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There used to be an American cop show called Hawaii 5-0
Always makes me laugh when someone calls me one, especially when I ask them if they know what it even means.
Trouble is BA, the drug lords, fraudsters and their minions don't hang around on play parks or smash peoples' windows. The damage they cause isn't immediately evident, and when it is, it's to a small minority of people. We do surveys all the time asking people what they think we should concentrate on.
Being in the know, I know it should be drug dealers, burglars e.t.c. Their most common answers are generally, car parking/dog fouling/youths hanging around on the street.
I absolutely love it when we take down a drug dealer or a prolific burglar. Unfortunately they don't hang around on the street drinking cider. If they did they'd be easier to catch :thumb:
good points,
haha i thought 'poor whowhere' as soon as i saw this thread :P
:yes:
I mean like... I know all the big drug lords aren't really in this country, but SURELY there are ways of finding the major drug dealers? I mean, the main guy in my area drives round in a really flash car, and dresses like a total pimp.. so he can't be that difficult to find!! He may as well wear a T-shit that says "I AM A DEALER" It's just stupid. Personally, I think the cops should dedicate more time out dealing with serious crime, instead of moving homeless people and confiscating cheap alcoholic drinks of chavs. x
I also had a clash with one of those baby-cops (PCSO?), who came up to us when we were students and literally said "oioioi, I hear you're smokin' a bit of the whacky tobaccy"... This was from a guy in his early twenties, around as old as me at that time... We thought it was funny, as we were just having a beer an' not smoking. He got annoyed at us, threatened to take our beers and tell people we were offering them to children, then asked us how many of us have been arrested!
When I was moving house by bus in West London, a police man asked me if I needed help, I said no. I saw him on the beat twice and he tried to talk to me on the bus, I said again I was fine moving house by myself... Then, I got off the bus and he grabbed his mate and said they were going to get off at the same stop. His mate didn't know why... But he grabbed him, jumped off and they followed me, right down the road to a distance where they could see what house I live in... Then turned away... Weird!
I think with anything that gives you authority, it attracts a lot of people who either have a chip on their shoulder, or who enjoy power.
I believe the fact that there needs to be an appropriate adult present when a child, or vulnerable adult is in custody, says it all about some people in the force (the appropriate adult makes sure they have their rights and aren't intimidated and bullied)...
However, like anything, you will get a few nice people in there too... I have met police who have been fairly ok with me. I'm also happy that as an activist, I so far haven't been tear-gassed or beaten like some of my comrades from other countries.
I am also noticing more police in my area... I have to say, I have had a gang of lads try to intimidate me, my house mate has been followed home twice in the last few months and somebody tried to break in last week... So this is the first time I am happy to see them, lol!
I agree with your first assertion, but I take an opposite stance on your following assertion. I would trust them because of the power than I as a citizen have over the police. The police are bound by legal duty to serve the public and therefore they are several orders of magnitude more liable if they cause you harm or distress than your fellow citizens are.
Isn't this why the IPCC exists? so that you can complain about instances where you feel that this is the case?
You can't complain about the system if your not prepared to engage in the system.
I'm merely pointing out that firstly,
you've made a sweeping generalisation about 150,000 people based on a handful of incidents.
And if you think we're bad then maybe you should see what policing is like in other countries.
How would you have it? If we see someone comitting a crime we just stand idly by and let them, because God forbid we lay our hands on them.
I disagree. My brother had an officer sacked and their sergeant demoted because she failed to investigate his accident properly and it almost ended up with him being taken to court.
So no, when I see that, I don't feel the police do have a lot of the same rules as 'normal' people. However, I haven't needed to bring anything to court... Yet.
If a police officer attacked me, I would no doubt take it to the papers and to the IPCC.
Isn't this a bit patronising? Just because the police are worse in some countries, does not mean that people in the UK haven't had bad experiences. These experiences aren't any less valid because hard they lived in Egypt, it could have been worse.
Nobody is saying that though... People are discussing their experiences of the police, not whether or not people should be allowed to commit crimes.
