You want to be a hero?

Sodom and Gomorrah........

2011-12-26T18:02:00.001Z

'The two men said to Lot, “Do you have anyone else here—sons-in-law, sons or daughters, or anyone else in the city who belongs to you? Get them out of here, because we are going to destroy this place. The outcry to the LORD against its people is so great that he has sent us to destroy it.' Genesis 19 V 12/13

You have come to notice that, in every environment you have ever worked, the organisation itself only continues to function because those employed within it who will go above and beyond what is required are just slightly larger in number than those who go to work and perform below the standard required. What also falls under this same umbrella is that those who are in charge of the organisation rely heavily on those people who belong to the former of the two groups.

Take the British Armed Services for example, is is widely known that there are servicemen and women who have failed to meet the standard of fitness required of them. There have been cases in the services where servicemen and women have tried to avoid service by some rather dubious means in a bid to avoid going on deployment, and whilst there are some servicemen and women that are caught and prosecuted there are, you are almost certain, some that go undetected.

What you have also come to believe is that societies all over the world also relies heavily on those who work hard, to offset those who are lazy and those who malinger. The Police have recently taken a huge hit on both their pay and their pensions, as have the Armed Services. What a lovely coincidence it is that these two organisations are prevented from withdrawing their services under law.

What the cynic inside of you believes and is disconcerted by, is that one day this whole 'arrangement' based on the 'good will' of those willing to go above and beyond is going to come crashing down when people realise that they can walk away with the same amount of money and respect if they just went to work and performed just below the standard required.

But what scares the hell out of you, is that one day the hard working, morally efficient driven people of this society will realise that they would be better off, at least in the short term, if they didn't go to work at all. Whilst you do not believe the Bible is the truth, you still can see that if that day comes, and those people get an attack of selfishness, no one will be able to save society from what is coming, because Sodom and Gamorrah will happen again, and you fear that no one will be able to stop it......

Merry Christmas Children.....

'Early the next morning Abraham got up and returned to the place where he had stood before the LORD. He looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, toward all the land of the plain, and he saw dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace.' Genesis 19 V 27/28.

Ivor......

2011-12-09T14:16:00.004Z

What you have found, during your career in policing is that decisions that are made 'on the ground' in seconds, in difficult, stressful, fast moving and unforgiving situations, are decisions that are judged, with hindsight, be they by senior officers, junior officers or for that matter, any one, you have found that decisions are scrutinised, pulled apart, alternatives offered from pages of procedure and legeslitive articles.

You cannot count on two hands the amount of times you have heard the following empty words from seniour police officers:

'What ever you choose to do, on the ground, we will support you.'

What you dislike about these words is that you disagree with them, because they are said with the knowledge that it really doesn't matter to anyone whether or not a Police Officer, Service Policeman or PCSO for that matter is supported by their Chain of Command, because really, what it actually comes down to is whether or not that Police Officer, Service Policeman, or PCSO can justify their actions in a court of law.

One thing that you have never had to do, and what you hope you never have to do, is confront an armed and determined suspect, who is ready to kill, both others and yourself. It is most likely the most stressful, unforgiving situation that a policeman can be involved in, and the thought of it makes you wince.

On the 22 July 2005 a SO12 Armed Surveilance Officer, code named Ivor, was deployed onto the streets of London as part of a team tasked to follow a suspect in the failed bombings on the 21 July 2005. The person that was believed, incorrectly to be the suspect, code named Nettle Tip, transited through London, by foot, on a bus and then made his way to Stockwell Tube Station. During this time, as CO19 Specialist Firearms Officers were struggling to make ground, Ivor volunteered on numerous ocasions to make the stop himself, as he had recieved information that led him to suspect that the suspect may be carrying an explosive device, and was ready to kill innocent members of the public.

On entering a tube carriage at Stockwell, Ivor sat behind the suspect, and waited for firearms officers, on seeing them, knowing that he was both dressed in smimilar clothes to the suspect and resembled him in appearence, he bravely took action.

Sir Micheal Wright: He wasn't wearing any inappropriate or unusual clothing, was he?

Ivor: He was dressed virtually identical to myself, yes, sir.

He moved to the door of the carriage, making a split second decision:

Ivor: However, when I saw the CO19 officers on the platform, I had to make an assessment within seconds as to why they were there.

He kept it open with his foot and gave a target indication, at this point the suspect got out of his seat and moved towards the officers.

Ivor: In my statement I said he advanced towards us.

Knowing full well that the suspect could have been carrying an exlosive device, Ivor then took hold of the suspect, wrapping his arms around his waist and pinned him back into his seat, both to prevent him from detonating a device and to assist in his arrest, the person believed to be Nettle Tip was actually an innocent man called Jean Charles DeMenezes, he was shot, at point blank range by two CO19 Specialist Firearms Officers, Charlie 2 and Charlie 12.

Ivor was then dragged out of the carriage and held at gunpoint by a CO19 officer and was understandably treated with grave suspicion until he identified himself as a Policeman.

The Honourable Mr Justice Henriques: We heard, commissioner, of some magnificent police work by several officers. The work of the officer codenamed ‘Ivor’ in grasping a suspected suicide bomber by both arms, pinning them to his side, was magnificent, and if had been dealing with a suicide bomber, he may well have saved many lives. As it was, he risked his own life, not only by way of proximity, but because he was dressed similar to Mr de Menezes, he was of similar complexion, and was indeed apparently for a short time understandably treated by the firearms team as an associate of the man they believed to be the bomber. It should be remembered also that he volunteered himself to make the stop before Mr de Menezes entered the tube station. May I, Commissioner, ask that he received the appropriate and well earned commendation?

This man, a constable, the lowest rank in the Police, put himself at risk, and bravely took action to prevent what he honestly believed may be a suicide bomber, hell bent on killing innocent people. Even though the man turned out to be innocent, Ivor still acted bravely and without consideration for his own safety, society needs policemen and women, like Ivor, who act without the direct support of their Chain of Command and are brave and rightious enough to make the decision 'on the ground' and then justify it in a court of law.

'Decisons made in real time are never perfect and it is easy to judge those decisions afterwards, from an arm chair.'

Ezra Kramer, The Bourne Ultimatum.

The value of life.......

