One of my new friends is/was a cop. Just found out about it. I genuinely believe ACAB, and this news has me conflicted because my new friend seems really cool and super nice. I don’t know him super well yet, though. He’s a big part of this new friend group and I don’t know how to process this and how to deal with the fact he’s a cop.
I don’t want to look past the fact he’s a cop, but I want to stay his friend and stay in this friend group.
Any advice for dealing with this shit?
I can’t talk to my therapist about it until Thursday.
Seems like maybe reality is at odds with a generalization. Maybe every cop is not a bastard, every landlord is not an oppressive monster, and every person who makes more money than you is not a net drain on society.
Maybe you have just discovered something rare and elusive: nuance.
This post reads like a lefty caricature by someone hard right, esp the last sentence.
Cops are not necessary evil, but the system tends to corrupt people and turn them to bad cops, just as with any position of power.
Landlords… well it depends. Someone who saved up a bit of money and invest in a few properties for retirement fund, they aren’t evil, just trying to survive.
Someone already rich and just want to buy up entire apartment buildings? Yea that seems a bit like excessive property hoarding, don’t sympathize with those.
Thanks for some sanity here. Some of these comments are really bizarre.
Look, I get that the system is shitty and corrupt. I don’t condone that and I agree it needs to change. But that doesn’t mean that every single individual is a terrible person. Some people are too chronically online to understand that life is not black and white.
ACAB is cops as a collective. Like, your friend may be a great person when not at work. And may even be ‘one of the good ones’ when on the clock.
That doesn’t mean he’s going to testify against a fellow officer that he sees planting drugs on a suspect.
Up to you if that’s someone you want to hang around with. But I will say there’s a lot of other moral grey areas when it comes to professions in our culture.
I have people in my friends group that are landlords. I don’t make it a point to hang out with them, but I don’t shun them either.
That doesn’t mean he’s going to testify against a fellow officer that he sees planting drugs on a suspect.
I work in the medical field. If anyone in my field was fucking around, like cops routinely do, they would be reported and fired faster than the rumour would spread. Our priority is the patient not my coworkers.
Cops, however, are ride or die- the public is just another tribe. ACAB because “good cops” enable every “bad cop”, it’s only a matter of time before every cop faces this challenge and every cop that does the right thing is run out of the department for being a “troublemaker”.
ACAB is cops as a collective. Like, your friend may be a great person when not at work. And may even be ‘one of the good ones’ when on the clock.
That doesn’t mean he’s going to testify against a fellow officer that he sees planting drugs on a suspect.
Totally. Some of the most horrific stories in the Police Problem community is what cops do to their friends and family.
There’s that one cop that won best police officer award and was straight off killing people.
Develop a more complex and articulated theory of the problems with American policing than “ACAB”. That’s a four word model of reality.
Shit’s complex.
i use to work with the police, and many i considered my friends. i know they were good people, but i also knew those on the force that were not.
part of the acab movement is about how the general public can never know which is which, so it is in our best interest to assume we are always facing the worst of the worst. your intimate knowledge of the person can be held separately from the movement.
i do understand that those good cops allowing those bad cops is a huge issue but thats really on them, not you. officers who attempt to ‘fix’ this issue arent officers for very long.
officers who attempt to ‘fix’ this issue arent officers for very long.
I think this is the crux of it. ACAB because any cop with morals and integrity doesn’t keep their job. Those who are left are either monsters or enablers.
I genuinely believe ACAB, and this news has me conflicted because my new friend seems really cool and super nice.
What you’re experiencing is cognitive dissonance. New information is clashing with your prior beliefs, leaving you with a choice: either update your beliefs or double down and lie to yourself even harder.
The thing is: which belief is the lie? Can cops not be bastards? Or is this guy not as nice as he appears to be?
That all cops are bastards.
How can you be so sure that’s the lie? Is that not just your own prior belief? Why do others need to evaluate their beliefs, but yours should only be doubled down on? Is that not cognitive dissonance?
There are tens of millions of cops around the world. The idea that not a single one of them is a good person is so statistically improbable that I’d bet my life on it being false.
Can you name another broad generalization that applies to every single member of that group without exception?
It’s a private club that is only open to bastards. If someone stays, it’s because the group decided they belong.
