October 14, 2024 • 20 mins
Is it possible to foster genuine reform in law enforcement while managing public perceptions effectively? Join Travis Yates as he recounts a thought-provoking encounter with a woman discussing FEMA's response to a North Carolina hurricane, drawing unexpected parallels to the challenges faced by law enforcement. Learn how this interaction highlights the need for law enforcement leaders to address unsolicited opinions and manage the public narrative, emphasizing evidence-based reforms over reactionary measures. We delve into the complexity of navigating the arrogance of others while advocating for understanding diverse viewpoints and focusing on educating the broader community to implement reforms that genuinely address societal concerns.
Join Our Tribe of Courageous Leaders:
Get The Book
Get Weekly Articles by Travis Yates
Join Us At Our Website
Get Our 'Courageous Leadership' Training
Join The Courageous Police Leadership Alliance
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to Courageous Leadership with Travis Yates,
where leaders find the insights,advice and encouragement they
need to lead courageously.
Travis Yates (00:12):
Welcome back to the show.
I'm so honored you decided tospend a few minutes with us here
today, and if you did notlisten to our last episode with
Steve Friend, I really encourageyou to go back and listen to
that.
I talk to a lot of individualsaround the country on a daily
(00:33):
basis and man that reallyimpacted me.
It's called the consequences ofcourage, and I speak to people
all the time that have hadconsequences, have had bad
things happen for doing theright thing, but I'm not sure
I've ever met somebody soresilient as Steve Friend and
what he is now doing.
But the story is just awful.
(00:54):
It's tragic, it's shocking, butit's encouraging at the same
time, and so I think it wouldhelp all of us to go listen to
that.
It's pretty scary to listen to.
I don't think anybody wants tothink that this actually happens
, but I really was encouraged bySteve and we'll be doing some
more things with Steve in futureepisodes and in future events.
(01:16):
Stay tuned to that.
But what an incredible episodethat was.
So be sure to check that out.
And today I'm doing this solo.
I had a few thoughts I've beenmeaning to get out to you, and I
had an encounter last week.
That was interesting and Ithink I can tie this back into
what law enforcement leadershipdeals with or what they haven't
(01:38):
dealt with well in the lastseveral years.
I want to kind of line thatstory out and get you some
things to think about.
I've certainly thought about ita few times and I shake my head
when I do think about it.
But I had a childless cat ladywalk up to me and start a
conversation Now as a joke,right, if this is, if you're
(01:59):
listening to this in the monthsor years ahead, if you're
listening to this in the monthsor years ahead.
We're in the middle of a prettyhotly debated political season
where the vice presidentialcandidate, jd Vance, was given a
really hard time for aninterview he did years ago where
he called people childless catladies.
I haven't even seen theinterview, but boy, they've made
(02:20):
a big deal about this commentthat he made four years ago,
probably well, I know it wasdone as a joke and ingested some
comedy at the time.
I think he was on TuckerCarlson when he said it, but boy
, they have used that ad nauseum.
So I don't say that to offendanybody.
I have no problem with childlessladies.
In fact, a lot of men out thereprobably prefer childless
(02:41):
ladies.
I have.
Well, I do have a little bit ofa problem with cats, but if you
have a cat I have no problemwith you.
And if you don't like thatterminology, then I would
describe her as a very palepurple hair lady with an Obama
sticker on her car.
Some of you know who I'mtalking about.
(03:02):
There seems to be a trend aswell, so that's sort of the
impression I got.
No, she was neither one ofthose.
She didn't have purple hair andshe wasn't carrying a cat.
But I want to discuss what shesaid to me because it was so
fascinating the mindset and Ithink it's a mindset that law
enforcement has faced and wehaven't done very well from a
(03:23):
leadership standpoint when weface that, out of the blue, this
woman walks up to me.
I did not invite thisconversation, she walked
directly up to me and she saidthis I want you to know, sir,
that FEMA is doing anoutstanding job in North
Carolina.
Now, once again, if you'relistening to this episode not in
(03:45):
real time we're in the middleof a hurricane that hit North
Carolina pretty drastically.
A lot of people suffering there.
It's about a week out from thathurricane hitting from what I'm
speaking as I, as I talk.
There's a hurricane hit inFlorida right now and there's
been a lot of controversy Rightnow and there's been a lot of
(04:08):
controversy about FEMA'sresponse to this.
That is the federal government'sresponse to disasters.
It's under the Department ofHomeland Security.
Mayorkas is over that and theyannounced this is not me, it's
not a conspiracy theory,mayorkas and that department has
announced that they're going togive every resident affected
$750.
And that department hasannounced that they're going to
give every resident affected$750.
