Let’s Avoid Calling For Wyatt Earp
Joel B. Levine MD
A soldier is ordered into combat. The soldier has no choice under a command. Risk is the currency of the job.
A police officer enforces the law. Risk is meant to be minimal and confined to actively interfering with or pursuing a criminal act. Risk should not be associated with a traffic stop. It should be a tedious interaction and boringly routine. At best, as a cop, you suffer an indignant stare from the newly ticketed. As the ticketed, you feel chagrin or “why me?’. It ends there.
The New Mexico killing of an officer is the illustrative video to watch. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rH6bsr61vrw
The first time you are incredulous at its fatal outcome. The second time, after you know that what has happened, you want to warn the trooper. The third time, you are hoping the trooper is more protective and draws his gun before asking the driver to hand over the pistol on the front seat. The last time you watch it, you simply wonder what has happened to the society.
In the prominent cases of today, one man was restrained for actively resisting arrest. The second was attempting to flee. It is likely that Daunte Wright had seen the George Floyd video and maybe the cops had seen the New Mexico video as well. What each saw in the other has changed and few editorials look for remedy. They just take sides with each adding risk in their own way. .
If a cop has to redefine each encounter as potentially dangerous then the rules are now altered. Assuming the worst is a tectonic shift in the relation between law and society. A loss of trust is a breach of a social contract. An orderly society cannot be perceived as suppressive. A disorderly society cannot be find justifications for its’ own violent and anarchic acts. The worst qualities and the most pernicious advocates for each extreme rush to the spotlight.
A lawless society is one wherein the routine enforcement of the law becomes risked filled. In the Old West, lawless towns had to find and hire the “Wyatt Earp’s of the day. When no new Marshal could be located, a “Paladin “, as the old TV Show showed us, was found. Paladins are champions of a cause , useful for romantic fictions in medieval lore , but soldiers of misfortune empowered by mistrust. Order will always be restored but not predictably in the way we really want.
