A recent column in your paper (“Policing must change,” Wednesday, Aug. 5) addressed the escalating tensions between police and black Americans. The writer attempted to link present-day police policies with those in place in Europe nearly 200 years ago.

Modern police policies have less to do with those of long ago than modern medicine has to do with trephining and bloodletting, both commonly used in the 19th century.

Serving police officers today have the most dangerous occupation anywhere, except that duty done by our military forces. However, there is a huge difference in their exposure. 

A combat soldier may serve in armed conflict for a year or longer if he so chooses. In the larger cities, police officers serve much of their 20 or 25-year careers under that same risk of losing their lives.

The news this past year has been filled with stories of black men (and women) who died while in police custody. If published accounts are accurate, those deaths numbered 16. In that same period, with little or no national notice, 51 police officers lost their lives while serving their communities. 

The real problem facing our society is not out-of-control police officers. It is the extreme hostility shown by young black men and women when they are faced with a blue uniform. Nearly everyone has now seen the video of the young black woman who was stopped for a broken taillight. We all saw her storm out of her car, beginning a furious verbal exchange with the officer. Her attitude turned what might have been a simple warning to get the light repaired into an ultimately fatal tragedy. Why was she so enraged?

I believe a large part of the problem is the shortage of positive role-models and the presence of race-baiters like Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and Jeremiah Wright. They have all become wealthy by exploiting the sometimes legitimate grievances of inner-

city black Americans. 

A black American who lived through the civil rights confrontations in the 1960s might well harbor very bad feeling towards police. However, many of those people are senior citizens now.

The current crop of young black Americans has never experienced overt discrimination, thanks to an enormous collection of laws enacted in the past half-century. That is not to say that individual acts of racial discrimination do not exist; they do, and will linger for a long time.  Unfortunately, the young and impressionable black Americans have been schooled by Sharpton, Jackson and Wright to believe that anything and everything that doesn’t go right in their lives is because of racism, and belligerent confrontation with police is encouraged.

I believe that the author of the earlier column has the right idea — he’s just facing the wrong direction. Rather than attempting to change the way that police deal with black Americans, he should be joining with pastors and educators in addressing the critical questions that keep these young people enmeshed in the cycle of poverty that bars them from becoming productive and successful citizens.

John Jamieson is a veteran with more than 20 years of service in the Army who retired to Farmville in 2002. Following retirement, he volunteered with Farmville Area Habitat for Humanity. His email address is rnco39@gmail.com.