Here’s the latest reader question, along with my reply!
Jim asks: Last weekend, my son was invited to a birthday pool party. Sadly, a little boy drowned at the party; thanks to quick thinking, we were able to revive him. The first two to arrive after my 911 call were local cops. They did this slow shuffle when they arrived. I was absolutely appalled that these AGWs would respond nonchalantly to a call of a child who had drowned. So, because I do what is best, regardless of any consequences, I screamed at them like a drill instructor. It went like this: “Let’s go! Move, move, move, a child’s life is on the line, move your ass!” The cops really did not like this but they did move their overpaid asses.
After all was said and done, one of them gave me a thumbs up, I assume because I was the one to get them moving. So, the reason I’m telling you this story is I actually got to “Hut-Hut-Hut” some cops. It felt good!
Thanks for your always awesome blog.
My reply: I am very glad the boy was revived – no thanks to the AGWs, probably. The indifference you describe is apparently general. It is also ironic – given we are expected to regard AGWs as “heroes.”
But real heroes take risks for the sake of others, often at risk to themselves – and without expectation of being paid to do so. This rules out AGWs – who get paid to enforce laws, not protect persons or property.
I agree with the late (and very great) Will Grigg – who advised never calling AGWs on the theory that there is practically no situation so bad that calling them won’t make it worse.
You’re probably lucky the AGWs didn’t Taze you for affronting their Authoritah.
Thanks for the kind words!
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Here is a guest article that deserves the light of day:
No One Cares If You Go Home Safe At The End Of Your Shift
Jan 02, 201812:50AM
Category: Politics
Posted by: Michael Z. Williamson
Here at the house, I have a couple of decades plus of military experience. I have tools to dig in or out of natural disasters. I have extinguishers and hoses. I have a field trauma kit and bandages. I have weapons both melee and firearm. I know how to use them. I know how to trench, support and revet. I understand the fire triangle and appropriate approaches. I understand breathing, bleeding and shock. I know how to detain, restrain and control. I have done all of these at least occasionally, professionally. I’ve stood on top of a collapsing levee in a flood. I’ve fought a structure fire from inside so we could get everyone out before the fire department showed up, which only took two minutes, but people can die that fast. I’ve had structures collapse while I was working on them. I’ve been in an aircraft that had a “mechanical” on approach and had to be repaired in-flight before landing. I’ve helped control a brush fire. I’ve hauled disabled vehicles out of ditches in sub-zero weather.
My ex wife has over a decade of service and some of the same training.
We have trained our young adult children.
My wife is a rancher who knows her way around a shotgun, livestock, sutures and tools, hurricanes and floods, and works in investigations professionally.
Our current house guest is another veteran.
This means if anything happens at the house, and last year we had a lightning strike, a tornado and a flood within 10 days’ we’re pretty well prepared.
Now, we’re probably better off than 95% of the households out there. The level of disaster that necessitates backup varies.
If we find it necessary to call 911, it means the party is in progress and it’s bad.
You will probably not be going home safe at the end of your shift.
And you know what? If it gets to that point, I really don’t give a shit. I don’t give a shit if you get smoked. I don’t give a shit if you fall under a tree. I don’t give a shit if you get shot at.
Because at that point, I’ve done everything I can with that same circumstance, and run out of resources.
If my concern was “you going home safe,” then I’d just fucking hunker down and die. Because I wouldn’t want that poor responder to endanger himself.
Except, that’s what I pay taxes for, and that’s what you signed up for. Just like I signed up to walk into a potential nuke war in Germany and hold off the Soviets, and did walk into the Middle East and prepare to take fire while keeping expensive equipment functioning so our shooters could keep shooting.
There’s not a single set of orders I got that said my primary job was to “Come home safe.” They said it was to “support the mission” or “complete the objective.” Coming home safe was the ideal outcome, but entirely secondary to “supporting” or “completing.” Nor, once that started, did I get a choice to quit. Once in, all in.
When that 80 year old lady smells smoke or hears a noise outside her first floor bedroom in the ghetto, she doesn’t care if you go home safe, either. She’s afraid she or the kids next door won’t wake up in the morning.
If I call, I expect your ass to show up, sober, trained, professional. I expect you to wade in with me or in place of me, and drag a child out of a hole, or out from a burning room, or actually stand up and block bullets from hitting said child, because by the time you get there, I’ll have already done all that. And there will be field dressings, chainsawed trees, buckets and empty brass scattered about.
I don’t want to hear some drunk and confused guy squirming on the ground playing “Simon Says” terrified you so much you had to blow him away. I don’t want to hear that some random guy 35 yards away who you had no actual information on , may have reached toward his waist band. Or that “the tree might fall any moment” or that “the smoke makes it hard to see.”
Near as I can tell, I don’t hear the smokejumpers, or the firefighters, or the disaster rescue people say such things.
