It's substantial to the individuals, but it's not substantial in terms of the numbers, which is what we were talking about. A tenth or a hundredth of a percent is not a substantial number.

Some number of people died from vending machines falling on them over the last ten years. The individual events were substantial to those people, but overall, whatever that number is, it's not substantial statistically.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

My experiences have been mostly positive, as a nice, compliant white guy.

But what I don't understand is the constant use of this sort of tough-guy, passive-aggressive heavily sarcastic, condescending tone, "In a hurry, are we?"

I understand the tough-guy part. They have to "control the situation" which means not showing weakness.

And I get when you're dealing with a-holes all day it's easy to drift into constant sarcasm.

But I'd prefer a more straightforward business-like transaction, without the weird scolding parent shtick.

Seriously?? I am NEVER using a vending machine again.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

rick_pcfl, your comment raises the question of to what extent is it the job of police to ensure their own safety. Obviously, no decent citizen wants to see police get hurt. However, the job is inherently dangerous, and at some point it is reasonable to ask whether efforts taken to ensure officer safety are butting up against responsibilities to protect and serve the citizenry - which in some cases includes the very citizen who is threatening the safety of the officer (encounters with mentally ill being one obvious example).

One metric that would useful in this conversation would be to see if rates of police killings (whether ultimately deemed justified or not) have gone up over time, and see if that correlates somehow with the increase in safety of officers that scorpio516 alludes to. Unfortunately, those stats are really hard to piece together. See, e.g., http://www.newsweek.com/...ill-each-year-480712

On a related note (and in an attempt to limit any backlash in the LR :)), I have this conversation (delicately) from time to time with 2 brothers-in-law who are both police. I am continually surprised at the shit they put up with, and the patience and courage they exhibit in the face of it. One of them has told me several times that he sees part of his job as being the object that people blow off steam towards - he tries to recognize that a lot times it's not really him people are pissed off at, he just takes the brunt of it because he's called in to mediate the situation, and he sees taking some amount of shit from people as part of his job description. I am impressed that he has maintained this viewpoint over 15 years on the job and continues to act accordingly. I consider him one of the many very good police out there.