textfiles/law/cops.txt

   >>>>>>     W H Y   C O P S   H A T E   Y O U     <<<<<<
   
           -if you have to ask get out of the way-



     Have you ever been stopped by a traffic cop and, while he was 
writing a ticket or giving you a warning, you got the feeling that 
he would just love to yank you out of the car,  right through  the 
window,  and smash your face into the front fender?  Have you ever 
had a noisy little spat with someone, and a cop cruising by calls, 
"Everything all right over there?" Did you  maybe  sense  that  he 
hoped that everything was not all right, that he wanted one of you 
to answer,  "No, officer, this idiot's bothering me"?  That all he 
was looking for was an excuse to launch himself from  the  cruiser 
and play a drum solo on your skull with his nightstick?  

     Did  you  ever  call the cops to report a crime-maybe someone 
stole something from your car or broke into your home-and the cops 
act as if it were your fault?  That  they  were  sorry  that  the 
crook  didn't  rip  you off for more?  That instead of looking for 
the culprit,  they'd rather give you  a  shot  in  the  chops  for 
bothering them with your bullshit in the first place?  

     If  you've  picked  up on this attitude from your local sworn 
protectors, it's not just paranoia.  They actually don't like you.  
In fact,  the cops don't just dislike you,  they hate your fucking 
guts!  Incidentally, for a number of very good reasons.  

     First  of  all,  civilians are so goddamn stupid.  They leave 
things lying around,  just begging thieves  to  steal  them.  They 
park  cars  in  high crime areas and leave portable-TVs,  cameras, 
wallets, purses, coats, luggage,  grocery bags,  and briefcases in 
plain view on the seat.  Oh,  sure,  maybe they'll remember to close 
all the windows and lock the doors, but do you know how easy it is 
to bust a car window?  How fast can it  be  done?  A  ten-year-old 
can  do  it  in less than six seconds!  And a poor cop has another 
Larceny From Auto on his hands.  Another crime to write  a  report 
on,  waste  another  half hour on.  Another crime to make him look 
bad.  

     Meanwhile,  the asshole who left the family heirlooms on  the 
backseat  in  the first place is raising hell about where were the 
cops when the car was being looted.  He's planning to write  irate 
letters to the mayor and the police commissioner complaining about 
what  a  lousy police force you have here;  the can't even keep my 
car from getting ripped  off!  What,  were  they  drinking  coffee 
somewhere?  

     And  the  cops  are  saying  to  themselves,  "Lemme tell ya, 
fuckhead, we were seven blocks away,  taking another stupid report 
from  another  jerkoff  civilian  about  his car being broken into 
because he left his shit on the backseat, too!" 

     These civilians can't figure out that  maybe  they  shouldn't 
leave stuff lying around unattended where anybody can just pick it 
up and boogie.  Maybe they should put the shit in the trunk, where 
no  one  but  Superman is gonna see it.  Maybe they should do that 
before they get to  wherever  they're  going  just  in  case  some 
riffraff  is  hanging  around watching them while the car is being 
secured.  

    Another thing that drives cops wild is the "surely this doesn't 
apply to me" syndrome, which never fails to reveal itself at scenes 
of sniper or  barricade  incidents.  There's  always  some  asshole 
walking  down  the  street  (or  jogging or driving) who thinks the 
police cars blocking off the area, the ropes marked Police Line: Do 
Not Cross,  the cops crouched behind cars  pointing  revolvers  and 
carbines  and  shotguns and bazookas at some building,  all of this 
has nothing whatsoever to do with him - so he  weasels  around  the 
barricades  or  slithers  under  the restraining ropes and blithely 
continues on his way, right into the field of fire.  

     The result is that some cop risks his ass  (or  hers  -  don't 
forget, the cops include women now) to go after the cretin and drag 
him,  usually  under  protest,  back to safety.  All of these cops, 
including the one risking his ass,  devoutly hope that  the  sniper 
will  get off one miraculous shot and drill the idiot right between 
the horns, which would have two immediate effects:  The quiche-for-
brains  civilian  would be dispatched to the next world,  and every 
cop on the scene would instantaneously be licensed to kill the scum 
bag doing the sniping.  Whereupon the cops would destroy the  whole 
fucking  building,  sniper and all,  in about 30 seconds,  which is 
what they wanted to  do  in  the  first  place,  except  the  brass 
wouldn't  let  them because the mother-fucker hadn't killed anybody 
yet.  

