Sunday, Aug. 29, 2004
A piece of my mind as a cops kid
I'm not a big fan of the news.
A lot of this comes from being scared to hear about crime in the city and county.
In 20 years I've seen news reports on the deaths of at least 6 men I knew through my father and his job and in High School I leanred beofre going to work on Saturday that two of my classmates, one I knew fairly well, had been killed in a firey crash over the weekend.
I see cases my dad's working on and how they blame the law enforcement officers when things go wrong.
Tonight they had stories on my classmates' families and a case my father worked while I was a Sophomore.
I've never really known why it upset me as much as it did when I found out James had be killed. I only knew him in passing.
I suppose it was just the shock of how quickly it happened and that kids getting ready to graduate from high school are not supposed to die, if anything they're supposed to be start new lives with big futures.
I know live by the cemetary they were both buried at and i think about them when I drive by.
Now they're parents are trying to sure the bar that served the man who hit them beer.
I have mixed emotions on this, I can understand feeling that bars and such should pay attention to customers and do what they can not to let people drive home drunk, but at the same time this was an adult man who chose to get drunk and then got behind the wheel.
It's like going after a meat plant because a resturamt served you uncooked meat.
Doesn't completely ad up.
In the other story a teacher my dad headed a case on is trying to get his 14 year conviction over turned.
Fingers of course are being pointed towards the investigating officers and people involved in the case.
This case had a huge impact on our family.
Not just because it was a teacher from a well known school, or the girl was a little younger than me, but really because our family was threatened.
People would walk up to my dad in public and tell him what a worthless piece of shit he was for "going after" this "saint" of a teacher.
I was in Wal-Greens with him trying to find cold medicine because I was near death with the flu and a woman walked up to us with her kids and proceeded to go off on my dad.
A week or so later I was pulled out of school, he wouldn't tell me why I just needed to go home and stay inside.
I still don't know the full story but I have clues telling me someone was threatening to hurt me.
I found out in a harsh way at about 7 that there are people who want to kill officers simply because they're cops.
My father was trying to help a girl who was raped by her teacher and people went after him.
This si why I have issues with people. No not all people are this way, but there are a lot who are and you don't always know who they are.
In high school I was one of the kids you stayed away from.
Not because I smelled or ate boogers, not because I was trash or hanging around me gave you a reputation, but because I was "the cops kid".
It was assumed that if I heard anything about the pot smoked over the weekend or anything else remotely incriminating (which lets face it, in high school there can be all kinds of that) I would go run and squeal to my dad.
I only went to my dad once and that was an extreme case where I knew a giel was being abused at home and wouldn't ask for help on her own.
Problem was I also didn't do anything incriminating, I didn't do drugs of any kind, didn't go to parties on the weekend, I didn't do a lot of things other kids did because I didn't want to.
My curfew was 11, so by the time I'd get somewhere I'd have to turn around and go home, I also knew that should any trouble occur I ran the risk of knowing the reporting officers or at least having them know me and I would almost have my father's wrath come down on me and really I think I'd be better off in a men's high security prison than I would my dad's house when he was mad at me.
Point.... I do have a point here...I steered from it a bit, sorry...
Back to my family and the threats...
My point is that people don't seem to care about the cops they point their fingers at.
Bring up cops in a public place and prolly about 5 out of 11 people will tell you what assholes they are because they give tickets or how they don't know what the hell they're doing and think they're all powerful because of the uniform...
If you're one of those people I would like to ask you to do something for a second...
Picture walking up to a house where a man is beating the hell out of his wife and kids, you don't know if he has a gun or a knife, or another type of weapon... would you go in? Would you just stand there and hope it turns out ok? Or would you look for someone else to help?
'Cops' go in without thinking twice about it.
A cop would do what ever he/she could to save your life or protect you whether you like them or not.
And whole their out there doing all this, their familes at home worried.
Worried about getting a phone call or a visit from another officer, worried about watching the news.
My dad's not on patrole anymore, thank God, but he does still go into situations everyday where he could get hurt. I still have a fear in my back of my mind of getting a phone call from Kim or liastening ot the news and hearing somethings happened.
I have nightmares about it sometimes.
I'm not saying cops or superheros or supreme beings.
They're everyday people.... they're people like you and me who chose a job that everyone needs.
So the next time you find yourself hating a 'cop' because he's just some stupid cop, maybe stop and remember that stupid cop could be someones daddy or mommy, someone's husband or wife, someone's child, just like you are.
If anything they deserve respect for the choice they made.
We'll pause for the men and women of the military who fight wars we may or may not agree with across the world but we ignore and at times disrespect the men and women trying to help keep our homeland safe from people who live in it legally.
Doesn't make a lot of sense does it?
harlemrain at 10:06 pm