à chacun son goût

jeffmiller:

Cops beating a man who is in diabetic shock.  More here.

Somehow, we’ve bought into a principle that, in situations like this, the safety of the officer is the most important thing.  That’s pretty much the exact opposite of what you want in your officers.  Their job is to protect the public first, not themselves.  That’s what makes it a hard job.  That’s also what makes it a job.  Because if you were setting up a civil society, you probably wouldn’t select a group of men, give them all kinds of arms, and then tell them that their job, above all else, it to protect themselves.  

Here’s what I want in a police officer.  I want him to approach a driver like this with an open mind.  I want the officer to hold out for the possibility that he might just be an innocent man having a problem.  The job of the police is to help people in need.  If you strip that from his job, then he’s just playing a video game, racking up points.