I fear this nation is in serious denial over a creeping disease of First
Amendment erosion. No one I'm reading here is apparently ready to see the
significance of the breadth and depth of police overreaching the bounds of
Constitutional protections of dissenting politics.
The rash of killings, beatings and racial profiling by police officers in
every urban center of this nation continue to draw defenses of citizens
clearly bent on protecting the police from criticism and accountability.
The evidence is on videotapes and broadcast over and over again. Only blind
people and those in denial can hide their heads in the sand over this
increasingly violent and insidious behavior in response to the most
legitimate of citizen action: demonstrations against policies and practices
of government and corporations perceived as dangerous to the sustaining of
human and animal life on this planet.
Individuals attempting to cause trouble during these rallies are one thing.
But when police officers from another jurisdiction infiltrate dissenters'
ranks, perhaps following, perhaps instigating, the violence of the few to
discredit the many, then we are heading for a very real and horrifying
police state.
These are not just words. We must wake up to the clear signals that dissent
is no longer tolerated, that good citizens are now prepared to dispense with
Constitutional guarantees in order to seek security or neighborhood peace.
Just keep your anger out of my neighborhood - away from my. I need comfort.
I need peace. If that means someone's head has to be bloodied so I can get
it - fine.
It is the attitude that worms its way into a society complacent about its
freedoms and willing to forego the struggle and vigilance it takes to keep
them. And the police - more and more - are - as they were at Minneapolis
ISAG conference and other incidents here and elsewhere - not the protectors
of those freedoms, but the killers of them.
Police culture, like so many subcultures, is understood by many, but ignored
by more. It is a culture of anger and violence confronting the dregs of
society, rather than working intelligently to ensure the common welfare. It
zeros in on the powerless and keeps them that way. Then it usually goes home
to its suburban enclaves where brother and sister officers reside thereby
creating its occupying force. Armed men and women keeping the downtrodden
out of the way of the rest of us, then retreating from any personal or
poltiical investment or involvement in the community they patrol daily.
Oh, yes. The unspoken policy is very real. But it speaks loudly by the
head-bashing violence inflicted on fellow citizens when it overreacts to
modes of legal expression. Living in denial of this simply justifies its
escalation and creeping dare I say it: fascism.
Andy Driscoll
--
"Whatever keeps you from your work is your work."
Albert Camus
The Driscoll Group/Communications
Writing/Graphics/Political Consulting/Communications Strategies
835 Linwood Ave.
St. Paul, MN 55105
651-293-9039
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> From: "Rich McMartin Rich McMartin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2001 09:38:09 -0600 (CST)
> To: "Minneapolis Issues" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: Re: [Mpls] Re: Police Brutality
>
>> Maybe I am naive, but I doubt that the police would have an official policy
>> of brutality. After all, that would give the lawyers something to use
>> against the police in court. However, there may be an unofficial "policy" of
>> brutality. But with no official policy, there is always plausible
>> deniability.
>
> Show us the evidence of this unofficial policy. Find the officers and the
> supervisors you were told, verbally or in memos, to execute this
> unofficial policy.
>
> Brutality by the force is intolerable just as brutality by individual
> officers. We have all seen media portrayals of incidents that were
> plainly brutality, and those officers must be punished. But I really
> doubt that the MPD has a policy, official or otherwise, that says they
> need to go beat up the populace to keep them in line. It is counter
> productive. They would lose my support and trust if I thought they did.
> Under CODEFOR brutality claims have actually declined.
>
>
> Rich McMartin
> Bryant Neighborhood.
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