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The police provide communities all over the United States with protection. They come to
people’s rescue in situations that only the specially trained can handle. However, there are issues
within the police system. Police brutality is a problem in U.S. society as we see stories in the
news of individuals being put to their death by a police officer demonstrates this issue. While
every situation is different, a police officer’s first reaction should be to protect the lives of the
citizens. Targeting individuals by race or gender may be seen as a myth to some but it is a
problem associated with police brutality. When events of police lashing out aggressively occur,
chaos takes over cities and states. With continuous headlines of death by police, there is a
disconnect between the police and communities creating a lack of security and an increase in
protest and backlash toward the police. To be able to solve the issue of police brutality, officers
need to understand the history and culture of the communities they work, receive better and more
Police brutality was not a problem that began in the 21st century. Dating back to the 18th
century there was extreme violence within the police forces, especially within the issue of black
prejudice. Homer Hawkins and Richard Thomas discuss white policing of black populations. The
policing was used as an excuse to control and over power the black communities of the times
(Hawkins). Since the first type of police force was formed in a time of racial tension, there are
still reflections and evidence of continued prejudice against minorities. “In short, much of the
white policing in black urban communities was little more than another form of white social
control which had evolved over the centuries in response to whites’ racial phobias of black
people.” (Hawkins). This long and painful history caused many people of these communities to
fear the police rather than trusting them with their safety and lives. Police brutality began during
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a time of racial tension and any aggression an officer showed an individual, which often was
extreme, became the norm. When aggression was a necessity to being a police officer in the
1700s, the trait was passed down and continues today. Police brutality has become a problem in
our society as it degrades individuals not guilty of a crime and can affect the surrounding
community and its safety if something were to happen. While the officer and the offender are
feeling the force of direct actions, there are bigger problems to consider if both lives aren’t
protected equally.
Even though police brutality may not affect everyone personally, it can impact
communities in which we live. Some individuals feel that police officers should be protected at
all costs but others believe that the police should be held accountable for their actions. In
Charlotte, North Carolina there was an outbreak of chaotic protests after an officer shot a man,
Keith Scott. These protests brought Charlotte to a state of emergency, which in turn affected the
safety of officers, community members, and the protestors. In many cases of police brutality, the
police officer is given a warning for their aggressive behavior even if shooting someone. In On
Liberty, John Stuart Mill, a political philosopher, discusses the contrasting ideas of liberty and
authority. “By liberty, was meant protection against the tyranny of political rulers. The rulers
were conceived as in a necessarily antagonistic positon to the people whom they ruled.” (Mill).
In the United States, liberty is the freedom afforded to the people to have their voice heard.
Police brutality takes away this voice. Everyone who is innocently harmed or killed by an officer
loses their right to be questioned. In some communities, officers are viewed as antagonistic
characters because of their rash and aggressive actions. To take away the negative perspective
individuals have, officers need to try to understand people’s values and liberties in our country.
Through both sides of the arguments of police brutality, whether the lethal force by the officer
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should be ignored or the officer should be held accountable for his or her actions, they each have
points to argue. It is important to recognize who represents the two sides of the argument. Since
there has been discrimination in the past, many minorities, such as African Americans, have a
sense of neglect and misrecognition. Charles Taylor in “The Politics of Recognition” focuses on
how some individual feel when they suffer a negative image and how they begin to believe the
same about themselves. He describes recognition as a need rather than want because it is the way
we identify ourselves. Without recognition, there is no feeling of the power to speak out. In the
case of police brutality, many communities with minorities feel that their voice has been taken
and they don’t have the confidence to stand up for themselves. Police are responsible for
protecting their citizens, not breaking them down. So, when an officer handles any situation there
needs to be consideration for how a person may be impacted by police. Through understanding
and deescalating a situation, they officer can gain the trust of many individuals and give them a
Every problem has a solution. However, the solution is never easy to accomplish because
of the controversial nature of the problem. Police brutality can be solved through giving officers
more specific training and raise their salaries. For many years, the training police officers
received was solely based on their protection, and while their lives are very important, we also
want to ensure the safety of the citizens as well. By providing training for officers that highlights
high-pressure situations it allows them to make better judgements of when and when not to use
lethal force. While every situation is different and you can’t train for everything that will happen
out in communities, high pressure situations happen and officers need to be prepared to keep
everyone safe. Another important aspect of the training police officers should receive would be
to understand the history of the community and become more involved within it. Traditional
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policing was viewed as an immediate arrest when not complying with the general law (Greene).
