quote:I normally hate the police, but I am glad to see them doing their jobs.
What causes a person to feel this way about an entire profession of individuals? I've met a lot of people who "hate the police", but not a lot who "hate waiters" or "hate firemen" or "hate accountants". What makes the police so special that they should receive a broader, more universal sort of hate than other people?
And should my friend the policeman be offended at this?
PS: And feel free to get all the "Police" band references out of your systems in postscripts Posted by Synesthesia (Member # 4774) on :
They hate authority? Perhaps they are African American males who have been racially profiled a few times and now hate all police officers? Maybe they are people who like to speed all the time and get tickets constantly. I cannot say I hate police officers anymore than I can understand hating an entire sports team that never once destroyed your lawn by letting all of their dogs soil it. So I definetly don't get hating EVERY SINGLE COP or EVERY SINGLE LAWYER or all policians. Perhaps I hate politicians... But, mostly the stupid dishonest ones that lie constantly and try to manipulate the public too much with hot button issues they care nothing about. Also, I do not like James Dobson, Pat Robertson or Fred Phelps, but I cannot say I hate all ministers. I have, I believe, a good reason for disliking these men, or at least 90% of their belief system.
(Also, I thought of the BAND the Police as soon as I saw this, for example, that creepy song)
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
Probably because policeman can easily abuse their power and be jack***** whenever they feel like it, while firemen and accountants don't really have much power over people and if waiters are like that then they don't get tipped.
Someone also once told me that they think that alot of the people that become policeman are usually power-hungry jack***** that like to feel like macho men...That's not my opinion in any way that's just what someone once told me.
Edit: "hating an entire sports team that never once destroyed your lawn by letting all of their dogs soil it. " Has that happened to you???
Posted by Puppy (Member # 6721) on :
I'm trying to figure out what those five asterisks stand for Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
Jack@$$es.
Posted by Dr Strangelove (Member # 8331) on :
I don't hate police, but I can't say I hold any special love for them either. Mostly because the majority I've been in contact with have been on power trips, strutting around like their on TV. Not all, but the majority. And, I'm a fan of less laws (though I'm not an anarchist. I'm a teenager).
I will say though, all 5 times I've been pulled over it's been legit. I've never gotten a ticket or a warning, but they have been legit. The officers themselves have just been jerks (other than the fact that they let me off clean )
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I don't hate the police. I think a lot of them work in a profession that gets less pay and less respect than it deserves, and still manage to perform their job very well. Any profession is going to have bad apples, but I've never had a bad experience with a police officer, and I'm glad they are there.
Edit to add: except in Ohio. The two times I've been pulled over in Ohio they've been jerks. The place I've been pulled over the most was in Detroit, but I've never gotten a ticket there, mostly the cops are just checking to make sure I'm not lost and to make sure I get home safely (which is a whole different issue in Detroit, but I won't get into that).
[ April 02, 2007, 06:15 PM: Message edited by: Lyrhawn ]
Posted by ClaudiaTherese (Member # 923) on :
quote:Originally posted by Puppy: PS: And feel free to get all the "Police" band references out of your systems in postscripts
PS: I take it this is well known: the band The Police is kicking off their reunion tour in my new hometown of Vancouver, BC.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dr Strangelove: I don't hate police, but I can't say I hold any special love for them either. Mostly because the majority I've been in contact with have been on power trips, strutting around like their on TV. Not all, but the majority. And, I'm a fan of less laws (though I'm not an anarchist. I'm a teenager).
I will say though, all 5 times I've been pulled over it's been legit. I've never gotten a ticket or a warning, but they have been legit. The officers themselves have just been jerks (other than the fact that they let me off clean )
I thought you said that one in Orlando was cool to you!
-pH
Posted by BaoQingTian (Member # 8775) on :
Probably a combination of the degree and type of power that the police have over your lives (as opposed to say a fireman or a waiter) and the traits of the people that are often drawn to that type of a job.
My father is a cop, and I have known dozens of officers over the years. I'd like to say that knowing many personally helped changed my negative POV toward the police, however it just reinforces it.
I can't say I hate the police, but I have a very negative view of them in general. There are always exceptions though. *shrug*
P.S. I mentally flipped a coin on whether the thread was about the band or the job
Edit: Wow I'm a slow typer
Posted by Nighthawk (Member # 4176) on :
I don't want to imply anything here, but generally I've seen that people who "hate" the police are those that have altercations with them in the past and lost.
For example, my current boss *really* hates the police. After all, he was a mob truck driver that went to jail for six years...
I myself got recently "temporarily" arrested (because I didn't have a ticket for public transportation for the third time; don't want to get in to it, but it's been discussed on another forum), but I was never booked and it's not on my record. Do I "hate" them? No. They made my life miserable, yes, but that was because of my own stupidity.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by ClaudiaTherese:
quote:Originally posted by Puppy: PS: And feel free to get all the "Police" band references out of your systems in postscripts
PS: I take it this is well known: the band The Police is kicking off their reunion tour in my new hometown of Vancouver, BC.
Totally why I opened this thread.
Posted by Luet13 (Member # 9274) on :
I don't hate all police. Just most of the ones in Chicago. And I think it's funny (in a sad way) that Chicago police just don't understand why they have such a bad reputation.
1. The Democratic Convention (The Whole World is Watching. And they were.) 2. I have seen police enter an intersection on a red light, flash their lights, pass through the intersection, and then turn their lights off. There was no emergency. They just didn't want to wait. 3. I got a ticket for riding my bicycle, with a helmet, on a bike path. 4. Drunk off duty cops beat people up. Link There was another incident recently, I can't find the link. 5. Someone stole my dad's antique lighting fixtures. The cops gave him a list of places where 'hot' merchandise shows up, and said he could check there. Isn't it their job to check?
So while I don't don't hate all police everywhere, I do think that most Chicago police officers are jerks.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
I dunno what DD meant, but I've uttered the phrase "I hate cops" before, and I can try to explain why.
First off, the use of 'hate' in the phrase is similar to the use of 'hate' in the phrase "I hate asparagus." I don't really hate it, just the idea of it makes me unhappy and my experience in the past with it has not been pleasant.
Second, when I say it, there is an understood (in the audience I'm talking too, not the audience here) "a**hole" between "hate" and "cops." The sad fact that I've met many many more a-hole cops that nice cops causes me to leave the expletive unsaid.
Third, for those of us that feel peaceful noncompliance and nonviolent crimes being punished by extensive jail time and harsh fines is cruel and unusual, the idea of a person wanting to go into a profession that enforces punishment of these crime does not inspire warm fuzzies.
Fourth, the cops I come into contact with are not out arresting rapists and murderers (at the time), their pulling me over for having hippy stickers, interrogating me on campus for being out late, coming into my house for having friends over, and each time somehow having cause to search my person. I'm sure that they do very heroic things sometimes, but not when I see them. They're just harassing me and my friends.
I've come to realize that this list could have no end, so I'll just say that when I walk away from an encounter with a police officer and he acts in a way that reminds me of all of the other unhappy encounters with police, I tend to mutter "I hate cops" at some point. But I do realize that not all cops are a-holes, and even the a-holes do good things sometimes. Based on my experience, however, I have to realize that completely on faith, and not anecdotal evidence.
This has taken a little while to write, so is probably inconsequential now, but there you have it.
(I hate The Police way more than I hate the police.)
Posted by Dr Strangelove (Member # 8331) on :
quote:Originally posted by pH:
quote:Originally posted by Dr Strangelove: I don't hate police, but I can't say I hold any special love for them either. Mostly because the majority I've been in contact with have been on power trips, strutting around like their on TV. Not all, but the majority. And, I'm a fan of less laws (though I'm not an anarchist. I'm a teenager).
I will say though, all 5 times I've been pulled over it's been legit. I've never gotten a ticket or a warning, but they have been legit. The officers themselves have just been jerks (other than the fact that they let me off clean )
I thought you said that one in Orlando was cool to you!
-pH
He was cool because he didn't arrest me . He still acted like there was a camera over his shoulder.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
Okay, I will admit he was cool for not arresting you.
-pH
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
I have more problems with female cops than male cops.
They have more of a tendency to act like they have something to prove, in my experience. They also seem to have more of a tendency to shrug off things you tell them, like when I got that creepy note in the mail, and the patrolwoman wouldn't even take a report.
....and the sad eyes don't work on them.
