One of the policemen travelled with us. The patient was, quite understandably, frightened by his predicament and asked for someone to hold his hand. As I was clutching the dressings to his face I didn’t have a spare hand – yet the policeman, also covered with the patient’s blood, didn’t hesitate to hold the frightened patient’s hand.
When we got to the hospital the patient asked if we were all white. I have no idea what was going through his head to ask that question, perhaps he had been brainwashed to believe that all us white people in uniform don’t give a damn about young black men. To be honest I hadn’t given it a thought and I doubt that the policeman had either, all we saw was someone who needed our help.
It’s what drives me nuts about the media, and to a certain extent members of the public and ‘community leaders’. Everyone is so quick to jump onto the bandwagon of criticising the police over, for example, a raid where they believed they had good information about a chemical bomb – yet you never seem to hear about the numerous small acts of kindness that they perform daily.
I guess that this is what blogs are good for.
–Tom Reynolds, Random Acts of Reality
[Thanks to Euan for pointing the way to his blog]
I am certain that events like this happy much more often than any of us realize. It is the exceptions that run counter to our expectations that people notice. Here’s an example, perhaps trivial in comparison to the event described, but nevertheless one that causes one to realize that police officers are just like all the rest of us. Some get it. Some don’t. Our crossing guard was out sick today. A police officer was assigned to her busy street corner. As children walked to school, there crossed the street on their own. The policeman sat in his car drinking a soda. The officer in the ambulance is one kind of role model. The officer sitting in his car in quite another.
This story reminds me of a young man I talked to once who was insulted that a woman had crossed the street when she saw him walking towards her. It was late at night and they were both walking alone. The man was furious that she could think him dangerous. Him! But a woman has to be suspicious of a man she doesn’t know. And a person of color has to be suspicious of a white person. It is difficult to ask a person to risk their safety to make a stranger feel better.
And yes, I think the media ignores the stress police are under–to live your life knowing that walking up to a car to give a simple speeding ticket could mean death!–and I always allow police officers the room to be churlish or whatever they need to be when dealing with a largely ungrateful public. But that said, Rodney King videos and other such scandals, do more damage than the media could ever do.
Thanks for sharing this food for thought