Is anyone else sick of anti police/some of the younger generation in general?

[fizzypop19]

I'm 29 so in no means "old" but I don't know what's happened the past couple of years.

I was bought up to respect police, not break the law. Obviously I have, underage drinking etc yet I've never been in trouble with police. Twitter is full of 17-20 year olds slagging off the police for breaking up protests etc hello we are in a pandemic and I'd really like to be out of lockdown soon?

Was also bought up to not judge anyone by their skin colour, religion, sexual orientation etc I have friends who are gay, black, white, Muslim, Jewish yet none of them understand this whole she/her announce your pronouns stuff, we all just respect each others preferences/views/religions/self identification.

Is anyone else feeling sick of this or am I alone???

It is not just the fact that a police officer is charged with the recent horrendous crime. That officer apparently committed a sex offence only days before and was still able to be at work in uniform.

There are questions about the investigation of that crime. There is the officer that took a selfie with 2 murdered girls at the murder scene and sent on to colleagues.

There is the physical response to women at at a vigil, while football celebrations have gone unchallenged.

There is the enforcement of non existent laws relating to Coronavirus.

My trust in the police is at an all time low tbh. I never used to believe all of the stories about police corruption, but I think is hard to continue to have blind faith in them.

If police hate the conditions they work under then why did they join just to whine about it?

Like I know enough of them that it wasn't simply or of the goodness of their hearts. My opinion of them isn't informed by recent media events it's through being a Met service user on a weekly basis

I understand fully that they work within serious limitations. I have a similarly dim view of the CPS and policy makers

I've personally reported hundreds of incidents relating to our business over many years, provided the police with hours of crystal clear CCTV relating to thefts, burglaries and assaults on my staff and myself. In one day I've been assaulted, detained the suspect and handed him over with a catalogue of CCTV relating to every single thing that the guy had ever done in our store from assault through to theft (all previously reported) to have him turn up 1 hour later with a friend and attack me outside our store. Our business has been burgled 7 times since Christmas, by someone who is well known to the police. Last time they left my partner and her 80 year old dad to clear the building/secure the property themselves. They don't send a forensic team. They lied and told us that forensics had been before we got there, when we checked the CCTV we saw that wasn't the case and rang and asked and the police said oh sorry we were confused but it's too late now

2 weeks ago a guy came into the store, refused to leave and was aggressive and threatening to my partner. The police came and took him away. Told my partner to ring 999 if he appeared again. Within the hour he was back and making further threats. When my partner rang 999 they had no record of the previous visit or arrest. When she rang back the next day that arrest was not on record so it wasn't just an updating time lag

If you think people's distrust stems purely from some teenage angst rather than from genuinely poor experiences with them then I reiterate that you're lucky either by location or just plain lucky that you don't have to deal with a police force that frankly isn't fit for fucking purpose

I once had the brilliant situation where I rang the police about a gang of black (relevant in a minute) youth who were snatching phones and handbags from tourists in our area. The police turned up! I was outside keeping an eye on the street and our customers. Police got out the van and surrounded me, started aggressively questioning what I was doing there, I played along a bit. I "matched the description" of recent reports of phone snatching and bag snatching in the area. A lone white adult. I told them that actually it was me who rang them and they were embarrassed but not apologetic, one said "I hope this won't put you off calling the police in the future" they got back in their van and instead of proceeding to where the incidents had been reported they left the fucking area. The kids came back shortly after and resumed.

I've been assaulted by someone on a tag who the police attended for and basically refused to arrest despite me having blood pouring down my face because it was "only low value shoplifting"

The views of those who have no dealings with the police are largely imaginary anyway

Well, some here sound as if they have dealings with the police on a daily basis. That is not what the vast majority of the population experience either.

As I said there are exceptions in all professions, the police like other public sector workers are subject to a higher level of scrutiny and regulations than other roles. Their job is law enforcement and at times they will not be popular but we need a police force in my view as without that I think most people would live in fear.

I don't think it's a police issue but a public issue -

Public are happy to take against teachers, doctors, nurses, care workers, police, social workers - ANYONE that the media decide to take a pop at because producing SHOCK HORROR headlines makes stupid people click - and even worse believe , and no amount of explaining statistics or pointing out the facts matters.

One social worker is accused of not doing their job and eg a baby being hurt by parents and the whole country is screaming for revenge and blaming them - the upshot is we have babies being taken from their parents for weekw/ months because the parent dared to take them to A/E because the gov (Labour at Baby P time) ran with the media and brought in draconian rules.

With the police most are very pleasant - most trying to do a job. A few aren't. A few teachers turn out to be paedophiles - doesn't mean all are. The media are getting loads of clicks finding stuff that a very few police have done (that's very few in the grand total of police in this country but stupid people don't understand stats) and stupid people like to have a soapbox to shout from to show how angry they are about whatever the latest media clickbait is.

Sad, because as in the Baby P case, laws were changed. The results of that are bad.

Police forces no longer investigate or even attend if the value of items stolen doesn't exceed 200 quid. We have to sell 800 quids worth of stuff to make 200 quid

So yeah I'm sorry people complain about you but you're the public face of a broken and largely useless system that concentrates it's efforts into the sort of crime that whilst it has a high public profile actually directly impacts very few people while leaving the kind of low level every day crime that affects everyone in the country uninvestigated and unpunished

'exceptions' implies very few.

