Memphis Disbands the “SCORPION Street Crime Unit” but is Free to Create Other Goon Squads. The Police Right to Use Force Offensively, which is Evil and the Source of the Problem, Remains Fully Intact

From [HERE] The Memphis Police Department on Saturday said it was shutting down the specialized Scorpion street-crime unit whose members included former officers charged in the death of Tyre Nichols.

The move to disband the unit came a day after the city of Memphis, Tenn., released video footage of the Jan. 7 traffic stop that led to the death of Mr. Nichols. Authorities had warned the video would be brutal.

The footage showed several Memphis police officers repeatedly striking and kicking Mr. Nichols, including while he appeared subdued and defenseless. One of the officers also appeared to use a Taser on him.

Mr. Nichols died in a Memphis hospital three days later. His family said Mr. Nichols was fatally beaten beyond recognition. 

In its statement Saturday, the Memphis Police Department said the “heinous actions of a few” had cast dishonor on the Scorpion team.

“In the process of listening intently to the family of Tyre Nichols, community leaders and the uninvolved officers who have done quality work in their assignments, it is in the best interests of all to permanently deactivate the SCORPION unit,” the statement said.

“It is imperative that we, the Memphis Police Department, take proactive steps in the healing process for all impacted,” the department said.

The Memphis Police created the unit in the fall of 2021. Scorpion stands for Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace in Our Neighborhoods. The unit of four 10-person teams focused on violent-crime reduction in high-crime areas of the city. [MORE]

STATIST DELUSION. Here is where all statist’s [republicans and democrats] get lost, asking shit like ‘was the use of force appropriate?’

Contrary to legal truths, in reality, the so-called “right” to attack people is evil regardless of whether it is done lawfully by persons having “authority” or done unlawfully by criminals. Acts that would be considered unjust or morally unacceptable when performed by people are just as unjust or morally unacceptable when performed by government agents.

To be clear, all persons have the natural right to defend themselves and come to the defense of others if they believe another person is in imminent danger from an aggressor. Private security workers and guards also work under said natural law.

In contrast police officers also have the extra or additional “power” to act as offensively as aggressors; the right to attack people or initiate unprovoked acts of violence against people whenever they deem it necessary. Police are said to have such powers when they are acting on behalf of “authority.” As such, “citizens” police are permitted to lawfully attack (make arrests) people, touch them against their will, assault them, interfere with freedoms in many ways, kidnap people (detain and transport) or imprison them because higher authorities have empowered them to do so. In turn, people are said to have a moral and legal obligation to obey police commands and have no right to even resist an unlawful arrest in most states.

The problem is that there is no rational basis for authority. Authority, the basis for all governments and rulership, is a farce. Government “authority” can be summed up as the implied right to rule over people. It is the government’s ability and moral right to forcibly control citizens, its right to be obeyed and the citizen’s corresponding moral and legal obligation to obey.’ Authority requires that government’s laws, commands and orders to be obeyed on a content-neutral basis (regardless of whether they agree or not.) [MORE] Michael Huemer defines political authority as “the hypothesized moral property in virtue of which governments may coerce people in certain ways not permitted to anyone else and in virtue of which citizens must obey governments in situations in which they would not be obligated to obey anyone else.” Said hypothesized moral property makes government the supreme authority over human affairs.

Authority has no meaning in reality because it does not come from people nor is it derived from any natural source. All governmental power allegedly comes exclusively from the people. Citizens delegate their individual power to government and it’s representatives for them to represent citizens. Such representation works much in the same way agents represent their principals in all kinds of business or other contractual relationships. For instance, a manager at McDonalds represents the owner of McDonalds when she carries out the owners business everyday ordering inventory and hiring workers, etc. She is the agent, the owners are the principals. Naturally, an agent only can possess whatever powers the principal gave to her. For instance, you grant the babysitter access and power to use your living room but not the basement. And it goes without saying that an agent cannot have more power than the principal because all said power originated exclusively from the principal.

Inexplicably, the government has granted itself the authority to do things that no individual could do. While citizens have the inalienable right to act in self-defense or come to the defense of others, citizens have no right to initiate unprovoked acts of violence on other people and no right to forcibly control other people. As such, it is logically impossible for citizens to delegate the right to forcibly control others to the government - because citizens cannot possibly delegate rights that they don’t have. In other words, if you don’t have the right to initiate unprovoked acts of violence against other people then you cannot delegate or authorize anyone else acting on your behalf to do so. Clearly for example, your neighbor has no right to stop, search and detain you and put you into handcuffs, kidnap you and lock you in a basement for failing to comply with one his commands. So, how could your neighbor delegate a government representative the power to do so?

Larken Rose explains, ‘in the case of “government,” the people whom the politicians claim to represent have no right to do anything that politicians do: impose “taxes,” enact “laws,” etc. Average citizens have no right to forcibly control the choices of their neighbors, tell them how to live their lives, and punish them if they disobey, So when a “government” does such things, it is not representing anyone or anything but itself.’ As stated, it is a logical and legal impossibility for a representative to have more power than the person he is representing. Larken Rose explains, “you can’t give someone something you don’t have.” There is nothing complicated about this. Rose states;

“Despite all of the complex rituals and convoluted rationalizations, all modern belief in “government” rests on the notion that mere mortals can, through certain political procedures, bestow upon some people various rights which none of the people possessed to begin with. The inherent lunacy of such a notion should be obvious. There is no ritual or document through which any group of people can delegate to someone else a right which no one in the group possesses. And that self-evident truth, all by itself, demolishes any possibility of legitimate “government.”

Rose explains if those in “government” have only those rights possessed by those who elected them, then “government” loses the one ingredient that makes it “government”: the right to rule over others (”authority”). If it has the same rights and powers as everyone else, there is no reason to call it “government.” If the politicians have no more rights than you have, all of their demands and commands, all of their political rituals, “law” books, courts, and so on, amount to nothing more than the symptoms of a profound delusional psychosis. Nothing they do can have any legitimacy, any more than if you did the same thing on your own, unless they somehow acquired rights that you do not have. And that is impossible, since no one on earth, and no group of people on earth, could possibly have given them such superhuman rights.

The point here is not a theoretical discussion about the purpose of government or history of government or how it should run. Rather, the question is - for what reasons does one man (or government) have supreme authority over another? Although explanation and justification for the right to rule is necessary, none exists. [MORE]