And that has, of course,offended many people because
(04:29):
they have been spending billionson illegal immigrants here in
this country to the tune of I'veseen reports of, you know, two
years of rent being paid, cellphones, you know income, a lot,
of, a lot of this stuff, right,and so that has blown out the
budget of the Department ofHomeland Security, and this is
once again, it's not me sayingthis.
(04:50):
Mayorkas has said that FEMA isrunning out of money and of
course, the controversy is well,how are you running out of
money for disasters when you'restill shelling out all of this
money out of the same departmentthey may be different funds,
but same department to peoplethat have broke the law in
America.
So it's a big political talkingpoint.
(05:11):
I wasn't wearing a T-shirt thatindicated that I was interested
in this conversation.
I was just walking down anaisle of a store and she walks
directly up to me and says thisto me.
So she obviously has an agenda,she obviously has a bias.
My question would be is whatwould you have said?
I'm going to tell you what Isaid in a minute.
I'm going to relate this tosimilar arrogance you see by
(05:34):
similar individuals when itcomes to law enforcement.
So this lady says to me this,you know, and of course I
immediately say, well, listen.
And of course I immediately say, well, listen, I'm going to be
honest with you.
I don't believe you.
I don't really believe anybodyelse, but who I will believe are
the residents of North Carolina, and in due time we will know
(05:55):
the actual truth, because peoplethat are living in North
Carolina will tell us.
Which then she pivoted and said, well, yeah, that's absolutely
right.
Which then she pivoted and said, well, yeah, that's absolutely
right.
We've now have Starlink, thatpeople are now able to
communicate out of NorthCarolina, and we're getting some
of these stories.
I said, well, that's good.
And then she asked me this NowI'm painting this picture
(06:17):
because I did not instigate anyof this.
She started steering thispolitical conversation to me.
Which many of you have metthese individuals?
Maybe you'll meet them atThanksgiving dinner, maybe
they're your family, where theyjust are almost picking a fight,
right?
The very folks that sometimespreach inclusivity are not
(06:39):
really inclusive at all.
They're only inclusive if youagree with everything they say
at all.
They're only inclusive if youagree with everything they say.
And she's looking, no question,to poke a bear.
Now, she doesn't know mypolitical affiliation, she
doesn't know my belief system.
She probably brought somebiases into that.
Like I kind of call her achildless cat lady.
That's kind of my bias, right.
So she's probably looking at me, this six foot three, 245 pound
(07:03):
white guy with a burly haircut,and thinks, yeah, this is a guy
I need to convince on my side,which is really weird, right,
really odd that she would dothis.
But I enjoy talking to people.
I enjoy having conversationswith people of all kinds.
It's very interesting to me.
And so she starts talking andbragging about Starlink.
They're able to now communicate.
(07:24):
And then she asked me well, howdoes Starlink operate?
Which I didn't necessarily knowfor a fact, but I looked into
it from my home at one point.
It's actually a little moreexpensive than the Internet I
use.
Now I said, well, you know, Idon't actually know, but I'm
pretty sure it's satellite based.
That's why they're able todeploy them in a disaster zone,
(07:45):
because when your telephonepoles are knocked out or your
underlying power lines are outor your power's out, it's coming
from space.
So it's satellite based andthat's why it's able to operate.
And then she says, offering thisinformation to me yeah, that
Elon Musk, he's a problem.
I thought to myself what isgoing on here?
(08:06):
Right, this is what's going on.
And I said well, what do youmean by that?
I mean Elon Musk has providedthese starlings.
His technology has enabled this.
In fact, he's so successful.
From what I understand, about90% of the satellites going in
space come from his company andthe federal government contracts
out with him because he's verygood at what he does.
(08:28):
So what do you mean by that?
And then she says this, andit's very telling.
She says, well, he's messed up,he's opened his mouth.
I don't think the government isgoing to be participating with
him anymore.
Pretty wild right Now.
I don't think she knows any ofthis, right, but it's this weird
mentality, this mind virus thatsome people have.
(08:51):
And what's she talking about?
She's talking about the ElonMusk has endorsed Donald Trump
for president and he has spokenvery negatively about the other
side of the political equation.
Much where the conversationended I wasn't going to get in
some debate, I just sort of said, yeah, yeah, I just sort of
(09:13):
shook my head at her, you know,and was sort of looking away out
of this conversation, but itgot me to thinking afterwards,
because that doesn't happen tome every day, I don't think it
happens to you, but it got me tothinking about when this
happens to law enforcement,because, yeah, you could replace
Starlink and North Carolina andFEMA with what you do.
How many people have had thisarrogance towards law
enforcement, where they knowbest?
It doesn't matter if theyhaven't been in law enforcement,
(09:35):
it doesn't matter if they don'thave the experience that you
have.
They know best, they know whatyour problems are and they know
how to fix it.
