Passenger Tasered At Airport: "The Terminal" Meets Kafka

That's just sick. Perhaps the majority of citizens who actually believe our police are out there to protect us will get it now. Increased enforcement - as is constantly cited as an important strategy for reducing crime - scares the hell out of me. In my experience and the experience of most people who have had a lot of police encounters in their lives - it is THE POLICE who are committing the most disgusting crimes. And they get away with it. While I realize there are some police officers out there who truly want to serve their cities with decent and compassionate enforcement, the majority of cops become cops for a reason. Power. The same reason people get into gangs. The brutality shown by police towards homeless people, street based sex workers, and the so-called criminals of our society (who incidentally are just doing what they can to survive for the most part) is out of control and much more common than anyone seems to realize or care. Scenes like this one at the airport show the truth about most of our "protectors." When will people wake up and smell the corruption? The only thing I feel when I see police is fear. And I haven't even done anything wrong. And yet our governments and our police forces are continually asking for more officers. Gimme a break. Spend some money on some decent, affordable housing, supports for people with mental health issues and addictions issues, and stop allowing our own people to STARVE. Then you will see a drop in crime. We don't need more ENFORCEMENT - like what is shown in this video. We need more love.

When I first heard that a man was tasered to death in an Airport in Vancouver, I didn’t pay much attention. Maybe it was the steady flow of depressing news that filters ones consciousness on a daily basis, but for some reason the story didn’t shock my system. After all, police have shot and killed many innocent people before. And you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to know that Tasers are lethal.

But it was when the full story emerged that I became not only shocked, but saddened and ashamed. How had we, as so called peaceful Canadians let our RCMP force become so violent? I know that airports are a high security area. There are a few places that should never be vulnerable, and an airport definitely falls into that category. But when the video emerged, I didn’t see a threatening villain, but a frusterated Polish immigrant who had been asking for the officers help in a non-violent fashion, when he was tasered. Two things stuck out in my mind.

1. The man (Robert Dziekanski) was unarmed
2. He didn’t speak English
In the video, one of the RCMP officers asks excitedly, “Should I taser him???”.

It was as if the officer was playing a video game.

I did not see any of the officers try to figure out “why” he was upset. I didn’t see any of the officers trying to figure out how to communicate with him in his native tongue. I did not see them try to help him at all.
It seemed that the officers were amateur, freaked out and acted cowardly by using the taser in the first 25 sec of being in the mans presence.
People talk a lot about investigating what happened, punishing the officers or debating whether tasers should be used. But I hope that this terrible occurrence will also open up a larger discussion on race and stereotype in our country, and how we as humans relate to one another.

Nomadic
whatsreallygoodies.blogspot.com

I had a pretty strong reaction to seeing the video of the student who got tasered at the Kerry forum - this was just as bad, maybe worse. While the taser, in my untrained experience, did seem like unwarranted and excessive use of force, I can't help but think that the taser didn't actually kill this man - the cop's knee across his neck may have had something to do with it, though.

Either way, it's unbelievable and shocking. Welcome to Canada, Mr. Dziekanski.