Why I do what I do

July 14, 2005, a day that is etched in my mind and will be forever. That day I put on a badge and took an oath to uphold the law and defend my city and its citizens from those who do not believe in the law and choose to willfully break it. I carried that badge with pride knowing that with it came a huge responsibility. For five years I have struggled in my mind to reconcile the facts as I believed them to be to what I saw in my everyday work. I believed that there was a little good in everyone. I believed that everyone would respect the badge, if not the person at least the office. I believed that when given the opportunity to do the right thing, good people would step to the plate and show themselves as good people. I believed that everyone would be supportive of my decisions I made in my job.

As the years went by the once shiny badge seemed to dull ever so slightly. The once lofty belief of serving and protecting people will result in their appreciation began to falter. I saw people for who they were, basically bad with a few streaks of good. I saw people who have no consideration or care for their fellow persons only for themselves. I saw people who had no respect for authority, no respect for the badge or the position. I saw people who Monday morning quarterbacked every decision I made, solely to undermine me and to make themselves look better. We now have a city council that undermines the police department on the local news. We have people who complain to the NAACP that it is not easy enough for them to file complaints on officers. We have citizens of the very city we have sworn to protect accusing officers of stealing gas and stealing money from their pockets. We can all point to injustices inside our own department where we feel that we haven’t been treated fairly in certain situations. With all the downsides of what is happening I struggle to find the upside, the positive. It seems like forever now that I have struggled with myself to understand a simple question, why do I do what I do?

To answer that question, I need to answer why I don’t do what I do. I don’t go to work everyday to make people happy. I don’t go to work to kiss ass to make someone look better on paper than they really are. I don’t go to work so that someone will see me and appreciate what I do. Although it is always nice to be appreciated it is not my driving force. I don’t go to work for the power trip. There are some that do, the badge gives you power to decide others fate, but that’s not why I go. So why do I do what I do? I go to work everyday because I know the difference between right and wrong. I have a sense of justice that demands that wrongs be righted, no matter if it is liked or not. I go to work that on the off chance I may be able to help someone, to be able to see a genuine victim who I can help.  Yet those reasons, as good as they may be, still are not my driving factor that brings me to work day in and day out.

The question has been posted to many discussion boards on the local newspaper website. Why would anyone want the job of a police officer? The hours suck, the pay is horrible and people hate us. Why would any rationale person take on a job like that? I will tell you my reasons. The first and foremost reason I put on this uniform every day is so that my brother to my right and my sister on my left goes home at the end of their shift in one piece. Not a day goes by without me wondering if it will be another December 20^th. I think to myself that I would hate myself forever if I was not able to or could not be there to help a brother in blue. I have seen and heard too many instances of one of us leaving behind a grieving widow and family. I swear to myself everyday I go to work that it will not happen on my shift if I can help it. I have no doubt in the desperate hour I would willingly give my all to have my brother live and I have no doubts that my brothers would do the same for me. If asked to, I would give my life willingly for the very people who live to criticize me and question every motive and every action that I do. I would do that not for love of them, but for the simple reason that it was my job. The other reason I wear this uniform is to prove people wrong. Prove them wrong about me and about the officer I am. I go to work to prove a society wrong, a society that has all but given up on an honest person who says what he means and means what he says. I go to work to prove that even when people criticize, accuse or downright degrade me and my profession I will still do what I promised to do those five years ago. Despite all the controversy that seems to be swirling about in our agency these days I firmly believe that those who are good officers feel the same way. Yes we may be irritated or angered by the public opinion and by the decisions that are made against us, but we will still do our job…if not for these two reasons alone.