It's an arrogance, right, andthat's what she was displaying.
She was displaying thisarrogant attitude, how she knows
this and she has the answers.
And even though she didn'taccuse me of having the opposite
(09:57):
opinion.
I think she was coming at melike she thought I was thinking
differently, even though Ididn't let on.
I really had fun having adiscussion with her and not
letting her know one way or theother.
But law enforcement's beendealing with this for some time.
Leaders have Think of all of thereforms, all of the demands,
all of the things that thesearrogant people and I say people
(10:20):
in general terms.
It could be mayors, it could bepoliticians, it could be
lawyers, it could be activists,it could be community citizens,
it could be PERF, it could bepolice.
It could be lawyers, it couldbe activists, it could be
community citizens, it could beperf, it could be police.
People that are so arrogant tothink you are wrong.
How have we typically addressedthat?
(10:40):
I'm going to tell you how I'veaddressed that in the past and
it has been horribly gone,horribly wrong.
I thought people think logically, like I do, just like this lady
.
I could have sat there anddrawn up the, showing her the
articles or showing her thetestimonies from my, from my
friends in north carolina thattold me hey, we're four days in,
we haven't seen fema.
I could, I could have showedher all these eyewitness
(11:04):
testimonies.
I could have showed her theevidence, I could have showed
her the news articles.
Nothing was going to change hermind, nothing.
But I would do this in lawenforcement.
I would say well, listen, Idon't think you're right here.
Here's the study from RolandFryer, and here's this and
here's the data.
And it only made things worsebecause then, instead of arguing
(11:25):
, they knew they couldn't arguewith me on the facts.
They would just then say, well,you must be a racist then,
because you don't agree with me.
Yeah, who knows?
Right, that's where they wouldquickly go to, because that
tends to scare people off.
And of course, that doesn'tscare me off, because I know who
I am.
My God knows who I am and Idon't care what name you call me
.
Truth is truth, but I think ina sense we've been sort of
(11:47):
crippled by not knowing how todeal with this.
And here's I don't know if Iknow all the answers, but I know
this arguing will not help.
You have to understand the vastmajority of people in this
country.
Do not believe this way.
She is an anomaly, she isunique.
Most people aren't like this.
You may have a core 10 or 15%of the people that are these
(12:08):
crazy purple hair type peopleright, not necessarily purple
hair, but that kind of arrogancebecause that is what that is is
complete and utter arrogancethat they know all and you don't
.
I don't think arguing with themdoes a bit of good, but I think
you have to direct yourattention to the rest of the
people, because somebody may notbe as informed as you are, but
their arrogance or theirinsuination of the information
(12:33):
may attract other people totheir side.
So I think you have to doubledown on the education
information to the generalcitizen.
So when this is because thesefolks can be very loud and very
bold.
She was extremely odd how vocaland animated and passionate she
was about FEMA in NorthCarolina, because obviously her
(12:54):
worldview had been challenged bywhat was in the news at the
time, which was it was they weredoing a horrible job, right,
and some of the news outlets,and so she's become very
boisterous, and so I don't thinkit does any good to attack the
person or attack the information.
But you have to pin your sightson the rest of the population,
the rest of your community, andyou have to do it in a
(13:17):
professional manner, right?
You don't want to bow down tothe way these folks act, whoever
they may be, and I think wereally, because we think
critically, we think we canattack an insane person with
critical, logical informationand that just can't happen.
If you're in my seminars, Ibreak down some of the research
(13:39):
that about 10% of the populationnot only doesn't ever believe
that use of force is correct inlaw enforcement, they don't even
think law enforcement should beable to use use of force.
They think law enforcementshould just be able to die at
the hands of a bad guy.
They should never be permittedto use force.
That's 10% of the population.
Now, that's a real study.
I can break that out andexplain it to you.
I won't today.
So that's at least 10% of thepopulation are completely insane
(14:03):
, because if you believe thatlaw enforcement would never have
to use force ever, you're aninsane person, right.
And so on top of the 10%, youprobably have 10 or 15% that are
borderline that, so it's aquarter of the country.
When I look at some of thepolitical polling, I kind of
make sense, right?
When 25% of the public thinksthe economy is great.
(14:24):
Well, who are these peopleright?
Do you ever go to the grocerystore.
Do you ever try to buy a car orget a home loan?
I mean?
So it's about a quarter of thecountry that is completely off
their rocker.
That's their worldview.
Nothing's going to change it.
That's who you're dealing with.
When you talk to these folksthat want to defund you, reform,
you do all these things.
Now we've said this time andtime again we are for police
(14:46):
reform, but not just haphazardreform to say we're being
reformed, evidence-based reform,not just let's throw everything
on the wall here with cashlessbail and all of this and all of
that and let's just see whathappens.