     An allied phenomenon is the "my,  isn't this amusing" behavior 
exhibited,  usually  by Yuppies or other members of higher society, 
at some emergency scenes.  For example,  a group  of  trendy  types 
will  be  strolling  down  the  street when a squad car with lights 
flashing and siren on screeches up to  a  building.  They'll  watch 
the  cops  yank  out  their  guns  and run up to the door,  flatten 
themselves against the wall,  and peep into the  place  cautiously.  
Now,  if  you think about it,  something serious could be happening 
here.  Cops usually don't pull their revolvers to go get a  cup  of 
coffee.  They  usually don't hug the sides of buildings just before 
dropping in to say hello.  Any five-year-old ghetto  kid  can  tell 
you  these  cops  are definitely ready to cap somebody.  But do our 
society friends perceive this?  Do they stay out of the cops'  way?  
Of  course  not!  They think it's vastly amusing.  And,  of course, 
since they're not involved in the funny little game  the  cops  are 
playing, they think nothing can happen to them!  

     While  the  ghetto  kid is hiding behind a car waiting for the 
shooting to start,  Muffy and Chip and Biffy are  continuing  their 
stroll,  right up to the officers, tittering among themselves about 
how silly the cops look, all scrunched up against the wall,  trying 
to  look  in  through  the door without stopping bullets with their 
foreheads.  

     What the cops are hoping at that  point  is  for  a  homicidal 
holdup  man  to come busting out the door with a sawed-off shotgun.  
They're hoping he has it loaded with elephant  shot,  and  that  he 
immediately  identifies  our  socialites  as serious threats to his 
personal well-being.  They're hoping he has just enough  ammunition 
to blast the shit out of the gigglers, but not enough to return the 
fire when the cops open up on him..  

     Of course,  if that actually happens, the poor cops will be in 
a world of trouble for not protecting  the  "innocent  bystanders." 
The  brass  wouldn't  even want to hear that the shitheads probably 
didn't have enough sense to come in out of an acid  rain.  Somebody 
ought  to  tell  all the quiche eaters out there to stand back when 
they encounter someone with a gun in his hand,  whether he  happens 
to be wearing a badge or ski mask.  

     Civilians  also aggravate cops in a number of other ways.  One 
of their favorite games is "Officer,  can you tell me?" A cop knows 
he's  been  selected  to play this game whenever someone approaches 
and utters those magic words.  Now,  it's  okay  if  they  continue 
with,  "...how to get to so-and-so street?" or, "...where such-and-
such a place is located?"  After  all,  cops  are  supposed  to  be 
familiar  with  the  area  in which they work.  But it eats out the 
lining of their stomachs when some jerkoff asks, "where can I catch 
the number fifty-four bus?" Or, "Where can I find a telephone?" 

     Cops look forward to their last day  before  retirement,  when 
they  can  finally  give  these douche bags the answer they've been 
choking back for 20 years:  "No maggot,  I can't tell ya where  the 
fifty-four bus runs!  What does this look like, an MTA uniform?  Go 
ask a fucking bus driver!  And no,  dog breath,  I don't know where 
you can find a phone,  except wherever your  fucking  eyes  see 
one!  Take your head out of your ass and look for one!" 

     And  cops  just  love  to  find  a  guy  parking  his car in a 
crosswalk next to a fire hydrant at a bus stop posted with  a  sign 
saying,  "Don't  Even  Think About Stopping,  Standing,  or Parking 
Here.  Cars Towed Away,  Forfeited to the Government,  and Sold  at 
Public Auction," and the jerk asks, "Officer, may I park here for a 
minute?" 