But it’s all I ever hear from the cops. If you and your five girlfriends in body armor, with rifles, are that terrified of actually risking your life for the theoretically dangerous job you volunteered for and can quit any time, then please do quit.
You can get a job doing pest control and go home safe every night.
Until a bunch of fucking pussies with big tattoos, small dicks, body armor and guns blow you away for minding your own business.
Because what you’re telling me with that statement is, your only concern is cashing a check. That’s fine. But if that’s your concern, don’t pretend you’re serving the public. If you wanted to help people at risk of life, you would be a firefighter, running into buildings, dragging people out, getting scorched regularly.
If you’re cool with writing tickets, then there’s jobs where you can do just that.
If you want to tangle with bad guys and blow them away, fair enough. But understand: That means they get to shoot first to prove their intent, just as happens with the military these days. Our ROE these days are usually “only if fired upon and no civilians are at risk.”
If your plan is “shoot first, shoot later, shoot some more, then if anyone is still alive try to ask questions,” and bleat, “But I was afeard fer mah lahf!” you’re absolutely no better than the thugs you claim to oppose. All you are is another combatant in a turf war I don’t care about.
Since I know your primary concern is “being safe,” then I’ll do you the favor of not calling. Cash your welfare check, and try not to shoot me at a “courtesy” sobriety checkpoint for “twitching my eye “in a way that suggested range estimation.
If you’re one of the vanishingly few cops who isn’t like that, then what the hell are you doing about it? If there’s going to be a lawsuit costing the city millions, isn’t it better that it be a labor suit from the union over the clown you fired, than a wrongful death suit over the poor bastard the clown shot? Both are expensive, but one has a dead victim you enabled. So how much do you actually care about that life?
How is the training so bad that it’s not clear who is the scene commander who gives the orders?
How is it that trigger happy bozos who, out of costume, look no different from the gangbangers you claim to oppose, get sent up front to fulfill their wish of hosing someone down because “I was afraid for my life!”?
Why does the rot exist in your department?
If you can’t do anything about it, why are you still in that department?
At some point, collective guilt is a thing.
You’ve probably not been a good cop for a long time.
And I still don’t care if you go home safe. I care that everyone you purport to “serve and protect” goes home safe.
Around here they always send a deputy to all ambulance calls.
Years ago I was strapped to a backboard and hauled to the horsepital. A goddamn deputy got in and just rattled on and on. The backboard was killing me. It makes my back straighter than I can tolerate with pain. The deputy kept saying I was a nervous wreck or similar from the wreck. I wanted to kill him but couldn’t reach him. What I WAS doing was turning everything into a joke and was doing a pretty good monologue. This was for me, how I react to pain I can’t get away from.
I didn’t appreciate him practically calling me a pussy and the EMT’s didn’t seem to be keen on any part of it. Later, when in the ER, he’s there too. WTF business is it of his? Much later when I was released, he wondered out loud why I didn’t have a drug test. Sure, drug test the victim. The other driver only got a ticket I later found out. I got sorta excited when a KW W900L went flying through the air right beside me as he’d ridden up on my trailer and load. It’s just not something I’d seen and felt before. When I”m alive and in pain, I don’t appreciate being harassed by anyone.
As usual the DPS showed up just as I was being hauled away and I’d been sitting in the crewtruck chilling down and being pissed. At least people who witnessed it were nice to me, offering me a sit in a cool pickup and something to drink. If it wasn’t beer I didn’t want it, had a whole cooler full of water.
And then the fire calls … I could go on all day about them interfering in fire suppression operations.
Here are two stories of firefighter arrogance, and is a good reason why “qualified immunity”should be abolished for ALL public workers and officials:
A firefighter from a certain southeastern Michigan community claimed to have a “arson dog”–one that could detect accellerants. This “firefighter” and his dog were instrumental in ruining many peoples’ lives by his testimony alone. Insurance companies LOVED this guy as he was able to get them out of paying (valid) claims. People were denied valid insurance claims and prosecuted for arson on the testimony of this “arson dog’s” handler.
Those who were “burned” by this supposed arson dog’s “handler” had no recourse, because of “qualified immunity”. The firefighter (and fire department) could not be sued.
Finally one citizen who had been accused of arson fought back by suing to prove the “arson dog’s” ability. The dog was found to have NO special ability. The “arson dog” and his human master’s career was finally over. How many innocent people were convicted of arson and lost everything they owned??
Another case was that of a plating plant that caught fire. The owners had a fire department “approved” fire plan in place which involved shutting off utilities and shutting down processes in an orderly fashion.
The firefighters that responded to the fire pushed the owner out of the way, and told him that they were going to do things “their way”. The building burned to the ground.
A firefighter’s job (for at least 98% of the time) is not inherently dangerous. This does not take away from the seriousness of their job, which is to be commended. but, firefighter arrogance can be just as dangerous as police arrogance. THIS is why firefighters should be included in the abolition of immunity for public officials.