The man holding this #BlackLivesMatter sign is Richmond (CA) police chief Chris Magnus, whose department has not lost an officer or killed a citizen since 2007, the year after he took over. This is not an accident, this peacefulness is the direct result of his leadership. Police departments across the country should be looking to his department as an example to be followed.
‘Chief Magnus changed the department from one that focused on “impact teams” of officers who roamed rough neighborhoods looking to make arrests to one that required all officers to adopt a “community policing” model, which emphasizes relationship building.
“We had generations of families raised to hate and fear the Richmond police, and a lot of that was the result of our style of policing in the past. It took us a long time to turn that around, and we’re seeing the fruits of that now. There is a mutual respect now, and some mutual compassion.”’
They also do regular officer trainings with roleplay scenarios and airsoft guns to teach them how to de-escalate, how to avoid firing when fired upon, and how to deal with people with weapons in a way that doesn’t end with a shootout.
They also apparently go through the details of officer-involved shootings elsewhere, picking them apart and using them as teaching tools for what NOT to do or what the officer could have done to avoid shooting the person.
Essentially, they take a proactive approach to not shooting people and put time, money, and effort into it. Richmond isn’t a low-crime area. Other cities could follow their model and almost certainly see results.
Who’d have thought it would take so much work to learn how to just … NOT shoot people
These are the sort of police officers who deserve respect. The ones who take the time to build a relationship with the community they’re supposed to be protecting, and work to actually protect people instead of just shooting anyone who looked scary.
In before anyone tries to say that the only reason this works is because Richmond is probably like “not as bad” as other places in the US
Man of the moment Keanu Reeves has shown his generosity by giving away £50 million of his earnings from the Matrix sequels. The 38-year-old decided to hand over the money to the unsung heroes of the sci-fi blockbusters – the costume and special effects teams.
*fistbump*
Confirmed. He’s also dumped millions into cancer research. I really do love Keanu Reeves a lot.
Keanu Reeves is like the nicest person. He still lives in an apartment/flat and he gives most of his money away to charities and people who need it. He even invites some paparazzi people to sit down and eat with him when he’s at a coffee shop or restaurant. He’s such a nice person.
When I was working on the UWS, one of my delivery guys accidentally backed his scooter into a parked car in front of the restaurant. I went out to help, since the driver didn’t speak much English, and it turned out the car belonged to Keanu Reeves. He helped us pick the scooter up, and when I asked if we could exchange insurance information (because the front of the car was pretty banged up), he kept telling us not to worry about it and put his hand on the driver’s shoulder and said “I just want to make sure you’re okay, man. Are you okay?” And he was so sincere about it and so kind that I decided in that moment I would always defend Keanu Reeves at all costs. He is an excellent man.
I need to be more like Keanu Reeves because I’m evil compared to him.
“Next few centuries”
Keanu dropping hints that he is an immortal.
i love keanu reeves
My wife and I were dining at Nobu’s in Honolulu and sitting across from us was Keanu or at least I thought it was. We kept talking about whether it was him or not and finally, I decided to throw some old school Bill & Ted at him.
I stood up and threw my arms up into the motion of an air guitar, my wife is begging me to sit back down, and I pointed at the guy who may be Keanu Reeves, and said, “Most Excellent.”
He stood up and did it back at me. Then we both had a moment and pointed at each other. I sent him another of whatever it was he was drinking. It was a cucumber sake martini. That was the end of it.
Or so I thought.
He left before we finished our meal. By the time we were done, dessert came that we didn’t order. We thought, “oh, must be compliments of the chef.” Then the bill never came. When we asked for it, our waitress said Keanu Reeves took care of it.
IT WAS REALLY HIM. And he left a note. It said, “thanks for the refresh. Keanu.”
When I finally saw him again years later, because of work. I brought it up. Then he air guitar and said, “most excellent. I remember. At Nobu’s. Thanks for the drink.” We chatted a bit and I got an autograph for my mum because she’s a huge Keanu fan. Then that was that.
What a moment.
An angel
And he does a lot of anti human trafficking work iirc. Seems like a really awesome guy.
Back when I first moved to NYC, I got a job as a theater usher. We were all young, 18-20 or so, and it was heavily impressed upon us that we needed to treat the theatergoers with TOTAL respect at ALL times or risk our jobs. As such, we were all totally underprepared for the drunk guy who tried to steal a bottle of wine from the lobby bar during intermission. We were trying to politely get the bottle back, but he was growing loud and belligerent. Since the second act was now starting, this was a countdown to all of us being in trouble.
Then Keanu walks up. Calmly charms the guy. Slips the usher behind the bar cash to cover the bottle, without the guy even noticing, and walks him back in to his seat like it’s a normal thing he does every day. He didn’t know the guy, didn’t know any of us, but effortlessly deescalated the situation and quite probably saved some jobs that night.
– Praise the living daylights out of a show and shove its greatness in everyone’s face
– 2 years later, pick it apart violently and insult everyone who still enjoys it in as edgy a way as possible because negativity is cool
!!!
uhh maybe marginalized ppl were excited at the possibility of a show (such as su) representing them, only to be rightfully angry when the show ends up racist, homophobic etc. anyway, super bad post all around
I feel like a lot of hardcore accusations of problematic and offensive content that get thrown at media that was previously lauded as progressive come from a few sources; first, the creators are often a lot more accessible than the creators of mainstream media. you can message rebecca sugar on twitter personally to call her a racist bitch, but you can’t do the same to, say, jj abrhams or another large-scale creator. likewise, you can’t stand on a streetcorner and scream at people until they agree to stop watching law and order, but you can certainly bully large groups of people online until they stop supporting an independent creator.
second, the fandoms that tend to form around progressive media tend to be younger, more volatile, looking to media and fandom as forms of activism. mainstream media they can write off as garbage, but progressive niche media that makes a sincere attempt to represent marginalized folks must be Absolutely Perfect. the idea that a piece of media can have good parts and bad parts, that it can try and only partially succeed, but that that partial success is still worth something, is completely lost on many young fans. either its irredeemable garbage or its the literal messiah, there’s no in-between. so if a show falls short of perfect, as is inevitable, then it goes straight into the “total garbage” pile and must be condemned by the masses.
genuinely trying to represent certain groups and making a few missteps is not the same thing as being ignorant or malicious. making a sincere effort to mean something to folks who don’t get a lot of things made for them is something to be proud of. would you rather go back to the times when fucking nothing got made for us? when the only characters we saw that we could relate to were only there to be made fun of? you’re spoiled by a rush of new creators who took “go make your own thing then” to heart and set out to make content for people like them, you have the gall to look at what they’re trying to do and spit on it for not being better. no creator owes you shit, no creator has to bow to a bunch of teenage bullies who do nothing but demand and harass, that’s all there is to it.
Dear lord can everyone please read this post because it’s so relevant
Male positivity? In my branding? It’s more likely than you think
I love this
Y E S. FINALLY
AXE realized their target demographic are the preteen and teen boys who over-apply their product and decided to do something good for these impressionable youths
Do you ever think about how Jeff Bezos could feed literally more than a million food insecure people while losing an hour’s wage but you have to tell yourself no when you want to buy a coffee but can’t because that’s all your rent money?
funeral-biscuit 