-pH
Posted by ludosti (Member # 1772) on :
I also don't understand the "I hate cops" mentality. Sure I've been pulled over for silly things (burnt out tail light), but that doesn't mean I hate cops. All of the police I've dealt with - either people I know who are cops or cops who I've dealt with - have been very pleasant. Nothing they've done have left me with any resentment towards the entire profession.
quote:Third, for those of us that feel peaceful noncompliance and nonviolent crimes being punished by extensive jail time and harsh fines is cruel and unusual, the idea of a person wanting to go into a profession that enforces punishment of these crime draws does not inspire warm fuzzies.
I thought it was the legal system doing this, not cops...
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
quote:I thought it was the legal system doing this, not cops...
It's the legal system that started the laws, it's the cops (edit: that I have come in contact with) that enjoy enforcing them. I say 'enjoy' because on a number of times I've heard an arresting officer voice a hope to be able to arrest someone for nonviolent crimes.
Literally. I worked as a hotel clerk and there was a smell reported on one of the floors and the local police came buy, and while they were waiting at the desk one of them said "I hope they have pot in there, I haven't arrested someone for possesion, I really want to." Similar things have been said to me when pulled over. Inside the Mexican border, I can almost guarantee that the officers really really wanted to arrest us, and for no other reason than that we were kids, sleepy and driving on their road. (In each of these cases there was nothing illegal found and the searches were warrantless(well, I don't know for a fact that the hotel incident was warrantless, but they didn't find anything))
[ April 02, 2007, 06:39 PM: Message edited by: vonk ]
Posted by Swampjedi (Member # 7374) on :
I know that in my case, "I hate the cops" means that I distrust them. All of the power in an encounter is behind the officer. Furthermore, a malicious officer can ruin your life in a moment.
Posted by BandoCommando (Member # 7746) on :
I feel somewhat intimidated by police, but I don't hate them. If I were at a restaurant or establishment and I were to see a firefighter, paramedic, soldier, or some other profession that typically wears a uniform, I might strike up a conversation with them. I would ask what their job was like, talk about the weather, etc. etc. With a police officer, I'd be much more reticent to speak, but I'm not sure why.
Though, I had an interesting casual conversation with a state police officer a couple weeks ago.
I was at a fast-food place waiting for my food to show up. When I made eye contact with the officer, he nodded to me in greeting, and I nodded back. He then asked me, "So you're a teacher?" (I was wearing my ID badge.)
I replied, "Yep, over at the middle school over there."
He grimaced. "Man, I can't imagine the kinds of things you have to deal with over there. I don't think I could deal with all those kids."
I was shocked. "C'mon, I said. You surely deal with hardened criminals in your line of work. What's a 12-year old going to compare to that?"
He chuckled a bit, then said, "Yes, but in my line of work, I get to have a gun."
Posted by Occasional (Member # 5860) on :
I don't like cops and I am one of the most law abiding person I know. They are never there when you need them and always there when you least need them. On top of that, very few are genuinely nice people; although part of that might be the line of work.
Posted by Uprooted (Member # 8353) on :
I don't know, I guess I just have this neurotic fear that they are watching every move I make, every step I take . . .
Posted by RackhamsRazor (Member # 5254) on :
The “I hate cops” mentality actually makes me really angry because I think the people who feel this way are stupid. Most people who say things like this often feel this way because they acted like an idiot one or more times and got caught for it. They were doing something wrong and a cop tried to enforce the rules (How dare they!).
I can’t even tell you the amount of times I have overheard other college students utter this phrase while they proceeded to tell their story about how they were drunk, high, speeding, having rowdy parties with underage drinking, or being prevented from brining down the field goal poles after a big football game win. In all of these cases they were acting like complete idiots and a cop tried to stop them.
I am sure there are bad cops out there just as I am sure there are good cops out there. From the stories I hear, I assume there are some surly cops out there, but how many surly post office workers, fast food workers, politicians, doctors, etc. are there? I would bet you could find many others in different careers that treat customers/others like crap so I do not think that is an excuse to hate all cops.
quote:4. Drunk off duty cops beat people up. Link There was another incident recently, I can't find the link.
. How many people of other professions get drunk and beat people up? You just don’t hear about it because they aren’t cops or famous people.
I am also sure many of them enjoy their jobs as well; otherwise they shouldn’t be in that career. I just don’t see what is so wrong with wanting to stop people from doing illegal things or wanting to catch people who cheat the system. These men and women don’t get enough credit for what they do. They do what is needed to keep you from hurting yourself or others.
I bet if more people quit having this attitude the cops would be less likely to assume you hate them and might act a little nicer to you. If you thought someone hated you for doing something right/doing your job you would be less inclined to act friendly towards them too, wouldn’t you?
Posted by TheGrimace (Member # 9178) on :
the problem as I see it is the way in which your average citizen is going to come in contact with police (or other authority figures, which I'll expound on).
As an average citizen who's biggest offense is generally speeding, my personal interaction with cops is almost entirely in feeling very on edge when I'm driving because I'm sure that I'm accidentally violating rule #327 of the road (or whatever). While in principle I am very appreciative of those officers who investigate violent crime, help resolve theft and other serious disputes, that aspect is far removed from my daily life and is hard to quantify. However, every time I get nervous because a cop might pull me over for doing 2 mph over the limit, that experience is very personal and easy to quantify. Additionally, it's always easier to remember and focus on the big negative issues (such as the afformentioned Democratic Convention) than it is to focus on the nebulous concept that I'm safer at night because the police are around.
I see it as very similar to why people are very untrusting of the CIA or NSA etc (other than general opposition based on concepts of universal right to privacy etc). When these organizations are doing their job right (which is probably a majority of the time) they are probably averting massive losses of life, but we don't get to hear about it. however, whenever it comes to them incorrectly arresting someone, or tapping the phone line of someone who turns out to be innocent, it smacks home to us on a more personal level.
Also, it doesn't help when there are entire divisions of law enforcement dedicated to the minor crimes. Example: at Purdue there was the regular police and the Excise Police. The regular police were pretty neutral in my book, but since the Excise Police's main job was to arrest people for public intoxication (an extremely minor offense in my opinion, especially around a college campus) it brought a big negative to the concept of the cops.
all that combined with what people have been saying above about personal experience, and the type of people who often become cops makes for an often negative view of the group.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by ludosti: I also don't understand the "I hate cops" mentality. Sure I've been pulled over for silly things (burnt out tail light), but that doesn't mean I hate cops. All of the police I've dealt with - either people I know who are cops or cops who I've dealt with - have been very pleasant. Nothing they've done have left me with any resentment towards the entire profession.
Ditto!
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by BandoCommando: "C'mon, I said. You surely deal with hardened criminals in your line of work. What's a 12-year old going to compare to that?"
He chuckled a bit, then said, "Yes, but in my line of work, I get to have a gun."
Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
I think I have a deeper objection to cops.
What traits are policemen selected for, and what kind of people are drawn to the position? In my experience, they are generally not the brightest and tend towards smug. They are the enforcing arm of a flawed legal system, using violent solutions to address moral problems. In a way, they are our legally sanctioned terrorists, and I don't think that we should be so supportive in our public policy of threatening people to be nice.
Maybe it's different in small towns, where cops have a personal relationship with the neighborhoods they are patrolling and can therefore use a more judicious reasoning in their bearing(so I'm told), but I've only ever spent time in cities where cops didn't know me from Adam, and that's always been part of the problem.
I've been hassled. I've been detained. I've been threatened, and I'm a non-drinking, non-smoking, non-stealing class of pacifist.
[ April 02, 2007, 08:26 PM: Message edited by: Irami Osei-Frimpong ]
Posted by ClaudiaTherese (Member # 923) on :
One of the things Dave was involved with in Madison, WI, was working with the Boys & Girls Club to get kids involved with the local authorities of various sorts. A community group met with Dave to identify concerns of the community -- both having trouble accessing 911 and a non-urgent trouble line and having a different vision of the community than the police were identified as core issues.
Community members went to an open-house day at the dispatcher office to meet the people behind the voices on the phone.
Additionally, one of the local activists helped organize a GPS mapping of the community coordinated to pictures and photos taken by kids which showed what that world looked like from their eyes -- what made them feel unsafe, where they knew they could relax, etc. The university provided Dave's skills and disposable cameras, and the kids presented to the police & other community leaders a large map and photoessay of their world.
Both the kids and the cops said it made a differece to look one another in the face, apart from confrontations. Pretty cool.
(I love my husband. He was instrumental in setting this up and getting it done, all as an extra project on his free time.)
