ucla student tazed many times for refusing to show his school ID

[literallyjohn]

Tabatabainejad, 23, was shocked Tuesday night [Nov. 17] after arguing with a campus police officer who was conducting a routine check of student IDs at the University of California, Los Angeles Powell Library computer lab

Comments

[predream]

I had trouble loading the video from LJ so I went to the YouTube site to find it, only to see that it had been removed for a "terms of use violation." Then I found a few others.

Again, WTF. Use of that kind of force is completely illegal, even when defending property (which wasn't the case anyway).

[literallyjohn]

i absolutely agree. i think law enforcement can only use guns when there is direct and iminent danger. tazers, on the other hand, seem to be used far too liberally. to me, it is similar to torture. it is a painful form of punishment worse than spending a few nights behind bars, and yet there is no due process, like a judge or jury, when it comes to this form of punishment.

i think being tazed multiple times for not showing a school ID can only be considered excessive abuse of power. tazers should only be used, like guns, as a last resort; not as a means to prove a point or to simply exercise power.

[predream]

By the way, do you have bea's email?

[literallyjohn]

yeah, but you might be able to ask her directly via her lj as well. did you go to northwestern? i'm wondering because i was on a couple of academic panels and once ran an asian american leadership workshop there so i may have met you.

[the_skim]

fuck. that was completely uneccessary and fucked up.

[literallyjohn]

fo sho!

Balance between Civil Liberties and Security

[theshufits]

Did you catch the show on the Price of Security?

Re: Balance between Civil Liberties and Security

[literallyjohn]

no i didn't see it. i think, though, that the balance swings a little too far right. as a historical trend, when tyrants came into power they took it during "states of emergency" and then never gave it back. i feel like that's the way we were going for a while with bush. some political theorists have posited that if a nation-state has the unchecked power to determine a "state of emergency" there is no accountability or real limit on state power or protection of civil liberties. it's amazing how people so quickly are willing to give up rights to privacy and liberty under the guise of maintaining freedom. the cost of freedom cannot be freedom itself.

[juche]

hey john, do you know if there's going to be any sort of campus mobilizing around this, either at other schools or at UCs? i'm at Davis and i've only had a couple people talk about this. there needs to be solidarity actions, i'm assuming that all UC campus police carry tazers.

i don't know

[literallyjohn]

hmm...i'm out in chicago so not too connected to student mobilizations out west, and the people i knew at davis are no longer there. i agree there should be solidarity actions and, at the very least, something to bring public attention to the issue.

on another note, i saw your name pop-up for the grad student conference out here that i'm helping organize so i'll probably be seeing you then.

[juche]

oh, does that mean my paper got accepted? i totally forgot that you were at uic.

[literallyjohn]

of course :)