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I once started an entire thread on this very subject over on another message board. It generated some interesting responses, mainly from - of course - the authoritarian personalities who were unable to see that they were authoritarian personalities (one of the prime indicators of this type of personality - a total lack of self-awareness).
George,
You might find this interesting:
The Authoritarian Personality:
Back in the 1960s, the Behavioral profession published statistics that showed the suicide, divorce and alcoholism rate in the police occupation to be almost double that of the general population. This rather startling revelation has since captured the attention of many concerned organizations, including the Citizens Commission On Human Rights, each of which has conducted independent research. The gravity of the situation is such that one organization, the National Police Suicide Foundation, is devoted exclusively to the study of this disturbing phenomenon.
The bottom line in the aggregate findings of these researchers holds, predictably, that stress is the cause of the inordinate rate of self destructive behavior among police. And while logical and understandable, when one considers how many occupations are equally if not significantly more stressful, the conclusion seems incomplete and, in my opinion, rather shallow.
Because of my innate interest in human behavior I made a point of reading all the relevant research on this subject and I attended a few professional seminars, none of which satisfied my curiosity as to the mechanics of the stress factors which compel so many cops to alienate their loved ones, to wed the bottle, and to "eat the gun" (cops even have an esoteric phrase for suicide within the job). But the professor of a post-grad psychology course I took in 1974 (at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, Manhattan), Dr. Jana Libertz, Ph.D., impressed me beyond my expectation with a brilliantly incisive exposition of the potentially pathogenic nature of the police occupation. What follows is a summary of my understanding of Dr. Libertz's observations, which I have discussed at length with several Behavioral professionals, each of whom concur without reservation.
When one takes an oath and accepts appointment as a police officer one is effectively detached from the community of ordinary citizens and becomes an agent of the state, a circumstance which often leads to development of the authoritarian personality. The exceptions to this prospect are small-town sheriffs and police officers whose familiarity with all or most of the citizens he serves operates to maintain his sense of community with them. Interestingly, this category of police officer does not appear in the suicide statistics, which include only members of larger agencies who deal with the public on an impersonal and strictly
authoritarian (as apart from
authoritative) level.
Acceptance of the authoritarian role, while perfectly compatible with the structure of a totalitarian state, will almost inevitably lead to stressful inner conflicts when occurring within the relatively permissive atmosphere of a democratic society -- where police authority is expediently tolerated rather than generally dominant. Those individuals who permit the authoritarian aspect of their occupation to supplant their personal reality stand to lose contact with the positive aspects of their former selves, including feelings toward family, "civilian" friends, and the
outer community in general.
In Freudian terms this situation sets up an ego/alter-ego conflict which often leads to loss of the essential self, which in ordinary terms means the assumption of a new identity -- one which is temporary and contingent on a synthetic sense of exceptional personal potency. Alienation is the natural consequence of this kind of crisis and often leads to irrational (sometimes illegal) self-destructive conduct, typically including the excessive use of alcohol or other drugs.
The authoritarian personality adrift in a democracy is a kind of lost soul. Typical manifestations of this condition include the tendency to associate only with other (similarly affected) police officers, inability to communicate with family or former friends, a pronounced cynicism, a generally contemptuous attitude and inability to accept the idea that the power of the state (the participant essence of the alter-ego) is not omnipotent. Extreme examples of this condition are seen in such behaviors as that of NYC Patrolman Justin Volpe who, in August, 1977, felt justified in punishing a belligerent arrestee by forcing the handle of a toilet brush into his rectum, causing severe abdominal injuries. (Volpe is presently serving a 30-year sentence for that distorted sense of personal power).
While there are many equally irrational examples of "police brutality" (unbridled authoritarian expression) most are never exposed but all serve to illustrate the kind psychopathology that arises from the misguided sense of power which resides in the authoritarian mentality. Most incidents of this nature are outward expressions of the kind of rage and arrogant indignation that a frustrated sense of power can evoke. But everyone who is affected by the authoritarian personality syndrome is not capable of such outer-directed expression.
And because suicide is sometimes the result of accumulated homicidal rage turned inward, we have substantive insight into the dynamic of the stress which underlies the phenomenal rate of police suicide.
Avoidance of the kind of stress which derives from an unrealistic sense of personal power requires an objective understanding of the limits of one's official authority in relation to the rights of ordinary citizens and, most important, a clear awareness that one's offical status is
temporary and revocable. Problems arise when this equation is either misunderstood or ignored.
How all of this relates to the Waco massacre is seen in the arrogance of those ATF management and supervisory level personnel who planned and orchestrated the illegal raid on the Davidian colony. Those individuals are directly responsible for the deaths of the four agents who would still be alive if an appropriate rather than exaggerated sense of authority had prevailed from the beginning. In the aftermath of that tragedy is seen the inability of many law-enforcement officers to accept that the victims of that enormous and protracted malfeasance are not to blame for it. This inability is a manifest example of the authoritarian personality.
The state must be obeyed.
