I hate it when I see on the news that one or more police officers killed someone who may not have posed a threat to anyone. It feels worse when it's a black guy because it seems to happen more needlessly to black guys. In some cases, it feels like the authorities are in a rush to get to the point where the officer is exonerated in any killing and the rush is three times as great when the victim was black.
But it's also terrible when it happens to people who aren't black guys. Or when it's a police officer or…well, actually anyone.
I am against people being shot…or for that matter, strangled or stabbed or otherwise killed.
The one exception I would make is if there's a real chance that they're about to kill someone else. Even then though, I would prefer they be stopped and apprehended via non-lethal methods. The police are supposed to be trained to detain suspects without resorting to physical harm. We give them weaponry and power because we trust they'll be used responsibly. We expect that and when the killings are investigated, we expect justice, not a fast tap dance and then we're supposed to put the whole thing behind us.
Right now in the news, we have a couple of recent reports of black guys being killed by police officers. And we have reports of at least five police officers being killed last night by snipers. I am against all of that. That may seem like an obvious stance but as I prowl the 'net, I see a lot of people who are horrified by one or the other so I thought I'd point out that you don't have to take sides on this. You can be horrified by both. You don't even have to decide which is worse.
So that's what I wanted to say.
And also, on a related note: I don't think you should use the term "senseless killing" unless you're able to define what would be a sensible one. I've given the matter a lot of thought and the best I've been able to come up with is if someone were to murder the people in some other country who call you up, claim to be from Apple or Microsoft Tech Support and tell you you have a virus and they need remote access to your computer in order to remove it. I'm still against murder but killing them…I could get behind that.