The Glade 4.0

The fact that he's conducting official business, plus the fact that you have a right not to answer. In other words, you can **** off (not answer) or you can answer.

You have no right whatsoever to demand answers from the police on the street aside from very narrowly-defined areas like "what am I being arrested for"? You can ask any question you want because you have freedom of speech, and they can ask any question they want for the same reason, plus their duties. Both of you have the same right to not answer. If you did answer, and then the cop won't, well tough ****.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

That's because it's the cops' job to ask questions and investigate things. It isn't yours. You're asking for your personal edification.

If you think the cop is actually doing something wrong, there are channels for you to address that. You don't have any reason you need to know why, unless it's you getting arrested. You want to know why. If you're not going to cooperate just because your wants aren't being met, you're a dick. If it's becuase the cop is being rude, that's more understandable.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Why do you have an issue with that? You're asking "why" to something like your name. There's nothing they can do to you with your name alone. Either cooperate or don't. ASking why is wasting their time. You're acting like a passive-aggressive douche by asking.

Same with the clerk in the store. You don't need to know why, you want to. You're just looking for a reason to get pissed.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Because a robber couldn't be there? He can never be in proximity to his home? Not buying it. Lots of crimes don't make the paper either.



Correct. You're assuming. you have reasons for that, but you're buiding tis distrust of cops on the assumption that strange things like that can't possibly have happened. They do. There's no reaosn you can't be the guy that just happened to be there.



Well, if you act like an *******, expect them to act like an ******* back. The cops should be polite, but that response isn't exactly rude. You're wasting his time asking "why" as if it really mattered.



Because it's his job to ask questions, and that job is often done under limited time. Furthermore, it's balanced by the fact that there's no expectation of professionalism on your part. He's asking you based on his duties, you're asking for your personal edification. Furthermore, "why" is a challenge, it isn't just a question. Ask a football coach if he ever tolerates his players asking "why?" Ask any parent with a teenager



Don't question Arathain, he hates that ****.



You just made an assload of assumptions in your tree scenario.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

It's astounding the lengths that you will go to defend cops, man. I get it, but wow.



Asking why he wants my info is not acting like an *******, or a passive aggressive douche. That's retarded. Further, it's my answer he wants, my info he wants, so my determination as to whether it matters or not. And in EVERY situation, it has mattered. I don't ask and then give the information regardless, I ask and decide if I want to give the info. So yes, it matters. It may not matter to you, because you don't like being questioned, and don't feel the public has any reason to know why you are asking them things.



THERE IT IS. This is the problem. Asking questions is a challenge, as if I'm challenging a coach or a parent. I'm not your kid, or a player on your team. I'm a citizen going about my business. You are just some guy doing his job. When I am out asking questions associated with my job, I do not consider myself an authority over people wandering by. This is the crux of the problem. You assume you have some level of authority over me. You may or may not, depending on the situation and how I am involved. So, if asked, explain. Citizens are not children (well, I guess some are, but I am not).



Learn to read. At no point have I stated I have a problem with being questioned. I only have a problem with douchebag cops getting all butt-hurt over being asked follow-up questions.



Which is why I used the word "generally". You gotta read, man. Generally, I don't. That's why I ask them. If I relied on assumptions, I wouldn't need to ask.

Because catching you making an assumption is going to "astounding lengths." Got it.

I don't need to defend this guy at all. He didn't do anything wrong. You just didn't like it. Furthermore, you're the one that said you didn't want to get bogged down in specifics, then you want to use specific personal examples where you start doling out information piecemeal as the discussion goes along.

I'd be justified in saying it's astounding the lengths you'll go to in order to have a problem with the cops. You certainly will make a lot of assumptions.



Yet you haven't actually explained how it "matters" except to say that it matters so that you can decide whether to give them the information. Evidently, the only reason you're asking is to see how he reacts to the question itself! This isn't about any actual concern over what he might do with your name, or what you might say about some incident you observed. It isn't like if you don't give your name and he's determined to abuse his authority and arrest you or detain you unlawfully, not giving your name is going to stop him. It also doesn't make any sense that you're all worried about whether he has your "best interests at heart" but then if he says "well, I'm investigating a robbery" you're going to be like "oh, ok." In fact, you evidently aren't. Instead, you obviously just decide there really was no robbery based on some arbitrary stereotype of what robbers and robberies must look like, as evidenced by your cocksure certainty in your tree example.

