He wants mob rule in the United States

To save the dogs.

Dogs are the better people. No being is glad more than the dog if his master returns home. If the dog dies, one mourns like with beloved members of the family.

Dogs are good for the soul.

"There's no actual evidence to back up this claim."

...that you're aware of. From http://www.volokh.com/2013/07/10/police-should-stop-shooting-so-many-dogs/ "

"Civil-liberties writer Radley Balko notes that over a nine-year period Milwaukee officers killed 434 dogs – about one every eight days."

Extrapolating that rate of puppycide out to the rest of the country would suggest that cops shoot a dog somewhere in America once every twenty minutes. Once every 98 minutes could be a drastic undercount.

"And, if it is true, what's the plan? How do you plan to solve this?"

Hmmm, I don't know. Maybe enforce laws against animal cruelty when they are violated by police officers, just as they are for everyone else? Hold police officers and/or their unions financially responsible for killing family pets, the same way FedEx or UPS would be if their deliverymen started killing every dog they came across?

"Extrapolating that rate of puppycide out to the rest of the country would suggest that cops shoot a dog somewhere in America once every twenty minutes. Once every 98 minutes could be a drastic undercount."

This statement is pure nonsense.

You're going to cite a website with "Conspiracy" in the title to prove me wrong by extrapolating. Are you in college or a professional of some kind? Didn't you ever learn that straight extrapolating isn't reliable? If you're going to link to statistics, link to a place that doesn't have "Conspiracy" in it's title. Although linking to a libertarian news source definitely wins points in my book, so I'll give you that. My point stands that extrapolating is unreliable.

And you're cute, thinking that unions will allow for more punishments, but I digress. Those are great ideas; however, shouldn't they have been implemented by now? Good ideas don't make the world go 'round. Executing good ideas is entirely different. A broad call for more rules worked very well for Occupy Wall Street, so I'm sure taking the same approach here will work out just as effectively.

MrBrightside ... hate to burst your bubble, but the police in this country are more dangerous than terrorists ... they kill people, why would it surprise anyone that they kill dogs they consider "dangerous" ... this isn't really news.

I'm not arguing that. I'm arguing against sensationalism.

I don't know if you have noticed, but I'm giving concessions where concessions are due: these are great ideas, yes, and some police (I'll argue that 1% makes the other 99% look bad) are overzealous (to say the least) and dogs aren't as dangerous as they're pained out to be. However, spouting ideas doesn't change anything. Actually following through.

Great, a documentary about how bad police are towards dogs. That will raise awareness. But it takes more than that. It takes more than a couple people getting up. It takes real protests, with a clear goal. It takes real action. It doesn't take a donation or copying and pasting a link. I'll support this cause the moment the sensationalism ends.

Man, all we need is Krellin to come in here and incoherently blame Obama and liberals for this to complete the circle.

It's only complete if someone pulls a #ThanksObama

Whoops, there it is.

In this thread people claim to be in support of an idea yet bitch about a documentary being made to promote the idea because one cited statistic may have been erroneously calculated.

This place is so fucking stupid sometimes.

1% makes the other 99% look bad in a lot of cases - police, lobbyists, bankers, the general American population (oops, did I say that?)...

I'm not seeing how this is sensationalized. There's nothing that suggests that. While sure, there's not a whole lot to suggest that it isn't being sensationalized, you are claiming it is while doing the exact thing you originally criticized the link for doing.

@PE

If you are trying to raise awareness about something the worst possible thing you can do is make shit up. It completely ruins your credibility and gives people a reason to keep believing what they want. It completely defeats the purpose of raising awareness in the first place.

"May have been erroneously calculated." There's not proof that 98 minutes is reliable. It's a random number. This is another cause undertaken without any real foundations. Forgive me if you think it's perfectly acceptable for people to make up numbers and then cite them, but I don't live in your brand of reality.

MrBrightside,

You'll support a cause once other people do the heavy lifting to get it started?

Can you be more lazy?

This thread is serving as a perfect example for the typical degradation cycle in webDiplomacy forum threads.

"I'm not seeing how this is sensationalized. There's nothing that suggests that. While sure, there's not a whole lot to suggest that it isn't being sensationalized, you are claiming it is while doing the exact thing you originally criticized the link for doing."

It's making up a number and then citing it. What am I doing that I criticized the link for doing? It's irresponsible to so blatantly lie. If you're going to lie, at least pretend it makes sense.

