Youthful Arrogance

This is probably going to be the most controversial post on this blog in quite awhile. I know some of you, especially my readers over at St. Louis Cop Talk, are going to want to complain. So here’s the link to the Complaint Box, so you can open it in a new browser tab or window, and have it right there to vent.

The day after SLPD Officer Norvelle Brown was shot, most of the MSM articles about the crime and his life stated that he joined the Force because he wanted to give back, to be a role model and a positive influence in order to make a difference in the lives of the many troubled youth of his neighborhood, because he himself was once teetering on the brink as a youth in that very neighborhood.

At the time, I had thoughts like this: “There you go, this is typical youthful arrogance. If any cop could possibly do those sorts of things, and ‘make a difference’ so that black ‘yoots’ stop committing dangerous crimes, don’t you think that at least one of the 1300 some-odd cops on the SLPD would have already done it? Or don’t you think it would have been accomplished by now? In other words, the late Officer Brown must have been so youthfully conceited that he thought that nobody else other than himself has ever thought of the idea that cops in black neighborhoods should be ‘role models’ and ‘positive influences. I mean, yes, he was a PAL track coach for most of the time he wasn’t working or sleeping, but, c’mon, PAL athletes probably wouldn’t be running with gangs, slinging dope, or shooting cops anyway.'”

I thought these things, but I certainly wanted to keep them under the vest, considering that those days were the emotional nadir. And I also realized that 30 really is a significant boundary in life — I only had 8 years on Officer Brown, and I’m calling him youthfully arrogant. Some old folks hormones must kick in on your 30th birthday, that you start to complain about what you yourself were like no so long ago. The 1960s hippies had that heart-brain axiom relating to 30 years old as the crossover — maybe this is one thing they happened to be correct about.

Last night, KPLR-11’s coverage of Officer Brown’s funeral was followed by a short profile of former LAPD Officer David Klinger, whose book, Into the Kill Zone, has a startling thesis backed up by a lot of good anecdotal evidence — in the universe of police officers that have been murdered in a similar fashion to the way Officer Brown was (allegedly) murdered, thug-style, most of the life histories and profiles of these officers are those, like Brown, who became cops because they wanted to make a difference, to be positive role models for troubled youths.

In other words, Klinger is saying that much more often than not, it’s the youthfully arrogant, bromide-obsessed, starry-eyed people like Norvelle Brown, rather than the stereotypical bad-asses and sons-of-bitches (i.e. cops hardened by years of experience that has taught them that youthful arrogance is delusional), who get shot by the thug class. Norvelle Brown would have become more jaded had he lived and been a cop for much longer.

Someone much older and wiser, but no more racially aware than myself, once made the analogy between canine behavior and black behavior. Just as you shouldn’t show fear in front of a dog or a pack of dogs, as they can somehow smell just a hint of fear on the part of their prey, and exploit it to the death (of the prey), when dealing with the thug class of blacks, you can’t show compassion. Whether it’s the mean streets of north St. Louis, or (as prison guards can tell you), making the rounds in the hoosegow yard, as a generality, blacks will interpret kindness and compassion and weakness, and prey on you because of it.

Honest history is replete with examples of this phenomenon — just examine the latter half of the history of white colonialism of Africa and (what would become) Afro-Carribean islands, especially Haiti. Sure as sunsets, death and taxes, the more you trust them, the more likely it is that it will come back as a knife in your neck. Closer than that, the Poetic Justice section of the St. Louis CofCC Static Webpage will drive that point home.

Assuming that the 15-year old suspect now in custody really did what he is alleged to have done, he is no less than fully responsible for this murder, legally speaking. However, I think that Officer Brown ever so slightly contributed to his own untimely demise.

As an aside, KPLR ran film from a black group in north St. Louis called “Better Family Life,” that is pounding the pavement, and demanding a one-week moratorium on all crime in the aftermath of the murder of Officer Brown. Hell, if they have the power to make thugs stop being thugs for one week, why not ask them to stop for more than one week? If they have that kind of power, and it works, PLEASE, Better Family Life, tell the St. Louis City Police Department your secret!!!  At that rate, why didn’t they ask for this moratorium a long time ago?  Could Better Family Life be prosecuted or sued for being an accessory in every crime committed during the time when they didn’t call for a moratorium?  If they have that much power, it only stands to reason.  For real, BFL doesn’t have that power.  It’s only a platitude for screaming protesters to yell in front of TV cameras for good PR.