Outrage (Song for Baltimore)

My cousin is a cop. My godson's dad is a cop. The guy I grew up calling "Uncle" (in actuality a family friend since my dad was a kid, but as much family to me then as the ones I was genetically related to) was a cop until he retired. And my great-uncle was a cop. I grew up holding his tiny, antique NYPD badge every time I could get my hands on it, turning it over and over in my fingers in awe and reverence. I am very, very pro cop.

That's one of the reasons the recent events gnaw at my stomach so fiercely. "Recent events" - as if that were a reasonable way to describe the seemingly endless stream of people of color dying at the hands of those sworn to serve and protect. And yet the horror is so overwhelming it seems to defy any brief summary, any shorthand. How do you reduce lives - human beings with friends, enemies, families, dreams, flaws, hopes, loves, and hates - to a sentence when you're trying to get your head around the whole picture, the span and scope of the monstrosity? Of course you can't, but it's human nature to strive to make sense of the chaos by whatever means we can, and so we try to encapsulate, to fit it all in somehow, lopping off edges as we must. We see life in patterns. Yes, we do. And this one's written in blood and neon.

And even that sounds glib. That's the magnitude of the loss, the size of the injustice. Like numbers so big they've lost all meaning, it's just too much for our language - or at least, beyond my meager skills - to fully convey. The repeated systemic betrayal of a sacred trust resulting in the worst possible repercussions. It's that.

So tonight my outrage is complex. I'm outraged at the unmitigated gall of those I hear castigating the people of Baltimore for their refusal to stay docile, to murmur the melodies of old spirituals while marching stoically and carrying banners saying "Pray for peace, and pray for him, the latest victim." 

I'm outraged that their privilege allows them to think, much less say, "Protest if you must, but don't damage property." As though the property were the important thing, more important than the life - the lives. As if the deaths of black men were only outrageous when they were considered property themselves. 

I'm outraged that people dare to criticize the world for exploding in the face of such obscenity. People dare to say, without a hint of irony, that "this is not the way to effect change," that the same peaceful civil disobedience that has done exactly nothing to stem the tide of institutionalized violence should be trusted again - that this time, despite being battered, bloody, flayed alive, people should offer some yet undiscovered other cheek. That they should extend the hand of friendship and patience to the dog that bites over and over again.

Yes, I am outraged.

I'm also outraged that those cops I love - the ones who dedicate their lives to their communities, the ones who believe in protecting and serving, not punishing and dominating, those who build up instead of tearing down - I'm outraged that they're tarred with the same brush as those who do such unmitigated evil. There have been bad cops for as long as there have been badges, but today's police culture has become one of closed ranks and blind support irrespective of sin, rather than one that demands the best of its members and expels those who don't measure up without mercy and without exception. It wasn't always so.

And this, in the end, is how you win. You don't beat a cancer by pretending it's not there, or by pretending it's not malignant, or that it's just a small thing not worth acting on yet. You don't beat it by taking the "wait and see, maybe it'll go away on its own" stance. You eliminate a tumor by removing it as early and thoroughly as possible, and then remaining sharply vigilant for any signs of remaining or returning sickness. You face the problem head-on, even though you know it's going to be a painful and difficult fight. You face it even though it hurts. And then you do what needs to be done. It won't be comfortable. Do it anyway.

When I was that child, holding that small, holy relic and running my fingers over the letters "NYPD" until I was in danger of wearing them smooth, I did so because those men (of course, back then they were all men) were real heroes. They were the kind who seemed like supermen because they quite literally were better than the rest of us - better people, whose egos were subjugated in service to the greater good. To them it wasn't about power, it was about responsibility. 

Those cops still exist. They still serve their communities, often unsung, but in it for reasons beyond glory. They are still my heroes. And I know without having to ask them that they're outraged, too.