Idaho police grads' slogan: "Go out and cause post-traumatic stress disorder"
This year's 43 graduates of the Idaho Peace Officer Standards and Training Academy came up with an interesting slogan: "Don't suffer from PTSD, go out and cause it." (PTSD stands for post-traumatic stress disorder.)
[Ada County Sheriff Gary] Black said the class president was ex-military, and that the slogan "slipped in." He declined to identify the graduate. Black said future slogans would be vetted by academy leaders.
You'd think the graduating police officers would have come up with a slogan that's more in line with the one I found on the academy's web site: "The trained Law Enforcement officer is the guardian of civil rights, the protector of the weak, and the defender of the innocent." Now, that's a kick-ass slogan if I ever heard one. Link
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I've got one they can put on their badge. "If you can read this, you're about to get your head bashed in."
I suppose it beats their original ideas:
"We will taze you, bro!"
And...
"So many Bro's, so little voltage."
No?
I remember sometime in the mid to late 80's when my hometown police scraped the "To serve and protect" decals of their cars. You could still see the glue residue. I asked one why they did that and his response was, "That's not our job anymore."
"That's not our job anymore."
Damn, I'm surprised he didn't give you a wood shampoo just for asking.
And in other news, police chiefs acrossed the nation are blaming a rise in LEO's killed in the line of duty on the expiration of the Assault Weapons Ban (which actually banned very little, just upped the prices).
Go figure... no... there couldn't be a correlation between cops acting like thugs and cops getting shot, could there?
[/sarcasm]
I don't expect people in high-stress positions not to crack mean jokes, as long as they do their jobs. Especially when their jobs involve unexpected potentially lethal situations, daily.
Call me when they're actually abusing their authority. Until then, it doesn't matter.
"Call me when they're actually abusing their authority. Until then, it doesn't matter."
Been spending the last 20 years on another planet?
It's already happening, they've just been really sneaky about it.
Wrong-house dynamic entries, abuse of civilians and various other violations of civil rights are perpetrated by our militerized police force on a daily (probably hourly) basis. It just doesn't always make it to CNN.
And it DOES matter, from the first time that it happened opened the way.
Does it have to come to cops being judge, jury, and executioner?
When it does, "TWIG", it'll be too late.
*Ring ring*
*Ring ring*
Twig: Hello?
PhiCancri: Oh, hi Twig?
Twig: Do I know you and why are you calling here? I'm angry, have an irritable bowel, and Republican.
PhiCancri: Oh, well no, you don't know me, but I wanted to give you a call since you've been living your life under a f'ing rock your whole life and let you know that the police all over the world have been abusing their authority since the dawn of time. If you read the news, watched television, or looked around at the world around you you would know this.
Twig: Well that's kind of hard when you're living under a rock your whole life.
PhiCancri: Touche. Cheerio then!
Twig: Cheerio!
*click*
Phlavor, what town was that?
ROFLcopter yeah that's definitely me, wingnut neocon and evil hater of all that is good and right. I also bake cakes out of puppies in my free time.
God I love the internet.
I see your point, Twig. It would be like a class of new priests saying "Our job is to molest children," or medical doctors saying "Let's give our patients deadly diseases." Just good-natured jokes, right?
Mark;
No, it's really not, although I'm pretty sure you could get some choice mottos from the medical profession if you asked around.
I don't know who thought it up, whether they are - as everyone here seems to think - some slavering fascist nightmare fondly stroking their nightstick in glee as they imagine all the poor innocent people they're about to Taser or, perhaps, you know, a bored smartass with a really bad sense of timing.
If there's suddenly a wave of police brutatlity and violence that sweeps Idaho, well then prosecute accordingly. But if it's just words? I'm not going to freak out about it.
Twig,
The problem with that is "what starts in the head, ends in the hand" - if you think it long enough, it becomes true to you.
No one who is given the authority to use deadly force should EVER crack wise about abusing that power.
Never.
"But if it's just words? I'm not going to freak out about it."
Joseph Goebbels thanks you for your cooperation in this matter.
Move along, citizen.
So the options here for our police force are Perfect Avatars of Ultimate Justice Who Never Get Tired or Annoyed or Angry or Say Stupid Things
or
Nazis.
