Why Our Emotional Reactions Can Be Problematic When It Comes to Dealing With The Rule Of Law
Subscribe Today!
How does a person’s emotional reactions relate to dealing with the rule of law? Bill Stierle and Tom discuss what happened in an episode of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, talking about the incident involving a man who called 911 for assistance in a robbery taking place at his neighbor’s home. They highlight the impact of the man’s emotional reaction to the situation and the 911 operator’s lack of communication skills to deescalate the caller. The caller escalated emotionally and eventually shot and killed the robbers. Bill and Tom discuss this incident in relation to Stand-Your-Ground-Laws that brings perspective into play as to why these laws are problematic, especially in a society where there are so many injuries and deaths due to gun violence.
---
Watch the episode here
Bill, you and I each watched Last Week Tonight with John Oliver where he did a whole spot on Stand Your Ground Laws. While we're not necessarily going to dive down that entire rabbit hole, there was something that happened that he raised awareness of a certain context or situation within the Stand Your Ground Law or one application of it or one incident where it was used. That presents an opportunity for us to talk about the need for certain types of people in our society to be educated on how to communicate better.
The hardest part about watching the show for me is when a person works themselves up emotionally, they don't have any self-regulation with their own emotions. What happens is they use words and strategies to try to manage their emotions. Instead of things to reduce the emotion inside the person, it will escalate it into a violent act. This is the reason why we have the number of guns we do but also, we have the number of injuries and deaths because of gun violence. The person is working themselves up to a point where their anger is getting the best of them that it tilts over to a terminal reaction towards the person or the situation that they're angry about. The thing that's upsetting is that simple things of words and phrases, and the ability to apply empathy to a situation can reduce the anger inside the person so that they don't go in and act out in a way that is going to cause that next level of injury or death. There are a lot of examples in the show that you and I were rolling our eyes going like, “How did we get here?”
There are many people featured, but there's a 911 operator who is speaking to someone who's called in about a robbery that's in progress. If that 911 operator had been educated or trained by Bill Stierle in applying empathy, it could have saved two lives. We should talk about this as an example because it's important. I want to acknowledge that 911 operators are trained to do certain things. Now, they're not trained to do certain things.
That's the thing. The 911 operator gets a call, this man is distressed about his neighbor getting robbed. He's calling 911, wanting them to do something. The 911 operator is explaining to him. This is where communication goes the wrong way. The operator is explaining to him, giving him facts, "Sir, don't go out. I want you to be safe. It's just stuff. Don't leave the house, sir." In the show, they said that it was fourteen times he told the guy not to leave his house. The guy left his house and shot the two people in the back for stealing his neighbor's stuff. Is that proportional? When somebody steals stuff, they should lose their life because they're stealing stuff. It's not proportional. It's not under certain laws. Under the Stand Your Ground Law, you can do that because all you've got to do is say, “I was fearful.”
“I was fearful for my life and my safety.”
In this case, he wasn't fearful. He put himself in the fear. He went out of the house. He felt like he should do something. Somehow, he had a belief, a bias or a perspective that it was okay for him to do the judge, the jury and the executioner for the two people that were stealing things. Tom, we have laws on the books for people stealing things, and how many years of jail or when they're convicted. There's a certain proportionality for the mistake or the proactive mistake of stealing other people's stuff. We don't execute people for stealing stuff. At least, I don't know any laws on the books for that one. If you steal somebody's stuff, the thing was so important that you get to lose your life over that.
I don't see that happening very much.
That's not something a judge has in its perspective. Regrettably, the 911 person did not manage the caller's emotion or did not gain the caller’s trust. Justice was going to be served.
We need to acknowledge that the 911 operator was doing what they were trained to do and the best they could.
Pretty good from a rational place and from a caller place, he stayed on there and he stayed with it until the guy finally escalated the 911 call. There's no blame or judgment here. The weight of this discussion is on language. That's the challenge. That's what I get hired to do. It’s to train business owners and even governments on, “Here's what to say. This thing works better than this thing.” If the 911 caller says, “Somebody’s robbing my house. I have this new law that I can use,” and that's what he did. “The laws have changed. The law says I can go and shoot these people." The 911 officer goes, “Sir, the police officers are on the way. They're going to be there. Let them handle this. The stuff is not worth taking someone's life over.”
