Police protests have consequences

There should have been nothing remarkable in Carson Daly sporting a NYPD cap for hosting the NBC New Year’s Eve coverage from Times Square. It was New York City after all, and New York’s finest were keeping everyone safe in the target of choice for jihadist terrorists. But he sparked a Twitter storm of praise and vile cursing. Such is the mood.

Since a St. Louis grand jury declined to bring charges in the shooting death of Michael Brown and after a year of racial tensions, there have been continuous demonstrations against what some claim is local police racism. But these organized and sustained demonstrations of anti-police invective have emboldened the morally unstable among us to attack the police who protect every community. Seeking redress for what they claim is injustice, they are endangering everyone.

One march chanted, “What do we want? Dead cops!” On another occasion, a small communist group shouted “Stand up, shoot back.” So it is no surprise that people are boldly threatening the police on social media and to their faces. We also have seen an unusual willingness of some to resist arrest. A Brooklyn man sent an officer to the hospital from a blow to the face. In Boston, seven teenagers beat and choked officers attempting to apprehend someone who skipped his court date. Worst of all, a career criminal assassinated two New York police officers in broad daylight as they were sitting in their cruiser. In a later, unprovoked attack, three men fired on LAPD officers in their car.

This climate has also led New York City police to pull back from confronting minor incidents. The opposite of the “broken windows” theory of policing, it will allow a culture of law-breaking to provide deeper soil for more serious criminality. This is also related to Mayor Bill De Blasio undermining his own police force by expressing fears for his biracial son after the Eric Garner grand jury decision. In so doing, he emboldened the vilification of police and violent assaults on them by the lawless fringe. Actions have consequences. It remains to be seen what the consequences will be for his reappointment of the judge who released two men without bail who made death threats against police and hospitalized an officer.

It is a mark of adult behavior to consider the consequences of one’s actions before launching them. The police consider that a matter of professional discipline. When judgment fails them, they are held responsible. The Boston police officers who were injured in the teen attack chose to use pepper spray and suffer injury instead of pulling their guns, even though, had they been overcome in the melee, they could have lost their guns and then their lives.

Protests also have consequences—for their speech, their tone, their duration, and the company and conduct they tolerate. In Ferguson, Mo., they would have had more credibility had they taken steps against looters. In New York, they would have been wise to heed requests for a day of silent respect as the slain offers were buried, or at least carried signs saying “We love good cops” and maybe donned NYPD caps of their own.