Posts

Showing posts with the label noble

Tater Take: Supervision from a beat cop's perspective

Cops and their supervisors; if you want an earful ask a cop about the worst supervisor they've worked for and grab a seat, and maybe some popcorn.  Every cop has the horrible supervisor story, and probably more than one.  Why is it some supervisors don't see why they are being bad at the job they are supposed to do? I've found that bad supervisors were never the real, working police.  And the ones that were, have forgotten what it's like. Any cop reading this can point out their good/great supervisors.  The ones that they didn't mind working for or when the supervisor asked for volunteers or for some sort of activity, the officers gladly went and did it.  I have had several really good supervisors, and still do, and while I am not a supervisor (yet...maybe one day?) I have been in positions of leadership or supervising in my life. The best supervisors I have had have done police work or been on a team of sorts (tact, gang, narcotics, etc.).  They know how paper shou

I'd loot too

I know what you are thinking... WHOA!  FULL STOP!  Did that cop say he would loot too?  Is he an anarchist?  A rabble rouser?  A criminal cop? I'm none of those, and nor would I loot. Now. Based on my life's circumstances and how my finances are in place I don't need to.  I can fully support my family, pay my bills, and have a few hobbies.  I can keep a roof over my head, food on the table, and clothes on everyone's back. Even as a kid growing up in a large family, my father worked and was our main source of income.  I got a paper route at a young age to start saving money with, and was able to buy myself toys and eventually a car when I was old enough.  My mother did some in home babysitting to shore up some more family finances, so I had plenty and was taken care of. But I still had the spaghetti dinners, the whatever-lunch-meat-on-sale sandwiches, we drove (very) old cars, I wore hand-me-downs from other families being the eldest in mine, my first bicycle was probabl

The noble burden of police work

Sun Tzu said it is better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war. Robert Peel, in his 7th of 9 Principles of Law Enforcement, wrote that "the police are the public and the public are the police".  Referring to that notion as having been a historic tradition of policing itself. The knights of England, and many other countries, were trained in war and worked in other pursuits during peace time. So what is, or what has become, modern day policing? Is it viral videos of entire departments dancing or doing the newest online trend?  Is it that sneaky video a citizen took as an officer does some sort of mundane task for another like tying a tie or helping change a tire?  Is it officers running their department's twitter or social media feeds to inform the citizenry of traffic incidents, crime, or other things?   Or is it more of what someone may deem as nefarious? Is it that officer not properly using the authority given to them by the peop