Badges? We Don’t Need No Stinking Badges
Matthew Yglesias at Vox brings up an important question.
Above you’ll see a picture of Scott Olson, the Getty photographer who’s brought us many of the most striking images of protests and police crackdown that followed the shooting of Michael Brown. [Click on the link in my first sentence to see the picture]
The other two men in the photograph have not yet been identified to the public. […] Reasonable people can disagree about when, exactly, it’s appropriate for cops to fire tear gas into crowds. But there’s really no room for disagreement about when it’s reasonable for officers of the law to take off their badges and start policing anonymously.
There’s only one reason to do this: to evade accountability for your actions.
Olson was released shortly after his arrest, as were Reilly and Lowery before him. Ryan Devereaux from The Intercept and Lukas Hermsmeier from the German tabloid Bild were likewise arrested last night and released without charges after an overnight stay in jail. In other words, they never should have been arrested in the first place. But nothing’s being done to punish the mystery officers who did the arresting.
[…]
Policing without a nametag can help you avoid accountability from the press or from citizens, but it can’t possibly help you avoid accountability from the bosses.
For that you have to count on an atmosphere of utter impunity. It’s a bet many cops operating in Ferguson are making, and it seems to be a winning bet.
Let’s get this out of the way. I am not anti-police. I am a cop’s kid. So… I called my father and asked him about police not wearing identification. Yep, that’s a big no no. The public has a right to know who’s arresting them. What happens if a person being arrested has a complaint about the way an officer handled the arrest? How would they file that complaint without the officer’s name?
Here’s the bottom line. The police have the power to arrest/detain citizens. They also have the power to use lethal force. With those powers come responsibility, accountability and transparency. I’m sorry, but that is not debatable.
Removing identification doesn’t inspire trust in Ferguson/St. Louis law enforcement (Is there much trust left?). In fact, it plays into the narrative that the police in Ferguson are functioning with impunity.
Removing their identification in addition to shoving around journalists is all of a piece. I was talking with someone this AM about Ferguson potentially happening anywhere in the US. I’m not sure what I think about that (in terms of police response) — that means that you have to believe that PDs all over are as badly trained (and substituting sheer authoritarianism) as the Ferguson PD was.
There’s a petition someplace to ask for Federal legislation that would compel all police officers to wear cameras while on duty.
Accountability cuts both ways.
The relevant social contract is that the police serve the community with integrity and that the public respects their efforts providing both safety and compensation.
When the public withdraws their respect (whether warranted or not), as has clearly happened here, I don’t have a real problem with “real” badges coming off. In this day and age, it would be easy to create a list of home addresses from just a few photos.
But there should be unique identifying badges of some sort… something to cite when filing a complaint. Something that a DA could use… That would, at least, end the appearance of impunity.
There should be a Federal Law that compels police to wear identification as well.
Not all, but many if not most police departments behave this way. It’s not an exception, as the shooting of a mentally disturbed man in St. Louis yesterday illustrated.
This isn’t just about removing badges and ID during riots. There are cases of SWAT teams serving no-knock warrants on the wrong house, then refusing to identify themselves or giving false information.
I grew up in the Philly suburbs during the Rizzo era. You learned real quickly that when the cops took off their badges, the billy-clubbing was about to begin.
@Liberal Elite: couldn’t disagree more. Accountability runs entirely to the people with deadly weapons and official State sanction to use them or to arrest people based on their judgment of a situation.
The accountability for citizens is being arrested, being physically restrained, being shot, being convicted, being fined, being sent to prison.
There is no requirement in the social contract for citizens to “respect” cops–police officers receive respect exactly the same way everyone else does: by earning it.
Holy shit. He did it again! Prof Newton.. kicks ass; takes names. The deal is completely one sided and it’s supposed to be. The cops need to protect me even if I don’t give a flying fuck about them. That’s the deal when you carry guns and lock people up.
“The police are not your friends.” – My 30+ year police veteran father in what I kindly refer to as “the speech” just before going away to school.
I’m so weary. New video shows Powell shooting. This video seems to be in some conflict with official account.
Prof Newt:
What does this mean – The accountability for citizens is being arrested, being physically restrained, being shot, being convicted, being fined, being sent to prison.
Citzens are accountable for being arrested; for being shot, etc? Or something else?
More lessons in reading comprehension: arrests, charges, imprisonment, etc. are how citizens are held accountable by the police.
