Good for you for simply involving yourself in your neighbourhood and community this way, especially engaging the authority of a cop on the street. That takes courage, and I wish more people had yours. Well done.
What a weird situation, and a good reaction from you!
You saw an interaction that disturbed you, went to try to see what was going on, and were treated poorly yourself and ended up feeling confused and upset about your interaction with the police as well as their interaction with someone else. You could focus on explaining to them how this is counterproductive because now they have a resident whose trust in the police has been reduced (which will also make their jobs harder, but you don't need to state that directly IMO).
Maybe that guy was a dangerous criminal, and our legal system failed to provide a legitimate way of doing something useful with him, and fabricating charges so that he could be arrested was in the best interest of society.
But is breaking the law to achieve what they believe to be the best course of action really a habit you want the police to be in?
What if they were wrong? What if, in the future, they're wrong about somebody you care about?
These same police who don't want us to be allowed to video tape them, in public where we can video tape anybody else, in their duties as public servants. What do they have to hide?
Police have a scary amount of power and lack of oversight.
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You saw an interaction that disturbed you, went to try to see what was going on, and were treated poorly yourself and ended up feeling confused and upset about your interaction with the police as well as their interaction with someone else. You could focus on explaining to them how this is counterproductive because now they have a resident whose trust in the police has been reduced (which will also make their jobs harder, but you don't need to state that directly IMO).
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But is breaking the law to achieve what they believe to be the best course of action really a habit you want the police to be in?
What if they were wrong? What if, in the future, they're wrong about somebody you care about?
These same police who don't want us to be allowed to video tape them, in public where we can video tape anybody else, in their duties as public servants. What do they have to hide?
Police have a scary amount of power and lack of oversight.
This is a fun video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B_yw1iYKpA
And you might find these folks interesting: http://www.copwatch.org/
Thanks for doing as much as you have already. It's much easier not to.
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