H -°, L 6° | Tomorrow: 
H 18°, L 6°While sitting in line for hockey tickets outside the Kohl Center this week, it was impossible not to overhear students angry about being ticketed for violating state laws and make comments like, “Don’t the police have anything better to do? Like fight crime rather than ticket us for using blankets?”
This type of uninformed blather is part of a bigger trend on this campus of blaming police officers on the grounds of doing their job and carrying out instructions handed down from their superiors.
Reading the pages of campus newspapers, the sentiment is clear: “We want to have our fun, and the police should be out worrying about the influx of crime downtown, not interfering with innocuous activity on the part of students.” Such a naíve position is unrealistic and shows a lack of understanding and respect for law enforcement and the legal system in general.
Regardless of how small or insignificant an infraction seems, the law was written for a reason. Regardless of what that justification for the law is, or how distasteful students find the law to be, it is the obligation of the police department to enforce this law. The venue for proposing change is in the legislature or court system, not by condemning police for doing their job.
Many make the case that, with violence rising in Madison, police should not be wasting their time ticketing students for using blankets at the Kohl Center. The big hole in this argument is that while the assaults have been occurring within the city of Madison, the jurisdiction of the Madison Police Department, it is the University Police Department, whose jurisdiction is relegated to campus facilities and neighboring streets, that is ticketing students in front of the Kohl Center. Even if the UWPD officers were not checking the ticket line, they wouldn’t be doing anything to curb the violence that is occurring within the authority of the MPD.
Another recently expressed opinion is Madison Police officers spending time checking drinking law compliance at local bars has some sort of connection with the increased violence. While many students may find police looking for underage drinkers in bars aggravating, it is a necessary part of the responsibility of the police department. Whatever American city you go to school in, the drinking age is 21, and the police department must do what they can to enforce it. The justifications for having 21 as the drinking age are outside the scope of this column and similarly are not at the realistic discretion of any decision makers in Madison. Until the drinking age changes at the top, the police must enforce it, even if that means making it difficult for those under 21 to have fun in an illegal way.
Assuming the MPD did decide to stop enforcing underage drinking, it is unlikely that the freed-up personnel would make any substantial dent in downtown crime. The couple of additional squad cars roaming the streets would not create an omniscient police presence that would immediately be able to identify and apprehend suspects in crimes that happen on quiet side streets and dark allies. The greatest likelihood is that the cessation of enforcing underage drinking would lead to uncontrolled drinking by underclassmen and ultimately more violence. The police department tries to enforce the most laws they can, keeping residents as safe as possible, with the limited resources afforded to complete these tasks.
The way not to get a citation for camping on state property is not to camp on state property. The way not to get ejected from a football game is not to break any rules. The way not to have your fun interfered with by the police is to keep your fun inside the law. While attending college in Madison, the decision may not always seem this cut and dry. It’s hard to be the odd man out when all your friends are drinking, just because your 21st birthday hasn’t arrived yet. What’s important to remember is that if you decide to break the law in order to have fun and you get caught, it’s your fault, not that of the arresting officer.
In order for UW students to have the safest college experience possible, it’s important to understand the role of the police department. Without police officers putting their lives on the line every day, we would not enjoy the comforts that we have come to expect in our lives. It is essential that students respect the police officers whom students interact with daily. When these officers act, they are only enforcing policy passed down from elected and appointed officials. Getting angry with police for doing their job does nothing to solve any of the grievances raised to improve student/police relations.
Adam Smith ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in political science and economics.
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Lots of good points here, but the sad truth is that the police in Madison do not do a very good job protecting us. A large part of the problem is patrol patterns. It seems like every time I turn around in my nice, relatively crime free neighborhood, I find a police cruiser. It’s probably true that my neighborhood is relatively crime free because patrols are so frequent, but when I’m in areas like the ones that have seen so many crimes against students recently, like the wave of purse snatchings, I almost never see any police at all. If the police did regular statistical analysis of where crimes are being committed, their patrol patterns would be very different and they’d be doing a much better job of protecting the people of Madison.
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Fuck the police!!! - Chewy
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FACT CHECK: The drinking age is not nationally 21, so it is conceivable that you could attend a university or college where 18+ beer drinking is legal.
There has been an increase in crime in areas patrolled by the UWPD, as has been reported by this paper.
A number of people have been removed from the recent football games without breaking rules, but instead through the actions of others around them.
