It was brought to my attention on Saturday that Noah Jacobs was complaining bitterly about the "Privilege, And Responsibility" post. He was portrayed as being on some sort of rampage about it. I was not told what was the content of his complaint. So I reached out to him to offer him an opportunity either to post a comment/complaint below the post, or to take a whole post as a guest author, so he could tell us all whatever he wanted. He declined. He did, however, give me some sense of what his gripe was.
As best I was able to understand it, he thought I either misunderstood or distorted his facebook comment, and that at the very least, I was incomplete in summarizing it. Noah sent me a more or less complete e-mail complaint about what he considered my mishandling of this issue. Since Noah did in fact decline an opportunity to explain this to us himself, other than telling it to me via e-mail, I will not reprint his e-mail here. I will not do for or to him what he did not want to do for or to himself. I will, however, reprint his facebook comment. It says, in its entirety,
"Just so all of you residents know... our three top police officers have been suspended with pay. No charges have been filed by the state attorney's office. The Village Manager and the entire Commission won't say why. I really think we should know who's in charge of protecting us in their absence. I really like these guys and to quote former commissioner Bernard" this is bizarre" .
The ellipsis is Noah's. I have preserved the punctuation errors, so as not to tamper with this post in any way.
The intention of the "Privilege, And Responsibility" post was to address one specific problem, committed mostly by Steve Bernard, and merely requoted by Noah. It's true that Noah significantly compounds the problem with his facebook post, but that was not my point.
Since Noah brings it up, however, we can examine exactly what he and Steve did that was problematic. I have already fully quoted Steve, at least to the extent Charles Rabin quoted him, and there is nothing more to be said about that. Noah takes this problem a few significant steps further.
First, Noah quotes Rabin, too, in informing his followers that "our three top police officers have been suspended with pay [and] no charges have been filed by the state attorney's office." I have no reason to suppose that Noah checked with BP administration to confirm if this was true. I was not told he did. What is crystal clear, however, is that if that statement was true, it would be precisely the kind of information of which the silence of an investigation would be intended to prevent dissemination. My point about Steve and Noah was that each of them has been in the unique position to know that some matters are exquisitely delicate and should not be made public, at least at a given point in time. Either of them, most certainly including Noah under this circumstance, should have known 1) that he had no information, at least no reliable information, and 2) that if he thought what was suggested to him might be true, he should contact the Manager for confirmation, if available, and permission to publicize. In this case, I have every confidence that the Manager would have told Noah not to make public this assertion, whether it was true or not. Again, this is precisely the kind of assertion that was not fit for dissemination. But my other, more salient, point is that Noah, and Steve, had every reason, and more reason than most people, to know this. They have very much "been there."
Noah's second point in his facebook post was that "we should know who's in charge" of our police force. Should we? If the whole matter is not to be known at this point, and if it is the Manager's job to see to Village functioning, including the police, it may well be that we shouldn't know anything, and that we should, even in retrospect, confidently assume that things are under control, unless the Manager says they're not. I don't think Noah is at all correct here. A few weeks ago, our Chief was away in Broward at a two-week seminar. This is true. Should Noah and the rest of us have been informed that the Chief was off site for two weeks, but we should not worry, because there was a functioning chain of command in his absence? What about when the Chief, or anyone else on the force, is on vacation? What does Noah, and what do the rest of us, need to know during that interval?
Third, Noah, explicitly sharing Steve's frustration, requotes Steve's declaration that the whole thing is "bizarre." Noah further explains that what makes it bizarre to him is that he "like[s] these guys." That's why the possibility of some unrevealed personnel action, reportedly possibly based on "misdeeds," is "bizarre?" Because Noah "like[s] these guys?" If he, or Steve, or all the rest of us, like them, then there couldn't be anything wrong, and it would be "bizarre" if there was? Either Noah is saying, in complaining both on facebook and to me, that unexpected things cannot happen, or he and Steve are protesting that they were unaware if something unexpected was happening. It would be "bizarre," they conclude, if something unexpected was happening, and they were not told about it. But isn't that exactly the point? Isn't the whole concept of confidential and non-public investigation supposed to prevent public dissemination of information? Even to them (perish the thought, apparently)? And shouldn't Noah and Steve, more than most people, know that very well? So what, exactly, is the complaint from these two?
Noah made one final criticism of me in the e-mail he sent. He said I should properly have reassured my neighbors, even if I had to go door-to-door to do it. He seems to have forgotten, or to have overlooked or ignored, or perhaps, amazingly, not to have comprehended, that I couldn't say anything. What little I knew was not for me to repeat. To anyone, and under any circumstances. Noah criticizes me for not being as indiscriminate and disrespectful of protocol as he is. You know what, Noah? Guilty as charged.
No comments:
Post a Comment