For many years, the answer little boys would give when asked
what they want to be when they grow up has been “I want to be a
policeman.” They recognized that the police are protectors, friends, the
people who put their lives on the line every day to protect society.
Today, however, the police officer’s job has suddenly become much
more dangerous. Police are themselves under fire, battling growing
resentment and distrust by large segments of a society they are sworn
to protect.
Recently, many have cited a rise in
resentment against police and authority figures as the cause of the wave
of anti-police violence. What should be our attitude towards authority?
In late August, Harris County (Texas) sheriff’s deputy Darren
Goforth was ambushed and killed at a suburban gas station. While fueling
his patrol car, a lone gunman walked up to him and shot him in the back
of the head, then shot him repeatedly as he lay dying. Goforth, 47,
left a wife and two children.
One week later, New York Police Department officer Brian Moore was
shot to death when he stopped to investigate a man suspected of carrying
a gun on a New York street. Just 25, he left a wife and two small
children. The young officer had already been awarded two medals for
meritorious service.
Near Atlanta, Fulton County police officer Terrance Green was killed
in another ambush-style attack by a man who assaulted a group of
officers after having “gone on a rampage” throughout south Fulton
County, Georgia.
“War on America’s police officers”
Through early November, 2015 witnessed the slaying of 34 police
officers. September was a particularly deadly month, with seven officers
giving their lives in the line of duty.
“War has been declared on America’s police officers,” says Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke.
Across the country, police feel themselves under fire, their role in
society maligned, their safety threatened. Speaking for the Fraternal
Order of Police, which represents more than 300,000 police officers,
FOP
President Chuck Canterbury said, “It’s almost a radical rhetoric
causing officers to say, ‘Wait a second, I’m out here to serve the
public. I saved a little old lady from a purse snatching. I gave
CPR on the highway and saved somebody. Now, I’m a villain?’” (quoted by Ed Payne and Artemis Moshtaghian in
CNN, “Attacks Leave Police Feeling Under Siege,” Sept. 4, 2015).
Across the United States, a string of highly publicized
confrontations between police and mostly minority youth has ignited a
wave of animosity against law enforcement and law enforcement officers.
Major American cities are the battlegrounds, where police themselves
feel threatened. A sinister piece of graffiti painted on the side of a
Houston building near the Harris County police station showed a picture
of a police officer with a gun pointed at his head.
Hollywood has piled on, with celebrities such as movie director
Quentin Tarantino calling cops “murderers” over the recent media-hyped
shootings in minority neighborhoods. Sadly, the Hollywood police haters
and rabble-rousers seem to get no end of publicity in a
celebrity-obsessed nation.
The Ferguson effect
Observers have noted the long-standing distrust and animosity
between police and largely African-American inner city youth, especially
young men. Those simmering tensions exploded after the August 2014
shooting of Michael Brown, a young African-American man shot by
Ferguson, Missouri, police office Darren Wilson. Brown had just robbed a
convenience store, and evidence showed that he attacked Wilson just
before he was shot.
Brown’s death touched off a wave of racial violence in Ferguson’s
minority community, resulting in night after night of widespread
violence, burning and looting. Confrontations with police produced
dozens of injuries to both rioting citizens and the police, tens of
millions of dollars in property damage, and more than 100 arrests.
Now, what is being called “the Ferguson effect” has caused police to
be far more cautious, especially when operating in minority
neighborhoods. The
Wall Street Journal reported this effect in chilling terms:
“Almost any police shooting of a black person, no matter how
threatening the behavior that provoked the shooting, now provokes angry
protests … Arrests in black communities are even more fraught than
usual, with hostile, jeering crowds pressing in on officers and
spreading lies about the encounter” (Heather McDonald, “The New
Nationwide Crime Wave,” May 29, 2015)
Police more cautious, crime rates up
Across the nation, some mayors and officials in cities with heavy
minority populations have themselves accused police of racial bias and
excessive use of force. In New York, Mayor Bill De Blasio alleged the
New York Police Department used excessive racial profiling, a charge
echoed by many minority mayors across the nation.