However, as society sees more issues with police, training has shifted to a tactic known as
community policing. The common elements in community policing include redefinition of police
roles to prevent crime, improved mutual relations between the police and community,
decentralization of police services and commands in different areas, and place more control in
the communities (Greene). By increasing training for high pressure situations as well as
community policing, it will foster positive attitudes within the community as well as decrease the
amount of deaths from police brutality. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average
salary for a police officer is $60,270 per year and the American median salary is $43,000 as of
2016 (PoliceOne). While location plays a factor in wages due to increased costs of living, many
of these officers are working every day on early and late shifts to protect our communities. By
increasing the salaries of officers, there will be an increased interest in becoming an officer and
as a result more motivated individuals in the field who want to protect the citizens. When the
officer’s life is on the line each time he goes to work there should be a higher pay for the training
and stress they endure. With more qualified and motivated officers, I believe we would see a
decrease in lethal force from officers. Through both solutions, it would diminish the fight
between two sides and create positive relationships within communities all over the United
States.
Retraining officers and raising salaries are two important solutions to end police brutality
yet there are concerns of how those could be plausible. To retrain officers would take a lot of
time and money as there are hundreds of stations in each state. In some of the rural areas of the
United States, there is very little room in their budget for funding any “extracurricular”. In big
cities, like New York City, there are over 30,000 police officers in their academy and retraining
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all of them seems unrealistic and not beneficial. Another critique of retraining officers would be
individuals who believe that the training in place currently is effective and the use of force is
necessary. Charles Taylor discusses the politics of recognition and details that recognition is of
extreme importance in our society today and a lack of recognition can result in “a person or
group of people can suffer real damage, real distortion if, if the people or society around them
This theory is present in our U.S. communities when it comes to police as the officers begin to
lose their sense of pride when individuals don’t appreciate their dedication and protection. The
more this image of police occurs, the more frustration occurs and lack of motivation for wanting
to change the way they train. As a result of police gaining a negative connotation, retraining is
even more confident to ensuring that members of a community only have positive interactions
and situations are handled in a calm yet effective manner. In response to cities and states not
having enough money in their budgets to fund a retraining program, there needs to be a sacrifice
for public safety. Through retraining all the officers, it would reduce potential lawsuits and
dangers to both police and citizens. Without retraining, officers are at risk for escalating
situations, using extreme force, and providing communities with more ammunition to believe
police officers effect their lives negatively. Officers deserve a positive recognition and through
During the training to become a police officer, they are taught the importance of making
it home every night. They are shown violence and death to videos to put the point across. In the
minds of many officers, “better to be judged by twelve than carried by six.” (Stoughton). When
officers have this mindset, there is no hesitation to reach for their gun, even within a calm
setting. The root of the issue is that police executives don’t want to review the use of force many
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officers use. Through retraining there is a benefit to the officer’s safety as well as the community
safety because the first thought is not to reach for their gun when thing may escalate. An
example of the benefits happened in Kalamazoo, Michigan. An aggressive man was carrying a
rifle and it ended with a 40-minute standoff and a handshake. Through the retraining, they were
able to deescalate the situation and not end in a 911 call (Stoughton). The critique that retraining
officers doesn’t benefit anything and things are fine the way they are doesn’t stand. There is a
need to change the way we handle situations so that more citizens are protected and officers
Another solution to the issue of police brutality would be to raise the salaries of officers
yet this has many critiques. Many believe that pay doesn’t correlate with performance. There was
a study done to analyze how losing an arbitration, a fight for wage increase, can affect the
performance of police officers. The study showed that police performance declined when
officers lost an arbitration. “The per capita number of crimes cleared (solved) by arrest is 12
percent higher in the months following an arbitration that ruled in favor of the police officer,”
(Das). Through this study, they were able to analyze that when police fight for higher or fair
wages and gain a raise they handle situations with an arrest rather than use of excessive force or
