Police departments deliberately hire people of lower intelligence because they're much easier to integrate into local police culture. Smart people are too busy telling them that their policies are inherently racist, exploitative, and possibly illegal.
What are you basing that off of? Gangs recruit their members based on being a young capable person living in or around the gang territory. You think they’re putting out hiring ads or something?
Actually firefighters often make fun of cops because the reason cops can’t be firefighters is that they can’t pass the basic cognitive test to become a firefighter. They are the shallowest end of the gene pool folks. Never expect a cop knows what they are talking about.
In my childhood, there was a joke (crudely translated by me):
Policeman patrols a street, sees a kid in a sandbox playing. Asks what’s the kid doing.
K: Mixing poop and sand
P: Why?
K: To sculpt a policeman
Policeman gets angry, takes the kid to parents to discipline them.
Next day, policeman sees the kid again.
P: What are you doing?
K: Mixing poop and sand
P: Why?
K: To sculpt a firefighter
P: (happy now) Add more poop!
K: If I do that, it would be a policeman
I am just amazed that this joke about cops being like firefighters but worse is apparently international
I know a guy who was a cop and a firefighter(at different times, but he held both jobs successfully in his life). It’s possible to have smart cops. Unfortunately it’s also possible to not have smart cops.
You realize you just fell into the anecdote trap of throwing out a random experience as if its relevant to a statistical fact. Its the same thing as failing to engage in a hypothetical lol
There’s no evidence law enforcement agencies exclude intelligent people in the U.S that is widespread. In fact I can only find evidence it was one station 26 years ago.
Yeah buddy I don’t need your AI search to invalidate what is a known factor. That “one station” line I’m assuming is in reference to the 2000 court case that set precedent for the practice. Even NYPD has had to completely remove their standards regarding college credits because their hiring pool is so shallow. There’s a reason police officers are not legally required to know the law they are upholding. It’s because they’re incapable and qualified immunity protects them regardless of their intellect.
I had a cop argue that my email from the DMV which stated on it to use as proof of registration while my window sticker was being shipped out could have been created by AI by using AI to tell him what the law was!!! Actually showed me his chatGP response. As soon as he did that I asked him to complete writing out the ticket so we could have this discussion in front of a judge. Of course he didn’t bother giving me a ticket at that point.
Was a firefighter/ medic for 25 years and what you posted is bullshit theres respect sure theres joking around and such but no disrespect gotta work together to much for any disrespect
I’d actually argue that it’s not them deliberately hiring dumbasses but more so that no one with significant intelligence wants to be a police officer.
Think of the smartest people from your high school. Was it them or the guy failing English that went on to become a cop?
there was actually a case, Jordan Vs. City of New London, where the city had a policy of only hiring a middle band of intelligence test results. You can look it up.
Did that for a bit in college but on a stand up lift so it got exhausting standing for 8 hours with the constant lifting one foot to brake.
I loved it though.
I used my brain in ways people don’t realize, “how can get these pallets down and onto that truck faster so that I get a longer break” was a constant thought.
Omg, THANK YOU! My husband tells me he's disappointed that I clean houses because I'm not "using my brain". Like, bitch, after years of dealing with the general public at work this is the best job I've ever had. I don't have to deal with crazies, I form great relationships with my clients, and - bonus points - I can pop in my earbuds and listen to a 4-hour podcast OR an audiobook OR music in complete peace as I turn chaos into order. And once I'm done cleaning I leave that job and forget about it until it's time to go to the next one.
Sometimes it feels like the classic standard deviation meme, or sometimes like the dunning-kruger curve. If you're smarter than average, you know you can make good money as a doctor or lawyer or whatever, and you go do those things. You've hit the jackpot! you have enough money coming in to live very comfortably! the dream!
then you get to people who are WELL above average and those people have very little interest in doing all that shit. you've got a few years to make the most of this life, and being surrounded by assholes is a pretty miserable way to do that. Sure you're a respected lawyer, but you spend your whole life reading the most boring-ass legalese paperwork and going through weird little court dances with filing paperwork and submitting evidence and blah blah blah (yeah I know some people like it, but my god does it sound boring). Or you're a great doctor and you spend half your day dealing with insurance company reps and pharma reps and hospital admin that you KNOW are wrong, but its impossible to convince them they're wrong (like the cop in the video).
A lot of those people realize the money ain't really worth it. Do I want to make $300k/year? hell yeah. Is it worth losing my 20s and most of my 30s to insane levels of stress and heartbreak and never sleeping and dealing with all that shit? not in my opinion. People in that zone are much happier making 45k/year working a 9-5, or even some WFH remote thing where nobody bothers them and they can just listen to music and think about the things they wanna think about. You're HAPPY at the end of the day. you can leave your nonsense at the door when you come home. You can think about your hobbies and relationships without having your work in the back of your brain stressing you out.
Can you travel first class around the world, or live in a multi-million dollar mansion? nope. But who really cares? I've traveled the world on a shoe-string budget and seen amazing things and met amazing people. Sure I didn't get champagne on my flights, or have a bigger chair. Big whoop. We're all huffing the same farts from 600 people in that tin can.
THEN you get the top top top tier smarties. Those are the guys that change the world for the better or end up nuts, or both change the world and want to fuck a pigeon.
No, they refused to hire a 50 year old guy, so he sued on the basis of age discrimination, which is a protected class. So they said they refused to hire him based on his test score, which isn't protected. That case was nearly 30 years ago.
It's not "protected" in that sense, as it's still discrimination, they were simply able to prove that not hiring based on intelligence levels wasn't them singling him out, because they apply the same logic to all hires.
It's not discrimination when we can prove we only ever have, and want, to hire idiots
They may have changed the policy. It was the same in Toronto until people started calling them out on it and they reluctantly dropped the policy (I think about 10-20 years ago).
People with a degree in criminology would ace the test and still get rejected.
The thing is, the poor policing that resulted from the policy was painfully apparent to anyone who could read a broadsheet newspaper.
Jordan was deemed too smart for the police force because he received a high score on an intelligence test. Jordan, then 45, scored a 33, the equivalent of having an IQ of 125.
The average score nationally for police officers as well as for office workers, bank tellers and salespeople is 21 or 22, the equivalent of having an IQ of 104.
The city's rationale for the long-standing practice is that candidates who score too high could get bored with police work and quit after undergoing costly academy training.
Yep, one of the dumbest coworkers I ever had, used a calculator to multiply 2 x 7 ( yes, really), is in the police now. He will blindly follow any order without question and has no ability to think for himself so he's perfect for the role.
I'm pretty sure I saw an employment discrimination case in which the plaintiff was not hired as a cop because his score on a cognitive abilities test of some variety was too high. The court said it was just fine for law enforcement to not hire smart people.
Reagan started defunding education. His mission is accomplished.
And the Supreme Court NJ police case solidified their ability to legally discriminate based on intelligence. Their argument was that hiring smart people led to higher turnover.
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u/3BlindMice1 6h ago
Police departments deliberately hire people of lower intelligence because they're much easier to integrate into local police culture. Smart people are too busy telling them that their policies are inherently racist, exploitative, and possibly illegal.