Help me . Focus group for police

[stillvicarinatutu]

Ok - I've asked to be part of a focus group as I'm a police officer and they are asking for participation.

I would like as a female pc to raise some of the issues I've seen here .

However- complete technophobe . The session is by some online fuckery next weds and I'm clueless ! Can anyone help ? They've said I can defer it and I will because I don't know how this online thing works . The group admin is in London and I'm ooop north .

Know what else - it made me absolutely bitterly regret goi g into the control room as a cop - I'm stunted.
If there was more support for single people in the job I'd have followed my heart into CID - but I can't work 18 hour shifts , sleep for 4 then go back in as I have dogs and a family and a life - but I really have a burning desire to get back out there on the frontline and do what I do best , and my best work was in sexual offences and domestic violence. It just burns you out after a while . Needed a break .

Wow OP you are amazing. One, asking. Two, listening. And three really telling the truth at the call.
Fantastic. Thank you.

Well done oppo. Solidarity

Cheers all

I just desperately hope the colleg of policing listen . They must have asked for this for a reason so they must know something is off - I think public perception is the biggest demoraliser there is right now - the lower ranks - us - are working out arses off but all we see is bad press , and it's hard to swallow when you're taking sexual assault victims to court on your days off in your own car . Nothing good ever gets seen . And then victims are court are so often let down by the judicial system it's soul destroying.

Anyway this was a really heartening thing to do because all of us were exactly on the same page - I just hope the college of policing listens to us . We never get heard but also these opportunities to say our piece dont come along often .

And actually I should thank you here - for helping me understand what's happening, for engaging with me , for educating me .
Thank you.
I really hope that by raising some of these issues we start to be heard - as police officers but also as women. This shit HAS to stop. Our police chiefs need to wise up to what exactly is happening. We aren't neutral if we are dancing to the tune of the offended .

And it appears to me that some groups are professionally offended . Needs to stop. We should follow the letter of the law and even then some of those are lame ....but that's government and a whole new ball game .

If I understood correctly this was one of several focus groups, presumably will include Police Officers from across the country. I'm worried about how they got the participants for the focus groups. If you were 'self selected' to a degree, your feedback might be dismissed as 'the the grumbling of the usual malcontents'.

This is not a criticism of you or your fellow participants. But it's been my experience that managers will dismiss things they don't want to hear as 'not representative'. I wonder if that's something that they could use as an excuse.

It's kind of out of your hands now and you can only do what you can do. I hope it was cathartic and it must be nice to know you're not the only one.

Once again, thank you.

It was country wide yes but I have a feeling that what is 6 said will be the overriding feeling of many serving officers with a bit of wool on their backs . They can't dismiss us all. They asked for complete honesty and they probably will regret that because if our group were anything to go by we all feel the same .

And I didn't know anyone else personally on our group - yet we all said the same . Everyone brought up pride and that bloody Macarena.

I think I was the only one to bring up rainbow lanyards and rainbow cars (not that we have any) but my colleagues were very vocal on "woke" policing and being roped into politics of certain groups . The tasking team guy brought up trans agenda before I did . I think there is much more to this than people realise and I do believe the feeling of normal , everyday police officers is that we are all absolutely sick of it and sick of being used . All most of us want to do is the actual job of catching the bad guys . That came through loud and clear. So fingers crossed.

OP- What are your views on people who doxx transpeople and accuse them of being "pedos" and "groomers"? Aren't there laws against this (UK)?

Yes, indeed, MargaritaPie.

The now well-documented paedos and groomers affiliated to children's charities would be a good start for police investigation.

What's doxxing.

Second - if any law is broken it will be dealt with . This is what I'm saying - police cannot take "sides" - they should deal with what's in front of them . If there is a crime - investigate it . But don't make crimes up - we are not the thought police . You are allowed to have opinions even if othered do t agree- law is written in statute- a crime is a crime or it's not . That's what I'm saying. Opinion doesn't and shouldn't enter into this. The question is- had a crime been committed? Yes or no ?
If yes - crime it and investigate it

If no - do t make one up to suit the complainant because they're offended.

