Sociopaths And Psychopaths: We Need To Screen Cops Nationwide - NOW.
Yes, there are psychologically healthy cops out there; but they appear to be badly outnumbered by the mentally ill ones who currently control and continue to corrupt the culture.
The Justice Department should consider nationwide mental health screening for anyone with a badge - and start weening out the ones who pose a danger - both actively and potentially - to the public.
Get them the help they need, sure. But take the guns and the awesome power granted to police away from them - the ruined lives, the growing number of citizens murdered by police, and the broken familes left in their wake, should be more than sufficient motivation to act on this problem in a way that maintains respect for police authority in general.
Think about it: Without effective psychological screening, we are putting a license to kill and unmatched power into the hands of dangerously mentally ill individuals who, because they are sick, actually WANT to kill people, actually WANT to physically beat, maim, and injure people, and who regard the power entrusted to them as inherently their own (not the State's), to use for self-aggrandizement, for their personal thrills, for their own amusement, for their personal enjoyment.
This is akin to putting pedophiles into grade schools; something we would NEVER knowingly do. Yet, we do the same sort of thing with our police forces across this country every day, giving catastrophically sick individuals the tools they need to feed their twisted appetites, setting them loose upon a citizenry which depends upon police for protection and security.
So let's psychologically test them all, dammit, and give the jobs currently held by the sick ones to healthy folks who will do the job we NEED them to do.
So many lives are at stake...and things are only getting worse and more dangerous for the citizens (you and me and our families and neghbors and friends!) which this multitude of sick cops are freely and joyously preying upon daily, all across this country...
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However, one can approximate the numbers by simply looking at the veritable avalanche of incidents of police brutality, authoritarian behaviors, and killings/murders committed by police - the number of incidents is steadily rising.
Try doing a DU search for "police" and see how many threads come up - I did - and there are way too many of them. And after looking through page after page of stories documenting attrocities, I found only one single story about a cop acting in a socially responsible way. Take it to a larger arena on Google and see what you get - the disparity is quite telling.
Sociopathology does not always manifest as active abuse; often it is passive, such as allowing abuses and criminal acts committed by cops to go unreported by other cops. This sort of tacit approval is dangerous, and more, it is by definition sociopathic.
-- Think about why cops "hate" internal affairs. You might also consider how many TV shows and movies glorify police violence and law bending/breaking by cops, and what this says about the police culture in our country.
-- Or just think about the cop who pepper sprayed the UC Berkely protesters who were passively sitting on the ground - it sure looks to me like he sprayed them just for the fun of it; and he was obviously quite confident his power as a police officer rightfully allowed him to commit this random and senseless violence against individuals utterly helpless to stop him from doing so.
-- Or think about how the UC Berkely and local city/county/State cops gathered around him and supported his version of the incident (he justified his actions with a big fat fucking lie, saying he believed he was in imminent danger from the protesters he sprayed), until video of the event overwhelmingly demonstrated otherwise.
-- Or think about how unreasonably angry and violent cops become when they find they are being videoed by anyone - a good example of this is a story I saw a few weeks ago here on DU about a woman who was arrested - on her own property! - for videoing a cop abusing a citizen on the street in front of her home...and this AFTER the Supreme Court found it was in the public interest to video cops performing their duties.
-- Or think about the recent case in NYC, where cops protestd en masse over the trial of cops found guilty of ticket fixing, and how these copswere pissed that they couldn't freely break the law to suit their egos.
-- Or visit the Big City Cops page on Facebook - consider their slogan "Let them hate, so long as they fear," and what this says about their mental state. There are more than a few cops who frequent, like, and regulrily comment on the page - it is not jut a few "rogue" cops - they are truly legion.
I could go on and on and on; examples of dangerous mental illness manifesting through the behavior of our police are everywhere, and seem endless.
And given such, it is my impression (which I did qualify in my post's opening sentence with the word "appears"
that mental illness is running wild in our police forces, overwhelming the few healthy cops who took the job because they wanted to SERVE the public, not merely use them as playthings and aggression targets and live prey.