The reason you're asking is because you can ask, and because it makes you feel like you're in control of the situation to not give him the information if you don't want to. "Ha! He wouldn't answer my question! I sure showed him not to try to make me respect his authoritah!" You know, because that information is really only for him, it isn't used to you know, determine who might be at fault in an accident, or arrest a criminal, or anything like that. No, it's just all about you and whether or not you feel like he's "butt-hurt" or not.

Yes, you're within your rights (I keep repeating this, because if I don't I know perfectly well my position will get distorted into "you have to comply with his requests"). That does not make you any less of a passive-aggressive douche. You also have a right to sing Joseph Stalin's praises in public. That also would still make you a douche.



Let me clue you in on something. When a police officer is investigating an incident, he does have authority over that incident, and he also has a duty to deal with it. He is not "some guy doing a job", he has the authority society (i.e everyone else) gives him, through the government. The law prescribes the ways he may use that authority. It does not give him the right to force passersby who are witnesses or otherwise not directly involved to give him any information if they go on their way. You can leave if you want to.

That's it. Period. He does not need to explain himself to you in order to investigate the incident. He needs to conduct himself in a professional manner, but that manner is described by the policies he adheres to, not by your personal standard of "butt-hurt" or avoiding conduct that reminds you of South Park episodes. When you ask "why do you need my name?" That isn't just asking for the reason he needs it; the question necessarily implies that he is doing something wrong by asking. Don't bother telling me "no it really doesn't mean that!" You just acknowledged that it did; your objection to the kid comparison wasn't "but it doesn't mean that when a kid asks his coach or parent why." your objection was "I"m not a kid." You know perfectly well what "why" questions mean when you're asking someone in authority, even if their authority over you personally is nonexistent. It's a challenge.

There are other ways to ask the question that are not a challenge. "What's going on?" is a completely different question. That indicates concern over what might be occurring, not a challenge to his duty to deal with it. Notice the absence of the word "you". In point of fact, if you were actually concerned with whether it's a matter you want to get involved with or not, this question would be a better one since it indicates concern with the matter at hand, whereas "Why do you need my name?" could either mean "What is it you're dealing with?" or "what's the legal justification for you asking me?"

As for your job, since your job does not include the authority to investigate and deal with everyday crimes, that's irrelevant.



And we're back to the "butt-hurt" stuff again. Not that the cop violated your rights, not that he was rude, just that he got "butt hurt". Yes, you have a problem with being questioned. Otherwise, you wouldn't be asking follow-up questions just to see what the cop's reaction will be. You don't like him asking those questions without first prefacing himself in a way that makes you feel in control, so you ask "why do you need my name?" as if he's doing something wrong. Your concern isn't over "what happened" it's "is this guy going to respond in a way that makes me feel in control? If yes, then I cooperate. If no, then I don't to show him I AM in control." Congratulations. You've reassured yourself that nobody can tell you what to do, by golly!


Do you realize how childish it is to complain that he got "butt-hurt"? Who gives a ****? Is he complying with the law, and comporting himself in a manner that complies with departmental dictates on professionalism? No? Then make a complaint. Yes? Then quit acting like your problem with him getting 'butt hurt' is anyone's problem but yours. you keep saying it over and over "I have a problem with cops that get butt-hurt..." So? So what?



So, you don't generally make assumptions, but you cite to me an example in which you did make an enormous assumption. You've got a fair number of assumptions in your other examples; particularly your hayride one. This is also after you claimed you "didn't want to get bogged down in specifics". Yet you insist on discussing the issue in terms of your personal experiences, which we have no way of viewing except through the lens of your presentation of it.

What is it exactly that's so important about you that we can make general conclusions about police behavior based on your personal experiences?

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Are you even paying attention? This is exactly what I’m trying to determine. What is he going to do with the information? If I approve, I give it, if I don’t, I won’t.

