My Brothers: Respect the Police & Each Other else You May Not Live to Share Your Side of the Story

The great Black singer known as Aretha Franklin sang about "R - E - S - P - E - C - T" and other than love this is one of the most essential missing ingredients for success in the Black community...

By the way, I used to have an Anti-Police sentiment or attitude (especially with White male officers) when I was younger and even prior to past two years… I could hear them say: “SO, HOW IS IT GOING? DO you know why I pulled you over… you were BLAH, BLAH, BLAH… LICENSE & REGISTRATION PLEASE”… at which point I wanted to say: “How the HECK do you think it’s going now that you have RUINED my day… LOL”

Anyhow, their ATTITUDE used to rub me the wrong way (as I imagine it does to a great percentage of young Black males as well)… perhaps it has to do with the police officer that pulled me over once and fabricated 5 tickets just to punish me for being disrespectful to him when I actually talking to my friend and did not realize that he could hear me… he proceeded to attack me and it wasn’t a nice experience to say the least…

But to be CANDID, I never did ONCE put MY ATTITUDE under the MICROSCOPE during those days, even though it wasn’t ideal at all (at least MOST of the times) when it came to the police… I just did not like the attitude that the police expressed towards people at large but primarily most minorities, and particularly Black males. YES, I realized that they were serving, and protecting while enforcing the law, but like many Black males, I also felt that often they were letting their testosterone take over to assert their male dominance over other alpha males who happened to be Black. I felt that it gave them an adrenaline rush and make them feel powerful, potent and superior, and like many other Black males, I hated the dynamics that such a potential adversarial and imbalanced relationship created.

HOWEVER, a couple of years ago or so I had an epiphany. I asked myself if my attitude had anything to do with the kind of responses I got from the police, and the answer was a resounding YES! (LOL)…

Because I resented the police so much, that resentment was apparent to them no matter how hard I tried to mask it. It was apparent in my facial gestures, choice of words and even tone, and the police reacted by doing what they are trained to do… SCRUTINIZE or ANTAGONIZE in order to find out if I am a LAW-ABIDING and RESPECTFUL CITIZEN because in their minds if a citizen cannot RESPECT THEM, then that person will not respect anyone else.

It is not an invalid argument. Whether one thinks of a police officer as “little people with a lot of power” or “strong people with lots of power”, the fact of the matter is that they are LEGALLY-EMPOWERED to keep us STOPPED, and if we choose to move, we can be accused of fleeing from them or even fighting with the, and it’s been known that some ethical law enforcement officers (LEO) have even FRAMED some drivers by planting drugs in their cars just because such drivers were deemed to be disrespectful to the police.

RULE#1: Respect the Police

RULE#2: If you feel like disrespecting the police, please see RULE#1 (LOL)

Arguing with a LEO is only going to delay things further and may even turn a normal procedural stop into a criminal occurrence which will cost you days of work, days in court and ample attorney’s feels to say the least; not to mention the frustration and increased anger and bitterness towards the police, which will set you up for even more trouble with them in the future.

WHY SHOULD YOU SHOW RESPECT TO THE POLICE or LEOs?

Think of them as a big brother or a parent. Essentially, they feel that after going through a rigorous training to protect and serve and particularly AGREEING to EXPOSE their lives day after day to CRIMINALS and SOCIETAL REJECTS, they deserve some level of respect. To be honest, THEY DO! (smile)

Imagine putting your life on the line to face criminals every night... imagine how traumatizing it can be to one’s family and how brave these men have to be just do to their jobs normally…

YOU SHOULD change your ATTITUDE towards the police because if one wants RESPECT, S/HE must first PROCURE IT… TRUST ME… the moment I started to show respect to LEOs, I stopped having to go to court to prove them wrong (even though I usually did successfully prove them wrong in court). It costed me time, anger, aggravation and most importantly MONEY.

Take my advice, take a deep breath and say the following:

“OFFICER did I do something wrong inadvertently, IF SO, I do apologize because that was NOT my INTENT, OFFICER!”

9 out of 10 times, the office will either let you go or run a routine check on your license to see if there are no pending warrants for your arrest. And if NOT, s/he will let you go either with a warning or with no warning or tickets at all.

HOWEVER – if you answer with an attitude with something along the lines of: “WHY DID YOU PULL ME OVER SIR?” Then the officer will gladly share that information with you, as you for your Driver’s license and registration and painstakingly have you wait and suffer in agony for the results of his investigative inquiry, which can be all standard operating procedure unless it is deemed to be UNREASONABLE in court.

KEEP THE RIGHT ATTITUDE

Many officers will even let you go to get your issues fixed (e.g., Driver’s license suspension, insurance cancellation etc.), but that’s ONLY if your attitude is RESPECTFUL and KIND…

The FRENCH has a saying that goes like “If you’re DEAD then you’re DEAD WRONG!”…

In other words, everything will be interpreted for you, and articulated for you (which is OK), but, by DEFAULT you’re denying yourself with an opportunity to keep your legacy intact and also you’re denying yourself of an opportunity to DUE PROCESS (i.e., your DAY in COURT), and to be honest that’s TOO BAD.

