Nah man when there’s a terrorist threat or some kids are getting fesity we call up those smitty brothers down on farmdale ave. I’ve seen em hit smack in the middle of grandma’s can o beans from a mile and a half away in the rain – i swears it!
The police don’t just pull farm boys with a crack shot every time they have a sporting event. They are fucking cops. Not only cops, but specialty cops. SWAT cunts. My homie is one - went from infantry to ranger to police to swat. Yeah - he’s a cunt, too. ACAB.
Just because you can’t read Chinese doesn’t mean it was spam.
Industry standard tiananamen square copy pasta that gets Chinese propaganda pushers in trouble with Winnie The Pooh. You realize how this looks for you and this instance right?
Look, can we start this over? I don’t like how this played out and I too was getting bent out of shape for what was likely good-intentions.
I’d understand if you were still upset and needed some time yet, totally fine
Lemmy is supposed to be better than Reddit culture, and be more civilized, and I feel like this was a fail here. I’d like to try again and maybe we can have some civil discourse about this if you’re up for it
Maybe? I don’t know if that’s worth the time though. Even if no rifle exists up there they could bring one up whenever. I’m sure there is security footage though of them hauling supplies in.
TIL spotters like to use one normal sized spotting scope alongside another one that’s the size of a rifle with a cover on it. Doesn’t make sense to me but I’m no spotter.
The guy who posted that is pretty well known in this instance for being a reliable information source on events happening in Ohio. They’re not just a random user.
In any case, the people saying this is pretty standard security for a large gathering of people are correct in it’s regularity, but I’m not particularly convinced that they’re correct in its efficacy as a practice. They’re all visible enough that they can be seen by the student body, which is either bad planning or blatant intimidation, and obviously gives up their position immediately, which is bad since they’re potentially a would-be ne’er-do-well’s greatest threat. If anyone becomes embedded in the protesting crowd, they become much less effective, if anyone takes up a tactical position, they become much less effective. If anyone starts to try to instigate violence between the protestors and police, which would probably be what any bad actor would do since it has a pretty high chance of success, they’re much reduced in their efficacy, or potentially even negative in their efficacy as it leads to an escalation of violence. If anyone has a bomb or does chemical attack, the sniper is probably too late.
Plus, from what I’ve seen of the other protests, the police already have a perimeter set up on the ground keeping track of who enters and exits, which makes sense. Snipers would probably be better served as a part of that perimeter rather than surveying the inside of the protest, since they can cover a pretty large distance, you could turn them around pretty quickly, if they did need to fire on where the protestors are actually gathered, they can screen who’s entering and exiting, and it’s overall better optics. They could probably keep their position better concealed since there’s not a huge crowd of people looking at that side of the building (if they even made any attempt to be concealed, which should be really the bare minimum).
This doesn’t make any sense to me, even just as a kind of surface-level tactical decision. Maybe I’m missing something here, but this just seems like it’s maybe stupidity, or intimidation or something else I can’t think of.
dude has his bipod deployed on top of his tripod, in possibly the least comfortable and most obvious position of all time, hoo lee, get this guy a medal or something we’re sending our best to protect against the dangerous student body
Look up at the sky, at the dark shapes of Coalition airships hanging there. Ask yourself: is there something sinister in moralism? And then answer: no. God is in his heaven. Everything is normal on Earth.
Wtf… Cops in riot gear arresting students before 10pm, and fucking SNIPERS intimidating in a peaceful one night protest on a college campus. And a university spokesperson saying “demonstrators exercised their first amendment right for several hours and then were instructed to disperse” like yeah, that’s enough first amendment right for you guys, go be quiet now.
Nope. Just nope. You are not free. Burn it all to the ground before it’s too late or we’re actually fucked.
Time to go full French on these fuckers. Molotovs are easy to prepare, as are pipe/nail bombs. Tires burn for a long time. There’s a lot of barricading materials inside the school which can be used, no doubt.
