So I have a question I sort of posted in there too but figure I’ll bring the conversation over here (in a more respectful way)
These are called spotters/marksman and they have them at football games, the Olympics, presumably political events, etc. to handle the threat of suicide bombers and other mass-population terrorist threats
How should we handle these threats without police intervention/snipers to quickly take out a bomber?
Looking for civil discourse if at all possible, but I also understand this is a high stakes discussion and directly affects some more than others
Edit: Asks a legitimate question, without ulterior motives, literally just trying to steer the conversation to a productive, constructive discussion: is bombarded with bad faith arguments, downvotes, accused of being down right disingenuous, and minimal attempts (1 as of this edit) to actually address the conversation. Psychotic experience this was.
There was an updated image that clearly shows the barrel of a rifle, so no. These are not for spotting. They are for sniping.
While it’s possible that people shot by guns are bad people, there is very little reason to assume it is likely at a peaceful protest on a University Campus that is ALWAYS crowded. Especially with the current track record of US Police.
My understanding of the original comment was that it was a marksman/spotter. Those are two people who work in tandem to perform a function.
The spotter looks at the larger picture, usually with some kind of binocular or similar, looking for threats and scanning a large area. Their other function is to protect the marksman. So if a threat (or anything really) approaches their position, the marksman can continue to focus on their job, while the spotter defends their position.
The marksman is simply just a sniper. It’s a fancy name for a sniper.
They deploy like this in pretty much every operation. Two man teams. The spotter providing protection and support for the marksman, and the marksman executing the mission.
I feel like people missed that, or maybe I misunderstood the poster? IDK.
A needless inaccurate distinction obscuring what it really is, it is a sniper. It is not normal. These crowds existed before the snipers arrived and will exist long after the protests end.
I’m saying it doesn’t matter if the people at the protest went to school there or not, that the sniper isn’t warranted, but I do apologize that in a heated moment I accused you of intentionally aiding the opposition.
“These threats” what threat?? People protesting? These snipers have never once protected protestors from the violent freaks that show up to run people over or shoot people.
From my point of view/questioning, it’s the threat of suicide bombers and other terrorist efforts (acid, dirty bombs, driving through a crowd of people) when it comes to protesting middle eastern matters in the states. Hell we have American terrorists doing terrorism here too, how do we better prevent that or are we stuck only responding?
Actual prevention of terrorism comes by building a just society. People who have basic needs, healthcare, education, and justice do not become terrorists.
And how do you expect a sharpshooter team to stop a suicide bomber, acid attack, or dirty bomb? Even stopping a crowd-driving-maniac would require significant luck. This isn’t an action movie.
I never made this claim… I was asking the question literally, which you answered and lead with, before going back to say I was implying something else. I’m confused how we ended up here, but I think we both agree that snipers are a threatening, and apparently not that effective means to prevent these things from happening. And even in reacting, snipers are overkill.
Yeah, you think all those people on January 6th weren’t having their basic needs met? No, terrorists are not logical people fed up with the system. They’re fanatics and psychopaths, and in Gaza it’s a revered profession. They literally don’t have their basic needs met because they are spending all their money and resources on violent extremism. They’ve been doing it so long their economy depends on it; if they stop killing Jews, they stop getting money from their benefactors in Iran and Qatar. Panislamism, which includes Hamas and its allies, is an ideology of violent repression of non-muslims and infidels, it’s not a freedom movement, it’s MAGA for Islam.
This is a complete distraction. The only people spilling protestors’ blood on American soil right now are cops. And your response to it is to try to justify why they need intimidation snipers on top of that?? Absolutely not.
The fact you Americans think this is normal for a protest says more then anything I can comment.
A good test is to think of a private entitiy doing this and if that passes the smell test. I don’t think deploying snipers at events has ever saved anyone (correct me if I am missing an incident) and in this case if they are there to protect the students why does the school not hire their own sharpshooters?
