2006-07-26

Duke Cops, Rasists Or Just Bullies?

The local police officers involved in investigating the Duke rape case have gotten themselves into trouble now, with charges of racism. The allegation sounds very plausable based on my life experiances, and I believe every word of it (until proven otherwise):

Six off-duty cops (including the two lead investigators of the Duke rape hoax; five are white, one is black) gather at a sports bar and get smashed. A cook (he's black) goes out back on a break, just as the officers leave. One of the exiting cars (containing two of the honkey cops) peels out, and the cook hollers out playful encouragement ("You go! Yee Who!"). The asshole cops inside (both of course well past the legal drinking limit) hear this, and misinterpret it as an insult, flip around, drive over to the cook, and shout, "Fuck you, nigger!". The cook responds, "Fuck you, cracker!". The drunk-driving cracker cops jump out and challange the cook to a fight. The other four cops swarm in, and all gang up on the cook, who falls to the ground and protects himself from harm. The cops rush away, and as they do the cook asks the black cop, "What's up?", and the black cop says, "They're drunk. I just work with them."

My take: These cops would have done the same thing to a white cook, though they would have found a different ugly thing to say to him; black cops would have done the same thing, and probably used same words; had the cook been Chinese or Indian, black or white cops would have done the same thing, and both used the same racial slur associated with those groups. Cops have a much higher than average incidence of bully behavior, many of them act like street gang members, and the only thing good I can say about them is that most don't act this way, and on balance they are better than any other police force in human history (some current European forces perhaps perhaps act even better).

I think that this will figure into the phony rape case in that they will have some of the investigatory officers testifying that use of a racial slur does not neccessarily indicate racism.

4 comments:

Nadir said...

"Cops have a much higher than average incidence of bully behavior, many of them act like street gang members, and the only thing good I can say about them is that most don't act this way..."

I agree with this statement. The NC cops' racism is an underlying factor. The psychosis of most people who want to be cops leans toward more aggressive, bullying behavior.

If one of my three cousins who are cops reads this, yes, this means you too. It doesn't mean all cops are bad, but some of them lean toward these tendencies.

I agree with Paul somewhat on this one. The racism may have played a factor in the cops' decision to attack the cook (I don't think they would have been as likely to attack a white male cook), but the real cause of the assault was that they were a bunch of drunk redneck bullies who happen to be cops, and their target happened to be black. The same or worse may have resulted if the cook were a white woman.

The same would not have occured if the cops were black and the cook was white because of the racial dynamics of this white supremacist society, but black cops might have attacked and Asian or Latino cook.

Paul Hue said...

Seems like Nadir and I are about 90% concurrent on this. Where I disagree with him:

1. White cops are equally assholish to white citizens. They had a black guy in their group, which undermines any assumption that these cracker cops figure race into their assholish behavior. I wouldn't be surprised if a study of this (if one were possible) found that white cops are less horrible towards black citizens given that such this puts them at greater risk for being caught than if they bully a white citizen. For example, had the cook been white and the drunken, brutish cops acted the same way (as I would expect), there would be no media attention now (except perhaps because these cops are involved with the Duke case).

2. I would really like to see Nadir put on some white face and a cracker wig and go mouth-off to some drunken off-duty black cops. Actually, I wouldn't like to see it, because it would get real ugly. I would not be surprised if a study found that black cops are even worse than white cops, given that black-on-white cop beatings hold zero media interest. I don't assume that black cops would act any worse to whites than to blacks, but I certainly don't think that the black asshole cops have any special fear of bullying white citizens. I don't even know how Nadir can link up "white supremacy" in cities like Detroit, DC, Raliegh, etc., where a majority of the people and city officials are black. I got beat up by black cops at a Prince concert years ago, and that's not my only experiance with black cops acting like brutes.

Paul Hue said...

http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=triangle&id=4393350

More details from the victim. Looks like these asshole cops caused very little harm. I am certain that had cops witnessed non-cops behaving this way, though, the cops would have arrested the lot. I am glad to know that under this cercumstance that this asshole gang restrained itself from issuing a severe beatdown.

I hope that this matter moves on to include the issue of DWI: How about the records of how much these cops drank before they got into their cars? It appears that they were not only drunk, but actually driving dangerously. These same cops would *probably* have unneccessarily arrested Nadir's dad (or my dad) for DWI had a minor speeding stop led to the detection of alcohol breath. But I do admit that some cops do act like decent humans when they pull over a non-dangerous driving soul who turns out to have been drinking.

But these guys in this case were driving like lunatics during their drunkenness.

Paul Hue said...

What would be great here is if one of these cops now claims that the victim here raped him behind a dumpster. Then the accused cop would now become a victim: he could say that prior to the incident the cook raped him behind a dumpster, and that he was only speeding away and calling him racial names out of anger at the rape. Then the victim-cook would turn into an alleged rapist! And the suspect-cop would turn into a sympathetic victim of rape. And rape victims never lie!

Sure, the cook has witnesses that never saw him leave long enough to have raped anybody, and the cop was never out of sight long enough to have gotten raped. But the DA could just ignore that information, accuse the cook publically, mandate DNA tests, declare that the results would demonstrate culpability, then when they return negative, arrest the cook anyway.