The point I think a lot of people are trying to make is that we have ABSOLUTELY NO WAY OF KNOWING what the child would turn into. She could have been the savior of humanity, or she could have been the one to doom us all. NO ONE CAN KNOW, so NO ONE can argue "The baby's life was more/less important because she could grow up to be [blank]". There is just as much probability that she would do good, as there is probability that she would do harm. WE DO NOT KNOW.

The police officer is already doing good for society. While he might not be discovering a cure for AIDS, at least he's doing what he can to help the small area of the world that he lives in. That's more than you can say for most people.

No life is worth more than another. But, personally, I'd rather go with what we already know to be good, than with an unknown that has just as much potential to grow into good or evil.

However, regardless of who's right and who's wrong, of who deserved to live or die, it doesn't change what happened. It's a tragedy, yes, but we should be thankful that more people didn't have to die, instead of bickering about those who did, because it doesn't change what happened. Either live with it, or die from it, but don't waste your time *****ing about it when it doesn't do any good.



Please do not bring religion into this.

Why do people think a cop is automatically a good person? I disagree that cops really do good for society. They are mere mechanisms to enforce the law. Sure, some of them do good things such as detectives but your average street cop? Whos to say he does anything better for society then your average person? IMO police officers are way too esteemed for what their position really entails. Quite frankly alot of police officers are ****ty people. The job kind of attracts narcissitic *******s with a taste for control and power.

I'm sure the police wanted all this continued negative publicity for themselves, as well as the nasty legal battle that WILL ensue. No, Brian, it's obvious that they did what they could just by the sheer virtue that the reprocussions of shooting the child were clear. I'm sure that in that moment you would fare no better; your backseat driving does not take into account location of the man, the time it would take to set up these ideas, ect. They did not have infinite time to deal with the guy, and your solutions.... a net launcher? Bean bags? Stun guns?! Do you know the range of these things? The chances that these solutions could fail, and thus further enrage the assailant? It's great that you are so willing to sacrifice numerous lives for the sake of one... no wait, with some of your solutions, the guy might have even shot his own daughter, or have her damaged in some other fashion. Then here you would be STILL decrying the eeeevviiiilll police who eat babies.

Brian is right. Nothing will bring the baby back, but the police should learn from this to train more and better snipers. Scoped rifles do exist for a reason.

From what I can gather from the article, this would have happened regaurdless. They started shooting when they tried to evacuate a neighbor from the building. Nothing would change the fact that some of the officers there would also start shooting as well. I sure as hell wouldn't depend on anyone to shoot from above.

I'm not stuck on the "the child could be this or that", I was simply using Emon's own logic against him. He said we weren't sure what the child would of been. It could be Hitler, Jesus Christ v2, next President, whatever, it doesn't matter. My point was that it could of been anything, just pointing it out to Emon.

You know, I suspect one of the strangest things here is if this happened in Iraq, with soldiers, most of the people attacking the guy who shot the baby would be defending him.

The whole post wasn't directed towards you, and especially not that part. Alot of people on here seem to be very anti-cop and base opinions solely on that.

The thing about the situation is that we don't even know the way it played out. Sure, theres some info in the article but it doesn't tell it play-by-play, all it mostly says is "gunfire was exchanged."

That could be taken several ways. Just as much as the guy could've been shooting randomly in the air he could've been actually trying to pick off cops thinking they won't shoot no matter what.

The sickening thing about this is how few facts we have, yet people insist on spouting off as if the police were completely to blame for all this and that they have the facts to prove it.

As for the sniper thing, we don't know if they called in snipers or not. They could have and they could've been on the way while this whole thing happened, it doesn't explain the time span of the events. It's a poorly done article. Especially when using quotes that say crap like "300 bullets."

Well, it is CNN. :p

Maybe you all didn't read the article..but:



An officer was shot -- you expect them not to return fire?

300 shots is undoubtedly an exaggeration. They probably fired 20 or 30 at the most.

Also, nowhere in the article did it state that the officers shot the baby -- while it is probable, maybe the guy holding her accidentaly shot her.

No matter how you look at it, the father killed his own child. Ever hear of suicide by cop? This is similar, imho..unfortunately, the child died..but if I were in the officer's shoes, would I stand there and get shot repeatedly? I doubt it..

