Why A Movement Lost Support

Police brutality, police corruption, and police “killings” of people of color have remained a steady debate for many years, with no apparent end in sight to the debate. In every jurisdiction across the United States, there are discussions about how to deal with the public, how to deal with the criminal element, and how to protect the innocent from the predators in this world. Like it, or not, there are predators in this world.

On television, it all looks glamorous, exciting, and fun. Policing has been one of the most glorified and romanticized careers in cinema and television. Writers have made fortunes glorifying the exciting fantasy of policing, both the good and the bad of it all, and yet people understand very little about actual policing. There are simply those things that are never seen by the public.

The greatest detriment to the police, in recent years, has become the news media. Nothing gets the readers stirred up more than stories about violent criminals and the cops. To make matters worse the media continues to point out the color of the injured or deceased civilian in the altercation with the police. They never announce, “Police have shot a citizen suspected of..." The news media only cares about ratings or, it wouldn’t sell the same number of papers or get the same number of views on the internet.

It’s the things that we don’t see that should matter the most to the media until there is something the unglamorized, unreported events that the news media doesn’t care about. Why? Because they love to tell a sensational story. Unfortunately, that has become the narrative of the anti-police movement.

Defund The Police Fails Perceived Mission

Make no mistake about it, the message Defund The Police, did not resonate well with the American public. Particularly because the majority of the American public doesn't believe that it's the right thing to do, and it's not. Underfunding the very organization that works to protect us from criminal elements of society makes no sense to anyone, particularly those that aren't involved in criminal activities and don't associate with the types that are. So all the chest-pounding in the world may have gotten some politicians to promise things they never were going to deliver but in the long run, it was an unrealistic venture, to begin with.

Sure, there may need to be some reform. We can always try new things and see what works better. But, those reforms aren't going to be the fix for anything if society doesn't learn to abide by the rules. Reforming police training might help, but at the end of the day, violence begets violence. What that means is, if you physically resist the police when they're doing their jobs, you are going to see an equal or greater amount of physical force utilized by them. That is, after all, what they are trained to do. And no, the politicians will not defund the police. Look what's happening around the country. The promoters of defunding the police gave them no reason to stick to that promise.

Much the way of the politician, even Nancy Pelosi recently pulled back, rejecting the popular slogan of ‘Defund the Police’. There’s no surprise when you consider the intensely uphill battle that the democrats face in November during the elections. The hypocrisy of politics has been in full swing, as once guaranteed promises, such as police reforms, have fallen by the wayside. And, why wouldn’t they have?

With officers’ hands being tied behind the backs at every corner, crime rose in America in 2021.

Per 2020 FBI final statistics released in September 2021, the number of homicides increased nearly 30% from 2019. This was the largest single-year increase the agency has recorded since it began tracking these crimes in the 1960s. In 2020, there were more than 21,500 murders reported. This total hadn’t been seen since the mid-1990s.

Overall, in 2020, violent crime was up 5.6 percent if you include aggravated assaults and domestic violence cases.

When defunding the police is no longer a thing in this country, who will its’ supporters have to blame? They will have to blame themselves. This is because the largest supporters of so-called “police reforms” are by a majority made up of the very members of society that made them look incredibly bad. There is no good selling point to rioting, looting, and destroying public property. There is no good selling point to assaulting members of the public, destroying businesses, and murder. And yet, they’ll still want to defund the police while conducting themselves in the very manner that justifies the police's existence.

Why People Wanted To “Defund The Police”

It sounds stupid. Defunding an organization that has historically been critically underfunded and understaffed made no sense to me, but I worked with the police and in law enforcement. I was, as they say, a public servant.

Understanding the reasoning for the outrage is something that we all can manage. There have been some outrageous events that have transpired on the news. Making things worse, the internet has become a place for free-range opinions and fringy conspiracy theories. Nobody seems to want to let the system work the way it was designed to work.

