Yes We Can

             Now, don’t lie to me.

I know good and well the following sentence has passed through your cranium at some point in your life “Some people are just plain jerks.” We all know it; we’ve all seen it; some people just need to be smacked. The only problem is that, under the current legal system, you can’t actually smack the people who need to be smacked. If you do, our nation’s sense of justice has become so perverted that the legal consequences are actually worse for the smack-er than they are for the smack-ee. Travesty. Or, even worse, sometimes you might find that jerks who are willing to blatantly flaunt social convention, are also generally not opposed to retaliating to being smacked with their own counter-smack, punch, kick, or half-nelson + wedgie and/or swirlie.

Now, these are grave issues facing our society; but, fortunately, I have come up with a brilliant solution. I propose that the Department of Justice form a special body of public officials specifically targeting violators of common sense and public etiquette. These servants of the public will would be tasked with finding those people who really need to be smacked, and then smacking them. I call them the Smack Police.

                Ok, so how does this work? It’s a relatively straight forward idea: if an Officer of Smack should observe some jerk committing an act of flagrant jerkity like trying to talk to someone when they are quite clearly trying to avoid being talked to, or speeding up in traffic to keep someone else from merging, or, more generally, doing anything I don’t agree with, then they walk up to the jerk, display their Smack Badge, and then smack them. It’s a fairly simple process.

                Of course, there would have to be rules for these officers of the public will:

               

                1. Officers of Smack may only smack jerks with one open handed smack, either front or back-handed; and, by implication, they may not use any kind of weapon.

                2.  Men may only smack men, women may only smack women.

                3. Officers of Smack may only smack adults 16 and over; although, now that I think about it, some of those young jerks really need to be smacked, so, the occasional smacklette on the back of a spoiled 12 year old’s head shouldn’t be out of the question.

                4. Smacks may be appealed if they are considered unwarranted; however, there are at least 10 years of bureaucracy between you and a verdict, so, really, is it worth it?

                5. Any retalitation against an Officer of Smack would be treated and prosecuted as assaulting a police officer; and trying to evade a smack would be prosecuted as evading arrest; so, take it like a man wussy boy.

                Now, I know what you’re thinking, “Who’s gonna pay for all this!” (Am I right?)Well not to fear good citizen. The great thing about this idea is that it would incur next to no additional costs in running the government. In establishing the Smack Police we would be giving a small body of people what amounts to a free license to smack anyone they think deserves it. That kind of privilege would be worth its weight in gold (appr. $920). So we wouldn’t actually have to pay these officials to do their job; the job itself would be its own reward; and, bonus, by forcing the officials to have everyday jobs, we’re forcing them to get out and mingle with the civilians they are tasked with monitoring.

               

                Now, one admitted problem is figuring out how to recruit these officers. You don’t want to accidentally hire jerks and then give them license to go around smacking people. Who wants to be around some jerk with the legal privilege of referring to himself as an “Officer of Smack”? You don’t hire jerks to police jerks; so, you’d have to recruit the right type of person to do this. Personality would be a very important factor. You might try hiring only those who don’t actually want the position. Appeal to their altruistic side and tell them that it’s their civic duty to hit people. Another strategy may be to hire only people who hate conflict and fighting, like a Buddhist monk, or France. These issues, however, are relatively small and easily overcome once the idea as a whole is accepted.   

               

                In brief, I am confident that, should my idea be accepted and enacted, national incidents of jerkity would fall dramatically. We would once again be able to walk our streets without fear of some jerk taking an obvious pot shot at our height, weight, long curly hair, or lack of athleticism (not that that’s ever happened to me). So, write your congressperson, start petitions, and let’s get these jerks smacked; cause, admit it, it’s a good idea.