LMPD 挑战硬币：形象将军官等同于战士，硬币可能引发争议

一位古希腊战士，手中的长矛上刻有“西方最佳”字样。奖章展示了丘吉尔唐斯标志性的双尖塔。

An ancient Greek warrior with a spear emblazoned with the words “Best in the West.” Medallions showcasing Churchill Downs’ iconic twin spires. Police in riot gear standing in front of a burning Louisville skyline.

一位古希腊战士，手中的长矛上刻有“西方最佳”字样。奖章展示了丘吉尔唐斯标志性的双尖塔。身着防暴装备的警察站在燃烧的路易斯维尔天际线前。

These are among the designs of collectible “challenge coins” that have been offered for sale to Louisville Metro Police officers through internal department-wide emails in recent years.

这些是可收藏的“挑战硬币”的设计之一，近年来通过部门内部电子邮件向路易斯维尔地铁警察出售。

While widely circulated within the department, the challenge coins are largely unavailable to the broader public — except for some that end up being resold on the internet. Emails obtained by The Courier Journal under the Kentucky Open Records Act provide a glimpse at the collectibles officers are designing and purchasing. The tokens range from controversial — like the riot police one — to more mundane and offer a window into how members of the beleaguered department see themselves.

虽然挑战币在该部门内广泛流通，但大多数公众都无法获得挑战币——除了一些最终在互联网上转售的币。 《信使日报》根据《肯塔基州开放记录法》获得的电子邮件让我们得以一睹官员正在设计和购买的收藏品。这些代币的范围从有争议的（如防暴警察的代币）到更普通的代币，为了解陷入困境的部门成员如何看待自己提供了一个窗口。

Challenge coins originally gained popularity in the military, but today they're a staple of American police culture.

挑战硬币最初在军队中流行，但如今它们已成为美国警察文化的主要内容。

“Traditionally, the challenge coin was something that was used among soldiers to commemorate either membership of a particular unit or being part of a particular operation or campaign. And that's very much how police use it,” said Michael Sierra-Arévalo, a sociologist at the University of Texas at Austin and the author of "The Danger Imperative: Violence, Death, and the Soul of Policing."

“传统上，挑战硬币是士兵之间使用的东西，以纪念特定部队的成员身份或特定行动或战役的一部分。德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校社会学家、《危险势在必行：暴力、死亡和警务灵魂》一书的作者迈克尔·塞拉-阿雷瓦洛（Michael Sierra-Arévalo）说，这就是警察使用它的方式。

The coins are such a ubiquitous part of law enforcement culture that when Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman was the top federal prosecutor for the Western District of Kentucky, his office would tweet out images of the collectibles from across the commonwealth and nation as part of “#ChallengeCoinFriday.”

这些硬币是执法文化中无处不在的一部分，以至于当肯塔基州总检察长拉塞尔·科尔曼 (Russell Coleman) 担任肯塔基州西区最高联邦检察官时，他的办公室会在推特上发布来自联邦和国家各地的收藏品图片，作为“#”的一部分挑战币星期五。”

LMPD’s coins are largely designed by individual officers or groups of officers and advertised for sale inside the department. Sometimes, coins created by groups like the Louisville Metro Police Foundation are offered for sale.

LMPD 的硬币主要由个别警官或警官团体设计，并在部门内做广告出售。有时，路易斯维尔地铁警察基金会等团体创造的硬币会被出售。

From emails The Courier Journal reviewed, $10 is generally the standard price for a challenge coin, although special ones can cost more. LMPD coins resold online can sometimes go for many times that amount. The LMPD coin depicting the Greek warrior is currently listed at $65 plus shipping on eBay.

根据《信使日报》评论的电子邮件，10 美元通常是挑战币的标准价格，尽管特殊的可能会更贵。在线转售的 LMPD 硬币有时可以卖到这个金额的很多倍。描绘希腊战士的 LMPD 硬币目前在 eBay 上的售价为 65 美元（含运费）。

Imagery that evokes warriors is a shared theme among a number of LMPD’s coins. The Greek warrior coin, which was offered for sale in 2020, features a figure holding a spear while draped in a black, blue and white American flag. The coin was created for LMPD’s 2nd Division, which covers much of Louisville’s West End, a mostly Black section of the city with a disproportionate number of homicides compared to the rest of Louisville. The names of individual West End neighborhoods are written on the stripes of the flag, which is worn as a cape. “Best in the West” is written on the spear.