Completely wrong. I gave that douche my info. It wasn’t until later that I figured out he was full of ****. As for abuse of authority, you’re correct in that it won’t stop blatant abuse, but I sure as hell don’t need to give him any information that may help him find something legit (i.e. fishing). Another example of this: having a conversation with a cop, he gets all pissy with me because I was stretched out in the grass with my eyes closed (sleeping’s illegal!) in a park, and he asked me how I got there. I’m giving him information, answering his questions, and say “my jeep” and point. “that’s your car?” walks over: “your registration is expired. Here’s a ticket”. It doesn’t do any good to give fishing douchbags any information.

Bullshit. Asking why is not rude, nor passive aggressive. In fact, from what you said before, if it’s a “challenge”, calling it passive aggressive doesn’t even make sense. I want to know why he wants my information, and what he plans on doing with it, so I can determine if it’s in my best interest or not to give him any info. It’s very simple, within my rights, and the only reason anyone would think it’s rude is because they don’t like being questioned.

This is very rarely ever the case in any situation that I’m discussing. As I’ve said multiple times, if there’s an investigation, it’s typically obvious, and I simply answer. If not, it only takes a half second to say “I’m investigating an accident”. It takes much longer to say “OMG why are you questioning me, waaaah”

Not at all. You shouldn’t make assumptions.

No, not at all. Look at you making all these assumptions about my intent while giving random cops you’ve never talked to the automatic benefit of the doubt. I will repeat AGAIN, it’s not a challenge, it’s a question. If I like the answer, I’ll give the info. It’s not a matter of me making him force me to give the info – it’s about figuring out what he’s going to do with the info.
Lots of cops are dicks, man, and they have the ability to **** with you if they want. It’s a precaution, and it has served me well.

WTF? It’s either rude to ask why or it isn’t. You don’t know the specific language used in any situation, nor should it matter. Make up your mind.

No, learn to read. You’re completely and utterly wrong. Nice assumptions, hypocrite.

I just did. Haven’t you been reading?
As for who gives a ****? Um. Me. Cops acting like douchebags. You know, the topic of conversation? Where have you been?

Because he couldn't have figured that out anyhow. And your registration was expired. And so, if that's what you mean by fishing, good. Then they should be fishing. It's hilarious that you think just attaching a pejorative term like "fishing" means its somehow a problem. He caught you violating the law. As for sleeping being, illegal, maybe it was. I don't know what the laws are there, but there's no reason the park can't have a rule against sleeping. If you think it's a problem, try to get the ruled changed.

By the way, I'm not "completely wrong". So what theat you gave one guy your info? We're talking about in general here. Now you want to act like I'm wrong about your general reason for wanting to know "why" just because in one specific instance you gave your name. You were the one that didn't want to get into specifics, but you keep dragging the topic back to your specific instances. I'm right. The only reason you want to know why is to feel like you're in control of something.



No one's questioned if it's within your rights. I keep repeating that. It's irrelevant that its within your rights. Just ebcause you're exercising your rights does not mean you're not acting like a douche - which you are. You are not going to learn anything from "why are you asking for my name?" that's going to determine if it's in your best interests or not, especially since you've already stated your criteria is not what the actual answer is, but whether the cop gets butt-hurt.

You're being rude and passive-aggressive. Oh wait, you can complain about cops geting butt-hurt, but there's a problem with criticizing your behavior?



I never said the cop should get into an argument with you. He should, frankly, walk away from your self-important *** and let you congratualte yourself on how cool you are for exercising your rights! As for your "waaa", that's right up there with "respect my authoritah" and "goon" and "meathead" and "butthurt" and "fishing" and all your little stupid meaningless terms. Oh look, you can make fun of something! You're really cool.



I'm not. That's a well-understood connotation of a "why" question when asking someone in authority a question, regardless if they are exercising authority over you, personally. It's a commonly-known cultural aspect of the question. Anyone who has ever played a team sport knows that.



What is it exactly that I'm "giving them the benefit of the doubt" about? Nothing. What I'm not doing is assuming they're doing anything wrong, especially not off your personal descriptions. You're not an unbiased source. I'm not making assumptions; I'm going off of your descriptions of your own behavior. If you don't want me to do that maybe you should have stuck to your original assertions about not wanting to get bogged down in specifics. You brought up your personal encounters, not me.