Were there more healthy cops than sick ones, I do not believe my proposal and the observations which prompted it would exist.
Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that mentally ill cops must far outnumber healthy ones, else the culture, and the public's relationship with it's police forces, would be vastly different than what we are currently experiencing.
So I must answer you no - my assertion concernng the number of mentally ill police I suspect exist, is not hyperbole; rather, it is careful conjecture, based upon observation, since there are, to my personal knowledge, no such numbers on this matter from which to pull.
Conjecture is not unreasonable - and it is not as if there are no examples (to the contrary, there are, in fact, shitloads of them) to back up my conclusions on this matter...
Have a heart, for pete's sake.
INNOCENT PEOPLE ARE BEING FUCKING KILLED BY THE VERY INDIVIDUALS CHARGED WITH PROTECTING THEM.
INNOCENT PEOPLE ARE BEING BRUTALIZED, BEATEN, AND MAIMED BOTH PHYSICALLY AND PYCHOLOGICALLY BY THE VERY INDIVIDUALS CHARGED WITH PROTECTING THEM.
And anecdotal observation is not always trivial - I am surprised you do not acknowledge this.
Facts, are facts. As epistomology states, a fact does not require proof; it is self-evident.
And it is a FACT that cops all across the country are abusing their authority as police officers, rather than discharging their authority in the legal, ethical, and moral ways Americans are conditioned to expect. And please, don't lecture me about all the good cops do.
I have, and will again affirm, I know cops do good things every day. In fact, I saw a State cop helping a disabled guy change a flat tire on the Interstate earlier today. Cops are paid to do good things, after all; isn't this their primary function - to do good?
Do you not understand how appearance and image maintenance are part of the sociopath's and psychopath's behavioral camoflage, and how "normal" behavior is one of the principle means a sociopath or a psychopath uses to seem healthy? I ask, for it appears your inclusion of this particular assertion is missing entirely from your rebuttals. Do you understand at all how a sociopath or a psychopath operates in society at large?
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Tell you what - since you apparently do not care for MY anecdotal observations and personal experience and the conclusions these lead me to draw, please use your expertise at data sampling, as a service to the DU community, and find all the reports you can OF COPS EN MASSE CONDEMNING ANY AND/OR ALL INCIDENTS OF COPS KILLING UNARMED INNOCENT CIVILIANS, COPS BRUTALIZING UNARMED CIVILIANS, COPS COVERING UP CRIMES OR UNCONSTITUTIONAL ACTS OR ABUSES OR EXCESSES.
Because if I am correct, you'll find plenty of police department condemnation of partcularly high profile incidents - which could be sincere, but are more likely face-saving/political/public relations/ass-covering press releases, rather than heartfelt expressions coupled with determined accountability and strategies to modify the culture which makes these incidents possible and prevelent.
And if I am correct, what you will NOT find is individual cops, or groups of cops, or police brotherhoods or unions or associations, condemning the culture which allows these acts.
Do you know why you won't find this anywhere out there? BECAUSE THEY ARE A GROUP LARGELY CONSISTING OF, AND DOMINATED BY, SOCIOPATHS.
If this were not so, don't you think cops everywhere would be mortified by these increasingly common events? Don't you think they would speak out against cops who do these terrible things, against cops who cover these monstrous things up?
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You know, airline pilots could start "accidentally" driving their planes into airport terminals, if they wanted to - scare, injure, or even kill people, do tons of damage to equipment and facilities, cover these incidents for each other ("yeah, I was flying that plane last week, I thought the brakes felt funny, so don't blame Charlie, its not his fault" - but they don't.
Do you know why? BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT A GROUP LARGELY CONSISTING OF, AND DOMINATED BY, SOCIOPATHS.
So please - find the data that will prove me wrong, so I can comfortably forget about all of ths horror, and go to bed...
