http://www.activistpost.com/2011/06/cops-just-love-those-tasers-mentally.html
^link to story
Let's imagine the following case: A shop owner hires John as a security guard in his establishment. In exchange for a salary, John starts to carry out his functions of protecting the merchant's and his customers' property from possible thefts and robberies by discouraging the actions of thieves through physical engagement if they attempt to commit a robbery. So far, so good — John performs one of the bravest and most noble professions, all within a strictly voluntary trading agreement and with respect for property. Now imagine that the store owner orders his security to destroy the competing stores, rendering his employer's store the only shopping option around. Or that John prevents — through the use or threat of physical violence — customers from buying products in places other than that of his employer. Or that John starts extorting a monthly amount of money from the entire neighborhood. Well, from this point on, anyone can say that if John chooses to comply with the orders from the owner of the store, he will become a criminal even though he continues to fulfill his original function of protecting the store and its customers from other criminals. But if John is an honest person who values moral consistency, he will surely refuse to commit such crimes and will look for another job. However, all functions described above are performed by state police: not only the function of protection of individuals' life and property against private criminal attacks, but also the criminal functions, such as preventing free competition in the market by implementing regulations, prohibitions and collection of taxes, amongst many others.
What is often claimed is that, unlike the security guard of the case above, the policeman does not follow orders from a private individual, but from a state. But this changes absolutely nothing of the nature of such actions. Human action is always individual. Only individuals act. Their actions are legitimate or criminal; and the fact that it has been ordered by a store owner, a president, a king, a dictator, or a majority of people in a particular territorial geography, does not turn vice into virtue. No one would say that the guards carrying out jus primae noctis were not criminals because they were acting on behalf of the king. Or, to use an example from a democratic state, the secret police officers of the German Nazi party executing Jews in concentration camps were not committing crimes because they were acting at the behest of a democratically elected government. These, for sake of example, are two cases in which a corrupt policeman who, in exchange for a bribe, wouldn't fulfill the "law" would be more desirable than the incorruptible one. And since every state has committed many crimes against its subjects, must we understand that all policemen are criminals? The answer is no, because the police are generally organized into subdivisions.
Police subdivisions
There are policemen that perform only virtuous and legitimate activities, there are ones that perform only criminal activities, and there are those that perform both types. The officers of the Anti-Kidnapping Division, for example, are police officers that do not involve themselves in criminal activities of the state for which they work. Their job is solely to combat the criminals who kidnap people — one of the most heinous crimes. And every time they get a job well done, they are rightly considered heroes, not only by the saved victims, but also by society as a whole. Not even the fact that they abstain themselves from fighting the largest kidnapping group of innocent people in society, which captures and keeps innocent victims captive for years at an impressive scale — the state — makes this division a criminal organism, for the non-action of refraining from helping someone can be considered immoral, but it can never be considered a criminal act. On the other hand, an example of policemen who are nothing but criminals are the policemen of the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration). Their job is to seek and obstruct the commerce and usage of certain substances the state arbitrarily decides to ban, such as marijuana, inhalants, steroids, heroin, morphine, amphetamines and even creatine supplements for athletes. They use their weapons to pursue and kidnap people who are engaging in trade; to threaten life and property of sellers who are satisfying the free demand of buyers; and, to steal the goods and the freedom of innocent people. That is to say, doing nothing more than what criminals do. However, some other organs of the police are tasked to perform these and many other crimes, but also get assigned, for instance, to pursue and arrest a murderer. The FBI is an example of such a branch. It is assigned to commit the same crimes as the DEA and many other crimes like: the persecution and capturing of people who are merely trying not to be stolen from (whom they call "tax evaders"), people who are sending their own money outside the state (which they call "capital flight"), people who are entering the country with goods purchased abroad without the consent of the king (the nomenclature for which is "smuggling"), and they even have slaughtered men, women and children for just exercising their freedom of religion and their right to keep and bear arms, as in the case of Waco, TX (what they had the impudence enough to profess that these people were slaves and they represented a danger to themselves and to the surrounding community!). Finally, the lists of crimes that are committed by FBI are endless. But what if they are also entrusted with the task to pursue and arrest real criminals like murderers and rapists? How should we judge them and other police agencies that do both criminal and legitimate activities? Are they necessary and even heroic?
Simple dilemma
At first glance, what may seem a difficult dilemma to resolve turns out to be rather simple, for a "bandit" and "hero" are not mutually exclusive qualifications; i.e., a person — not a specific action — can be considered both a criminal and a hero. Let us consider the hypothetical case of a known thief in the neighborhood that had committed multiple robberies. Since he was always able to escape from the security agents that pursued him, let's imagine he was walking freely through the streets when he saw a burning building and, risking his own life, bravely faced the fire and saved the lives of a dozen people. Would someone say that he was no longer a thief then? Of course not, because a brave, heroic, decent act does not redeem or delete crimes committed before and neither does it with those that could be committed later. Likewise, a committed crime does not render a previous or a posterior heroic act non-existent. This thief will always be a hero to the dozen people who remain alive because of his act, but for his victims, he will always be the person who stole from them. Another example: if a man chases and arrests the rapist of a child and on the following day he murders a man, does he cease to be a killer and should he not pay for this crime? Obviously not, because although he deserves the recognition and admiration of all for helping to bring justice in the case of rape, he also deserves the contempt and scorn of society for killing an innocent person, and must be punished severely just as any other killer who has never committed a heroic act.
It is therefore simple to ethically analyze those police subdivisions that do not commit crimes and also those that only commit crimes; it is also easy to express an opinion on those subdivisions that perform both legitimate and necessary duties as well as criminal ones. The officers who are part of latter, mixed type of subdivisions that carry out these duties do not differ at all from John, the security guard of our example above, who starts to commit a series of crimes besides the fulfillment of his duty towards his employer's store. They are just criminals, who may sometimes also perform good deeds.
The difference between sporadic, private criminals and the police is that the former are anonymous; they are always running away and hiding, and are usually only revealed as criminals after being caught. The police officers, on the other hand, usually reveal their identity and are identified by uniforms and badges. Vehicles and buildings used by this criminal group openly display their markings. And they proudly flaunt their crimes, as when, for example, they "make an apprehension of drugs and smuggled goods", in other words, when they rob the property of merchants, and proudly announce to the society all the figures and details of the robbery they carried out. (that makes them a gang)
Conclusion
Thus, this compulsory monopoly of the use of force, that in addition to this crime — monopoly— practices many others, creates a situation where the police, which should be the guardian of property rights, is the same unit that attacks such rights; that those who should execute one of the most honorable and courageous functions of society: the addressing and directly tackling of some of the worst things in our world — human wickedness — manifested in the form of terrible crimes against life and property, are the same people who in most cases commit many other crimes,
and sometimes exclusively commit crimes. It is still amazing that, for example, a police officer that heroically risks his life to protect people from a robbery one day, invades private property and points his guns at elderly women to prevent them from enjoying their bingo game on the following day; thus deserving the same social contempt destined to the robber he arrested the day before for this crime and so many others committed on a daily basis. These people that — by a divine gift, a genetic predisposition or any reasons whatsoever — have the courage to face the most vicious elements of society should be the first to denounce the crimes ordered by the state and, of course, refuse to take part in them
What's in a defintion
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