---
Edited to add: This doesn't fix things, of course. It's not all birds singing and lions laying down with the lambs. But it was a good, practical step in facillitating a working relationship. With the face-to-face contact, something new was introduced that needed to be introduced.
I hope those are kids that are more likely to become activists in their own right. Maybe not comfortable activists for the rest of us (nothing wrong with that), but at least having been listened to. Getting your voice listened to can be addictive, especially when you have very really wrongs in your own daily life to right.
Posted by Occasional (Member # 5860) on :
I-Frim, although I would never associate them with terrorits and think that is insulting for why they exist, I must say that my experience is small town cops are not much different than larger city cops.
Posted by Sterling (Member # 8096) on :
I have mixed feelings about the police.
There are a lot of hard-working men and women in law enforcement who really are out to help people. Officers who exemplify the notion of "to serve and protect".
But there are also a certain number of cops who got into the line of work for all the wrong reasons. As an outlet for aggression, say, or for the power to impose their standards on others. It doesn't take much to get on the bad side of someone who's looking to exert power, and it can ruin your whole day.
And in a very few (thankfully!) cases, it can end your life. Which is a hard thing to forget. It can make one feel very uncomfortable to feel that someone walking among you could kill you, and it might not come out as a crime- just as paperwork. Or a suspension.
When I was living in Seattle, our car was ticketed repeatedly for being parked outside our house. Yet when our car was broken into, the police came out, basically made us out to be asking for abuse for not having a wheel restraint or a car alarm, and then we never heard from them again.
Later, I encountered a couple of guys breaking into a car outside our house, called the police, and gave them descriptions and a license plate of the car they departed in. Never heard about that again, either. Which lead me to the unfortunate conclusion that the Seattle police are only effective against parked cars.
(sigh)
I don't hate the police. I just...
I wish that some of them didn't think there job wasn't something that it was never meant to be. And that some of them didn't seem to be little more than private security for the rich and powerful. And maybe that some of them didn't seem to view everyone outside of uniform not as civilians to protect but as untrustworthy suspects who might not have committed crimes... Yet.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
I don't hate the police.
I have however had ugly experiences with individual police officers.
Many years ago my mother told me to run an errand for her and take her car. She did not tell me that the inspection sticker on her car had expired, so I was totally baffled when a police officer pulled me over. He interpreted my bafflement as snottiness, ordered me out of the car, and felt me up for a weapon, screaming at me the entire time.
He then fined me $79, saying that it didn't matter if it wasn't my car and I hadn't been told by the owner that the sticker had expired, I was obviously a careless idiot who wanted to cause an accident.
Even years later, I can recall every detail of how he screamed at me, jerked me around, and in general did his best to humiliate a clueless kid who was only trying to run an errand.
I don't hate the police in general, but I certainly despise individual officers.
[ April 02, 2007, 09:31 PM: Message edited by: Puffy Treat ]
Posted by Occasional (Member # 5860) on :
Sterling, thanks for giving an example that explains what I mean when I said, "They are never there when you need them and always there when you least need them."
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
Puffy Right after I got my car (shiny brand new, still had temp tags), my friends and I drove to Orlando and got lost. I was 19, I think my friends were 18 and 21. It happened to be Fourth of July weekend. We realized we'd gone the wrong way, and I tried to pull out onto the main road but didn't see that there was a car coming (the visibility was awful...big plants and a sharp turn). So I turned in front of said car...not too close, but it was a cop car. It followed us for twenty minutes until we realized we'd gone too far and turned around. Kept following us. When we turned onto the right road, it pulled us over.
The (female) cop ordered me out of the car, started shining a light in my eye and got in my face, screaming at me about how I was going to cause an accident and kill my friends and how she could take me to jail right now. She didn't write me a ticket or anything...just screamed and screamed and then let us go. I mean, maybe she thought I was drunk and pulled me over for that, but she shouldn't have taken it out on me if she was upset that she was wrong.
-pH
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
Virtually all the cops I have ever interacted with have been extremely polite. Respectful, even. I have had a couple of exceptions, but mostly I have a very positive opinion of the way cops do their work.
And it's demanding, frightening, stressful work.
Of course, I've never been ticketed for any moving violation nor found to be at fault in an accident, so in almost all of my interactions with cops, the cop was on my side. Speed less, and maybe you'll like cops more. Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
I did have an experience like Puffy Treat's, which is why I said virtually all. It was the day after my nineteenth birthday, and I had just returned to college from an HSA conference. My girlfriend at the time was being driven back to college from a trip home over the weekend. She had just recently been diagnosed with myasthenia gravis and just recently been released from the hospital. She was in a wheelchair, and I had been helping to take care of her in her first days out of the hospital. She had gone home while I was out of town, because otherwise she would have nobody really caring for her. I was an emotional wreck in general at this time. The whole time she was in the hospital I had been there every day from morning to night. I had all but stopped attending classes, and was just barely scraping by in my job. This was the semester that I lost my 4.0, and though it hadn't happened yet, I could certainly see it coming. I was burning the candle at at least three different ends, and not getting any sleep at all. (Heck, at the conference, I remember yelling at a girl because she offered to iron my shirt for me; I thought she was being sexist. ) So I called her--I guess she had not yet left, because this was before cell phones--and she asked me to pick up dinner. I took her car, which had pretty much not been driven in a couple of months, to pick up McDonalds.
One of her lights was out. It was not yet dark enough to require headlights, but I put them on anyway because I'm a safe driver that way. I got pulled over because of the burnt out light. This was the very first time I had ever been pulled over--and the only tickets I ever received, not counting parking tickets. I begged the cop not to give me a ticket. I was pathetic, but I was stressed, and I didn't know that the ticket wouldn't affect my insurance. I could barely afford anything as it was, and if my insurance had gone up, my driving days would have been done. He clearly was enjoying himself. He gave me a ticket for the headlight--almost anyone else I've ever talked to had gotten warned for that, not ticketed. He gave me a ticket for not being able to find her registration. He gave me a ticket for not having proof of insurance (it was in my car). He started to give me a ticket for not having my seatbelt on, and I got indignant. I always wore my seatbelt, because I was a safe driver. There was no doubt in my mind that I had been wearing my seatbelt, and now he was just making crap up. That was the ticket he didn't give me.
I think he was just looking for my spine.
The "face value" of the tickets was $30 each. $90 was a lot of money to me back then, and I was unbelievably stressed about that. As it turns out, though, all I had to do was show up at the courthouse with the registration, my insurance paperwork, and an affidavit signed by a cop saying that the light was repaired, plead no lo contendere and each ticket was reduced to $9.
(That actually did come back to bite me years later when I moved to South Carolina, because in SC a ticket for a burnt out headlight actually does increase your insurance rates--it does not in Florida. And a plea of no lo contendere was considered a guilty plea. But I only had to tough it out for one more year then before it was off of my record. And insurance was much cheaper in SC than in Florida anyway.)
-o-
In my opinion, any cop who catches me doing something ticketable and lets me off with a lecture--even a yelled lecture--is an extremely cool cop. I can't imagine being pissed about that.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
I don't know anyone who hates the Police.
Even the people who have moral objections to 'Roxanne' will still scream 'ROXAAANE!'when it comes on the radio.
(Oh, stop your moaning. You knew it would happen.)
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I hear cop stories all the time from the friend of mine that works at the police station, and a lot of the time when they are yelling at you, especially if you're younger, they're seriously just trying to scare you because you were doing something they view as unsafe, and they honestly don't want you to get hurt, and they don't want to punish you for it.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
I was lost. Not trying to be reckless. Just lost in the maze of Orlando and its many gated communities.
-pH
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: I hear cop stories all the time from the friend of mine that works at the police station, and a lot of the time when they are yelling at you, especially if you're younger, they're seriously just trying to scare you because you were doing something they view as unsafe, and they honestly don't want you to get hurt, and they don't want to punish you for it.
I didn't know my Mom's car had a defunct inspection sticker, and was honestly confused when he pulled me over. Ordering me out, feeling me over, and screaming at me until his face turned mottled magenta sort of makes me think the cop in this case did want to hurt me. Or was taking something else out on me.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
A few people have mentioned that the main reason one would dislike the profession is because they are a law breaker. A few people have also given their reasons why they don't believe that, and I'd like to add mine.
I've been arrested, between high school and college. The officer that arrested me was, by far, the nicest police officer I've ever met. I was rather intoxicated and having a hard time of it and he was very gracious, and a little amused, as he explained in a normal voice why I was being arrested. I pretty much agreed with most of what he said.