Liberal Elite argued that civilian “respect” for police was part of an accountability element of the social contract; I disagreed. Police hold civilians accountable for breaking the law, not for respecting them.
Does it not occur to you that you appear to have been the only one who did not get it?
@SN “There is no requirement in the social contract for citizens to “respect” cops”
You do realize that I was equating the word “respect” with “does not attack” in the comment I made. Go back and read it again. My exact words:
“…public respects their efforts providing both safety and compensation.”
Protestors who attack police officers are denying such respect.
And you complain to others about reading comprehension.. Ha!
@SN “Liberal Elite argued that civilian “respect” for police was part of an accountability element of the social contract;”
Wrong.
It’s so strange to me. I’d wager that the most frequently used argument in the comment section of this blog is that the person arguing the other side of something can’t comprehend what the other wrote.
Reading comprehension.
I didn’t say exactly that. I said this.
Show me where I said that!
I wonder whether that’s a problem with reading or a problem with writing. I do think that when pressed it’s very rare for someone to give any credit to a counter argument. Liberal Elite wrote that “accountability cuts both ways.” Those words exactly. And Prof Newton and I said that’s not the case. Period. I don’t know where the miscommunication is here.
Liberal Elite wrote that she/he has no problem with the police taking ID/badges off in situation like these. This is preposterous. This “social contract” LE describes simply doesn’t exist. Yet… here we are. Amazing.
SN:
A simple, uncluttered request for clarity prompts an insult from you. That seems to be the preferred means to elucidate.
Following your lead – once again, you say some of the most simple-minded things I’ve ever heard from an adult.
You flat out missed LE’s point. Hence, the confusion. LE’s simple point was that BOTH sides of the police/citizenry dynamic have a responsibility to each other. The police, as LE describes the dynamic, are to do their job with integrity. The citizens are to respect their authority and compensate them.
How on God’s green earth does LE’s point translate into the single sided relationship whereby, in your world, the police are the only party accountable? That is what you said? Right? Police accountable their use of power. Police hold citizens accountable by way of arrest.
What about the lucky bastards that never get arrested? Not accountable until they end up in cuffs or dead on the sidewalk. Essentially avoid arrest or being gunned down – no need to tender respect to the police institution. If I read for comprehension correctly, they are free to act without accountability.
What you’ve described my charlatan friend is an elementary school playground.
There is no requirement in the social contract for citizens to “respect” cops–police officers receive respect exactly the same way everyone else does: by earning it.
This is what Steve said. The police are enforcers of the law created by the authorities that are supposed to represent the rest of us. You have no obligation to respect any part of that authority — indeed, most non-violent action against a government is about a visible withdrawing of your support for that authority. There may be consequences for not respecting the police, but there is no reason to to hand over something they haven’t earned or have worked to undermine. I would say that the social contract includes both parties working at some mutual respect, but you certainly are not obligated to it, especially when that authority is acting in a corrupt manner.
Agree with you that “I would say that the social contract includes both parties working at some mutual respect.” SN said no such thing, unfortunately.
As you did, LE described a mutuality of respect between police and citizens. SN flat out said he “couldn’t disagree more.”
Agree that once the institution fails to uphold its end of the bargain, we have every right, and maybe duty, to withdraw support by non-violent means. The age old quandary, in my mind, who gets to decide that and under what criteria.
Here we have a scholar of American History, a published author and a university professor being called a “charlatan friend.” (Note: Interesting use of charlatan as an adjective. Not sure I’ve seen that before.)
I think on that note I take the remainder of the day off.
ATIAM persists in reading difficulties. Liberal Elite started his post with “accountability” before he talked about mutual respect. He also said,
When the public withdraws their respect (whether warranted or not), as has clearly happened here, I don’t have a real problem with “real” badges coming off. In this day and age, it would be easy to create a list of home addresses from just a few photos.
So the argument runs that if the public doesn’t appropriately “respect” police, that relieves the police from a portion of their part of the social contract (being identified and held accountable for their use of force).
Then ATIAM says:
Agree that once the institution fails to uphold its end of the bargain, we have every right, and maybe duty, to withdraw support by non-violent means. The age old quandary, in my mind, who gets to decide that and under what criteria.
