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AIBU?

To feel incredibly irritated with all these posh people in the meejah and political establishment who are so outraged by the police lying about Andrew Mitchell?

71 replies

BasilBabyEater · 17/10/2013 23:19

Do they not know that the police sometimes lie?

Have they not heard of the Birmingham Six, the Guildford Four, Hillsborough etc.?

Why are they so surprised about it?

Surely everyone knows that the police lie sometimes? How can these idiots be so surprised about it? Just because it's one of their own this time?

OP posts:

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timidviper · 17/10/2013 23:23

Exactly. Different story when it happens to them!

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TigOldBitties · 17/10/2013 23:26

Yanbu.

I have heard and read so much about this story. I can't believe it's the most important thing to be reporting at the moment.

I thought that the levinson enquiry showed police and media to be complicit in lies. Politicians and police certainly are. It's not news, just pages and hours of stating the fucking obvious.

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Footface · 17/10/2013 23:27

Because they don't feel so untouchable now, maybe their realising their not better or more protected than the rest of us

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mrsmalcolmreynolds · 17/10/2013 23:28

YABU - just because something unacceptable has happened in the past does not mean that people are not right to point out that it is unacceptable when it happens again!

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nonmifairidere · 17/10/2013 23:28

Sometimes lie? More like their default setting.

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TigOldBitties · 17/10/2013 23:33

Should read Leveson. Autocorrect is trying to make me look a right knobhead.

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Darkesteyes · 17/10/2013 23:34

Outraged about Andrew Mitchell but didnt give a fuck about the issue Dennis Skinner brought up.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/oct/16/david-cameron-wants-apology-andrew-mitchell?CMP=twt_gu

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redbinneo · 17/10/2013 23:45

We all know that the police lie. But should that be acceptable?

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BasilBabyEater · 17/10/2013 23:51

No, I don't think it should be acceptable.

But usually when they do, the media and politicians behave as if the very idea of them lying is such an outlandish, peculiar one that only the maddest conspiracy theorist can possibly believe it.

They usually take at least a couple of decades to admit the police have lied.

Except when it comes to one of their own of course. Suddenly, they treat the police as if they're just another profession, not some kind of special chosen ones who are simply above suspicion.

OP posts:

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BasilBabyEater · 17/10/2013 23:53

It has just irritated me so much. It shows so clearly, the double standard applied to normal people when dealing with the agents of the state, compared to privileged people when dealing with them.

I know, I know, the double standard has always been there (and it didn't need to be employed years ago because the police knew their place and would never dream of challenging a government minister) it's just that this story has just thrown it into such sharp relief for me.

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Darkesteyes · 17/10/2013 23:58

YY Basil It took 23/24 years for the FULL disclosure of the truth about Hillsborough. The Morgan family are STILL waiting for the truth about the murder of Daniel Morgan .....compared with how long it took for the details of the Mitchell saga to come out. Not to mention the massive cover up over Jimmy Savile.

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Darkesteyes · 18/10/2013 00:00

Daniel Morgan.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Morgan_(private_investigator)

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fairisleknitter · 18/10/2013 00:11

I suspected Mitchell was being messed with from the beginning and as such I felt sorry for him.

It's all about your background and experiences of people you've known.

The vast majority of Tories don't get how many people suffer undeserved harassment and just general bad luck in life; the Dennis Skinner part of the article with the braying of the Tory MP illustrates that. Thanks for that by the way, it gives me heart when I hear Dennis defending his constituents.

To be honest my DH from a nice MC background has always despaired of my suspicious attitude towards some police. (I don't think he could square it with my v. law-abiding ways!)

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VerySmallSqueak · 18/10/2013 00:13

Oh Basil YADNBU.

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Darkesteyes · 18/10/2013 00:14

Dennis Skinner is old skool Not many of them left

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GiveItYourBestShot · 18/10/2013 00:25

Yanbu! It was the same with the Countryside Alliance march, they were outraged to discover that the police occasionally beat up protestors.