I call Godwin and fold. Have a nice one.
#11: If it were just one smartass the motto would've been nixed by the other 42 graduates. That all 43 thought this was somehow a good idea is less about one smartass with bad timing and more about an entire class of police cadets who aren't taking their training and newly-given responsibility seriously.
I see your point, Twig. It would be like a class of new priests saying "Our job is to molest children," or medical doctors saying "Let's give our patients deadly diseases." Just good-natured jokes, right?
Twig,
"I call Godwin and fold."
My evil plan comes to fruition!
As the guy said to SGT. Stedanko in "Up In Smoke":
"Bye-bye, Lardass!"
All things of this nature being predictable (or perhaps inevitable?), you just know the little shit who came up with that slogan will, eventually, wind up being Sheriff.
Twig: Intentionally triggering Godwin with your own post doesn't work.
#13: They're not police officers, they're graduating cadets.
#17: I can see him practicing his you-got-a-broken-tail-light swing already.
"I can see him practicing his you-got-a-broken-tail-light swing already."
Geek Driver: <comicbookguyvoice>"Hah! My +5 Tailights of Lexan defeat your +1 Nightstick of Pummeling! I am the victor in this encounter!</comicbookguyvoice>
#18: Twig didn't trigger Godwin with his post #13. Look at #12: Goebbels = Nazi, QED.
Crash,
Good ole' Jacksonville Beach, FL. But I noticed that particular statement disappearing in other places around the same time.
And maybe this was just a "Southern hospitality" thing but I'm just old enough to remember police helping old ladies change their tires and carrying slim-jims in their trunks to help people who locked their keys in their cars. That was the mid to late 70's.
Twig folded but I'll still direct this at him:
Would you similarly say that I can make terrorist jokes at airport security checkpoints then and shouldn't be hassled unless I commit a terrorist act? They're just words but they'll get me detained, removed from flights, and potentially worse...
Lizardman: well, that's a troubling free speech issue for some people, too. Certainly it's come up here at BoingBoing before.
Santa's Knee's comment that "what starts in the head, ends in the hand" can (and has) been used to justify all sorts of censorship. Don't like horror movies or violent video games? That's a great reason to ban them.
While I agree that the motto was probably not a great idea, Twig has a point here — people make inappropriate jokes all the time. The cut-up who suggested this motto probably never expected it to go beyond the other 42 graduates in his class. I could certainly see a small graduating class of MDs choosing a motto like "Supplying funeral homes since 1945" — if they figured it would cause a few chuckles at the party that night and then be forgotten. It's gallows humor; without more context, it's hard to pass judgment.
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The police would like you to believe they deal with life and death every day, but the vast majority of them never see that. They would like you to believe that every day they go to work they don't know if they will come home, the vast majority never see that either.
Look up the death stats, there have been more people killed in construction jobs in the last three years than all the cop deaths since the stats have been kept, including 9/11.
I can see Twig's point and understand the logic of it. A few cops, sitting around, talking shop, might say something just godawful and completely inappropriate. Hang around police lab tech and you'll hear more jokes about post-mortem erections and the "funny suicides" to fill a million lifetimes.
But there's a world of difference between awful things said in private and making awful things your slogan.
I'm reminded of how, a few years back, a tape of some Chicago firefighters screwing around, making lewd and racist remarks (there were firefighters of all races involved) and general grabassery got played on tv. The hue and cry was deafening and some of the firefighters were disciplined. The truly stupid part of what they did wasn't the horseplay and ribald talk, it was videotaping it. If you're going to be an idiot, and everyone is at some point or another, then do it in private.
"Especially when their jobs involve unexpected potentially lethal situations, daily."
Huh. What's to be expected when you sell assault weapons to the population? When you encourage divisiveness at every turn? When you brag about freedom, and then let slip the dogs of truth?
Violence breeds violence. As people wake up from their illusions to realize that they're in chains, you have to expect some to become "unsettled". Part of the cost of doing business as usual these days.
Jphilby, I assure you that it is as easy to injure a police officer with an axe as it is with an assault weapon. Check your statistics. Hardly any murders are committed with legally purchased assault weapons.