For anyone who has posted about me getting pulled over by a gay police officer, who thinks its good my project and mission are working, please have empathy. When I say it bothers me that police officers abuse their power, its something I say because in 7 years I have been pulled over about 100 times by police officers without reason. I have literally been given multiple tickets for having fagbug written on the car that say lettering bigger than 2 inches. I was cornered by 3 cops after my wedding on my way home for no reason, I have been followed into hotels and blocked from leaving, for no reason. If I am selected out of 5 cars going the same speed to get a speeding ticket, police have said to me, If I have five cars and have to pick one, who do you think I am going to pick. The first year my car was rainbow, I almost lost my license and paid over $2,000 in tickets, and could no longer afford to pay for collision on my car because of it. My driving never changed, however I was treated noticeably different. I had to put forth an immense amount of effort to change the way I drive, take a defensive driving course, and get my record back on track. Just last week I had plans to meet my wife for lunch 10 minutes from her work. She only has a half hour lunch break. I was supposed to be there 15 minutes early and was on track to do so so I could order our food for it to be ready once she arrived. On the way there, a cop was driving next to me and said, Can you pull over for a second? I said, Why? I knew I was not getting pulled over for any reason. He looked at me and said, Why, really? He had the attitude Im a cop and you should do whatever I say. When I have somewhere I have to be which is every single time I am in my car heading somewhere, cops do not have the right to pull you over to make you late to wherever you are heading. When I say it bothers me that police officers abuse their power, imagine driving 30 hours to an event, and you get pulled over by every single cop who feels entitled to pull you over for no reason because they have a question? Cops dont have the right to do that. It would delay my trip by about 15 hours and make me miss my event which is what often ends up happening. The first week I had my car the rainbow version, I was at an event in Cornell, and 2 female cops came behind me as I was stopped in front of a welcome sign trying to find where I was heading and supposed to have my car on display for the event. I was on the phone with the woman in charge already pulled over. The female officer came up to my window and thought my car was hate speech and attempted to kick me off campus. I explained the story however the other cop demanded my license and told me, I dont believe your name is Erin. I dont believe you own this vehicle, and I dont believe you are a speaker on campus today. I thought they were there to help me because I was lost, but they pulled me over, even though in that moment I was doing nothing wrong and was already pulled over. Later students complained about the way I was treated and their boss called me. He said what if your car was anti gay, wouldnt that have made you happy that we were trying to kick someone like that off campus, and I said no. It doesnt. Its freedom of speech. When a cop followed me into a hotel once and blocked me from leaving just because they had a question I was not open to talking to them. I deal with cops doing this to me on a weekly basis and no one has the right to block you from leaving a parking space, or forcing you to stop to speak to them when no one else in the world gets to do that. I get that people are curious. The car reaches thousands of people a day and I bend over backwards to speak to hundreds of people a day while I am stopped. No one has the right to force me to stop to talk to them when I am heading somewhere. There is not one person out there who would appreciate being late because of cops abusing their power and forcing you to talk to them because they are curious or have a question. The car has a website on it for a reason. If I say something bothers me, it is because I have lived it and it happens thousands of times. People on my page should have empathy and I should not have to explain all of this for people to understand what it would be like. The car gets attention, I am glad it is successful in doing that, but it is in the realm of peoples rights. I more than extend myself to people, and make myself accessible, but there are limits.
Posted on: Fri, 13 Jun 2014 14:30:21 +0000
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