One Side of the Coin

I still can't wrap my brain around the uproar surrounding Alpharetta, GA. police officers, who first pulled over and then arrested a sixty-five year-old African-American grandmother after she failed to comply with their requests to A. sign her citation and B. step out of her car after refusing to do so.

Granted, she was pulled over for a “minor” offense: that of failing to maintain her lane. But in our DUI-centric society, where it often seems that is the only crime an individual can commit, veering outside your lane is clue number-one to law enforcement that you're impaired.

Especially when it happens after sundown.

Rose Campbell—presumably being sober—had only to sit patiently, let the officer explain why she was being pulled over and hope that said officer, seeing that she was, in fact, sober, would let her off with a warning.

But she couldn't.

Campbell also couldn't ask “Why do I need to sign this?”, the better to learn that doing so merely acknowledges being pulled over for a traffic violation, and that if she wished to contest the ticket she could do so in court.

While I have not spoken to her personally about this incident, I am going to assume Campbell felt this was a textbook case of profiling—pulling someone over not necessarily because of what they did, but for who they were when they did it.

And sadly, she let that dictate the remainder of the encounter.

Campbell was childish. Campbell was petulant. Campbell screamed like a toddler told to finish their peas—or else forego their screen time. And after telling the arresting officer she wouldn't get out of her car until his supervisor came on scene, she refused to do so then as well.

I would have lost my temper, too. I would have dragged this sixty-five year-old brat out of her car and told her to shut the fuck up, too. Campbell's behavior was a disgrace. She soiled every legitimate claim of police profiling and police brutality out there.

Yes, being pulled over sucks. Is there anyone who enjoys having their vehicular miscues amplified by the flashing LED lights of a police car—in public?

Nope.

But it happens. And when it does, we have to be the amazing people we tell everyone we are on Facebook and Instagram.

Cops are stressed. I'm pretty sure they don't enjoy pulling people over. I'm pretty sure they wonder who the hell they've stopped, and whether a sawed-off shotgun awaits them as they approach the driver's-side window.

But as someone who has been pulled over for far-less serious infractions than failing to maintain my lane, my advice is this:

1. Shut-up. Let the officer do their job. Hand over your license and registration. Don't act like you're two days overdue for a hit of meth. Ask questions using your indoor voice. You don't like being screamed at, do you? Neither do cops.

2. Acknowledge reality. You were in a hurry to get to your job because you left the house ten-minutes late. And on the day you have to give an 8 AM PowerPoint presentation on the reasons behind your employer's declining market-share.

You hate your job. And PowerPoint. You were a whole 'nother kind of DWI—driving while irritable. It's 7:35 and you're still thirty minutes away from work. Your boss is going to be chewing on your ass all day long, aren't they?

We all have bad days. We screw up. And sometimes, we're caught.

Clench.

Again, be the towering monument to self-control you say you are on social media. (The thought being that a ticket is a whole lot better than being forcibly inserted into the back of a squad car.)

And remember: contrary to what our media often implies, traffic stops are survivable.

And speaking of our media (especially the electronic kind who can't resist airing a controversial video because it's good for business), shame on them for validating Campbell's behavior. Shame on them for painting her not as a spoiled and entitled exception whose mistakes should remain immune from prosecution because of her race, but as a doting grandmother and frail diabetic.

In other words, a hapless victim of wanton police brutality.

Retch.

Let's be very, very clear: Rose Campbell is not Rosa Parks. She is a driver who momentarily let her concentration lapse and then had a great, big hissy fit when she got caught.

As Campbell herself later stated in an interview “Everyone does it.”

You would be correct, Rose. And that is why distracted driving is a topic of national concern—except when you do it. Because you're special and even when law enforcement has a valid reason for pulling you over—they don't.

Do I have that right?

Upon hearing that Campbell is, like me, a professional driver, I would urge her to consider a career change. Perhaps to something in the field of landscaping.

Because abetted by our short-sighted media, she has a remarkable ability for turning molehills into mountains.