Have you ever considered the other side?

Image by Diego Fabian Parra Pabon from Pixabay

I’ve seen a lot of posts from people asking who is tired of glorifying criminals and crucifying police officers and am wondering if these folks that feel this way have ever considered the other side?  Or, have they considered that perhaps the police officers are the ones who are the criminals? 

What has your experience been with police?  Have you been pulled over?  What was it like?  Now consider what it may be for others, especially people of color.  Not sure it’s different?  Look at all of the brutality coming to light after George Floyd’s death.  Now, I don’t want to hear: “But, he was a criminal and what about his past … “ because we all have a past and we shouldn’t be judged on who we are now or in the future based on mistakes we made in the past.  That aside, he was literally killed over an assumption that a $20 bill he used to pay at a convenience store was counterfeit.  The other person with him, a non-POC, was not treated the way he was or even arrested, yet he was also accused of paying with counterfeit money.  Let that sink in for a moment.  

I’m multi-racial.  Most of the year (bar the summer months), I’m white-passing, so I definitely have not had the experience Black people have with the police.  However, I have had some questionable experiences, and out of any time I interacted with police, maybe 25% of the time it was a positive experience.  I didn’t really think about it at the time and just brushed it off as that was how they are trained to deal with the public (which is true) and that was that. BUT, THAT SHOULDN’T BE HOW IT IS.  They are there to SERVE AND PROTECT not freak you the fuck out and cause you to have anxiety, or worse, fear for your life.  In my experiences, and they were not heinous in any sense (we’re talking getting pulled over for speeding, going through a yellow light, or making a report of a car break-in), I have been lied to and treated like I was the criminal.  I don’t know if it had to do with my race, that I’m a woman, or how they are trained to see people as criminals or lesser than they are.  I imagine it may have been some combination of the three.  In any event, THAT IS NOT OKAY.  And I’ll say it again, I AM WHITE PASSING.  I AM NOT BLACK.  There are so many more stories that are worse than mine for people of color.  Even if you aren’t willing to listen or believe those stories, I implore you to look at mine.  If that has been my experience, doesn’t it stand to reason that there is a problem with our law enforcement?  Why don’t they partner better with the public?  Why are they trained to treat people as guilty criminals when they first encounter them?  Why are they militarized (more on that below)?  Why do they resort to violence time and time again instead of de-escalation?  And why the hell do they not require more screening and training in the hiring process, hold them accountable for their actions, and keep track of the problems fired police officers have so they don’t just go work for another precinct and carry their bad behavior to another area?  These folks WORK FOR US.  Why do we pay them to make us scared to deal with them and/or potentially harm us?  

Now, onto the idea of defunding/abolishing/decommissioning the police.  I get it, you hear the words “defund, abolish, decommission” in regard to police officers and you freak out a little that someone won’t be on the other end of the line when you call 911—THAT IS NOT THE CASE.  When I first heard these words, I didn’t fully understand what was meant by them until I educated myself more on the ideas.  Cliff notes version is it’s about giving them a budget that makes sense (have you seen the crazy huge budgets they get?? I didn’t realize until I saw it for myself just how astronomical they are) and distributing those monies into other community-uplifting programs such as education, mental health, addiction, homelessness, etc.  I encourage you to read more about the idea from reputable sources, there is plenty of it online.  

The other thing is we ask our police officers to do WAY TOO MUCH.  I’ll say that again.  THEY ARE DOING WAY TOO MUCH.  Why do we send them out to deal with homelessness, mental illness, drugs, or domestic disputes?  They aren’t trained to handle those situations and they shouldn’t be expected to.  Let them respond and handle things that break the law, and if it turns out they need to hand it over to a professional because it’s related to something like mental illness or drugs, then that is what should happen.  

Lastly, I highly recommend reading this article written by a former police officer, which details the corruption that goes on.  It needs to change and it needs to change NOW.  This is not the way people should be treated, and in addition to that, targeting and treating people based on the color of their skin, gender, sexual orientation, etc. should NEVER be tolerated.  If a police officer is going to do that, they have no business being in law enforcement.

It's okay to say goodbye ... or to hit pause

Me and Tequila back in the day.

My sophomore year of high school, I had to sell my horse.  The main reason had to do with the fact my parents were divorcing and neither could or would continue to pay for the cost.  Of course I was devastated because he was my best friend and helped get me through a very difficult time during my parent’s nasty divorce proceedings.  I was also at the top of my show game with him, having worked years to get him to that point only to have to give it all up.

Looking back, I realize I was probably close to taking a hiatus from one of my most cherished hobbies – horseback riding.  I wanted the freedom of having my driver’s license and a car of my own to get away from the strained relationship I had with my mom.  In order to get that, I needed to get a job.  In order to make enough money to save up for a car and insurance and to continue to pay for said car and insurance, I had to work a certain number of hours.  On top of that, my classes in high school were keeping me busy, so it was only a matter of time before those took precedence and I cut way back on my riding career with my horse.

Fast forward through high school graduation, various jobs, and college graduation … it would be several more years before I got back into my passion of owning and riding horses.  Much older, I have come to realize I have to be more careful because I do not bounce like I did when I was younger, and apparently, I fall more.  A lot more.  My younger self was a much better rider, obviously.  I try not to let that bother me too much.

Getting back into horses meant I also brought my daughter along for the ride.  Once she started riding and taking lessons, she knew it was something she loved just as much as I did.  My daughter hit this  same timeframe in her life back in 2017 and once again this year.  She has aspirations to be an equine veterinarian, which means more rigorous classes at school and more time spent working so she can make enough money for vet school.  She is very conflicted because she also wants a riding career, but she’s burning herself out and has to realize something has to give.  Unfortunately, it’s the horse career at the moment.  

It’s hard to put something on the back burner, especially something you absolutely love doing.  I get it because I’ve been there.  But, sometimes things we really enjoy, whether they be hobbies or things we do as extra-curricular activities to keep ourselves sane, have to sit on the sidelines until we get past the more rigorous "time demanders."  Unless those things are actually going to be your career, you have to let them go for a little while.  It’s a hard process to go through, but a necessary fork in the road to take.  If you don’t learn to set things aside, you won’t be able to set yourself up to be able to come back to those things, more prepared and able.

At both of these junctures in my daughter’s life, we talked about it and then I listen and listen some more as she verbally worked through the process of letting go.  The first time, she dug her heels in, she cried, she got angry, and seeing her full of stress because she was juggling too much was so hard.  This second time of hitting the pause button I think was easier (although no less sad or disappointing), having gone through it once before.  I listened, I supported her, and looked forward to when she could come back to the sport she loves.  This time, I know she sees the light at the end of the tunnel in that she can always come back to riding when she has more time.