One of the things that creeps me out about Mayor Pete is the corporate consultant-gabble that he sometimes drops into. It makes sense: he worked for McKinsey in his 20s, as one of the drones in the giant cash-extractive machinery of big dollar consulting. That’s where he learned to proactively leverage his synergies, I bet. [stderr]
Having done subcontracting for Perot Systems, and Booz Allen Hamilton, the sound of corporate leet-speak always gets my alert systems humming; it may mean that I’ve got a hypercompetitive manipulative corporate nihilist in the room, and it’s time to get my back to the wall so it doesn’t collect any errant ice-picks.
But worse than corporate leet-speak is the language in which things happen but nobody acted to make them happen. You know, the language in which ‘spontaneous existence failure’ is normal. Nobody broke the thing; it just decided it wanted to be in pieces. I’m hyper-sensitive to it and I’m especially hyper-sensitive if crashed airplanes, bombed weddings and hospitals, or police officers are involved. [cnn]
13 Pennsylvania prison employees suspended after inmate death
Not “killed” – he just died, you know? One minute he was standing there, the next he was dead. That kind of thing. Oh, are there details?
Tyrone Briggs, 29, was involved in an altercation with a fellow inmate on November 11 near their housing unit in State Correctional Institution Mahanoy. While waiting to be processed into the restricted housing unit, Briggs became unresponsive and was taken to the prison’s medical triage for CPR.
“While waiting to be processed into the restricted housing unit” – i.e.: cops grabbed him and were going to put him in solitary confinement.
“became unresponsive” – sounds like “he died” to me.
“was taken to the prison’s medical triage for CPR.” – because when someone’s heart stops and they’re not breathing, by all means take them somewhere where there aren’t cameras. I was CPR trained and certified back in the day (in 1989; I would be very hesitant to try CPR now since I hope/suspect the process has been revised but if I were the only person present, I guess I’d have to) but I don’t remember anything about “move the patient” – it was all “you must immediately do a few chest compressions then start ventilation.”
CNN appears to have adopted the unintentional stance from a press release written by the police. “Oh, someone died.” But it sounds to me like someone was killed by cops who were trying to torture him in solitary confinement.
I recently read an article written by a journalist (who considered herself a feminist) complaining about how she is forced to use phrases like “alleged sex offender” not because there’s any doubt about whether somebody is or isn’t a rapist, but because if she instead typed “rapist,” then she and her newspaper could get sued.
When it comes to crimes committed by the police or prison guards, law enforcement officials can just intentionally give journalists vague details so that journalists aren’t legally allowed to use words like “killed.”
Two workers at a federal jail where Jeffrey Epstein was found dead have been arrested on charges related to the wealthy sex predator’s death.
My first aid training, about 10-15 years more up to date than yours, also never mentioned anything about moving a casualty, except maybe to avoid immediate danger. It was still just about one thing: oxygen to the brain. Everything beyond that is up to the professionals who should already be racing towards you, and not waiting for you to show up. One pragmatic instructor would also add that we shouldn’t worry about broken ribs when doing chest compressions: if you were to get sued afterwards then, all things considered, you must have done a good job.
komarov@#3:
My first aid training, about 10-15 years more up to date than yours, also never mentioned anything about moving a casualty, except maybe to avoid immediate danger. It was still just about one thing: oxygen to the brain.
We were treated to a few tales where people sometimes resumed breathing and sat up while you were going the breaths. That sounded… interesting.
Pierce R. Butler@#2:
Two workers at a federal jail where Jeffrey Epstein was found dead have been arrested on charges related to the wealthy sex predator’s death.
That’s an interesting one – he was supposed to be under observation but apparently the guards were asleep or something.
Andreas Avester@#1:
When it comes to crimes committed by the police or prison guards, law enforcement officials can just intentionally give journalists vague details so that journalists aren’t legally allowed to use words like “killed.”
At what point do we say the press is complicit if they adopt minimizing language when they know the situation not as described?
“Billionaire Jeffrey Epstein was found unresponsive in his cell following day-long meetings with his lawyers. He was taken to the hospital where he appeared to shuffled off his mortal coil.”
Mine (9 years ago) advised against moving an injured person most of the time. They might have broken bones or internal injuries that can be made worse by moving the patient incorrectly. My instructor advised moving the patient only in rare circumstances, for example if the place where they are located is dangerous to stay at. Otherwise just wait for doctors to arrive so that they can move the patient correctly.