The officers that I've disliked, and by and far most of the officers I've met, have been the ones I've observed before/during/after a potential arrest. It's not what they do; I understand that the law is the law and that's what they have to do. But a person, cop or not, who enjoys the prospect of making another person's life much worse is not a good person, in my book.
Most of the officers I've observed enjoy 'busting' people and 'taking them down.' To me it seems like they would rather put every criminal on earth in jail than have there be no criminals on earth to begin with. I'm probably wrong about this, but that's the impression that I get.
So it's not about me being a law breaker so I hate the law enforcers. I don't like the law they eagerly enforce and I don't like the attitude that most do it with.
[ April 02, 2007, 11:03 PM: Message edited by: vonk ]
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:The “I hate cops” mentality actually makes me really angry because I think the people who feel this way are stupid.
This would be an excellent conclusion if it were at all true, but too many people in this country have every excuse to feel inherently distrustful or disdainful of cops, based on prior experience with them.
Trust me, if you live in the right place, there really is no such thing as a good cop. Some districts are rotten to the core. Even the good districts can't really avoid having the occasional problem cops, since the career has this nightmarish tendency to attract arrogant twits with a societal Napoleonic complex.
My cops rule though. <3 cops!
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
I've had a few times where I wouldn't have been suprised if the cop pulled me over but didn't end up doing anything.
One time it was late at night and I was making a U-turn. There was only one incoming car and it was kind of borderline on whether I had enough time to make the turn. It was late and I was tired so I made it anyway and pushed the gas hard. As soon as I was in the other lane the car zooms past me and I realize it was a police car as it turns it's lights, but not the sirens, on for a second. He must've been in a rush though because I'm pretty sure he was going fairly fast to pass me so quickly and the fact that he didn't ticket me for kind of cutting him off. I guess he just turned the lights on to scare me but didn't have time to pull me over.
Another time I was on the way to school and I passed a speed trap doing like 8-10 over. The cop looked me in the eye after he put the radar down and looked away as if he didn't notice. I found out when I got to school that my friend got pulled over by the same speed trap doing 12 over.
And my final mistake was at a stop sign in a residential neighborhood. I looked to the left and then to the right and then paused for a second to say something to my friend and then I made the left turn. While I was looking to my right a cop car came up from the left and he had to slow down significantly when I made the left turn. He probably could've ticketed me pretty easily, but again I saw him look out his window, acting as if he didn't notice.
I guess I'm pretty lucky when it comes to cops.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:But a person, cop or not, who enjoys the prospect of making another person's life much worse is not a good person, in my book.
Perhaps they are angry at the person who is making other people's lives worse, and thus savor the opportunity to put a stop to it.
Posted by DevilDreamt (Member # 10242) on :
I don't feel like I have much to add. I do have some personal experiences with bad cops, but I don't see a point in adding them.
To put it into D&D terms, I tend to be aligned Neutral Good and the cops I meet tend to be Lawful Neutral at best and Neutral Evil at worst. I admit that "hate" was a strong word there, but I know of many instances where officers have outright failed to do their duty, and many where they seem to go above and beyond just to scare or torment someone for a purely personal reason.
Edit: Plus you'd be amazed how many cops I know that smoke pot and outright break laws, without a second thought.
Posted by Tstorm (Member # 1871) on :
My experiences with police also differ from everyone else here. I don't have any issues with police doing their jobs and catching me in the process. Say, for example, the single speeding ticket I've ever received causes me no emotional distress. No, I wouldn't get angry or upset about that. (Except to say that sitting at the bottom of a hill is a dirty, rotten trick. )
I do, however, hold in my mind the memory of police who did not do their jobs, and caused a significant amount of emotional harm. I won't elaborate further, except to state these facts: it was their choice and (at least partly) their responsibility for what happened.
But I'm friendly and respectful of people and I like to feel that I at least attempt to show respect for people even if they don't do the same for me. In other words, the uniform brings some respect with it, in my eyes. If the person wearing the uniform acts in a disrespectful manner toward me, then I could care less about the uniform, and I'll treat the person accordingly. Posted by Verily the Younger (Member # 6705) on :
quote:I don't want to imply anything here, but generally I've seen that people who "hate" the police are those that have altercations with them in the past and lost.
Yep.
quote:Perhaps they are angry at the person who is making other people's lives worse, and thus savor the opportunity to put a stop to it.
Yep.
The majority of my experiences with police officers have been neutral at worst. I have had one encounter with a power-tripping officer who laid down a penalty on me (banning me from driving the rest of the evening and threatening me with arrest if he saw me driving away) out of proportion to the offense (trying to make it through an intersection before the light turned red and not quite making it; no accident was caused), but even that has nothing to do with "the police" as a profession. It was one a-hole cop. Of course I hate him, but it's because of the "a-hole" part, not the "cop" part.
Okay, so there are a-hole cops. There are cops that get into the profession for the wrong reason. There are also a-hole doctors who get into their profession for the wrong reasons, and can make quite a lot of money while being incompetent and costing people their lives who could have been saved by a more competent doctor. Yet people don't look to those bad apples in the medical profession and say, "I hate doctors!"
Yet people have encounters with a few cops who are bad apples, and they stretch their resentment of those individuals into a generalized hatred of all cops. They assume that because the few cops they've personally dealt with were bad, then all cops must be rotten to the core and worthy of scorn.
(Take the word "cops" out of that last paragraph and replace it with a word like "blacks" or "Jews" or "immigrants" or whatever. Now you know why I feel nothing but disdain for the person speaking when I hear someone say, "I hate cops!")
It's also asinine, by the way, to assign blame to the police for laws you don't agree with. They don't make the laws. There are bad laws, I agree, but the police cannot pick and choose which laws they will enforce--or they aren't supposed to, at any rate. Often when people complain about the police, it's because they've been busted for breaking some law and they thought for whatever reason they should have been an exception; perhaps because they personally feel the law they broke was a bad law to begin with, or perhaps for some other reason. At any rate, they are uncivilized for believing they should have been an exception.
Actually, it's when the police do start making exceptions that things really start to get bad. The moment the police stop enforcing laws consistently, the door opens for corruption, higher crime rates, and a general breakdown of society. Our civilization is only a bearable place to live because we have a system of laws and a whole profession of men and women whose job is to see that those laws are obeyed and that lawbreakers are dealt with. I have no patience for people who break the laws--even the bad ones--and then complain when they are caught.
[singing]Don't do the criiime, if you caaan't do the tiiiiime![/singing]
Posted by plaid (Member # 2393) on :
Dentists scare me Posted by DevilDreamt (Member # 10242) on :
I don't think society hinges on law (as I said, Neutral Good here).
You shouldn't be filled with disdain over statements like "I hate cops!" For starters, most people don't mean it in a genuine way.
Expecting police to continue to behave in a way they have behaved in the past seems acceptable to me. Occupation profiling is very different from racism, and a good measure better than racial profiling performed by police. In racial profiling, people have very little in common outside of appearance, whereas police officers as a population can be expected to have more commonly shared attributes. The risk for stereotyping is absolutely there, but expecting police to be apathetic and corrupt might be a very realistic and practical position to take in some districts.
Instead of launching into sweeping statements about the nature of people who "Hate the police," consider that these people could have a very legitimate need for law enforcement reform where they live. Granted, complaining about the police online isn't going to fix the problem, but your attitude of brushing complaints aside isn't going to help anything either, and it's an attitude that tends to ignore problems in law enforcement rather than help solve them.
As for the doctor example, if things got bad enough in a community, people absolutely would start hating doctors. It's a little easier for bad doctors to blend in, because if your doctor is a jerk, you can most likely get a new one. If your local or state police are jerks, you can't go to a new police officer or get a second opinion. You're pretty much stuck with the law enforcement you're given.
Posted by Verily the Younger (Member # 6705) on :
quote:Granted, complaining about the police online isn't going to fix the problem, but your attitude of brushing complaints aside isn't going to help anything either, and it's an attitude that tends to ignore problems in law enforcement rather than help solve them.
Quite the opposite, I think. To try to solve the problems in law enforcement requires a belief that the problems are soluble in the first place. You can say that the majority of police officers in a given locale are corrupt, and for many locales that's probably even true. But if you extend that observation into a general hatred of "the police" as a system, as a concept, then you won't work to get rid of the corruption because you'll assume the corruption is inherent and can't be gotten rid of. Therefore statements like "I hate cops!" are detrimental to fixing the system in areas where it truly is broken. Only by discounting the sweeping anti-police attitude as the bigotry it is can you actually solve the real problems with law enforcement that exist.