2011-05-06T15:57:00.000+01:00

Recently you discovered something about a particular 'faith' that shocked you, to the point of anger, to the point of total disbelief. Whilst you usually envy those who have a strong belief that something more must exist beyond this life on Earth, this time you didn't feel envy or jealousy for that sense of belief, you felt appalled, disheartened and extremely unnerved. The idea, or as you would like to call it, the misinterpretation, you were told brought out a side in you that you try to keep locked away, the belief that you have that nothing in this life is pre determined, that something is worth fighting for.

The majority of those people who claim to be Jehovah's Witnesses do not believe in accepting blood transfusions, they state it is down to the belief that the bible teaches that life is blood and that blood must not be eaten and that the followers of Jehovah must not have their blood replaced, even in a case where life or death is a certainty without a blood transfusion. They base this on numerous scriptures in the bible, including:

'Keep themselves from what is sacrificed to idols as well as from blood and from fornication.' Acts 21:25

'But you must not eat the blood, pout it out on the ground like water. Do not eat it so it may go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is right.' Deuteronomy 12:23-25

You've always said the bible is open to interpretation, and of course misinterpretation, but this is as far as you have seen, one of the most dangerous lines of deviation from what must have been intended. Granted it doesn't rank amongst Islamic Fundamentalists who believe in Jihad and that the abhorrent and despicable attacks that took place on 9/11 and 7/7 were done in the name of God. But it ranks within their midst, mainly due to the fact that it involves life, not just one's own life, because if a Jehovah's Witness wishes to refuse a blood transfusion for themselves, then that might be extremely stupid and ridiculous decision, but it has been known that they have refused blood transfusions for their children.

In your view, if a Jehovah's Witness is informed that their child needs a blood transfusion to survive and they refuse that transfusion, they have MURDERED their child. There is no other way of putting it, yes it may not be polite or respectful to stand on the 'line' with comments like that, and that view may not 'stand up' in a court of law on this earth, but it would stand in a court conveyed to decide on morality, on compassion, on life and on humanity. The bible also states:

'When Jesus saw this, he was indignant. He said to them, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." And he took the children in his arms, put his hands on them and blessed them.' Mark 10:14-16

Children are God's creation, they are innocent, when a child is born you never know what they will grow up to be, they may become Police Officers, Paramedics, Fire Fighters, Architects, Doctors, Nurses, Soldiers, Care Workers, or become involved in other occupations, callings, that save the lives of others. Whilst it is a adults decision as to whether or not they accept a blood transfusion, it is NOT the right of a Jehovah's Witness to decide for their child, it is not their right, if they love their child, or they believe their child was given to them from Jehovah, they would want that child, that lovely little bundle of joy to survive, to the point of them having to give their life to save that child, such a quality is not just that of a person who claims to believe in God, but the quality of a human being, a mother, and a father.

Life is precious, the bible states:

'Lord, help me to realize how brief my time on earth will be. Help me to know that I am here for but a moment more.' Psalm 39:4

There have been cases around the world, recently in Ireland where a child was saved by a blood transfusion, when the child's parents who were Jehovah's Witnesses refused the transfusion, but the court over ruled them. Mr Justice Hogan, has my utmost respect for standing on that 'line', for making that decision, to save a life.

The question that you always ask those who state they believe in something more, no matter what religion, is:

'What happens if you are wrong?'

The battle for humanity.....

2010-10-24T12:42:00.002+01:00

CREDIT: BRITISH ARMY

L/Cpl Amy Thomas (above) dispels the myth that all Royal Military Police Officers are ugly......

As you sat there, your rifle and the pistol on your hip became the centre of attention:

'I hear you're a man of faith?'

'Where did you hear that?'

'People talk.'

'Clearly they do.'

'But if you're a man of faith, what do you think God would say about you carrying guns?'

You are a quiet, unassuming man, and one thing you have never been completely comfortable with, is carrying a 'gun'. As far as you are concerned, the only reason they exist is to kill, thirteen bullets in a magazine means that with thirteen pulls on the trigger, thirteen people could be killed.

'You look pretty cool, with that pistol, is it loaded? Can I touch it?'

'No you can't touch it, yes it is loaded, and no, it is certainly not cool.'

When you were a boy, you used to think carrying a gun would be 'cool', that it would make you feel 'hard' and that it would cause people to respect you, until you were given one, until you looked at it and realised that for the next 160 days, you would have to carry it, and that you could be in a situation where you might have to fire it.

'What do you mean you don't like guns, you're in the wrong job, what are you doing here?'

'Perhaps you're right.'

When he asked you that, you refrained from saying what you thought, you wanted a quiet life whilst you were out there, you didn't want to ruffle any feathers, you were depending on these people. What you wanted to say, was that you will carry them, as you are ordered, but when you carry them, you don't have to like it and you certainly don't have to be proud of it.

When people ask you about your view on guns, you always remember a scene from the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode, The Siege of AR 558. A Starfleet operating base is under attack by Jem Hadar, and Doctor Bashir takes up a firing position, he checks the settings on his phaser rifle, making it ready to fire and a soldier says to him:

'I can see you've done that before.'

He replies:

'Too many times, it's funny, I joined Starfleet to save lives.'

It's a sad state of affairs, but in such a situation, not even the strongest, the most morally centred amongst us is immune from having to take up arms, or to being so effected by what they see, that they become jaded, cynical and apathetic.

'Our commitment to defeating this policy of ethnic cleansing, our commitment to allowing these people to return to their homes in peace, that commitment is total. This is not a battle for Nato, this is not a battle for territory; this is a battle for humanity, it is a just cause, it is a rightful cause.'

Mr Tony Blair, Former Prime Minister of Great Britain.

Principles over practicalities.......

2010-09-06T11:55:00.002+01:00

CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES

'On Tuesday night I gave the order for British forces to take part in military action in Iraq. Tonight, British servicemen and women are engaged from air, land and sea. Their mission: to remove Saddam Hussein from power, and disarm Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction.'

One quality you admire in a person and respect, is the ability to make a decision, a difficult decision, and then once made, despite criticism, hindsight and public protest, to stand by that decision, to brave the storm. In 2003 Tony Blair was The Prime Minster of the United Kingdom, and therefore the responsibility, was laid squarely at his feet. What some people forget, is that the decision was not his alone, the decision was brought before the UK Parliament and the issue was voted on, it returned a vote count of: 412 - 149 in favour.

'I know this course of action has produced deep divisions of opinion in our country. But I know also the British people will now be united in sending our armed forces our thoughts and prayers. They are the finest in the world and their families and all of Britain can have great pride in them.'