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Cityofgold · 18/10/2013 00:58

YANBU. However, the other side is that it is never acceptable for the Police to lie, and just because they lied about some foppish Tory Twat does not mean it is ok. It is not ok for them to lie about interactions with kids on council estates, and it is not ok for them to lie about meetings with cabinet ministers. No one comes out of this well:
-Mitchell for his original rudeness, albeit less than was originally reported.
-Police officer on gate for being a jobs-worth dick.
-Police office on gate for making stuff up (Lying) in his notebook.
-Another Police officer for fabricating (Lying) an eyewitness account in an email.
-Federation Police representatives for miss-representing (lying) about what happened in a meeting with Mitchell.

A sorry tale all told.

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cumfy · 18/10/2013 01:43

I think it's good to see just how untouchable the police feel they are.

In a way the whole point is that it is over such a trifling incident.
On paper the police have nothing to gain and everything to lose.
But at every turn they just act as though they are omnipotent.

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TotallyBenHanscom · 18/10/2013 02:21

Having read the transcript of the interview with the heads of the three police forces and Andrew Mitchell (which by the way reads like a scene from Yes Minister!), I find it very odd that Mitchell apologises profusely and grovellingly, way out of proportion to his alleged 'conversation' with the officers on the night in question.

And then the police repeatedly try to get him to confirm that the officers had misreported the incident in their notebooks - and Mitchell won't do it. The police keep reminding him that if the integrity of the officers recall is in question, then that has serious repercussions for any and all future evidence presented by the police to the courts. And that rightly the officers need to be disciplined. And for that to happen, Andrew Mitchell needs to officially confirm that the officers got it wrong, and he won't do it. He's asked about twenty times and will just not confirm that the officers didn't record the event exactly as it happened.

The entire transcript is on the BBC news website.

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Echocave · 18/10/2013 06:21

The Mitchell case is really odd and as far as I'm concerned nothing like the other cases of miscarriages of justice mentioned.
I have to say I laughed at a headline earlier this week where Teresa May said the story could damage the public's trust in the police. In a row with a politician, she means, oh yes, those upstanding members of society (!). (Ok ok they're not all second home expenses fiddlers).

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charitygirl · 18/10/2013 06:43

YANBU

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VerySmallSqueak · 18/10/2013 07:34

But at every turn they act as if they are omnipotent

Couldn't have put it so eloquently cumfy.

And the scary part is that none of these revelations and wrongdoings being exposed will make a jot of difference. They will all just mutter about it,a few will wriggle uncomfortably for a short while,and then it'll be business as usual.

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cory · 18/10/2013 08:37

cumfy Fri 18-Oct-13 01:43:10

"In a way the whole point is that it is over such a trifling incident.
On paper the police have nothing to gain and everything to lose.
But at every turn they just act as though they are omnipotent."

I think I agree with this. In a kind of way, if your friend has just made a horrible mistake and shot dead an innocent person and his whole life is about to crumble into pieces, you could kind of see how you might be tempted to step in and try to protect him. Wrong but understandable. Even somebody who feels lying is a big deal might be tempted. (Not saying they should give in).

But this was just so totally unnecessary. There was no disaster staring anyone in the face, nothing bad coming out of telling the truth, no need to make the effort to lie. The fact that somebody did really does suggest that they don't think lying is a big deal. And probably that they don't think the people around them would think so either.

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cory · 18/10/2013 08:40

But good on Dennis Skinner- we need more like him!

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hackmum · 18/10/2013 09:15

I agree, OP. The police have often been quite brazen in their lying. Even recently we've had the Menendez case and Ian Tomlinson, the newspaper seller who was killed. Just the other day there was a story about how the police had connived with construction companies over their blacklist of workers who had raised safety issues - but the police claimed they had nothing to do with it.

And now the Tories are shocked, shocked, like Captain Renault, to find that the police tell lies. Where have they been all these years?