Why is it? The original question is asking that if because of a few bad experiences, or as in the first post because of something you've read in the paper should all police officers immediately be classed as either dangerous or un-trustworthy.
I personally find it insulting that there is an insinuation, actually fuck it, a belief that I'm a violent, dangerous or untrustworthy person because of my chosen profession.
And they are also calling for a fundamental change in how the police is run which would include things such as how much force should be used when apprehending a criminal.
Policing can be a dangerous business. Officers routinely engage with people others would cross the street to get away from. Sometimes it gets ugly, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes a cop oversteps the mark, most times they don't.
Even when a cop doesn't overstep the mark, as I said before the place is suddenly swarming with armchair cops who think they know better.
I think it's patronising because it's the usual talking down to somebody who has had a shit time of something... "Awww don't worry love, at least you're not living in a refugee camp in Sudan" xx
Well whatever the situation other people live in, they are still entitled to their beliefs and emotions regarding a situation. Each of us is different.
I work in a profession which is disliked by a lot of people too and it never surprises me when people say they have had bad experiences. In fact, I was at drugs awareness training and it honestly felt like the trainer changed personality when he found out who we were from... Why? He had a bad time with a colleague in another office. But hey, that's life... People given power often abuse said power.
Because people have had bad experiences from the police. You have to admit, some police do abuse their power (just like squaddies, jobcentre workers, council workers, security staff an' anyone else may) and people react from experience. Granted, it is fashionable in some circles to hate the police too... But police are supposed to protect and unfortunately, some people make the rest of ya look bad.
To me the general tone of the topic suggests that we're all the same. The question "Do the police make you feel safe, do you trust them?" suggests the implication that all police officers are the same, otherwise it would be "Most coppers are decent, some are arseholes, discuss" e.t.c.
What do you do out of interest? From the training you've been on I'd hazard a guess social work of some description?
I've not once intended to discount someone's own personal experience. I've met cops who are total douchebags, so believe me when I say I can understand what it must be like, it's bad enough being on the same side as them. They're lazy and impolite, and some are just utter gits. But they are a minority. For every unhelpful, arsehole cop there are 10 of us beavering away trying to make you less likely to become a victim of crime.
As I said before, what annoys me is the universal, collective belief that no matter what we do or how we do it, we've cocked up somewhere.
Take the recent murder/kidnapping. Criticism from the media that it took a length of time to actually check the inside of the van before finding the injured bloke. A suggestion that it is the police's fault that he died.
Nothing mentioned about the murdering bastards who took him in the first place, or that we must find that many dead bodies in vans, searching them for a corpse should be a matter of routine.
Now if things had been different, if they'd checked the van instead of trying to catch the kidnappers the headlines would have read "bungling officers allow 4 kidnappers to escape".
We can't win.
This is a rare example of police behaving badly
If i was a copper i would prob get a lil rough with some of them too, imagine how much they must temp u into hitting them sometimes....... they dont have an easy job, although i do think this policeman over stepped the mark
I'm also a little wary of anyone whom shows blind faith in them too.
To suggest that this is a "rare" example of bad behaviour ignores every other thread on here where the police (or an individual) seems to have gotten away with a pretty serious crime.
Having said that, I would worry about vigilantes even more.
Officers have a lot of discretion and that can't be taken away. There are a lot of things where we will come up with an alternative if we can, especially if you're young or never been in trouble before.
Tell that to Ian Tomlinson's family.
Or the Police Action Law Group:
I tend to trust individual police officers, although I certainly wouldn't trust the organisation as a whole if I had some sort of complaint about their behaviour.
Suppose that you're the victim of a crime. If you wouldn't trust the police with it, what's the better alternative you'd choose? Let the criminals go free and unsought, or go after them yourselves? I don't see how either of these would be a better alternative than telling the police and risking that the officers handling your case would be jackasses.
If I didn't trust a certain officer [which I'm yet to] I would ask for my case to be handed to someone else.
Where I'm from, if one of our mates was beat up or robbed, we'd sort it out ourselves. However, I'm not from the city.
:yes: Same here. To be honest, I don't trust the police with major crimes either, because when I did report to them what's happened (and they had evidence too) they did nothing. x