It’s not statistical probability. It’s cause and effect. All cops are bastards not because of luck, but because only bastards remain cops.
Ever heard the phrase “Nazi bar”? You let one nazi stick around, then more nazis come in and people who aren’t nazis have to either leave, be nice to the nazis, or put up with a lot of nazi attacks. Either way, the entire bar becomes full of nazis.
Law enforcement is a bastard bar. If you’re not a bastard, you leave. If you stay, you’re either a bastard, a bastard enabler, or you have a target on your back and won’t be a cop for long.
Oh yeah? You gonna open up to a cop? You gonna talk to him about stuff, maybe? You know, about that thing? What’s he gonna do? Is he gonna write it down later? What if he finds out about your association with a minority? Is he gonna arrest your friend because of something you let slip? Does he hide when his friends and family commit crimes? Can you trust a friend like that?
Because the fact he chose a bastard job makes him a bastard.
I feel bad for you. The imaginary world you live in must be really terrifying.
Where I live, there’s a strict screening process to become a cop. It requires a three-year education, and you need a college degree just to apply. There are far more applicants than available spots, so even many good candidates don’t make it in. Trust in the police is generally quite high among the population, they’re respected, and every time a firearm is used for example, it’s investigated thoroughly. Officers do face legal consequences when malpractice is discovered.
So, yeah, I’d hang out with a cop and talk to them about the same stuff I’d discuss with anyone else.
Oooooh, so your opinion is irrelevant everywhere else. Have fun with the leopards. I’m sure they won’t eat your face.
When you realize that the cop on the job and the person in their free time are 2 separate, almost independent, personalities, the cognitive dissonance goes away.
Uh no. That is exactly what cognitive dissonance IS.
No. If you want to correct someone, please be sure to know your definitions.
Cognitive dissonance is a process inside the observers mind. In this example it goes something like this: ‘I believe all cops are bastards’ vs. ‘I met a cop and he is not a bastard’ -> something doesnt match, thats the dissonance.
My sarcastic comment hinted at the person OP met not being a cop, but the flipside of a human that is a cop in their job and a completely different person in their freetime (like schizophrenics). This makes the second statement ‘I met a cop and he is not a bastard’ untrue and resolves the dissonance.
It is not cognitive dissonance to understand that people wear different masks around different people Your best friend can be nice to you while secretly abusing his family. Cop can treat others like subhumans, and still be nice to you. Still a bastard.
I believe ACAB, and my cousin is actively trying to become a state trooper.
Doesn’t mean I walk up and spit in his face at every family gathering. We talk, we grew up together, we shoot the shit and have a good time.
But if he asked me to condone or celebrate his job? Nah, he knows how I feel about the police and their profession, as long as he’s safe and not drinking the Kool aid (he will) that’s all I can hope. And that maybe he’ll open his eyes someday. 🤷♀️
As a hard rule, though, I won’t date cops or mess around with them. One reached out on a dating app recently and I just politely responded with “I’m not interested in law enforcement, sorry” to which I got “Uh, I’m actually a correctional officer.”
Cool, so you abuse people after the police have finished abusing them, that’s not the brag you think it is.
This is the best mentality
Idk add some nuance into your life maybe
Perhaps you should get to know your friend better, instead of stereotyping him. You can either learn a little about the nuances of a law enforcement career from him, or shun him and put your head back in the sand
ACAB is about defaulting to thinking of them as bad guys and enemies until proven otherwise. This new friend of yours has proven otherwise, why you so hung up on it. The world isn’t black and white, there’s all kinds of shades in between and it’s not even a linear scale. Have some nuance in your morals and ethics.
First of all, I find your phrasing that he “is/was” a cop kind of interesting. Is he a cop or is he not? If he was but is no longer a cop, it could very well be that he left that career because he shares some of your same thoughts and feelings and you’re getting yourself worked up over nothing.
Anyway
To me, ACAB means that all cops are bastards collectively
It does not mean that each individual cop is a bastard.
There are undoubtedly some cops that are good people, doing their damnedest to do the right thing, standing up for the little guy against the bastards, who are trying to make the system better from the inside, who understand the role that policing should be, etc.
And there are of course some who are bastards, who abuse their power and do all of the things that make policing shitty.
