Oh, please. (On the headline)
Since the moment when police officers turned their backs in protest on New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, we’ve seen the type of escalating activity in the city which would be more recognizable as the preview to a messy Latin American coup d’etat.
[No.]
The latest is a form of purposeful sabotage on the part of the NYPD, which is now actively shirking its duty to enforce the law. According to the New York Post, traffic tickets and summonses have plummeted by 94 percent, and overall arrests are down 66 percent for the week compared to the same period last year.
["Last year" and for many years before was the "broken windows" theory of policing: deliberately show no tolerance for the most petty of crimes, arrest everyone--for vandalism, littering, panhandling, protesting, drinking in public, trespass, selling single cigarettes. The theory is that those petty criminals are more likely to be the ones who go on to murder, rape and rob.
When I first read about "broken windows" years ago in the New Yorker I thought it was brilliant and, I think I am right in this, serious crime did drop in cities that practiced "broken windows" policing. I remember reading a police officer explaining how broken windows policing works: "You go up to a person for some petty offense, 'accidentally' bump into them, you feel a gun and you can arrest them for that," a more serious and dangerous crime.
The problem is, well, the problems, well, you can see: "bumping," more contact generally between police and people, which people? Black and minority people because it's in the poorer Black and minority neighborhoods that you're going to see more broken windows, more graffiti, public urination, drunkenness, pot smoking, etc., and thus the more likely you're going to have Black and minority people feel that they are being singled out, which is true, and where you're more likely to see a Black man accidentally killed by a police officer over an encounter for selling untaxed cigarettes.
The broken windows theory of policing also encourages the police to engage in their own petty illegality, like "accidentally bumping" up against a person, to engage in pretextual encounters, to make up the pretexts where none exist.
Broken windows policing is an example of "preventive" law enforcement and I have become increasingly wary of preventive anything, prevent defenses in tackle football, preventive medicine, preventive policing.
Broken windows policing is a preventive alternative to the approach tried by the police chief in Los Angeles many, many years ago, guy by the name of Parker. Parker's idea was to set up roadblocks on highways and search every single car without exception. That certainly got around the problem of selective, discriminatory law enforcement that you have in broken windows policing but, as you can imagine, the citizenry was irate and the roadblock searches couldn't get around the Constitution, the Supremes finding roadblock searches in violation thereof and that ended Parker's try at preventive policing.
If I am correct that broken windows policing has reduced crime then the American people have to make some choices: Do we want fewer broken windows in return for more dead, mostly Black people, in return for more arrests of (mostly Black and minority) people, in return for more police petty, occasionally more serious, illegality? Or do we want a lower "quality of life" (as broken windows policing in also called): more broken windows, more drunken bums in the streets, more aggressive panhandlers, more urine-smelling subways and more murder, robbery and rape in return for fewer arrests of, mostly Black and minority, people, less police illegality of whatever seriousness, less "bumping," less aggressive, violent policing, more dead, mostly Black, people. I don't mean this facetiously, that is a tough choice! But having once thought broken windows was brilliant, I, Benjamin Harris, now choose less broken windows policing.]
...
Supporters of the NYPD have pointed out throughout the back-turning that their officers feel upset at Mayor de Blasio and others, that they feel they are less safe because of the comments of politicians. This is one more example of one of the most irritating tendencies of unionized police forces today – a recurring demand that they receive the same attitude of respect for authority given to the United States military, without any of the responsibility and duty that comes with it. A poll last week found that a mere 15 percent of active duty service members approve of President Obama – understandable, considering his many policy decisions and a laundry list of questionable choices.
But is the American military turning their backs on the Commander in Chief? Showing contempt for him? Going AWOL with the endorsement of their superiors? Shirking their duty? Booing and jeering at him at a graduation ceremony? No. They, after all, are not unionized.
The real rise of frustration with police officers in America comes down to one thing: an enduring sense that the current law enforcement system is unfair. We have to abide by rules they do not. We are the civilians, as if they are not. When we go before a court, enduring bias assumes that police are responsible and honest, even if the evidence suggests otherwise. District attorneys have one method for grand juries with cops, and different methods for ones without cops. The problem is one of institutional disrespect for their own civic obligations. We have to obey the commands of officers, but they have no real desire to obey the commands of their own authorities, or the ultimate authority they serve – the people.
In retrospect, Mayor de Blasio should’ve responded to the backs turning by firing people immediately. The NYPD needed to be reminded that chain of command exists, and that they are not at the top of it. Instead, what New York City is experiencing now amounts to nothing less than open rebellion by the lone armed force under the worst kind of weakened junta, one led by a figure ideologically radical and personally weak, who has lost control of his bureaucracies and may soon be devoured by them.
