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Old Bill getting their priorities right
BillieTheBot
Posts: 8,721 Bot
Police block motorway to pick up toy
Police closed a section of the M11 to rescue a girl's soft toy after it flew from the family car in a gust of wind.
[...] Her father Simon, who called out Essex Police, said: "One of the officers had children and probably knew the importance of these things."
Police said their action was a "minor inconvenience" to avoid Amy's distress.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/4150386.stm
Well who said coppers are not servants of the people?
Beep boop. I'm a bot.
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Comments
"Lets get a burglar!" "Nah, we could jsut rescue a soft toy, and hold up traffic for absolutley ages."
And no matter how efficiently they are carried out, roadblocks severely increase the risk of accidents on the road. You would have thought that the police would want to keep them to a minimum. I won't even go into waste of resources, cash etc.
I also have to wonder whether the child in question might be being brought up as a bit of a spoilt brat.
Duh. "You matter more than anyone else on the Road, let me get the police, waste their time and everyone elses to get your cuddly toy back."
will the police be mounting safety contols to help frogs cross the road?
if they can get the funding then probably ...anything to keep them away from those nasty criminal types ...officers could to easily be corrupted in a criminal environment.
Mind you one of my sister's has never quite forgiven me for dangling her toy panda out the window of the car until she promised to stop pestering me
I wasnt being entirely serious, it does seem like a waste of time and money to me, but I dont think I would have done well infront of the kid, crying children freak me out.
I think the police did a wondeful job, and its refreshing to actually see some human emotion and some human common sense in positions of authority for a change.
The police officer who rescued that toy should be given a medal, not vilified.
If you are in such a rush that you can't wait ten minutes for a very young child to be reunited with her favourite toy then you should have set off earlier. Some things are more important.
You go and tell that girl that her best friend- because that's what toys mean to young children- isn't important, and that you being ten minutes late for a meeting you should have already arrived at is far more important.
I for one want to commend the police officers in question for showing some human compassion. They did a very kind thing when it would have been easier not to. They should be praised not abused.
And I feel for them- they are vilified for being robots, and when they do show some compassion and emotion they are, er, vilified.
Oh okay, I misread you there.
Yes it would have been an upset for the kid... and a valuable lesson in life.
A good 'bribe' from her parents (new cuddly toy, special treat) should have been more than enough to compensate. I certainly know what my dad would have said if I'd carried on crying for too long...
I couldn't quite tell...........
I think the police showed some emotion, and I think that's good to see. How much delay did it cause, ten minutes max?
How many officers are required to carry on a blockade? Officers who would otherwise be patrolling the motorway, looking for speeders and infractors, etc etc.
Is the increased risk of accidents really worth the recovery of a stuffed toy for a child?
Depends how loud the kid was crying I guess.
You can't speed when the road is closed, either:)
I wonder if they put seven bullets through the head of the toy before returning it to the little girl...
Motorways are for going along bloody fast, not pissing about because some kid managed to accidentally wang a soft toy out the sunroof.
Kids are a pain.
:grump:
Yes I am compassionless when it comes to things like that (children)/other road users
It's not spoiling the child at all. Not unless you think burying their pet rabbit instead of eating it is spoling a child too.
You're all cold heartless bastards.
Lets look at the stupid parents who rang the police after this incident. Jesus Christ, a fucking toy, not a family heirloom like. And if they were so bothered they'd go out and look themselves. It's not the polices job to be closing roads and chasing after toys no matter how kind it was of them to do it.
Yep, I'm sure they would go and dodge the cars doing 85mph.
The police thought it was.
The polioce aren't complaining about the waste of resources, so why is everyone doing it on their behalf?
They didn't ring 999, they rang a non-emergency number.
The police were there anyway.
Why is everyone so upset about it? Feel the love, people.
The fact that police wasted time in such a trivial, pointless and minor issue.
The fact that police blocked a motorway and caused delays for such a trivial, pointless and minor issue. Now Kermit, if I remember well you were bitterly complaining about BA staff going on strike and inconveniencing passengers. At least you could argue that the livelihoods of hundreds of families were at stake. What exactly was at stake here, other than a child being upset for half an hour?
If I'd been late to a meeting and lost my job or a good business deal; if I'd been late on a date and found out my date gave up and left; if I'd been late on my child's wedding... my natural reaction would've been to find the father in question and stick the offending toy up his backside... same goes for the coppers concerned.
And then you could go deeper into it and wonder what world do we live in where a person thinks it's appropriate to inconvenience literally thousands of people so their child can have a toy back.
I genuinely fear for the psychological well being of this child, if she's really being brought up in such way as to grant her every last wish and to spare her the 'trauma' of losing a stuffed lion. Not to mention several lessons concerning sense of proportion, selflessness and consideration towards others.
But the British police's role in society isn't just to catch criminals, but to serve the public. I've asked policemen the directions to places and I wouldn't expect him to turn round and say its not his job. Same for this - it was easy to do, helped out a family and was good PR.
it was a kids toy for fucks sake ...if it had been my wallet it would have been a different story.