Would an intelligent, sophisticated body of people design and support a system which criminalizes, prosecutes and fines its good citizens? I hope you will excuse my cynicism in the first part of this story, but it does reflect the attitude I developed as this was happening. If you read through you will find there is a message to be gleaned from this story.

It’s 8:00 AM and my wife just called me. We aren’t usually out and about this early in the morning, but she had no choice; she’s a pawn in the criminal system now. Yeah—she’s a menace. I will probably have to register her and notify the neighbors. I don’t know how it happened or why— I guess she just snapped. There are differing versions of the story, that’s always the way you know, her version and the cop’s. My wife and I have been together for nearly a third of a century and she has always been an exemplary member of society and a wonderful, honest wife and a caring, compassionate individual. So I think I will side with her on this one.

Nearest I can gather, she was on a rampage in town. She had been to the library to check out some books and then went to the nursery—probably a front though; maybe she was trying to score. She had an extra $20 in her wallet when I was sneaking around in it; I think she had just sold her last crop. Hopefully the profit margin will get a little better in time. She’s not real bright; she  has a few degrees from a local college and she has been designing graphics on computers for a couple decades. She has a home business, has always done the books for my business and has been published in a couple magazines. By the way, she’s an artist too. So maybe she isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, if you know what I mean. Oh yeah, she has written and illustrated a children’s book she hopes to publish soon. Almost forgot, she had an almost perfect grade point average in college, 3.94 or so, she’s never been in jail, never drank and never smoked. But there must be something wrong with her because she was sucked in by the legal system. The cop who bagged this one must be mighty proud. I’ll bet if his kids knew he had brought this one down they would be the envy of the neighborhood.

I must say though, having been with her over thirty years I can find no faults, but fortunately for me—the cops saw through her facade. The all-knowing, infallible personnel in the traffic law system got her number; according to them she doesn’t know how to drive and she fibs. Either that or she thinks she is telling the truth but is so wigged out on something she can’t see straight; she doesn’t eat Twinkies so that won’t fly. Oh, I forgot to mention she had a little whiskey in a coke at her 21^st birthday party in 1979, someone else suggested it, but she didn’t like it so she doesn’t drink. She doesn’t take any prescriptions and doesn’t even take aspirin. What a trouble maker; surely a menace to society. You would think the police would have her behind bars by now. Well, they tried. She just got back from traffic court. They finally landed a big fish when they caught her. Boy-howdy the local ‘sheriff’ is probably still bragging.

Sorry, I was feeling quite facetious for a minute. Fact is she did just get back from court. And there is a less cynical version of the story I just told. And I am telling it because I think it is shameful the way people prey on each other. I find it hard to imagine that an intelligent society would allow the system to degenerate to the point it has. It is as though nobody cares about anybody and nobody cares about what anyone thinks about them. In this case my wife got to experience the more seamy side of humankind and the way our society works. The whole story has a stink about it, and I know there are stories which are much worse; but if we can’t deal with the simple stuff we surely don’t have a chance with the complex stuff. I have been around for over 60 years and I have seen some changes. I’m not saying everyone was wonderful when I was young, but I think it was a lot better than it is now. And we only have one place to put the blame—on people. Please don’t think for a moment I am naive enough to think a policeman has a pleasant job, but that shouldn’t give them license to be inconsiderate of any individual.

In this incident my wife was stopped and told she had not stopped at a stop sign. The exact description on the citation reads as follows ‘no stop at sign.’ It isn’t even clear what she was supposed to have done wrong. The description doesn’t discriminate between a California stop or completely ignoring or missing it and driving through at 25 miles per hour. But that didn’t seem to concern anyone in the system at all—which should have given us a clue what we were up against. My wife told the officer she thought she stopped, he said she didn’t—and wrote her a ticket. It makes me wonder, how the supervisors would know what the officers are doing with their time except for by how many citations they write. I admit I don’t know what pressures are put on police to issue citations, but I definitely think this must be one of the problems with the system. I mean it is a system that needs to produce income to cover expenses. I don’t know what the money goes to, but it really doesn’t matter to the point I am trying to make here. What bothers me is when it is forced from the good citizens of the community? The justice system, speaking of the traffic portion, has the same problem as the medical system, who in either system would want anything to change?

Now to my way of thinking my wife was unfortunate to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. I assume this officer probably thought she didn’t stop—I can’t imagine any decent person intentionally lying about something like this. But, someone was wrong. Could the twenty year police officer have been wrong? He was sitting in a car, in a parking lot, on the side street—at the intersection of a tee. Very simply, my wife was driving straight through and he was sitting perpendicular to the direction she was traveling. Sounds like a great vantage point for him, except for a couple things. I went to the parking lot where he was parked and the cold, hard fact is there is a row of hedges lining the parking lot. I could only see the top portion of the cars as they came into view from behind the building adjacent to the parking lot. If he looked away from that intersection for a few seconds she could have stopped at the sign; then proceeded, and it would have appeared to him she never stopped. Is it possible this officer never took his eyes off the intersection? Is it likely that at some time on his shift he would get something off the seat, look in a lunch bag, tune a radio, answer or make a phone call? Probably not, he probably stared at that intersection for the whole day. Does anyone believe that? Yep—the judge did.

