Raging Bulls in Blue: The Deadly Toll of Warrior Policing on Steroids

Guest Post by John W. Whitehead

This is warrior policing on steroids.”—Paul Butler, law professor

That the police officers charged with the beating death of 29-year-old Tyre Nichols are Black is a distraction.

Don’t be distracted.

This latest instance of police brutality is not about racism in policing or black-on-black violence.

The entire institution is corrupt.

The old guard—made up of fine, decent, lawful police officers who took seriously their oath of office to serve and protect their fellow citizens, uphold the Constitution, and maintain the peace—has given way to a new guard hyped up on their own authority and the power of the badge who have almost absolute discretion to decide who is a threat, what constitutes resistance, and how harshly they can deal with the citizens they were appointed to “serve and protect.”

Memphis’ now-disbanded Scorpion unit provides a glimpse into the looming crisis in policing that has gone beyond mere militarization.

Unfortunately, while much has been said about the dangers of police militarization, a warrior mindset that has police viewing the rest of the citizenry as enemy combatants, and law enforcement training that teaches cops to shoot first and ask questions later, little attention has been paid to the role that “roid rage,” triggered by anabolic steroid use and abuse by police, may contribute to the mounting numbers of cases involving police brutality.

Given how prevalent steroid use is within the U.S. military (it remains a barely concealed fixture of military life) and the rate of military veterans migrating into law enforcement (one out of every five police officers is a military veteran), this could shed some light on the physical evolution of domestic police physiques.

A far cry from Mayberry’s benevolent, khaki-clad neighborhood cops, police today are stormtroopers on steroids, both literally and figuratively: raging bulls in blue.

“Steroid use,” as researcher Philip J. Sweitzer warns, “is the not-so-quiet little secret of state and city police departments.”

John Hoberman, the author of Dopers in Uniform: The Hidden World of Police on Steroids, estimates that there may be tens of thousands of officers on steroids.

Illegal without a prescription and legitimized by a burgeoning industry of doctors known to law enforcement personnel who will prescribe steroids and other growth hormones based on bogus diagnoses, these testosterone-enhancing drugs have become hush-hush tools of the trade for police seeking to increase the size and strength of their muscles and their physical endurance, as well as gain an “edge” on criminals.

Having gained traction within the bodybuilding and sports communities, steroid use has fueled the dramatic transformation of police from Sheriff Andy Taylor’s lean form to the massive menace of the Hulk. As retired cop Phil Dees explains, “Anabolic steroid use among law enforcement officers is prevalent among the subset of cops who are heavily into weight training. They usually stand out from the crowd, and anyone who cares to look can pick out the most likely suspects.”

Broad-shouldered. Slim-waisted. Veiny. Tree-trunk necks. Rippling physiques. And as big as action heroes. That’s how Men’s Health describes these “juicers in blue”: cops using a cocktail of steroid drugs to transform themselves into “a flesh-and-blood Justice League.”

“Because juicing cops are a secretive subculture within a secretive subculture,” exact numbers are hard to come by, but if the anecdotal evidence is to be believed, it’s more widespread than ever, with 25% of police using these drugs to bulk up and supercharge their aggression.

Indeed, while steroids are physically transformative, building muscle mass, they are also psychologically affective, upping resistance to physical and emotional stress during periods of prolonged or heavy conflict, to the delight of the military, which was involved in their early development and experimentation.

Cue the rise of muscular authoritarianism.

As Philip Sweitzer documents, “Cops on steroids are simply the natural evolution of a conscious decision by the federal government to promote military authoritarianism in drug enforcement, and the implementation of military technologies.”

Roid rage is yet another example of blowback from a militaristic culture.

There are few police forces at every level of government that are not implicated in steroid use and, consequently, impacted by “roid rage,” which manifests itself as extreme mood swings, irritability, nervousness, delusions, aggressive outbursts, excessive use of force, a sense of invincibility, and poor judgment.

“For officers who work daily in high stress, high adrenaline environments and carry guns, the ‘rage’ can be even more extreme,” concludes journalist Bianca Cain Johnson, eliciting “a Hulk-esque response by those using steroids to normal situations.”

When that roid rage is combined with the trappings of a militarized cop armed to the teeth and empowered to shoot first and ask questions later, as well as to probe, poke, pinch, taser, search, seize, strip and generally manhandle anyone they see fit in almost any circumstance, all with the general blessing of the courts, the danger of any encounter with a cop grows exponentially more deadly.

Given the growing numbers of excessive force incidents by police, especially against unarmed individuals, we cannot afford to ignore the role that doping by police plays in this escalating violence.

For instance, in one of the largest busts nationwide involving law enforcement, 248 New Jersey police officers and firefighters were found to have been getting fraudulent prescriptions of anabolic steroids, human growth hormones and other muscle-building drugs from a doctor. A subsequent investigation of those officers found that many had previously been sued for excessive force or civil rights violations, or had been arrested, fired or suspended for off-duty.