I remember the 911 operator saying, "Stuff is not worth getting hurt over." They're saying you could get hurt if you leave your home and intervene here. The 911 operator, by continuing to say the same thing over and over to this man, "Don't leave your house," unintentionally got that man more worked up and frustrated. He believed that he has the opportunity to protect his neighbor’s stuff or keep these guys from getting away. He believed he knew the law when it comes to Stand Your Ground, which was apparently newly passed in the State of Texas where this took place, and that if he didn't take action, they're going to get away. He got so worked up and he's like, “I don't care what you're saying, 911 operator. I'm taking action.”
When a person can move their rational mind into a place that it's okay for them to execute the world to enact the law the way they see it and you're putting that level of power in each individual citizen, then all of a sudden, the police officers are going there and saying, “You did follow this rule. I can’t arrest you, because even though you shot these two people and you did what our role is as the peacekeepers. You chose to be the person to move things and use the law based on your emotions and the freedom it gives you as an individual to interpret the law the way you would like to interpret the law.” That's when civil society has a little bit of trouble. As soon as you start doing that, then all that needs to take place as a person has to have an emotion. They get to enact capital punishment because they had the emotion of fear.
I know a thing or two about fear. Fear is something that is a very difficult emotion to shake off because as soon as you're scared about something and you move it to a level 7, 8 or 9 inside your body, your body carries that level of adrenaline and cortisol and other molecules of emotion for a long time. You can feel fearful because someone broke into your house, somebody else was in your space and/or you can tell yourself the real story. There was one moment in which somebody else came into my house and took some of my stuff. It doesn't mean it's going to happen tomorrow. I'm going to put two locks on now. I'm going to do some things differently to protect my house even though I've been left with this traumatic moment. The hard part about it is that we're trying to get laws to manage emotion. Tom, that's not a good thing.
I remember hearing in a movie about law school where there's a famous quote that law is reason free or it's supposed to be reason-free. It's really not, especially in this Stand Your Ground Law where it brings perspective into play, which is very problematic. Not to go down that rabbit hole, but I would like to focus on the 911 operator. In that situation, if that 911 operator had had some training in communication, in de-escalation, what could that 911 operator have done to keep that person in their home, which might've saved two lives?
You'd be the person that's about ready to go shoot somebody. You're going to be that guy. Load up in your brain three sentences and we will roleplay three sentences. You're going to call 911 and I'm going to be the guy. I know, as the 911 person, I need some information. I need what's happening and what's the address. I know that I've got what is happening description of the situation because I've got a dispatch and give the officers some information and where to go. That's what I got to do first, so I know that that has come about. You called and you gave me the situation. I fished for the address and I'm ready to say the following sentences, “Sir, officers are on the way.”
“They can't get here fast enough. These people are going to get away with robbing my neighbor.”
“Sir, you want me to make sure the officers are there to protect your neighbor's stuff? Is that correct?”
“Yes, but they're not going to get here in time. I've got a gun and I know the law. I need to stop these people.”
“You have the thought that you'd like to protect your neighbor’s stuff and you want safety for your neighbor stuff and you can do something about it. Is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“I'm requesting that we let the police officers go ahead and take care of that, but it sounds like that you would like to be supportive to your neighbor. Is that correct?”
“Yes. I don't want these guys to get away with this.”
“You want to make sure that there's justice for your neighbors and you would like the police officers to get there soon. Police officers are on the way. They've been dispatched. They will be there in a timely way, sir. We want to make sure your need for safety is being met too. We want to make sure you're protected just in case they happen to be armed also. We don't want you to get hurt either. We also want to make sure that the police officers do their job and role. Would you be willing to let them do their job?” Give me some pushback.
I don't know what he would say to that. It gets him thinking and slows him down for sure.
I'm hoping that what the readers are getting in this role play is that my empathetic narrative got Tom to say yes 1, 2, 3, 4 times almost. I got Tom to say yes to things. I've built up trust with Tom that I was hearing the issue. You're scared about them leaving. You want to make sure that justice is served. Let police officers do the justice part. You see how important that was all of a sudden to let police officers do the justice part. Let them enact the law. The citizen is looking for justice, fairness and protection of his neighbor's stuff. He sees that something is "morally wrong.” Something legally wrong is taking place. This is not about protecting the robbers. This is about setting a standard in our society that we look for in different situations to be handled by the police.
