Ever since the terrorist attacks in France in 2011 the presence of armed military personnel on the streets of France has noticeably increased. Arguably, this is to increase the protection of the people, and to perhaps increase the response time of the security forces in the event of another terrorist attack.
Yet consider this… if we live in a society in which there are no armed forces on the streets, the presence of any armed person would be a cause for alarm, and could be readily identified and raised to the attention of the security forces. Whereas, in a society where there is a regular armed presence on the streets, the sight of an armed person becomes normal and would not necessarily provoke a call to the forces of law and order.
This morning, in the Gare de L’Est in Paris I saw 4 people, armed with what appeared to my untrained eyes, to be high-powered military ordinance in the form of rifles. The station was full of people, and no-one batted an eyelid, not one person (that I saw) challenged the soldiers, or asked them for any form of verification of their identity – I can only suppose that like me, the other occupants of the train station assumed that anyone walking around the station dressed in military garb and carrying a rifle was indeed military and was there for a legitimate (and approved) purpose. But it this assumption fair? After all, wouldn’t it be the best possible disguise for a terrorist to dress as a soldier of the country in question? Would not dressing in French military dress permit someone to walk around Paris heavily armed and yet unchallenged? Isn’t therefore the idea of placing armed soldiers on the street the compete antithesis to the safety of the citizens?
The regular repetition of a thing leads to the eventual acceptance of this into what is considered ‘usual’. We do not routinely question the ‘usual’ or ‘normal’ – even in situations where we disagree vehemently with the thing, if it occurs often enough we cease to question its presence, even where we continue to question its legitimacy.
The example of armed soldiers (or indeed police) can be considered as even more difficult since we are dealing with a questioning of the behaviour in the forces of law and order – the forces of authority if you will and I would argue that questioning authority is harder than questioning simple behaviour. To question a position of authority is to require that position of authority to justify itself; an act which can be read as inferring an equality of status between the questioner and the position of authority. Yet such equality is rarely the case, those in positions of authority have a different set of rights than those who are not in a position of authority.
Yet how even can we identify anyone as being in a position of authority? Given the breadth of variety of guises adopted by the combined security forces, is it reasonable to expect that anyone is able to immediately judge whether or not any single uniform is legitimate or not? On a personal level I have absolutely no certain knowledge of the variety of uniform used by the military forces (or indeed the police of that matter), therefore should I come face to face with one, I would more than likely have to make an assumption either way. In addition to this, even should I be satisfied of their identity, as I am unfamiliar with the specific laws governing the use (or not) of firearms in public, I would also have no way of knowing whether or not the individual in question was authorised to be in possession of a gun or not. To the best of my knowledge, the laws of the land preclude private citizens from promenading projectile weapons in the streets of France (even a bow must have the string removed in order to permit its transportation in public). Thus it can be assumed that any person so armed is either outside of the law, or has been granted dispensation from the law in some way or other. All of which is based largely on assumptions, made by the individual, in the moment.
Assumptions can replace the act of questioning, and no longer questioning results in acceptance.
Once a thing becomes accepted, it is possible for it to be abused. Not only can the position of authority itself be abused, but the perception of the position of authority can also be abused. Were I to adopt the uniform and demeanour of a soldier, would the citizens accept me blindly as a soldier – as I accepted the soldiers this morning? Our acceptance therefore of armed soldiers on the street means that anyone can dress as a soldier and carry a gun on the street – is that what we want? Is that the level of security that we seek?