You are not able to figure out what a cop is going to do with the information just from asking "why". If he's going to **** with you, he isn't going to tell you that. That's a complete bullshit answer. You're asking to find out if he's going to get "butt hurt". That's not me assuming anything; you made it very clear - you answer if he tells you why, you don't if he gets "butt hurt". Therefore, your question is not in order to determine "Why"; it's to determine his reaction to being questioned. you've made it very clear; your big issue in this regard is how cops react to being questioned.

As for "they have the ability to **** with you" it's very evident that "**** with you" in your opinion includes things like giving you a ticket for an actual violation, like an expired license, or talking to you because you're sleeping in a public park - which may, in fact, be illegal, and there's certainly nothing wrong with simply approaching you and asking why you're doing it. I really don't care that cops can "**** with you". I care if they do something illegal themselves, or violate their own policies. Simply doing something you find annoying - well, tough. You should have gotten your plate renewed.



I did. You know perfectly well that the way a person phrases what they're saying changes its meaning. There's hundreds of books on the subject.



No, not really. I'm right. I'm also not making assumptions. Your behavior is quite frankly, being a dickhead. That's my opinion. Oh wait, I forgot. You're allowed to whine and moan and ***** about "butthurt" cops and make silly South PArk references, but YOUR behavior can't be criticized. I can certainly figure out your motivations from what you've said. Claiming I'm making assumptions is bullshit; your stated reason for asking the questions contradicts your stated criteria for answering them.

Furthermore, you assuming that "there was no robbery" based on nothing more than the fact that this guy was approaching you near his own home, or based on your appearance at the time, is ludicrous. Me making deductions about your reasons based on your stated criteria for answering questions, is not an "assumption." It's a deduction or an inference.



To who? Me? In which instance are we talking about? You've got an endless supply, it seems. I wonder why that is?



After your latest example of the cop in the park, I doubt very much that you've ever encountered a docuhebag cop in your life, or the reliability of your personal examples. Oh no, he was "fishing" and you got a ticket! Good. Evidently you needed one.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

In my view, asking why the cop needs your name doesn't imply that he's doing something wrong, but it does imply that he's doing something intrusive, that he's imposing on your time and privacy. And he is. It may be completely legit for him to do so, but it doesn't strike me as unreasonable to ask/expect him to provide at least a cursory justification up front.

That said, whenever I'm approached and questioned by a cop, I generally just answer his question and immediately follow up with one of my own to ascertain his reasons for approaching me, all in a friendly, conversational tone. For example, when approached by a cop while out for a late-night walk near my parents' house: Cop rolls up and says, "Good evening, sir. Do you live around here?" I respond, "No, just visiting my folks (gesture in roughly the direction of their house) and felt like taking a walk. Anything wrong?" To which the cop usually answers, "No no, just keeping an eye on things. Have a good night." Annnnd....scene. Never really had an encounter go beyond that (other than getting ticketed once for not having an up-to-date license on my dog's collar).

One thing I will say really annoys me, though, is when they shine their flashlight in your face at night. It's only happened to me a couple of times, and both times the cop took the light off me when I asked him to, but seriously...that's just frackin' rude.


I think it's possible for behavior to be legal and within the bounds of professional codes of conduct and yet still be rude, brusque, aggressive, arrogant, whatever. "He didn't do anything that warrants official disciplinary action" isn't exactly the gold standard for not being a jerk.

I wasn't sleeping, he was just being a tool. And when he realized I wasn't sleeping, he went fishing for something else. That's a douchebag cop. Yes, my registration was expired. There's ALWAYS some damn thing they can find if they look hard enough. You don't see how this would make an individual not want to talk to cops?



No, totally wrong. I always give my info if I deem it appropriate. And yes, I'm in control of the way I answer questions /boggle.



Because it's **** retarded to get upset because someone asked why you want their personal information. Retarded. Over the top. The ONLY explanation I can come up with is that an individual cannot stand his authority being questioned. Which is douchebaggery.



