Specifically are they paranoid? Paranoia is a form of psychosis and that makes it "crazy".
In living memory there have been horrific violent events in which a person we later defined as mentally ill got access to fire arms and killed a lot of people.
The one group of people in society most likely to have access to firearms are police officers, so their mental health is a serious concern. Over the years I have come in contact with a fair amount of police during my work in emergency health care and mental health care. Some of them have said some very disturbing things.
" Nothing is illegal if you are not caught." is one of the scarier quotes I remember.
What brought this to mind is that my tiny town, pop 3 to 4 thousand, has recently built a new police station. The building they have put up is a single story brick block house with only little "firing port" windows set up high near the ceiling. It is clearly a fort. The only justification for the design is the expectation of having to survive a popular uprising. This in a residential/agricultural community that has no history of racial tensions, and a 90 percent Caucasian population. While we are not a wealthy community we are by no means a slum.
A new police station was needed. For decades our police worked out of a frame house near the town highway department. The number of riots our local police have had to deal with in the last 25 years? Zero. Attacks on police headquarters? None.
So what are our police afraid of?
Being afraid when there is no reasonable threat is text book Paranoia.
In living memory there have been horrific violent events in which a person we later defined as mentally ill got access to fire arms and killed a lot of people.
The one group of people in society most likely to have access to firearms are police officers, so their mental health is a serious concern. Over the years I have come in contact with a fair amount of police during my work in emergency health care and mental health care. Some of them have said some very disturbing things.
" Nothing is illegal if you are not caught." is one of the scarier quotes I remember.
What brought this to mind is that my tiny town, pop 3 to 4 thousand, has recently built a new police station. The building they have put up is a single story brick block house with only little "firing port" windows set up high near the ceiling. It is clearly a fort. The only justification for the design is the expectation of having to survive a popular uprising. This in a residential/agricultural community that has no history of racial tensions, and a 90 percent Caucasian population. While we are not a wealthy community we are by no means a slum.
A new police station was needed. For decades our police worked out of a frame house near the town highway department. The number of riots our local police have had to deal with in the last 25 years? Zero. Attacks on police headquarters? None.
So what are our police afraid of?
Being afraid when there is no reasonable threat is text book Paranoia.