Cop Love

Column by Alex R. Knight III.

Exclusive to STR

Cop Love is a psychological disorder.

It exists in spite of all reason, all logic, all empirical evidence, all appeals to the truth.

It is impervious to everything and anything whatsoever except unconditional worship of police as the most noble and righteous guardians of both justice and order.

It is a disease. And it is a lie.

I was involved in an all-too commonplace Facebook fracas recently, regarding this video. The YouTube comments themselves are disgusting enough, but here were the points I tried to calmly raise:
 

  • The woman is absolutely correct in her assertion that there exists in this traffic stop no corpus dilicti (claim or evidence of an injury) – a vital element for any civil or criminal case to have standing (a basis for applicable action in the first place).

 

  • It thus follows then that she should have never been pulled over and detained to begin with.

 

  • It then further follows that the cop's actions are wholly illegitimate – and that his subsequent actions, essentially demanding obedience to his “authority” (which extends from nothing more substantive than that he is wearing a costume with a badge on it and makes his living, in the words of the old Steve Miller tune, from other people's taxes).

 

  • I also posted Marc Stevens's No-State Project website, which on social media, carries with it the adage that “No product or service should be provided at the barrel of a gun” in bold-faced type.

 

And, as an addendum, I also added what the government courts in all 50 "states," and at the federal level straight up to the Supreme Court have unanimously ruled:  That the police are not there to protect any of us.  In fact, in very clear and unambiguous language, several of these rulings have gone so far as to state that the police are under no obligation to do anything at all.  We're forced to pay them via taxation, and obey them without question.  Yet they have no "reciprocal" duty of protection or service of any kind.  "To Protect and Serve," in other words, applies only to their relationship to the rest of government itself -- not to any taxpaying public.

 

The original poster took the thread down from their wall entirely, in order to extinguish the firestorm, but there is still a firestorm very much burning inside of me today, and here are just a few samples, non-verbatim of course, of exactly what was said in reply to these presentations of rationality – in many cases even after repeatedly reposting the same information:

“People like this are just picking a fight!”

“When the officer pulls you over, you give him your license. You do what he says.”

“What an idiot this lady is! She just wants to cause a scene. The officers were actually pretty nice, all things considered.”

“She supposedly had a taillight out. That's a public safety issue.”

“If she'd just done what she was told and complied, everything would've been fine.”

“You must've had something really bad happen to you for you to hate the police so much.”

No mention of anything I had to say from an informational standpoint. No curious questions about new concepts, or possible freedoms that exist of which the reader was likely never even previously aware. No attempt to rebut anything I had to say in any meaningful capacity.

Just unbridled rage at the sheer temerity of anyone who would so much as question the blue-suited heroes, the lords of all creation, the ultimate and final righteous arbiters and owners of all other human lives. The executors of the politicians' will! How dare you not be a good obedient Jew, and just get on the cattle car when the nice self-sacrificing officer tells you to! What makes you so special?

Cop Love, I repeat, is a psychological disorder. A deeply ingrained and profoundly disturbing one. The government-operated public schools, the mainstream media, and the mindless will to social conformity have all done their work on the populace at large. That we awoken wonder at the state of this world is a wonder in and of itself.

Cop Love. Don't get infected by it. Don't have any tolerance for it, either. That path is just as deadly.

Instead, be a comparative rarity in this sad and declining world full of so many authority-worshipping buffoons and lost-cause mental midgets: Be intelligent. Be informed. Be an individual. Be strong. Be self-aware. Love freedom, not slavery. Fight for it. Speak out loudly against its enemies. Resist. Be alive. Be free.

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Alex R. Knight III's picture
Columns on STR: 153

Alex R. Knight III is the author of numerous horror, science-fiction, and fantasy tales.  He has also written and published poetry, non-fiction articles, reviews, and essays for a variety of venues.  He currently lives and writes in rural southern Vermont where he holds a B.A. in Literature & Writing from Union Institute & University.  Alex's Amazon page can be found here, and his work may also be found at both Smashwords and Barnes & Noble.  His MeWe group can be found here.

Comments

emartin's picture

"Most people prefer to believe that their leaders are just and fair, even in the face of evidence to the contrary, because once a citizen acknowledges that the government under which he lives is lying and corrupt, the citizen has to choose what he or she will do about it. To take action in the face of corrupt government entails risks of harm to life and loved ones. To choose to do nothing is to surrender one's self-image of standing for principles. Most people do not have the courage to face that choice. Hence, most propaganda is not designed to fool the critical thinker but only to give moral cowards an excuse not to think at all." ~ Michael Rivero

D. Saul Weiner's picture

This is right. People cannot handle the cognitive dissonance that arises when they acknowledge the truth about the power structure. The problem is mainly one of self-deception. We see this all the time with the refusal of so many people to see the reality of the government vaccine program. The truth is all around them, but they insist on ignoring or rejecting it.

