Quote:I'll let you in on a little secret.  The visual of a police officer "armed to the teeth" is a deterrent.  An "intimidating and aggressive look" is often favored by police because it gives a tactical advantage.  You have no idea what it is like to don the uniform and go out into the public, especially in areas that have a high crime rate.  You are instantly a "target" in these areas.

 

People like to complain about how teachers are paid.  Here's another secret that I'll let you in on.  A starting police officer earns a salary pretty much on par with a typical teacher in a public school.  These police officers put themselves in harms way every single day\night that they work.  They are exposed to and have to deal with some of the worst atrocities that can occur in daily life.

 

I'll give a few examples of what I did/saw when I served.

 

One night, we were called to a local bar where a fight broke out.  When we pulled up and tried to contain the situation, other people tried to inject themselves into the situation.  It immediately got pretty violent, and we initial responders felt that we were in jeopardy.  We ended up having to call the State Police to come and back us up.  We finally settled the crowd down and made some arrests.

 

On another night I had to respond to a car accident, single vehicle.  The occupant of the vehicle had run into a tree and the vehicle caught on fire.  When the fire was put out, we not only had to identify the "person" that was in the vehicle, but I had to go and tell the family of this person that she (it turns out that it was a female) was deceased.

 

On anther night I responded to a vehicle accident, and the driver of the vehicle was deceased.  It was a young male, and we determined his identity from what he was carrying with him.  As the initial officer on the scene I had to accompany the Chaplin to inform the family.  I remember seeing a note on the front door of the apartment from his mother that read something to the affect "this is the last time that I cover your paper route".  We waited until she got home, and little did she realize that the note that she left for the kid was in fact true.

 

The bottom line is this.  I shared some of my experiences while serving as a Deputy Sheriff.  I refuse to limit police agencies access to the tools necessary to carry out their job.  When people question or criticize police for what they do, I challenge them to walk in their shoes one day.

As I alluded to in my previous post, due to your position and experiences there would be no evidence or examples or opinions that will sway you. That's just as understandable as I would hope you would see my point of view from the outside. Still, I have no idea how to respond to the above post so I will just let Eric do it for me.

 

Quote:With all due respect you disagree because of your position as an officer. Your view is one of accountability and while I'm sure you are an honorable officer and from our interactions I have no reason to mistrust you that trust is not universal to all departments and more importantly the people who oversee them.

Government is government I naturally mistrust in all it's forms


Now forget that the police and military serve two separate purposes I have a big problem using the police as a peace keeping paramilitary force and a big problem using the military as a police keeping force.


One is to work with the community to prevent crime protect the innocent and keep the peace the other is to seek and destroy. When you mix the tools and role of these different organization it's a small step to tyranny.

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