It's reading things like this, and seeing that people in our society are not only becoming used to the militarization of our police forces, but encouraging it... it frightens me to my very core:
SWAT teams were originally designed to be used in violent, emergency situations like hostage takings, acts of terrorism, or bank robberies. From the late 1960s to the early 1980s, that's primarily how they were used, and they performed marvelously.But beginning in the early 1980s, they've been increasingly used for routine warrant service in drug cases and other nonviolent crimes. And thanks to the Pentagon transfer programs, there are now a lot more of them.This is troubling because paramilitary police actions are extremely volatile, necessarily violent, overly confrontational, and leave very little margin for error. These are acceptable risks when you’re dealing with an already violent situation featuring a suspect who is an eminent threat to the community.But when you're dealing with nonviolent drug offenders, paramilitary police actions create violence instead of defusing it. Whether you're an innocent family startled by a police invasion that inadvertently targeted the wrong home or a drug dealer who mistakes raiding police officers for a rival drug dealer, forced entry into someone's home creates confrontation. It rouses the basest, most fundamental instincts we have in us – those of self-preservation – to fight when flight isn't an option....Peter Kraska, a criminologist at the University of Eastern Kentucky, estimates we’ve seen a startling 1,500 percent increase in the use of SWAT teams in this country from the early 80s until the early 2000s. And the vast majority of these SWAT raids are for routine warrant service.
Read the rest for some more frightening statistics. And if that's not enough for you, read this white paper on the topic. And that's just with police SWAT teams. Here is a map showing just a small fraction of these SWAT team abuses. Now imagine what would start happening if we threw in the National Guard.
That's why I not only say no... I say hell no, no way.
Disclaimer The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent my employer's view in anyway.