And there are cops who aren’t actively bastards themselves, but also aren’t doing anything to make waves and stand up against the bastards.
It’s a case of a few rotten apples spoiling the bunch. The apple barrel has a couple absolutely amazing apples in there that are everything you could ever want from an apple, a whole bunch of meh run-of-the-mill grocery store apples, that do the job of being an apple well enough, but aren’t going to make you stand up and say “holy shit, that’s a good fucking apple,” and then there’s a handful of rotten apples that will make you puke your guts up, and unfortunately you don’t get to pick and choose which apple you’re eating, you just have to reach in blind and take a bite, and since those rotten apples are in there, it’s a pretty big gamble to make, you have to really need that apple for it to be worth it.
However, entering into a friendship is different than other interactions you’d have with the police. You get a chance to inspect the apple before you eat it, to see if it’s good, ok, or rotten to the core.
I’d say don’t dismiss him outright because he’s a cop, but try to feel him out, see what his attitude and philosophy is like, don’t grill him on it, but take note of how he reacts when different subjects are brought up, and if you find something problematic with what he says, try to explain how your views are different in a non-confrontational way, don’t make it a fight or an argument or a debate, just try to explain your thoughts and feelings and try to understand why he thinks the way he does as well. With the right people around him, it’s possible that you could help make him or keep him a good cop when otherwise he might go bad, it’s up to you if you want to take on that task.
Can you separate the profession from the person?
Does ACAB mean the people are bastards, or does it mean it’s a job that can never be done ethically?
Is ACAB a critique of the people doing the job, or is it a criticism of our society for tolerating being policed?
This is one of many problems with “ACAB” because not every cop is one way or the other.
Reality is that a functioning society needs police officers. It sounds like you hit it off with this person and they have some good qualities that you like.
How do you expect the police to change if we don’t get involved? Getting rid of the police entirely is not a solution. But getting in and making changes from the inside is a valid way to make things better.
Why are you wanting to create an echo chamber for yourself? Why don’t you expose yourself to others and other ideas that are different than yours? What’s the harm there? Are you scared you won’t be able to change his mind or that his ideas might make some sense to you?
This.
I’m friends with a former Republican social media person. I don’t share his views and he’s knows that, but I can appreciate his views so that I can learn.
Sometimes the most uncomfortable perspective can help you grasp some really complicated things.
And also, you might not even know what their views on the police are.
Just get to know them. Don’t adapt their views if you don’t subscribe to them, but listen to them and maybe you can take away some stuff here and there.
Yes go out and befriend a KKK grand wizard today lol you will learn a lot.
Sure, ask Daryl Davis https://youtu.be/PVVFx3issHg
Sure go hangout with a neo nazi, I’m sure they have redeeming qualities.
Neo-nazies are the same species of human as KKK members. If what Daryl Davis did worked with KKK it should work with neo-nazies too. Or do you have a valid reason to think it wouldn’t?
I have a friend who worked at a convenience store in an area where the KKK still has a decent presence. The local grand wizard or dragon or whatever ridiculous rank he had took a liking to my friend (it should maybe be noted that my friend is practically a caricature of blond, blue-eyed whiteness.) I wouldn’t say they were friends, it was more than he was on the clock and couldn’t really afford to lose his job by telling some racist fuck to pound sand, they didn’t keep in contact outside of work, neither of them changed each other’s minds about anything (my friend is now engaged to a black woman) but they did have some fairly in depth and civil conversations about race and society and such.
I can’t say for what Mr Pointy Hat’s takeaway was from their talks, but my friend’s overall impression is that the klan guy was kind of stuck. He kind of seemed to know that the world had changed around him, and that maybe he was in the wrong and there was no place for someone like him anymore, but he was unable and/or unwilling to change himself to adapt to the new world and to different ways of thinking than he’d been brought up with, so the kkk was kind of his way of carving a safe space for himself out of the world where he knew how things worked and where he had some sort of value. And his hatred towards black people and other people different from himself wasn’t really that they should be killed or enslaved or treated poorly, but that he didn’t get why they needed to be part of the same society as him, sort of like if they could just all go off and live in their own countries he’d wish them the best in their endeavors.
I’m not saying that’s at all a good philosophy, I find it absolutely abhorrent, but it’s also more nuanced than I would have otherwise thought a klansman would be capable of.
