A Cycle of Fear and Irrationality

Scared people act irrationally.

I’ve been pulled over a couple of times in my life, to receive a talking-to from a traffic policeman about a piece of dubious (although not dangerous) driving. I’m not afraid of the police, though. Some people are. And when people are afraid, they do irrational and unwise things – like running away from what they fear.

A man commits a minor traffic infraction, and runs from the police. 7 police break down the door of his house, enter with guns drawn, tase him, and pepper-spray his 84-year-old mother, before pinning her to the ground and arresting her as she cried “Help me, Jesus”. What sort of country does this kind of massive overreaction happen in? One guess. In the UK, the registered keeper of the vehicle would probably have got a £50 fine in the post two weeks later. Do our roads contain a significantly higher incidence of dangerous driving?

Scared people act irrationally. Why are people scared of the police? Because of incidents like this. Why does this sort of thing happen? Because people act irrationally and the police see it as a provocation. This is a cycle that isn’t going to be easily broken. But the burden of breaking it lies with the police.

Last year in the US, the police killed around 1146 people. In an average year in the entirety of the UK (population: 1/5th of the US), the police fire their guns at all less than 10 times. Are US suspects really so much more dangerous than UK ones?