I have read a lot of comments to my posts that, how dare I question police tactics when they respond to danger, after all we ask them to do our dirty work and protect us. I have heard that comment in person a lot recently, and I agree that we ask police to do a lot and it gets complicated and messy in the heat of the moment. That is why I have long-advocated that we ask them to do less, and take the personal responsibility to do more for ourselves. I dont expect the police to defend my home, nor tend to my wounds in an accident, or negotiate the resolution to a fender-bender. I dont expect them to keep me safe on the road, watch over my business, protect my trash cans from wild animals, catch all the thieves, or lock up all the violent gang members. In the same regard that I practice fire-safety and keep a healthy amount of extinguishers around my home but am glad a fire department is on call with the specialized expertise to contain an out-of hand blaze, I think of police as a public service that is best used to supplement the strength of a vigilant populace. We all share a community together, and specialize in different tasks that help each other prosper. I choose to provide legal services, and develop a small business that will hopefully one day help reduce transportation costs. Does that make me weak? Does that make me a lesser member of society? I will never ask someone to do something I am not willing to do myself, and in my opinion every free man and woman should have the same attitude if they wish to retain that freedom. I train my mind and body to defend myself, my home, and my family. I take care to recognize the inevitable dangers of daily life, and take steps to both mitigate those dangers and resolve any incidents. I take responsibility for whatever life throws at me, but at the same time its nice to have a community of specialists, so that I too can focus to master a select number of tasks and provide those services to others focused on different matters. That is what makes us a team, a community, and a nation. There was a time when we asked the police to be keepers of the peace. We asked for a select group of souls to exercise great discretion within their community as to protect the innocent at all costs, and to be on guard to fight when pure evil becomes a 5 alarm blaze. Those men still fill the ranks of many departments. Now, however, we ask them to enforce the law, which has become an immense and complicated animal indeed. As the law expands so has the need to expand the ranks. We have tasked these officers to enforce laws that often judges and lawyers with more titles after their name than the Yankees cant seem to agree on the exact interpretation. Laws that politicians dont even understand or abide. Misunderstanding often leads to anger or a close-mindedness to simply do as told. These two attitudes have swelled greatly both among enforcers and enforcees in direct proportion to the swelling of the legal code. It is no surprise that police or now LEOs feel as though they do everything. They are increasingly involved in every little facet of American life; from enforcing front yard flower box continuity voted by those in favor of neighborhood beautification to curbing public behavior by enforcing some new ban advocated by this weeks nanny group on the soap box. As the front-line face of these laws which are inevitably unpopular, the LOEs are also the recipients of anger. Either that they enforced too much of something, or not enough. If we want to change the face of law enforcement in America, we should first look to not only reforming the law, but reimposing the limits on the formation of laws in the first place. As a nation we need to accept that we cannot socially engineer all life. We need to accept that freedom and responsibility go hand-in-hand. We need to understand that if we want great souls for a ever sacred and specialized task, then we must keep that job pure and deal with the other nuances of life personally. If we can do that, I think we may start to see each other as members of the same team once again.
Posted on: Thu, 23 Oct 2014 05:50:45 +0000
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