Saddam Hussein was a dictator, a tyrant, a danger to those on the side of justice who would oppose him. By March 2003 he had ignored seventeen United Nation Resolutions, he was an outlaw in the international community, he had previously illegally invaded Kuwait in 1990 and had to be removed from that country by Operation Desert Storm, even after being defeated and being sanctioned by the United Nations, he still appeared on live television and claimed victory.

'My fear, deeply held, based in part on the intelligence that I see, is that these threats come together and deliver catastrophe to our country and world. These tyrannical states do not care for the sanctity of human life. The terrorists delight in destroying it.'

You know many people believe different things about whether nor not Military Intelligence was fabricated, whether or not Attorney General Goldsmith was pressurised to come to his conclusions, whether or not the situation in Kosovo should have been used as a precedent for the actions in 2003, or whether or not, and this is one of your favourite conspiracy theories, oil was the reason for the invasion of Iraq.

'So our choice is clear: back down and leave Saddam hugely strengthened; or proceed to disarm him by force. Retreat might give us a moment of respite but years of repentance at our weakness would I believe follow.'

What most 'Anti War Protesters' are to ignorant to see, to self righteous to take in, is that Tony Blair was willing to follow the principles, of morality and compassion. To look at what he believed, and to take action, to produce such a brilliant and passionate plea, that he brought about a 263 majority vote, the backing of the democratic parliament of the United Kingdom. Then when it all went sideways, when people turned against him, when he became the target of those who would use hindsight as a weapon, he stood by his decision, and that, for you, makes the man worthy of great respect.

'I hope the Iraqi people hear this message. We are with you. Our enemy is not you, but your barbarous rulers.'

You did not serve in Iraq, but you know a lot of people who did, be that in Basra, Baghdad, or other parts of the country. You are only too aware that Service Police Officers died in that country, but Tony Blair, for all his faults, had one of the hardest jobs in the world, he knew the consequences that could ensue and he knew what had to be done. The men and women of the British Armed Forces were ready to do the job they had trained for, and he bravely and morally made the decision to send them to do it, because he had faith in their abilities. Despite the odds against them, the equipment shortages and other obstacles, they did the job and they did it well.

'That is why I have asked our troops to go into action tonight. As so often before, on the courage and determination of British men and women, serving our country, the fate of many nations rests.'

Out on a limb.......

2010-08-12T16:14:00.029+01:00

You were sat in the crew room with a witness, making conversation, you heard Pete, a fellow Special, on the radio:

'Assistance required........suspect making off......white male.......six foot four.......white hoody.....blue jeans, he's wearing only one trainer.....heading towards ASDA.......'

Pete was out of breath and trying his best to give a good description to the control room, you could hear in his voice that he was out of breath, a little scared, and that he knew that if he caught the suspect he would have trouble restraining him, you also knew that the he was shouting for assistance because he was 'Single Crewed'.

As you listened to the commentary you realised that other Officers were saying they were along way away from assisting, you also realised he was heading in your direction, towards the front of the Police Station. You knew no one else was in there except you, the Sgt and two other PCs were in custody, about eight miles away. You realised at that point that you would have to go and help out, you thought about the witness, and took her out into the foyer and asked her to wait there. You made your way out of the front door and started running down the street:

'He's running past Argos.........towards Coptill Lane.....onto Pretrail Road....I can't keep up with him....I've lost sight'

There was a long silence, you were about two hundred metres away from McDonalds, on your own and scared, when you saw him, you pressed the button:

'Bravo Whisky two three, I can see him, he's outside Mc Donalds, Pete he's outside Mc Donalds, facing Pretrail Road, turn around.......turn around'

You ran, as fast as you could, towards Pete, who was shouting and pointing at the man:

'Stay there.....don't move.....stay there......!'

Seconds later you and Pete had the male down, then you heard the sirens and saw the blue lights, back up had arrived, all be it a little too late.

Single Crewing is a bad idea, a very bad idea, one day someone will get seriously injured, and this incident and one other always comes to your mind when you think about it. What if you hadn't been able to leave the witness in the foyer, what if you had been too far away on foot to help Pete, and what if he had had to arrest the male on his own. When you knew Pete he wasn't a fighter, he certainly didn't like violence, actually he did whatever he could to avoid it, to even put hands on a suspect, and most of the Police Officers you have worked with, are exactly the same, they usually just want to get home on time.

You remember other Officers telling you, when you first joined up that you should not worry, because our gang is always bigger than their's and that back up is only a short distance away, now you know that that is not the case, back up can be far off, and when Officers are being Single Crewed more and more, someone is going to get seriously hurt, and it's going to upset the public at the breakfast table, but it will upset the familes of serving Police Officers a lot more, because let's face it, it's not a fucking game out there......

'Bravery is the capacity to perform properly even when scared half to death.'

Omar Bradley

It's not always a happy ending.........

2010-07-10T20:17:00.000+01:00

You've seen quite a lot of hurt and pain, even at eighteen years of age you were delving into domestic violence and the effects of rape, but still, sometimes, you look out the Police car window into the dark and you find yourself unable to comprehend what you witness. You see the nameless, random girls, they stagger along, intoxicated to the point of being catatonic, they are wearing skirts that are hiked up almost to their waist line, they laugh and shout, smiling as the effects of the last glass of wine kick in, the alcohol stimulating their confidence to another level. A few hours down the line:

** They may find that they are in the room of a man they do not know, a man they have just met, a man that isn't their boyfriend, have sex with him, forget to use a condom and catch HIV or Syphilis.

** In another club, or the next pub, or a house party, they take it to another level by taking Cocaine, Ecstasy or LSD.

What you think, as you look at them, feeling superior, self important, and sometimes a little self righteous is that, for the majority of them, it is their own fault, no one forces the alcohol down their throat, no one puts a gun to their head and tells them to drink it, or to take a tablet or to take their clothes off (or not in some cases) and open their legs.

No matter how much people dress it up, saying that they are only having fun or having a good time, the cynic inside of you, the immoral side of you, the apathetic side, built from seeing what you have seen, can't see it that way, you can't help but say to yourself that they are fools, deficient in judgement, lacking in common sense and they will at some point, be left to dwell in the sewer for which they have created with their own actions. But then, you hear about people like Robyn Bennett who was, that's past tense, an 18 year old girl, 'bright, happy, intelligent, outgoing and friendly young woman.' On the day she died, she went onto her 'MySpace' page, and edited it with a poem entitled: 'Every day is a party', she also proceeded to name the model Kate Moss as one of her heroes.

