Week Four: Critical Thinking Assignment
Do you think that this chapter (8) has accurately described the police personality? Why or why not? Can you identify any additional characteristics of the police personality? Are there any listed here that you do not think are accurate?
Police working personality is defined with the following terms: “authoritarian, conservative, cynical, dogmatic, efficient, honorable, hostile, individualistic, insecure, loyal, prejudiced, secret, [and] suspicious” (Schmalleger, 2015, p. 242). As I studied the norms for police culture this week, I found myself envisioning a rigid yet just, paternal-centric definition of officer. However, what I fail to see is the balance of empathy, care, respect, communicator, teacher, and selflessness often noted as successful characteristics of members of the force. Given that these terms were established in the 1960s offers a clue for the gaps – the impacts of females in law enforcement norms.
Lonsway et al. (2002) underline this misbalance noting, “… women accounted for only 12.7% of all sworn law
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Police subculture may, however, be changed through external pressures, such as new hiring practices, investigations into police corruption or misuse of authority, and commission reports that create pressures for police reform” (Schmalleger, 2015, p. 243). The integration of new technology, both on the side of the public (think Facebook Live and smart phone video recordings) are already making a huge impact questioning the regular negative behaviors of policing. I also believe that situational training of officers, and stronger consequences for officers who demonstrate poor behaviors, need to be in place and upheld by leadership. Frankly, it should not just be the judicial system that puts an impactful spotlight on bad behavior, but internal processes which give no excuse for poor