That is not what we're talkingabout, because you'll notice
that all these reforms in recentyears, regardless of what it
(15:06):
may be changing the use of force, taking away your tools, all of
this stuff Police shootingshave not been reduced one bit.
In fact, they've increased inmany jurisdictions because the
crime has increased, because theuse of force in law enforcement
is correlated with violentcrime in jurisdictions, and so
at some point we're going tohave to have a different tact,
and that's not just to agree toagree.
(15:28):
So at some point we're going tohave to have a different tact,
and that's not just to agree toagree, we're going to have to
literally ignore theseindividuals and then turn our
attention to the public andexplain why we do it and when we
do it.
That's really where theattention needs to go.
You're wasting your timearguing with crazy people.
You just are Right people.
(15:50):
You just are right.
But that's what we see time andtime again, because these crazy
people are very loud andboisterous and there's your
community meetings and they'recalling your politicians and
they're in the media.
I know it is very enticing thatyou know you're right and you
know they're wrong and you wantto try to prove that.
Proving it does you no good.
It just doesn't.
You need to be very clear andconcise and communicate in a
(16:11):
forward fashion to yourcommunity about why you're doing
it, when you're going to do itand what the impact you
anticipate will be.
There's several departments thathave now introduced what's
called a policing plan.
I really love this idea.
They're big over in Europe.
They're not very popular inAmerica.
I don't understand why, andI'll put in the show notes a
(16:35):
link to a few of them, but it'sessentially a business plan for
a law enforcement agency.
They will put out a documentand they'll review it every year
and revise it, but it explainswhy they do what they do.
You know, hey, we haveautomatic license readers.
Here's why we do that.
You know, we proactively deployofficers where crime is, despite
(16:57):
the population.
Here's why we do that.
The demographic data on ourarrest won't always be along the
census lines.
Here is why that is.
We're protecting victims ofcrime, and those victims of
crime are a certain demographic.
So when we're in those areasbecause crime is generally
interracial, meaning one raceversus the same race sometimes
(17:20):
you won't see a perfect data setwhen it comes to population.
So what are they doing there?
They're literally getting leftof Bain, left of the controversy
.
They're trying to explain whythey do it before somebody
raises a concern.
And I think it's a very, verygood idea to have that document.
But I very seldom have seen it.
(17:40):
But I think we have to thinkabout it differently.
But I very seldom have seen it.
But I think we have to thinkabout it differently.
You're not going to be able toargue your way out of people
that believe this, that have thearrogance to think they have
all the answers.
I don't have all the answers,but I would put my education,
training and experience againstsomeone like that any day of the
week, right?
So why do they tend to win somuch and law enforcement changes
for them, when inside lawenforcement, those are the
(18:04):
experts that know what thereform should be.
Those are the experts that knowbest practices, but we listen
to outside entities so much, andI think we have to have a
different approach.
Now, listen, I wrote an entirebook around this premise, called
the Courageous Police Leader.
You can get it on Amazon.
It's been around for five years.
I'm not sure how many peopleare listening to it or reading
it, but I saw this for years.
(18:26):
That was just decimating us,and it, of course, came to a
head in 2020 when the book cameout with defund police and all
these crazy silly things, andyou saw what happened after that
.
Right, we saw violent crimespike to the largest has been
from one year to the next in ourhistory, since the FBI has been
doing the data, and the onlyreason they've been able to get
(18:47):
the crime rates come down is theFBI literally quit reporting
the data from about half thepolice departments.
You know in a political yearthey're using.
A crime is actually down underthis presidency.
Yeah, because your FBI quitreporting the data.
That's really odd, but you know.
They know it's a lie, of course, but they're using that as
political fodder, and so we haveyet to recover from that, from
listening to crazy people andbeing scared of this, and so
(19:12):
this is not going to stop.
There's an element of peoplethat just believe they're right,
no matter what, and they are soarrogant about it they're going
to interject themselves in whatyou do.
So as leaders, we need toreally cognitively think what
can we do today to prevent thisin the future?
(19:32):
That's what our Left of Banecourse is all about.
We have an entire course builton this.
Some of the things you can dorely heavily on data to avoid
having to do some of these sillythings because you aren't
prepared.
So check that out.
Go to travisyeatorg.
We want to help you with that.
We're going to be doing somemore information on this,
whether it's documents or someforms that can help you.
(19:52):
I have one form already out.
I'll send it to you if youreach out that.
If you go to a communitymeeting, it's sort of a rule
form, right, everybody agrees onthe rules before we have this
dialogue, and it's really crazythings like.
We're going to be honest, right, we're going to be honest and
tell the truth.