As David Meinert reports, “Steroid use has been anecdotally associated with several brutality cases and racially motivated violence by police officers, including the 1997 sodomizing of an Haitian immigrant in  New York.”

Not surprisingly, police have consistently managed to sidestep a steady volley of lawsuits alleging a correlation between police doping and excessive force, insulated by a thin blue wall of silence, solidarity and coverups, powerful police unions, and the misapplied doctrine of qualified immunity.

Qualified immunity is how the police state stays in power.

Indeed, as Reuters reports, qualified immunity “has become a nearly failsafe tool to let police brutality go unpunished and deny victims their constitutional rights.”

At its most basic level, what this really translates to is an utter lack of accountability, whether over police brutality or doping.

Despite concerns about roid rage by police, few agencies carry out random tests for steroid use among officers, not even when an officer employs excessive force. Objections to such testing range from concerns about availability and cost to officer privacy.

As Hoberman points out, “The police establishment has reacted to the steroid culture by equivocating: announcing zero-tolerance policies while doing the absolute minimum to detect and control steroid use.”

Thus, any serious discussion about police reform needs to address the use of steroids by police, along with a national call for mandatory testing.

For starters, as journalist David Meinert suggests, police should be subjected to random drug tests for use of steroids, testosterone and HCG (an artificial form of testosterone), and testing should be mandatory and immediate any time an officer is involved in a shooting or accused of unnecessary force.

This is no longer a debate over good cops and bad cops.

It’s a power struggle between police officers who rank their personal safety above everyone else’s and police officers who understand that their jobs are to serve and protect; between police trained to shoot to kill and police trained to resolve situations peacefully; most of all, it’s between police who believe the law is on their side and police who know that they will be held to account for their actions under the same law as everyone else.

Unfortunately, more and more police are being trained to view themselves as distinct from the citizenry, to view their authority as superior to the citizenry, and to view their lives as more precious than those of their citizen counterparts. Instead of being taught to see themselves as mediators and peacemakers whose lethal weapons are to be used as a last resort, they are being drilled into acting like gunmen with killer instincts who shoot to kill rather than merely incapacitate.

We’ve allowed the government to create an alternate reality in which freedom is secondary to security, and the rights and lives of the citizenry are less important than the authority and might of the government.

As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, the longer we wait to burst the bubble on this false chimera, the greater the risks to both police officers and the rest of the citizenry.

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Anonymous
Anonymous

Yeah the police are terrible yet the stupid fucks that resist arrest are just asking for trouble.

Anonymous
Anonymous

Free men are supposed to be able to resist anything other men attempt to do.

https://www.lewrockwell.com/?s=resist+arrest

https://www.lewrockwell.com/?s=resisting+arrest

Anonymous
Anonymous

Wow, Langley. Single downvotes all the way down through every post, even TBP’s founding senior darlings. You’re good. School us, baby.

Hit me again, bartender.

Anonymous
Anonymous
Anonymous
Anonymous

More whites are killed by police than blacks, when I see these national coverage dead nigs killed I don’t even pay attention. It’s all bullshit. I’m also sick of seeing local police kitted up in plate carriers and BDUs. They’re jumpy scared rabbits these days.

Anonymous
Anonymous

And that’s especially horrible, considering who’s actually causing trouble ’round these here parts:

ShotSpotter Technology, Designed to Make Communities Safer, Deemed Racist for Confirming Most Gunfire Is in Heavily Non-White Communities Across America
https://www.unz.com/sbpdl/shotspotter-technology-designed-to-make-communities-safer-deemed-racist-for-confirming-most-gunfire-is-in-heavily-non-white-communities-across-america/

Apparently, even arresting the guilty is now rayziss, too . . .

And this is why Wakanda will never be built . . . these barely-trainables want to be left alone to be fish in a barrel and shoot each other. It really is the jungle, it seems.

The “talented tenth” had best run for their lives.

Anonymous
Anonymous

It was a shock to me to come home after years away and see the local police armored up just to stroll around a small town. No one else seemed to notice or care. I know it didn’t happen totally overnight but damn people have short attention spans.

YourAverageJoe

Decades of Affirmative Action have instilled a sense of privilege, in that a nig can get away with behavior that would get a White excoriated on national teevee.
A race that must be accommodated for it to have the illusion of success brings down all.
How is the lowering of academic standards working out for us?
Watch an old My Three Sons episode and then watch a Blackish episode so that reality can slap you in the face.
There is no shortage of Walmart videos that provide fit examples as well.

Iska Waran
Iska Waran

Each case has to be assessed individually. Those Memphis cops should be convicted.
Don’t steroids make your balls shrink?

