So I Went to a Party With Some Friends, Including Two Police Officers...

[NYMountaineer]

And with all the Gates talk going around, I couldn't resist asking them some of their opinions regarding the current situation, marijuana legalization, and general relations between police and the public.

I hope I'm not misrepresenting what they said, but I'm going to try to paraphrase and sum up their feelings.

1. Regardless of whose fault the Gates incident was, Obama overstepped his bounds by getting involved. If Gates did severely lose his temper, though, disorderly conduct is a viable charge.

However:

2. There are a lot of asshole cops out there, but unfortunately, individual good cops don't have a lot of power to cleanse the system out. These two officers admitted to being pressured into situations (citations/arrests) by their superiors that they were personally uncomfortable with. This bit was interesting because you could hear the contempt in their voices for crooked cops.

3. One said that marijuana shouldn't be legalized, and noted that he had friends who smoked it heavily and wound up as slow-witted losers. The other said the he would prefer if it was legalized, as the police have enough to deal with without nanny state regulations.

4. Cynicism and fear between the police and the public are strong and dangerous on both sides. It would be wonderful if relations could be normalized, but this is difficult to do with so much acrimony as part of the status quo.

Maybe this isn't the end-all answers that everyone wants, but it's the best that we could come up with just having friendly chats. Keep in mind, this was a party, we were munching on snacks, having beers, laughing, playing pool and generally being very cordial, and there was never any real tension about these subjects.

I just felt that I should share a few views from the other side. I'm sure some will unrec me and scream "FREEPER! FREEEEEEEEPPPEEEERR!!!" for this post, but frankly, as disturbing as police corruption is, I find generalized hatred of police and stereotyping of them disturbing as well. I've got friends and relatives who are police officers, and in the end, they're still complex human beings who come in all shapes and personalities and ought to be understood as such.

[dkf]

1. I think the Gates cop's behavior is a stain on his profession.

I don't think that all police are like this but I do think that cops with the kind of attitude that Crowley exhibited aren't well suited for the job.

[hlthe2b]

2. I have some professional contacts with older senior police officers

from several jurisdictions. I really like these guys--all who have risen up the ranks during a time when community policing was stressed. Several have commented on their concerns that the younger cops coming up through the ranks have not all had that same emphasis on community outreach and as a result they feel that abuse of authority issues are on the rise. Their cohort of police officers always looked upon the public as their neighbors, while many younger cops feel distant and distinctly separate from the general public for whom they are supposed to serve. To me, therein lies the problem. However, I don't doubt that race may enter in to some varying extent, depending on the jurisdiction.

[Ex Lurker]

27. A veteran police officer told me not long ago that

the new guys coming in were "scary." His words.

[eppur_se_muova]

67. Um ... younger cops trained during the Bu**sh** years? What a surprise.

The attitude of "those in authority can do now wrong" has trickled down deep. It will take a long time to get rid of it.

[hlthe2b]

82. Yup..... theire is a correlation, for sure

[Tangerine LaBamba]

3. Thank you for a telling and informative post -

People who have their own cop-hating agenda won't agree with you, or won't post to this one, or will unrecommend you. Or ignore you.

But your experience is similar to conversations I've had - not about Gates but about bad collars and pressure from within, bad cops, and legalizing dope - with police officers, and all it means is that there are good and bad, just as there are in any profession.

The one thing about cops, though, like firefighters and medical personnel, is that they are willing to go into unknown situations - in the case of cops and firemen - that could cost them their lives, situations so fraught with peril that I have trouble breathing when I think of some of them, and they do this freely and voluntarily.

That always amazes me.

K&R.....................

[JDPriestly]

21. "Cop-hating agenda." That's not the issue. It's bad experiences with

police officers that cause distrust. I am about as far from a criminal as you can imagine, but I have had some bad experiences with police officers as well as a few good ones. Police officers need more training in anger management and how to diffuse people who are angry for no good reason. They probably already get some, but in general they need more. The situation in Cambridge could have been avoided if the police officer had diffused the anger in the situation. The police officer is the authority. He or she is in charge and responsible for diffusing anger. There was no reason for that situation to escalate as it did. The officer lost control of the situation -- probably out of a kind of absurd wish to win an imaginary macho competition. "How dare he?" was the question being asked by both adversaries. Immature on both sides, but, as I said, the officer was in charge of the situation and should have just not taken himself so seriously. It wasn't worth it. Hopefully he sees his error. Because if he doesn't, he is likely to get into a worse situation in the course of his career.

