"With power comes great responsibility" is horseshit. We can hope all we want that those in power will act responsibly, but it will never happen. Responsibility is remembering to pick up your kid after school. Power is being able to send your maid to do it for you.
I dislike cops, not because of some anti-authoritarian motives, but because I distrust them. I don't really believe that many cops become cops for the "greater good," or that those who do maintain that mindset for very long. At base we are all just people, people who want to live the way we want to live. A cop becomes a cop in much the same way that a plumber becomes a plumber, or a writer a writer. They choose to be. This choice (in present-day society) hands over the moral high ground to the cop in the hopes that everyone else will live a happier, safer life for it. And (sometimes) we do.
Part of me wonders if the price of this transfer of power is that occasionally some dude gets hit with a tazer at a political rally, or worse, someone gets beaten up or gunned down for a reason that in no way fits with the punishment...
Should we accept this? Should we demand more from our authorities? Or should we banish them altogether?
Question 17.2
