Police officer borrows bike to chase dangerous driver who fled on foot

Either that or they need to have the numbers of local buskers on speed dial as nothing speeds up a chase like a quick blast of sax.

Bit of a battle between ACAB & AMAB for me

I can't stand the acryonym ACAB. Maybe police forces do have a habit of attracting power crazed psychopaths, but they also attract people who want to serve their community.

Painting them all as bastards is just as bad claiming all cyclists are red light jumpers so far as I'm concerned, and stinks of black-and-white populism. The world's a complex place.

Boopop wrote:

I can't stand the acryonym ACAB. Maybe police forces do have a habit of attracting power crazed psychopaths, but they also attract people who want to serve their community.

Painting them all as bastards is just as bad claiming all cyclists are red light jumpers so far as I'm concerned, and stinks of black-and-white populism. The world's a complex place.

Well put but the bigger issue concerns the 'bad apples'. Cressida Dick and her ilk like to downplay the problem and refer to officers like PC Couzens as 'just a few bad apples' and that may be true, but the irony is that the saying goes that if you don't remove the bad apples, they ruin the whole barrel.

The bad apples show to other officers that behaviour that shouldn't be tolerated is considered acceptable. And it shows to the public that police officers are not to be trusted and that some deserve to be despised.

While there are undoubtedly a minority of bad officers who need weeding out, the huge majority trying to do a difficult job, often with their hands partially tied. Some sections of society have definite reasons to distrust the police and a lot of work will need to be done to rebuild confidence and deal with bad apples decisively and transparently but my experience says that a significant chunk of those using the ACAB tag do so because they don't believe that the laws of the land should apply to them. I may not like some of our current laws but until I can convince a majority of the population to elect a Govt that will change them, I have to obey them or be willing to pay the consequences when caught. I can't blame the police for enforcing them (though whether they have the resources to do so effectively is a whole different argument).

Hmm... complex and you're right that it's easy to mix lots of issues e.g. laws we don't agree with, issues with the courts (and the judiciary), problems getting stuff dealt with (CPS, police resources and priorities).

It isn't a job I've ever looked at and though "that'd be a doddle".

However... the police are a "vocational organisation".  It is more than a 9 - 5.  That means there are pressures which shape the behaviours you get from police on average.  Much more than those expected for your average corporation / group.  There have been plenty examples of the influence of "local conspiracies" where one or two "bad apples" are not just overlooked but actively influence a bigger group.

The police are spending a lot of time with / around criminals.  Unless you establish relationships with those in that section of society how else are you going to learn what's going on?  It's hardly unknown for the border to get blurred - or find families with members on both sides.

If you see something you think is wrong and try to go against the culture I suspect you'll lose not just your pay check but your career and probably most of your friends / support network.

LeadenSkies wrote:

While there are undoubtedly a minority of bad officers who need weeding out, the huge majority trying to do a difficult job, often with their hands partially tied. Some sections of society have definite reasons to distrust the police and a lot of work will need to be done to rebuild confidence and deal with bad apples decisively and transparently but my experience says that a significant chunk of those using the ACAB tag do so because they don't believe that the laws of the land should apply to them. I may not like some of our current laws but until I can convince a majority of the population to elect a Govt that will change them, I have to obey them or be willing to pay the consequences when caught. I can't blame the police for enforcing them (though whether they have the resources to do so effectively is a whole different argument).

Just because a law exists, it doesn't mean that it's necessarily moral to obey it and often the only moral choice is to disobey it.

https://rebellion.global/blog/2020/11/03/civil-disobedience-examples/

In a few very select and very worthy cases like those you highlight, yes mass civil disobedience is justified but personally I don't count routine speeding, careless driving, theft or drug possession to be civil disobedience, rather petty (or not so) crime.