     "What,  are ya nuts?  Of course you can park here!  As long as 
you like!  Leave it there all day!  Ya don't see anything that says 
ya can't,  do ya?  You're welcome.  See ya  later."  The  cop  then 
drives  around  the  corner  and  calls  a  tow truck to remove the 
vehicle.  Later, in traffic court, the idiot will be whining to the 
judge,  "But Your Honor,  I asked an officer if I could park there, 
and  he  said I could!  No,  I don't know which officer,  but I did 
ask!  Honest!  No, wait Judge, I can't afford five hundred dollars!  
This isn't fair!  I am not creating  a  disturbance!  I've  got  my 
rights!  Get  your hands off me!  Where are you taking me?  What do 
you mean,  ten days for contempt of court?  What did  I  do?  Wait, 
wait....."  If  you  should happen to see a cop humming contentedly 
and smiling to himself for no apparent reason,  he may have won  at 
this game.  

     Wildly  unrealistic civilian expectations also contribute to a 
cop's distaste  for  the  general  citizenry.  An  officer  can  be 
running  his  ass off all day or night handling call after call and 
writing volumes of  police  reports,  but  everybody  thinks  their 
problem  is  the  only  thing he has to work on.  The policeman may 
have a few worries,  too.  Ever think of that?  The sergeant is  on 
him  because  he's  been  late for roll call a few days;  he's been 
battling like a badger with his wife, who's just about to leave him 
because he never takes her anywhere and doesn't spend  enough  time 
at  home  and  the  kids  need braces and the station wagon needs a 
major engine overhaul and where are we gonna get the  money  to  pay 
for  all  that and we haven't had a real vacation for years and all 
you do is hang around with other cops and you've been drinking  too 
much  lately  and I could've married that wonderful guy I was going 
with when I met you and lived happily ever after and why don't  you 
get  a  regular  job  with regular days off and no night shifts and 
decent pay and a chance for advancement and no one throwing bottles 
or taking wild potshots at you?  

     Meanwhile,  that sweet young thing he met on a call last month 
says her period is late.  Internal Affairs is investigating him on 
fucking up a disorderly last week; the captain is pissed at him for 
tagging  a  councilman's  car;  a  burglar's  been  tearing  up the 
businesses on his post;  and he's already  handled  two  robberies, 
three  family  fights,  a  stolen  auto,  and a half dozen juvenile 
complaints today.  

     Now here he is on another juvenile call,  trying to explain to 
some  bimbo,  who's  the  president of her neighborhood improvement 
association,  that the security of  Western  Civilization  is  not 
really  threatened  all  that  much by the kids who hang around the 
corner by her house.  "Yes, officer,  I know they're not there now.  
They  always  leave  when  you come by.  But after you're gone they 
come right back,  don't you see,  and continue  their  disturbance.  
It's intolerable!  I'm so upset, I can barely sleep at night!" 

     By  now  the cop's eyes have glazed over.  "What we need here, 
officer," she continues vehemently,  "is greater attention to  this 
matter  by the police.  You and some other officers should hide and 
stake out that corner so those renegades  wouldn't  see  you.  Then 
you could catch them in the act!" 

     "Yes,  ma'am,  we'd  love to stake out that corner a few hours 
every night, since we don't have anything else to do,  but I've got 
a  better  idea," he'd like to say.  "Here's a box of fragmentation 
grenades the Department obtained from the Army just for  situations 
like  this.  The  next time you see those little fuckers out there, 
just lob a couple of these into the crowd and get down!" 

     Or he's got an artsy-crafty type who's  moved  into  a  tough, 
rundown  neighborhood  and  decides  it's gotta be cleaned up.  You 
know,  "urban pioneers." The cops see a lot of them now.  The  cops 
call  them  volunteer  victims.   Most  of  them  are  intelligent, 
talented,   hard  working,   well-paid   folds   with   masochistic 
chromosomes interspersed among their otherwise normal genes.  They 
have nice jobs,  live in nice homes, and have a lot of nice material 
possessions,  and they somehow decide  that  it  would  be  just  a 
marvelous  idea to move into a slum and get yoked,  roped,  looted, 
and pillaged on a regular basis.  What else do they  expect?  Peace 
and  harmony?  It's  like tossing a juicy little pig into a piranha 
tank.  