As you put a name to a face, to a random girl, it becomes a little harder to judge, to condemn, to feel superior, because like it or not, wanting to have fun is not a crime, it's just what young people want to do, is it an excuse? No, it's not, and they must answer for the actions they take when they bring themselves to a state where they do not know what they are doing.

When you see the girls walking by the window, sometimes you want to get out of the car, take hold of them and tell them about Robyn and that if they are not careful, if they don't heed the advice of those who have seen it, have been involved in it, that they will end up just the way she did. You want to tell them that no one deserves to die like she did and no father should ever have to give his daughter CPR and then watch her die in his arms. Taking drugs, becoming intoxicated to the point of being unable to control their actions will lead to them becoming another victim of drugs, violence, rape and worst of all, their own mortality.

It's not a fucking game, and you know that if you did try to talk to them, you would be laughed at, as just another person in a uniform, dull, boring, lifeless and out to spoil their fun, but if you could, you would plead with them, to be careful, because if they had seen what you have seen, that if they had watched a fourteen year old sprawled out on the floor of a house with paramedics over her, having almost choked to death on her own vomit, or a young taxi driver, moved to tears because a twenty five year old woman is on her way to Accident and Emergency in an ambulance, because she wandered out into the middle of a dual carriageway, drunk and not able to comprehend what she was doing, they might just be saying the same thing, pleading with themselves to think, to stop and to walk away..........

'Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.'

Seneca

British Airways......

2010-05-07T15:50:00.000+01:00

The average salary of someone doing this job is £29,000:

These chaps start at £17,000:

'What the hell did you think the gun was for, huh? Show-and-tell? Look, you'll get over it - all right, they'll send you to BSS, you'll do all that Buddhist "I love and revere all sentient beings" crap; then at o'dark-thirty, next time you're up, you will drag your weary, fried ass out of bed, you will put on your gun and your vest, and you will do it all over again. You know why? Because this is a front row seat to the greatest show on earth. Can you abuse it? Yes, sir - you can, and you will; I guarantee it. Because it is relentless, and it gets to you, and it seems like it changes nothing. But a day like today, with some interesting capers, and a few good arrests? That's good. But every once in a while, you get to take a bad guy off the streets for good... and that, my friend, is God's work. So now you wanna be a pussy and quit, you quit. You're a cop because you don't know how not to be one. If you feel that way, you're a cop. If you don't, you're not - you decide.'

Officer John Cooper, Southland.

De oppresso liber.......

2010-04-19T13:44:00.008+01:00

Mr Mark Leader has been discharged from the UK Armed Forces for throwing a wellington boot at a member of the Taliban who was found planting an IED in Afghanistan. Now, many people are calling for this man to be reinstated, Facebook pages, petitions and all the usual clichés.

You have read quite a few of the comments on this Facebook Group, and have come to the conclusion that people are maybe a little ill informed. They seem to think that this man threw the wellington boot at the Taliban fighter whilst he was actually planting the IED, which would have been a legal way of dealing with the situation and understandable. However what a court martial believes happened is that a SNCO in the Royal Marines, one of the most well known, revered and respected fighting forces in the world, sought out a human being, and assaulted him, while he was almost defenceless. No matter what this member of the Taliban had done, no matter who he was, no matter how he had treated others, he was to be treated with respect and within the confines of those rules which this SNCO had fought to protect, signed up to abide buy and taken an oath to uphold.

People are throwing around clichés such as ‘Necessary evil’, but a question they should ask themselves is this, how can we possibly put an end to persecution and oppression, if we become the persecutors and oppressors ourselves? Was the punishment too harsh? Did it fit the crime? Did he actually act in self-defence? Has there been a serious miscarriage of justice here? Was an example made of this man? Should seventeen years of service helped him at Court Martial, or should all those years of service taught him that rules are there for a reason, for a purpose?

Members of the UK Armed Forces, especially those in positions of authority, who should be setting an example, Officers, SNCOs, NCOs and the Military Police, have to be held to a higher moral standard than others, because they are at the spearhead of the fight to free the oppressed, help the helpless, to protect those who cannot protect themselves.

'Moral principle is the foundation of law.'

Ronald D Workin.

Did I ever see a Taliban fighter.......

2010-04-16T06:03:00.000+01:00

As soon as you heard the alarm, you dived onto the floor, as you were laying there, face down in the dust, you knew you were out in the open, no blast walls to cover you, no bunker near by, your heart started to beat faster, if you had any emotions at that moment, you would have been close to tears with fear. A loud explosion in the distance, you breathed a sigh of relief, it wasn't your turn this time, but you knew someone else wasn't so lucky.

The man who was sat in the isle seat had clearly been through this before, you asked him, he said he was on his fourth tour, an infantry soldier, married, with a two year old baby girl. Even now you remember his face, because you knew then that he was going to do something that you will never have the courage to do, the bravery to do. You tried to sleep, but after a few minutes you realised it wasn't happening, you were sure it was due to the can of red bull you had drank just before getting on the plane.

You had been feeling sick most of the journey, you didn't know whether this was due to the fact that you hate flying, or that you were scared of the unknown, eventually you managed to settle down with an autobiography, written by the second most beautiful woman in the world.

The lad who was sat next to you looked about the same age as you, he clearly hadn't done this before because he looked as white as a bed sheet, like he was going to be sick all over the floor at any moment, and he was shaking as he tried to put his helmet chin strap on. He was laughing as he was trying, but not like he was finding it amusing. You told him to calm down, and take deep breaths, he told you he had only been in the job for twelve months, and didn't expect to be heading out to Helmand so soon. You are immune to having any feelings, but if you weren't, you would have been scared for him.

As you sat in the pitch dark, the plane descended, and you suddenly realised you were in the window seat and therefore, foolishly you thought, were most likely to be hit by surface to air small arms fire, you turned to the young lad next to you, tapped him on the arm, and said to him in disbelief:

'What the fuck are we doing here?'

'What for? Did I ever see a Zulu walk down a City road? No! So what am I doing here?'

Private Henry Hook, Zulu.

The rough diamond.......

2010-02-08T22:08:00.000Z

You knew, that as it was your first time, you wouldn't enjoy it. With that in your mind you prepared yourself, but what you didn't know, was that whilst you were in the worst place you have ever been to, you would meet a person so beautiful, cute, caring, kind, sexy, stunning and vivacious.

