Blogs
I was about to make some smug joke about “what sort of fascist police state does Dustin live in where chalking a sidewalk is considered a crime” but then I did a little research and it turns out it’s, uh, America? (Although the cops are apparently much more likely to enforce rules against sidewalk chalking when you use sidewalk chalk to protest police brutality, who could’ve guessed!)
—The Comics Curmudgeon on
Dustin
DustinLiterature
Times aren't any better. They've called their secret police G.P.U. instead of Cheka, but it's still the same thing. Do you know what I heard at the store lately? They've just discovered another anti-Soviet conspiracy. They've arrested dozens of people. Today they arrested old Admiral Kovalensky, the one who was blinded in the war, and they shot him without trial.
— Alexander Dimitrievitch, We the Living by Ayn Rand
"What was a policeman, if not a civilian with a uniform and a badge? But they tended to use the term these days as a way of describing people who were not policemen. It was a dangerous habit: once policemen stopped being civilians, the only other thing they could be was soldiers."
Live-Action TV
"Apparently, there are plans in the Metropolitan Police for policemen to start filling out crime reports instead of the public, and that just wouldn't work, because the police speak in a different way to normal people. For instance, a member of the public would say, 'He hit me over the head with an iron bar', while a policeman would say, 'I asked him to move along.'"
— Hugh Dennis, Mock the Week
Tabletop Games
To be just, our law must be cruel.
— Codex Arbites - the Commandments of Justice, Warhammer 40,000
The crimes that brought this sentence were light ones, all things considered. Low-level incompetence in their duties, perhaps, or a speech that a judge had ruled might lead to sedition. It could be impiety, laziness, freethinking, or any of the myriad ways of putting the Emperor behind their personal welfare that the penal codes sum up as thoughts of self. Whatever the crime, their convictions were judged not to outweigh their ranks, or whatever commendations, ordinations or charters of merit their service might have earned. If there was any question of those weights being equal, the dusty, gasping figure in front of its carriage would be marching into the maw of battle in a Penal Legion uniform, or lying in a red pool in front of an Arbites firing squad. No, the men in the desert were petty criminals.
Blind, Warhammer 40,000
Video Games
"Do you know the value of the shark? Without them, the sea would be littered with the detritus of the weak. The men who come for you have much in common with those great animals. What sharks do for the ocean, these men do for Rapture."
—Andrew Ryan, Bioshock Infinite: Burial at Sea
Web Original
You know, I just spent an entire summer watching cops all across this country deploy pepper spray like Glade air freshener. And yet, I saw no footage of Cincinnati cops doing their rotten filthy business. Maybe they realized that their methods were outdated and that LOL JUST KIDDING THEY TREATED INNOCENT PEOPLE LIKE LAB RATS. Cincinnati has its racism honed like a fine blade. They were clubbing people to death long before the NYPD even stumbled upon the notion.
—Drew Magary, "Why Your Team Sucks 2020: Cincinnati Bengals"
Incredible competition for the title of America’s Worst PD this summer, but by God Seattle, did your infants in blue make a run. They’re not gonna pussy out in the clutch... No sir. When the pressure is at its highest, they’re gonna take a risk and fill your grandma’s oxygen tank with tear gas concentrate. YOU CANNOT WIN UNLESS YOU MAINTAIN AN ATTACKING MENTALITY.
—Drew Magary, "Why Your Team Sucks 2020: Seattle Seahawks"
Apparently anticipating that the World Cup's queue lines will be populated by goons carrying rocket launchers and flamethrowers, the Rio police force has handed out 200 sets of a 22-pound "RoboCop" outfit (their word, not ours) of protective equipment. What comes with it? For starters, special flame resistance up to 427 degrees Celsius (you know, in case this happens) and a Batman utility belt equipped with pepper spray, a stun gun, pistols, handcuffs, and, of course, a special World Cup baton. The helmet and mask are inspired by Darth Vader (seriously) to 'provoke a psychological effect on the protesters and ... make them jump down chasms while yelling "YOU'RE NOT MY DAD, we guess?
Real Life
The ideal of the polizei, at all times and everywhere, is to get their hands upon every citizen at least once a day.
Shoot first and inquire afterwards, and if you make mistakes, I will protect you.
—Hermann Göring, instructions to the Prussian police
"All of North Korea is a jail."
— Kim Y.Sam
"The Terminator films are not really about the human race getting killed off by future machines. They're about us losing touch with our own humanity and becoming machines, which allows us to kill and brutalize each other. Cops think of all non-cops as less than they are, stupid, weak, and evil. They dehumanize the people they are sworn to protect and desensitize themselves in order to do that job."