Anonymous
Anonymous

The statement To Serve & Protect falls on the face of Supreme Court Reality !
Police officers have no obligation to protect you until you are in custody (under arrest) and even then it is extremely limited as to action and liability !
As for the roid rage independent random piss & blood tests will end that especially if they are suspended without pay !
FACT : LEO’s have a high rate of depression, alcoholism, domestic abuse , divorce & suicide add steroid abuse to this heavily armed fired up individual with qualified immunity and BOOM !
You have a mentally and emotionally disturbed powder keg with a short fuse !
Most interactions with police are routine and mundane traffic ticket or a warning but then you have the prick who just decided today I’m flexing my authoritative muscle because I can and a partner ready and willing to cover for him in that case FUCK BOTH OF THEM
They are bad cops and need to be routed out !

hardscrabble farmer
hardscrabble farmer

https://abcnews.go.com/US/court-oks-barring-high-iqs-cops/story?id=95836

Court OKs Barring High IQs for Cops

September 8, 2000, 10:32 AM

All of this is part of a long term plan. There is no incompetence about it, this was a designed outcome of a deliberate policy. Clearly a violation of the 14th amendment, the courts are part of the engineered destruction of the Republic.

Anonymous
Anonymous

When I’ve shown people that, they run away and think I’m crazy. Then show them that Israeli Defense Forces are training US cops to treat Americans like Palestinians, and they scream:
https://yandex.com/search/?text=Israeli+Defense+Forces+are+training+US+cops&lr=223

bidenTouchesKids
bidenTouchesKids

The militarized police are the standing army the founding fathers warned us about. As usual we didn’t listen to them.

Anonymous
Anonymous

Colonel Jeff Cooper, USMC, said all able-bodied men must comprise a people’s militia, as the Founders stated.

Anonymous
Anonymous

Police and their families live amongst us. Military not so much.
There will be a point in time when they must consider what they are doing and why vs the repercussions of what those actions will be.
Consider the situation in Mexico, but reversed, because in this country, private citizenry is heavily armed.

Anonymous
Anonymous

Any cop who is aware of bad behavior of fellow cops and does nothing about it is as bad or worse than than the bad cop.

Anonymous
Anonymous

There are no GOOD COPS because there are still BAD COPS.

The True Nolan
The True Nolan

Same thing with the military.

Anonymous
Anonymous

Most cops don’t give a shit about your rights. Their primary job is to be a revenue generator for the city, county, or state by writing tickets. Many of them view themselves as being above everybody else and that’s why they refer to everybody else as “civilians”.

As far as the steroids go, it is a problem, and some cops do use them, but let’s be honest, have you seen some of these cops? Fat and completely out of shape and could never even engage in a foot pursuit. Sometimes I wonder if they they still have physical fitness tests at these police departments because some of these cops are disgusting looking in their appearance.

The problem with law enforcement, is it’s like a magnet for narcissists and sociopaths. Many cops are complete egomaniacs and are not interested in anything but blindly following orders and their paychecks.

WTF
WTF

Complete agreement.

Slick
Slick

Reminds me of how a lot of therapists are pretty fucked up in the head.

Pablo
Pablo

We can’t blame Whitey so now we blame all these ‘roid raging cops?
The only ‘roids I see them using come from Duncan Donuts.
It is all Bullshit.

Anonymous
Anonymous

I went to high school with three guys that became cops. They were all nerd/dorks that were made fun of and rejected by girls.

Paleocon
Paleocon

Binge watch The Shield for an accurate perspective.

Better yet, imagine how you would do their job. All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God.

MrLiberty

Get rid of the war on vice/consensual activities and have police ONLY go after folks who committed crimes with victims, and policing would become quite different.

brian
brian

Also demilitarizing them would also have a more positive effect, imo Remove the unaccountable warrior mentality

Anonymous
Anonymous

but that would be dangerous, safety first

Anonymous
Anonymous

Cops are not your friends

WilliamtheResolute
WilliamtheResolute

When the SHTF these police will still show up to your 911 call…with a gang…to rob you.

falconflight
falconflight

Fcking A.

Anonymous
Anonymous

LEO’s High rates of DEPRESSION, alcoholism, domestic abuse, divorce and suicide now add roid rage to this mental and emotional time bomb .
These are the people traveling among us heavily armed and with qualified immunity!
Incidentally that SERVE & PROTECT is a nice car door or sleeve patch decoration but the Supreme Court already proclaimed LEO’s have no obligation to protect you !
However one thing is certain if you use the force necessary to protect and defend yourself these “PUBLIC SERVANTS” will have you in the back seat handcuffed or on the ground in a heap waiting for a ride to the emergency room !

brian
brian

will have you in the back seat handcuffed or on the ground in a heap waiting for a ride to the emergency room !