Trust me, if you PUSH any Office’s button in 2017, s/he will shoot you and you will probably die, particularly if you’re deemed to be disrespectful, impatient and even belligerent.

MY NEW ATTITUDE (OR PARADIGM SHIFT)

I show respect to LEOs every day. I say hello to them. I allow them to get in front of the line at the supermarket. I have even played music for officers while passing by, and something amazing happened to me. I started understanding LEOs more and the more I did, the more they understood me as well. The fact is, my only true bad experience with the police came about when MY ATTITUDE was at its worse towards them around 21 or 22 years of age (LOL).

Thus, I suggest that you visit a police department, talk to them, ask them what it’s like to be on the streets or why they are so apprehensive even though you’re not a criminal. MORE LIKELY THAN NOT the answer will be something along the following:

“WE JUST DON’T KNOW WHO IS GOING TO TRY TO SHOOT US, thus we need to use UNIVERSAL PRECAUTION to disarm potential perpetrators by any tools necessary. We are suspicious of EVERYONE, particularly those that look THUGGISH or fit a certain profile"

I don’t want you to die MY BROTHERS… I want you to live on to share how you believe you were wronged as only then will an officer feel compelled to apologize to you, your family and society at large. Otherwise, it's their words against those of the ones that love you... I must say one last thing. Many of us do have a problem with respecting authority figures… it can be seen as an INFERIORITY COMPLEX in which we feel that whoever challenges US must feel little of us or must be RACIST when it’s usually not the case.

Many of us came from single-family homes in which we became the MAN of the house with a highly level of FATHER ABSENTEEISM particularly among Black Americans, and thus became SUPER ALPHA MALES… many of us failed to be RESPECTFUL to our parents (as an authority figure) and since that’s all we know (particularly when challenged), we automatically revert to it when we are stressed and challenged. That was not the case with me, but I believe that I just had a bad experience with them and I heard that many of them were racist in the news and I watched them deal with many Blacks and Hispanics and saw that their attitude were different, but perhaps the attitude of the Whites towards them were different as well (LOL)... I never thought about that part that much because I have never been White before. But that is worthy of a research itself... HOW MUCH does Black attitude towards COPS vary from that of Whites (smile)... things that make one go hmmm...

We need to stop being REACTIVE and we need to start SHOWING MORE RESPECT to OFFICERS (even if its for their TITLES)... We need to show respect to anyone who is in a position of authority (e.g., the President of the US). If we SHOW RESPECT then 9 out of 10 times we’ll get respect back. NOW for the RACIST COP, who will push your BUTTON; please don’t give him a reason to book you. Accept the ticket, challenge it and await your day in court. TRUST ME, it may feel like the end of the World at that time, but I assure you after a few hours, LIFE will go on for you yet again. This, TOO, shall pass my Brother! (smile).

Cops know that “Black Lives and Other Lives Matter”, trust me… but some just don’t care about any lives to be honest… I have seen many White cops brutalize White women and men as well, but to be honest, they are more brutal with minorities, because many of them held hidden stereotypes that come out in moments of rage in which they become beastly like a predator is to a prey.

ANYHOW, as to the dirty COPS… get a GRIP DUDES, it is not THAT SERIOUS… YOU should respect us too OFFICERS… and I assure you that we WANT TO RESPECT YOU and your sacrifice in accepting to PROTECT & SERVE!

I must assert that, according to CNN, and a former law school colleague (Mr. Williams), the COP who had shot the unarmed Black man known as PHILANDO CASTILE was found NOT GUILTY today... It is outrageous, but it exemplifies the need for the TRILLION BlawMMMA Movement. We need to educate our BROTHERS to prevent getting shot in the hands of insensitive and racist cops and in the hands of other brothers with depraved hearts. More importantly, we need to help our Brothers get rid of the FRUSTRATION that they are feeling that induce them to lose control by helping put money in their pockets. That will help solve a lot of problems. We must unite and must work with each other despite our differing views based on religious, political and national origin factors... theses are DIVIDE-and-CONQUER grounds that prevent far too many of us from uniting to RISE UP together.

To the COPs - RESPECT & HONOR, but please stop killing our BROTHERS needlessly...

To my BROTHERS- Much Respect and Love... Keep Your Head Held Up High...

ONE LOVE!

Dr. Pete Lorins is the Chief Editor of LorinsPOST.com. This article was sponsored by LORINS.biz, a multi-industry consulting firm that provides the following types of services… Management of Law Firms, Medical Clinics, Businesses...Project Management, Sales, Marketing, & Leads Generation...Research & Engineering... It can be reached via www.LORINS.biz