Yay Met!!

[angus_mcnitt]

The Metropolitan Police has issued guidance to its officers to remind them that using a camera in public is not in itself a terrorist offence.It warms my heart every time I read something like this. As a semi-photographer, I get annoyed at how many cops try to push photographers around by misquoting or flat out misusing anti-Terror and privacy

Comments

[helen99]

It is nice, I totally agree. But... I have to say it.

I find it insanely disturbing that the reminder was necessary. I realize that action-oriented minds make very strong "big picture" connections (you have to to survive on the street). So "some people with cams could be up to no good" will be read as "everyone w/cam is suspect, nab now, ask questions later". My mind is pretty much the opposite of that by virtue of a desk job, rather than an action job. Mental mobility exercises help me make the jump to try to understand.

[angus_mcnitt]

I think it is also a reflection of the whole "Fear of Terror" that was instilled as a business after 9/11. They pushed law enforcement into new areas they were not trained for, or if they were trained they were miss-trained

[helen99]

> you can be a cop, or a soldier, not both

True. During Katrina and the RNC the riot squads didn't answer to the local department and wouldn't identify themselves when making arrests. Probably Iraq-trained mercenaries trained to kill enemies, but the enemies were the people they were patrolling. I hope you're right and they're moving on.

[wetdryvac]

While few, I have personally seen some very good people being very good exceptions to this. What makes them able to bridge the gap is this ability to make clear, both to themselves and to those they serve/protect OR fight that the either/or condition tends to be there for a reason. Also, each of the good ones happened to not be beat, and also had, within the force, a very strong area of specialty. Demoltions to bomb squad, for example - and interrogator to interrogator. Pprior, I'll add, to the whole torture issue coming to the fore - outside of, "Torture doesn't work and here's why."

*shrugs*

Some of them taught me what it took to be human in a time when I wasn't, and so despite the rarity of soldier to cop to soldier working, I note the exceptions.

[wetdryvac]

Good good.