Authority does not get angry even though it may at times act as though it is angry. I wonder what kind of parent that police officer is or would be -- not very good, I suspect.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

23. I agree about good and bad cops,

but you're making all sorts of comments suggesting you know what happened inside that house and out on the porch, and, frankly, you don't.

No one knows. Not yet.

Perhaps we'll get the whole story someday, but I'm not sanguine about it.

And your shot at the parenting abilities of the arresting officer tells me that you're a fool who makes unfounded assumptions in your driving need to make a man into a monster. That's a cheap shot beyond belief.

I could say, with more experience of you here than you have of the cop in Cambridge, that you're a witless wonder who makes up facts just so that he can be comfortable with his bias.

Bad father. You're beyond delusional. What a jerky thing to say.......................

[JDPriestly]

24. Look the officer was insulted in front of a group of people.

felt embarrassed and put down so he got the upper hand by arresting the man who was insulting him. It was childish on the part of the officer who should have just walked away and left the equally childish, angry man to sulk in his house.

Here is why I say he must be a bad parent. Children love to challenge their parents and push their parents to the edge. That is how a child tests his or her own ability to take charge of his or her life. A parent has to control the child and not let the child get out of hand. If the parent joins the child and also gets angry and loses control, then the situation can end very badly. That is how some parents end up in dependency court with their children taken away from them.

What the parent has to do is to respond to the child's anger in a calm way without allowing the child's anger to take control. After all, the goal of the parent is to teach the child how to control the child's own anger for him or herself. The parent must respond to the child's anger with firm strength rather than with a return of anger. This officer did not know how to deal with the professor's irrational anger. It was a pretty silly confrontation. I conclude from that that the officer probably generally has a lot of trouble controlling his anger and probably also loses his temper with his children if he has any. People who do not lose their tempers with any adult will lose it with their children. You don't have to let your child take charge if you are clearly in charge of yourself. Your child will copy your behavior and learn over time to manage his or her anger well.

Every police officer should know how to deal with displays of irrational anger in others whether the others are their children or people they meet in their work. Techniques for this can be learned. Obviously this police officer needs to take a course in anger management. (So does the professor needless to say.) If the officer doesn't learn how to manage his anger, this officer will end up in a tragic situation sooner or later. (It's possible that the professor will also, but less likely since he does not have to deal with angry suspects quite as often as the officer.)

[Onceuponalife]

4. I appreciate your observations

I have a relative who is a cop in California and you couldn't find a bigger FReeper. He's always complaining about taxes yet taxpayers pay his salary. He says he would round up the unemployed and "welfare cheats" and put them on buses and deport them from the state. He listens to Hannity and Dr. Laura religiously. Michael Savage is one of his heroes. He has a signed copy of one of Savage's books. He refers to the drunks and non-violent drug offenders he has to lock up all the time as "scumbags."

So my mileage varies from yours concerning cops, obviously.

[Mythsaje]

44. I think empathy should be a requirement... The fact that this relative

is a Freeper type should immediately disqualify him from the profession. IMO.

[BlooInBloo]

5. "Cynicism and fear between the police and the public are strong and dangerous on both sides."...

But they have guns and the authority to use them, and a big blue shield to back them up. Fuck them. And fuck the false equivalence.

[demodonkey]

6. If -- IF -- Gates did severely lose his temper it was in his OWN HOME.

A so-called "free" citizen should have the right to do what he or she pleases inside his or her own home, including acting "disorderly-ly" within reason (such as not to the point that it is threatening another person or disturbs or enrages neighbors.)

So unless Gates was screaming at a level that was frightening the entire neighborhood or was wielding a gun or butcher knife (or his cane?) at the cop, I agree with Obama that the police acted stupidly, regardless of what your cop friends say.

[NYMountaineer]

10. Well, as I said, they simply explained that it was a viable charge.

They never said that they necessarily supported the arrest, but that there was a legal case to be made.

I personally agree with you that Gates shouldn't have been arrested, and that Sgt. Crowley was out of line.

[demodonkey]

16. Per my post, I don't believe it WAS viable, unless he was so violent he was...

...frightening or severely disturbing neighbors and / or threatening someone. And there is no report or evidence that happened.

Thus I disagree with your cop friends that there is any legal case to be made and again I agree with our President that the police acted stupidly.