In my opinion: when they omit known information that disproves the official narrative given in the press release. With careful wording it shouldn’t be hard for journalists to avoid getting sued while still making clear what probably happened.
For example: “The official press release stated that… This narrative leaves some unanswered questions. It seems odd for prison guards to do… Such actions would make sense only if the man had been killed and was being moved to another location in order to falsify evidence. Why else would guards do…? Some facts about this mysterious death appear to remain unknown, which necessitates a further investigation.”
If a journalist is prohibited from stating that a guard killed the man, they still probably should be able to carefully pick their words so as to hint that it could have been a possibility. I have no idea what exactly American journalists are allowed to write without risking getting sued, but they should be able to carefully pick words in order to get the message across without stepping over the line that can result in a court case.
@Andreas Avester:
Most of the time it’s not about worrying whether or not they’re going to get sued; it’s about worrying whether or not the police are going to talk to them again rather than only talk to ‘compliant’ news outfits. The fact that there are multiple news outfits willing to beg for scraps of information from their master’s tables has led to a race to the bottom, with the result that now none of the major news networks is likely to do anything that would risk the coveted ‘access’.
Marcus Ranum @ # 5: …apparently the guards were asleep or something.
It seems the guards not only slept, but falsified their work records – federal charges likely today.
I posted this as an example of ambiguously-phrased reporting as well as prisoner-tending imperfections.
Sometimes you need to move a patient before you start CPR. They need to be on a hard surface for compressions to be of value, so not in bed or on a sofa, unless you have a backboard. The rule is to protect the neck and keep the head still. I’ve moved someone to the floor for CPR, but never to another room or location. Time is critical to avoid brain death. Not starting the process immediately is very suspicious – death may have been the goal. Dead men don’t tell tales.
As for breaking ribs that happened to me once, with a cancer patient who didn’t have a DNR (do not resuscitate), but it’s unlikely with a non-wasted adult. Ribs are springy and have more give than you’d think. Anyway, most people would choose life and a broken rib over death.
The business about putting “alleged” in front of the crime for journalists just seems to be part of the whole “innocent until proven guilty” part of our justice system, which isn’t something I’d be comfortable complaining about. It isn’t just a fear of being sued — a defense attorney can reasonably argue that the jury has been prejudiced if their client has been called a rapist or a murderer or whatever without qualification in the papers. My understanding is that even if someone is caught red-handed with the gun standing over the body, they’re still an “alleged” murderer until the word “guilty” has been uttered in court, after which time the papers can drop the word “alleged.”
@ 1 Andreas Avester
The “alleged” form is used in Canada all the time. My assumption has been that it is used, quite reasonably, for someone who has been charged but not convicted of a crime. The Crown is alleging that the person is guilty but it has not been proven.
It seems quite reasonable. If one is found not guilty in a court of law, that person may not be too happy that the newspapers, television news, etc., have been calling them “mass murderer”, “sex offender” or so on.
The weasel-worded official press releases can be more difficult to deal with though I cannot see why one could not use a qualifier such as “possibly” killed though as someone who lives in a city where prisons are a major industry, unspecified deaths in prison are just assumed violent until a better explanation emerges.
Blast it, brucegee1962 got here first.
Mayor Pete is a slippery snake, from what I see on social media. I find him even more repulsive than Biden, although Gropey Joe has the excuse of being stupid.
Ethnic Rifts in Bolivia Burst Into View With Fall of Evo Morales
One of my favourite recent headlines, a true masterclass of using passive, nonsensical language. Morales just tumbled from power, must have slipped on something.
In major US media coup == fall/tumble and so on.
Marcus Ranum (#6) –
The media are complicit when they accept government statements without question and become stenographers, when they stop doubting and participate in the “us versus them” narrative. Compare how Ralph Nader was treated by the US media (mostly ignored) to how anti-war and anti-racism activists today arepainted as the enemies of the state.
As I’ve heard it said:
Palestinians allege, Israel confirms
Anything Palestinians say is considered dubious or propaganda, even when accompanied by video (e.g. the intentional bombing of the Rafah refugee camp). Anything Israel says is assumed to be true, even when it’s an outright lie (e.g. the Israeli military adding “go back to auschwitz” to a recorded radio transmission from the Rachel Corrie).