You forgot that they are quite willing to help you reach the room temperature challenge if they ‘feel’ threatened. And, they don’t supply the baggies, they just write a few notes so they can remember their lies better.

Anonymous
Anonymous

There was never an old guard.

I think there should be estrogen testing for cops.

Mike Tre
Mike Tre

This article is pure nonsense. So called roid rage is a myth. the author knows next to nothing about the subject of synthetic testosterone and appears to be a shill for demonizing masculinity, as he attributes a false symptom to the immensely complex problem. This webzine is fast losing credibility.

MMinWA
MMinWA

I kinda agree.

HcG is not a form of T. It mimics the LH(released by the brain) to coax your testicles to get to work as they will begin to lower production of a wide array of hormones called androgens because of the exogenic introduction of T.

IOW injecting yourself with testosterone flips the off switch in your balls because they think there is a sufficient level in your bloodstream.

Anonymous
Anonymous

Just as injecting opioids causes cessation of endorphin release, causing a lag when external opioid use is halted.

Muscledawg
Muscledawg

We keep hearing about the need to reform police training policy. Does this imply that cops are trained to do this to ppl? This is what the fucking left wants us to believe. Show me one, ONE, dept. that actually trains cops to beat a perp to death. (Don’t they “disengage” high speed pursuits now?) There are none. These fucktard cops overstepped their departmental authority to “control” a perp. Then why is the dept responsible for restitution to the “victim” if the dept had no control of the situation. Those cops took it upon themselves to go above and beyond what the law allowed and need to be held to account. Both by incarceration and monetary restitution to the victim. It is my hypocritical Christian view that they lose EVERYTHING. And if that means their families get fucked, tough.

Motown
Motown

As horrible as the police work may have been….STOP RESISTING. It could have been quickly ended and death avoided. If you argue this point, you’re falling for the narratives and are being ignorant. STOP RESISTING. COMPLY, GET HANDCUFFED, GET PUT IN THE CAR, DEAL WITH IT AT THE STATION WITH YOUR LAWYER. Live another day. 9 times out of 10, these situations are escalated when the person fights and resists lawful detainment or arrest.

Harrington Richardson
Harrington Richardson

I get a close up view of what is going on locally and I am pretty sure most would be shocked out of their jocks at what law enforcement, the good the bad and the ugly, have to deal with. Drugs, drugs, drugs, (DRUGS and legal weed 100 more times) drugs, drug dealers, drug suppliers next level, fucking Mexican cartels and US motorcycle gangs just like Sons of Anarchy, Feds of all stripes with too many running their own scams and informants. The various dealers also murder each other on a regular basis and the Feds fuck up local enforcement by shielding “their” murderers who flip and disappear into Witness Protection often undermining all the good work done by the locals.
The next biggest problem is Chester the Molester. The number of pedos and child molesters that they catch is stunning.
After dealing with this for most of your day you may not be psychologically fit to deal with the more normal parts of the public.

Anonymous
Anonymous

After dealing with this for most of your day you may not be psychologically fit to deal with the more normal parts of the public.

And…..?

Are you suggesting that it is OK for them to be monsters, because they deal with monsters? Certainly looks that way from your post.

Maybe we would be better off getting rid of the police if that is the case. At least there would be less monsters for us to have to deal with and those that we do would not have “qualified immunity” when they act like the people they are supposed to be protecting society FROM.

Harrington Richardson
Harrington Richardson

I am suggesting I understand the situation. I wonder what some lame fuck would do if he had to deal with a call that a mere description of leaves jurors wretching their guts out in court? Instead of just hearing about it you had to see it, hear it, touch it and smell it?

Anonymous
Anonymous

” a mere description of leaves jurors wretching their guts out in court? ”
Most jurors are women, but still, can you be more melodramatic? That shit doesn’t happen.

The Central Scrutinizer
The Central Scrutinizer

Well…that’s what you get for engaging with anonymous fags, bro.

For MY part, I feel what you’re puttin’ down. I’ve lived next door to 3 cops in my life. They all describe what you wrote here.

Anonymous
Anonymous

What a crock of shit. They have been protecting their dealers for at least the last 50 years. They do nothing but speed and give tickets and take statements and act important.

Sons of Anarchy, lmao.

Falcon101
Falcon101

The sad part of “Policing” in Amerika is the fact that very few of the police that are tasked with enforcing the “Laws” of the land actually know ANY LAWS and have zero desire to learn ANY of the very Laws they are supposed to “Enforce” & let me stress the Force part because that sees to be all they know.

The Central Scrutinizer
The Central Scrutinizer

OJT is a bad thing?

/s

Two if by sea.
Two if by sea.

Just a question…
Why can’t Leos just net the little monkeys and throw em in the backseat.
A real net.

awoke
awoke

Based. The protectors should be held to a higher standard than those they protect.

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