Bad apples

The bad apples metaphor, originated as a warning of the corrupting influence of one corrupt or sinful person. Over time and alternatively, it has come to mean that one such person should not be seen as representative of the rest of a corporate body. It is often used in the context of police misconduct.

A watercolor of a bad apple

This article is about English metaphor. For other uses, see Bad apples (disambiguation).

Origins
The concept of bad apples is not limited to the police

The bad apples metaphor originates from the proverb, "A rotten apple quickly infects its neighbor", first recorded as used in English in 1340.[1] The proverb was rephrased by Benjamin Franklin in Poor Richard's Almanack in 1736, stating "the rotten apple spoils his companion."[2] The phrase was popularized by sermons during the 19th century, claiming "As one bad apple spoils the others, so you must show no quarter to sin or sinners."

Linguists such as Ben Zimmer have pointed out that the proverb had an opposite meaning to its modern usage, blaming people complicit with "bad apples" of being at risk of corruption rather than claiming bad apples are not representative of a group.[3][4] According to Zimmer, the first recorded modern usage of the proverb was in the Osmonds song, One Bad Apple. He also pointed out that the metaphor may have switched meaning because grocery stores became more common and displayed fresh apples, rarely showing rotten ones.[5][4]

Modern usage

By US presidents

When the US Army's war crimes at Abu Ghraib surfaced, George W. Bush condemned the soldiers who participated in war crimes at the prison but used the bad apples metaphor to defend the rest of the US Army.[6]

Barack Obama used the bad apple metaphor in a 2013 speech to defend his Healthcare law when thousands of Americans were losing their health insurance. He claimed that it was the fault of "bad apple" insurance companies rather than his Healthcare law.[7]

Of policing

The bad apples metaphor has been used by pro-police politicians, municipalities, and police themselves to defend police organizations when police officers are criticized for alleged misconduct.[8][9] The metaphor communicates that the few criticized officers do not reflect the performance and behavior of the rest.[10]

Pro-police officials were first recorded as using the metaphor following the beating of Rodney King and it was used following the shootings of Michael Brown, Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, Breonna Taylor, and the killing of George Floyd.[4][11] U.S. President Donald Trump used the bad apples metaphor to defend police in a Dallas speech in June 2020, claiming that there are bad apples in every organization and there remains a need for police to protect citizens.[9] In his first presidential debate with Donald Trump on September 29th, 2020, Joe Biden used the bad apples metaphor to defend policing when asked about racial inequality in terms of the justice system, claiming that the vast majority of police officers are "good, decent, honorable men and women".[12]

Critics of policing have often rejected use of the metaphor, arguing that policing is a fundamentally broken and racist system. They claim that policing is flawed beyond repair, citing black people being disproportionately more targeted by police than white people and referencing that the police originated from slave patrols. They say that existing police forces must be abolished since attempts at reform are ineffective. A common counter metaphor used by critics such as Rashawn Ray is that the metaphorical apple tree that officers come from is rotten to its roots and must be replaced.[13]

Anarchist author Kristian Williams claimed in his book, Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power in America, that the bad apples argument is a way for police departments to displace blame onto a few officers to avoid criticism and actually changing as a whole.[14]

Critics of the police also accuse officers in general of being aware of who "bad apple" officers are and being complicit with them, giving as examples the three other officers present not stopping Derek Chauvin from killing George Floyd and that 57 Buffalo officers resigned after two officers were suspended for shoving a 75-year-old man. Harry Litman, a US attorney who has worked with police, has said that it is difficult for police departments and other officers to remove "bad apple" officers due to systematic practices protecting them, giving as an example that Derek Chauvin had 17 complaints on his record before killing George Floyd.[10][11] A study on the integrity of police by the National Institute of Justice found that, while over 80% of officers they surveyed do not believe in keeping silent when aware of misconduct by other officers, 24.9% of them agreed whistleblowing was not worth it, 67.4% of officers believe they are more likely to be given a "cold shoulder" by their police peers if they report misconduct, and 52.4% believe it is not unusual for cops to turn a blind eye to police misconduct.[15]

See also

References
  1. Speake, Jennifer (2015). The Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs. Oxford University Press. p. 271. ISBN 978-0-19-179944-0.
  2. Franklin, Benjamin (1736). Poor Richard's Almanack. p. 61.
  3. "Tweet". Benn Zimmer. Twitter. Retrieved July 8, 2020.
  4. "'A few bad apples': Phrase describing rotten police officers used to have different meaning". ABC News. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  5. Curzan, Rebecca Kruth, Anne. "TWTS: Does one bad apple spoil the others? Not according to the Osmonds". www.michiganradio.org. Retrieved July 8, 2020.
  6. "Abu Ghraib, 10 Years Later". The New York Times. April 22, 2014. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  7. "Obama blames 'bad apple' insurers for canceled coverage". Reuters. Reuters. October 31, 2013. Retrieved July 8, 2020.
  8. Dance, Scott. "De Sousa: Baltimore police corruption limited to a 'very few bad apples'". Baltimore Sun. baltimoresun.com. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  9. "At Dallas talk on police and race, Trump shrugs off 'bad apples' and again vows to 'dominate the streets'". Dallas News. June 12, 2020. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  10. Litman, Harry (June 10, 2020). "Column: Bad apples, yes, but it's the system that keeps them on police forces". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  11. "Bad Apple Proverbs: There's One In Every Bunch". NPR.org. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  12. "First 2020 Presidential Debate: WATCH LIVE Pres. Trump, Joe Biden go head-to-head". ABC News. September 29, 2020.
  13. Ray, Rashawn (May 30, 2020). "Bad apples come from rotten trees in policing". Brookings Institute. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  14. Williams, Kristian (August 3, 2015). Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power in America. AK Press. pp. 43–47. ISBN 978-1-84935-215-4.
  15. "Enhancing Police Integrity" (PDF). Research for Practice.

Further reading
  • The dictionary definition of bad apple at Wiktionary
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