It wasn't exactly a normal day, you'd had about three hours sleep in forty eight hours and you were close to falling asleep while you were still standing up. Suddenly something woke you up, you felt a hand on your shoulder, and heard the words: 'Yes, sweetheart' in your ear. You turned around and saw someone who, was so cute and so beautifully petite. The first thing you noticed about her was that she wasn't wearing any make up, and still she looked so beautiful, she was also so tiny, she looked so fragile, her next attribute that took your attention was her eyes, under her sexy glasses, they looked so innocent, immediately you wanted to find out about her.

During the next few weeks you found the time to listen to her, she told you about her life, the things she had been through, the things she had done, and regretted. You won't admit to having any feelings for her, or about what she said, but if you did, or could, you would say how surprised and emotionally moved you were, that even at such a young age she had experienced so much heartache, yet she still found the strength, the courage, the bravery to look on the bright side of life, to admit her mistakes and to smile.

You don't usually quote songs, but IYAZ understands where you are coming from:

'That girl, like somethin off a poster
That girl, is a dime they say
That girl, is a gun to my holster
She's runnin through my mind all day.'

One thing that you never got the opportunity to tell her, that you wish you had, is that her hips are almost as sexy as her feet.........

'My gift from God is that he gave me a kind heart, I feel what other people feel, so I can help them.'

The Rough Diamond

The time is now.....

2009-12-14T20:49:00.005Z

This quote seems to adequately explain the position you are in:

'Yes. The final supreme idiocy... coming here to hide. The deserter, hiding out in the middle of a battlefield.'

Lee, The Magnificent Seven.

Applying a price tag.......

2009-12-09T12:29:00.017Z

The British Armed Forces is filled with volunteers, paid volunteers, no one forces a potential Soldier, a Marine, a Sailor or an Airman to 'sign on the dotted line'. Each Service person joins for their own reasons, not one reason is the same, perhaps similar, but not the same. They know how much they are going to be paid, they know what they might have to do, they know where they may be ordered to proceed and they know that their families will stay behind, whilst they go.

Those persons that suffer the most, in your opinion, are the children of those serving in the Armed Forces, because they do not choose, they are born into the life, they have to accept, they have no choice.

   People join campaigns such as 'Soldiers should get Footballers wages', you understand their out cry, their point of view, and you agree with their cause in principal, but no one forces potential Servicemen and women to 'sign on the dotted line' and accept that level of pay, members of the Armed Forces should get paid more, without question, especially Service persons at the low end of the pay scale, but the issue is, members of the Armed Forces risk their life, no matter what cap badge or trade group, how, in God's name, does someone put a price tag on that?

'If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.'

Desiderata

One of the few.....

2009-11-29T12:41:00.006Z

This man stayed behind, while others fled....

"The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet not with standing, go out to meet it.”

Thucydides

Those who gave their lives....

2009-11-11T11:49:00.009Z

Left behind, their radio and lad rover stolen, a team of six Royal Military Policemen perished....

Sgt Simon Hamilton-Jewell, 41:

'Sgt Tim's last words to Mr Baiphy have a vivid ring of desperation. "He asked me for a radio to talk to his superiors," Mr Baiphy said. "He said: 'Our radio has been burned in the Land Rover.'

Corporal Simon Miller, 21:

'Outnumbered by perhaps 1,000 to one, they mounted a desperate last stand in the baking heat. Shattered windows, rooms pockmarked with bullet holes and the pulverised brickwork of the wall surrounding the police station show how fiercely they fought.'

Corporal Russell Aston, 30:

'According to several Iraqi accounts, two of the Britons took cover behind sandbags on the roof of the building. Others manned firing positions in the front rooms.'

Corporal Paul Graham Long, 24:

'Bloodstains on the floor show that one soldier was killed or wounded in the corridor then dragged 10 yards towards the entrance of the building. Every fragment of glass has been blown out of the barred window of one front room.'

Lance-Corporal Benjamin John McGowan Hyde, 23:

'Ten heavy calibre bullet holes scar the wall, perhaps showing where another military policeman died.'

Lance-Corporal Thomas Richard Keys, 20:

'On the other side of a small courtyard, two small rooms have been gutted. More than 24 hours after the fire started, blasts of heat were still overpowering and acrid smoke curled from the doorway to the rooms.'

You know, deep down that you would have run, as fast as you could, away from the gunfire, and you wouldn't have looked back.

You cannot imagine, no, you do not want to imagine what these six brave men were thinking the moment they were taking up their positions, making their rifles ready to fire, you do not want to think about the moment it dawned on them that they were going to die, that they realised that they would have to fight until they could not fight any longer.

You do not want to imagine, because you are not strong enough, not brave enough and not courageous enough, these six men, boldly, intrepidly, stood their ground, held their position, performed their duty and for that we must remember them.

'In war, there are no unwounded soldiers.'

Jose Narosky

Soldiers are not heroes.....

2009-11-04T12:45:00.006Z

You do not like Facebook, you are not an active member, and you refuse to be so. Recently, while using a relative's Facebook account you stumbled across something, and if you had any feelings at all (which you don't), you would have been angry when you saw it.

The Facebook group called 'Soldiers are not heroes' include this in their 'mantra':

'Putting on a soldiers uniform does not make you a hero. Supporters of the group generally agree that the wars that our armed forces are participating in at the present time and in recent years are unnecessary and unjust. Therefore we don't feel that we should be pressured into offering "support" to people fighting and killing innocent people for causes that we don't believe in.'

You have a response and it comes in the form of a quote:

'It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the soldier, not the organizer, who has given us the freedom to demonstrate.
It is the soldier, who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protestor to burn the flag.'

- Father Dennis Edward O'Brian, USMC

Carnage.....

2009-10-31T14:20:00.011Z

You have been Policing since you were eighteen years of age, and in those years you have come across a few interesting situations, and you can safely say that in most of these situations alcohol has been a contributing factor.

If she fronted a new perfume, it certainly wouldn't be called 'Dignity'.

It's all fun and games, until someone is raped.

Will he be in a cell an hour later, or an ambulance?

Binge drinking can cause the following:

Brain damage
Alcoholic Poisoning
Hypothermia
Hypoglycaemia
Haemorrhage
Pancreatitis

High Blood pressure
Strokes
Breast cancer
Skeletal Muscle Damage

In emergency rooms, self-reported alcohol consumption within six hours of admission is higher for injured than uninjured attendees. 20-40% of emergency admissions are intoxicated; the night-time rate is higher at 80%.

