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(Prime Time Crime exclusive June 27, 2017)
Thuggery and Craven Political Correctness
By Bob Cooper
Forty years ago, the relationship between the police and gay communities in most North American cities wouldn’t be described as rosy. A lot has changed since those days. The Vancouver Police have openly gay members of both sexes. Inspectors and NCOs in the West End meet regularly with representatives of the gay community. The VPD responds quickly & aggressively to hate crimes and we won a lot of accolades when we cleared 2 high profile gay murders when I was in the Homicide Squad. The biggest single turning point was in 2002 when the VPD officially marched in the Gay Pride Parade for the first time and got huge cheers from the crowd.
I doubt there’s a city anywhere
with a better rapport. That
is, until the Black Lives Matter movement came to town.
The BLM is a group of radical Left-wing subversives as evidenced by
their own rhetoric on their Facebook site.
Funded by billionaire George Soros, the BLM believe that any group or community that seeks a better relationship with its police department is consorting with the enemy (or, in this case, the ‘0ppressors’) and must be denounced and hounded into renouncing that relationship. Buoyed by their success in bullying Pride organizations in Toronto and Halifax to bar the police from their respective Pride Parades, they turned their sights on Vancouver. Now you’d think Pride Vancouver might stop and wonder ‘Who are these people and what have they done for us?’ A faction of Vancouver’s gay community did just that and launched a petition in support of keeping the VPD in the parade to avail. Thuggery and craven political correctness carried the day.
BLM couldn’t care less about Pride Vancouver and are simply using them as weak-willed dupes, a device to sew the seeds of division. As a sop to the VPD, Pride Vancouver agreed to allow a small number of uniforms but the remainder will have to wear T-Shirts and absolutely no marked vehicles which eliminates the VPD’s two most visible units, the Pipe Band and the Motorcycle Drill Team both of which have been major hits in the parade for years.
Pride’s timid gesture was met with scorn from the BLM who promptly pulled out of the parade altogether and held their own little parade. Good riddance I say but I don’t imagine the cops will be invited back before Saturday lest BLM show up and hijack the parade like they did in Toronto last year (Biting the hand).
Doubtless there will be VPD members who, despite what’s happened, feel that their presence in the parade is important. While I understand that and respect their decision they should bear a few things in mind. Firstly, singling out a group of people and imposing different standards on them than on the rest is discrimination. Period. Secondly, Pride Vancouver has turned its back on you, a good reminder that the truest, most steadfast friends you’ll ever have in this world are other cops. Finally, marching in a parade that discriminates against not just you but all of those you serve with and dishonors the uniform you wear, is neither participation or inclusion.
It’s submission.
Bob Cooper is a retired Vancouver policeman. He walked a beat in Chinatown and later worked in the Asian Organized Crime Section and the Homicide Squad.