EDITORIAL – Middle finger no ticket-worthy offense

Apparently, police and construction workers in Center Township, Pa., have a lot of free time… Apparently, police and construction workers in Center Township, Pa., have a lot of free time on their hands. What else could explain the lawsuit Thomas Burns is filing?

Last April, Burns grew frustrated with a traffic delay caused by construction and gave the middle finger to a construction worker. The worker radioed the gesture to a police officer stationed down the road, and the officer cited Burns for disorderly conduct. The citation was eventually dropped, but Burns filed suit anyway, believing he was maliciously prosecuted.

Come on, now. If flipping people off was considered a legitimate offense, almost everyone would get ticketed at some point or another. Just about everybody – construction worker, motorist and otherwise – has given the finger to someone, somewhere, and probably received it a few times, too. Everyone’s been cut off or otherwise inconvenienced by other drivers, or frustrated enough with a construction delay to say some mean things or show some unpleasant gestures.

It’s not the job of the police to worry about this. They aren’t paid to make sure we’re nice to one another; they’re paid to make sure we don’t break laws and harm other people.

The police officer in question should have been looking for people speeding or driving dangerously. The idea of pulling someone over and citing him for something as commonplace as a middle finger should have been laughable to the officer.

Of course, if the construction worker in question had actually been busy working on something, he never would have seen the bird flipped at him. He never would have felt the need to take time out from his work – which is largely funded by tax dollars from the likes of Thomas Burns – to call the police.

Burns is sadly not the first person to end up in court because of his middle fingers. Pennsylvania courts have already tried other, similar cases and found that the gesture does not constitute obscenity or disorderly conduct. The only exception is when it is used in a clearly sexual context, which it is highly doubtful that Burns invoked.

This is an abuse of power on the part of the construction worker and the police officer. The only evidence in a situation like this is one person’s word against another’s; if police will respond to such petty complaints, what’s to stop construction workers from calling in such “offenses” whenever they’re bored? What’s more, if precedent shows that this sort of citation doesn’t hold up in court, then police officers who continue to issue them are just taking advantage of or trying to squeeze extra money out of average motorists.

Thomas Burns, you are fighting a good fight. The Pitt News salutes you – with more than one finger.