You bring up a good point. The prevention part - snipers are seemingly ineffective. The reaction/response portion however, does point to guns being used to prevent further damage. 2016 dallas shooting - police used a bomb to take out the shooter after the fact. LA airport shooting in 2013 - taken down with regular guns.
Overall, I think you make a good point, they’re ineffective at prevention, and even response can be handled w/o the need of long range or automatic weapons. There’s always the argument that “well there aren’t any attacks because we have these” that I can see people making but that feels fallacious somehow, just not sure how exactly.
I am still left to wonder, how do you actually prevent the bombing and other attacks from happening. What is effective?
When the bomber intends to die in glory, there is no deterrent possible. Death isn’t any deterrent. It can only be stopped before they get to the scene.
Reeducation or incarceratin of zealots.
Large investment in mental health.
Prosecution of group’s and individuals that call for violence or have violent philosophies.
Reduce access to weapons and materials.
High bounties for reporting suspicious activity or behavior.
Promotion / enforcement of a homogeneous society.
None WILL be done. Many are undesirable. But they can be used to prevent. Does that help you?
Yes absolutely. These are most definitely actionable and are also excellent conversational pieces that can be discussed further, which was all I wanted instead of outrage commenting basically.
I think healthcare in general (including mental health) services would be hugely impactful to the general population.
I also think our educational system is being eroded and a lot of kids are pushed away from continuing education (in any form, not just traditional university which fails a lot of people) in favor of blue collar work
Now I’m not saying blue collar work is bad, but I do think continuing education is important, especially as our life expectancies are increasing. It’s important people stay educated and continue to practice things like the scientific process so that we don’t lose that information and become disinformation spreaders.
Without solid education, we can’t possible expect a “bright” future imo.
What did you mean about the homogenous society? In what ways? Looking forward to any examples/explanation you could give!
In a homogeneous society, everyone has the same background. No differences of traditions, religions, art, music, etc. They all look roughly similar. They have no fuel to make another member into the “other”. As I understand, Iceland has something approaching this. I expect the Sentinalese do, to. The ways to get to this from a large and diverse society are, of course, appalling.
Yeeeeeahhh, not sure if I agree with this one. To me it feels sort of lazy and skirts around the true nature of accepting people for who they are and learning to be more tolerant of people not exactly like us
Sorta feels lazy to say, well let’s get rid of what makes us different/unique.
Nature doesn’t really believe in the homogeneous, I don’t see why we should strive to make it so
I think you might be mistaken as to the point of the police being on site. Its not really the job of police to protect (and extra so for protesters). The risk of a terror attack on any large group of people is a weak excuse for this sort of response from police.
Something about those who give up liberty for safety deserve nether…
I sorta agree, but wanted to ask for some clarification - what liberties do you see being given up here? They didn’t really take anything away, they were just there. It’s definitely intimidating, and nobody trusts the police (for good reason, namely lack of appropriate oversight, action, and training) but I can’t see how anything was taken away or given up here for the illusion of saftey that the snipers would hypothetically be providing, know what I mean?
You have normalized a police state where as a people you now think it is normal to have things like sniper teams set up at all major events with a lot of people. This has been done as you have stated; “to handle the threat of suicide bombers and other mass-population terrorist threats” even though sniper teams have almost no ability to stop or even just not make the situation considerably worse.
The thing about trading liberties for extra safety is not only about the liberties lost but that it is a fools journey since the things done for safety are more likely to be ether useless, or just bad (think TSA vs militarizing the police).
You are not stopping a mass casualty event at the time and place of the event itself but well before it. This show of force is just control, theatre, a waste of taxpayer money and in the worst case the cause (ironically enough) of a mass casualty event.
So I have a question I sort of posted in there too but figure I’ll bring the conversation over here (in a more respectful way)
These are called spotters/marksman and they have them at football games, the Olympics, presumably political events, etc. to handle the threat of suicide bombers and other mass-population terrorist threats
How should we handle these threats without police intervention/snipers to quickly take out a bomber?
