No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
Pittsburgh Police Chief Cameron McLay is feeling the heat after this photo of him holding this sign went viral.
It’s bad enough for a cop to be bombarded with negative sentiment by the public; it’s even more disheartening when he has to hear it from his fellow boys in blue.
For more than a week, Pittsburgh Bureau of Police Chief Cameron McLay has been on the receiving end of a racially charged attack from the city’s Fraternal Order of Police. His offense? Doing his job.
On New Year’s Eve, Chief McLay came upon a group of protestors and agreed to their request to be photographed holding a sign featuring a message that he took to mean as a commitment to help combat racism in the workplace. But after that photo went viral, the head of the Pittsburgh Fraternal Order of Police, Howard McQuillan, accused McLay of “pandering,” and condemned the display as a swipe at the integrity of the city’s police (or at least its white officers). McLay was also taken to task for allegedly violating the department’s social media policy.
While McLay has been criticized by the very people who are supposed to have his back, the reaction from the public has been quite different. Almost everywhere else—according to this thought-provoking op-ed piece on PennLive.com—including on social media and in the halls of his own department, McLay has been showered with an outpouring of support for his impromptu display of community solidarity.
So, who’s right and who’s wrong? Tell us what you think in the Comments section below.
(Image via Twitter)
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