Faced with criticism from city hall, the media, popular culture, and
minority communities, police everywhere report being more cautious and
reserved in their responses. One example: In many cities, officers now
wait in their patrol cars for backup before confronting crime suspects.
Police cautiousness has emboldened criminals, leading to a spike in
crime rates across the nation. After falling for two decades to just
over 300 in 2014, murder rates in New York City more than doubled during
the first six months of 2015. In Baltimore, gun violence rose more than
60 percent compared to the same period last year—its 43 homicides in
May 2015 the deadliest month since 1972. Statistics show this pattern
across the country in 2015.
What’s behind it?
Events in inner-city neighborhoods have shown that the right
provocation can fan smoldering embers of resentment into a full-blown
blaze. But is this a new development or something that has been growing
for years?
History has a way of repeating itself. With the rise of highly
emotional racial conflicts in the late 1960s, police began to hear
themselves referred to as “pigs,” an epithet that continued in
inner-city neighborhoods long after the violence subsided. White college
students picked up the term, screaming it at police who were called to
keep order in often-violent protests against the Vietnam War.
We can add the effects of modern mass media, whose ranks today are
filled with the products of modern Western education, which denies the
existence of any moral authority, and, therefore, challenges
all authority.
And we have seen incidents in which law-enforcement officers have
acted rashly, unwisely, abusively or even criminally, leading to
unnecessary injuries and deaths. Some have been charged with and
convicted of murder, manslaughter and assault, among other crimes.
Advancing their own media narrative, television news coverage of the
Ferguson incident and others too often demonize police officers,
painting pictures of alleged “police brutality” while totally ignoring
barrages of rocks and debris hurled at officers, accompanied by taunts
and threats. And usually agitators are in the background egging on
the crowd.
The picture of growing disrespect and hatred toward police and
authority figures is impossible to ignore. But is there an even deeper,
more fundamental cause?
Few recognize, and even fewer will acknowledge, the sinister
ultimate cause behind today’s violence and disrespect for authority.
Your Bible identifies a powerful and evil adversary who, incredible as
it may sound, casts his influence over all mankind today. “You He made
alive, who … once walked according to the course of this world,
according to the
prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience …” (
Ephesians 2:1-2, emphasis added throughout).
This being has the world under his sway, influencing millions in attitudes of rebellion and strife (
1 John 5:19;
Revelation 12:9). Read our free booklet
Is There Really a Devil ? to learn more about this being and his influence on the world.
The prophesied solution
Human beings, it seems, have always had a problem with authority,
which gives rise to the question: What should be our attitude towards
authority and authority figures? The apostle Paul addressed this issue
in his letter to the church in Rome:
“Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities.
For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are
established by God. For rulers are not a cause of fear for good
behavior, but for evil” (
Romans 13:1-3,
New American Standard Bible). Paul went on to exhort the young pastor
Timothy to give thanks for “all who are in authority, that we may lead a
quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence” (
1 Timothy 2:1-2).
Thankfully, despite today’s violence, your Bible proclaims a
soon-coming time when people will live at peace, a time when God’s law
will guide all of humanity. Study the prophecies of
Isaiah 2:2-4;
Isaiah 9:6-7;
Isaiah 11:6-9 and
Isaiah 35:5-7. It also foretells the time when Satan, this great adversary, will be restrained—no longer able to influence mankind:
“Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having … a great chain
in his hand. He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is
the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years …
and shut him up … so that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years were finished” (
Revelation 20:1-2).
At that time, when God’s long-foretold Kingdom is established on
earth, Satan’s influence will be replaced with attitudes of cooperation,
giving, and true justice for all. Notice in particular what the prophet
Isaiah foretells of Christ in Isaiah 11: “The Spirit of the Lord will
rest on Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of
counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord…
with righteousness He will judge the poor, and decide with fairness for
the afflicted of the earth” (
Isaiah 11:2-4, New American Standard Bible).
Millions who today feel, whether rightly or wrongly, that they are
denied justice will be treated fairly. The entire world will respect
authority and live secure, peaceful lives under the supreme law of God,
which will ensure justice, peace and tranquility. God speed that day!