I mean, yeah, real crazy thingsthat you have to set these
boundaries for, but you've gotto set those because if not,
(20:14):
things are going to go very,very haywire, because next time
it won't be some crazy lady thatwalks up to you and talks about
Elon Musk, it's going to besomebody that's trying to change
the inner workings of yourpolice department.
Thanks for listening.
I look forward to talking toyou next time.
And just remember, lead on andstay courageous.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Thank you for listening to Courageous
Leadership with Travis Yates.
We invite you to join othercourageous leaders at www.
travisyates.
org.
Welcome to Courageous Leadership with Travis Yates,
where leaders find the insights,advice and encouragement they
need to lead courageously.
Travis Yates (00:12):
Welcome back to the show.
I'm so honored you decided tospend a few minutes with us here
today, and if you did notlisten to our last episode with
Steve Friend, I really encourageyou to go back and listen to
that.
I talk to a lot of individualsaround the country on a daily
(00:33):
basis and man that reallyimpacted me.
It's called the consequences ofcourage, and I speak to people
all the time that have hadconsequences, have had bad
things happen for doing theright thing, but I'm not sure
I've ever met somebody soresilient as Steve Friend and
what he is now doing.
But the story is just awful.
(00:54):
It's tragic, it's shocking, butit's encouraging at the same
time, and so I think it wouldhelp all of us to go listen to
that.
It's pretty scary to listen to.
I don't think anybody wants tothink that this actually happens
, but I really was encouraged bySteve and we'll be doing some
more things with Steve in futureepisodes and in future events.
(01:16):
Stay tuned to that.
But what an incredible episodethat was.
So be sure to check that out.
And today I'm doing this solo.
I had a few thoughts I've beenmeaning to get out to you, and I
had an encounter last week.
That was interesting and Ithink I can tie this back into
what law enforcement leadershipdeals with or what they haven't
(01:38):
dealt with well in the lastseveral years.
I want to kind of line thatstory out and get you some
things to think about.
I've certainly thought about ita few times and I shake my head
when I do think about it.
But I had a childless cat ladywalk up to me and start a
conversation Now as a joke,right, if this is, if you're
(01:59):
listening to this in the monthsor years ahead, if you're
listening to this in the monthsor years ahead.
We're in the middle of a prettyhotly debated political season
where the vice presidentialcandidate, jd Vance, was given a
really hard time for aninterview he did years ago where
he called people childless catladies.
I haven't even seen theinterview, but boy, they've made
(02:20):
a big deal about this commentthat he made four years ago,
probably well, I know it wasdone as a joke and ingested some
comedy at the time.
I think he was on TuckerCarlson when he said it, but boy
, they have used that ad nauseum.
So I don't say that to offendanybody.
I have no problem with childlessladies.
In fact, a lot of men out thereprobably prefer childless
(02:41):
ladies.
I have.
Well, I do have a little bit ofa problem with cats, but if you
have a cat I have no problemwith you.
And if you don't like thatterminology, then I would
describe her as a very palepurple hair lady with an Obama
sticker on her car.
Some of you know who I'mtalking about.
(03:02):
There seems to be a trend aswell, so that's sort of the
impression I got.
No, she was neither one ofthose.
She didn't have purple hair andshe wasn't carrying a cat.
But I want to discuss what shesaid to me because it was so
fascinating the mindset and Ithink it's a mindset that law
enforcement has faced and wehaven't done very well from a
(03:23):
leadership standpoint when weface that, out of the blue, this
woman walks up to me.
I did not invite thisconversation, she walked
directly up to me and she saidthis I want you to know, sir,
that FEMA is doing anoutstanding job in North
Carolina.
Now, once again, if you'relistening to this episode not in
(03:45):
real time we're in the middleof a hurricane that hit North
Carolina pretty drastically.
A lot of people suffering there.
It's about a week out from thathurricane hitting from what I'm
speaking as I, as I talk.
There's a hurricane hit inFlorida right now and there's
been a lot of controversy Rightnow and there's been a lot of
(04:08):
controversy about FEMA'sresponse to this.
That is the federal government'sresponse to disasters.
It's under the Department ofHomeland Security.
Mayorkas is over that and theyannounced this is not me, it's
not a conspiracy theory,mayorkas and that department has
announced that they're going togive every resident affected
$750.
And that department hasannounced that they're going to
give every resident affected$750.
And that has, of course,offended many people because
(04:29):
they have been spending billionson illegal immigrants here in
this country to the tune of I'veseen reports of, you know, two
years of rent being paid, cellphones, you know income, a lot,
of, a lot of this stuff, right,and so that has blown out the
budget of the Department ofHomeland Security, and this is
once again, it's not me sayingthis.
(04:50):
Mayorkas has said that FEMA isrunning out of money and of
course, the controversy is well,how are you running out of
money for disasters when you'restill shelling out all of this
money out of the same departmentthey may be different funds,
but same department to peoplethat have broke the law in
America.