In case anyone missed it, there's quite a lot of it documented here:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4649165-mermaids-being-investigated-by-the-charity-commission-thread-2

And in the first thread too - that's the second, continuation thread.

And here:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4652666-mermaids-charity-paedophile-porn-photos-scandal-in-the-press

For example.

Sorry, OP, didn't mean to derail.

Sincerely hope your focus group has been listened to and taken seriously. Sounds good that you took part.

Doxxing is the act of revealing identifying information about someone online, such as their real name, home address, workplace, phone, financial, and other personal information. That information is then circulated to the public — without the victim's permission.

A favourite tactic of TRAs.

What MargaritaPie fails to mention in her post is that the information regarding the those associated with Mermaids was already in the public domain, not hidden and had already been widely circulated by the people themselves. You will find MargaritePie popping up regularly to declare any and all people targeted by TRAs and subsequently visited by the Police to be guilty without trial or even charge in some cases, it's a very special skill of theirs.

And has anyone been "doxxed" ?

I read about mermaids in the times . A pretty normal daily newspaper. They clearly thought that it was newsworthy. No one has been doxxed there have they ? That someone affiliated to that charity was also affiliated to a group that aids "maps" and that another had taken part in porn is just another news story - much like the papers dish the dirt on politicians who have affairs or have offshore accounts. It's newsworthy to the papers . And if it's true - I can't see what crime or what doxxing has been committed?

Margarita - is the times story untrue ? F so that falls under libel- civil law . Nothing to do with criminal law or police .

Police investigate crimes . Criminal law .

It is however - unsavoury? A childrens charity affiliated to members with links to groups that aid peadophiles and pornography ?
Can see why it's news worthy .

But no - nothing criminal . It's not
Criminal to libel or even slander - that's civil law . If it's untrue then those individuals are free to sue . Under civil law .

I'm being deliberately factual as it appears doxxing has been mentioned

I think Pie was being a bit....random, seems, at best, tangentially relevant to the thread.

I'm sorry the CoP won't feedback on the...erm...feedback. Or collate the responses, that would have been interesting.

Oh the COP will be collating the feedback- I believe that was the point of the exercise.

What I am against is the politicisation of the police force to push an agenda that has no criminal offences.

Everyone is entitled to an opinion. Offensive to some or not . Holding an offensive opinion is not a criminal offence .

Committing a crime is a criminal offence.
But crimes are written into statute and we cannot just interpret that to suit an agenda .

I object to the police being used in that way .

My opinions are entirely my own and I am not in any way a spokesperson for the police .!

But I am entitled to my opinions. As long as they don't interfere with my job - and they don't - having an opinion is allowed . We have freedom of speech . It's written into the human rights act .

Freedom of speech, the right to peaceful protest , these things should never be eroded by the state .

I mean I have opinions like the next man or woman .

When I lock up an offender for child sex abuse I have an opinion.
When I lock up for domestic violence I have an opinion.

As long as I remain neutral within my job - that's fine . And I do . Always have . Always will .

Crime is pretty black and white .
What I do t like is the grey areas that are creeping in for the sake of being seen to be politically correct.

And that's exactly what I fed back .
Having an opinion on womens rights is not a crime . Having a stocker in your window with your opinion is not a crime . Retweeting someone else's poetry is not a crime .
These are things I take issue with .

I feel I now need to be guarded on voicing my own personal opinion despite that not being a crime either !

OP, if the police could focus on real-life actual crimes, rather than what people say on Twitter, that would be huge improvement.

At the moment, there are some police forces who seem to put more effort and resources into what women say on Twitter - arresting them even though no crime was committed, getting heavy on them for their political opinions - than they do for actual real-life crimes such as home burglary.

Sex crimes and rape against women and children are very evidently a long way down the list of seriousness and priority, as evidenced by Rochdale and all the other grooming gangs. Extremely abused girls being dismissed by the authorities as "child prostitutes", no further questions asked; as if everything was all right, then.

Thank you for speaking up on this!

I get it . Basically that's what we all said .

Love you all for the education. It's been eye opening.

I'll keep learning x