Posted by DevilDreamt (Member # 10242) on :
Bigotry is not the right word here. You should stop assuming people have extreme viewpoints and viewpoints that are incapable of changing. I don't think anyone has advocated a hatred of the police as a system (outside of the band).
If we poll a district, and the majority of citizens have an "I hate cops!" attitude, I see that as an indicator there is something wrong with the police, not as an indicator the majority of citizens are sore about getting caught, blaming the police for unjust laws, or falling victim to their own stereotyping and bigotry. We don't even have to say a majority of the people. If a majority of the poor, racial minorities, or any other group report dissatisfaction with the police, something could be wrong there.
You'll have to explain why mistrust of the police in corrupted areas in harmful, and how "sweeping the anti-police attitude as the bigotry it is" will help solve anything, especially in problem areas.
What do you think the real problems are? You've ended your post with a very bold statement, but I can only foresee your plan (the public sweeps away their anti-police bigotry and adopts a more police-friendly bigotry) as solving some minor superficial problems at best, and aggravating the situation at worst. Sure, it would promote the general moral of officers, and mean a lot to the officers that aren't corrupt, but I don't see it solving anything. Misplaced reliance and trust would allow corrupt and apathetic officers to more easily abuse people. When you talk about the issue, I see people, most likely people unaffected by the problems, brushing off the needs of a minority in favor of a more friendly world view. You aren't helping anything by calling us bigots, you're just trying to stay in your comfort zone and pretend that our problems don't effect you.
It's difficult for a minority group to influence policy, especially when that group happens to be the poor. Sure, we could go on an outright civil-rights style movement to try to get our voices heard, but many people lack the conviction to do that, in part because they are so used to their voices being ignored.
Posted by Carrie (Member # 394) on :
quote:Originally posted by vonk: First off, the use of 'hate' in the phrase is similar to the use of 'hate' in the phrase "I hate asparagus." I don't really hate it, just the idea of it makes me unhappy and my experience in the past with it has not been pleasant.
I hate asparagus.
Posted by Uprooted (Member # 8353) on :
quote:Originally posted by Scott R: (Oh, stop your moaning. You knew it would happen.)
Well, he capitalized the Police. How could we possibly help it?
Posted by Kasie H (Member # 2120) on :
I'm torn on this. In my hometown, an utterly boring and completely safe suburb, the general feeling was that they just didn't have enough to do. I also got pulled over once because my father neglected to renew the inspection on his car, and the officer proceeded to give me a $200 ticket while kindly saying he had let me out of two additional tickets that would have totaled $400. Considering many of the other families we knew who had been pulled over for this same reason and received only a warning and stern instructions to renew their inspection....well, who knows.
Living in Washington is a bit of a different story. First of all, we have ten times as many cops as other cities and ten times as many *types* of cops as other cities. We have, in no particular order, the metro police, the Park Police, the Capitol Police and the Secret Service. All of whom prowl all over town and all of whom have powers of arrest, traffic ticketing, etc etc. As a single girl living in a the city and not engaging in any illegal activities, I'm happy when I see metro police patrolling my neighborhood because it makes me feel safer. Because I work on Capitol Hill and don't do anything illegal, I really like the Capitol Police because I see the same ones every day posted outside offices. Same goes for the Secret Service; I've become friendly with a number of the officers, and since their purpose is protection and I'm generally innocuous things work out well.
But I was driving one time and I accidentally didn't yield in a roundabout to a Park Police guy. I would have hated to get a ticket for it, but, well, I screwed up, and I would have understood. But instead the guy just pulled me over and screamed at me through the window about how stupid I was, then drove away. Guess he didn't want to deal with the hassle of actually ticketing me. He just wanted to yell. *That* really made me mad.
Posted by Euripides (Member # 9315) on :
I don't hate the police at all and generally respect them. But then I'm half white and middle class; unlikely to be racially profiled in any way.
I respect police officers because in my mind they aren't closely associated with the shortcomings of the political establishment (perhaps a naivety). I make a distinction between the director of police for example, and the average officer.
In my experience police officers have been amiable people anyway. Some have a swaggering gait, but otherwise I haven't run into any that were on a power trip.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
Verily, I'm not sure if your second to last post on the last page was a response to my post or not, but I'll respond as if it were.
I think the OPer was interested in why people would say "I hate the police." Most, if not all, of the people that have admitted to uttering the phrase have been quick to point out that it is mostly hyperbole. It's something to say when you feel like there's a bad situation and there's nothing you can do about it. If you want to understand why people say it, maybe you should reread what people have posted, instead of insinuating that anyone that says "I hate cops" must be a bigot and/or racist.
Also, again, most of the comments haven't been about breaking the law and not liking the consequences. It's been about multiple, individual police overreacting to situations and/or the attitudes with wich many are observed doing their job.
And I don't think this is specific to the police profession, as you suppose. Many, many a time when I hang up after a telemarketer calls I say "I hate telemarketers." Rest assured, I'm no bigot, I don't hate telemarketers and I have never burned anything in their yards. I have heard many people say "I hate the dentist," "I hate lawyers" or "I hate those kiosk sales people at the mall." I think your anger may be a little out of proportion to what is really being expressed by the phrase "I hate [blank]": frustration, helplessness, annoyance, defensiveness.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
I am made uncomfortable by anyone with power over me. That includes the cops.
But I usually don't hate them unless they're blocking traffic. (why do people slow down to 40mph in a 65 just becuase a cop is around?)
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by Kasie H: But I was driving one time and I accidentally didn't yield in a roundabout to a Park Police guy. I would have hated to get a ticket for it, but, well, I screwed up, and I would have understood. But instead the guy just pulled me over and screamed at me through the window about how stupid I was, then drove away. Guess he didn't want to deal with the hassle of actually ticketing me. He just wanted to yell. *That* really made me mad.
I must say, only as one being somewhat familiar with the area, though admittedly more familiar with the next large-ish city to its north-ish vector up the 9-5, that I cannot understand for the life of me why the thought had not occurred to you that the officer was fully prepared to do what may have needed to be done with summonses, but chose to do otherwise despite his annoyance because he could possibly have been under the impression that you were in all other manner harmless and not requiring the need for such a punitive action.
It is not unheard of, in my experiences in conversing on the subject with officers and former officers from various cities across the country, for a police officer to perform a traffic stop for an otherwise minor violation if there are factors involved that could lead one to believe there may be worse behavior taking place. This type of assessment, to the officer who is on a patrol in a car, bicycle, or on foot, is partially trained and often followed up in workshops given to their local precinct regarding specific problematic areas relevant to their city and locale. I had no noticable amount of surprise to hear more than one officer speak in an unfriendly manner of how they knew a fellow officer of the law who was known to have performed the "driving while black" traffic stop on at least one confirmed instance. This is an unfortunate verification that, no matter the profession being discussed, there are bound to be individuals who reflect poorly on their fellows who share the same or similar responsibilities within the field.
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
I hate cops Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
I hate corrupt cops who dont do their jobs. Cops who do do theyre jobs Il bake brownies for.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
Methinks thous doest protest a wee bit too much, considering the ratio of honest to corrupt is likely not equal to your ratio of brownies to anger.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:It is not unheard of, in my experiences in conversing on the subject with officers and former officers from various cities across the country, for a police officer to perform a traffic stop for an otherwise minor violation if there are factors involved that could lead one to believe there may be worse behavior taking place.
In many areas it's not just not unheard of, but standard operating procedure for anything short of reckless or drunk driving. There are officers whose primary purpose for traffic stops is to make a quick reasonable suspicion/probable cause determination and then either wave them on (admonishing them to slow down/get the car inspected/register/etc.) or attempt to get consent to search.
It's surprisingly effective, not least because people with drugs in the car often think the officer already knows and think the officer will search anyway. It is generally targeted at specific areas and at specific legal but suspicious driving behavior (sudden U-turns or turns into a laundromat after seeing the cruiser, or circling the block repeatedly).
Absent something like a missing kid where the officers want to be able to eliminate as many cars as quickly as possible, I generally suggest people not give consent to search, even if they have nothing to hide. Do it politely and don't try to stop them from searching - just say "I do not consent" and obey their instructions regarding where you stand, hands in pockets, etc.