"Disorderly conduct" is a vague charge that allows too much leeway to the police to let someone they don't like have it, IMHO.

[NYMountaineer]

17. Fair enough

I'll agree that vague laws and charged cause lots of trouble.

No doubt my friends have a natural bias towards their own side, it's practically inevitable

I'm glad, however, that the charges against Gates were dropped.

[tblue37]

20. This HuffPo post explains why it was NOT a viable charge to make:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/adam-winkler/obama-was-right-about-the_b_244888.html

But one thing is clear: Gates did not violate any law. Under Massachusetts law, which the police officer was supposedly enforcing, yelling at a police officer is not illegal. There are clear decisions of the Massachusetts courts holding that a person who berates an officer, even during an arrest, is not guilty of disorderly conduct. And yet that is exactly what Gates was arrested for.

The Massachusetts statute defining "disorderly conduct" used to have a provision that made it illegal to make "unreasonable noise or offensively coarse utterance, gesture or display," or to address "abusive language to any person present." Yet the courts have interpreted that provision to violate the Massachusetts Constitution's guarantee of freedom of speech. So police cannot lawfully arrest a person for hurling abusive language at an officer.

In several cases, the courts in Massachusetts have considered whether a person is guilty of disorderly conduct for verbally abusing a police officer. In Commonwealth v. Lopiano, a 2004 decision, an appeals court held it was not disorderly conduct for a person who angrily yelled at an officer that his civil rights were being violated. In Commonwealth v. Mallahan, a decision rendered last year, an appeals court held that a person who launched into an angry, profanity-laced tirade against a police officer in front of spectators could not be convicted of disorderly conduct. So Massachusetts law clearly provides that Gates did not commit disorderly conduct.

The Cambridge Police should be training their officers to know the difference between legal and illegal conduct. What Gates did was probably not so smart -- in general, be nice to people carrying guns -- but it wasn't disorderly conduct. At least not in Cambridge, Massachusetts. That explains why the charges against Gates were dropped. It wasn't because the police were trying to defuse the situation. It was because Gates had done nothing illegal <emphasis added>.

Since this arrest occurred in Massachusetts, it was a bad arrest. Your cop friends might be right about their own jurisdictions, but Crowley either was too ignorant to know the law in his own state, or he deliberately ignored the law in order to abuse his power "to teach this guy a lesson." Either way, he was in the wrong, and he was definitely "acting stupidly," escalating a situation when a large part of his job as an LEO is to de-escalate whenever possible.

[NYMountaineer]

22. That might be the case.

I'm in Upstate NY, so the law might be different here.

I know some jurisdictions around here have strict public disturbance laws, which include laws against loudly using offensive or angry language in public places. Most times, the cops'll ignore it, sometimes they'll stop and tell the guilty parties to cool their tempers, but if someone claims that they were disturbed, charges can be made.

Another nanny law not worth its salt, if you ask me, but until someone takes the town to task for it, it remains.

[pnorman]

19. He pretty well acknowledged that raising one's voice in one's own home wasn't a viable charge.

So he asked the professor to step outside, thereby turning it into a "public disturbance"."Smart move" perhaps, but one that will NEVER work the second time around! Bad cop! Have a beer!

pnorman

[EFerrari]

7. The idea that liberals hate cops is just another version of "you don't support the troops"

and similarly, it's a right wing smear.

[NYMountaineer]

9. Believe me, I don't wish to make smears

But there are plenty of anti-cop posts here on DU, which I honestly found unnerving.

I'm simply trying to show another side of the story.

[EFerrari]

12. There are a lot of hard feelings and for some of the reasons you write up

in your OP.

[NYMountaineer]

13. No doubt.

I've dealt with a couple of lousy cops in my life, but the vast majority of cops I've dealt with were perfectly decent people.

Some people might accuse me of shilling, but in truth, due to being acquainted with a number of cops, I actually hold them to a high standard. I want to see corrupt cops purged out of the system and locked up, as well as good cops kept safe and rewarded for their work.

Hell, I'd have no problem if a law were passed stating that that authorities (cops, politicians, etc) could be subject to 50% longer sentences for crimes committed than civilians.

The way I see it is like this: if someone sworn to uphold the law breaks the law, it's a form of treason.

