author: David Graeber
content: "A former LAPD officer turned sociologist (Cooper 1991) observed that the\
  \ overwhelming majority of those beaten by police turn out not to be guilty of any\
  \ crime. \u201CCops don\u2019t beat up burglars\u201D, he observed. The reason,\
  \ he explained, is simple: the one thing most guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction\
  \ from police is to challenge their right to \u201Cdefine the situation.\u201D If\
  \ what I\u2019ve been saying is true this is just what we\u2019d expect. The police\
  \ truncheon is precisely the point where the state\u2019s bureaucratic imperative\
  \ for imposing simple administrative schema, and its monopoly of coercive force,\
  \ come together. It only makes sense then that bureaucratic violence should consist\
  \ first and foremost of attacks on those who insist on alternative schemas or interpretations.\
  \ At the same time, if one accepts Piaget\u2019s famous definition of mature intelligence\
  \ as the ability to coordinate between multiple perspectives (or possible perspectives)\
  \ one can see, here, precisely how bureaucratic power, at the moment it turns to\
  \ violence, becomes literally a form of infantile stupidity."
id: c9fcd620-4edb-4df7-8730-b5366120c978