【英语语言学习】警察应该何时开枪

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

Are American police too afraid of the public? That's a sensitive question, especially after five officers were gunned down in Dallas last week. Many reformers say it has to be asked. NPR's Martin Kaste reports now on the growing debate inside the world of policing over whether cops are being taught to pull the trigger too fast.

MARTIN KASTE, BYLINE¹: When you listen to the protesters, the message is clear. They think police are too quick to pull the trigger when faced with potential danger. The thing is it's really hard to tell whether this is something that's changing. The stats on police use of force in this country are just too unreliable to say anything for certain. Still, Peter Kraska is one person who does think that police have become quicker to use force.

PETER KRASKA: From everything I can tell, even though amazingly we don't have good statistics on lethality² by police, the problem has certainly gotten worse.

KASTE: Kraska is a professor who's made a career out of studying what he calls police militarization. He says this in part because of what we've been seeing in the videos lately, images of police shooting people who aren't clearly armed or who have made a false move. But he also points to something else.

KRASKA: One of the cultural changes that has gone along with what we call the militarization of policing is a type of training that specifically comes from military-trained people that emphasizes that the police need to be - they need to have a warrior³ mindset.

KASTE: He's thinking about certain training companies which over the past couple of decades have become very influential⁴ in the police world. He says what he doesn't like about them is the way they rely on videos of bad outcomes - police that are ambushed⁵ or rushed by suspects often with fatal results. One of the companies he has in mind is called Calibre Press.

Earlier this week, Calibre was giving a leadership class to officers from around St. Paul, Minn. The class is taught by the company's owner Jim Glennon. He's a former cop from Illinois who owns the company. He says during the session that just now wrapped up, he and these local cops talked about the public outrage⁶ over the death of Philando Castile, the man shot by a local officer last week.

JIM GLENNON: The main thing to think of it is this - is that the information is not out so why is everybody who doesn't know anything offering opinions outside of their field of expertise⁷?

KASTE: Calibre is a major player in the world of police training. Glennon figures his company trained 20,000 people last year. The company's students include Officer Jeronimo Yanez, the officer who shot Castile. Glennon shows a sample of the kind of videos that he uses in his class.

GLENNON: Watch how fast this guy moves.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

UNIDENTIFIED OFFICER: You're going - you know what? Turn...

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: No, no, no, no. I don't want to...

UNIDENTIFIED OFFICER: Put your hands on the hood⁸.

(SOUNDBITE OF GUNSHOTS)

KASTE: Glennon is unapologetic about using videos like this, and he dismisses the criticism of people like Kraska.

GLENNON: Here's what bothers me about, oh, we'll never show these videos because then we won't have aggressive cops. No, you'll have dead ones.

KASTE: He says his courses are all about balance. He wants police to watch these videos, discuss them and learn from them. And he points out that his company also teaches plenty of classes about de-escalation and bias⁹. And he has no patience for the critics who say police training has become too militaristic.

GLENNON: The line out there by politicians and even some chiefs of police in this country who should know better are saying we train too much like warriors¹⁰. When in fact, if we train more with stress, stress-induced training, we would actually shoot less.

KASTE: It is true that police train a lot less than most people assume. For instance, here in Minnesota, the training requirement is only 16 hours per year, and most of those hours are not spent in simulators or active scenarios¹¹, the kind of training that can teach cops how to keep their focus when the adrenaline starts pumping. That kind of training is expensive, especially for smaller departments.

So companies like Calibre fill the niche¹², and it's retired¹³ cops who do much of the training, whether with the companies or at the public institutions that teach aspiring¹⁴ police. James Densley is a criminologist at one such college in Minnesota, and he says the identity of these trainers can have an effect.

JAMES DENSLEY: Now, there's nothing wrong with having police officers training police officers. I mean, in many ways, intuitively it makes sense. But I think one of the downsides of it is it also perpetuates¹⁵ a sort of mindset that maybe those police officers who are now instructing had learned when they went through the system, and then they're just sort of handing it down to future generations.

KASTE: The mindset that he worries about is a sense of us versus¹⁶ them, one which regards the public as more dangerous than it really is. But that's a contentious¹⁷ opinion to hold right now, especially inside this world of police training. By saying things like this for the past few days Densley has stirred up some bitter responses from police and trainers. They accuse the academics and the reformers of telling cops that they should hesitate too long in the face of danger at the cost of their own safety. Martin Kaste, NPR News, St. Paul.