That's fine. He's welcome to do that. If he doesn't want to answer the question and doesn't need the info, he can walk away. That's not douchebaggery. Douchebaggery is when they get offended by a simple question and cry about it. And no, I'm not self important for asking a question. If I got belligerent, then yeah - I'm rude. Getting belligerent simply because someone asks you a question is definitely douchebaggery. (which is my point).



This is totally wrong.



So, basically your point is that if you ask a question rudely, then you're rude? /golfclap



No, so what we have established here is, that from a cop's perspective (in your view at least):

1) If you have a problem with someone, it's perfectly acceptable to ask them questions and look around until you find something, even if totally unrelated to the issue at hand, to nail them on.
2) If you ask them a question, and they want to know why you are asking, then they are self-important assholes who are inappropriately challenging your "authority" over them.

These are the two metrics I've used in this thread to define "douchebag cop_01".

I keep trying to believe that the average cop does not behave this way. I keep getting disappointed. It sucks, because I do know a few good ones.

It's not unreasonable to want to know what's going on. What's unreasonable is to ask it in a confrontational way, and then wonder why someone gets "butt hurt". Text does not convey tone, and we don't have a recording of the incidents Arathain is bringing up, but "Why are you asking me <insert here>" is pretty much invariably confrontational - and not just in law enforcement. It's that way anywhere. I cited a couple examples. There are plenty of others. When someone asks you "why are you...", they are rarely actually interested in the answer; they're just prefacing for something else.



That may be because, rather than asking about his motives ("Why are you asking if I live here"), you're inquiring if something is wrong or not. That's far less accusatory because you're not asking a question that assumes he's doing something wrong right from the get-go.



I agree it's very annoying, but I doubt it's intentional, at least the putting it in your face part. It really should be on your hands.



I don't think that rude, aggressive, or arrogant would fall within the boundaries of professional behavior. Brusque is a rather inconsequential complaint. Police are not doctors; lack of bedside manenr isn't an issue. If the officer is doing something that falls withint he realm of "expected professional behavior" but the citizen thinks is rude, aggressive, or arrogant, or being a jerk, then frankly, the problem is that he's crossing that particular citizen's line for being a jerk, unless that agency has a particularly low standard for expected behavior. If that were the case, citizens should address it to the mayor, council, county comissioners, state representatives, etc. Otherwise, well, maybe he doesn't perceive himself as being a jerk. Maybe other people don't either. Each person's line is different, and that's why standards exist. It's rather unreasonable to complain about an officer being a jerk to you if no one else seems to perceive him that way.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

In this situation it's probably 50/50 whether I'd respond "yes, something wrong?" or "something wrong?" For the latter response, I would anticipate 1/3 generating a response along the lines of "yes, something's wrong, I asked you a question!" Which is completely mind-boggling to me.

Not sure why you would find an officer getting annoyed at you not answering their question mind-boggling.

I find that viewpoint exceedingly strange.

I'm having a conversation. No justification to get bent. If I met you on the street, and you said "hello, do you live around here" and I replied "is something wrong?", would your response be to get annoyed? Would you response with "yes, something's wrong, I asked you a question!". I can only assume not, so the only real difference is that he's a cop, and is somehow more justified in such behavior because he's a cop. Mind boggling. Is it just that people have gotten used to this behavior and have normalized it?

I think that's part of it. However, I also think that for many people (usually white, middle- to upper-class people), the fact that the person asking them is a cop leads to certain positive assumptions about his purpose - namely, that he has a good reason for asking and isn't interested in jamming them up unfairly and that proactive policing like that is a beneficial public service.

Think of it like this - if a uniformed fireman or paramedic came up to you and asked, "Do you live around here?", I'm guessing you'd be more inclined to assume he's in the process of doing something good and is only asking because it's information he needs to do that good thing, so you'd be more likely to answer "yes" instead of "why". That's how a lot of people feel about cops.

Oh no, he was "being a tool." How dare he.



No it's not. That's silly. Especially since he could have run the plate on the jeep, then wrote the ticket to the owner and left the copy on the windshield. He didn't "go fishing", he observed a violation. Then he investigated, discovered you were the owner, and gave you a ticket.