[Mythsaje]

45. I've known good ones too...

I think they're up against a fucked up, bass-ackward bureaucracy designed to protect the bad ones as much as the good ones. I also think they have to make a decision as to what side of the whole thing they're on. It takes courage to go into a strange situation where combat is a possibility, but it also takes courage to take on a system-wide problem that isn't going away under current management.

I think all interactions between the police and citizens should be recorded for quality control.

[reformedrethug]

66. Obviously I dont post much, read more than anything

But I have to chime in here. I used to work for a Sheriff's Office taking care of their network. Before I left, ALL of the cruisers were setup with digital video and voice recorders that activated the moment the lights and or siren was turned on. They could not turn it off, could not mute the voice, they were locked out of it. When they pulled back on station it automatically downloaded to a server that only 2 people had access too and that was it.

EVERY traffic stop, every call they went on was recorded and they were told to point their cruisers to where they would be standing if at all possible, also, if it was a domestic they always went with 2 cars. Not only for their own protection because as anybody who knows cops know, domestics are the WORST calls to go on as far as how explosive the situation can become very quickly.

Several times this video was burned to DVD for court reasons, both good and bad. Also, they citizens of this county just voted out the old Sheriff and elected fresh blood, sort of. The guy they elected used to be a Major before he left and decided to run for the office. I have kept in touch with a few of the guys there and they say he is doing his best to clean house and get rid of the trash so to speak. Could not have happened any faster IMHO.

[NYMountaineer]

69. Good.

Sounds like a damn good start to me. Now, if we could spread this to a larger scale...

[TexasObserver]

28. co-sign

[NYMountaineer]

8. Politics plays an unfortunately large part of policing.

They're beholden to their jurisdictions, ad absurdum, unfortunately.

In one case near me, we had a landslide that wiped out part of a highway. The construction took long enough, but the DOT insisted that the area remain marked as a construction zone for months after repairs were completed, because NYS law allows for fines to be doubled for traffic violations committed in work zones.

Politics plays a much bigger role in policing that some realize, and on another level, police abuses are like military abuses. They need the men, so they find themselves taking on some who are competent, but not always of the best moral character, and the system doesn't always check these types like it should (obviously). The two officers at the party noted this last point in particular.

For those who are curious as to race, one officer was white, the other was hispanic.

And Blooinbloo, you may say "fuck the police," but what's your solution?

[Skittles]

14. my solution

put Bloo on Ignore - for your own sanity

[seabeyond]

11. i was all for your post until the last paragraph. i like how the cop said it better

4. Cynicism and fear between the police and the public are strong and dangerous on both sides. It would be wonderful if relations could be normalized, but this is difficult to do with so much acrimony as part of the status quo.

he was much more open to the problem seeing the whole than what your last paragraph was. what pisses this side off, lol. i am not a hater, dont say all cops and i am sorry that people you love get a bum rap, but as the cop friend says, both sides adn there are reasons.

BUT

i do thank you for this post. i do like hearing from the cops. without a pretense when they are expressing and sounds like you did a good job reciting back

thanks.

[JDPriestly]

15. Police officers should not arrest people for being rude and saying nasty things to them.

Police officers have the power to cite people and should not spend taxpayer money arresting people for being insulting and loud. It's just a waste of the officer's time and public money.

[nosmokes]

18. I got no use for the lying murdering motherfucking pigs or the ones that

cover up for'em, and when push comes to shove that's every one of 'em. I have very rarely had a pleasant encounter with a cop, even when I'm simply trying to be Mr good citizen and be helpful. I still get an attitude like I'm talking with a storm trooper and s/he's gonna take down any second. I'm not addressed as sir or mister and I'm pushing 50 here, and pushing it pretty hard.I"m sick and tired of dealing with an occupying force in my own backyard.We need police, for sure, but we don't need this paramilitary force that has mutated from the cop on the beat, someone who really was there to protect and serve, not get all up in your private bidness and what or who you do in the bedroom or what you smoke in your pipe.

[Fumesucker]

25. I wonder if the cop who thinks pot shouldn't be legalized has ever known any alcoholics..

Who ended up as "slow witted losers"?

And if he thinks alcohol should be made illegal for that reason?

Somehow I suspect there would be a different standard applied for alcohol..

[TexasObserver]

29. "Who would you rather have to arrest - someone drunk or someone high on weed?"

THAT is the question to ask officers.

If they're truthful, they'll tell you that it is the drunks who pose a real danger to them, not weed smokers.

