No Stupid Questions

They are not required to serve and protect. US courts say so.

Reminds me of my favorite Simpson’s quote.

Marge (to Bart): “Your father wanted to be a police officer but they said he was too heavy.”

Homer: “No the army said I was too heavy, the police said I was too dumb.”

Our law enforcement is a huge joke and the meh pay, high turnover rate, and low bar of entry attracts the type of people you wouldn't want to be associated with to begin with.

But also, why are small framed 5'3 women allowed to be police?

Fact is, most cops can't outrun or overpower a lot of criminals who chose to resist or flee. In actuality that's a pretty tiny part of the job. The rest is tickets, reports, paperwork, arrests with no resistance, investigations, etc. you don't have to be an athlete or even very physically fit to do any of that. Id rather deal with a fat cop that isn't a dick more than a slim one who's a dumbass.

Becauase people who are sensible and emotionally stable enough to be healthy probably aren't stupid or malicious enough to be cops.

You also can't be a cop at some stations if your IQ is tested too high.

They want obedient bullies, it's a low bar.

Never met anyone who was too fat to shoot minorities.

From what I've seen, they don't even learn about the law and often break the law by illegal detainment, searches and confiscation. Cops who served for over 20 years but don't know people their rights. They often get minimal training while having to serve alone where everyone carries a gun. That's asking for problems. And now cops in the US are militarized with heavy combat gear, while the majority is white and racist. So obesity is the least of the problems with US police.

Non joke answer: A bunch of reasons. Many precincts are understaffed, so they need all the hands they can get. The police union is huge and makes it extremely difficult to fire even the most homer-simpsonian individuals. Many of the hugely obese cops are assigned to "light duty" meaning the most exertion they face is paperwork, manning the public information desk and or doing things like serving writs (in some cases you're allowed to wear the uniformn even if you're not a bonded officer, which is absurd). Additionally, fitness requirements are actually fairly rare across the whole spectrum of law enforcement - It's surprisingly rare to see them for any positions besides uniformed patrol officer, even detectives or etc. aren't always required to pass them - and even when you do, they're usually pathetically easy to pass.

Everyone’s so fucking obese here that most people don’t notice.

Since you're using terminology tied to BMI, it is important to note that it's use for police officers doesn't accurately reflect reality.

A lot of cops take their fitness regime seriously, including building a lot of muscle mass. If you have significant muscle mass, you are going to be considered obese or morbidly obese per BMI even though they are in great physical shape. This would be true for other fields like firefighters.

They just need to be able to drive a car and pull the trigger on their gun

Cops don't exist to protect you and they don't have to be physically fit to serve their purpose: using the threat of violence and the prison industrial complex to protect the interests of capital.

to give an answer to a rhetorical question: because firing people based on weight is a can of worms being opened. while it's still technically not illegal to fire someone because their weight makes them "unfit," the ada can be invoked if said obesity is caused by a disorder (e.g., type 1 diabetes). this ignores the fact that it's hard to prove that someone would be unfit just for their weight; it just opens up employers to lawsuits. a simpler way to think about it would be to ask yourself if the guy handing out speeding tickets is "unfit for duty" solely because he's obese.

Kind of an over simplification. Yeah, cops should ideally be fit-ish but even an obese person with a gun or a tazer can protect people, maybe not as well but still, and that doesn't take into account the fact that a lot of cops are not actually on the streets but rather in an office doing paperwork etc. The problems are:

• There are maybe not enough cops that are fit for actual fights?
• Cops are ridiculously undertrained and unfiltered, giving us all if these assholes that really just like power.

I believe that they are not allowed. Some of them just are.

The point is to punish, not to protect. Fatasses can punish just fine.

Just as well as any other cop