There isn't always something, and if you don't like the laws, try to get them changed. There's no reason the cops shouldn't enforce the law just because you think it's too easy for them to catch you breaking it. You're also moving the goalposts. We're not discussing not talking to the cops because they might catch you doing something, we're talking about how they act when you ARE talking to them.



You keep trying to say I'm wrong about things I'm not even talking about. You "deem it appropriate" based on whether or not the cop gets "butt hurt." That's what you've been saying since the beginning. That's also you being a douchebag. I'm also not talking about you being in control of the way you talk; I'm talking about your need to control whether or not the cop gets the information he's looking for from you.



Ah, so you ARE questioning his authority. Good. I'm glad we cleared that up. I'm glad you finally abandoned this bullshit story about "determining if its in your best interests" to answer or not.

You're right about one thing. The officer should not get upset. That's unprofessional. It is not, however, retarded, nor over the top. People question authority all the time, because they think that the time and place to do that is the street rahter than the courthouse. Just because some douchebag wants to "question authority" and think that somehow that entitles him to an answer does not mean the cop should waste time entertaining, or arguing with, such nonsense. He should go on about his business.



I'm quite sure that none of these officers started crying. As for "getting belligerent", we already addressed that. There's laws and standards of conduct. If he's not violating those, he isn't doing anything wrong even if he is being a "douchebag" in your estimation, which is evidently very difficult to avoid.



It's exactly what you've been saying this entire time. It's not "wrong" and don't retreat behind the "learn to read" defense. I've been reading what you've said very carefully. You've been caught giving contradictory answerss and you're just screeching "You're wrong!" in denial.



Yes, that is one way to put it. I don't know what you're golfclapping about; you've been trying to argue against that by arguing that an exceedingly rude, confrontational question is not rude. But we can avoid that now, since you admitted above that you are questioning the officer's authority.



Yes. Why wouldn't it be? Would it be better to just nail them ont hat in the first placewithout asking any questions? Or are you suggesting that laws should not be enforced because they don't fit your personal idea of what's important enough, or just because the officer was already talking to them about something else?



Well, you just admitted that you ARE challenging their authority. However, if YOU had been reading carefully (since you just try to escape from every inconsistency by claiming the other person "isn't reading" or "isn't paying attention") you'd have said that I said they have authority to investigate. Furthermore, a cop doesn't even need any authority to come up and ask you a question any time he wants. Anyone can do that. You don't have to answer, but you're challenging authority that isn't even relevant. Furthermore, it's perfectly obvious from the question "why do you need to know my name?" that you are making a challenge. What do you think criminals ask when they're trying to weasel out of something "why, why, why..."?

There's a place (I'll remind you yet again) where you can challenge authority you think has been misused. It's called a court. Here's the thing: you actually stand a chance of winning there too, since you're before an impartial person, and not just trying to bull your way through on your own insistence that you're right. Just because you are challenging authority does not put you in the right and authority in the wrong. there is nothing inherently virtuous about challenging authority anymore than authority itself is inherently virtuous.

Read RD's post. There's a world of difference between his behavior and yours.



Well, there's your problem. Stop using your personal metrics. The cops aren't obligated to avoid being douchebags in your personal estimation. Your metrics suck.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

There is certainly an interesting disparity in the reaction to the different emergency responders. I guess two out of three ain't bad.

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Of course it's different, he's a police officer, on duty and in uniform. The assumption is that he's asking you a question related to his duty.

This reminds me of talking to my brother in-law who's a State Trooper. It drives him nuts when people ask him, "is there something wrong officer?" Obviously there's something wrong, he didn't pull you over just because he was bored...

That's quite a good way to put it, except that you'd be amazed. White middle-to-upper class people are actually just as likely to get upset at being approached by a cop as poor, non-white people. Middle-to-upper-class people are more likely to assume that because they are a law abiding citizen that the cop should just know that and leave them alone - after all, they obviously aren't criminals!

Poorer, non-whites may fear the cops based on assumptions of racism, but they also may be quite approachable because they are more likely to be victims of crime and want the polcie to be available for them.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

What is your point with this? This is my entire point. Not that he's not allowed to be a tool.