One thing that is often unappreciated is how scary a traffic stop is from an officer's perspective. There's a reason they control every aspect of the stop as much as possible - to minimize the chances they'll either get shot or have to shoot someone.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
To what Dagonee said: I can fully concur that just as much has been related to me from professionals in the law enforcement and criminal justice fields.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
I've come into contact with the police only ever indirectly. The first time we were teenagers engaged in a scavenger hunt which often (although it didn't for us) resulted in theft and vandalism and underage alcohol and unsafe driving.
Although we hadn't done anything wrong a policeman pulled us over and proceeded to swear angrily in a clear attempt to intimidate us away from our scavenger hunt. He kind of picked the wrong group to swear at because we had no intention of stealing. The poor guy at the wheel was really worried.
I thought that the policeman's attitude was over the top, but justified to an extent. Other groups of the scavenger hunt WERE rampaging around, stealing various things. Instead of doing whatever it is they normally do, these police were forced to do babysitting duty for a bunch of graduating teenagers. I would be annoyed.
I can see, though, how such an incident- we weren't doing anything illegal, hadn't, and really had no intention of doing so- could be the key to the beginning of a bad relationship with the police because this guy was probably one of the angriest most intimidating people I've ever come into contact with.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
In your hindsight, to which you admit included others in different groups engaging in unwarranted behavior, could you not come to an equal conclusion that said officer was not able to discern whether you were also engaged in such behavior just from looking at you?
Posted by BaoQingTian (Member # 8775) on :
Sure. That leaves the question of why said officer lost his temper and started swearing at a bunch of kids that had not done anything wrong. Several people have alluded to this before, but a big problem that some people have with cops' attitudes is that they see a criminal in everyone and tend to treat them in that manner.
Posted by Blayne Bradley (Member # 8565) on :
I do understand that hate is undoubtably too strong a word but fitting with the thread, indirectly abstractly if a cop does harm through graft, corruption, and laziness for no purpose other then selfish reasns then abstractly Ill support measures that ensure said cops get caught and punished and will complain when justice isnt meated out.
However I perfectly accept grey areas. as described in James Clevels Taipan novels regarding Hong Kong and its description of the HK Police, I can unstand why moderate corruption that is essneitally a means to and end ( preserving order and protecting the public interest ) and to me in that situation tolerable and abstractly acceptable while of course not actively or publicly encouraged.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
I think Teshi is right...a big part of people's dislike of police probably has a lot to do with the intimdating tactics they use, often on people who have done nothing wrong.
I don't like it when anybody tries to intimdate me. I once worked at a concert where the club sent over their LARGEST, TALLEST, HUGEST, SCARIEST BOUNCER THE SIZE OF A TREE to record my starting inventory counts so that the club would know how much of a cut they got. That was so unnecessary.
-pH
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:I think Teshi is right...a big part of people's dislike of police probably has a lot to do with the intimdating tactics they use, often on people who have done nothing wrong.
I agree, when used, it's unpleasant for the victim of the tactic. But I'll be honest: until we start paying them better, I'm comfortable (and this is speaking as someone who has been the 'victim' of this tactic as well) permitting them that method as a means of protecting themselves, and making their jobs easier.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
Rakeesh, you're also not female.
Edit: Also, I don't see "low pay" as a justification for scaring the crap out of people who've done nothing wrong.
(I don't hate cops, just to make that clear.)
-pH
Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
quote:Several people have alluded to this before, but a big problem that some people have with cops' attitudes is that they see a criminal in everyone and tend to treat them in that manner.
I think this comes from them constantly seeing the worst that humanity has to offer. In other words, I don't think people with this attitude become cops, I think cops tend to acquire this attitude.
I am personally grateful to cops. They put their lives on the line every day and I think of it as a noble career. All of my experiences with the police have been positive. At the same time though, I'm a nerdy looking white girl and I strongly suspect that police are kinder to me than they might be to others that don't look so innocuous.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
That's true, I'm not. However, you also said the cop was a female, blunting some of the edge you get by pointing out that you're also female. But on an individual basis-which is where cops generally live, btw-a female can make their life just as hard and dangerous as a male can, both immediately and in the future.
---------
Also, you certainly did do something wrong in the situation you outlined, unless you meant "not too close" to mean "not illegally close" when you turned out in front of the officer. I'm operating from that assumption, because you said she said she could write you a ticket and take you to jail, and you didn't (in the post) dispute that claim.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: That's true, I'm not. However, you also said the cop was a female, blunting some of the edge you get by pointing out that you're also female. But on an individual basis-which is where cops generally live, btw-a female can make their life just as hard and dangerous as a male can, both immediately and in the future.
---------
Also, you certainly did do something wrong in the situation you outlined, unless you meant "not too close" to mean "not illegally close" when you turned out in front of the officer. I'm operating from that assumption, because you said she said she could write you a ticket and take you to jail, and you didn't (in the post) dispute that claim.
She definitely had no cause to take me to jail. And as I said before, I think the fact that it was a female cop made it WORSE. But that's the thing - you don't have to be a man to intimidate a woman, especially not a skinny, young woman. I'm not a very scary-looking person, and I'm not much of a fighter. I wasn't driving recklessly, nobody was hanging out the window, we didn't reek of booze or pot...we were just LOST (and I told her we were lost). There was no reason for her to behave that way.
Also, although you are not actually saying so, by pointing out that you're a skinny young woman and it doesn't take much to intimidate you, it appears that you're implying that a large, muscular young man should not receive the same treatment from a cop for the same offense.
I'm just speaking to appearance here, not what you actually said, please bear that in mind.
quote:There was no reason for her to behave that way.
Perhaps she just wanted to frighten you sufficiently so you wouldn't pull out ahead of cars at an intersection in the future, pH.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
quote:Perhaps she just wanted to frighten you sufficiently so you wouldn't pull out ahead of cars at an intersection in the future, pH.
How is scaring people part of a police officers job? Prevent people from breaking the law and capturing people who broke the law, obviously, but scaring people?
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
...this was not in 2006.
You seem to be getting a little bent out of shape about this, and I don't know why..so okay. You either aren't intimidated by police ever or don't mind when they try to intimidate you. I do. You apparently think it's justifiable in most situations. I don't. I've been written tickets by cops who've been perfectly nice to me, and I didn't hold the ticket against them. In this particular instance, my problem was with her attitude and her behavior.
-pH
Posted by Kasie H (Member # 2120) on :
My issue with being pulled over but not ticketed wasn't the fact that I was pulled over - it was how the police officer treated me. Literally yelling and berating me as "stupid and incompetent". I mean...professionalism, anyone? This was like sanctioned road rage.
Edit: Also, it was approximately 9:30 a.m., I was drinking coffee (he yelled at me for that, too: "You're just going on, drinking your coffee, you just f*ing cut me off!") and driving at a relatively low speed. I'm almost certain he didn't do it because he thought I was drunk.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:...this was not in 2006.
You seem to be getting a little bent out of shape about this, and I don't know why..so okay. You either aren't intimidated by police ever or don't mind when they try to intimidate you. I do. You apparently think it's justifiable in most situations. I don't. I've been written tickets by cops who've been perfectly nice to me, and I didn't hold the ticket against them. In this particular instance, my problem was with her attitude and her behavior.
OK, it wasn't in 2006. Chances are, though, that the language of the law hasn't changed...and no, I'm not particularly interested in digging up the exact year and local law on the books for your incident. If you're willing to hide behind that, fine, but you certainly sound like you were guilty of reckless driving.
It's strange that you're accusing me of getting bent out of shape over this...I've been polite and reasonable about the whole thing. Can you point to something that says I am, please?
Also, I've said nothing that would lead anyone to think I think intimidation is justifiable in most situations, unless someone is going to just guess at my opinions. I've also never said I don't mind when I'm being intimidated. For what I actually said...:
quote:I agree, when used, it's unpleasant for the victim of the tactic. But I'll be honest: until we start paying them better, I'm comfortable (and this is speaking as someone who has been the 'victim' of this tactic as well) permitting them that method as a means of protecting themselves, and making their jobs easier.
I said I was comfortable with it, in the sense that I, as a citizen, am comfortable with it. I should have been more specific and pointed out I was speaking in broader terms.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
quote:Perhaps she just wanted to frighten you sufficiently so you wouldn't pull out ahead of cars at an intersection in the future, pH.
I'm sorry, but that really sounds like justification to me.
Posted by pH (Member # 1350) on :
Rakeesh, the mere fact that you're nitpicking at an anecdote to me implies you're getting just a little too worked up about it.
