Capitalist Killer
17th July 2003, 14:44
The Social Role of the Police (http://www.sawu.org/redstar2000/theory.php?subaction=showfull&id=1054049721&archive=1054467213&cnshow=headlines&start_from=&ucat=&)
It bothers me when people say "there are good cops." I don't understand what they mean by "good".
When we had a cop trolling our board a few months ago, I suggested a possible definition of a "good cop"...essentially one who had the eyes of an eagle when it came to tracking down murderers, rapists, etc. but who was blind as a bat when it came to persecuting hookers, junkies, drug dealers, the homeless, demonstrators, etc.
Naturally, I got the predictable response: "we don't make the law, we just enforce it."
Now consider what that really implies: if a cop is ordered to track down a murder, he does it. If he's ordered to beat the shit out of demonstrators, he does it. If he's ordered to round up the Jews for "special treatment" (execution), he DOES IT!
He's a professional who "carries out his orders" no matter what.
I suggest that such an "individual" is beyond good or evil; he has voluntarily surrendered his humanity and become a machine. Machines are not "good" or "bad"; machines either "work" or "don't work." That's all.
No one disputes the tautology that our enemy is the capitalist class. But it is the enemy's machines that directly confront us...it is this thing that looks like a human but acts like a machine that will kill us if it is ordered to do so (and may do that anyway, like any other potentially deadly malfunctioning machine.)
Please do not suggest that I am "dehumanizing" cops. No one makes you take up a career in "law enforcement" (real name: professional killer). They have dehumanized themselves.
Perhaps it will sound "harsh" to many ears...but there's no ethical difference between killing a cop and burning a cop car. They're both tools of our class enemy.
When reading this I found your logic to be failing in several key areas.
By what you wrote above you are generalising a very large group of people. To say that they automatically become machines/tools of the state is an attack on your own arguments. I refer specifically to when you said and I quote: -
3. Sadistic brutality towards women, children, and anyone physically weaker or incapable of resistance.
4. Racism.
5. Official Homophobia.
6. Total contempt for all who are not police.
7. Rampant corruption.
These were some of the descriptions you gave as attributes necessary for police work.
However surely you see the contradiction in your posts. In one you say that police become blind machines of the state who only carry out orders and in another you talk of police corruption and foul play. So they become tools only following orders and rampant monsters breaking their own rules in another post. Which are we to believe? I find this piece of inconsistency to be rather confusing. Are the police either brutal criminals of a corrupt nature, or are they tools of the state blinded by propaganda and brain washing into perfect obedience?
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A second point I wish to raise with you is again on your description of the police. Your argument is that the police are all unpleasant people, however I personally know a police officer that joined because he believed that he could help people by protecting them from criminals who are out to mug them and sell drugs to their children etc. He feels that he is making a small difference to the lives of many in a positive way. Surely these are noble aims.
There are other points I wish to raise with you on this but we can come to them a little later.
I just wish you to clarify these points you have made a little more.
It bothers me when people say "there are good cops." I don't understand what they mean by "good".
When we had a cop trolling our board a few months ago, I suggested a possible definition of a "good cop"...essentially one who had the eyes of an eagle when it came to tracking down murderers, rapists, etc. but who was blind as a bat when it came to persecuting hookers, junkies, drug dealers, the homeless, demonstrators, etc.
Naturally, I got the predictable response: "we don't make the law, we just enforce it."
Now consider what that really implies: if a cop is ordered to track down a murder, he does it. If he's ordered to beat the shit out of demonstrators, he does it. If he's ordered to round up the Jews for "special treatment" (execution), he DOES IT!
He's a professional who "carries out his orders" no matter what.
I suggest that such an "individual" is beyond good or evil; he has voluntarily surrendered his humanity and become a machine. Machines are not "good" or "bad"; machines either "work" or "don't work." That's all.
No one disputes the tautology that our enemy is the capitalist class. But it is the enemy's machines that directly confront us...it is this thing that looks like a human but acts like a machine that will kill us if it is ordered to do so (and may do that anyway, like any other potentially deadly malfunctioning machine.)
Please do not suggest that I am "dehumanizing" cops. No one makes you take up a career in "law enforcement" (real name: professional killer). They have dehumanized themselves.
Perhaps it will sound "harsh" to many ears...but there's no ethical difference between killing a cop and burning a cop car. They're both tools of our class enemy.
When reading this I found your logic to be failing in several key areas.
By what you wrote above you are generalising a very large group of people. To say that they automatically become machines/tools of the state is an attack on your own arguments. I refer specifically to when you said and I quote: -
3. Sadistic brutality towards women, children, and anyone physically weaker or incapable of resistance.
4. Racism.
5. Official Homophobia.
6. Total contempt for all who are not police.
7. Rampant corruption.
These were some of the descriptions you gave as attributes necessary for police work.
However surely you see the contradiction in your posts. In one you say that police become blind machines of the state who only carry out orders and in another you talk of police corruption and foul play. So they become tools only following orders and rampant monsters breaking their own rules in another post. Which are we to believe? I find this piece of inconsistency to be rather confusing. Are the police either brutal criminals of a corrupt nature, or are they tools of the state blinded by propaganda and brain washing into perfect obedience?
---------------------------------------
A second point I wish to raise with you is again on your description of the police. Your argument is that the police are all unpleasant people, however I personally know a police officer that joined because he believed that he could help people by protecting them from criminals who are out to mug them and sell drugs to their children etc. He feels that he is making a small difference to the lives of many in a positive way. Surely these are noble aims.
There are other points I wish to raise with you on this but we can come to them a little later.
I just wish you to clarify these points you have made a little more.