     moving day:  Here come the pioneers, dropping all their groovy 
gear from their Volvo station wagon,  setting it on the sidewalk so 
everyone on the block can get a good look  at  the  stereo  system, 
food processor,  the microwave,  the color TV,  the tape deck, etc.  
At the same time,  the local  burglars  are  appraising  the  goods 
unofficially  and calculating how much they can get for the TV down 
at the corner bar,  how much the stereo will bring at Joe's Garage, 
who might want the tape deck at the barbershop,  and maybe mama can 
use the microwave herself.  

     When the pioneers get ripped off,  the cops figure they  asked 
for  it,  and  they got it.  You want to poke your arms through the 
door of a tiger cage?  Don't be amazed when he eats it  for  lunch!  
The  cops  regard  it  as naive for trendies to move into the crime 
zones and conduct their lives the same way they did up  on  Society 
Hill.  In  fact,  they  can't  fathom why anyone who didn't have to 
would want to move there at all,  regardless of how  they  want  to 
live  or  how  prepared  they  might  be  to adapt their behavior.  
That's probably because the cops are intimately acquainted with all 
those petty but disturbing crimes and nasty little  incidents  that 
never make the newspapers but profoundly affect the quality of life 
in a particular area.  

     Something  else  that causes premature aging among cops is the 
"I don't know who to call, so I'll call the police" ploy.  Why, the 
cops ask themselves,  do they get so many  calls  for  things  like 
water leaks, sick cases, bats in houses, and the like.  Things that 
have   nothing  whatsoever  to  do  with  law  enforcement  or  the 
maintenance of public order?  They figure it's  because  civilians 
are getting more and more accustomed to having the government solve 
problems  for  them,  and  the local P.D.  is the only governmental 
agency that'll even answer the phone at 3:00a.m.,  let  alone  send 
anybody.  

     So,  when the call comes over the radio to go to such-and-such 
an address for a water leak,  the assigned officer rolls his  eyes, 
acknowledges,   responds,   surveys  the  problem,  and  tells  the 
complainant,  "Yep,  that's a water leak all right.  No doubt about 
it.  Ya  probably oughta call a plumber!  And it might not be a bad 
idea to turn off your main valve for a while." Or, "Yep,  your Aunt 
Minnie's  sick  all  right!  Ya  probably oughta get'er to a doctor 
tomorrow if she doesn't get any better by then." Or, "Yep, that's a 
bat all right!  Mebbe ya oughta open the  windows  so  it  can  fly 
outside again!" 

     In the meantime,  while  our  hero  is  waiting  time  on  this 
bullshit  call,  maybe  someone is having a real problem out there, 
like getting raped,  robbed,  or killed.  Street cops would like to 
work  the  phones  just  once  and  catch  a  few  of these idiotic 
complaints!  "A bat in your house?  No need to send an officer when 
I can tell ya what to do over the phone, pal!  Close all your doors 
and  windows  right  away.  Pour  gasoline all over your furniture.  
That's it.  Now,  set it on fire and get everybody  outside.  Yeah, 
you'll get the little motherfucker for sure!  That's okay,  call us 
any time." 

     Probably the  most  serious  beef  cops  have  with  civilians 
relates  to  those  situations  in  which  the use of force becomes 
necessary to deal with some desperado who may have  just  robbed  a 
bank,  iced  somebody,  beat up his wife and kids,  or wounded some 
cop,  and now he's caught but won't give up.  He's not going to  be 
taken alive,  he's going to take some cops with him, and you better 
say your prayers,  you pig  bastards!  Naturally,  if  the  chump's 
armed with any kind of weapon, the cops are going to shoot the shit 
out  of  him  so bad they'll be able to open up his body later as a 
lead mine.  If he's not armed,  and the cops aren't creative enough 
to  find a weapon for him,  they'll just beat him into raw meat and 
hope he spends the next few weeks in traction.  They view it  as  a 
learning  experience  for  the asshole.  You fuck up somebody,  you 
find out what it feels like  to  get  fucked  up.  Don't  like  it?  
Don't  do  it  again!  It's  called "street justice," and civilians 
approve of it as much as cops do, even if they don't admit it.  

