ICPPUL > Police
ICPPUL is an acronym that describes a type of malignant authority. ICPPUL stands for:
- ignorant, conflicted, privileged, power over, unaccountable, and lazy
(This is NOT representative of all police, or other forms of authority)
- ignorant: Police training requirements are lower in the US than many other countries, and less than the training required of hairdressers in some states. Most of the training American police receive concerns how to use force. Much less time is devoted to conflict-resolution, understanding the public’s constitutional rights, and the laws they pledge to enforce. But some are knowledgeable and educate the public.
- conflicted: The institution has a conflict of interest. They often have financial and career incentives to assess fines and issue tickets. The mass surveillance system pressures them to collect personal identification that they are often not entitled to. They consistently investigate themselves and find no wrongdoing.
- privileged: Qualified immunity gives police special status. They are the only group of people for whom ignorance of the law is a valid excuse. This license to be ignorant of the law promotes complacency.
- power over: They do not exercise “power with,” but they see themselves as a class separate and above the public. They use their power to troll and provoke those they are investigating. This despite the fact that consent-based policing is as old as the nation (see video below).
- unaccountable: Only in the most egregious and well-documented cases brought by sympathetic victims with good representation are police meaningfully held accountable. Often times, the perpetrating police quickly find reemployment as an officer in another town or city.
- lazy: They don’t put in the work necessary to know the law. When they don’t know the law, they do not consult the law or another knowledgeable officer before making an arrest or issuing a citation. Before taking action, they often rely on hearsay (complaints), rather than doing an actual investigation themselves to verify that a complaint is valid (partly because they don’t have to).
Podcast
Consent Based Policing