They called in a SWAT team..an officer was shot..what is your perfect solution, Massassi cop-haters?

Asumming the guy was out side, or the sniper would have had a shot. There're a lot of detail we don't really know. A sniper wouldn't have taken such a shot if there had been a glass window in the way becasue the guy was holding the kid, for example.

The article stated that the man was holding the child hostage in an apartment at one time, but it doesn't state when the fatal shooting took place..or even who shot the child.

hte pigs are keepping us down

Right. There's no telling if a sharp shooter could have prevented the kids death.

Hey, I pretty much hate cops but I'm not argueing with what they did. It was the logical thing to do. People are just being irrational in argueing against this.

Well, you failed. No, there is no real way of knowing what the child would grow up to be, but you can infer by knowing his situation and similar situations of millions of other children in history. Yes, it's possible the kid would have grown up to be a brilliant scientist despite his ****ty parents and community, but history tells us that's not very likely. A child's parents and environment have more influence on his life than any other factors, thus if he lives with ****ty parents in a ****ty community it's not as likely he'll grow up to be successful as if he lived in a middle class family in a nice neighborhood with loving, supporting parents that payed for his college education.

My point was that if I have to choose between an already successful cop, his collegues, civlians and a baby, who, as I already pointed out, is statistically less likely to succeed, I choose the cop, his collegues and the civilians in the area. I realize that you, Spectrael, aren't saying you think the baby's life is more important, I was just offering another view to the other "oh my GOD a BABY! COPS EVIL!" crap in the thread.

The cop could also become bored with policing and find a cure for cancer.

Edit: omf! Does anyone see that google ad at the bottom?

I'm sure they shot the baby just for fun.

The way you guys are acting it's like they shot the baby on purpose...did you even stop to think that the best option was choosen given what was going on at the time?

My problem with that is that you simply seem like an *******. The fact that you think it would be better for a cop, Bill Gates, or anyone who's successful to live over someone else, especially an infant, which by nature we adults (assuming you are) are suppose to protect simply because they're "less likely to succeed" just downright sickens me.

I don't see how you, or anyone for that matter, could have such a view. If this was your daughter or son in this same situation, and someone said to you "Well Emon, your child wasn't successful and wasn't likely to be 'statistically', so it's a good thing he/she died instead of the cop" I'm sure you'd be absolutely furious.

Or actually judging by what you post I'm not so sure you would be.

Oh please. So just because it's an infant it should be protected at all costs? All the cops were once infants. They all have mothers and fathers and children that would miss them to death if they got shot in the line of duty. I think you are really the one being stupid and irrational.

"Hey, lieutenant. Bet you twenty bucks you can't hit the kid."

"You're on."

Yes. I'm sure that's exactly what went on in the situation. Drop out of the Canadian NWA and rejoin the majority of society which realizes that not all cops are black-hating rednecks who toy with teenagers for ****s and giggles.

Or maybe Canadian police just really, really suck ***.

As I keep saying and as you keep ignoring, I said no human life is worth more than any other. My "statistically speaking..." argument was just something I threw out there. When I mentioned success, I didn't mean financially. I meant for the good of the human race. Granted this is on a very small scale, but the cop is already doing something good. From a purely objective, third party point of view, it may be more likely that the cop will better society than a child who we can not tell the future of. The cop, however, is already doing something to help society. That's all I'm saying. I'm not saying I would ever be able to make the choice.

And yes, if it was my child, of course I would want him to survive. Duh. Most species want their young to survive, we're no different. It's a part of natural selection, wanting to make sure your genes are passed on to the next generation. Everything tries to survive - the strong ones do and the weak ones don't. Of course we have feelings and emotions for our children but I'm willing to bet those are an extension of said primative instinct.

So say the infant grows up to be the next hitler, and you look back on this event. Would you have rather the child live, or the police officer?

Don't get me wrong, it's horrible that this happened. The loss of any life is a tragedy, let alone that of a child's. But let's be realistic here; The sad truth is, not everyone always has a chance to live. Some people have to die, and some people have to choose who lives and who doesn't. It's horrible, yes. It's disgusting, yes. But it's reality, and we can't escape that. This man was threatening the safety of the child, the police officers, and anyone else that was in the area. An officer had already been shot. The police were faced with this decision; Either return fire, and risk hitting the child, or hold fire and risk the possibility, nay, the probability that this man would harm more people. I don't care what your opinion on the matter is, the fact is that losing the child was the lesser of two evils. It's horrible, but it was the only option.

