Is It A Totalitarian State Yet? Explorer Scouts Train in Post-9/11 Law Enforcement Methods

Just in, and on a similar note:

3 Florida prison officers dismissed 2 others resign after 40 children deliberately shocked with stun guns

Three US prison officers have been dismissed and two others have resigned after 40 children in Florida were deliberately shocked with stun guns.

The incidents at two prisons occurred last month during a national day when people take their children to work.

In one case, a group of children were told to hold hands in a circle before one of them was shocked with a stun gun and the shock ran round the group.

No one was seriously hurt, but an official said it was "inexcusable".

In the other case in a second prison, children were given individual shocks.

The children, aged from five to 17, were all sons and daughters of employees of the Florida Department of Corrections.

[In Full @ BBCNews]


The moderator @ Gates of Hell Comments On Explorer 'Brownshirts' (linkage nla):

"After the training and indoctrination is over, I wonder how readily these young people would, without thinking, open fire on US citizens…"
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"...the Explorers have faced problems over the years. There have been numerous cases over the last three decades in which police officers supervising Explorers have been charged, in civil and criminal cases, with sexually abusing them.

Several years ago, two University of Nebraska criminal justice professors published a study that found at least a dozen cases of sexual abuse involving police officers over the last decade. Adult Explorer leaders are now required to take an online training program on sexual misconduct."

[See Boy Storm Troopers of America for the context to his comment:]

A Buffalo's personal, relatively recent experience:

At the beginning of the war on Iraq I was standing at the town clock where I live, a focal point for whatever protest is occurring due to it's proximity to the heart of downtown and commuter/tourist car traffic.

A California Highway Patrol car pulled up behind some cars stopped at the traffic light, right in front of the hundred or so peaceful sign-waving demonstrators.

Then, a young boy (16-19 years old judging by facial features) in the patrol car's passenger seat pulled out a digital camera and started taking pictures of the assembled crowd, chilling the spirit of the middle-class affluent protesters and young people in the crowd, many of whom were inexperienced and needed regular reminders that their task was to hold the signs towards the traffic, not commiserate with each other, and that the constitution of the US absolutely allowed for them to protest in that manner.

An unknown but most likely significant number of them never returned for further protests.