarly ridiculous accusation against them?

This is part of why we have juries. The letter of the law must be nullified sometimes in the interest of justice.

[EvgeniyZh]

Statistically speaking "murderer is black" is a sensible assumption in US [1], but I'd prefer it wouldn't be made

[1] https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime-in-the-u.s.-...

[ceejayoz]

The chance of a random black person being a murderer is substantially lower than the chance of a random cop being racist.

[loeg]

> Statistically that's a pretty sensible assumption.

Also, you know, protected opinion.

[behringer]

It's not smears when it's (mostly) true or opinion.

[TheCoelacanth]

Doesn't really matter since police officers are public officials. The bar for defaming a public official is actual malice, which is clearly not the case here. They need to prove that he deliberately said facts that he knew were false with the deliberate intention of harming them. It was also obviously a satirical song which further weakens the case. This is such a weak case it should have been thrown out before it ever reached trial.

[ceejayoz]

Honestly, "actual malice" part probably the thing both parties here agree on existing. It's a series of diss tracks, they're inherently malicious.

You're just allowed to be maliciously right about things, if you like.

[snackbroken]

"Actual malice" is confusingly not about if the defendant was acting maliciously. It is specific legal jargon meaning that the defendant knowingly or with reckless disregard for the truth made the false statements.

[ceejayoz]

One of the songs claims he fucked one of the deputies' wives; I presume that, at least, fits it. (Unless it's true.)

[ryukoposting]

It's a NY Post article. Expect some slant, and find a second opinion.