-pH
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
By that definition, we're all too worked up about quite a lot of discussions here on Hatrack, pH.
--------------
quote:I'm sorry, but that really sounds like justification to me.
Huh? She was saying it was unjustifiable, I was pointing out a means by which it could be justifiable. Obviously it's a justification, vonk.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
quote:I've said nothing that would lead anyone to think I think intimidation is justifiable in most situations
quote:Obviously it's a justification
I think I'm missing something.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
quote:Originally posted by Kasie H: My issue with being pulled over but not ticketed wasn't the fact that I was pulled over - it was how the police officer treated me. Literally yelling and berating me as "stupid and incompetent". I mean...professionalism, anyone? This was like sanctioned road rage.
Edit: Also, it was approximately 9:30 a.m., I was drinking coffee (he yelled at me for that, too: "You're just going on, drinking your coffee, you just f*ing cut me off!") and driving at a relatively low speed. I'm almost certain he didn't do it because he thought I was drunk.
I couldn't speak for that individual myself, but it could very well have been frustration on top of work related stress. The whole stop itself could have been justified as making you later for work if one was assuming regular business hours. As for the screaming, I agree that it's unprofessional.
quote:Originally posted by pH: ...this was not in 2006.
You seem to be getting a little bent out of shape about this, and I don't know why..so okay. You either aren't intimidated by police ever or don't mind when they try to intimidate you. I do. You apparently think it's justifiable in most situations. I don't. I've been written tickets by cops who've been perfectly nice to me, and I didn't hold the ticket against them. In this particular instance, my problem was with her attitude and her behavior.
-pH
Intimidation does indeed play a role in it, and were I in a similar situation I may have even been less intimidated due to my familiarity with some who are in law enforcement. There are demographical differences for who tends to be more intimidated in those cases, and you have every justification feeling intimidated (and possibly unfairly so) in your description. I can sympathize due to my own sense of intimidation in airports. I tend to get by assuming the best of intentions until I get a feeling of something otherwise.
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
When I went to England the first thing I did was have a car accident. It was clearly my fault, being unfamiliar with "roundabouts" and driving on the wrong side of the road.
The other guy hit me, and he could have avoided it, but I was definitely in the wrong place at the wrong time, and he was furious.
When the police showed up, I thought they were crossing guards. They didn't carry guns, and their only uniform was slacks, white shirts and a sash across their shirt. They must have had badges or something, but I don't remember them. They were so polite that I was reminded of waiters. They calmed the other guy down, without using any of the American cop swagger or intimidation. They had us exchange information, verified our paperwork, and sent the other guy off.
After he was gone I explained that I really didn't understand what I had done wrong, since I saw no traffic control device or sign in front of the roundabout. The other guy had entered the roundabout after I had, but I was blocking his exit on the other side (to my left), and he had come from my right, so I was supposed to yeild right of way to him. They took their time explaining this to me, and even got out a traffic manual to show me diagrams.
Several kids I went to high school with became cops, and I've had conversations with them at reunions and so forth. I definitely get the feeling they've been indoctrinated to operate under the assumption that everyone is guilty, and that macho strong arm attitude is a requirement.
Funny thing is, there was a cop when I was a teenager named Dixon Smith. I never met him, but all the kids who grew up to be cops had had run-ins with him. He had a reputation of being able to talk with teenagers and defuse the situation without arresting them. Once I was talking to two cops and they asked me if I knew him. I didn't answer, but got a kind of smirk on my face, because I'd heard all the stories. They said "why do they always do that?" And kept prying me for information. I had never met him, so I really didn't have anything to say, but they went on about how he was always solving crimes, trying to be a good cop, as if that was a bad thing. I never figured that out.
Posted by RackhamsRazor (Member # 5254) on :
Blayne Bradley-what in the world were you trying to say when you wrote this?
quote: I do understand that hate is undoubtably too strong a word but fitting with the thread, indirectly abstractly if a cop does harm through graft, corruption, and laziness for no purpose other then selfish reasns then abstractly Ill support measures that ensure said cops get caught and punished and will complain when justice isnt meated out.
I am not the grammar queen by any means, but that "sentence" does not make any sense.
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
I've had a few good experiences with police and a few bad ones. The problem comes that the upside is normally very small (unless you're in a hostage situation or being attacked and are saved) and the downside is huge, even for a law-abiding person in day to day life.
The few times I've had "good" interactions with police, it was when I made an honest, non-dangerous mistake, and they let me off the hook. Essentially they used their discretion to be friendly, and I was no better off than I was before.
The few times my friends or I have had "bad" interactions with police, it's involved screaming, threats, violation of civil rights, and obvious abuses of power for no good reason.
I don't hate the police, but as an arm of the legal system, I distrust and fear them much more than I respect them.
On a personal basis, many are great people, but their job encourages them to distrust the public, treat people as criminals and as potentially dangerous, and use force, up to and including killing, in their every day jobs.
That's a great deal of power and responsibility for one person to have. Some people who have the job should not. Some people can normally handle it, but make mistakes. I would imagine that most of the people who would be best suited for the job have no desire to take it, and many of the people who are ill suited to the job have a great desire for the power and authority it holds.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
heh heh heh
'justice isnt meated out'
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Irami,
quote:What traits are policemen selected for, and what kind of people are drawn to the position? In my experience, they are generally not the brightest and tend towards smug.
Given your past history (around here, anyway) of voicing openly anti-white racist views, anti-establishment views, and generally anti-The Man views (frequently in an openly smug, condescending, morally superior tone), the first thing I wondered when I read your post was, "How was your behavior when you encountered police officers?"
quote:They are the enforcing arm of a flawed legal system, using violent solutions to address moral problems. In a way, they are our legally sanctioned terrorists, and I don't think that we should be so supportive in our public policy of threatening people to be nice.
This is so much bu@#!@#. Not the part about being the enforcing arm of a flawed legal system, because obviously they are acting in support of a flawed legal system. What human system isn't? No, the part that's excrement is the part about legally sanctioned terrorists. While undeniably there are police who use terror as a means to an end (and do so unjustifiably, I mean, not in an attempt to apprehend a criminal threatening someone's life, for example), indicting them as a whole is complete nonsense.
You can see this with even a casual examination of how a police officer spends their day. Most police officers-the vast majority, in fact, across the nation-don't spend their time Shield style thumping heads and shaking down informants, dropping the hammer to make their job easier down the line. Generally they spend their time, you know, in their cars driving, and responding to calls.
I am in complete, unashamed support of a public policy of threatening people who are violent themselves, or who prey on other citizens. You are too, if you're willing to be honest with yourself. If you've just gotten mugged and the guy's running away, you don't want him to politely yell down the street to stop that guy, you want him to run up, tackle that jerk, and get back your wallet.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Hmm. Well, to be honest, I did so for two reasons. One, it didn't ding the Trolldar nearly as much as it did you, apparently. That's genuinely surprising to me, given our past differences. I don't mean that to be snarky, but I would've simply said previously that it was unlikely that in a social or political discussion, there would be something left-leaning that you found trollish and absurd, and unworthy of response, and I didn't.
So...well, I apologize then for my incorrect misconception. My bad. The other reason is because someone I respect has personal reasons for not voicing their opposition to the statement Irami made, and since I read it I had intended to at least voice some opposition to it, since that person couldn't. I just got caught up in the Florida reckless driving stuff is all.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Hmm. Well, that post was addressed to a post that's since been deleted by Mr. Squicky.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Sorry. I've got to be faster on deleting posts that I rethink. Basically, I said, why would you engage him? What purpose do you think it serves. Irami was the guy who says something really stupid/apalling. It stops conversation for a bit, everyone stares for a second, and then they move on having actual sensical conversation. The only thing that elevated him above that was Rakeesh actually addressing his statement.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:I don't mean that to be snarky, but I would've simply said previously that it was unlikely that in a social or political discussion, there would be something left-leaning that you found trollish and absurd, and unworthy of response, and I didn't.
You apparently know very little about me.
---
edit: I don't particularly like people saying ridiculous things and it matters little to me what "side" these statements belong to. But that doesn't actually damage the forum or make productive discussion more difficult. What does is people addressing them like they merit a serious response, especially when this addressing takes on a provocative, spoiling for a fight aspect as yours often seem to do.
Posted by Jutsa Notha Name (Member # 4485) on :
He does that.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
That probably has something to do with why I used words like "apologize", "misconception", and "my bad", Mr. Squicky.