In absence of alcohol, meth, crack, pcp, or cocaine, weed is not going to compel anyone to fight with or attack police. The failure to treat it differently is mainly based upon the opposition of Big Pharm, Big Alcohol, Big Tobacco, Big Private Prisons, and other fascists.

[Fumesucker]

33. It's very hard to get them to be truthful about such things..

The cultural bias in favor of alcohol is overwhelmingly strong.

Obama is going to "have a beer" with Gates and Crowley, for instance, and no one thinks anything of it.

[TexasObserver]

34. Obama should have the White House police then arrest Crowley for public intoxication.

Led out in handcuffs. I wonder if he'd be yelling in protest about his rights.

[Fumesucker]

36. Now *that* would be precious..

I'd probably expire from asphyxia laughing..

:rofl:

[NYMountaineer]

39. Alcohol was mentioned too.

His words were something like "too much marijuana can fry your brain. of course, too much alcohol can, too."

In any case, he wasn't vehemently against it, but felt that it was enough of a danger not to legalize.

The other cop was pro-legalization.

[MrScorpio]

26. I'm not surprised at what they told you

Not one bit

[KG]

30. werd.

[struggle4progress]

31. Be calm and polite with the uniforms, but never voluntarily give up your rights

[Raineyb]

32. Am I supposed to be surprised that cops basically thought that arresting

someone on a bullshit charge was a good idea?

So they know there's a problem with the system but can't really be bothered to do much about it. But we're not supposed to be wary of the institution they work for.

In other words there's nothing new here.

[ContinentalOp]

77. Exactly my reaction.

Glad I'm not the only one.

[Bluenorthwest]

35. So you could hear contempt for corruption in their voices

but they report that on the job they play along, and do things that they think are wrong. That is called being a coward. The contempt in their voices is not a good thing unless they act on their true feelings. But cops don't do that. They will whine when drinking about 'bad cops' but at work, they are the handmaids to the bad cops, and they never take a stand.
If they took a stand against that corruption, instead of participating in it and then attempting to assuage their guilt via beer soaked 'confessions', our police departments might stop being so corrupt.
But the 'good cops' are cowards who will do wrong for money, much like the folks they call 'criminals'.

[ecstatic]

38. Good point nt

[Posteritatis]

42. So do you bend against your will at times, or leave entirely and let someone worse take your place?

It's easy to sit safely back and throw e-stones, but it's not quite that simple in the real world, where sometimes the only option is to do what you can even if you have to do unpalatable things in order to keep it up.

[Mythsaje]

47. You have to choose between honor and convenience...

No one has ever said having a sense of honor wasn't a handicap.

[ecstatic]

37. Point 2: Do you think the black officer was forced to be

"supportive" of what Crowley did? He is in the uncomfortable position of defending Crowley to the MSM but I wonder how sincere he is when doing so. :shrug:

[NYMountaineer]

40. He might very well be.

But the system is very binary--the old us vs. them mentality. I wish more upright cops would take stands, but a lot of them would wind up paying for it with their jobs, no doubt, if they tried.

[Mythsaje]

41. I'd say it makes it clear the problems are systemic, not individual.

The SYSTEM makes it hard for good cops to do anything about the bad ones, which is exactly the opposite of what it should be. And, yes, MANY constant pot-smokers are a little out of it, but the VAST majority of them are undetectable without direct knowledge of their habits.

Sure, cops are human beings, but they are part of a sub-section of the population capable of causing massive damage to public trust, individual liberties, and respect for the law in the first place. If they don't hold themselves to a higher standard, then we'll have to do it for them.

[redqueen]

43. re: Slow-witted losers... didn't Carl Sagan smoke?

Maybe he would've been even more brilliant without it...

[Mythsaje]

46. Well, let's see... The one quarter I made the honor role in college

I was stoned 90% of the time when I wasn't at school, about 20% of the time when I was. Most of my homework was done while I was stoned. Go figure.

[NYMountaineer]

49. Heh, heh, I've got no problem with marijuana use.

So long as it's done in moderation like alcohol.

Keep in mind, I was just trying to record my friends' opinions because I thought they might be useful for discussion and debate purposes. I don't necessarily agree with them 100%.

[Mythsaje]

50. I realize that.

I've had a few similar discussions with cops, believe it or not. It's really the "don't rock the boat" stuff that gets to me the most. Some boats NEED rocking. This is one of them.

