The Elderly Man Assaulted by Buffalo PD Demonstrates Police Brutality is About Power UPDATE

Like many people I was aghast at seeing the video of an incident yesterday involving  two Buffalo police officers shoving an elderly man to the ground hitting his head and began profusely bleeding out of his ears. To add insult to injury, another officer was prevented from coming to the elderly man's aid.

Initially, Buffalo PD claimed the man had tripped, but the video evidence states otherwise. The man has been identified as Martin Gugino, a 75-year old man who lives in nearby Amherst. Gugino sustained a concussion. He remains hospitalized in serious but stable condition. The two officers in question have been suspended.

Much of the anger which has been directed towards police officers has been their treatment of African-Americans and Latinos and for good reason. There is no question these communities are treated far more harshly than Caucasians and Asian-Americans. Many African-Americans and Latinos, including those without any criminal records, not only don't trust the police but fear for their very lives.

But as the assault of Martin Gugino proves police brutality is not confined to the African-American and Latino communities. Yesterday's incident of police brutality illustrates the most fundamental conflict between civilians and civilian authority - power.

Police are vested with extraordinary powers over the rest of us. They can tell us where we can and cannot go, they can detain us and they can use physical force against us whether or not we actually pose a threat to them. In short, police have the power of life and death over us.

Of course, most police use their power responsibly and manage to go through their career without causing anyone serious injury or death. But a critical mass do not because they enjoy the power they have over other people and abuse it with impunity.

Consider what was said by agnostic intellectual Robert Ingersoll of President Lincoln in 1883:

If you want to find out what a man is to the bottom, give him power. Any man can stand adversity — only a great man can stand prosperity. It is the glory of Abraham Lincoln that he never abused power only on the side of mercy. He was a perfectly honest man. When he had power, he used it in mercy.

Over the years, this quote has been modified to read, "If you want to test a man's character, give him power," and became attributed to Lincoln himself.

However one chooses to phrase those words, it illustrates the point that you can take a measure of a person by how he or she uses the power granted to them. Whether it's the officers in Minneapolis who took the life of George Floyd or the officers in Buffalo who assaulted Martin Gugino there are too many police officers who do not temper their power with mercy. 

It remains to be seen whether these officers in Minneapolis and in Buffalo will face the consequences for their lack of mercy. If these officers don't face those consequences it will only further erode the trust civilians have for civil authority. In which case the term civil authority will be rendered an oxymoron.

UPDATE: In response to the suspension of the two officers responsible for assaulting Martin Gugino, all 57 members of the Buffalo PD Emergency Response Team have resigned from the unit en masse. They say their two fellow officers were just following orders. Clearly these police officers are of low character and do not believe power should be tempered with mercy.