So it's a big political talkingpoint.
(05:11):
I wasn't wearing a T-shirt thatindicated that I was interested
in this conversation.
I was just walking down anaisle of a store and she walks
directly up to me and says thisto me.
So she obviously has an agenda,she obviously has a bias.
My question would be is whatwould you have said?
I'm going to tell you what Isaid in a minute.
I'm going to relate this tosimilar arrogance you see by
(05:34):
similar individuals when itcomes to law enforcement.
So this lady says to me this,you know, and of course I
immediately say, well, listen.
And of course I immediately say, well, listen, I'm going to be
honest with you.
I don't believe you.
I don't really believe anybodyelse, but who I will believe are
the residents of North Carolina, and in due time we will know
(05:55):
the actual truth, because peoplethat are living in North
Carolina will tell us.
Which then she pivoted and said, well, yeah, that's absolutely
right.
Which then she pivoted and said, well, yeah, that's absolutely
right.
We've now have Starlink, thatpeople are now able to
communicate out of NorthCarolina, and we're getting some
of these stories.
I said, well, that's good.
And then she asked me this NowI'm painting this picture
(06:17):
because I did not instigate anyof this.
She started steering thispolitical conversation to me.
Which many of you have metthese individuals?
Maybe you'll meet them atThanksgiving dinner, maybe
they're your family, where theyjust are almost picking a fight,
right?
The very folks that sometimespreach inclusivity are not
(06:39):
really inclusive at all.
They're only inclusive if youagree with everything they say
at all.
They're only inclusive if youagree with everything they say.
And she's looking, no question,to poke a bear.
Now, she doesn't know mypolitical affiliation, she
doesn't know my belief system.
She probably brought somebiases into that.
Like I kind of call her achildless cat lady.
That's kind of my bias, right.
So she's probably looking at me, this six foot three, 245 pound
(07:03):
white guy with a burly haircut,and thinks, yeah, this is a guy
I need to convince on my side,which is really weird, right,
really odd that she would dothis.
But I enjoy talking to people.
I enjoy having conversationswith people of all kinds.
It's very interesting to me.
And so she starts talking andbragging about Starlink.
They're able to now communicate.
(07:24):
And then she asked me well, howdoes Starlink operate?
Which I didn't necessarily knowfor a fact, but I looked into
it from my home at one point.
It's actually a little moreexpensive than the Internet I
use.
Now I said, well, you know, Idon't actually know, but I'm
pretty sure it's satellite based.
That's why they're able todeploy them in a disaster zone,
(07:45):
because when your telephonepoles are knocked out or your
underlying power lines are outor your power's out, it's coming
from space.
So it's satellite based andthat's why it's able to operate.
And then she says, offering thisinformation to me yeah, that
Elon Musk, he's a problem.
I thought to myself what isgoing on here?
(08:06):
Right, this is what's going on.
And I said well, what do youmean by that?
I mean Elon Musk has providedthese starlings.
His technology has enabled this.
In fact, he's so successful.
From what I understand, about90% of the satellites going in
space come from his company andthe federal government contracts
out with him because he's verygood at what he does.
(08:28):
So what do you mean by that?
And then she says this, andit's very telling.
She says, well, he's messed up,he's opened his mouth.
I don't think the government isgoing to be participating with
him anymore.
Pretty wild right Now.
I don't think she knows any ofthis, right, but it's this weird
mentality, this mind virus thatsome people have.
(08:51):
And what's she talking about?
She's talking about the ElonMusk has endorsed Donald Trump
for president and he has spokenvery negatively about the other
side of the political equation.
Much where the conversationended I wasn't going to get in
some debate, I just sort of said, yeah, yeah, I just sort of
(09:13):
shook my head at her, you know,and was sort of looking away out
of this conversation, but itgot me to thinking afterwards,
because that doesn't happen tome every day, I don't think it
happens to you, but it got me tothinking about when this
happens to law enforcement,because, yeah, you could replace
Starlink and North Carolina andFEMA with what you do.
How many people have had thisarrogance towards law
enforcement, where they knowbest?
It doesn't matter if theyhaven't been in law enforcement,
(09:35):
it doesn't matter if they don'thave the experience that you
have.
They know best, they know whatyour problems are and they know
how to fix it.
It's an arrogance, right, andthat's what she was displaying.
She was displaying thisarrogant attitude, how she knows
this and she has the answers.
And even though she didn'taccuse me of having the opposite
(09:57):
opinion.
I think she was coming at melike she thought I was thinking
differently, even though Ididn't let on.
I really had fun having adiscussion with her and not
letting her know one way or theother.
But law enforcement's beendealing with this for some time.