[NYMountaineer]

51. Agreed.

I don't smoke it, but I would like it to be legalized and taxed, and treated in a similar way to alcohol, ie, age limits, no smoking and driving, etc.

But it's the legislatures who make the laws, so it's them who we should be needling. In any case, public support is growing and this is liable to become a larger wedge issue in upcoming years.

[Mythsaje]

53. It's one issue that Libertarians and Liberals can agree on...

And with ordinary Republicans going the way of the dodo because of their love affair with the crazier element of their group, a lot of barriers are going to fall.

I know there are DUI laws on the books with regards to pot, but I can virtually guarantee that it'd be awfully hard to enforce. The number of accidents directly attributable to marijuana alone aren't easy to quantify. How, exactly does one determine whether a person is currently stoned or has just smoked in the last several days? Not easily, that's for sure. Maybe we should use the method suggested by Johnny Carson. The cop approaches the vehicle with a tray of twinkies to test whether s/he has munchies.

:D

[proteus_lives]

48. Cops are human beings.

I'm glad you shared this. I think people sometimes just think of LEO's as the law they represent. They are just like the rest of us with different thoughts and opinions.

Communities and police need to reach out to other. Better understanding is the key.

[Fire1]

52. Indeed, I DO understand them as 'complex.' n/t

[seabeyond]

54. crowley lied. officers knew and stood with him. those pissed just pissed that much more

people that trust cops will now step to pissed

[NYMountaineer]

55. Of course I'm pissed.

Arrest Crowley, put him on trial, lock him up. Purge the bad cops.

But my point is that declaring the police to be some sort of big, general faceless enemy doesn't get us anywhere.

Lemme frame the argument a different way. Careers are a choice. So is religion. Some police are corrupt. Some Christians are crazy fundies. Some good cops don't stand up to bad ones like we'd like them too. Some moderate Christians don't confront radical evangelicism like we'd like them too. But it would be bigotry to declare all Christians as crazy radicals.

Yes, I realize bad cops are most dangerous because of the direct power they have, but blanket statements will get us nowhere.

[seabeyond]

56. you know. him leading out of house was cop speak to all that his intent was to arrest

every cop that read that knew that crowley was gonna arrest them. not ONE cop across our nation had the balls to stand up

i hear what you are saying. you use exactly the examples i do. as a christian it is MY job to stand up to the fundamentalist and if i dont i fall short. am less. many i hear them say, we dont think like that, dont pin it on me. hubby with male crap says, i dont think that way, i dont do, not me. i feel strongly, so very strongly gotta say it out loud and if part of group have an even greater responsibility in it

but that is the frustrating thing last handful of days.

we were talking reason. we knew. and still people saying, no trust, respect, ect... how can we. cant.

but i hear ya

jsut something had better be done

political. bushco, what they did way over line. why have to prosecute. to draw the line or truly expect both parties to do it and more

[NYMountaineer]

58. I'd support a crackdown.

Or a citizen-run regulatory commission to police the police. As I've said earlier on this thread, when someone commits a crime after swearing to fight on the side of law and order, it's almost a form of treason. Hence, I don't plan to tolerate crooked cops.

But I was seeing a lot of posts along the line of "typical lying PIG!" or "fuck them all!" and felt that such talk wasn't the way forward.

Honestly, sometimes I hear about police corruption and feel like giving up on them, too, but I can't help remembering all the decent cops I've met who are caught in the middle of this whole conflict, and thus, I don't feel that anger in broad strokes helps anything.

[seabeyond]

59. i know.

you are right.

i just heard and so very mad. hate (k, i hate no one) lyin. but i feel that way with my christians. i know so many good people who believe the fundamentalist way, but dont.

[NYMountaineer]

60. I understand your point too.

It's been an ugly situation for a long time, and cynicism is inevitable.

I suppose, if I had to boil it all down, I'd say that discipline is the key. Discipline on the part of the public to behave respectfully, but more importantly, discipline on the part of the police to enforce the law in good conscience. Discipline so we don't have excessive use of weapons and cops beating people up with tasers and truncheons. Discipline so they stick to the letter of the law and don't concoct phony charges. Discipline to appreciate good cops for the job they do, and the strength to put bad ones in their place.

In the end, a little responsibility goes a long way.

No hard feelings, I hope, even if we disagree on a few points?

