A long time ago, when I was younger and dumber, I did a police ride-along with a high school classmate who had gone on to become a cop.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
It was one of the most chilling and radicalizing nights of my life. (Thread)
Two memories stand out to me. The first is how my classmate spent most of the night: rolling around suburban Maryland in a patrol car, punching license plate numbers into a database, looking for excuses to pull people over.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
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My classmate was so bored that he’d punch pretty much anyone’s plate into the database. But he devoted special attention to beat-up cars or drivers who looked “out of place” — which typically meant black or brown drivers in predominantly white neighborhoods.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
To punctuate his boredom, my classmate would respond to other cops’ traffic stops. When he heard another cop had pulled someone over, he’d turn on his lights and tear off into the night.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
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In this instance, a colleague of his had pulled over a car for some trivial reason — a broken tail light or expired registration — and then discovered that the driver was, as I recall, an ex-convict driving with an expired license.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
The guy (who was white) had gotten out of prison earlier in the week and hadn’t had a chance to renew his license. When he got pulled over, he was driving around with his wife and young kids.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
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Not content to leave this poor guy with a warning, the officer who initiated the traffic stop asked him to step out of his car for a conversation. As they were talking, more and more bored cops rolled up, including my classmate.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
Eventually the scene came to a boil. I don’t know exactly what happened. I seem to recall the guy taking a swing at a cop or raising his voice. Regardless, he wound up face down on the curb, his hands cuffed behind his back.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
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His family looked on screaming and crying as the cops hauled him away. It had been a short family reunion.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
As we drove away, my classmate told me that, because this guy had violated his parole, he would likely do a multi-year stint in prison.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
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And that was night: a full shift devoted to manufacturing crime — desperately searching for reasons to pull people over and then harassing people until they snapped.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
In short, nothing he did made anyone safer. He didn’t protect or defend a damn thing, except white supremacy and class domination. His entire shift had been devoted to profiling, harassing, and intimidating people.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
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What I learned that night is that behind every Derek Chauvin or Darren Wilson — behind every dramatic eruption of violence — is a whole universe of pervasive, mundane, and wanton cruelty.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
The cruelty isn’t an accident; it’s the point.
— Sean Trainor (@ess_trainor) June 7, 2020
The Obama Diary 
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