It was your first Saturday night on duty in a very long time, it was no longer the summer holidays, so you didn't have much time to put the hours in during the week, your girlfriend was working, and your mates were going out and getting pissed, so when you realised you had nothing else to do, you decided to go in and do a few hours.

It was about 2300 hrs, you were sat in the town centre in a police car watching all the people walk by, looking down your rather large nose at them, wondering what possessed them to come out on such a cold night, wearing next to nothing. Your brain working, the cogs turning, you started to think of the reasons, but you didn't get very far down the list, because the airwave radio perked up.

You weren't the first car to arrive at the club, so when you arrived the crowds had already gathered, the screams, the shouting, the laughing, the mixed emotions, the paramedics, the police officers, the door staff, the mother, the daughter, the son, the father, the girlfriend, the brother, and the blood.

It was all fun and games, until someone was 'GLASSED'.

For the price of two.......

2009-08-01T20:45:00.003+01:00

Your mum had ironed your shirt, polished your boots, and made you a packed lunch.

Two hours later, you finally realised it wasn’t about playing the hero, you looked at her, she was crying, you’d never seen anyone cry so much, but you knew it wasn’t out of pain, but despair. Yes, she was clearly in pain, the blood running from her mouth, nose and head told you that much, you knew she was crying because she was on the edge, she had nothing left to hang onto. You heard the sirens of the ambulance in the distance, you knew the paramedics had most likely seen this kind of thing before, but you were only eighteen years old, you had only ever seen this much blood on television.

If you had any feelings you would have been stood there, righteously angry, cursing to yourself. You knew you could do nothing, nothing you did would make any difference, it wouldn’t do any good, Jonathon had made the arrest, a girl was in the back seat of the patrol car, handcuffed. The other two girls, who were involved, looked harmless, you looked at them and made a judgement, you looked down on them, they were the lowest of the low, your naïve mind was working overtime.

Three witness statements and an interview later, you knew the story, you knew what had happened. A young, innocent girl with learning difficulties, desperate for a friend, had been lured to a location, and had been ambushed. One of the girls jumped on her, attacked her, whilst the other two filmed the attack, on their mobile phones.

All the girls were under the age of fourteen.

‘Join the Special Constabulary, learn to become cynical, jaded, apathetic, unsympathetic and unemotional, lose your soul and live ten years, for the price of two.’

You wonder how many people would join the Special Constabulary, if those words were at the forefront of the recruitment campaign.

Surplus to requirements...

2009-07-07T13:19:00.006+01:00

It was a warm, sunny day, and you were rolling around the floor in front of a betting shop. A stop and account had gone awfully wrong, and a male was in the process of being arrested for breach of bail. As you placed your knee in the centre of his back, a woman with a nose ring, and an ample midriff, shouted at you to stop hurting him, to stop being brutal.

About three weeks later, you attended a suspected assault, the same woman was now playing the role of injured party, and now wanted your help. She didn't remember you, but you remembered her.

People need the Police - They like the Police.

People don't need the Police - They hate the Police.

You would like to think that this kind of mentality, this kind of opinion only belongs in the lower areas of society, but it doesn't. It seems to be present amongst the educated, the 'examples'.

On Panorama last night, Hannah McClure said this:

'The first thing I remember seeing is, a man in full riot gear, pointing a Tazer gun, well it felt like it was at me.'

It was a planned arrest, of suspects wanted for serious offences of violent disorder, what did she expect? A Police Officer to arrive and offer them tea and cakes, whilst perhaps dressed in shorts and an anorak?

What people don't seem to understand is that the Police have a job to do, if searches are not carried out, if intelligence is not gathered, if strict rules are not enforced, if a line is not drawn, innocent people can get killed, this can happen:

'Our failures are known, our successes are not.'

Walter Burke, The Recruit.

The return of the horse and carriage.....

2009-06-15T20:53:00.005+01:00

You love to drive your car, it’s a brilliant car, it does 0-60mph in 7.5 seconds and it hits a documented top speed of around 150mph, you will state here that you have a clean driving licence and have never had a road traffic collision in the time you have been driving, over three years. You have also attended fatal RTCs, and visited the victims of these collisions in hospital.

You were watching a program earlier on ITV1 about whether or not the limit should be lowered on rural roads to 50mph, in a blanket fashion. A road that you know of quite well is the A617 from Newark to Mansfield, you don’t drive on this road a lot, but you know it has recently also been reduced from 60mph to 50mph. Recently you were driving along that road, travelling at around 50mph and a woman in a Vauxhall Corsa VXR overtook you, you thought she must have been doing around 70mph maybe more, in order to overtake you, she contravened solid white lines and just missed oncoming traffic by a matter of centimetres.

Obviously the local council had taken the advice of the extremely beautiful, but perhaps naïve Miss Katie Shephard, and reduced the speed limit. But had that had any effect on this driver? No. She broke the speed limit, contravened solid white lines and almost caused a head on collision.

Lowering speed limits will have absolutely no effect on drivers who are willing to drive over the speed limit. If a person is willing to drive at 100mph on a 60mph limited road, then will lowering it to 50mph make them slow down? No, of course it won’t, it will just make those drivers who want to drive at 60mph (lawfully), slow down, and make their journey more mundane and less of an experience.

Last but not least, one thing you can’t stand is drivers who toddle through a NSL road at 45mph and then continue through 30mph limits at that speed, be damned the children who get in their way. Will the proposals that Miss Shephard supports stop these drivers from killing children? No, of course they won’t, it's obvious.

Next thing, people will be crowing like cockerels, you can hear them now:

‘Lower the speed limit to 10mph on all roads, let’s reduce traffic collisions, let’s save lives.’

You can't understand their naivety, it is quite disturbing.

When the curtain falls......

2009-05-15T13:06:00.005+01:00

You get up, rub your eyes, look over at the other half of the bed, she's still fast asleep, of course she is it's half past five in the morning. It's pitch dark outside, only the street lights are providing illumination in the gloom of a foggy morning. You have a quick shower, a shave, get changed into your uniform, go over your boots with a brush polish, kiss her good bye (she's awake by now, not through choice) and head off to work. It's a quick drive in, especially at that time in a morning, no one is around, except for the milkman.

You arrive in work and the first thing Alan asks you is: 'Late night was it?' He jabs you in the ribs gently, and then produces a wide grin, expecting some sort of retort, one that you usually give, you are happy to provide one: 'Yes, your sister can really party when she gets going.' he laughs, hits you again, he gets your sense of humor, not that many people do. About an hour later you're watching a re run of Jeremy Kyle, while doing paperwork, sorting out a case file for Criminal Damage, it's not that interesting, but they damaged some expensive equipment, they need to be arrested and processed, shouldn't be a problem for you.

