Why are were so afraid of the cops?

[frazzled]

12. I never particularly "respected" cops or thought they were there mainly to help

I came of age during the Vietnam protest era, but even as a young adolescent had seen the police brutality of the civil rights era on the television and in Life magazine photos. I had no rosy picture of the happy Irish cop on the street corner who knew and nurtured the neighborhood kids and only chased the bad guys with their billy clubs.

As a young college student in New York City in the late 1960s I encountered the police on horseback with clubs and tear gas. I recall the training we received before marches to protect ourselves against police aggression. (Don't wear earrings was a particularly sobering one: the thought of getting a hoop earring ripped out of my ear was enough to make me cautious.) A few years later, I was harassed by a group of cops. The police were pretty universally called "pigs" in those days, a moniker I disagreed with but understood its import.

I knew that there were good cops and bad cops, and so I don't care to besmirch them all. But as an institution, I have never seen them as a "helpful, protective" force. Indeed, I can't think of a single incidence in which I, personally, was helped or protected by an officer. The institution of policing in this country needs a serious overhaul. It's been a long, long time since their main duty was to protect and defend. They have morphed from defenders to active aggressors in search of people to apprehend ... and worse.