Tacoma Police Department announcement.
Chief Moore answers the question, “what is your vision of anti-racist policing?”
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Chief Moore,
You could also add to your comments the following thoughts or concepts:
(1) Good, proper, lawful policing is based on behavior, not race, gender, religion, or any other consideration. If a citizen behaves and obeys the law, they will generally not have contact with police. For any citizen who misbehave or breaks the law, the cops are in their life. That makes sense and is as it should be.
(2) As a retired police officer in Pierce County I remember too many times to count where I would make a citizen contact and the subject would tell me, “You are just hastling me because I am ____________________ (fill in the blank.) I would tell them things like, I did not know you were _____________________ (fill in the blank). I could not see you through your illegally dark tinted car windows. Do you want to talk about your illegal windows or would you prefer we only deal with why I really made contact with you?” “I stopped you because you were driving at 60 mph in a 20 mph school zone.”
While I admit there are bad cops in our country who do focus their police powers and actions on individuals because they are ___________________ (fill in the blank). Most cops do not perform racist policing. They perform bad behavior policing.
The real sad issue is numerous citizens falsely believe all cops are racist when they are not. These citizens not only accuse cops of being racist, they believe their own false premise. They and their children grow up hating the police because the actions of an occasional rogue cop triggers a false belief..
Believing cops are racist, when they are not hurts the citizen and society more than the cop falsely accused of being a racist.
I am not saying racist policing never happens. It does happen, but not as often as some citizens believe.
I have had real life experience of being thretened with racist policing like I was a black maile. This incident occured during a Harley Davidson motorcycle ride while dining north of Clarksdale, Mississippi in the deep South.. I am white. My friend and riding partner is black.
While we were minding our own business and behaving ourselves during our effort to have breakfast in a local diner, a white cop treated us in what definitely felt like a racist or predjudicial manner.
The cop either hated blacks, motorcycle riders, or the fact that a white man was riding and dining with a black man. I was fearful the cop might follow us out of town to his favorite “beat down” spot and there would be trouble of the worst kind.
I am happy to say we were able to ride into the sunset without any further issue, We were left with the distinct impression that we were not welcome in this cop’s town. Some cops are racist, but not all cops. In fact most cops are not racist.
Cheif Moore, thank you for your focus on providing non-racist policing. The world is a better place because of you and people like you.
Joseph Boyle – Retired Police Officer 25 years.
Thank you Joseph Boyle I completely agree with your comments and wish more citizens had this same outlook. So many issues could be avoided if more citizens just had some plain ‘common sense’ when they are contacted by police officers. I don’t know a single officer that goes to work in the morning wanting to get into a struggle with someone he or she makes contact with. I don’t know a single officer who WANTS to put his hands on someone or use his or her weapon. Every officer I know just wants to do a decent job serving his or her community and then come home safe to his or her family and make it to retirement like you somehow did. Thank you for your 25 years of service.