Looking for civil discourse if at all possible, but I also understand this is a high stakes discussion and directly affects some more than others
Edit: Asks a legitimate question, without ulterior motives, literally just trying to steer the conversation to a productive, constructive discussion: is bombarded with bad faith arguments, downvotes, accused of being down right disingenuous, and minimal attempts (1 as of this edit) to actually address the conversation. Psychotic experience this was.
There was an updated image that clearly shows the barrel of a rifle, so no. These are not for spotting. They are for sniping.
While it’s possible that people shot by guns are bad people, there is very little reason to assume it is likely at a peaceful protest on a University Campus that is ALWAYS crowded. Especially with the current track record of US Police.
My understanding of the original comment was that it was a marksman/spotter. Those are two people who work in tandem to perform a function.
The spotter looks at the larger picture, usually with some kind of binocular or similar, looking for threats and scanning a large area. Their other function is to protect the marksman. So if a threat (or anything really) approaches their position, the marksman can continue to focus on their job, while the spotter defends their position.
The marksman is simply just a sniper. It’s a fancy name for a sniper.
They deploy like this in pretty much every operation. Two man teams. The spotter providing protection and support for the marksman, and the marksman executing the mission.
I feel like people missed that, or maybe I misunderstood the poster? IDK.
Killing people is bad.
A needless inaccurate distinction obscuring what it really is, it is a sniper. It is not normal. These crowds existed before the snipers arrived and will exist long after the protests end.
Are they also not the students from the school? So they would have been on campus but not all in one place anyway.
Again with pointless and needless distinctions that attempt to lessen the sin being committed.
Umm, I think you have my point backwards… unless you are implying the protesters are sinners?
I’m saying it doesn’t matter if the people at the protest went to school there or not, that the sniper isn’t warranted, but I do apologize that in a heated moment I accused you of intentionally aiding the opposition.
“These threats” what threat?? People protesting? These snipers have never once protected protestors from the violent freaks that show up to run people over or shoot people.
From my point of view/questioning, it’s the threat of suicide bombers and other terrorist efforts (acid, dirty bombs, driving through a crowd of people) when it comes to protesting middle eastern matters in the states. Hell we have American terrorists doing terrorism here too, how do we better prevent that or are we stuck only responding?
Actual prevention of terrorism comes by building a just society. People who have basic needs, healthcare, education, and justice do not become terrorists.
And how do you expect a sharpshooter team to stop a suicide bomber, acid attack, or dirty bomb? Even stopping a crowd-driving-maniac would require significant luck. This isn’t an action movie.
I never made this claim… I was asking the question literally, which you answered and lead with, before going back to say I was implying something else. I’m confused how we ended up here, but I think we both agree that snipers are a threatening, and apparently not that effective means to prevent these things from happening. And even in reacting, snipers are overkill.
Yeah, you think all those people on January 6th weren’t having their basic needs met? No, terrorists are not logical people fed up with the system. They’re fanatics and psychopaths, and in Gaza it’s a revered profession. They literally don’t have their basic needs met because they are spending all their money and resources on violent extremism. They’ve been doing it so long their economy depends on it; if they stop killing Jews, they stop getting money from their benefactors in Iran and Qatar. Panislamism, which includes Hamas and its allies, is an ideology of violent repression of non-muslims and infidels, it’s not a freedom movement, it’s MAGA for Islam.
This is a complete distraction. The only people spilling protestors’ blood on American soil right now are cops. And your response to it is to try to justify why they need intimidation snipers on top of that?? Absolutely not.
You did not address what they said and instead made a slew of assumptions about their intent. They actually had a question
The fact you Americans think this is normal for a protest says more then anything I can comment.