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 lethality   

n.致命性，毁坏性

参考例句：

• Modern weapons have greater range, accuracy, speed, and lethality than anything ever dreamed of before. 现代的武器比从前所梦想的任何武器射得更远，射得更准，速度更快，而且更具有杀伤力。 来自辞典例句
• The Mk 46 provides long-range lethality while engaging small, high-speed, surface targets. 该系统在舰船遭遇小型高速水面目标时将提供远距离的致命杀伤力。 来自互联网

3 warrior   

n.勇士，武士，斗士

参考例句：

• The young man is a bold warrior.这个年轻人是个很英勇的武士。
• A true warrior values glory and honor above life.一个真正的勇士珍视荣誉胜过生命。

4 influential   

adj.有影响的，有权势的

参考例句：

• He always tries to get in with the most influential people.他总是试图巴结最有影响的人物。
• He is a very influential man in the government.他在政府中是个很有影响的人物。

5 ambushed   

v.埋伏( ambush的过去式和过去分词 )；埋伏着

参考例句：

• The general ambushed his troops in the dense woods. 将军把部队埋伏在浓密的树林里。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The military vehicles were ambushed. 军车遭到伏击。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 outrage   

n.暴行，侮辱，愤怒；vt.凌辱，激怒

参考例句：

• When he heard the news he reacted with a sense of outrage.他得悉此事时义愤填膺。
• We should never forget the outrage committed by the Japanese invaders.我们永远都不应该忘记日本侵略者犯下的暴行。

7 expertise   

n.专门知识(或技能等)，专长

参考例句：

• We were amazed at his expertise on the ski slopes.他斜坡滑雪的技能使我们赞叹不已。
• You really have the technical expertise in a new breakthrough.让你真正在专业技术上有一个全新的突破。

8 hood   

n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖

参考例句：

• She is wearing a red cloak with a hood.她穿着一件红色带兜帽的披风。
• The car hood was dented in.汽车的发动机罩已凹了进去。

9 bias   

n.偏见，偏心，偏袒；vt.使有偏见

参考例句：

• They are accusing the teacher of political bias in his marking.他们在指控那名教师打分数有政治偏见。
• He had a bias toward the plan.他对这项计划有偏见。

10 warriors   

武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• I like reading the stories ofancient warriors. 我喜欢读有关古代武士的故事。
• The warriors speared the man to death. 武士们把那个男子戳死了。

11 scenarios   

n.[意]情节；剧本；事态；脚本

参考例句：

• Further, graphite cores may be safer than non-graphite cores under some accident scenarios. 再者，根据一些事故解说，石墨堆芯可比非石墨堆芯更安全一些。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法
• Again, scenarios should make it clear which modes are acceptable to users in various contexts. 同样，我们可以运用场景剧本来搞清楚在不同情境下哪些模式可被用户接受。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

12 niche   

n.壁龛；合适的职务(环境、位置等)

参考例句：

• Madeleine placed it carefully in the rocky niche. 玛德琳小心翼翼地把它放在岩石壁龛里。
• The really talented among women would always make their own niche.妇女中真正有才能的人总是各得其所。

13 retired   

adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的

参考例句：

• The old man retired to the country for rest.这位老人下乡休息去了。
• Many retired people take up gardening as a hobby.许多退休的人都以从事园艺为嗜好。

14 aspiring   

adj.有志气的；有抱负的；高耸的v.渴望；追求

参考例句：

• Aspiring musicians need hours of practice every day. 想当音乐家就要每天练许多小时。
• He came from an aspiring working-class background. 他出身于有抱负的工人阶级家庭。 来自辞典例句

15 perpetuates   

n.使永存，使人记住不忘( perpetuate的名词复数 )；使永久化，使持久化，使持续

参考例句：

• Giving these events a lot of media coverage merely perpetuates the problem. 媒体大量地报道这些事件只会使问题持续下去。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Lack of water perpetuates poverty, increases the risk of political instability, and affects global prosperity. 水资源短缺导致贫穷，使政局不稳，且影响全球的繁荣。 来自互联网

16 versus   

prep.以…为对手，对；与…相比之下

参考例句：

• The big match tonight is England versus Spain.今晚的大赛是英格兰对西班牙。
• The most exciting game was Harvard versus Yale.最富紧张刺激的球赛是哈佛队对耶鲁队。

17 contentious   

adj.好辩的，善争吵的

参考例句：

• She was really not of the contentious fighting sort.她委实不是好吵好闹的人。
• Since then they have tended to steer clear of contentious issues.从那时起，他们总想方设法避开有争议的问题。