When it comes to police vs. everyday citizens, they are not the same. Police, by virtue of their authority, are granted the power to use levels of force that are necessary to prevent a threat in the performance of their duties. That, to the public’s apparent dismay, means that the police are granted the authority and immense responsibility to use deadly force when it’s deemed necessary. They are allowed to use force in effecting an arrest when it is necessary.

Every time a cop uses force and it’s unfortunately against someone of color, the public begins to denounce the police once again. There is no time for a thorough investigation into the matter. We’ve seen cities burn, innocent people assaulted, even murdered, and stores looted for the high-dollar goods inside. What looting stores do for people when they’re allegedly “pissed” about a police shooting is beyond most reasonable people.

The spectacle of the past couple of years has done nothing but divide a country on this issue. And, divided it will stay until there is a return to common sense. Common sense is, however, in short supply in America. Politically, the left cannot get what they want when it came to police reforms and that was…never going to happen.

The very people that were promising it are the biggest hypocrites in the entire country. The elitist politicians wanted the return to power. Where did it leave any of us, as murders went up across the country? Violent crimes skyrocketed, policies of reform failed to protect the public, and people continued to argue against policing. Meanwhile, the politics were focused on the 2022 election, the pandemic, and now a war breaking out in Eastern Europe.

Where Things Are Likely To Go

If you’re anti-police, go ahead and stop reading here. You’re not going to like this next truth. The arrows above, they don’t point forward.

Things are likely to return to a “somewhat” modified version of before. The rare difference will be that there might be a higher standard applied to justifying the use of force. That’s just the plain reality of the situation.

We’ve already seen plans announced for the return of special units in New York City. In all likelihood, California’s new plan will have some of the same components. There will be special crime units, more police recruitment, and an eventual replenishment of the cops that have left the departments.

It’s time to face facts. Without police, the barbarians at the gate will eventually come through. Without people that are willing to keep order so that citizens can live their lives relatively free from the threat of being robbed, assaulted, raped, and murdered, we are living in an anarchist society. There is nothing wrong with people wanting to know that when they come home their homes haven't been burglarized, their property is safe, and that when someone has committed a crime against them, there’s a consequence when caught.

Common Sense In Police Interactions

What the cowboy should do is lay on the ground and follow orders. That would be common sense. What the officer must do, is take the person into custody.

A couple of weeks ago there was a raid in Minnesota. The incident in question resulted in the shooting of an armed individual who, on body camera, appeared to be pointing a gun at the police. An armed individual, sleeping with a gun?

Anyone that sleeps with a gun is either scared of something, or they’re overly protecting themselves from something. When a bunch of men storms your house with flashlights after kicking the door in, you’ve zero chance of winning a gunfight with them. Common sense? You would think so. But, the man aimed a gun at the police and got what anyone with common sense would expect.

Common sense once told me I could arrest a guy on a warrant for murder, and not need a gun to do it. The poor kid, and I say kid because to me he was just that, kid, was scared out of his mind. Sure, he did what he did but wanted to turn himself in rather than have to look over his shoulder for the rest of his life. But, due to bad public relations and the state of the country’s view on police use of force, he imagined he’d get shot walking into the building. Long story short, he cooperatively surrendered in our department parking lot. Said goodbye to his family on the front sidewalk before entering, and it was a story that barely registered in the newspapers.

Had I taken a gun out to arrest the kid it would have changed the perception of me to the family and the kid. He could have gotten spooked by the sight of a large gun, even on my waist. It could have changed his mind and then it’s no longer voluntarily surrendering, but being taken by force. Anytime there’s a gun around, there’s a chance someone will get shot. That’s a basic safety rule of carrying a pistol. In Illinois, I’ve known four officers that suffered attacks where suspects attempted to disarm the officer and take their guns.

Common sense goes a long way and if both sides utilized some common sense approaches to incidents, interactions, and the truth, there wouldn’t have to be such a negative appearance of the police in America. The only battles that should be fought are in court. But, common sense tells every person in uniform that there are seriously bad people in the world that won’t be mature and go without a fight.

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