Jutsa, before you go trotting that bullcrap out, let's just remember who called who a Fox News fan in that thread that got deleted, hmm? And then just drop it. I have no interest in furthering our disagreements in this thread, unless it's actually topical.
And unlike you, if I say I won't respond to you anymore, I'll mean it Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
And I appreciate that, Rakeesh. I should have acknowledged your apology.
I was trying to emphasize that the statement you made pretty much has to come from someone who really has very little understanding of why I do things.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:I was trying to emphasize that the statement you made pretty much has to come from someone who really has very little understanding of why I do things.
Hey, I admit to that.
Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on :
*Hands out cookies-on-a-stick to everyone*
Now use your hands and mouth to eat it and calm down before you start fighting again. Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Who's fighting?
Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
I stand by what I said. When people act "in line" out of fear of negative martial consequences, that's a form of terrorism and not something we should be proud of. It's a hallmark of a criminal justice system that trafficks in fear, and yes, I think that there is something politically and morally lazy about this approach. I think the same thing about parents who overprescribe threatening and hitting children. There are a lot of them, and I hope a great majority of them will come around.
There is a quote for Dr. Zhivago that's stuck with me for years:
"If the beast who sleeps in man could be held down by threats—any kind of threat, whether of jail or of retribution after death—then the highest emblem of humanity would be the lion tamer in the circus with his whip, not the prophet who sacrificed himself. But, don’t you see, this is just the point—what has for centuries raised man above the beast is not the cudgel but an inward music: the irresistible power of unarmed truth, the powerful attraction of its example."
We aren't so enlightened such that we fully understand this inner music Pasternak speaks of, but I think that we should spend less energy exualting the ways and means of our penal system, and understand the whole business as shameful and at best, a necessary evil.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
When I lived in Washington State I had several unpleasant interactions with the police.
On one occasion I was pulled over because of a malfunctioning head light and issued over $400 dollars in bad citations. When I began to cry, the officer told me that if I did not calm down he would arrest me for assaulting a police officer. (note I was simply crying, nothing else, no swearing, no aggressive action). In the end a judge overturned all of the citations but it did cost me half a day of my time to get it over turned.
On several other occasions I was stopped and detained by police for over 30 minutes without any explanation. A friend of mine was arrested for swearing at a cop who nearly ran him over. The officer was backing his car through an intersection and ran a stop sign. For swearing at the cop, my friend was charged with reckless driving (on a bicycle) and assaulting an officer. Both charges were thrown out by a judge but not until my friend had spent the night in jail.
On couple of occasions when I actually needed the police such as when I was robbed, the police were rude and indifferent.
In other places where I've lived my interactions with the police have been largely neutral or positive, but it only take one incident in which a police officer misuses his authority to sour a person against the police. I'm a middle class well educated white woman, yet I've had enough such incidents to be suspicious of police. I can't imagine what it must be like if you are poor or a minority or just an improperly dressed male.
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
The police are SUPPOSED to do good things, rescue people, protect and serve, make life safer for good people, catch the bad guys, and all that. It's great when that happens, but it's their job.
Unfortunately, there are lots of instances when they are not at all the good, wholesome, saviors we expect them to be, and these examples stand out.
Police are supposed to be heroes. If Superman did all those heroic things, but every once in a while he beat the hell out of somebody for no good reason or put someone in jail for something they didn't do, we wouldn't think he was so great.
Cops have a lot to live up to, and rightly so. We invest them with the authority to act as our protectors, with the power over life and death, over freedom, that none of the rest of us have.
In this society, we give most of our powers of personal protection over to strangers, and we need to feel that we can trust them to use that power in our best interests. I don't get to carry a gun to defend myself. I don't get to arrest someone who commits a crime against me. I don't get to keep the streets safe.
I gave the power to do those things to the police, and I expect them to use that power to protect and serve me. Never to harass me. Never to violate my civil rights. Never to use that power for their own, personal agendas. Any time they use that power incorrectly, I have a reason to be upset, because it's my power, as a citizen. I'm just placing it in their hands, with the trust that they'll use it correctly.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:If Superman did all those heroic things, but every once in a while he beat the hell out of somebody for no good reason or put someone in jail for something they didn't do, we wouldn't think he was so great.
Yeah, but if Superman did all those heroic things, and some other guy in tights who also did heroic things every once in a while beat the hell out of somebody for no good reason or put someone in jail for something they didn't do, we wouldn't stop thinking Supes was great.
Unless we were J. Jonah Jameson.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:it only take one incident in which a police officer misuses his authority to sour a person against the police.
When someone makes such a conclusion after only one negative incident with a person of another race, we have an ugly name for it.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Police are supposed to be heroes. If Superman did all those heroic things, but every once in a while he beat the hell out of somebody for no good reason or put someone in jail for something they didn't do, we wouldn't think he was so great.
Then you'd have batman, and everyone loves batman!
MightCow: Unfortunately we can only select our cops and authority figures from the pool of humanity. If only we could somehow reserve those devoid of imperfection for political office and law enforcement we'd be OK!
I accept that people in positions of authority WILL eventually misuse it, and there are mediums in place to protect the people from it. But better to have flawed law enforcement then none at all if you ask me. And since perfect law enforcement is impossible, Ill take what we have now, and keep an eye on it to make sure it does not go out of control.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
I forgave Supes for it long ago
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
The problem that you have with cops that you don't have with superheroes is that one of those groups self-selects for some undesirable traits.
Not saying that they all do, but I don't think there's any denying that the police (like the military) tend to attract a certain breed of power-abusing bully. And those cops (while a minority) give the majority a bad rep.
Couple that with the fact that a certain amount of bullying and abuse of power is tacitly accepted, if not encouraged, and it's not hard to see why some people have the opinions of the police as a whole that they do. I don't know whether they're warranted or not.
And the difference between cops and every other profession given here as an example is that the police are in a position of power over every single one of us. They're the enforcers, and they don't always handle that responsibility as they should, IME.
Posted by The Rabbit (Member # 671) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee:
quote:it only take one incident in which a police officer misuses his authority to sour a person against the police.
When someone makes such a conclusion after only one negative incident with a person of another race, we have an ugly name for it.
There is a very important difference here Dag. The incidents I've described are examples of police officers obusing their special authority. Racial groups don't have any special powers or authority by virtue of race. If I was mistreated by a person with blue eyes (for example), there is no simple way they could use their blues to hurt me so there is no logical reason to conclude that their was any relationship between their blue eyes and the their behavior.
On the other hand if a police officer uses his uniform, his badge, or his authority to ticket or arrest me to treat me unjustly, the situation is very different. He is using the special powers and authority he hold only because he is a police officer to hurt me. So it is not irrational for me to resent not just the person who hurt me but the position he used to do it.
Misuse of authority is a pretty well studied field and it has been demonstrated that most people become less respectful of others and more prone to obusive behavior when they are given authority.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:I stand by what I said. When people act "in line" out of fear of negative martial consequences, that's a form of terrorism and not something we should be proud of. It's a hallmark of a criminal justice system that trafficks in fear, and yes, I think that there is something politically and morally lazy about this approach.
When people act "in line" out of fear of negative consequences, the more applicable (and less rhetorical) word to use is 'coercion.'
Also not too crazy about the notion of the criminal justice system trafficking in 'fear,' but given the state of the modern day prison-industrial complex, I'm sure they're trading in something! Posted by Foust (Member # 3043) on :
I have three opinions about the police.
One, they're all individuals; the actions of some do not reflect on the others.
Two, when they're serving and protecting, they're among the best people in society.
Three, when they're acting simply as agents of the status quo, they might as well be an occupying military force.
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Has that happened to you???
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. He still acted like there was a camera over his shoulder.
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Right after I got my car (shiny brand new, still had temp tags), my friends and I drove to Orlando and got lost. I was 19, I think my friends were 18 and 21. It happened to be Fourth of July weekend. We realized we'd gone the wrong way, and I tried to pull out onto the main road but didn't see that there was a car coming (the visibility was awful...big plants and a sharp turn). So I turned in front of said car...not too close, but it was a cop car. It followed us for twenty minutes until we realized we'd gone too far and turned around. Kept following us. When we turned onto the right road, it pulled us over.![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
) So I called her--I guess she had not yet left, because this was before cell phones--and she asked me to pick up dinner. I took her car, which had pretty much not been driven in a couple of months, to pick up McDonalds. ![[Angst]](graemlins/angst.gif)