It's also not just the amount of training they receive, but the content of the training. When you learn in Police academy that 1) everyone is armed and dangerous and 2) everyone is out to kill you, you tend to be more aggressive. And this is drilled into their skulls with the equivalent of a jackhammer. No wonder you get cops that are completely devoid of empathy, reason and humanity, but rather trigger happy assholes who will use violence for every single issue.
From what I understand the system is little bit more involved. In the Academy they technically teach you all the rules you need to abide by. But they drill the self and buddy defense imperative into you at every moment. This is so they can point at the training regimen whenever reformers make a stink.
But that's not the end of training for police officers. There's two more crucial steps. First you have to get through probation where it's really easy to fire you and your training officer basically controls that 100%. So it's a vibe check. Then they send you to continuing training seminars that propagandize police into a Hollywood Western mindset and teach them to not feel guilt or shame at killing people. Basically lowering the psychological barrier to shooting people.
Which for the record, isn't even a step the military takes. It's not hard to dehumanize someone threatening you. The only reason you'd need a class to do so, is if you're trying to dehumanize people before hand.
Their justification for it is such an open and obvious lie too. He might get bored and quit? Because he's too smart? Makes zero sense. On the list of jobs one might do I don't think being a cop would rank very high in the boredom rankings.
Are you judging the profession based on television? The majority of cops sit somewhere for a long ass time waiting for something to happen then when it does its mostly something boring like hauling a drunk driver in, writing a speeding ticket, or responding to a domestic violence call to either play therapist or MAYBE haul the guy off for the night knowing that nothing will happen except a tearful reunion.
On TV cops fire their guns twice in 30 minutes whereas in reality 68% NEVER fire a firearm in their career. There are almost a million officers in the US you have no doubt seen many in passing. Did it seem like on average they are out doing exciting things?
You'd be surprised. Unless you're in very specific parts it's a lot like the military. Boredom for 99 percent of the time and 1 percent "action". Add on to that, the second they find out you're a "smart guy" you're going into an office job where you stare at spreadsheets all day.
this comes up again and again and it's always only this one case. iq and being a good cop is not even directly related so I wish people would stop bringing this up as some sort of gotcha.
Actually IQ is correlated to problem solving which literally makes you a better everything just not obviously by itself. While this case is an extreme example of scaring off smart people there are lots of less direct ways you can discourage them from joining your ranks. Promoting idiots to positions of power and allowing them to erect dysfunctional systems that people l lower on the totem pole aren't allowed to change, punishing anyone who snitches on their fellow cops misbehavior, and promoting your idiot cronies are all pretty effect and pervasively practiced.
Compare that to the federal standard 3-5 years of University-like education with loads of theory and practice parts they need in my country to be a basic police(wo)man. Topics like deescalation techniques, basic communication in several languages, and psychological training are integral parts of the curriculum. And much more important than knowing how to shoot or beat up someone.
While I agree that police need more training and psychological evaluations... How much of this is because job training schools lobbied for needless licenses and things to be covered under those licenses? Does someone really need 1600 hours of training to cut hair?
It differs state to state but being a barber and cutting hair are not the same thing. A barber's license is one of a few different ones used to get a job cutting hair. The thing that barbers generally do that others don't is provide a shave. Use of a straight razor along with health and safety is part of the training.
For context a full time bachelors student is pulling about 600 hours in one 15 week semester.
You can absolutely use a safety razor. Best haircut place I ever went to for my military cuts did so. If it's a scissors and buzzers cut, anything over 40 hours is just exploitation.
It makes sense to have a separate license since those signs ran on stupid high voltage. I had a friend nearly stop his heart messing around with a neon sign transformer (he knew how dangerous it was, he just didn't care)
Actually you might be surprised how much building code interior designers have to know.
For example, in California permanently installed kitchen islands are required to have electrical outlets on either side. You gotta know that to design the kitchen in a way that won't get your clients in trouble.
Well obviously. You have to live with a bad haircut for at least a few weeks, what could a police officer do that would affect your life as much as that?
I can't really comment on how much is a sufficient amount of training for law enforcement, cuz fuck if I know. There's certainly no shortage of problems from cops, but is the root of that problem their training? I suspect it has more to do with the quality of applicant / screening in the hiring process. There are a handful of kinds of people who'd be interested in a career in law enforcement, and most of those are the kind of person who shouldn't be trusted with ANY authority.
You can't train someone out of being a shitty person.
Tbh the column on the left is the one that elicits more of a 'seriously?' from me. Why in the everliving FUCK would I need more than a couple youtube videos worth of insight + a cert showing you understand how and why to clean sharp shit between clients to give hair cutting or nail painting a shot? Result might not be pretty right out the gate; but legally speaking, who cares? Price it low until your skills increase.
You might not be able to train the shitty out of a turd, but you can raise the cost of entry and weed out some dingleberries. If the required effort is higher and the time commitment greater, it might deter some folks.
You can't train the shitty out of someone? You can have them supervised for a lot longer and if they have the pattern they fail. That is the exact purpose of pointing out the difference.