For 126 years, Labor Day has been a sleepy respite from toil and trouble, a day wedged between two busy seasons. America's hard workers may travel, picnic or just slack at home – but for the ability to do any of this in relative safety, we can thank our neglected and much-maligned police.
Although far from perfect, we've enjoyed a better relationship with law enforcement than most of the world, precariously balancing the power of state and personal liberties. Only in free nations are police inclined or even allowed to be your friend. Our long and complex relationship with peace officers is evident in over two centuries of popular culture.
Police and their eternal struggle against the forces of evil are possibly the most pervasive theme in Western culture. They rank up there with love stories, anyway. Novels began to deal with crime and policing almost from their inception. Dostoevsky's 1866 "Crime and Punishment" was an early psychological analysis of the killer Raskolnikov. Porfiry was the detective who suspects and dogs him.
Always the maverick, American authors reacted to the Brits who established the genre in the 1930s. Well-manned bobbies and inspectors were replaced with our hard-boiled, cynical detective. Almost invariably he smoked, drank and womanized intensely, while firing off several rounds in most chapters. Many of them were presented as being members of a police force somewhere in the U.S.
Now the relationship between lawmen and their charges is feeling incredibly strained, along with every other institution. Still, it's been a good, long run and most of us would like to keep it going. Balancing power of the state with individual liberty worked because the majority of us were law-abiding citizens with respect for each other and police.
Tocqueville's well-known observation about America's greatness being contingent on goodness still stands. We really aren't looking virtuous just now, and neither are many of our leaders. Previously, our cops battled the bad guys in relatively constrained numbers. Metastatic growth of crime and its acceptance is forcing police to battle a huge segment of the population. Now they are compelled to battle for their image and reputation as well.
Darker and more cynical portrayals of America's cops seem to accompany this shift over the last decade or so. Not surprisingly, it's accompanied by a much more sympathetic image makeover for criminals. This is evident in everything from video games to novels, comic books, magazines, television and films. They have substituted antagonist for protagonist.
The television series "Breaking Bad" popularized a bad-guy trend, although it was an inversion of most crime show premises: A bitter man becomes a violent and successful meth dealer, besting the cops. Meanwhile, much of the nation was rooting for him. By its final show in 2013, "Breaking Bad" moved into the "Guinness World Records" as the most critically acclaimed show, ever. It was unlikely to have gotten past a studio pitch a few decades back, but how we've changed.
Immersion in any alternate reality for hundreds of hours has the effect of conditioning people to accept whatever is being presented, or at least to find it less shocking. In this case, it's norming violent abuse, including actions against police. Nothing does this better than a diet of villainous detectives and DAs eternally careening through the plot lines. To enjoy a story behind any work of fiction in any media, it's necessary to temporarily suspend disbelief in what is happening (or accepting it as real). Otherwise we're aware it's only a script and actors, which isn't very emotionally satisfying. Viewers may suspend ethical judgment as well.
Avon chief constable Nick Gargan objected in 2014 to negative portrayals of detectives and officers in British media. Many of the newer generation of police characters run from unsympathetic to corrupt, sinister or half-mad. "Crime writers should depict more detectives as clean-living and balanced rather than damaged and hard-drinking like the Inspector Rebus of Ian Rankin's novels," Gargan said to the Guardian.
Good writers can do it. There's Poirot, Inspector Morse, Columbo and many others. In 2012, BBC police series "Good Cop" (promoting just that) only lasted four episodes before BBC pulled it. Ironically the continuing story line of "Good Cop" paralleled some troubles of American police that began about then. Lead character Rocksavage is forced to shoot the gangster who killed his partner. Convoluted rules prohibited this, and the constable is setup for blackmail and trouble for doing his job. Plant Rocksavage in any American town and "Black Lives Matter" (BLM) could substitute for the gangsters. It's uncanny.
Although annual killings by U.S. police between 2005 and 2012 were remarkably stable at about 400, a deliberate campaign to demonize police began shortly after that. Thank BLM and assorted proxies as well as inflammatory "news" coverage worthy of Pravda at its worst.
In light of the epidemic of assassinations of police, conservative activist Lloyd Marcus is producing a "Blue Lives Matter Celebration" to honor law enforcement officers on Sept. 10 in Daytona Beach (see details below). Lloyd is a gifted singer and promises an "upbeat and inspiring family event." Celebrities include radio talk-show host Andrea Shea King, former New York cop and author Joe Sanchez (aka "Super Cop"), Mychal Massie and Wild Bill For America.
Marcus sent me these thoughts: "Candidly, when I decided to produce a Blue Lives Matter celebration event, I was angry … over the evil bogus narrative promoted by the left that has caused assassinations of police across America. Do not get me wrong, I am not apologizing for my anger. Decent people should get angry when evil prospers. It is called a righteous anger. Jesus got angry at the money-changers who disrespected the temple."
Labor Day this year was marred with random violence and truly bizarre tragedies. Brooklynn's "West Indian Day Parade" was the scene of deaths by shootings and stabbings. Picnicking families in Chicago are regularly mowed down. It's practically a gruesome tradition there. We need help from local officers more than ever, and they need our cooperation. This gesture may be the start of something big – perhaps a trend of standing for cops and not the bad guys. Breaking Good.
Blue Lives Matter Celebration (sponsored by Lloyd Marcus)
Date: Saturday, Sept. 10
Time: 11 a.m. -2 p.m.
Place: Ocean Convention Center, Daytona Beach, Florida
Admission: FREE (Costs for this event are high and Marcus needs help underwriting expenses. You can find more information here.
Sources
Crime fiction needs more clean-living cops, says police chief