During the Black Lives Matter manifestation in Stockholm on 3 June a policewoman kneeled down to the demonstrators, after having heard them shouting “All cops are bastards”. In addition, she hugged them and they cried together. I earlier characterized the happening as a failed courtship. The metaphor was intently gentle, and the aftermath heightens the severity. The monopoly on violence is the last outpost, which must not surrender. Not as much the sun of June as the silence of the Police Authority is efficiently melting down the Pillars of Society to tin soldiers in liquid form.

Let me suggest an intellectual experiment. A middle-aged, white, heterosexual policeman approaches a racially interested white gathering on his knees, whereafter he is gesticulating, chanting and holding up placards, thereby showing his support for the mob. What reaction would then be expected from the journalists? From the Police Authority? Had they helped him to disappear until the storm was over and thereafter given him his job back? Or had they thrown him to the wolves?

This is not about an individual police officer. It is about saving a country. The event also gives the recruiting discussion renewed relevance. The policewoman might have been scared, fair enough. She might sympathize with the activists, fair enough. However, when dealing with riots we cannot have shaky knees. A person pursuing such an action is not suitable for the job. The wrongful act must have consequences. Irreparable damage is made. Still, some damage control has to be done. The policewoman should be suspended and the Police Authority should disclose the selection procedure for Police Academy applicants. End the era of reduced requirements! No more gender perspectives. No more forced diversity. No more quotas. We citizens need to be told what help we can expect from the forces upholding order.

There is no need for any more desk police officers either. The elephant graveyard is full. In contrast, there is a considerable amount of elephants strolling around in the rooms constituting Sweden. In order to monitor and, when needed, catch the assailants of today, the melting police soldiers have to tighten up.

When the monopoly on violence is terminated, the democracy dies. Through the silence of the Police Authority, the suffocation process is now entered upon.