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Excellent quote.  But only because it is so sadly true.

Mark Davis's picture

You will obey! Resistance is futile! So sad that so many people have been conditioned to accept their submission to arbitrary authority and justify it with "The police were very polite while they were demanding obedience and threatening violence." 

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Mark, here's another textbook example of how 99% of the population react when you attempt to explain Voluntaryism to them.  Nothing but denial and cognitive dissonance:
 
http://everything-voluntary.com/dreamers-parents-never-sinned
 
 

PaulTheCabDriver's picture

While I agree with you guys that the woman in the video was right, one should also point out that, as libertarian attorney Marc Victor is fond of saying, "The roadside is not the place to argue constitutional law." This is prudence. Surrounded by so many "paladins in blue" who are armed to the teeth, she is literally taking her life in her hands by not being cooperative.
She is lucky she didn't get shot.

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Imagine the effect it would have, however, if everyone -- or even just *most* people -- spoke up to them this way and refused cooperation.  They can't shoot us all.  They can *try* -- but that's when people start shooting back.

Samarami's picture
    "...Cop Love, I repeat, is a psychological disorder..."
    "...Imagine the effect it would have, however, if everyone -- or even just *most* people -- spoke up to them this way and refused cooperation..."

My mode is to sidestep and avoid confrontation wherever possible. You're not a-gonna change 'em. But each confrontation I allow myself causes grief to me. Even here on the forums. Because I've come to understand that few of us [present company excluded :-)] are willing to back up and assess our own conclusions prior to getting into pissin' matches -- particularly over what I call "libertarian dogma"..

My philosophies might be weak. If so, I really need to make that assessment.

One thing I do often is, when checking out to pay at Wal Mart or the grocery, ask: "...do you take federal reserve notes here???" Which, often, meets me with a blank look and insolent response. At that point I'll often hold up a "dollar" or a five and say, "this is backed by the most dangerous superstition in town -- nothing else!..." They generally don't want to touch that with the proverbial 10' pole, but it resets the psychological disorder some. Sam

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Sam, how are you?  :-)  I don't disagree with your basic premise -- avoid confrontation.  Absolutely right.  But here there was no avoiding them, they pulled her over.  So the options at that point become very limited:  Surerender freedom meekly, in the hopes that the cops' abuses won't be too harsh, or stand your ground and assert your freedoms.  We can debate the pragmatism or lack thereof in the course this woman chose, but regardless, I salute her courage and integrity.  And again, if this attitude were far more pervasive, we might get to see some positive change.  And change is quite sorely needed in an atmosphere where one inherently takes one's own life into one's own hands simply by asking a few questions of a couple of 90 IQ apes in blue suits.
 
We have a long way to go.  But things are also underway as well, aren't they?  

Samarami's picture

Hello Alex!

Since I no longer have internet at home (interfered with my biking and stayin' young :-|) I didn't watch the video. Have to bring earphones to hear videos, and never remember my ear buds.

I've seen many confrontations with police and border psychopaths, some quite good. But it's fair to keep in mind those who "bravely-stand-their-ground-and-assert-their-freedoms" are the ones who plaintively wish the beast would just tame down. If "we" stand up for our "rights", we might see him become less oppressive.

He ain't a-gonna.

To this extent I fully agree with Mr. Davies. Organized state must end. And neither you nor I nor Jim are a-gonna end it. Except to exorcize the vestiges that linger betwixt our ears.

On the other hand, I've ended it for the most part. I'm a free, sovereign state. In so being I must daily recognize the hazardous trip wires all over the place. They have to be sidestepped and circumnavigated in order for me to remain free. I find myself reviewing our old and late friend, Harry Brown's "...Freedom in an Unfree World" (I think a free text version can be clicked on this link).

I can be free. Here. Today. Where I'm "at". So can you. Sam

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Hi there again Sam:
 
I understand entirely where you're coming from, but of course, unlike those good folks who bid open defiance to the Crown, where I'm coming from is that I don't want to see the beast tamed -- I want to see it die:  As both institution and idea.
 