Yep. Lemmy.world gets the ideological Reddit crowd that can’t stay due to some enshittification-related controversy, but they still want Reddit, so they go to the largest, generalist instance.
Anyone from Reddit with more niche interests likely already goes to leftist, programming, star trek, blahaj, or other instances that match their niche interest, which lesves Lemmy.world with everyone else.
I’m gonna get downvotes too but you guys are right. It doesnt matter what social media forum you go.on they all end up the same in the end. Definitely plenty of brain dead takes on lemmy, it doesn’t matter where those posters came from because they ARE part of lemmy now even if people want to pretend that doesn’t count (it does).
As someone who’s worked large events and closely with police or other big wig officials, I am consistently surprised at how people are surprised about how high profile event security works.
The amount of work that goes into keeping people safe regularly is monumental. You’d also be surprised at just how much hard targets don’t get attacked when a limelight is cast on them compared to soft targets. It’s violence prevention 101 and easily the most important.
It seems insane to me because I’ve only met armed police once in my life, and that was at download festival in the UK after a spree of terrorist attacks across the UK and the rest of Europe.
That was quite entertaining however as the armed police kept having to run away from drunk people who wanted pictures taken with the guns.
Agreed, most of the responses here are ridiculous.
They bring snipers out anytime there’s a big event or a major public figure. Michelle Obama visited the University of Akron when I was going there, they had snipers all over the place.
They’re not bringing out snipers for some kind of perverted crowd control. It’s almost definitely so if someone shows up with a gun and starts firing into the crowd all the protestors don’t get shot.
Yep b3causr there’s absolutely no difference in armed defense when the president or first lady is visiting and when students are protesting, none at all.
He’ll might as well tell the students of tiananmen square that tanks are just a normal part of defence.
Have you considered what would happen if an active shooter, consider one that’s pro-Israel, showed up in that crowd and they didn’t have a sniper?
Tell me you wouldn’t be over here screaming “ACAB” when the cops are unable to get to the shooter (and have to risk firing through a crowd or do nothing) because there are hundreds of college students between where the cops are standing and where the active shooter is.
Having a sniper on the roof is in no way similar to a tank running someone over in the street. There is no practical application for a tank vs a civilian population. There is 100% a valid reason to use a highly skilled marksman to increase the odds that if something bad does happen, it’s stopped quickly, and you can get EMTs to the injured parties.
Your position is offensively wrong.
EDIT: Minor edit to remove a swear and switch to textual emphasis.
Have you considered what would happen if an active shooter, consider one that’s pro-Israel, showed up in that crowd and they didn’t have a sniper?
This is some absolute bullshit “good guy with a gun” mentality.
Also either painfully, painfully naive or fully deepthroating the boot. Like do you actually believe these anti-riot cops are there to protect the protestors?
Might as well claim that the police at the BLM protests were just there to protect them at that point as well.
Tell me you wouldn’t be over here screaming “ACAB” when the cops are unable to get to the shooter (and have to risk firing through a crowd or do nothing) because there are hundreds of college students between where the cops are standing and where the active shooter is.
I wouldn’t, I would be talking about the insane fucking gunman killing a bunch of people. Like do you remember the Vegas shooting? The discourse wasn’t about the police and how they didn’t have snipers everywhere at this event, it was about the actual shooter.
Having a sniper on the roof is in no way similar to a tank running someone over in the street
Okay, then what about the riot cops and traditional military that actually started the massacre? Am I allowed to compare those? Or would that undermine your point too much?
There is 100% a valid reason to use a highly skilled marksman to increase the odds that if something bad does happen, it’s stopped quickly, and you can get EMTs to the injured parties.
Yeah and it’s just a nice little coincidence that they could be used on the protestors too right? And we all know the police would never lie, or use force against protestors, especially left wing students right? So we should just take them 100% at their word and just let them point weapons at peaceful protestors.
