Don’t hate the police.
Bad cops exist. There is no doubt. Any organization that gets large enough will suffer from corruption. If you get together a thousand math teachers, a few of them are bound to be evil math teachers. Dividing by zero when no one is looking, trying to collapse the universe.
The police have been turned into absolute villains during the Occupy protests. When the blame is given, it is not the individual officers that committed these acts of brutality, but the entirety of the police force. This is unfair. I have known several stellar human beings who wore a badge and they did so honorably. And their friends and partners did so honorably. There are thousands upon thousands of people protecting and serving to the best of their ability. People who run toward the danger. People who risk their lives for a shitty paycheck and very little gratitude. People who do this because they genuinely want to make a difference.
But then there are those who become police officers for the power. And when you seek power such as that, the temptation to abuse it can be strong. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Maybe I am naive, but I choose to believe that these bad cops are in the minority. I believe this partly from my own experiences, and partly from the stories of 9/11 in which hundreds of NYPD officers went into a building that could collapse at any minute and 23 of them did not make it back out.
But the good cops aren’t sexy enough for the news. The good ones at the protests who are there under orders to try and keep the peace are essentially invisible. The bad cops get all the attention and they tarnish the reputation of all cops. That frustrates me. I suppose all I am asking is that you don’t write off cops all together. They do help keep us safe. They do keep a lot of terrible people off the street. And when you need them, they are just a phone call away.