That being so, it is impossible to be free when one has to constantly sidestep aggression or potential aggression at every twist and turn in life's pathways, starting with taxes.  I tried my best, along with Irwin Schiff, to stop funding the beast and ultimately the beast arm-wrestled me back into compliance.  Schiff himself fared even worse, I'm afraid.
 
So unless you have some means of being the first colonizer of Mars, I'm afraid freedom can only truly and fully come about once there are no longer government enforcers watching us and waiting to pounce at the first true signs of our unwillingness to continue to be physically controlled.  Our minds can be free, yes.  But our physical bodies and property -- not so much.  Not until the death-knell of government itself.
 
I have little hope I'll live to see that day, but it is, I think, the correct goal nonetheless and I'll continue to do what I can in my own small way to push things in that direction as much as possible without sacrificing too much of what pleasures there still are in life even under the increasingly burdensome yoke of the State.  I'm thinking perhaps your own philosophy is not too far from that, as well.  :-)

Samarami's picture
    "...it is impossible to be free when one has to constantly sidestep aggression or potential aggression at every twist and turn in life's pathways, starting with taxes..."

So, does a truly free anarchist expect there will be no "free market robbers" once civil state meets its demise and organized state becomes history for each and all? I can't speak for "...every twist and turn in life's pathways...", but I suspect there will be ample supply of shysters and fraudsters and down-right burglars and robbers in a true state of anarchy. Of course if we all have to protect our own interests in order to circumvent those who will rob us, we will devise plans to do so. Free-market plans. (What was the old show, "Have Gun, Will Travel"???) As of now, you will be prosecuted even if you do attempt to protect yourself -- especially if you "...take-the-law-into-your-own-hands..."

Neither you nor I know exactly how the world around us will shape up in total freedom. That's because none of us have ever been totally free. I like to think I've come about as close as most -- simply due to the recognition that "...if it's gonna be, it's up to me, not thee..." I've gotta be free if I expect to do much in the way of participation in your becoming free.

I can write all the essays and programs and lesson plans to "teach" others how to become free and the evil aspects of statism. But if I'm still moaning and whining away about the white man, his "police", et al., my broadcasts will no doubt be of limited effect.

Freedom begins betwixt my ears -- not yours (although I know you personally are processing liberty each time you wake up -- and I truly wish you and all Root-Strikers to be free). Once a critical mass become free betwixt their ears, there will be no market for the white man.

I'm happy to see this marching forward and, like you, hope to see the end of state before I die. I'm 83. You'd better get skattin'!!! My total freedom depends upon you -- contrary to my seeming preachin' otherwise.

I could go on endlessly about this. But for now I'll repeat: I can be free. Here. Today. Where I'm "at".

So can you. Sam

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Not much argument here, except to say that there is in fact a vast difference between tyrant thieves who have the tacit support of society if I attempt to repel them or defend myself against them, and the garden-variety kind whom I could (and even can, in some cases, now) defend myself against at will with societal approval if not even assistance.
 
Such is another of the differences, I'd be willing to wager, between a status-quo statist society and a free one.

Samarami's picture
    "...tyrant thieves who have the tacit support of society..."

And therein lies the heart of the matter. As long as this condition exists you and I will indeed have to scrap and fight (much of the combat taking place betwixt each of our very ears) in order to be and remain free. There is a huge and daunting demand for authoritarianism out there in the marketplace. And if there is anything those of us at STR understand it is the law of supply and demand. As long as individuals "register" and "vote" the apparent demand will remain strong. I long for the day they hold an election and nobody shows up.

That's why it is important for you to continue to comment and write wherever you see the opportunity. And everyone else here and at the precious few other anarchist forums on the net.

I'm not certain what it's going to take to make significant erosions in that demand. I'd like to see it in my lifetime. Yet, the growth of internet freedom and genuine free thinking engendered therein shows the way. It could be happening before my eyes, but I'm too prejudiced toward my own dogma to recognize it.

As you've seen me write, I was probably more stimulated to investigate freedom once I became free of alcohol within AA (still perhaps the most libertarian organization in town), lo those many years ago. Sam

Alex R. Knight III's picture

An excellent response, Sam.  Thank you.  :-)

Samarami's picture

Thanks for the reminder, Paul, of one of your better contributions. Too bad STR has had to become fallow and not conducive to the good raz-a-ma-taz discussions we had back then. Sam

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Sam, I think you and others like Paul are very much keeping the raz-a-ma-taz alive, and it's good to see.  :-)

Alex R. Knight III's picture

Paul, I had forgotten about this one.  It's a great one.  Concise and accurate.