An Emotional Win & A Loss For Public Safety
The widely disliked governer of California Graham Newsom has decided to ban chokeholds being used by police. Whilst this may look harmless on the surface to those that don’t practice BJJ, you now wonder just how are police meant to handle dangerous and violent criminals without restraining them via choke?
Of course the chokehold has been abused by police in the recent past leading to at least one notable death which doesn’t need repeating. But this makes us wonder, if the police can no longer apply a choke hold on a violent man, what will they resort to if he is stronger than them? The answer is probably more common use of a firearm.
Once again, a tragic death is being used by a polictician purely for political gain and driven off the back of emotional outrage. We have already covered why chokes aren’t dangerous in past articles. However, if you actually set out to kill someone with a choke then you will probably be successful. Much the same as if police decided to try and kill you with their car by running you down, they would also succeed. The answer to the problem is clearly not to ban police cars, but to actually hold the officer responsible who tried to kill you.
The specific piece of legislation is as follows :
CA AB1196 (19R) by Assemblymember Mike Gipson (D-Carson), prohibits officers from using carotid restraints or chokeholds, techniques that have come under increased scrutiny in the last few months
Interestingly enough under curent law, California cannot take away an officers badge if they have committed a crime but are happy to enough to ban a choke hold which they know nothing about.
Perhaps politicians should actually train BJJ before they decide to enforce unresearched and crazy laws upon police which will quite probably increase deaths and reduce public safety. This suggests the state are more concerned about how they appear to the public, rather than actually punishing people who abuse power in their job.