As anyone who has been around this campus for more than a couple years (this is my sixth) can tell you, the UWPD tends to increase ticketing of high profile misdemeanors whenever the University is publicized in a manner that does not sit well with administration officials. Our recent bump in party school rankings, as well as the high ranking by ESPN for our sports fan base has raised the ire of administration officials, who in turn have been pressuring the UWPD and MPD to make more visible signs that those rankings are inaccurate.
The question of whether the citation of minor misdemeanor infractions (that until recently had not been cited) is the best use of limited UWPD and MPD resources in a time of increased major misdemeanor and felonious crime is, in fact, a completely valid question. So is the question why this, why now?
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You know who else was “doing their job and carrying out instructions handed down from their superiors?”
That’s right. The Nazis.
A law is not just by virtue of its existence.
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Why does this guy named Adam Smith call his column “The Wealth of Madison”? Has he ever even read the Wealth of Nations by (18th Century) Adam Smith? Apparently not, because this Adam Smith is some uber-authoritarian right-wing wacko.
The cops are pigs, as always. Their sole job is to protect the state and ruling class from the people. Can you say CLASS TRAITOR?
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A lot of students aren’t pissed the cops are giving out tickets, but they are, instead, pissed that it’s for a stupid law. If you can tell me why it obstructs the university in any way to let students have blankets outside, then please let us know. Tents, fine ok-but blankets? Come on-is UHS not busy enough that they need to be overwhelmed with students getting sick from sitting outside for a week in the cold? Also, it sucks that the police enforce the law so randomly-why didn’t they ticket all the football ticket holders in the first few games or the hockey ticket holders at the beginning of the week? If the police really aren’t as busy as you say they are, then why did they choose 2 days before turn-in to start giving out tickets? Lastly, you can’t honestly tell me you don’t get pissed when you get tickets when cops are “just doing their jobs” so stop being such a hypocrite.
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The police are not as nice as some would like to paint them. For example, have you ever had your car surrounded by eight cops yelling at you to get out of a car when you are parked in a parking lot with nowhere to go and when you didn’t do a damn thing. I have and at the same time they were telling me to turn off the car, while no one was in the drivers' side and we were listening to the radio waiting for someone to come out of the police station, one of the cops seemed like he was moving to draw his gun. Sad part is that it wasn’t the Madison police it was UWPD.
Also let’s not mention the numerous deaths that happen in this country when police are "defending" themselves, both the person they just gunned down had no weapon on them or even worse they were in a wheel chair. Sounds made up, it’s not. It’s just that some people have never seen this reality because they and their communities are not criminalized.
Cops aren’t sweet; they are apart of a power hungry, abusive and racist system. And don’t try and say I am playing the race card cause it's a reality. Wisconsin ranks third nationally in disproportionate minority confinement, meaning they lock up ppl of color at alarming rates. Wisconsin is 87% white but the prisons are 90% ppl of color with many of them being black men. 1 in for black men will go to college while 1 in 3 will go to prison. Its not a coincidence its called institutional racism.
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“The way not to get a citation for camping on state property is not to camp on state property. The way not to get ejected from a football game is not to break any rules.” If laws MUST be enforced no matter how ridiculous and if simply having a blanket is enough for students waiting in line to get ticketed for camping on state property why weren't thousands of fans apart from the student section not given citations or kicked out for having blankets at last weekends football game?
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I don’t know why you guys are bitching about the cops. Why not bitch about the way the tickets are distributed? You shouldn’t have to wait for a week outside.
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Please…the Madison cops are MUCH better than those in Oshkosh, La Crosse, you name it.
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You know the Nazis had pieces of flair, that they made the jews wear.
-pmk
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don’t you censor these comments anymore jeez
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I really, really liked the column. I think the one issue addressed was personal accountability.
The Law does not exist on a paper in the courthouse; it is not propped up by the billy clubs of the police. It is backed up by citizens. That’s what makes it a legitimate law.
But what happens when we disagree with a law? Shall we disobey it because we disagree? No. I know I’m going out on a limb by saying you follow the law, but I shouldn’t be.
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Listen buddy… when I’m in college, the only times I want to think are in class and when I’m doing my homework… untill I graduate, I will be an uninformed, opinionated idiot all I want… so go soak your head… I need to go binge drinking now so I can throw up by 3:00 am and still get to sleep…