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Different tactics for different goals
Anybody who's ever played a war-game (tabletop or computer) is familiar with the tactic of surrounding the enemy. It gives you lots of options, and the enemy very few: the enemy can perhaps choose which of your units to engage with first, at the expense of turning his back on your other units, but not whether or when to engage. It's a good military tactic to maximize confrontation, and maximize stress and casualties among the enemy.
Anybody who's ever herded sheep, or watched somebody herd sheep, is familiar with the tactic of almost surrounding someone: put a physical block, or an aversive stimulus such as a barking dog, everywhere except where you want someone to go, and the person will probably go that direction. It's also useful in politics, as![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
osewalrus likes to point out: if you want somebody to move in a particular political or legislative direction "voluntarily", without losing face, make it easy for the person to move in your desired direction and difficult to move in any other direction. It's a good tactic to get people to do what you want them to, without confrontation, stress, casualties, or loss of face.
So what does it mean when police departments intentionally surround groups of protesters, then close in from all sides, as has happened this week in Charlotte (search the page for "Charlotte"), New York City, Philadelphia, and probably many other cities? It means that after telling protesters to disperse peacefully, they've taken away that option. It means their goal has become maximizing, rather than minimizing, confrontation, stress, and casualties. Like our Dear Leader, they want conflict, they want confrontation, because it gives them an opportunity to win and the other side to lose; de-escalation is for sissies.
It also means that at least some police departments have forgotten their primary peacekeeping mission, and are taking the military as a model: they're taking tactics that work in zero-sum, unavoidably-violent military situations (at least when you have dominant force), and applying them in civilian situations where avoiding violence should be a high priority.
Anybody who's ever herded sheep, or watched somebody herd sheep, is familiar with the tactic of almost surrounding someone: put a physical block, or an aversive stimulus such as a barking dog, everywhere except where you want someone to go, and the person will probably go that direction. It's also useful in politics, as
osewalrus likes to point out: if you want somebody to move in a particular political or legislative direction "voluntarily", without losing face, make it easy for the person to move in your desired direction and difficult to move in any other direction. It's a good tactic to get people to do what you want them to, without confrontation, stress, casualties, or loss of face.So what does it mean when police departments intentionally surround groups of protesters, then close in from all sides, as has happened this week in Charlotte (search the page for "Charlotte"), New York City, Philadelphia, and probably many other cities? It means that after telling protesters to disperse peacefully, they've taken away that option. It means their goal has become maximizing, rather than minimizing, confrontation, stress, and casualties. Like our Dear Leader, they want conflict, they want confrontation, because it gives them an opportunity to win and the other side to lose; de-escalation is for sissies.
It also means that at least some police departments have forgotten their primary peacekeeping mission, and are taking the military as a model: they're taking tactics that work in zero-sum, unavoidably-violent military situations (at least when you have dominant force), and applying them in civilian situations where avoiding violence should be a high priority.
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