This Is Not How You Heal -- Or Serve

(AP photo - John Minchillo)

This photo was taken yesterday outside the funeral of slain NYPD officer Rafael Ramos, with hundreds of officers turning their backs as New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio spoke, as some had done earlier when de Blasio went to the hospital where the police officers were taken.  Incendiary remarks by Patrick Lynch, meathead leader of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, and others =cough= noun, verb, 9/11 Giuliani =cough= have succeeded in convincing some in the NYPD that de Blasio's cautioning his biracial son about interactions with the police after the chokehold death of Eric Garner was an insult to the police force.  Enough has been said about the lameness of that argument that we needn't discuss it further.  The fact that city hall's in the midst of tough labor negotiations with the NYPD is also adding to the posturing and bitterness.

But the larger issue that has been raised by these outward shows of disrespect for civil authority by some in the NYPD can be boiled down to:  "Who do you serve?"  Here's Charles P. Pierce:

... In response, and at the encouragement of television hucksters like Joe Scarborough, police union blowhards like Patrick Lynch, political zombies like George Pataki, and comical fascists like Rudolph Giuliani, the NYPD is acting in open rebellion against Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York, and the civil power he represents over them. This is an incredibly perilous time for democracy at the most basic levels.  [snip] 

... If the NYPD runs a slow-motion coup against the freely elected mayor of New York, then it is running a slow-motion coup against all the people of New York. There is no exemption from this fundamental truth about the way this country and its system is supposed to work.

Ta-Nehisi Coates extrapolates this show of insubordination into a most unpleasant future scenario:

When the elected mayor of my city arrived at the hospital, the police officers who presumably serve at the public's leisure turned away in a display that should chill the blood of any interested citizen. The police are not the only embodiment of democratic society. And one does not have to work hard to imagine a future when the agents of our will, the agents whom we created, are in fact our masters. On that day one can expect that the tactics intended for the ghettos will enjoy wider usage. 

There's an "us vs. them" mentality that unfortunately is in danger of becoming the norm in minority community/ police relations, if it hasn't already.  As Gene notes here and here, the same confrontational attitude by the Patrick Lynch's of the world -- not to mention right-wing pols and media --  doesn't seem to arise when the cop killers are white, "sovereign citizen," right-wing militia types.

Police have the toughest job in the world and that fact needs to be respected. But they do themselves and their communities no favors when they lose sight of who they're protecting and serving.