Let's dumb it down a bit. You have the choice of saving one life and losing two, or saving two and losing one. What would you choose?

Did I say anything at all that I thought the cops did this on purpose?? No I ****ing didn't. Infact I said that I DID agree with what the cops did in this situation. So keep your stupid sarcastic comments to your self.

And no, not all cops are *******s. I clearly said MOST, and I believe that. And I HAVE seen cops toy with teenagers for ****s and giggles. I've seen cops call black people niggers. I've seen alot of completely unethical and illegal conduct from cops. There are some good cops, but not alot. Most of them are on a complete power trip.

In some places, the cops have to be hard asses, or they're the ones who end up dead.

Yep. And I think you will find they possess many of the same traits as the criminals they are chasing.

In some cases that's not necessarily a bad thing. Of course, I hope you're not implying that there are many, many dirty cops out there.

Wow, for a second I thought your experiences were localized within where you live. But that can't be! It's a LOT more accurate to take impression of police officers in one area of the country and apply them to the rest of the world.

getting back to an earlier point in this thread,

Who are we to make judgements on the worth of life?

People tend to do things like that when they get emotional about things.

Duke: I've never been harassed by the cops. Neither have any of the friends I hang out with/used to hang out with. Why? because we never did anything for the cops to harass up about. If you are constantly having problems with the cops, maybe you might want to rethink what you're doing, since you're a constant in the equation too. I can not believe that the cops in your area roll down the street and say "Hey, there's Duke. Let's go **** with him!". They tend to have their reasons, like responding to complaints form other people and so on.

I highly doubt these problems are localized, when you hear the same stuff from people all around north america.

And way to go on the excessive sarcasm. It really doesn't help your case to be such a patronizing little puke.

Let's all take a few moments to breathe deeply...in and out, slowly...and calm the inner fire of our souls.:em321:

No, they're not localized, but you and many others exaggerate the problems. There's also the fun-to-hate-cops-FIGHT-THE-MAN attitude that most people have. I've been in cars with people, gotten pulled over for speeding or running a red light, only to see them pleed in front of the cop for mercy, get a ticket and say "god damn f****ing cops" when the cop leaves. A lot of people have similar attitudes, which is unfortunate.

And funny that you call me a patronizing little puke, as if I'm some 15 year old. Because your case is nothing but biased personal experience and assumptions.

That is irrelevant. I am not saying they shouldn't be stopping me, because I do live a lifestyle where I am prone to getting stopped by police (ie: I hang outside at night with friends). It's the way they act and the way they carry out their duty. They expect complete respect yet treat you in the most condesding manner possible. They are unethical and sometimes criminal. And by 'they', I mean bad cops. I have met nice, good cops. I am not denying this. Many of them do exist. Which is why I haven't use definites in any of this. I'm just argueing against the social notion that cops are always good people who should be respected above all.

I haven't had any problems with cops either, and I've lived in three states.

And whose agreeing with the social notion that cops are always good people and should be respected above all? I haven't seen that anywhere in this thread. I brought up the cop-already-doing-good vs infant-we-don't-know-if-AIDS-cure-or-Hitler, but that only works if we assume the cop is a good guy that's trying to help society, and I made that assumption obvious. It wouldn't work any other way, and I wasn't trying to make it do so.

You said "The cop is already doing something good for society." I was simply responding to this, saying it's not necessarily true. It may have been an assumption you made, but so what? Im saying it's a bad assumption to make.

Oh hmm, perhaps in my first post I did. But I believe in my subsequent posts I pointed out that I was assuming the cop wasn't crooked.

Yes, I agree it's not good to assume cops are always good people out to do the right thing, but I think it's equally as bad to assume they're not good people (and I'm not saying you thought so). The assumption I was making only applied to that specific scenario, perhaps I didn't make that clear enough.

You just refuted yourself. Well done.

Are you ****ing kidding me?? I have been saying from that get go that not all cops are this way. Are you just trying to annoy me?