The video shows Officer Ryan Westlake speaking to Tavion Koonce-Williams through his car window and seconds later firing his weapon toward the teen, whose arms were raised.
You do have a point. What would happen if someone with a real gun shot up a school, and during the investigation it showed the killer interacting with a security guard at the front of the building, who would later say, “they said it was fake so I let them through”
It’s good to be skeptical but I’ll never understand being skeptical in service of bootlicking. Why are you doing mental gymnastics to absolve this scumbag cop of any responsibility? You’re going out of your way to defend a piece of shit cop while simultaneously trying to find a reason to justify shooting this kid.
Maybe you need to ask yourself why you’re doing that.
I think what they’re trying to get at is that if you see a gun, you assume it’s real until proven otherwise.
Should police be shooting people just for having a gun in a country where we have a legal right to bear arms? No, of course not. But saying that the cop should have immediately known it was fake is a BS argument. They have no way to know that and when in doubt, it is always a real loaded firearm. Firearm safety 101 is literally to always assume every gun is loaded and live until proven otherwise.
If you’re going to argue at least use reasonable arguments that don’t make all of us in the ACAB crowd look dumb. Like the fact that this cop was known to have a drinking problem and a history of domestic violence which should have disqualified him from being a cop. Plus police shouldn’t be shooting people for meerly posessing a weapon in a country where that is a legally protected right. Plus the kid was nowhere near the gun when the cop shot him.
What unreasonable arguments are you referring to? I didn’t make any arguments, I just asserted that the cop is a scumbag (for reasons you highlight) and said that the other user should not be bending over backwards to defend the cop.
Like you say, he acted stupidly and was not justified in firing on the kid. Trying to put blame on the kid is an attempt to defend the cop. We would not be tolerant of the same user pointing to a woman’s outfit in a thread about rape.
Apologies for assuming you were a conservative, I’ve seen you around and you do seem to have mostly reasonable takes; but defending cops shooting a kid for having a toy is an objectively bad one.
Agreed that the only real solution is fewer guns though.
I’m not defending the cop. He could have parked down the street and got in the megaphone asking for the guy to empty his pockets and get on his knees. Dude totally fucked up by rolling up to him. Obviously if they thought he had a gun, getting close is a bad idea.
Clearly the cop needs a little more training. But come on, walking down the street brandishing a “gun” in 2024? Not a super smart move.
Kids don’t have the same risk evaluation skills as adults. You’re blaming the victim of a shooting because they don’t have the life experience that you do.
It’s like saying “walking downtown in a skirt that short? Not a super smart move.” It’s not explicitly blaming a sexual assault victim for their attack, but you’re implying that they’re at least a little responsible.
You do have a point. What would happen if someone with a real gun shot up a school, and during the investigation it showed the killer interacting with a security guard at the front of the building, who would later say, “they said it was fake so I let them through”
It’s good to be skeptical but I’ll never understand being skeptical in service of bootlicking. Why are you doing mental gymnastics to absolve this scumbag cop of any responsibility? You’re going out of your way to defend a piece of shit cop while simultaneously trying to find a reason to justify shooting this kid.
Maybe you need to ask yourself why you’re doing that.
I’m not actually trying to defend the cop or the teenager. I’m certainly not “going out of my way.”
Cops shouldn’t have guns.
I think what they’re trying to get at is that if you see a gun, you assume it’s real until proven otherwise.
Should police be shooting people just for having a gun in a country where we have a legal right to bear arms? No, of course not. But saying that the cop should have immediately known it was fake is a BS argument. They have no way to know that and when in doubt, it is always a real loaded firearm. Firearm safety 101 is literally to always assume every gun is loaded and live until proven otherwise.
If you’re going to argue at least use reasonable arguments that don’t make all of us in the ACAB crowd look dumb. Like the fact that this cop was known to have a drinking problem and a history of domestic violence which should have disqualified him from being a cop. Plus police shouldn’t be shooting people for meerly posessing a weapon in a country where that is a legally protected right. Plus the kid was nowhere near the gun when the cop shot him.
What unreasonable arguments are you referring to? I didn’t make any arguments, I just asserted that the cop is a scumbag (for reasons you highlight) and said that the other user should not be bending over backwards to defend the cop.
Like you say, he acted stupidly and was not justified in firing on the kid. Trying to put blame on the kid is an attempt to defend the cop. We would not be tolerant of the same user pointing to a woman’s outfit in a thread about rape.
The person you were responding to was responding to this comment.
I didn’t realize you weren’t the one who posted that comment so that’s my bad.
What school allows even fake guns in?
The lengths conservatives will go to to excuse police shooting a black kid who wasn’t breaking any law is astonishing.
Do we let cops just shoot anyone they suspect was brandishing?
Im not a conservative.
Cops shouldn’t even have guns. Guns shouldn’t even exist.
Sure, but they do have guns and guns do exist.
Apologies for assuming you were a conservative, I’ve seen you around and you do seem to have mostly reasonable takes; but defending cops shooting a kid for having a toy is an objectively bad one.
Agreed that the only real solution is fewer guns though.
I’m not defending the cop. He could have parked down the street and got in the megaphone asking for the guy to empty his pockets and get on his knees. Dude totally fucked up by rolling up to him. Obviously if they thought he had a gun, getting close is a bad idea.
Clearly the cop needs a little more training. But come on, walking down the street brandishing a “gun” in 2024? Not a super smart move.
Kids don’t have the same risk evaluation skills as adults. You’re blaming the victim of a shooting because they don’t have the life experience that you do.
It’s like saying “walking downtown in a skirt that short? Not a super smart move.” It’s not explicitly blaming a sexual assault victim for their attack, but you’re implying that they’re at least a little responsible.
If he was 10, and looked like a kid, I’d agree with you.
However, if the cop didn’t have a gun, he’d have to solve the problem without violence…
I feel the comparison to rape is not appropriate. No one “freaks out and rapes” because they’re afraid for their life.
Change this to “if he was white,” and you can see how ridiculous this argument is. I wasn’t making any point about his appearance; that’s irrelevant.
The rest of your post is just as irrelevant to the points that I made, so I see no use in responding to them.
If he was a green alien 👽 sounds ridiculous too. We can change the words to make anything sound ridiculous.
Is your suggestion that the security guard immediately kill this person?