A good test is to think of a private entitiy doing this and if that passes the smell test. I don’t think deploying snipers at events has ever saved anyone (correct me if I am missing an incident) and in this case if they are there to protect the students why does the school not hire their own sharpshooters?
You bring up a good point. The prevention part - snipers are seemingly ineffective. The reaction/response portion however, does point to guns being used to prevent further damage. 2016 dallas shooting - police used a bomb to take out the shooter after the fact. LA airport shooting in 2013 - taken down with regular guns.
Overall, I think you make a good point, they’re ineffective at prevention, and even response can be handled w/o the need of long range or automatic weapons. There’s always the argument that “well there aren’t any attacks because we have these” that I can see people making but that feels fallacious somehow, just not sure how exactly.
I am still left to wonder, how do you actually prevent the bombing and other attacks from happening. What is effective?
When the bomber intends to die in glory, there is no deterrent possible. Death isn’t any deterrent. It can only be stopped before they get to the scene.
Why won’t anyone answer my question, I know this.
What can be done to prevent
OK…
Reeducation or incarceratin of zealots. Large investment in mental health. Prosecution of group’s and individuals that call for violence or have violent philosophies. Reduce access to weapons and materials. High bounties for reporting suspicious activity or behavior. Promotion / enforcement of a homogeneous society.
None WILL be done. Many are undesirable. But they can be used to prevent. Does that help you?
Yes absolutely. These are most definitely actionable and are also excellent conversational pieces that can be discussed further, which was all I wanted instead of outrage commenting basically.
I think healthcare in general (including mental health) services would be hugely impactful to the general population.
I also think our educational system is being eroded and a lot of kids are pushed away from continuing education (in any form, not just traditional university which fails a lot of people) in favor of blue collar work
Now I’m not saying blue collar work is bad, but I do think continuing education is important, especially as our life expectancies are increasing. It’s important people stay educated and continue to practice things like the scientific process so that we don’t lose that information and become disinformation spreaders.
Without solid education, we can’t possible expect a “bright” future imo.
What did you mean about the homogenous society? In what ways? Looking forward to any examples/explanation you could give!
In a homogeneous society, everyone has the same background. No differences of traditions, religions, art, music, etc. They all look roughly similar. They have no fuel to make another member into the “other”. As I understand, Iceland has something approaching this. I expect the Sentinalese do, to. The ways to get to this from a large and diverse society are, of course, appalling.
Yeeeeeahhh, not sure if I agree with this one. To me it feels sort of lazy and skirts around the true nature of accepting people for who they are and learning to be more tolerant of people not exactly like us
Sorta feels lazy to say, well let’s get rid of what makes us different/unique.
Nature doesn’t really believe in the homogeneous, I don’t see why we should strive to make it so
I think you might be mistaken as to the point of the police being on site. Its not really the job of police to protect (and extra so for protesters). The risk of a terror attack on any large group of people is a weak excuse for this sort of response from police.
Something about those who give up liberty for safety deserve nether…
I sorta agree, but wanted to ask for some clarification - what liberties do you see being given up here? They didn’t really take anything away, they were just there. It’s definitely intimidating, and nobody trusts the police (for good reason, namely lack of appropriate oversight, action, and training) but I can’t see how anything was taken away or given up here for the illusion of saftey that the snipers would hypothetically be providing, know what I mean?
You have normalized a police state where as a people you now think it is normal to have things like sniper teams set up at all major events with a lot of people. This has been done as you have stated; “to handle the threat of suicide bombers and other mass-population terrorist threats” even though sniper teams have almost no ability to stop or even just not make the situation considerably worse.
The thing about trading liberties for extra safety is not only about the liberties lost but that it is a fools journey since the things done for safety are more likely to be ether useless, or just bad (think TSA vs militarizing the police).
You are not stopping a mass casualty event at the time and place of the event itself but well before it. This show of force is just control, theatre, a waste of taxpayer money and in the worst case the cause (ironically enough) of a mass casualty event.