Leaders have Think of all of thereforms, all of the demands,
all of the things that thesearrogant people and I say people
(10:20):
in general terms.
It could be mayors, it could bepoliticians, it could be
lawyers, it could be activists,it could be community citizens,
it could be PERF, it could bepolice.
It could be lawyers, it couldbe activists, it could be
community citizens, it could beperf, it could be police.
People that are so arrogant tothink you are wrong.
How have we typically addressedthat?
(10:40):
I'm going to tell you how I'veaddressed that in the past and
it has been horribly gone,horribly wrong.
I thought people think logically, like I do, just like this lady
.
I could have sat there anddrawn up the, showing her the
articles or showing her thetestimonies from my, from my
friends in north carolina thattold me hey, we're four days in,
we haven't seen fema.
I could, I could have showedher all these eyewitness
(11:04):
testimonies.
I could have showed her theevidence, I could have showed
her the news articles.
Nothing was going to change hermind, nothing.
But I would do this in lawenforcement.
I would say well, listen, Idon't think you're right here.
Here's the study from RolandFryer, and here's this and
here's the data.
And it only made things worsebecause then, instead of arguing
(11:25):
, they knew they couldn't arguewith me on the facts.
They would just then say, well,you must be a racist then,
because you don't agree with me.
Yeah, who knows?
Right, that's where they wouldquickly go to, because that
tends to scare people off.
And of course, that doesn'tscare me off, because I know who
I am.
My God knows who I am and Idon't care what name you call me
.
Truth is truth, but I think ina sense we've been sort of
(11:47):
crippled by not knowing how todeal with this.
And here's I don't know if Iknow all the answers, but I know
this arguing will not help.
You have to understand the vastmajority of people in this
country.
Do not believe this way.
She is an anomaly, she isunique.
Most people aren't like this.
You may have a core 10 or 15%of the people that are these
(12:08):
crazy purple hair type peopleright, not necessarily purple
hair, but that kind of arrogancebecause that is what that is is
complete and utter arrogancethat they know all and you don't
.
I don't think arguing with themdoes a bit of good, but I think
you have to direct yourattention to the rest of the
people, because somebody may notbe as informed as you are, but
their arrogance or theirinsuination of the information
(12:33):
may attract other people totheir side.
So I think you have to doubledown on the education
information to the generalcitizen.
So when this is because thesefolks can be very loud and very
bold.
She was extremely odd how vocaland animated and passionate she
was about FEMA in NorthCarolina, because obviously her
(12:54):
worldview had been challenged bywhat was in the news at the
time, which was it was they weredoing a horrible job, right,
and some of the news outlets,and so she's become very
boisterous, and so I don't thinkit does any good to attack the
person or attack the information.
But you have to pin your sightson the rest of the population,
the rest of your community, andyou have to do it in a
(13:17):
professional manner, right?
You don't want to bow down tothe way these folks act, whoever
they may be, and I think wereally, because we think
critically, we think we canattack an insane person with
critical, logical informationand that just can't happen.
If you're in my seminars, Ibreak down some of the research
(13:39):
that about 10% of the populationnot only doesn't ever believe
that use of force is correct inlaw enforcement, they don't even
think law enforcement should beable to use use of force.
They think law enforcementshould just be able to die at
the hands of a bad guy.
They should never be permittedto use force.
That's 10% of the population.
Now, that's a real study.
I can break that out andexplain it to you.
I won't today.
So that's at least 10% of thepopulation are completely insane
(14:03):
, because if you believe thatlaw enforcement would never have
to use force ever, you're aninsane person, right.
And so on top of the 10%, youprobably have 10 or 15% that are
borderline that, so it's aquarter of the country.
When I look at some of thepolitical polling, I kind of
make sense, right?
When 25% of the public thinksthe economy is great.
(14:24):
Well, who are these peopleright?
Do you ever go to the grocerystore.
Do you ever try to buy a car orget a home loan?
I mean?
So it's about a quarter of thecountry that is completely off
their rocker.
That's their worldview.
Nothing's going to change it.
That's who you're dealing with.
When you talk to these folksthat want to defund you, reform,
you do all these things.
Now we've said this time andtime again we are for police
(14:46):
reform, but not just haphazardreform to say we're being
reformed, evidence-based reform,not just let's throw everything
on the wall here with cashlessbail and all of this and all of
that and let's just see whathappens.
That is not what we're talkingabout, because you'll notice
that all these reforms in recentyears, regardless of what it
(15:06):
may be changing the use of force, taking away your tools, all of
this stuff Police shootingshave not been reduced one bit.
In fact, they've increased inmany jurisdictions because the
crime has increased, because theuse of force in law enforcement
is correlated with violentcrime in jurisdictions, and so
at some point we're going tohave to have a different tact,
and that's not just to agree toagree.
