When Everything is Illegal Police Can do Whatever they Want

The recent footage out of Calgary of the two female police officers arresting a man playing hockey has highlighted how the lockdown orders and regulations have become so strict to the point that police can justify doing nearly anything.

This isn’t to say this is exactly the police’s fault but more of a legal problem because police officers are expected to perform a certain amount of interactions and often have quotas for tickets handed out. If you make it extremely easy to hand tickets out it shouldn’t be a surprise when many officers take advantage of it.

Now because everything seems to be illegal in places like Alberta, a police officer merely just has to observe someone in public for ten minutes and likely can find something they can be ticketed over, and arrested if the person resists. 

People are being pulled over a ticket for riding in a motor vehicle with someone not from their household despite people who live close can have two close contacts, which raises the question of why we cannot ride in a car with someone who doesn’t live with us but can go grocery shopping around dozens of other people? 

If an officer walked into a grocery store they could write-up probably half the store for improper use of masks or not socially distancing.

All around the world people are also being fined and arrested for attending anti-lockdown/anti-mask events seemingly unfazed by the free speech implications of picking and choosing what behaviour at what time is allowed to be considered actual free speech. 

A few months back, even a pregnant mother in Australia was arrested for merely having organized an anti-lockdown event. 

With the young man in Calgary getting violently brought down on the ice, for refusing to identify himself when he was going to be ticketed for playing hockey with some friends, it has become quite clear that the government has made laws so strict police can seemingly get away with anything. 

Not only were the two female officers needlessly escalating the situation with someone who likely could have just had his photo taken for identification later, but they were overtly assaulting him by kicking him and trying to buckle his knees to perform an arrest out-of-line with the lockdown law violation.

The Calgary police in the aftermath of that situation defended their actions citing that the law said they have to enforce lockdown and gathering orders.

At the end of the day it’s up to a police officers’ own discretion whether or not they will enforce a law violation that they see, and when everyone who leaves their homes likely has committed multiple violations without even knowing it, then the police can target anyone they want for whatever they want as everyone has technically done something wrong. 

We are essentially finding ourselves living in a world summed up best by the head of the Soviet Cheka/KGB Lavrentiy Beria in his infamous quote “Show me the man and I’ll find you the crime,” and very likely the current state of affairs cannot be sustained for much longer without regular people beginning to resent and distrust the police.