"If you're going to link to statistics, link to a place that doesn't have "Conspiracy" in it's title."

ROTFLMAO! Eugene Volokh is one of the most respected legal scholars in America. If the word "Conspiracy" bothers you that much that you'll refuse to take anything he says seriously, I think that speaks more to your irrationality than his.

"Didn't you ever learn that straight extrapolating isn't reliable?"

Not reliable relative to what? Where exactly are the reliable nationwide statistics on dogs shot by cops? Is there a database somewhere I don't know about that you're sitting on? Why don't you give us all a more precise accounting if you don't like mine?

"Those are great ideas; however, shouldn't they have been implemented by now? ... A broad call for more rules worked very well for Occupy Wall Street"

They are already implemented. Shooting dogs is considered animal cruelty under the law in every state so far as I am aware. People can be and are prosecuted for it - except when the perpetrator is a police officer. And since they are considered property, killing a dog opens the perpetrator up to a civil liability just the same as if they'd put a bullet hole through a laptop.

"Good ideas don't make the world go 'round."

Um... you *asked* for good ideas. I gave some to you. And now you're being a dick about it.

"You'll support a cause once other people do the heavy lifting to get it started?"

I'm not going to put my name next to anything while there is such obvious faulty thinking involved. Can't you tell I'm too busy going around and policing other people's thought processes to do this research myself?

/s

"If you are trying to raise awareness about something the worst possible thing you can do is make shit up. It completely ruins your credibility and gives people a reason to keep believing what they want. It completely defeats the purpose of raising awareness in the first place."

Where is this being completely made up? The page didn't give a methodology for its numbers. Y'all are assuming it's made up and then ballyhooing it for that. That's stupid. Tolstoy gave you all a separate number that wasn't well-calculated, but the actual page didn't give specific data... and why would it? It's a Kickstarter page trying to raise money for the documentary, not a research paper.

"Not reliable relative to what? Where exactly are the reliable nationwide statistics on dogs shot by cops? Is there a database somewhere I don't know about that you're sitting on? Why don't you give us all a more precise accounting if you don't like mine?"

Making up data is not the proper response to not having it.

@PE

I'm not criticizing the article. I'm criticizing Tolstoy for pulling a number out of his ass and trying to pass it off as being cited from a source.

"Tolstoy gave you all a separate number that wasn't well-calculated, but the actual page didn't give specific data... and why would it? It's a Kickstarter page trying to raise money for the documentary, not a research paper."

You're seriously making me smile at how adorable you are. So it's okay for me to make a Kickstarter page and make a faulty claim and not give any reasoning behind it? Be right back, going to raise money to raise awareness about how Obama is so ~obviously~ from Kenya. BUT I don't have to give sources, because President Eden said it was okay.

"I'm not criticizing the article."

Then you're obviously not who I was addressing in my initial post.

"So it's okay for me to make a Kickstarter page and make a faulty claim and not give any reasoning behind it? Be right back, going to raise money to raise awareness about how Obama is so ~obviously~ from Kenya."

Why would you call it a "great idea" and then equate it to arguing that Obama is from Kenya? Dumbass. This is exactly what I was talking about in the initial post. You have no clue how reliable the stat is one way or the other, but you're going to insist the whole thing is sensationalistic nonsense, all the while claiming support for the idea. For someone who's taking the position that it's good to wait and see how accurate something is before passing judgment, you sure aren't following through very well.

I love dogs...pressure cooker or slow cooking works best, I've found, otherwise they're a little tough.

Best of all, small contribution to your local police force's charity fund pretty much guarantees a steady supply of fresh meat - can't beat that, right?

I'm gonnna try a blind side-by-side with the rhino steak I'm gonna get. Anyone want in on that?

Tolstoy has had a lot of time to provide any form of proof. I've looked myself and maybe it's out there, but I don't see anything supporting the 98 minutes "statistic."

"I'm criticizing Tolstoy for pulling a number out of his ass and trying to pass it off as being cited from a source."

I didn't "pull it out of my ass". The one every 98 minutes was questioned because there was no supporting evidence presented. I used a single subset of data (that was *NOT* "made up") - the only hard numbers I could find after 20 minutes of googling - and extrapolated to match the same units of measure to show that it was not an unreasonable figure.

I agree that this methodology would not get me an A in a statistics class or land men on Mars, but it *is* good enough to show that the original 1/98 figure cited is not entirely unreasonable - which was all I was trying to do.

As long as they're pit bulls, I'm ok with it.