You’re either the most naive person on the planet or have a boot kicking fetish. Either way you fucking disgust me.
Yeah and it’s just a nice little coincidence that they could be used on the protestors too right?
Give me ONE incident of an active duty US sniper (police or military) EVER shooting a SINGLE protestor with even so much as a rubber bullet. Otherwise your argument is complete bull shit.
Edit: This isn’t some “good guy with a gun” or “untrained beat cop” situation. This is a sniper.
Edit 2: For anyone who wants to understand what is almost certainly happening here, watch this video youtu.be/PnEB5u2wqEY?si=58MTT_sqv1Tf7Lv6. This is standard procedure when you get these large gatherings to protect people. This person is actively encouraging increased risk to the safety of the protestors (and everyone else involved), while making personal attacks, and completely unfounded claims about this being some form of political persecution. It’s IMO ridiculous and indefensible behavior regardless of where you stand on the Israel and Gaza situation.
The 40ish arrests kinda lean towards this being intimidation. Also I think shooting into a crowd (where these teams where pointing) has never been a good idea and as far as I can tell no evidence exists of even a single time a sniper team has been successfully used in any crowded area. (If you find some please share)
It’s not intimidation because it’s normal for any large crowd. The snipers are not there to arrest anybody. The snipers are not going to assassinate some random college student.
You’re also not going to find “the snipers really saved the day” articles because they’re just going to say “the police” in pretty much any article praising a police response. They also don’t normally shoot their guns and are more to assist the folks on the ground with figuring out where trouble is and how to get to it.
You could do a lot of the same job with a pair of binoculars. I’m sure they don’t because it’s just another expense and then you need to switch from binoculars to a rifle and find the target again if something does go sideways.
Give me ONE incident of an active duty US sniper (police or military) EVER shooting a SINGLE protestor with even so much as a rubber bullet. Otherwise your argument is complete bull shit.
So because that very specific combination of a sniper shooting a protestor in America hasn’t happened yet that makes it okay? Snipers have shot other civilians, the police have shot protestors and police snipers have shot protestors before in other countries. So you would have to be really dishonest to pretend that means it’s fine.
Edit: This isn’t some “good guy with a gun” or “untrained beat cop” situation. This is a sniper.
“Police violence is okay as lk g as they are trained”
So was this shooting justified then because the sniper wasn’t as untrained as a random beat cop?
Like I get you’ve committed to the position and there’s no way you’re mature enough to deviate from that now, but my god this is such a bad hill yo die on.
Did you even read the article you linked? A dude shot his girlfriend in the head with a shotgun. Then was taking shots in the dark (literally) shooting from a building while he had a baby in his arms. That could not be more different of a situation from stopping an active shooter in a public gathering. It also has absolutely nothing to do with using snipers as some means of intimidating protestors or suppressing political speech. This was a very tricky domestic situation that went wrong.
This article also says:
A former federal law enforcement sniper, whose name KCUR is withholding because he now works in the private sector, said “99.9 percent of the time” snipers are relaying information to commanders, not firing their weapons.
The most important rule for a sniper is they “must be absolutely sure of the identity” of any target. That directive is on page one of the FBI’s Advance Rifle Training manual.
Don’t you dare start talking about maturity. You’ve been more than happy to make numerous personal attacks and inflammatory remarks.
I’m done with this conversation. You can believe what you want but you are very very wrong about the facts and risks of this situation and the personal attacks do nothing to help your argument.
As I already told the other person: Those were not snipers, they were national guardsman that were untrained for that kind of work and they shouldn’t have ever been there.
Why shouldn’t they have been there? By the logic of the other poster, having the national guard with rifles lined up would have protected the protesters from an active shooter. Wouldn’t everyone be so angry at the police if they didn’t stop the active shooter with the national guardsmen?