唤起战士的形象是 LMPD 的许多硬币的共同主题。这枚希腊武士硬币于 2020 年发售，其图案是一个手持长矛、披着黑、蓝、白三色美国国旗的人物。这枚硬币是为路易斯维尔警察局第二分局设计的，该分局覆盖了路易斯维尔西区的大部分地区，该地区以黑人为主，与路易斯维尔其他地区相比，凶杀案数量不成比例。西区各个街区的名称都写在旗帜的条纹上，旗帜被当作斗篷佩戴。长矛上写着“西方最佳”。

“This imagery that directly equates officers to warriors, soldiers, that are presumably fighting some enemy — that is something that’s relatively pervasive within policing,” said Sierra-Arévalo, who spent more than 1,000 hours on patrol with officers doing field research. At best, he added, that can look like police viewing themselves as sheepdogs; at worst, he said, that imagery takes on the form of the Punisher, the fictional Marvel Comics vigilante who uses extrajudicial force against criminals.

“这种形象直接将军官等同于战士、士兵，他们可能正在与某些敌人作战——这在警务领域相对普遍，”塞拉-阿雷瓦洛说，他与警察一起巡逻了 1000 多个小时，进行实地研究。他补充说，这最多看起来就像警察将自己视为牧羊犬；他说，在最坏的情况下，图像会呈现出惩罚者的形式，惩罚者是漫威漫画中虚构的义务警员，对罪犯使用法外武力。

Another coin, for LMPD’s robbery unit, features a balaclava alongside one of the Ten Commandments: “thou shalt not steal.” On the other side, the fleur-de-lis of the LMPD logo is partially obscured by a red bandana hung in a way that mimics how a person would wear one across their face to hide their identity. Two downward-facing handguns straddle the sides of the fleur-de-lis.

另一枚硬币是为 LMPD 的抢劫部门设计的，上面有一个巴拉克拉法帽和十诫之一：“不可偷盗”。另一方面，LMPD 徽标的百合花部分被红色头巾遮盖，其悬挂方式模仿了人们将头巾戴在脸上以隐藏身份的方式。两把朝下的手枪横跨在百合花的两侧。

Another coin for sale on eBay— which The Courier Journal did not see referenced in the emails obtained through open records — echoes that Biblical theme and portrays LMPD officers as God’s avengers.

eBay 上出售的另一枚硬币（《信使日报》在通过公开记录获得的电子邮件中没有看到提及）呼应了圣经主题，并将 LMPD 官员描绘成上帝的复仇者。

“If you do evil — be afraid,” reads the Major Crimes Division coin. It then quotes the rest of Romans 13:4: “For we do not bear the sword in vain, we are ministers of god, agents of wrath to deliver vengeance to those who do evil.”

重案组硬币上写着：“如果你作恶，就要害怕。”然后它引用了《罗马书》13:4的其余部分：“我们并不是徒然拿着刀剑，我们是神的使者，是愤怒的使者，要向作恶的人报应。”

As first reported by LEO Weekly in 2022, a 2017 LMPD firearms training slideshow used that same Bible verse.

正如《LEO Weekly》于 2022 年首次报道的那样，2017 年 LMPD 枪械训练幻灯片也使用了相同的圣经经文。

Sierra-Arévalo said there are “certainly” components of racial inequality and police taking a “good guys and bad guys” approach in challenge coin imagery, including ones The Courier Journal showed him. However, he believes images the public could potentially find problematic are created mostly out of ignorance.

塞拉-阿雷瓦洛表示，“肯定”存在种族不平等的因素，警方在挑战硬币图像中采取“好人和坏人”的态度，包括《信使日报》向他展示的图像。然而，他认为公众​​可能认为有问题的图像大多是出于无知而产生的。

“A lot of it is frankly driven by dudes doing stuff without thinking too hard about it,” he said. “It’s guys left to their own devices doing stuff that they think looks cool, and which gives them a sense of being cool, or high-speed, or super tactical. That also explains why soldiers do a lot of things … it’s an appeal towards masculinity and

“坦率地说，这很大程度上是由那些没有经过深思熟虑的人做的事情推动的，”他说。 “人们用自己的设备做他们认为看起来很酷的事情，这给了他们一种很酷、或者高速、或者超级战术的感觉。这也解释了为什么士兵会做很多事情……这是对男性气质的吸引力和