[seabeyond]

61. i dont even blame the cops. like i dont blame the soldiers. it is higher up that set the tone

that draw the line. that have the boundaries. they are the one to create the atmosphere. what the lowers are is what the higher have done.

we seen it in everything. parent with child. military. corporations. schools. the job of the higher up, why they are paid the big bucks, is to be the oversight

it is the higher ups that have failed these cops. especially the good cops. it is the higher ups that failed our soldiers

[NYMountaineer]

62. Damn straight.

The "few bad apples" excuse doesn't work if no one's doing anything to remove them from the barrel.

[seabeyond]

63. no, because it is no longer a few bad apples. we are talking orchards....

let a bad apple set up against each other without being thrown away, gotten rot the good apples, lol lol

[fascisthunter]

57. most of us know there are good cops and bad cops

the problem is, all too often do we see cops sticking up for one another even when a cop has done something wrong. That is why people generalize, because enabling bad cops make the police force as a whole culpable. Until communities, especially in the inner city, start to see cops not just reprimanding bad cops, but firing them, the police force will be labeled as a whole. Not a rule but very close to how civilians resent cops.

[lumberjack_jeff]

64. My best friend is a cop, and he feels pretty much this way.

"The code" pisses him off no end, but cynicism from the public makes tribalism within the department difficult to combat. Us and Them.

I think he's generally against legalizing dope because illegal is the way it's always been. "It'd be like admitting defeat".

[seabeyond]

65. a poster said, sees all cops bad but will pretend to protect self. adn cops see all of us as crimin

criminals to protect themselves

it is us against them

and it is not/does not work

[NYMountaineer]

68. And the tough thing is this:

Change has to come from two directions: the top and the bottom.

The local cops and citizens might try to work on their people skills with each other, but if the state wants arrests and fines, the cops are beholden to them.

On the other hand, even if we get meaningful regulatory legislation, it's got no teeth unless we got good folks on both sides at the bottom who are actually going to pay heed to it.

There's nothing that will be solved anytime soon.

[seabeyond]

71. i have lifetime of tickets. i dont care. i pay. back in late 90's i saw we need this

my son was a couple years old. i wanted him to have sense of community. trust cops. not fear cops. i would see them in the local convenient store, on break. i would tell son, put on huge smile, say hi Mr. Officer. and interact

5, 6, 7, x's not once did son get positive feedback and i would tell him. not all adults like kids. finally i stopped

had firemen in our grocery store so started using them. they were friendly, welcoming, interactive with both boys. they chatted, more than once put kids in their truck while they waited and chatted about what they were cooking for dinner. even stopped and chatter at firehouse when they were out and about cooking. always positive

to this day, boys will ask firemen in the grocery store, whats cookin. and they will chat

i knew then it was a matter of bringing cop into community. but they dont want, they stand separate and want it that way

when boys were about 5 i had nephew with me and he had just had an experience with cops night before. scary moment, father beatin on mom, both drunk, cops come. two bicycle cops rode by. one cop stopped the boys and chatted for a while. then handed both a badge

that was the HUGEST thing a cop could have done for my nephew at that time. to see the cop in non scary environment right after experience. told cop, because of his nice to boy, he does not even know the magnitude of good he did with interacting with that boy

it makes all the difference.

[lumberjack_jeff]

70. In my experience, two kinds of people become cops.

Boy scouts and football players.

The former, I trust.

[Mythsaje]

78. Good point. Me too. n/t

[ieoeja]

74. "Cynicism from the public" when about 99% of the public knee-jerkingly worship cops?

There is your Conservative mindset at work. The whole "liberal media" myth became fact during Vietnam because a very tiny percentage of the media criticized our gov't's actions in Southeast Asia. Under certain (most?) circumstances anything short of 100% support is too little support.

[NYMountaineer]

75. 99%?

You're exaggerating now. Hell, even FR has plenty of anti-cop posts if you look.

[Mythsaje]

79. It's not dishonorable to admit defeat when your ass has been kicked around the planet...

It is, however, dishonorable to allow that defeat to drag more people down in the process than it should have.

[lumberjack_jeff]

80. It is one of the points on which he and I disagree.

After 35 years, there are lots of them. :D

[Mythsaje]

81. I'll bet...

I'm sure it's interesting at the very least.

[Strong Atheist]

72. Welcome to DU!

:toast:

[NYMountaineer]

73. Ha ha, thank you very much.

I've been lurking about a while and finally decided to join back in April. Going pretty good so far.

[Strong Atheist]

76. Enjoy! nt.