Blog of the Blogs

Its what everybodys talking about

Police blogs are dropping like flies. Internal investigation committees are being set up, and mass emails sent to police to warn them of the dangers of blogging. Thats what I've heard anyway...


On a serious note, I can understand why senior management don't like blogs. It is very, very rare that a blog expresses their agreement with an 'official policy', and sings the praises of what a good job the police are doing. On the whole, blogs are used to rant and rave about them. With these 'anti-policy' views being thrown about, its no wonder they are slightly perturbed. However, going around threatening blogs is not the best way to deal with this!

Have any of you ever wondered why we write blogs? Why we spend our own free time putting our thoughts down on virtual paper, for all to see? The simple reason is because no matter how much we talk at work, no one is listening. There are NO forums for ordinary police officers to stand up and say "Thats good on paper, but THIS is what happens on the street". We can't knock on your doors and say "We've tried this policy, and I know it makes you look good to the public, but its causing more problems for us, because of THIS". There really isn't any way for us to do this.

We can't speak to our supervisors about the problems that policy causes - well to be more accurate, we could but it won't help. Sergeants are just as annoyed at most of them as us, and could only pass them to the inspectors. Inspectors are too busy managing all of the teams and policies, and might pass them to the Superintendants. The Superintendants are 1) Too busy playing buzzword bingo at the latest meeting and 2) Too far removed from the ordinary officer on the street to understand the problems brought to them.

Blogging is our only way to vent our frustration, and yes, we do want the public to know how frustrated we are (and WHY we are frustrated) because all that senior management teams care about is the view they give to the public. I honestly believe that senior management teams don't actually care anymore about catching criminals or solving crimes, which is what every officer joined to do. They only care about getting that extra detection, making those statistics look a little better, putting one more high visibility jacket (doesn't matter if its an officer or a PCSO) out onto the street so that the public will see them.

I could be wrong. Perhaps I have badly misjudged you. Its possible - I've never met you. I've never seen you. I've only read your blanket emails, seen your name at the bottom of every new policy. If I am wrong, and you truly do care, give us a proper chance to speak.

posted by A non mouse