Since the moment when police officers turned their backs in protest on New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, we’ve seen the type of escalating activity in the city which would be more recognizable as the preview to a messy Latin American coup d’etat.
[No.]
The latest is a form of purposeful sabotage on the part of the NYPD, which is now actively shirking its duty to enforce the law. According to the New York Post, traffic tickets and summonses have plummeted by 94 percent, and overall arrests are down 66 percent for the week compared to the same period last year.
["Last year" and for many years before was the "broken windows" theory of policing: deliberately show no tolerance for the most petty of crimes, arrest everyone--for vandalism, littering, panhandling, protesting, drinking in public, trespass, selling single cigarettes. The theory is that those petty criminals are more likely to be the ones who go on to murder, rape and rob.
When I first read about "broken windows" years ago in the New Yorker I thought it was brilliant and, I think I am right in this, serious crime did drop in cities that practiced "broken windows" policing. I remember reading a police officer explaining how broken windows policing works: "You go up to a person for some petty offense, 'accidentally' bump into them, you feel a gun and you can arrest them for that," a more serious and dangerous crime.
The problem is, well, the problems, well, you can see: "bumping," more contact generally between police and people, which people? Black and minority people because it's in the poorer Black and minority neighborhoods that you're going to see more broken windows, more graffiti, public urination, drunkenness, pot smoking, etc., and thus the more likely you're going to have Black and minority people feel that they are being singled out, which is true, and where you're more likely to see a Black man accidentally killed by a police officer over an encounter for selling untaxed cigarettes.
The broken windows theory of policing also encourages the police to engage in their own petty illegality, like "accidentally bumping" up against a person, to engage in pretextual encounters, to make up the pretexts where none exist.
Broken windows policing is an example of "preventive" law enforcement and I have become increasingly wary of preventive anything, prevent defenses in tackle football, preventive medicine, preventive policing.
Broken windows policing is a preventive alternative to the approach tried by the police chief in Los Angeles many, many years ago, guy by the name of Parker. Parker's idea was to set up roadblocks on highways and search every single car without exception. That certainly got around the problem of selective, discriminatory law enforcement that you have in broken windows policing but, as you can imagine, the citizenry was irate and the roadblock searches couldn't get around the Constitution, the Supremes finding roadblock searches in violation thereof and that ended Parker's try at preventive policing.
If I am correct that broken windows policing has reduced crime then the American people have to make some choices: Do we want fewer broken windows in return for more dead, mostly Black people, in return for more arrests of (mostly Black and minority) people, in return for more police petty, occasionally more serious, illegality? Or do we want a lower "quality of life" (as broken windows policing in also called): more broken windows, more drunken bums in the streets, more aggressive panhandlers, more urine-smelling subways and more murder, robbery and rape in return for fewer arrests of, mostly Black and minority, people, less police illegality of whatever seriousness, less "bumping," less aggressive, violent policing, more dead, mostly Black, people. I don't mean this facetiously, that is a tough choice! But having once thought broken windows was brilliant, I, Benjamin Harris, now choose less broken windows policing.]
...
Supporters of the NYPD have pointed out throughout the back-turning that their officers feel upset at Mayor de Blasio and others, that they feel they are less safe because of the comments of politicians. This is one more example of one of the most irritating tendencies of unionized police forces today – a recurring demand that they receive the same attitude of respect for authority given to the United States military, without any of the responsibility and duty that comes with it. A poll last week found that a mere 15 percent of active duty service members approve of President Obama – understandable, considering his many policy decisions and a laundry list of questionable choices.
But is the American military turning their backs on the Commander in Chief? Showing contempt for him? Going AWOL with the endorsement of their superiors? Shirking their duty? Booing and jeering at him at a graduation ceremony? No. They, after all, are not unionized.
The real rise of frustration with police officers in America comes down to one thing: an enduring sense that the current law enforcement system is unfair. We have to abide by rules they do not. We are the civilians, as if they are not. When we go before a court, enduring bias assumes that police are responsible and honest, even if the evidence suggests otherwise. District attorneys have one method for grand juries with cops, and different methods for ones without cops. The problem is one of institutional disrespect for their own civic obligations. We have to obey the commands of officers, but they have no real desire to obey the commands of their own authorities, or the ultimate authority they serve – the people.
In retrospect, Mayor de Blasio should’ve responded to the backs turning by firing people immediately. The NYPD needed to be reminded that chain of command exists, and that they are not at the top of it. Instead, what New York City is experiencing now amounts to nothing less than open rebellion by the lone armed force under the worst kind of weakened junta, one led by a figure ideologically radical and personally weak, who has lost control of his bureaucracies and may soon be devoured by them.
