Still Not Getting It

We've been taking a lot of heat in the comment sections yesterday for our stance on the G-20 people. We've been misquoted, called names, challenged, etc. And people are still trying to defend the actions of a few idiots.

We assume the supervisors on the scene passed a promotional test at some point. Or at least a part of promotional test seeing as how "merit" pretty much skews Part 2 of any test. And we know from our own experience that the order on Processing Persons Under Departmental Control has been a large part of a few exams we've taken. This is indefensible. We have yet to see even a tiny argument that makes any sort of sense.

• Policy to take photos of a prisoner? In a controlled environment for booking and ID purposes. This wasn't that.
• Mass arrest? Of one person? You've got to be joking.
  
• The prisoner was a willing participant? Try running that one by the Supreme Court. You've already restricted his movement, you think the Court is going to say he had any sort of freedom at all? Not likely.
• No time on the job hair-gels did it all? Not even close.
  
• You never did anything stupid so you must be a pussy copper? We never denied doing anything stupid - but we were wise enough to not take pictures of it and smart enough to learn from others' mistakes. Who doesn't know about cameras everywhere? Especially in a strange city?
• If everyone keeps their mouth shut, they'll never find out? Two shifts of coppers, in a known intersection, with an actual arrest that has some one's name on the report somewhere? Stevie Wonder could pick that platoon out.
  

Yeah, we joke about throwing the cuffs on some jagoff and tossing them in the car and taking them to the station. It's routine. But do you ever stop to realize the awesome power we've been granted by the state? We can remove someone from the streets and completely deny them the freedoms granted them by the Constitution of the United States. Call it what you want, but that is a power not granted out of hand to just anyone. That is why there are Rules, Regulations, General Orders of all stripes, Legal Bulletins and everything else. The system was built to be completely at odds with the monarchy of the day.

Most of the people who show up at these G-20 summits are anarchists, protesters, grievance-mongers of all stripes. They all have cameras (which are better than anything the Department fields), they all have agendas (with media machines to maximize exposure) and they are all trained to provoke a reaction for publicity and lawsuits (which is likely what this was).

So while our post was written out of anger, disgust and frustration with the actions of a few, we'll stand by the message - stop doing stupid shit and making it that much harder on the vast majority of us trying to make a living in what was once a respectable profession.