     Remember how the audience cheered when Charles Bronson  fucked 
up  the  bad  guys in "Death Wish"?  How they scream with joy every 
time Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry makes his day by blowing up  some 
rotten  scumball  with  his  .44  Magnum?  What they applaud is the 
administration of street justice.  The old eye-for-an-eye  concept, 
one  of  mankind's  most  primal  instincts.  All  of  us  have it, 
especially cops.  

     It severely offends and deeply hurts cops when they administer 
a dose of good  old-fashioned  street  justice  only  to  have  some 
bleeding-heart  do-gooder happen upon the scene at the last minute, 
when the hairbag is at last getting his  just  deserts,  and  start 
hollering  police  brutality.  Cops  regard  that  as  very serious 
business indeed.  Brutality can get them fired.  Get fired from one 
police department,  and it's tough to get a job as a  cop  anywhere 
else ever again.  

     Brutality exposes a cop to civil liability as well.  Also, his 
superior  officers,  the police department as an agency,  and maybe 
even the local government itself.  You've seen  those  segments  on 
"60  Minutes",  right?  Some  cop  screws up,  gets sued along with 
everybody else in the department who ever had anything to  do  with 
him,  and the city or county ends up paying the plaintiff umpty-ump 
million dollars, raising taxes and hocking it's fire engines in the 
process.  What do you think happens to the cop who fucked up in the 
first place?  He's done for.  

     On may occasions when the cops are accused of excessive force, 
the apparent brutality is a  misperception  by  some  observer  who 
isn't  acquainted  with the realities of police work.  For example, 
do you have any idea how hard it is to handcuff someone who  really 
doesn't  want to be handcuffed?  Without hurting them?  It's almost 
impossible for one cop to accomplish by himself unless he beats the 
hell out of the prisoner first,  which  would  also  be  viewed  as 
brutality!  It  frequently takes three or four cops to handcuff one 
son of a bitch who's absolutely determined to battle them.  

     In situations like that,  it's not unusual to hear someone  in 
the  crowd  of  onlookers  comment on how they're ganging up on the 
poor bastard and beating him unnecessarily.  This makes  them  feel 
like telling the complainer,  "Hey motherfucker,  you think you can 
handcuff this shithead  by  yourself  without  killing  him  first?  
C'mere!  You're deputized!  Now go ahead and do it!" 

     The  problem is that,  in addition to being unfamiliar with how 
difficult it is in the real world  to  physically  control  someone 
without  beating his ass,  last minute observers usually don't have 
the opportunity to see for themselves,  like they do in the  movies 
and  on  TV,  what a fucking monster the suspect might be.  If they 
did,  they'd probably holler at the cops to beat his ass some more.  
They might actually even want to help!  

     The  best thing for civilians to do if they think they see the 
cops rough up somebody too much is to keep their mouths shut at the 
scene,  and to make inquiries of the police brass  later  on.  There 
might be ample justification for the degree of force used that just 
wasn't apparent at the time of the arrest.  If not,  the brass will 
be very interested in the complaint.  If one  of  their  cops  went 
over the deep end, they'll want to know about it.  

     Most of this comes down to common sense,  a characteristic the 
cops feel most civilians lack.  One of the elements of common sense 
is thinking before opening one's yap of taking other  action.  Just 
a  brief  moment  of  thought  will  often prevent the utterance of 
something stupid or commission of some idiotic act that will, among 
other things,  generate nothing  but  contempt  from  the  average 
street cop.  THINK-and it might mean getting a warning instead of a 
traffic  ticket.  Or  getting  sent  on  your  way rather than being 
arrested.  Or continuing on to your original destination instead of 
the hospital.  It might mean getting some real  assistance  instead 
of  the  runaround.  The  very  least it'll get you is a measure of 
respect cops seldom show civilians.  Act like  you've  got  just  a 
little  sense,  and even if the cops don't love you,  they at least 
won't hate you.