Some vexing Snoop Dogg footage

Posted by Maximum Fun on 6th November 2007

Here’s some footage of the fight that got Snoop Dogg arrested and held overnight (but not charged) in the UK’s Heathrow Airport. The high-profile case led to Snoop being banned from the UK due to his prior criminal convictions in the US.

Of course the footage is heavily edited in Snoop’s favor, but it’s nevertheless very disturbing. We see cops hounding Snoop and his entourage, physically provoking them, and eventually using nightsticks on them.

I’ve only seen this sort of thing go down a couple times in real life, but it’s always the combination of the victim’s extreme suspicion and the police’s arrogance that leads to conflagration. People who are scared of cops freak out when they deal with cops. That can mean abuse, or physical resistance, or whatever. Too often the police are unwilling to de-escalate, fearful of losing their position of authority if they do, but this baloney is just not how you solve shit. Being the bigger man is how you gain authority, not lose it.

If you’re a middle class rich guy like me, it’s easy to stay cool and not start anything — if you’re scared of the cops (for good reason), it isn’t. If I was Snoop, I’d be freaked out, too. And Snoop has done criminal shit in the past I would never condone, but as far as I’m concerned the responsibility for situations like this lies with the folks with the uniforms and nightsticks and power of arrest.

The cops have the power, and they have a really tough job — it’s tough to de-escalate when people are yelling at you, freaking out, being abusive, etc. But that’s why they’re cops, and we’re civilians. If they can’t handle it, they shouldn’t be serving.

Blah blah blah, politics whatever, sorry to intrude. I promise Maximum Fun later.