I think we are more in 'significant minority' territory, sadly.

Propensity to corruption is estimated at a third across all professions I read somewhere. It needs weeding out ruthlessly from public life, especially the police.

I played along a bit. I "matched the description" of recent reports of phone snatching and bag snatching in the area

But why the need to provoke them, play games and waste their time? Why not tell them upfront that you were not the actual suspect they were after?

The police enforce the law , they don't make the law , the average police officer just follows the procedure. Often lack of money means they can't act in everything which I think is case for more police.

But I still think they police should at least go and speak to someone who has sent a series of very threatening texts to a support worker, and call round to the home of a very vulnerable young woman with MH problems when wasn't responding to phone calls or visits and her home was unsecured (front door wide open).

Surely a neighbour could go and close the door of the woman. Why wasn't social work called as presumably she has a MH support worker. The police have no knowledge of the woman - would they know if she was iller? Leaving a door open - is it really a police matter. If she wasn't there what would they do - nothing - someone needs to report a missing person.

If she has no support worker, no mH support worker, no family and no neighbour I still don't see it as a police matter.
She chooses to live in the middle of nowhere without family. Is it their problem.

But why the need to provoke them,

Playing along a bit was me not making it immediately clear that the window ledge i was sitting on was my own. That was it. They stopped their van and told me not to sit outside my own shop. I didn't reply cos it didn't seem necessary

So yeah I'm sorry people complain about you but you're the public face of a broken and largely useless system that concentrates it's efforts into the sort of crime that whilst it has a high public profile actually directly impacts very few people while leaving the kind of low level every day crime that affects everyone in the country uninvestigated and unpunished

Is the high public profile you refer to covid distancing???

So 150,000 deaths is ignorable is it?

So if we have another wave and another major lockdown going on for goodness knows how long, that is a minor issue and the police should be ignoring distancing laws?

Also because you're in slight disbelief at this point, really, that you've called the police about theft and they're interested in someone sitting on a windowsill

Is the high public profile you refer to covid distancing??

No

Playing along a bit was me not making it immediately clear that the window ledge i was sitting on was my own. That was it.

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Is the high public profile you refer to covid distancing??

No

What is it ?

Wow! Not had much to domwith police officers but when I have I've found them invariably helpful and professional. I speak as I find.

Yes there are issues with institutional sexism.....much the same in society. It is however a totally different force from the early 1980s when my female cousin joined and was subjected to a sexual assault in the name of "initiation." It would never happen now but there's still a long way to go in terms of attitudes to women and women's issues.

That said....I return to my first point. The police officers I've met (mostly male) have been helpful and professional.

You think it's legit that you should explain to aggressive police that you're sitting there not doing anything when you are in fact sitting there not doing anything?

You seem to be unable to see past your own privilege

I think at the OP's age people start to realise that they are no longer the "young generation" and that people in their teens/early twenties view them as old and part of the problem.

When you're in your teens it's easy and seems perfectly rational to blame "old" people for the problems of the world. When I was about twenty, I was disgusted by reruns of 1970s TV shows that were overtly racist and homophobic. I couldn't believe people were electing people like George "Dubya" Bush. It was convenient, albeit lazy, to blame "old" people for allowing bad things to happen.

The thing is, when you are twenty, a 29 year old is "old" too. You lose connection with people in their teens and early twenties very quickly.

The "OK Boomer" crew saw their targets as being anyone over about thirty, not just the traditional post-WWII bracket. But they too will find themselves the target of the next generation's wrath, sooner than they expect.

The problem is young people think they know everything, but actually they know nothing. Old people think they know everything too. Middle aged people perhaps realise they don't know very much. Basically nobody knows anything, it's just some people are more vocal about it.

What is it ?

High profile crime.

This was in 2017 and I had just had it explained to me in regards to they incident of the bloke who came back and attacked me with his friend that this was low level crime

It is low level crime that mars every single Londoners life, whether mugging burglary or shoplifting or antisocial behaviour. These are the crimes that affect everyone and they are the crimes that the police and policy makers have stopped investigating

If they need more money then give it to them but the current system isn't working

In my "real life" experience I have never had a bad experience with the police - clearly that is very unusual , or is it just I obey the law.

Of course there are people in the police who have committed crimes are who should not be doing that job but that is the exception . Most of the complaints come from social media portrayal of the police.

@Chanjer

What is it ?

High profile crime.

This was in 2017 and I had just had it explained to me in regards to they incident of the bloke who came back and attacked me with his friend that this was low level crime

It is low level crime that mars every single Londoners life, whether mugging burglary or shoplifting or antisocial behaviour. These are the crimes that affect everyone and they are the crimes that the police and policy makers have stopped investigating

If they need more money then give it to them but the current system isn't working

Yes they need more money, that's the reality. With the cuts to funding the threshold is unfortunately high for what gets followed up and what doesnt.

I feel sorry for the ones that do attend our burglaries and assaults because they know they can't do anything. They apologise for it. I don't have a problem with the majority of individual officers who've ever attended but the system as a whole is fucked. I have reported hundreds of crimes, 1 has gone to court and it has resulted in a conviction