The past year has seen a series of high-profile cases in which police have been accused of using unnecessary and even lethal force, especially against black suspects.
Not all of these incidents have proven to be what they first appeared, as the apparently justifiable shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson demonstrates. But some of the cases seem very clear-cut. Americans of all races and political stripes reacted with outrage at the videotaped choke-hold that led to the death of Eric Garner in Staten Island. And there is almost no racial divide in public opinion regarding the outrageous videotaped police shooting of the unarmed, fleeing Walter Scott in South Carolina.
Still, there are some conservatives who would prefer to minimize this problem. They have acquired an unfortunate habit of responding to stories of police brutality against black Americans with an irrelevant question: “What about black-on-black crime?” After all, they argue, crimes committed against black Americans by other blacks are far more common than police shootings or other excessive uses of police force. Why so much concern about these cases when they arise?
It is not enough to point out that this oft-cited comparison is bunk — a digression and not a true argument at all. It is worse than that. For one thing, it assumes that African-Americans labor under some kind of collective responsibility or collective guilt — a concept conservatives reject in every other instance and should not be accepting here as a special case.
But more importantly, this line of thinking evinces a failure to understand a key role that government is expected to play in the lives of its citizens. Law enforcement is powerful, and every American — regardless of background — has a right to expect fair treatment from law enforcement.
Police officers play a vital role in American society. They are entrusted with special power and given great deference as the guarantors of civil order under the nation’s laws and in its courts. Their bond with citizens is something sacred. At their best, they are the guardians of the republic.
But much is expected from those to whom so much respect and trust are given. Thus, the great respect that Americans have for law enforcement is precisely what makes a corrupt, brutal, or otherwise lawless police officer a worse criminal than any other kind. The worst crime, after all, is the corruption of that which society holds in highest regard.
Lawbreaking officers, in addition to the people they physically harm, harm society’s trust in the vast majority of their police colleagues who want to do the right thing. The very ability of the police to improve society and fulfill their mission erodes every time the public trust placed in them is betrayed by one of their own.
This is why these police shooting incidents really do matter, for liberals and conservatives alike. And it’s why everyone does well to follow them, to hold police to a high standard, and to judge such occurrences based on the facts of each individual case.
