Dignity increasingly a right only afforded to those in your tribe

The appalling assault of a naked mentally ill woman by two police officers in Western Sydney has sent shockwaves through the city.But should we really be so surprised, asks Joe Hildebrand.

The appalling assault of a naked mentally ill woman by two police officers in Western Sydney has sent shockwaves through the city.

But should we really be so surprised?

I have a huge amount of respect and sympathy for our cops. They do an incredibly complex and traumatic job in which their lives could be in jeopardy in what are often chaotic and fast-moving circumstances.

The scene in Emu Plains was clearly chaotic and fast moving with a clearly troubled and hostile subject in a state of high distress.

Timothy Trautsch leaves Penrith District Court on Tuesday.

Nathan Black leaving Penrith District Court.

But it is equally clear from the evidence to which the officers pleaded guilty that they feared no danger.

Instead they laughed at and humiliated the woman further, using incredibly coarse language.

Yet perhaps the most telling thing is that the body camera footage which ended up condemning them was the very thing they thought would vindicate them.

In other words, they didn’t even think they were doing anything wrong.

And that is precisely what is wrong.

Trautsch sat motionless throughout the proceedings.

Not just in this incident, not just in Sydney, but across society as a whole.

There has never been more awareness of mental illness than now, with all kinds of platitudes, training and contortions of language to address it.

But when push came to shove — quite literally — the basic human empathy simply wasn’t there.

Likewise across every conceivable workplace situation or human interaction we have ever increasing tomes of regulation dictating the correct words to use and the correct way to behave but has any of this made us better people? I’m not so sure.

Nathan Black covered up before he jumped into a getaway car.

Indeed, the very people who are often the most determined to condemn or regulate the behaviour of others are often the ones who behave most appallingly if they encounter anyone who doesn’t conform to their world view.

Just look at the torrents of abuse spouted on social media by so-called “progressives” whose profiles enumerate their virtues.

And like these two police officers, they don’t think they’re doing anything wrong — they think they’re fighting the good fight.

Or look at the infamous comment by a prominent activist academic that it was her job to make anyone who supports Israel feel uncomfortable, words that were interpreted by another academic as a call to make Jews feel uncomfortable.

Ironically, religion once provided a moral framework that prioritised compassion but in these more Godless days religion itself is used as both a weapon and a target.

Some on the right accuse Muslims of not assimilating while extremist Muslims aid their cause by trying to whip up Jew-hate among their moderate and peaceful co-religionists.

Meanwhile the atheist left continues to stare down its nose at Christianity.

And yet it is Christianity at its core that pioneered the radical idea of universal human dignity, regardless of race, colour or creed.

In today’s fractured society it seems that dignity is increasingly a right only afforded to those in your tribe.

That’s not progress. That’s prehistoric.

Originally published as Dignity increasingly a right only afforded to those in your tribe