Before you can even start the process however, a call comes in, incident in progress. The caller states that a vehicle has just turned over on its side in the middle of the road, someone is crawling out of the window. You put your baton and cuffs on, grab your high vis jacket and a set of vehicle keys, and then Alan, and make your way there. The scene is not what you expect, a small car is parked on the grass verge, a woman is sat on a bench at the side of the road, crying loudly, her husband is leaning against a near by wall, he isn't saying a word. You talk to the woman who made the call, she tells you that she saw the vehicle swerve in the middle of the road, tyre squealing, then it landed on the grass verge, the woman got out, and was followed by the man, an argument ensued and she started crying. So no 180 degree flip? Thought not.

You talk to the woman, she cries a lot, takes hold of your hand, she doesn't want to tell you what happened, how it happened, why it happened, who did what to whom, all she wants is her husband out of the way for the night. You talk with Alan, he tells you exactly the same story, but from the husband, it seems you've hit a wall of silence. Alan is a good lad, harmless and lets his heart rule his head, so you both decide what to do, and four hours later, it's all rapped up, ready for the shift to end.

You are just about to go home, when your Boss beckons you:

'McClaine, have you got anything planned for tomorrow night?'
'Yes, I have actually, I'm taking her to the theatre, should be a good night.'
'I was hoping you would say no, I need you on nights tommorow.'
'I've got plans.'
'I'm not asking though, just being polite about it, as we all know you like.'
'Well I need you to order me.'
'Then consider it an order.'
'No worries boss, shouldn't be a problem then, i'll be in at 8.'
'Thanks Joe.'

You arrive home, open the door, she's watching TV, it appears that some one just fell into a lake, she finds in funny, you love it when she laughs, her smile is beautiful. You know that in a few minutes, that smile won't be there anymore, you decide to tell her later, let her smile for a little longer.......

'You know, sometimes, it just gets really hard to smile through it when they ask you to bend down and grab your ankles. You know?'

Fox Mulder, The X Files.

Mixed messages......

2009-04-25T23:31:00.001+01:00

You urge people to look at the above photo, and watch this video, and then read these quotes:

'I didn’t realise he was talking to me – it came as a complete shock because we were there as a group. Obviously I was flattered. But all the girls are gorgeous so I was really taken aback.'

Charlotte McCormack (Wales Online)

'Most girls would probably like Simon saying they were beautiful, but I hated it. I felt sick later. I wanted to get off the stage as quickly as possible.'

Charlotte McCormack (The Daily Mirror)

Did Charlotte McCormack blush with pleasure, lap up the compliment, and then realise what people might think and back track?

A young woman is in a night club, in a City centre, she is tipsy, she is having a great time. A man takes a shine to her, they flirt with each other, dancing, she rubs her body up against his, they embrace, their lips together. She leads him away, out of the club, in a taxi back to his flat, they have sex, and fall asleep.

She wakes up the next morning, confused, she doesn't want her boyfriend to find out, she can't bare to think what he would do. She leaves the flat, walks back to her house, crying on the way, she lets herself in and tells her boyfriend that a man has raped her.......

'Truth will ever be unpalatable to those who are determined not to relinquish error.'

E. W. Montagu

A society of victims?

2009-03-15T11:05:00.005Z

As you read the front page, you see that another has fallen, the epidemic of knife crime is out of control. Young John was 16, he was stabbed to death, his mother is on the front page, tears, heart ache, despair. They speak of Young John, he was a good boy, raised in poverty, on a council estate, he had his whole life ahead of him, he never did anyone harm, he never deserved this.

But maybe Young John wasn't so innocent, maybe he bullied someone, maybe he victimised polite Jimmy, to the point that polite Jimmy broke. Polite Jimmy, raised in comfort, never anything but friendly, he couldn't take one more beatings, he couldn't hide the bruises any more. One day when he got out of bed, he saw a knife in his dad's kitchen draw, he thought it was his only hope, his only way to escape Little John.

As polite Jimmy walked home, young John found him, he hit him, he spat on him, polite Jimmy couldn't take it, so he took the option and stabbed young John as hard as he could, only once.

John died on the pavement, Jimmy died as he ran from the scene.

Who was the real Victim?

Who decides?

'Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.' Adolf Hitler

Two sides of a coin.......

2009-02-07T13:18:00.012Z

One wears a dirty uniform, the other a clean suit.
One works in unbearable heat, the other an air conditioned office.
One is thousands of miles from home, the other on her doorstep.
One is on low pay, the other is on a high wage.
One dodges deadly bullets, the other dodges phone calls.

You watched Shami Chakrabarti's emotional plea on Question Time this Thursday, and to tell the truth you were embarrassed for her. In your opinion she attempted to win the audience over using inflexions, emotions and raised voices.

Why did the the audience agree with her, were they not watching the News on the 7th of July 2005? You've never been a fan of Geoff Hoon, but he offered a voice of reason, calm, cool, collected, in response to what may have been an attempt to create mass hysteria.

Chakrabati would most likely be singing a different tune if the sound of dyeing children were within her earshot, then it may hit home that terrorists are not people, they are parasites. While she sits in her safe, expensive, air conditioned office, she should think about British Troops, in 40 degree heat, trying to survive.

Living in a broken home......

2009-01-15T20:06:00.000Z

The night is cold, the ground is laden with snow, and as you rush to the scene of the domestic, you find yourself wishing you had actually gone to the cinema and not into work. The Christmas lights look rather stupid, the house is littered with them, maybe the electricity bill caused the argument, it's sometimes as simple as that. Knock, knock, knock, the door opens, a middle aged man, he's very calm, alarm bells start ringing in your head, and not the festive kind.

As you walk in, you notice two young children sat on the bottom step of the stairs, the boy is crying, the girl is looking after him, she has her arm around him, good girl. The man says to you:

'Come in, this way.'

He leads you into the kitchen, a woman is sitting in a chair, dinner is on the table, four place mats, four plates, you notice two empty bottles of wine, the man does not smell of liquor. Your female colleague takes point:

'Are you all right luv, what's the matter?'

Two minutes later you arrested the middle aged man for assaulting his wife, he is taken to the custody suite, where he is interviewed. In the interview he breaks down in tears, he tells you that he can't take it any more, he cooked a lovely meal, for his wife and children, they all sat down to eat it, twenty minutes later, after his wife had drank almost two bottles of wine, she lectured him, she shouted at him, she pushed him right to the edge, so he hit her, once, only once.