I feel deeply upset at this moment to think if that was happening in a community of color, the police’s response has a different experience for a community of color. I'm not going to let my bias get in the way that there aren’t different responses from 911, but the de-escalation part of it so that the rule of law doesn’t start to try to do things regarding emotions. We got to be mindful that just because a person's getting worked up, it doesn't give them the ability to step across the line of what the laws on the books are for robbing a house. Robbing a house does not mean the robbers lose their life. It means that the person's robbing the house.
Depending on many factors, if someone's convicted of anywhere from breaking and entering to burglary, they're going to get anywhere from months to a couple of years in prison. They are not going to lose their life over it. The crime on its face isn't going to. The shocking thing about John Oliver's show and I encourage all of our readers to go watch it. We've got the video of this available on YouTube. You can watch the whole thing. There are many problematic issues with this Stand Your Ground Law. The shocking part to me in this particular case is this man in Texas left his own home with his shotgun and shot these two people in the back. They died and according to the law in Texas, he was found to be justified under the Stand Your Ground Law. It is unsettling, to say the least, that these two people who were committing a crime and deserve to be apprehended and meet justice met a different kind of justice that's out of proportion with the crime they were committing.
It's the reason why our system of law is set up is to create proportionality, and also to create time so that there's evidence that is captured, that there are other things so that it can justify what the action is to take place. A lot of times, when bad things happen, we don't see all perspectives. This one looks a little bit cut and dry and nice and clean but it's not at all. All you’ve got to do is to put a person of color in the role. That's not what happens to that guy. In the Stand Your Ground Law, you're supposed to wait for the police officer. “I used the Stand Your Ground Law.”
It's like, “You're a person of color. We're going to apply the law differently. We're going to see it from a different view set because this is our bias. It doesn't become even quicker." What I like training people to do is how do we talk about safety through disagreements. This person has a disagreement about the way things go and what is the common good and how do we create an even application to whatever the law or situation is. Are people responsible for their own emotions? If you think about what you and I were laughing about earlier about use your words.
As someone that has some pretty young children, even my youngest is seven. It's not that long ago, I remember my kid was a toddler. When she didn't like something, she would swat at it with her hand or hit someone or push someone out of the way. We always tell her, “It's okay. Use your words.” It's an attempt to communicate when you take other kinds of actions. She was struggling with finding the words to express herself and communicate. The same thing we see here applies to a lot of examples in what John Oliver talks about. If you use your words, they can be more powerful than that gun. If you use the right words if you understand the context of the situation and you're that 911 operator, instead of giving a directive, an instruction or an order, "Don't leave your house." The person is not liking that response. They’d say, “You don't understand the situation. You're not here. I have a gun. I can go out and do something here.” He worked that guy up.
It didn't meet his needs and fed into an escalation. I'm not faulting the 911 operator for not doing their job. They have a very difficult job to do. They've got to assess in a split second whether somebody is hurt and needs an ambulance, or there's a fire and they got to get the fire department or they got to send the police. Talk about a complicated job. I've not done that job, so I don't understand that from experience. At the same time, from our perspective, it is easy to see in hindsight that if they also had some training and empathy, they could de-escalate the situation and effectively have prevented two lives from being taken even though it wasn't his fault.
Empathy for the guy that is scared and has a weapon for the guy inside the house is the thing that de-escalates that guy. "You feel scared. You want justice." “Yes, I want justice.” “The police officers will be there to execute justice for you and your neighbor.” That's a line of reassurance. “Would you like some trust that we are going to be there and we're going to catch those people and we're going to do our part?” The guy has worked himself up into such a place that, “I can do something about this. I can act on behalf of the law because I have the new law that protects me for taking lethal action.” It's a lethal action for self-defense. It's not proactive.
It's not a lethal action justified for pursuit. We're not the police and we didn't review all the evidence and they decided that Stand Your Ground applies. If this man's home was being burgled and they're in his home, it’s a much more justifiable case than leaving your home, going outside to protect your neighbor's stuff.
