Since we have been discussing torture off late in class, I feel that this issue is very relevant to our understanding of Human Rights. Mostafa Tabatabainejad, 23, a student at UCLA did not show ID to campus police, while working in one of the university's libraries. The police then used a tazer gun on him. The excruciating video of this incident can be viewed on youtube. The link to it is below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3GstYOIc0I
I could not watch the whole thing. You can clearly hear the student say that he would leave, but the police continue to abuse him. What was even more shocking was the number of students who just stood there. Yes, there were some who asked the police for their badge numbers. They yelled at the police and the police just seemed to yell back.
The video is long--over six minutes. I could not watch the whole thing. It was just too painful.
Saturday, November 18, 2006
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The United States continues to press for more diversity in the work place and on college campuses. At the same time, they question people from different diversities as in the case of this UCLA student who was in the library doing his work. Was he sitting there researching how to fly airplanes into buildings? Probably not. He didn't seem to be doing anything suspicious, and I don't think UCLA would have accepted him into college if they were suspicious of him. UCLA most likely used diversity as one characteristic in accepting him to their school. And this same diversity is what got him tazered.
I agree with everything Jolly J said, especially the fact that the incident was 6 minutes long. There is no reason that it should have taken that long for them to arrest him. The student was not doing anything threatening enough to warrant tazering for 6 minutes. The UCPD could have considered him to be a threat because he did not have an ID, but the student did not deserve to be tazered for that. The situation should have been dealt with in a more civil manner.
--Kristy G
My Dad was a Police Officer who died on the day of his retirement from the police force. He proudly served his city for 32 years.
It angers me to no end to see the disrespect and hatred for our police officers. I do not look through the world with rose colored glasses and I know and understand that racism is alive and well in Police Departments. It's everywhere. But what many people don't seem to understand is that these officers GIVE THEIR LIVES to protect us.
They have seen 9 year old gang bangers shoot and kill. They have seen mothers kill their children, fathers kill entire families. They are surrounded on a constant, daily basis with "bad guys." Their lives are consumed with what they see on a daily basis. Officers with only a few years on the force have seen more evil than most of us will see in our entire lives.
Towards the end of my Dad's life, he became nostalgic about his life on the police department. He told me stories that haunt me to this day. Stories of being shot at, stories of watching a few of his partners take their last breath. I was 26 years old when I heard of the 3 lives he'd taken in his career and how he was afraid of how he was going to atone for the lives of these 3 men. How he saw the eyes of their mothers every night when he closed his eyes.
A crime is a crime. A Police Officer is not exempt from proper justice. BUT, let's take a moment to think of what these men and women are doing for US before we are so quick to point the racist finger to their faces.
P.S. Hewhowould, any officer who is certified to used a tazer must be trained on its use and before receiving certification must be tazed themselves. Where do you get your ideas from?
I wanted to add that currently most people think that the student refused to show his ID, not that he didn't have it. I'm not posting this to justify what the officers did (no one uses a taser to get someone to move, they're get someone to not move), but rather to show that the student wasn't completely innocent. A big part of our class is about getting to the truth of matters, and as we've read the victim often gets mislabeled as entirely innocent. This shined a little light on the situation, but I'm still horrified at the officers' actions. There's nothing more disillusioning than seeing those who are supposed to uphold justice smash it to pieces.
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