Walk a mile in their shoes.....

It’s easy to find drivers, and riders, who can give you a horror story about their treatment at the hands of the police.

Some would have you believe that police see it as their life’s work to make life hard for drivers, to issue tickets at every possible opportunity, and to act as road vigilantes, using every trick in the book to target drivers who “have done nothing wrong”.

And there ARE police like that.  I’ve met a couple myself.

But let’s be fair.  In my part of the world, the overwhelming majority of police are honest, hard-working people with a thankless job.

For every police officer who views writing tickets as a game where he who writes the most wins, there’s a thousand who can’t believe the stupid, dangerous things people do on the road.

It’s a stressful job.  I know cops who’ve had cars driven straight at them.  I know of at least two incidents in my home state where cops have been killed – one run down deliberately, and one shot while doing traffic duty.  I know plenty of others who have been injured so severely that they have been forced to retire.

Pity the cop who’s first on the scene and is confronted with a car travelling so fast it broke into four pieces on impact. 

Or how about the one called to an accident where a poor biker has gone off the edge of the road, and down into the gully, with a likely fractured spine? 

Or how about the one who attends an accident where a biker has been decapitated by the tray of a container truck?

Need I go on?

As a bike rider, I prefer to think that these guys are in a position to help us.  We’re vulnerable to the stupid things car drivers do.  I know I’ve been hassled by cars on the road, and occasionally, nearly been run down by idiots.  It helps to view one of the roles of police as keeping the morons under control.

Every time I’ve got a traffic ticket from the cops it’s been for speeding – and I was guilty. (Oops!)  The cop has been polite and, in a few cases, has actually written the ticket down for a lower speed – meaning a lower penalty.

I do need to declare that I have a lot to do with police professionally.  You'd be surprised how many ride, and you'd be even more surprised by how many ride Harleys!

So next time you get pulled up by a cop on the road, try to remember that they’ve got a pretty ordinary job.  Try a little respect – it can’t hurt.  You’d better believe that all cops apply what they refer to as an attitude test.  It exists!  If your attitude is bad, that’s exactly what you’ll get back.