One Nation, under SWAT: The undemocratic Militarization of the Police
One Nation, under SWAT: The undemocratic Militarization of the Police
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Everyday Militarization
Dont think, however, that the military mentality and equipment associated with SWAT operations are confined to those elite units. Increasingly, theyre permeating all forms of policing.
As Karl Bickel, a senior policy analyst with the Justice Departments Community Policing Services office, observes, police across America are being trained in a way that emphasizes force and aggression. He notes that recruit training favors a stress-based regimen thats modeled on military boot camp rather than on the more relaxed academic setting a minority of police departments still employ. The result, he suggests, is young officers who believe policing is about kicking ass rather than working with the community to make neighborhoods safer. Or as comedian Bill Maher reminded officers recently: The words on your car, protect and serve, refer to us, not you.
This authoritarian streak runs counter to the core philosophy that supposedly dominates twenty-first-century American thinking: community policing. Its emphasis is on a mission of keeping the peace by creating and maintaining partnerships of trust with and in the communities served. Under the community model, which happens to be the official policing philosophy of the U.S. government, officers are protectors but also problem solvers who are supposed to care, first and foremost, about how their communities see them. They dont command respect, the theory goes: they earn it. Fear isnt supposed to be their currency. Trust is.
Nevertheless, police recruiting videos, as in those from Californias Newport Beach Police Department and New Mexicos Hobbs Police Department, actively play up not the community angle but militarization as a way of attracting young men with the promise of Army-style adventure and high-tech toys. Policing, according to recruiting videos like these, isnt about calmly solving problems; its about you and your boys breaking down doors in the middle of the night.
http://www.juancole.com/2014/08/nation-undemocratic-militarization.html