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Foul Language and Rude Gestures Lead to Pittsburgh Citations

By TChris, Section Civil Liberties
Posted on Tue Sep 02, 2008 at 11:06:08 PM EST
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You'd better watch your mouth and control your middle finger if you travel to Pittsburgh.

City police wrote nearly 200 disorderly conduct citations over a 32-month period for swearing, obscene gestures and other acts deemed disrespectful, a number that a civil rights group said was unacceptable and showed a lack of officer training.

Free expression is sometimes rude. That's the price of freedom.

"Nobody likes to get sworn at, but you can't make it a crime," said Witold Walczak, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Foundation of Pennsylvania.

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    Foul Language and Rude Gestures Lead to Pittsburgh Citations | 6 comments (6 topical)

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    In December 2001 I was given a ticket (5.00 / 1) (#1)
    by shoephone on Tue Sep 02, 2008 at 11:20:58 PM EST
    for flipping off a King County Metro cop (who was tailing a Metro bus in his unmarked blue van.) The ticket was for illegally changing lanes, but what induced him to stop me was my flipping off his van behind me when he refused to let me cut in to the lane even though I had been alerting him of the coming lane change with my signal that was blinking for two blocks!

    Cops are sometimes jerks just because they want to be. Since he was in plainclothes (not wearing a badge) and never identified himself as a cop, even while ordering the ticket (which was mailed to me a week later) I reported him and challenged the ticket, demanding he show up in traffic court two months later so I could force him to testify before the judge. He was too chickensh!t to show up and my ticket was dismissed.

    King County cops ("Kincos") are notorious and infamous around here.

    That being said, I would never knowingly flip off a cop, regardless of the circumstances. Nothing good can come of it.

    And this comes from... (none / 0) (#2)
    by jarober on Wed Sep 03, 2008 at 05:20:16 AM EST
    This kind of thing stems from campus speech codes and the idea that it's wrong to do anything that might offend someone.  Those speech codes were well intentioned, but they have generated a world of bad ideas with troubling consequences.

    this predates (none / 0) (#5)
    by blueness on Wed Sep 03, 2008 at 12:15:40 PM EST
    "campus speech codes." There were once laws on the books, all over the country, prohibiting public swearing, "swearing in front of ladies," vulgar gestures, unseemly dress, and the like; most of these were struck down in the 1960s and 1970s. That's why these officers are instead citing people under the catch-all "disorderly conduct." My guess is these officers are operating on some variation of the "broken windows" theory of policing.

    Parent
    I miss George (none / 0) (#3)
    by Redshoes on Wed Sep 03, 2008 at 06:06:58 AM EST
    in my world there would be no PC police and I'm tired of those who take offense.  As for the louts who use rude language well they've suffer from a lack of imagination.  Pity them.

    Policy reminder (none / 0) (#6)
    by TChris on Wed Sep 03, 2008 at 12:57:04 PM EST
    I just deleted a post that used an expletive.  This is a reminder that TalkLeft policy prohibits the use of expletives.  Not that we object to them, but law firms often have filters that keep readers from viewing sites that use those words.  In its early days, TL had a problem being blocked those filters. Hence the policy.

    Sorry! (none / 0) (#7)
    by lizpolaris on Wed Sep 03, 2008 at 02:35:00 PM EST
    I was making a joke based on the topic.  Penn & Teller might also have a problem here as well as in Pittsburg then!

    Parent
    Foul Language and Rude Gestures Lead to Pittsburgh Citations | 6 comments (6 topical)

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