I also won’t say that my friend necessarily had a perfect read on this guy, it could very well be that he totally took the wrong things away from what the guy said. And even if he did hit the nail on the head, with a sample size of 1, you can’t exactly extrapolate that to say that the rest of the klan or other racist shitbags feel the same way.
But I do think there can be some value in talking to some of these types of people, maybe not befriending them exactly, but building some sort of mutual understanding might help get some of them onto the right path before they end up too old and stuck in their ways like that guy.
Something about playing with a dog who was rolling in the sewer and you will also stink like shit. I’m exposed to enough morons, people don’t change at least not for the better. I’m not going out of my way to engage more but good for you.
If you didn’t think people can change, you probably wouldn’t spend as much time arguing with people on the internet as you do. Not really much point in doing that since you’re not going to change their minds after all.
But even if you genuinely don’t think people are capable of improvement, I think it would still be worthwhile in a “know your enemy” sort of way.
Yeah just keep getting to know your enemy. That is super effective way to deal with them. Kill them with kindness as it were lol while they kill you with rocks. Worry not I’m sure in 3 days you’ll rise again.
My dude, what the actual fuck are you on about?
“Know your enemy” isn’t a saying about peaceful turn-the-other-cheek, love-thy-neighbor, forgiveness bullshit
It’s about knowing how and why they fight so you know how to defeat them.
You can’t and won’t win over every individual Nazi or klansman and make them see the light, but each one you do is one less enemy on their side and one more ally on yours, and my talking to them you get a better understanding on how to beat them.
Sure buddy sure. As Elvis put it." A little bit less conversation a little more action please…" Ya dig?
I have a couple of friends in law enforcement (NYPD & state Police). They tend to be best cops around, one of them is being sent to be a trainer so he can get some bigger promotions.
You got to ask yourself and maybe them if they are a good person. All cops are bad because of what the system does to them. But who they are in spite of what that system is doing says more about who they are as a person.
Chances are they’ll have edgy jokes, but you’ve been on the Internet long enough to end up here, so I’m sure you can navigate that.
Remember conservatives hate liberal arts colleges because people who are exposed to diversity are more tolerant of it.
This is one of many problems with “ACAB” because not every cop is one way or the other.
It’s a statement of what the job entails, whether the individual is a “moral” person off the clock is not relevant.
Reality is that a functioning society needs police officers.
Police are a relatively modern invention, have only been around ~200 years.
Police as in law enforcement. That’s been around a long, long, long time.
It sounds like you are the kind of person that can’t comprehend empathy and stepping into other persons shoes. If something doesn’t happen to you you’re sticking to pre canned ideas you heard repeated often enough.
What did you expect, that a cop would show up to a friendly meeting and bully everyone there? That’s not what makes ACAB. it’s the fact that s significant portion of them beat wifes, or use deadly force, or are unfair to minorities.
You’re already going into the mode " he treats me ok so he must be nice to everybody". Ask him if he’d turn a blind eye if a homeless person steals food from a big supermarket, and you’ll have a chance of glimpsing how he deals with problems and people on a non friendly, stressful, low stakes environment.
I don’t know if this will help or not. I came across this video a while ago. It’s a former cop describing what they deal with. I’m ACAB too, but they are still people being exploited just like us. The system is what we should be directing our anger towards. https://youtu.be/_nl5zMIwcmQ?si=mbAwDWi6vjGx3Njz
They can quit if don’t like what they’re dealing with.
no one drafted police, they chose that profession and have the opportunity to leave it. no sympathy.
I genuinely believe ACAB,
Yeahhhh… No. That’s not true. Being a police officer doesn’t make someone a bad person. Good cops exist.
The reason ACAB is because a good cop exists in a superposition between resigned and
murderedtragically killed in the line of duty, and the act of reporting a bad cop collapses the waveform.I was of this conviction until Amsterdam riot cops hunted down protestors like animals and beat them relentlessly, without reason, after they were released from custody, and not a single other cop denounced it.
(Here’s a short compilation of videos taken while it happened, a journalistic video piece and a news article)
Good cops should prevent bad cops from existing.
There are no good cops.
You forgot to add “…for a very short time per individual” at the end