It is unfortunate that in societies such as ours police are needed, but they are. Personally I know we are better off with police than without, but I also think there is room for improvement. I don’t know what the first people said when a police force was created, but I can imagine a group of intelligent people getting together today and creating a police force. I suspect they would develop it from the basic premise that the police should work toward ensuring safety for the citizens in the community. I assume this is the premise on which any police force should develop and operate. But my wife and I now realize that the activity of the police force includes extracting money from the ‘lawful’ citizens. There are probably some exceptions to who gets ticketed, but for the most part it seems the police write citations and the courts collect fines—just run us through and get what they can. Feels like one of those sci-fi’s where helpful robots are built and they get too powerful and take over.

It continues in the courtroom. One of the first things the judge said to the whole group was 99.9% of the time he sides with the officers; does anyone want to change their plea? The hands went up—he excused them—they paid the fines. My wife opted to stay—as we should. If you think you have been unjustly charged with doing something wrong—say your piece. If there are officers who really are being abusive, or incompetent, it will eventually become evident in court—I hope.

I was shocked, as was my wife, when a judge in an American court would tell everyone they had a tenth of one percent of a chance of getting a fair hearing. The judge stood there making the point that he was heavily biased. It was apparent by the hands going up that a lot of people understood they could not get a fair hearing in that court by that judge? Unbelievably, that is the way it happened.

In my opinion the first thing that went wrong was the officer could have ‘easily’ checked my wife’s driving record and determined she is a law abiding citizen. He could have ‘easily’ said you need to make sure you stop completely at the signs and then recorded a written warning. This warning could then appear on the driving record for 2-5 years and if at any time an officer had concerns about the way she stops, or doesn’t, he or she could—with social impunity—issue a citation. Sure the officer had impunity, but that was legal impunity. But when one human is abusive to another they are in violation of a greater obligation–to each other.

Why would an employee of a legal system designed by good, law abiding citizens issue a citation at the first possible hint of an error? In his conversation with my wife the officer even referred to it as a California stop. So it’s obvious she didn’t just run through it. He even went so far as to tell her he occasionally does the same thing. How do you give a citation to someone for doing the same thing you do? I couldn’t do this to anyone. Certainly this would produce an unhealthy level of cognitive dissonance for the police officer. Unfortunately this doesn’t tell the whole story—we have mechanisms for shutting down our moral barometers when we have to do things which are morally objectionable. This isn’t necessarily good though because we then become unnaturally detached from our humanity.

That violation may not have hurt that officer then, but it may. According to psychologists we are adversely affected with cognitive dissonance when we have to act in ways which are not in accord with the way we feel. Furthermore that action and the impression it left on my wife and I will have a small effect on the evolution of society. People that abuse the system, and other people, must not realize that in time the people in their own families will be affected similarly, by abuse. They must not realize that when you treat enough people improperly it is going to come back around; literally. Do we not have a society which tends to be unfriendly? Maybe, just maybe there is a connection. The old law of cause and effect is unforgiving. My wife and I both have a different opinion of the system now and it will always affect how we perceive the people in the traffic system and what we have to say about them.

Unfortunately it is not unusual to get lost in the details when one focuses tightly on anything. But once the big picture is lost, once the attention is only on the letter of the law and not on the intent, a person has lost sight of a higher purpose. The emphasis then, in the case of traffic officers, shifts from helping create a safe environment for everyone to—writing tickets—period!

I wrote this because I hope some people will be reminded what being a member of society means. We should remember and consider that when we are born into a society we inherit an implicit contractual responsibility. All mature, responsible people have an obligation to society through this ‘social contract.’ This contract is easily understood when paraphrased as follows ‘do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ In order to live successfully and comfortably in a society, cooperation and consideration are essential. Some think of this as reciprocity. Now I know not all people accept such responsibility, but fortunately there’s only a small percentage who abuse this obligation—and there is nothing easily done about this. But for the majority, who are reasonable and really desire a decent society for their loved ones, I think this is well worth considering. Even if some people don’t care if they live in a reasonable society I would think they would strive for one for the sake of their loved ones. I have often wondered how people who are destructive to society and the environment justify their actions when they have families. Corporations poison water, air, food, humans and animals; companies pilfer millions from working families; bureaucracies marginalize the citizenry who give legitimacy to their existence; leaders promote wars, etc. What happened to my wife isn’t as bad as these examples, but the common thread is lack of respect and compassion for fellow humans who deserve it.

I acknowledge that being on the police forces must be tough. I can’t imagine having to face that every day; I am glad there are people who choose to do so. I do want to thank the good police officers who are out there. But I want to make the point that there is a segment of society which responds well to being treated with respect. A few years ago I was pulled over for not having my lights on in a daytime lights area. The officer said he would let it go if I would do my best to turn my lights on. I now remember to turn them on every time because of his consideration and courtesy. I literally feel that I owe more to him than the law.

Just a thought, the laws are made to regulate our actions, but more importantly, we must regulate ourselves by the law we understand to be superior—Do unto others . . . !