Is there something special about being a sniper that makes you not a cop? That makes you not part of the same system, the same trainings, the same culture, the same lunch room, that leads regular officers and riot cops to brutalize protesters, especially those on the left? Is there some requirement that to be a sniper you have to be extra nice to leftist causes?
The fact is that absent some specific threat the department received, or some extra-special high value target/event (Superbowl, presidential address, etc) the use of snipers to “protect” the protesters is a farse. We should both know that if anything the snipers are there to “protect the university and its property” much more than the protesters because that’s what the rest of the cops are there for.
You can’t stop a shooter with a line of national guardsmen. You also can’t figure out where they are in a timely fashion without someone with a vantage point.
There is a lot special about a sniper, including more and regular training specifically for the role. A sniper also (typically) is not in the heat of the situation. Nobody is throwing a brick up to the 5th floor. For similar reasons, a sniper can’t beat the crap out of someone from the 5th floor.
That’s extremely different from a national guardsman, especially like those that were sent to Kent with automatic rifles, minimal training, and placed right next to the protestors. From what I understand this has improved following the Kent State massacre, however the national guard should be a last resort in these situations.
The fact is that absent some specific threat the department received, or some extra-special high value target/event (Superbowl, presidential address, etc) the use of snipers to “protect” the protesters is a farse.
By the time that happens it’s too late. You’ve got a panicked crowd, you have no visibility, and nobody in a position to take a shot. There’s a reason they use snipers in big public sporting events, gatherings, and while protecting a public figure.
The thing that’s fundamentally wrong with the argument that snipers aren’t there to protect protestors is that they’re regularly used in these exact same situations for any large public gathering (unlike riot police).
They had snipers at the Marietta Sternwheel Festival the last few years. This isn’t some fringe thing, it has nothing to do with the fact they’re protestors or protecting property. It’s about protecting people by keeping an eye on the situation and (possibly) taking an individual threatening the gathering out quickly if necessary.
This is some absolute bullshit “good guy with a gun” mentality.
Has any shooting to your knowledge been stopped by anything other than a self defender, a cop, or the guy shooting himself to avoid said cops? The common denominator in any of those is “a gun held by someone intending to stop the shooter.” (In the case of the shooter shooting himself, it is generally still to avoid a group of guys with guns intending to stop the shooter, the cops.)
You’re one of those “harvard says the good guy with a gun is a myth” guys, aren’t you? I can smell it in your comment. Seems you missed an important note from that study however: While defensive gun use is “more accurately estimated at 100,000 DGU/yr,” instead of the CDC’s reported estimates by Kleck and Lott, all gun deaths including suicide and accidents are still around 60,000 a year, adjusting for intentional homicide only gets 12,000/yr, and just for fun those scary black rifles that are “the problem” are only used in ~500 deaths/yr. Furthermore their study discounted entirely what is likely the most common form of defensive gun use, defensive display, in which the sight of the firearm is enough to scare off the attacker. This means that Harvards 100,000 estimate would be low if we included them. Still though, even with them pretending defensive display is all lies, 100,000>60,000>12,000>500, meaning guns are used far more for defense than murder or suicide.
What can we take away from this? Well, if 100,000 is SO infrequent that we can categorize it as a “myth,” what then is 60,000 or 12,000 or 500? If 100,000 dgu is a myth, so to must be our 60,000 gun deaths at 40,000 less.
I’m really not sure a sniper would be super useful in that situation. Obviously, different environment than the 2017 las vegas shooting, but I don’t really think that those snipers on rooftops would really be effective at all in taking out a committed shooter, which could just shack up in one of the many buildings with windows facing the crowd and fire down or into the crowd. Maybe in that case, a sniper might be able to peep out where the shooter is, or might be able to get a shooter on the way in or out, but with the level of people there and the level of surrounding buildings, I’m really not sure they’d be able to do very much. Obviously if someone just walks in off the street and opens up on everyone, then a sniper might be more effective, but I dunno.
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