even death. The critique for the solution of raising the salaries remains where do we get this
money? The money that is in the budget for a state allocates money in different areas, some more
important than others, but the amounts vary. If an officer was to receive a higher salary there
would be less money for education or funds to repair the roads. Priority is what states use in
order to choose how to allocate their funds. By allocating the funds to public safety, there will be
a positive impact in our community. To become a police officer, you must go through rigorous
training and examinations to be able to serve a community. Raising the salary of police officers
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would motivate the officers and provide them the opportunity to always feel comfortable in a
financial stance. In the University of Declaration of Human Rights, Article 24 states, “Everyone
has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic
holidays with pay.” No matter what day of the week or hour of the day, police work to protect
our communities. They make sacrifices, and while the do receive pay when on holidays,
someone does have to work on holidays. Through increasing their salaries, there will be more of
Every critique made to combat the solutions of retraining police officers and raising their
salaries has a valid argument. There are many logistical issues when it comes to paying money
for something that there isn’t always an immediate response. Nothing can happen overnight but
there need to be measures taken to decrease the amount of police brutality and eventually lead it
to an end. In Hannah Arendt’s, The Pursuit of Happiness, he discusses the “public happiness”
and the meaning of revolution. He depicts the necessity for revolution as a move toward political
freedom. Many cases of police brutality begin with individuals who don’t feel equally treated
and don’t feel like they have the power of political freedom. When members of a community are
empowered with political freedom they can gain a sense of voice and confidence. Police officers
can silence an individual’s voice but the goal to end police brutality needs to begin with allowing
Issues of money may be apparent in the solutions proposed to end police brutality. There
are many communities who don’t trust police officers because of the history of excessive force
and violence they have shown in some cases, and they don’t see the need to support them. To
combat this issue, there needs to be more communication and transparency between the
communities and officers. This is where the tactic of community policing comes in to play. The
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more police officers are involved in the communities they live and work in, the easier it is to gain
support. However, this all begins with the actions that they show. Like in the case of Kalamazoo,
Michigan when the officers began with a man with a rifle acting crazy and ended it with patience
and a handshake. Examples like that will show the communities that officers protect the lives of
citizens and don’t make the situation any larger of an issue than it needs to be. Through gaining
the support of the communities they work, the solutions will be easier to implement.
Police brutality creates chaos and distrust within the United States. There have been
protests and retaliating shootings toward the police because some citizens don’t feel protected.
As a society full of resources, we need to use them to make officers aware of the dangers they
face when not following the law and reward them for risking their lives to protect us. In some
situations, there is probable cause to shoot someone but in other situations the individual may be
innocent and wasn’t even given a chance. By retraining police officers to handle high pressure
situations and enforce the idea of community policing, there will be less innocent civilians killed
and officers. Community policing can create a bond with the people who don’t trust officers and
allow them to see officers as real people who sacrifice their lives daily. Raising the salaries of
officers increases the number of motivated police officers who want to make a difference in the
communities and protect everyone. When getting paid low wages, they only want to look out for
themselves because they aren’t getting paid enough to risk their life for people who could take
their own. Their wages aren’t only a way for them survive, but something to be proud of. When
an officer is being paid fair for the work and the risks they take every day they gain a sense of
pride for their profession and as a result protect that image. By implementing these solutions
there will be safer communities. There won’t be as many issues of civilians protesting and the
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chaos that can bring to a community. Rewarding police officers for all the good they do will be
Works Cited
Greene, Jack R. "Community policing in America: Changing the nature, structure, and function
Hawkins, Homer, and Richard Thomas. "White Policing of Black Populations." Out of Order?
"How much does a cop make?" PoliceOne. N.p., 15 Sept. 2016. Web. 07 Apr. 2017.
Mas, Alexandre. "Pay, Reference Points, and Police Performance." The Quarterly Journal of
Mill, John. “Chapter 1: Introduction, Chapter 2: Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion.” On
Stoughton, Seth. "How Police Training Contributes to Avoidable Deaths." The Atlantic. Atlantic