The interesting part of this comment is that there is no corresponding injunction on the police to use non-violent means. While I’m certainly not an advocate of violence against police, on the opposite hand if a police officer IS acting violently (let’s say a SWAT raid on the wrong house where my dog is shot, a flash-bang is set off in my baby’s crib, and nobody identifies as police), as an American citizen I refuse to guarantee that officer’s safety from a corresponding level of defensive violence.
Who gets to decide whether to withdraw their support from the police (back to speaking non-violently)? Pretty damn simple: any American citizen or group of citizens. Withdrawing my support for police does not give me the right to institute force or fraud against any other person, or to break a law without willingness to accept the potential consequences, but I withdraw my support from any law enforcement agency that (1) conducts illegal searches and seizures; (2) harasses citizens based on race or poverty, not actual crimes committed; (3) engages in illegal surveillance activities; (4) develops into a full-fledged military force that is not answerable to pretty much anyone until after it has decided to curtail the rights of other people and possibly commit violence.
No. THAT police force does not have my support. It has the physical force to coerce my obedience in certain situations, but it does has lost the moral grounds for employing that force.
@SN “So the argument runs that if the public doesn’t appropriately “respect” police, that relieves the police from a portion of their part of the social contract (being identified and held accountable for their use of force).”
No. Sorry. Still not right. Maybe I left out the word “by” and should have used the word “such” instead of “their” in my original post. But it seems like you are reading my original post in the most stupid possible manner and then attacking that as a straw dog.
Here. I put them in caps below and repost.
“The relevant social contract is that the police serve the community with integrity and that the public respects their efforts BY providing both safety and compensation.
When the public withdraws SUCH respect (whether warranted or not), as has clearly happened here, I don’t have a real problem with “real” badges coming off. In this day and age, it would be easy to create a list of home addresses from just a few photos.”
I am arguing for basic police safety. I go on to argue that there still should be unique identity badges… but not necessarily tied to names.
In no place did I suggest that police not be held accountable, or not be identifiable. In no place did I suggest that the police could simply waive their part of the social contract. But when the public does put the police at risk, they do have the basic right to protect themselves. And not putting their names on their costumes is a legitimate part of that.
SN
I’d rather have tobacco leaking out of my male breast implants than trudge through more loose association jabber penned by you. Reading comprehension isn’t the problem here – its shit writing.
Done here.
Amy Davidson writing in the New Yorker in response to the WaPo editorial written by a cop who basically has LE’s point here (that the way to be safe in police presence is to respect them), makes this point:
Respecting state power just because that’s the safest thing to do isn’t part of the social contract. If the public is actively assaulting them, the police do have the right to defend themselves (there’s protocols for escalation of force). But for people who are allowed to use force in the name of the state shouldn’t be allowed to do that anonymously. Any accountability for those who might misuse that grant of force goes right away, simply because you can’t ID the person misusing that power.
@cassandra “WaPo editorial written by a cop who basically has LE’s point here (that the way to be safe in police presence is to respect them),”
For the 3rd time… That wasn’t the point I was trying to make.
@cassandra “Any accountability for those who might misuse that grant of force goes right away, simply because you can’t ID the person misusing that power.”
Let’s put this in historical perspective. Famous Race Riots:
Detroit 1967 – 43 dead
Baltimore 1968 – 6 dead
Washington DC 1968 – 12 dead
Miami 1980 – 15 dead
Los Angeles 1992 – 53 dead
Ferguson 2014 – 0 dead
It seems to me that they’re using some sort of restraint in Ferguson, and that accountability isn’t totally lacking.
The individual who writes the following sentence then complains about a published author’s “shit” writing…
“I’d rather have tobacco leaking out of my male breast implants than trudge through more loose association jabber penned by you.”
The audacity and comedy of that makes me glad I got out of bed this morning.
@LE — I have no idea what those numbers are supposed to reflect. The dead in the Detroit riots included rioters and police. In LA, the dead included those shot by officials and also those shot by rioters. A number of those incidents also include not just National Guard deployments but also Federal troops. In Ferguson, no one outside of Michael Brown might be dead, but the injuries caused by the rubber bullets (so yes, they are shooting!) and the tear gas (a chemical weapon banned in war zones) are huge. People are being hurt in Ferguson, but not by traditional bullets. You can make the case that the restraint is on the part of the people of Ferguson — who have been made to live in a war zone even though most of violent actors come from outside of Ferguson.
You can also argue that in Ferguson, there is a fair amount of accountability being provided by the people out taking pictures of officials behaving badly.