The weird part about this story is that we're coming off of when police raided a home and the guys inside the house, feeling threatened and fearful. He's got a gun and he says, “Don't come in, I have a gun.” The police officer standing out, “We're coming in.” All of a sudden, they're amped up because they hear that there's a gun inside. All of a sudden, a person that's sleeping gets killed because of the violence that some bad person is going to get away with something. That's okay for life to be lost because a bad person's going to get away with something.
You're talking about the no-knock warrants in Atlanta. Breonna Taylor, that one was very troubling. This is the other irony of the Stand Your Ground Law. We're not taking a deep dive into this and we'll leave it up to the readers to go watch that video, watch that whole thing that John Oliver does. With all the scrutiny on policing and when police are justified using force, they're educated and have experience in this. In the Stand Your Ground Law, these people are being held to a lower standard of taking human life. That's based on perspective as long as you either believe that your life's in "danger" or you state that you believed your life was in danger. That one needs some air quotes around it. You can get away with shooting someone taking lethal action wherein situations where even police can't justify taking someone's life in that exact same context. We're scrutinizing police more than the average citizen with a gun with the Stand Your Ground Law. That's very unsettling.
If we're going to stick the landing here, the lawmaker has a huge problem. Voters vote with emotion. They're voting on the basis of their perspective and their perception of safety being met in the environment. Is this lawmaker going to create a law that's going to make my biases, my fallacies into law, so that I have perceived protection from the outside world? The challenge with this is that we need to have more of a compassionate, empathetic response to safety. The quickest way to get safety is to walk away. Yet all of us know that if you're in the kitchen arguing with somebody, walking away could be a tough run because you're trying to make your point about the good reason why you did or didn't do the thing you did.
The person, whoever it is, spouse, child, friend, somebody arguing at a bar or at a restaurant over something, it's not enough to lose somebody's life because you can't manage your emotions. The main thing is to walk away from the argument. It's like, “This argument is getting too heated. It's not worth arguing about this.” That’s not what the fight response does. The fight response says, “I can win. I'm in the right about this.” That's not our strongest play as a human being, because then all of a sudden, we're escalating things into whatever crime that's being done.
Another person can decide that that crime is enough to lose your life over. All of a sudden, we're into The Purge situation. The Purge, it's a movie where nobody's going to be arrested for anybody getting hurt, getting killed on this one day. It's a difficult premise because that's not what we're looking for here. We're not looking for that type of society where every individual gets to act out their own version of justice. That's not where we're supposed to be going here. How do we get equality? How do we face our biases? How do we adjust our perspective and how do we get our body used to walking away from conflict and/or learning some skills how to empathize our way through the conflict?
In many cases, that would prevent an ultimate conflict which can cause loss of life in the example we're showing. That doesn't even have to be that extreme that life is on the table. Getting some training, some education in communication for police, 911 operators, you've done this in those situations or with city governments, even state governments. The Flint water crisis, you dealt with that whole thing. If there's anything that we can do to help raise awareness, that's the thing. It is to help raise awareness for there are better ways to deal with things that can bring about better outcomes and cause less of a mess.
It's so important. We can't keep escalating and thinking that as an individual, they get to be an independent dispenser of law and justice. It's not a strong strategy for a free country to do that. Free has some limitations to it. It's so unsettling to say it because people don't like hearing it. Freedom also means that you've got to look out for the other person's freedom. You've got to nurture their freedom. If you don't nurture their freedom, then they can also have an influence on your freedom. You don't want to get there. You don't want those two things to do that because then all of a sudden it’s like, “It’s look like I'm going to lose on this.” Instead of applying empathy or the strategy of walking away or the strategy of stepping in and through a difficult discussion, then a discussion about how heavy a dog is doesn't have to end a life because that was inside the show. There's an argument in a restaurant about how heavy dogs can get and a guy got shot over it. That's not an argument that somebody should die over about how heavy a dog is, how much a dog weighs. It's not an argument to lose life over.
There are a lot more to learn about this subject. There are also more to learn if you're a business or a local government, a state government, or even some other national politician. There's a lot that can be improved by getting some training. I would encourage any of those types of people to reach out to you, Bill. That's at BillStierle.com or PurchasingTruth.com. We'll get you there.
Thanks a lot, Tom. Thanks, everybody, for reading.
Important Links:
- Stand Your Ground Laws – YouTube video
- BillStierle.com
Love the show? Subscribe, rate, review, and share!
