Protest is protected; rioting is not

There has been a lot of conversation lately about the protests that occurred in Ferguson, Missouri and in cities across the nation in regards to the Michael Brown killing. It's important to remember that peaceful protest has been protected by court rulings for decades but rioting hasn't and rioting is what we see way too much of.

Many people believe that the peaceful protestors are from the local community and the rioters come in from other places and there is some evidence to support that perspective. But a little history is important here.

Peaceful protests started back in the 1960s with the civil rights movement, led by Dr. Martin Luther King, who advocated non-violent tactics. Because of the respect blacks had for Dr. King, they lived up to his example and marched peacefully. There was still violence when they did but the violence was instigated by the white onlookers and the police rather than the protestors. Those of us from the older generation vividly remember police batons, police dogs and fire hoses turned on the protestors at will, aided by a rabid group of white onlookers.

We saw the police do the same thing during the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago where hundreds of thousands of young people gathered to protest the Vietnam War and were met by what came to be known as the Chicago Police Riot because the police instigated the violence rather than the protestors.

But that began to change after Martin Luther King's assassination. Because he was no longer in charge, blacks felt more free to do what they wanted to do during protests instead of what Dr. King told them to do and so their protests went from peaceful to violent. There were violent riots all over America in the aftermath of King's killing and other riots continued after that. The most severe and brutal was the riot in the Watts section of Los Angeles after several white policemen were acquitted of police brutality on Rodney King, even though the whole affair was captured on video tape. Rioters destroyed a large section of the city with massive fires and the looting of stores was unprecedented.

We have seen similar scenarios since then. Trouble makers from other areas come in to a city, march with local peaceful protestors and then begin rioting; stealing and burning whatever they can and oftentimes the peaceful protestors follow their lead and do that too. This is not acceptable and cannot be tolerated because it generates a communal sense of disrespect for the community and the police that protect it.

I think this is really the genesis of the problem. My generation was taught to respect the law. We would have never thought to challenge a police officer or to not do what we were told. Some police officers took advantage of that submission but most didn't. Today's crowd is significantly different; they challenge the police on general principle alone.

A generation ago, if two guys were walking down the middle of the street, as Michal Brown and his friend were, and a police officer drove up and told them to get on the sidewalk, they would have gotten on the sidewalk. But Michael Brown didn't. He challenged the police officer even though he had just stolen cigars from a convenience store and pushed the manager into a display of groceries.

Brown has been described as a gentle giant but what I saw on the videotape showed him as a bully and a thug instead. But it was his refusal to get out of the middle of the street that caused the confrontation that led to his death.

If he had simply followed the police officer's legal order, none of the rest of what happened would have happened.

So it's a lack of respect for legal authority that leads to many of our problems today and that's what has to be solved. There are far more private citizens in this country than there are police officers and when we start disobeying lawful police orders out of hand, we are on a slippery slope toward societal chaos.

Parents, schools, churches and community action groups have to do a better job of making sure that young people respect the police.

And the police have to do a better job of earning that respect!