PAX Centurion - May / June 2015

www.bppa.org PAX CENTURION • June/July 2015 • Page 13 Cell-phone circus We’re a video-cam away from another Baltimore or Ferguson By James W. Carnell, Pax Editor W E HAVE TO BE THE MOST SCRUTINIZED, SEC- OND-GUESSED PROFESSION ON EARTH. With the advent of the cell-phone camera, everything we say, everything we do, is now subject to instant review by armchair quarterbacks. The police are called because things are out of control, or there’s a family disturbance, or there’s a fight in the middle of the street after the bars have let out at 2AM. And what do we arrive to???... Virtually, an army of cell-phone patriots holding up their record- ing devices as if we – the police – represent the night’s entertainment. Twenty-something little girls and boys that Mommy and Daddy have sent to college and been indoctrinated by their liberal professors now confront every call which the police respond to; ironically and most often, called in by themselves , awaiting the arrival of the police! Then, they criticize every aspect of police involvement through social media and join some self-righteous movement demanding an end to “police brutality” “No Justice/ No peace”/ “Black Lives Matter,” etc., etc., etc., ad nauseum. The fact is, it’s almost be- come impossible to be a po- lice officer in this day and age without having every word you say and every act you per- form reviewed by idiots and morons who wouldn’t do what we do if their lives depended on it. We are , without any doubt, the most second-guessed and criticized profession in the country. No lawyer, no doctor, no politician is subject to such scrutiny as are the police. Do they really wonder why so few quality police recruits are avail- able nowadays? Most young people are choosing far-more rewarding careers that do not require mandatory overtime, nights, weekends, and holidays, and constant review of everything they do or say, sub- ject to withering criticism and potential criminal and civil liability. When and where I was brought up (Mattapan, 1960’s-70’s) , you did not question a cop when he told you to move or do something. It was unheard of . If you even thought of complaining to your parents that Officer Whooley had kicked you in the ass, you got a second and third one fromMom and Dad (back then, we had Mothers and Fa- thers;- anachronistic , I know, but it was a different world…) because, obviously, if Officer Whooley (sorry Bob, had to use your name…) had to talk to you, you did something wrong. Today, these morally- equivalent cretins think that Judge Judy gets to review their grievance onYouTube. Did the policeman act “inappropriately”?Was his/her language “harsh”. Did he/she act in a way that the video-world did not agree with after review by their cyber-friends? Many, many officers – especially on the dreaded midnight shifts downtown- report that they are called to, for example, barroom fights or disturbances on State St., Lansdowne St., Hanover St. or a variety of other locations where drunken morons engage in altercations at 2AM. The officers inevitably arrive to a cadre of inebriated nitwits with their cell-phone cameras at the ready, waiting for their “Police/ YouTube moment.” The police are at once confronted with a vio- lent, dangerous situation, often involving drunken men and women, sometimes with weapons, and then with college-age critics holding cell-phone cameras waiting for their moment in the sun as a victim of police brutality or insensitivity. The natural result is, of course, what we have been talking about for years: “de-policing”. It was a topic covered by TIME magazine after the Cincinnati riots many years ago. The TIME reporters simply could not seem to understand: Why did crime and disorder increase after the police were criti- cized by the local politicians and media? Hmmmm…. I wonder why???What a mystery? Could it be that the police, being normal human beings subject to the same vagaries as everybody else, could respond by shrugging their shoulders and simply writing re- ports after-the-fact as opposed to performing pro-active, aggres- sive police work? NOOOO…. Of course, the Chiefs of PoliceAssociation and PERF (Police Executive Research Foundation, aWashington, D.C.- based ”think-tank”: HA – what an oxymoron!) will tell the gullible media “NO”! “Our police officers are primarily concerned with commu- nity policing,” will say the administrative politicians-in-uniform who have never made an arrest in their lives, wear stars, bars and feathers that they never earned, donated money to the right politician, and are paid ten times the pay of the average street cop for spouting crap to the media. And the executives from PERF will produce statistics and charts for the media to prove that “community-policing” is the single- minded concern of the average police officer, who does not question the wisdom of his perfumed managers because the average police officer is a tin soldier and a plaster saint. (Or at least, that’s what the public thinks….) But I will tell you this: any cop whose primary interest is not his/ her family, spouse, children, home and assets, above all other things, is either a liar or an idiot. In this day and age, every interaction with the general public, no matter how seemingly innocent or innocuous, is an invitation to the end of your career and the destruction of your reputation. That’s the cell-phone circus that we all have to be aware of….