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COPS HAVE
MOST THANKLESS JOBS
There
is one trait common to all humankind. No matter our age, IQ or
political leanings, we all secretly consider ourselves experts when it
comes to the other person’s job. It doesn’t matter if we aren’t
competent at our own work. We watch what other people do and know in
our hearts we could do it better.
One of
the toughest and most thankless jobs in America is law enforcement. There
is no way I could ever be a police officer and, I suspect, neither could
most of the rest of us. But we sure as hell can second-guess everything
the police do, forgetting that sometimes they have a split-second to make
a decision and we have weeks to critique their actions from the safety of
the sidelines.
Law
enforcement is equal parts mind-numbing tedium and mind-blowing terror.
When an officer leaves for work, his or her family has no way of knowing
if there will be a next meal together. A couple of weeks ago, a
Carroll County deputy sheriff got up from the dinner table to assist in
the chase of an arson suspect. He was shot to death for his efforts.
We
don’t care about the police until we need them. If we find ourselves
threatened we want them to protect us, no matter what the risks.
Other than that, leave us alone. We resent being told what to do.
It impinges on our personal liberty. Let us speed, run red lights
and tailgate while we yak away on our car phones. If we are
stopped, give us the opportunity to lie or cajole our way out of a traffic
citation so that we can laugh about the experience to our friends and then
burn up the roads again. Otherwise, we may get downright hostile.
When I
lived in East Point, the local judge received a call from an irate citizen
who had been stopped for running a red light and wanted to complain about
the officer’s curt manner. “Do you know where he had been before he
stopped you?” the judge asked. “He had just told a family their child had
been killed after running a stop sign. Maybe this officer saved your
life.”
A South
Georgia sheriff recently told me about a prominent citizen who was livid
over the attitude of the deputy that had stopped her for a moving
violation. What she didn’t know was that the officer’s car had a video
camera. A review of the tape showed that the deputy had handled the stop
exactly as he was supposed to do, including showing her more courtesy than
she had shown him. Last I heard, the sheriff was trying to get the
complainant and her husband to review the tape with him and point out the
source of their complaint. Good for him.
Are
there bad police officers? Absolutely. Are there police officers that
abuse their authority? Certainly. There are also bad teachers and
preachers and doctors and lawyers. And don’t forget the CEOs and
accountants that abused their authority and ruined the lives of a lot of
people in the process.
The
truth is that police officers are no worse than the rest of society and
probably better than most of it. It continues to amaze me that we
can find people willing to put up with all the verbal and physical abuse,
the criticism, a lack of appreciation for what they do and the very real
possibility that somebody may kill them before they can ever collect their
meager pension.
I have
never gotten a ticket in the half century I have had a driver’s license.
That doesn’t guarantee that I won’t get one in the future. The most
likely opportunity will be when I haul a tailgating truck driver out of
his cab and kick his rear end into the next time zone. I know that is
wrong, but so is tailgating.
No
doubt I will huff and puff and wonder why the police couldn’t better spend
their time stopping all the crazy drivers on the road, instead of
upstanding citizens like me. If I do, I should re-read this column,
particularly the part about the East Point judge, and understand that some
unappreciated souls may have saved my life, whether I wanted them to or
not. I just hope I remember to thank them.
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