Real Policing...

Ironic.  The day I post on policing I find myself in the middle of a debacle.  I went to see a step show in a midsize American city.  The event was in an amazing old (for american standards) venue.  There were probably 1500 people there, almost all of which were african-american save the venue staff, and four white people that I saw.  The show was great (the hour it lasted).  But at almost an hour into the show, a fight broke out in the balcony near where we were sitting.  People began to scatter, the fight moved about that section and was eventually squelched by the police with their characteristic knee in the back while handcuffing a young kid.  Now, the performers in this event were mostly high school and college teams, though there was one junior high team.  Hence the audience was largely the same.  Within a few minutes of the fight being stopped the lights came on and the show was stopped (though I must give credit to the Alpha phi Alpha team for stepping right through the fracas, not to be deterred).  Following the end of their performance the organizers stopped the show.

Now lets examine this, how many people have ever been to a show of any kind and there was a fight?  Heavy metal concerts are fights, especially in the mosh pit.  What about concerts full of drugs, and anything else?  A high school football game?  I've heard of a fire alarm going off in a electronica trance funk type show and the show continuing on.  I was amazed that at the door though for this step event, there was NO security.  No frisking, no wanding, no metal detectors, no nothing.  There wasn't even any real security watching as people came in.  There were two police officers there that I saw at one point.  Now think about concerts or other events, security is impeccable (down to taking in water), but with a blind eye to certain things and substances.  The event was poorly organized.    

Anyway, the point of all this is what happens from there.  After the show got closed down the cops rolled in.  at least 30 police officers, including three I saw three mounted on horseback.  Within the theater it was abysmal, 15-16 year old kids (rightfully upset that the show was canceled) yet NOT causing any trouble, and the cops are pushing them out the door, literally, pushing them.  Rude as can be, like they all were criminals (it was about 10 degrees fahrenheit, -13ish celsius).  Now the worst thing about this is that as a white person, I was spared of all of this.  I was able to walk up to event staff and chat with them about the situation, I was able to ask about a money refund, and the police didn't push or harass me at all.  Outside in a mob of people the cops were a huge display, I mean cars with their lights on ever curb and corner, horses, menacing, etc.  I saw one walking around with his chrome extendable stick ready to just start hitting people, and he looked like he was 'looking' to.  And the saddest thing about it, is as a white face in the middle of a sea of black, they didn't bother me at all.  Even chatted with me as I asked for directions.

This was an overwhelming use of force and an underwhelming display of any form of compassion, understanding, and/or racial (or any other kind of) understanding or sensativity.  Now obviously, the kids need not to fight.  American society and culture needs to find a cure for this (maybe take away the me first, individualism and 'tuff guy' mentality that is 'cool'), and the cops are responding based on history and training.  But ONE fight!?! and this is the display of force you bring out to show a bunch of 12-22 year old kids?  What do you expect them to think of 'cops'?  They were shown no respect and no understanding because of just a couple individuals.  And I tell you this and you can believe it or not, but in my wholly honest opinion, if this was a regular concert - full of white faces - one fight would not have stopped the show, never mind bring the entire police force down upon these kids.  It was abysmal.  We just keep making things worse for ourselves, on both sides and as a society.    

Police and Policing

What is it that ‘laws’ are supposed to do? Take a moment and think about this...
I like to take it back to the original intent and the motivation for it. Ultimately laws try to make society a more ordered and secure place. Obviously what ‘ordered and secure’ means will differ from place to place and culture to culture. In some places and/or times laws weren’t needed for certain crimes as all ‘property’ was communal, and/or criminal outcomes weren’t about punishment, but more about restoration.  The goal really is to find a way to work within a cultural system to find a way to allow people to feel secure.  In current global society I think that we have lost some of the original intent of the concept of laws and replaced it with a cultural of punishment and zero tolerance. 

I am not saying that if someone does something against the law that they should simply be able to pay their way off or somehow be obsolved of the crime.  But ultimately, the goal always was supposed to be to create that type of society where people felt comfortable and safe.  What says that this requires jail or death sentences, which are simply the way that things are mostly done today and in the societies we live in.

The point that I am trying to get to here is that 'policing' as it is undertaken today is for the most part about fear and then retribution.  Of public figures police officers are generally some of the worst regarded people in many places.  Now obviously, they are the messengers of laws that tell people they 'can not' do something.  No one seems to like being told what they can't do.  But the culture of policing in many of the countries I've been in or studied is not one of a 'peace officer', but more about intimidation than helping people to 'learn' the leasons needed to create this more 'ordered' and 'secure' society. 

Take this advertisment from Prague.  When I first saw this billboard I

thought it was for a new actin movie or TV show (the tag means 'Action Prague').  But it is not an advertisment for a new action drama, but for recruiting new police officers.  Guns, Motorcycles, tough guys, movie type personas.  Amazing, what type of people do you think you are going to get for the job?  Certainly not 'peace officers'.  You are going to get argressive people that want to shoot guns, take risks, have power, and feel like 'tough guys'.  And the sad thing is that while this ad is so blatently absurd, this is really the type of person that a lot of people envision when they think of "cops".  We all have been driving on the road when a cop passes us going well above the speed limit.  We hate it that 'professional courtessy' means they will never get a ticket.  Abuse of the law is par for the course with police officers (as it is in many industries).  And it doesn't help that the type of people they try to recruit are the once that this type of add appeals to. 

I think another issue is about power, no where else in society is someone actually 'the law'.  They can tell you whatever they want and make you do whatever they want.  If you complain it is your word versus a 'police officers', and you'll lose.  If they pull you over, they treat you like a criminal, no inocent before proven guilty there.  You can't get out of the car, can't actually dare to be anything but passive and just take whatever they say.  It is definitley not a conversaiton among equals (How often do you see a scene in a movie where a cop smashes out a tail light and starts talking sh*t and making threats, and let's not mention Rodney King or Amadu Diala).  Abuse of power inundates society, but I guess we expect police officers to be above that.  They are the closest and most visible association to 'the law' that we have, it would be great to see them lead by example and in the spirit and in the intent of laws in general - to make society a better more stable place to live.

Now obviously this type of compassion and understanding does exists among police officers.  Not everyone gets a ticket everytime they are pulled over, and police officers are people as well and have emotions and feelings just as the rest of us (though if you get people with the above advertisment its possible not as much).  But they can not break free of the system and their trained objectives.  Western society is so thoroughly based on individualism that everything sees all as their own right.  Police officers rightfully have to protect themselves.  Society puts them in the cross hairs, and in return they put society in teh cross hairs.  Both sides need work.     


To me, rather than inducers of fear, police officers should be teachers as well as monitors.  How many people have been pulled over, all full of this fear, and then the officer lets them off with a warning.  Upon this, many people actually head this warning and learn a lesson.  Once a person stares losing their license, money, or even job in the face, their perspectives can easily change.  People can learn without being 'punished' on numerous levels of 'criminality'.  I mean think about it, is it the physical time in jail staring at the wall 'thinking' about what you've done that 'rehabilitates' someone, or is it the loss of privledges and time and the thought of a life ruined?  You don't have to sit in a cell to experience that.

Now I am not saying we should abolish jail - that would be for a different thought process - but what I am saying is basically that society needs to rethink how it goes about 'ordering' and making itself 'secure'.  What it wants doesn't have to come through fear and intimidation, but through leasons learned - and taught.  There are good police officers out there, but they get caught in a culture of policing and violence that minimizes some of that.  People can learn lessons and not have their lives ruined during it.  The simple prospect of losing everything, can teach us to change our ways, while still allowing us to be productive members of society and not physical and/or financial drains on the political and economic system.