Fraternal Order Of Police Threatens Quentin Tarantino: ‘We’ll Try To Hurt Him In The Only Way That Seems To Matter’
Quentin Tarantino may have a surprise coming, courtesy of the Fraternal Order of Police, sometime before the release of his next movie The Hateful Eight.
Tarantino drew sharp criticism from police around the country last month after the director spoke out against police brutality at a New York City rally.
As previously reported by the Inquisitr, Tarantino’s remarks at the rally were taken as suggesting that all police are murderers, which caused the NYPD to initiate a boycott of the director’s upcoming western, The Hateful Eight.
Tarantino responded to the accusation, telling the Los Angeles Times, “All cops are not murderers. I never said that. I never even implied that.”
The Fraternal Order of Police, which is the largest police union in the country, doesn’t buy it and isn’t letting Tarantino off that easy. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the Fraternal Order of Police has issued a veiled threat against Tarantino, indicating that it has a surprise waiting for him.
According to the Hollywood Reporter, details of the surprise are not clear at this time. The executive director of the police union, Jim Pasco, indicated that whatever is in store for Tarantino, it goes above and beyond the boycott initiated by police in New York.
“Something could happen anytime between now and [the release of The Hateful Eight]. And a lot of it is going to be driven by Tarantino, who is nothing if not predictable. The right time and place will come up and we’ll try to hurt him in the only way that seems to matter to him, and that’s economically.”
The Hollywood Reporter asked for clarification as to whether Pasco’s statement should be taken as a threat.
The union director replied, “Police officers protect people. They don’t go out to hurt people.”
Tarantino clearly disagrees with that sentiment. His remarks at the New York Rally that sparked so much outrage in the first place explicitly called some police murderers.
“I’m a human being with a conscience. And when I see murder I cannot stand by. And I have to call the murdered the murdered and I have to call the murderers the murderers.”
Speaking to MSNBC, the director clarified his remarks from the New York City Rally, saying that he is not anti-police or a cop-hater — he is just opposed to the police killing unarmed men and women. Additionally, he said that his remarks at the rally referred to very specific cases of what he saw as police brutality and murder.
“Now, in the case of Walter Scott, who was the man running in the park and was shot in the back, and the case of Sam DuBose, I believe those were murder, and they were deemed murder,” Tarantino told Chris Hayes on his MSNBC program All In. “And the reason, and the only reason they were deemed murder is because the incidences were caught on video.”
Regardless of any clarification, Tarantino still has a surprise waiting for him sometime between now and the Christmas release of The Hateful Eight.
Most industry experts think that the police boycott, or whatever the Fraternal Order of Police has planned, won’t affect Tarantino at the box office, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
However, the ultimate effects of the boycott and the veiled threat from the Fraternal Order of Police remain to be seen. The head of the Los Angeles Police Protective League told the Los Angeles Times that he believes a wave of private citizens will rise up in support of police on the issue.
“There’s an underground of people who are very pro-police,” Lt. Craig Lally told the Los Angeles Times. “And it’s going to be this underground that shuts down the movie, not the cops.”
Since police unions are not official government organs, representatives of those unions calling for boycotts or issuing threats aren’t technically violations of Tarantino’s freedom of speech. However, that is a fine distinction to make. Do you think it’s appropriate for police unions to issue boycotts and threats like this?
[Photo by Kena Betancur/Getty Images]
