I think there's the expectation that they should view their jobs more seriously than that of, let's say, a porn director or toy designer.

They are different from the rest of us, in the same way that those who are border patrol officers, paramedics and military officers are. Not only does your job greatly influence your persona but you should be expected to take your job more seriously depending on the subject matter you're dealing with.

I think his point was that the fact that we rely on such an expectation (in the face of constant evidence that it is insufficient) is one of society's problems. I think that, in general, people do feel an obligation to meet (what they see as) the societal expectations of (what they see as) their role. But from a statistical perspective, relying on individual people to do so as a mechanism to ensure compliance with the role is foolish.

We do not send airplanes into the skies comfortably secure in the knowledge that airline pilots take their responsibilities very seriously. (Which they do, I am sure.) We do not do that because the airline industry cannot survive a failure rate of 'everyone tries hard'. Instead, there are checklists, redundant safety mechanisms, and the like, all of which greatly improve the airline success rate.

> I don't mean to excuse LEOs, but rather to point out that the expectation that they're somehow different from the rest of us, is one of society's problems.

Can you elaborate a bit? In what way are they "no different"? At the very least they are LEO, unlike all the "rest of society" AKA non-LEO.

Are these stats wrong? http://womenandpolicing.com/violencefs.asp

And what is the civilian equivalent of the blue shield? How come people snitch on each other all the time for petty things, or even make UP bad things about each other? How come LEO are rather more tribe like when it comes to that stuff, seem to cover up even murder with no problem, and sometimes even threaten the precious few cops who do speak out? How many cases are there of cops blowing the whistle about concrete cops who killed concrete persons? Is that just not being reported on as often?

I don't mean when something or someone ELSE, the non-LEO society if you will, proved without a doubt that a cop did a heinous thing, and the cop is impossible to defend, that some will condemn that cop as well and distance themselves. That one's a given, and if you see a whole lot of cops getting caught horrible things and not very many cops speaking out before anyone got caught, you should be worried IMHO. If you aren't, that just makes me worry about the US public as well. But again, "if" is the operative word here, I'm asking more than claiming this.

But this I will claim: The pre-"super-high-tech" era is the last window of opportunity to solve the problems of power and morality.

We simply have no political consciousness, at all, anywhere in the world; not in the sense of Hannah Arendt, who said politics is not about life, it's about the world, which should be one way or another, which should outlast us one way or another. I would add, so life can prosper in it. Here's an idea, to not think about what offends people who are living right now, but to think about what would offend people who might live in 1000 years, that is, what results of our (in)actions would they like, what would they curse our names for, maybe even in between screams of torture. Yes, this takes courage, which I lack as well, but even realizing one should be able to do something but doesn't dare, is better than rationalizing it. There's at least some measure of hope and dignity there.

I guess you don't believe that with great power comes great responsibility. It seems to me that line of thinking that having control over other peoples lives doesn't require responsibility. That is the real problem here.

Judges, police, politicians all are very different from those of us not giving the power over others lives. You should expect them to behave accordingly or expect that they be locked away in prison or executed. Just like they do to other people often times wrongfully.

With great power comes great injustice. This is a fact of human existence. All the bullshit about "responsibility" is just window-dressing for the arbitrary domination of human beings.

"Control over other people's lives" is the problem. Occasionally those who obtain that control use it only in benign fashion, but such conduct is exceptional.

This expectation is often emphasized and reinforced by LEOs themselves. Witness any time an officer refers to "civilians", as though they themselves are some extraordinary power outside normal society.