PA Troopers Got Off Easy
by Christopher Cantwell • September 14, 2014
One Pennsylvania State Trooper is dead, and another is wounded, after they were ambushed outside their barracks in Pike County Saturday night. “It’s a cowardly attack. It’s an attack upon all of us in society” said Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Frank Noonan. Social media is abuzz with messages of support for the widow of Cpl. Bryon K. Dickson, and her two sons who have now lost their father. The wounded trooper, Alex Douglass, was in stable condition Saturday after surgery at Geisinger Medical Center in Scranton, reported The Morning Call.
Police from three states have descended upon the Poconos to search for the assailant, who has yet to be captured or identified. Police are being tight lipped, and are not disclosing whether the barracks had CCTV cameras, or whether there is any evidence at all. One man was being questioned as a person of interest, but not a suspect. Police now suspect the shooter to have left the area, having thoroughly searched for any sign of him, and found none.
Right now, we know nothing about the shooter. We don’t know his identity, his motives, his political beliefs, or whether he was a good or bad person. I hope that it stays this way, because I hope he is never caught.
What we do know is that Dickson became a law enforcement official in 2007, and had recently transferred to the Blooming Grove barracks a few months ago from Philadelphia. For the last seven years, he has threatened, intimidated, harassed, kidnapped, assaulted, and robbed an immeasurable number of people. We know this, because had he not done so, he would not be a police officer. That’s what a police officer is; a full time, well paid, violent enforcer of politicians’ edicts.
At some point in his life, Dickson likely had numerous career options. He could have been a construction worker, a food service professional, he could have gone into computers, medicine, psychology, or any number of different professions. Instead, he joined a gang. He decided to pick up a gun, and threaten the lives of his fellow Pennsylvanians. Instead of being productive or creative, he made a conscious decision to take from others by force. He did it for the same reasons other people join other gangs, money, power, and respect.
Every traffic stop he engaged in was a death threat. Every arrest a kidnapping. Every fine a theft. He was paid through taxation, a global system of coercion that presently enslaves the entire human race. He was an active participant and willing co-conspirator in the system of oppression that makes wars possible. Should Dickson have pulled you over on the highway, and you attempted to evade him, he would use whatever level of force was necessary to stop you, up to and including running your car off the road and shooting you in the face, with a gun you were forced to pay for.
After choosing this lifestyle, and having lived it for seven years, I’d say a quick death from an assassin’s bullet is really quite merciful. Should Dickson have been forced to make restitution for his crimes, he would easily have to work well beyond what most people consider retirement age, and even then would likely fall well short of making all of his victims whole before dying of old age.
If his death prevented a single traffic stop, then his killer is a hero. If it saved the taxpayers of Pennsylvania a single penny, then his killer is a freer of slaves. If it makes one young adult think twice about becoming a cop, then his killer saved an immeasurable number of people from theft, assault, imprisonment, and death.
If there were enough men like Dickson’s killer out there, then there would be no police. The moment being a cop was actually as dangerous as being a convenience store clerk, these worthless cowards would walk off the job so fast it would make your head spin. The war on drugs would end in a day. Millions of peaceful people would be released from the rape cages of the prison industrial complex. There would be no war. Tens of millions of children would no longer be force fed psychotropic drugs. Markets could begin repairing the thousands of years of damage that governments have inflicted upon human society.
Dickson was no hero, and his killer no villain. It’s really quite the contrary. It’s easy to feel sorry for his wife and children. It’s easy to turn on your TV and cheer for police to catch the “bad guy”. I’m going to ask you to do something more difficult.
Think.
You live in a world where violence is rewarded with money and power and respect by State sanction. Every once in awhile, somebody decides to punish and prevent that violence by using force against a cop. Rather than thank him for his bravery, society labels him the worst sort of criminal, and hunts him down like an animal.
I see this as profoundly sick. That as a species we heap praise upon people who kidnap and murder and steal in the name of “law”, but demonize those who risk their lives to do something meaningful to punish and prevent that violence. I will not engage in this behavior, and neither should you.
Cpl. Bryon K. Dickson was a violent criminal. His uniform does not excuse his crimes. His death marks the end of a 7 year crime wave, and I couldn’t be happier about it.
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