He went fishing. When I explained I was not sleeping, he asked me how I got there, went over to the jeep I just pointed out to him, walked around it twice until he found something wrong, and issued me a ticket.



That is what I'm saying. I'm talking to a cop, and low and behold he looks for a reason to snag me on something. And yes, there is always something. Maybe not with others, but with me there is always some damn thing. Something I didn't know about, forgot to do, overlooked, didn't realize was burned out, expired, or whatever. There is always something. Only one time have I ever survived an obvious fishing attempt unfazed.



No, I deem it appropriate based on his response. "you fit the description of a suspect" vs. "i'm looking for people who witnessed an accident around the corner" vs. "oh, just being friendly" are all going to result in different responses. Whether he gets butt hurt or not isn't going to affect my response at all, merely how I think of him. I'm smart enough not to fall into the "argue with a cop" trap they like to set out.



No, learn to read. I'm not questioning his authority, I'm getting information. The only explanation for him getting bent is that he somehow thinks it's not acceptable for me to question him.



If a cop did that, he wouldn't be a douchebag. And there would be no issue. "Sir, what's your name?" "Why, what's up?" "Nothing, nevermind." "Ok."



Based on the criteria I laid out, you pretty much can't be a douchbag unless you get belligerent, or go fishing. If only they followed that standard...



I'm not screeching. And no, you are not correct. I don't think you are reading my responses if you think this.



No, I have not. I've never suggested it's ok to be rude to an officer. It's your contention that asking him a question is somehow rude, which is ridiculous. Then you turn around and suggest that you can ask a question, but it's rude to ask it rudely? Well no ****. Who ever said anything about asking something rudely? If I ask something in a rude fashion, then yes, I must concede that I am rude. /boggle



Never did. Asking why they want my name is not challenging their authority, it's asking a question. Now, they may come back and say something stupid like "I'm a cop and I have authority in this matter, and you have to do anything I say!", in which case I would feel compelled to question that.



I've never suggested he does not have the authority to ask me questions. Where is this coming from? This is why I'm not challenging his authority. Of course he has the authority to ask me this. I just need to decide whether to answer. He doesn't have the authority to make me answer, as you have said. That's all I'm "challenging" by asking. I'm not responding with "you can't ask me that!!" That would be a challenge to his authority, and is not the case.



Good thing I'm not challenging any authority. I'm deciding whether to answer a question. I don't need to go to court for that. (Well, I might, but that would be the cop's decision, not mine, at that point.)



I can see how a cop would think that.

Interesting, thought provoking question.

You are both correct and incorrect in your guess. If either of those began asking me personal information, I would immediately want to know why. I don't give out personal information unless I know what it's being used for, period.

So on the face of it your assumption is incorrect. However, my concerns in both scenarios would be different, and so you are correct from that sense.

The difference between the 3 responders is that of the three, only a cop can harm me. Not physically, but in terms of causing me legal and/or financial trouble over whatever they want, really. The other 2 have no opportunity for this. When speaking to a cop, I cannot speak freely, I cannot let my guard down. At least not until I figure out what brand of cop he is and what he wants.

If that sounds paranoid, ok - but this is based on vast experience of being hounded and harassed by cops on countless occasions.

That's really the only reason that people don't like speaking to cops in the first place. If they don't like what you say or how you say it, they have the power to **** your life up for a bit, justified or not.

So you think it's ok for your brother in law in that scenario to answer "Yes there's something wrong, I asked you a question!"

Getting annoyed over stupid questions is one thing, although if it really drives him nuts, that's a bit uptight. Getting all bent and belligerent over being asked is something different.

No, they really don't. They may go ahead and do it anyhow, but that's illegal, and their life is likely to get **** up even worse int he long run if they try. Not talking to cops just ebcause they "can **** up your life" is stupid. If a cop can **** up your life legally, it's because you're breaking the law.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I direct you to the video posted on the first page of this thread.

In case you never watched it, a man is wrongfully detained and arrested (something I would refer to as **** up my day) for a legal open carry and all the cops did was issue an apology.

GOOD DAY SIR.