(15:28):
So at some point we're going tohave to have a different tact,
and that's not just to agree toagree, we're going to have to
literally ignore theseindividuals and then turn our
attention to the public andexplain why we do it and when we
do it.
That's really where theattention needs to go.
You're wasting your timearguing with crazy people.
You just are Right people.
(15:50):
You just are right.
But that's what we see time andtime again, because these crazy
people are very loud andboisterous and there's your
community meetings and they'recalling your politicians and
they're in the media.
I know it is very enticing thatyou know you're right and you
know they're wrong and you wantto try to prove that.
Proving it does you no good.
It just doesn't.
You need to be very clear andconcise and communicate in a
(16:11):
forward fashion to yourcommunity about why you're doing
it, when you're going to do itand what the impact you
anticipate will be.
There's several departments thathave now introduced what's
called a policing plan.
I really love this idea.
They're big over in Europe.
They're not very popular inAmerica.
I don't understand why, andI'll put in the show notes a
(16:35):
link to a few of them, but it'sessentially a business plan for
a law enforcement agency.
They will put out a documentand they'll review it every year
and revise it, but it explainswhy they do what they do.
You know, hey, we haveautomatic license readers.
Here's why we do that.
You know, we proactively deployofficers where crime is, despite
(16:57):
the population.
Here's why we do that.
The demographic data on ourarrest won't always be along the
census lines.
Here is why that is.
We're protecting victims ofcrime, and those victims of
crime are a certain demographic.
So when we're in those areasbecause crime is generally
interracial, meaning one raceversus the same race sometimes
(17:20):
you won't see a perfect data setwhen it comes to population.
So what are they doing there?
They're literally getting leftof Bain, left of the controversy
.
They're trying to explain whythey do it before somebody
raises a concern.
And I think it's a very, verygood idea to have that document.
But I very seldom have seen it.
(17:40):
But I think we have to thinkabout it differently.
But I very seldom have seen it.
But I think we have to thinkabout it differently.
You're not going to be able toargue your way out of people
that believe this, that have thearrogance to think they have
all the answers.
I don't have all the answers,but I would put my education,
training and experience againstsomeone like that any day of the
week, right?
So why do they tend to win somuch and law enforcement changes
for them, when inside lawenforcement, those are the
(18:04):
experts that know what thereform should be.
Those are the experts that knowbest practices, but we listen
to outside entities so much, andI think we have to have a
different approach.
Now, listen, I wrote an entirebook around this premise, called
the Courageous Police Leader.
You can get it on Amazon.
It's been around for five years.
I'm not sure how many peopleare listening to it or reading
it, but I saw this for years.
(18:26):
That was just decimating us,and it, of course, came to a
head in 2020 when the book cameout with defund police and all
these crazy silly things, andyou saw what happened after that
.
Right, we saw violent crimespike to the largest has been
from one year to the next in ourhistory, since the FBI has been
doing the data, and the onlyreason they've been able to get
(18:47):
the crime rates come down is theFBI literally quit reporting
the data from about half thepolice departments.
You know in a political yearthey're using.
A crime is actually down underthis presidency.
Yeah, because your FBI quitreporting the data.
That's really odd, but you know.
They know it's a lie, of course, but they're using that as
political fodder, and so we haveyet to recover from that, from
listening to crazy people andbeing scared of this, and so
(19:12):
this is not going to stop.
There's an element of peoplethat just believe they're right,
no matter what, and they are soarrogant about it they're going
to interject themselves in whatyou do.
So as leaders, we need toreally cognitively think what
can we do today to prevent thisin the future?
(19:32):
That's what our Left of Banecourse is all about.
We have an entire course builton this.
Some of the things you can dorely heavily on data to avoid
having to do some of these sillythings because you aren't
prepared.
So check that out.
Go to travisyeatorg.
We want to help you with that.
We're going to be doing somemore information on this,
whether it's documents or someforms that can help you.
(19:52):
I have one form already out.
I'll send it to you if youreach out that.
If you go to a communitymeeting, it's sort of a rule
form, right, everybody agrees onthe rules before we have this
dialogue, and it's really crazythings like.
We're going to be honest, right, we're going to be honest and
tell the truth.
I mean, yeah, real crazy thingsthat you have to set these
boundaries for, but you've gotto set those because if not,
(20:14):
things are going to go very,very haywire, because next time
it won't be some crazy lady thatwalks up to you and talks about
Elon Musk, it's going to besomebody that's trying to change
the inner workings of yourpolice department.
Thanks for listening.
I look forward to talking toyou next time.
And just remember, lead on andstay courageous.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Thank you for listening to Courageous
Leadership with Travis Yates.
We invite you to join othercourageous leaders at www.
travisyates.
org.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!