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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHunting license or badge. Or just too fat to do anything but shoot.
When citizens become sworn police officers in America has the badge they are issued become a license to hunt African-Americans? A further notion for discussion may be the image of the fat cop. How can anyone as out of shape as most cops seem to be, be expected to cope with a physical altercation of any sort? If they are required to meet a physical conditioning standard when hired and issued a gun and arrest authority, should that condition not be required as an ongoing state? If an officer is so out of shape that his or her only option is to use deadly force then perhaps desk duty or crossing guard duty until conditioning standards are reacquired is in order. Mental state and conditioning is as important as physical, when a department recognizes it has an officer(s) who is pathologically unsuited for duty it must act proactively regardless of its wish not to violate the blue wall philosophy or whatever secret society ideology it supposes itself to be operating under. In almost every segment of employment the expectation is that the employee will try to improve him or herself and not become an embarrassment or liability to the employer, we should expect no less from those we place in positions of such total authority and power. Continuing education, ongoing physical conditioning and mental health monitoring should be minimum standards for anyone who straps on not just a gun, but the authority to enforce our laws. We pay these people to protect and serve us, not terrorize a segment of society that they seem to regard as less than human.
DetlefK
(16,423 posts)In an 8-hour-workday, if you spend 2 hours walking, 1 hour sitting at a desk and 5 hours sitting in a car, how are they supposed to stay in shape?
Anecdote: A police-department in Germany once had a problem with their cops parking the patrol-cars in no-parking-areas. They took away their cars and forced them to go on patrol by foot for 3 days.
Heidi
(58,237 posts)not because they're fat.