You couldn't get a statement from his wife, she was catatonic by the time you went back, passed out on the sofa, the children spent the night with their grandparents. You have been told, time and again, it is not your job to believe or to take sides, the Police gather the evidence, and present it. But that time, you believed the husband, you knew he was telling the truth, you just knew.

You went home at 00:15, driving slowly as the roads were still laden with snow, you weren't thinking about what to get your girlfriend for Christmas, or what to do on New Year's eve, because all you could think about was those two young children, living in a broken home.

'A child sees everything, looks straight at it, examines it, without any preconceived idea.'

Olive Schreiner

Guilty in the press court....

2009-01-11T15:15:00.006Z

'RTC boss, she says she's crashed her car into a lamp post on the Low road, she wants Police to help her.'
'Typical, she's a woman.'
'No boss, she didn't say she had reversed it in to a lampost, it was a frontal collision.'

At this point your boss burst out laughing, your boss is a female.

It was three years ago, before he went to Afghanistan, in three years a person can change, a person's values and beliefs can be completely reversed, he's been to a war, he has most likely killed people, directly or indirectly.

Yes that doesn't excuse what Price Harry said, saying the word 'paki', it doesn't make it right, in fact it is most likely wrong, but people hang him all the same, declare him guilty, without any consideration of the circumstances.

'He is then shown making a mock mobile call to the Queen, the Commander in Chief of the British Army, in front of other cadets.'

You find that quite funny, most of your colleagues don't care about the Queen, do they do their job for her, no, they all do it for different reasons, but you have never heard the Queen being one of those reasons.

Banter in the military is part of what makes the job great, the day the Politically Correct squad on their high horses take it out, the job won't be half as enjoyable.

'Political correctness is just tyranny with manners.'

Charlton Heston.

The grey man........

2009-01-04T13:36:00.006Z

When a person speaks out, it shows that they have character, and that they actually believe what they are saying. It is easy, comfortable, to sit back and watch something happen, to not become involved. You suspect that most people sit back, because of fear. They are fearful of what people will think of them if they do get involved, or disagree. They may fear being called a heretic, a bigot, a outcast, downright crazy or just being noticed, picked out in a crowd.

In society being different can be a problem, if a person is not the same as everyone else it causes them to be noticed, to be singled out. That in turn means that they are watched more, their actions are more scrutinized than others. Society has started to breed an atmosphere where being a 'grey man', a person who is so devoid of character, follows everyone else, not noticeable, is the best way to be. In training it was the same, you noticed that the 'grey man', the person who was devoid of any sort of character, just moving along in the background, hoping no one would notice them, always seemed to make it through.

If a person is two dimensional, how can they be found faulting, but all the same, how can people find a trait in them to praise. People need to go against the norm, they need to start speaking and standing up, don't follow the crowd, or become a sheep following the shepherd, being too scared to disagree or to put a different point of view forward. You have criticised feminists in the past, and you disagree with them, but at least they have the 'balls' to speak up, stand up, and for that you respect them.

'If you lose money, you lose nothing, If you lose time, you lose something,If you lose character you lose every thing.'

Swami Vivekananda

Happy New Year..........

2009-01-01T16:06:00.000Z

As tax payer's money goes up in smoke, British soldiers in war zones don't have the right equipment required to stay alive.

As this idiot,a member of the armed forces no less, uses a Royal Air Force helicopter to visit his girlfriend, and to attend a bachelor party, there isn't enough transport to evacuate wounded British soldiers on the battle field.

'A fool who knows his foolishness is wise at least to that extent, but a fool who thinks himself wise is a fool indeed.'

Dhammapada

Accusations of beauty.....

2008-12-17T16:36:00.001Z

Due to being on nights and that you enjoy making the most of your TV License fee, you have been watching Strictly Come Dancing and The X Factor. Of the two shows you seem to enjoy the former more than the latter.

The X Factor seems to be a platform for people to broadcast their hard ships and their problems, it also seems to be a launching point for bad tabloid headlines. Owen likes to waste Police time by needing an escort because of the mass hysteria he caused when he returned home to Northern Ireland. JLS or as you like to call them, Aston and his backing vocals, seem to be a waste of air time. How can the judges miss the fact that Aston sings, and then the other three sing in the background. It's hard to believe.

The only part of the show that was actually worth watching was when Alexandra and Diana were on. Diana's style is totally unique and very refreshing, and Alexandra is an amazing singer, powerful, professional, and hard working. She had to win, because if she hadn't, it would have made a mockery of the entire show.

Strictly Come Dancing is excellent, not just the attractive dancers (Lisa Snowdon and Erin Boag) and the actual dancing, but also the banter from the judges, and dare you say it, Bruce Forsyth and Tess Daly. And most importantly of all, it is not full of teenagers attempting to get the spotlight by making bad tabloid headlines and storming the stage on live performances.

What seems to have hit you most of all is the improvement of one of the celebrity dancers, you don't pretend to know much about the subject, but anyone should have noticed it. She was slow and wooden at the start, but over the weeks, she has become the best dancer on the show, most likely due to the effort and guidance of her professional dance partner Brendan Cole.

You are predicting that Lisa Snowdon will win, and you hope she does, not because she is beautiful, but because she dances beautifully.

'To dance is to be out of yourself, larger, more powerful, more beautiful. This is power, it is glory on earth.'

Agnes de Mille.

The advert for natural beauty......

2008-11-28T23:05:00.009Z

It's rare that you say this, but you've had your mind blown, by what feels like a nuclear bomb. She's intelligent, bright, curvacious, bubbly, confident and polite. To be completely honest, Shona Collins is a walking, talking, smiling advert for natural beauty.

You thought she would win as soon as you first heard her speak and saw her smile, you were right.

'I love my curves and freckles.'

She should, they are amazing.

God be with them.......

2008-11-04T23:45:00.006Z

It's raining and cold, your clothes are soaked through, you can feel the water on your skin. You've had a total of four hours sleep in the past three days, you're tired, run down, you see things moving around you, when there isn't anything there. It was light when he approached, he came from the bushes to your right, Mike saw him first, he shouted to you and warned you about what was coming. The figure came towards you, walking slowly, his hands held in the air, he was saying something you couldn't understand. You had no idea what to do, so you shouted at him to stand still, he didn't stop, he kept coming towards you. At this point he lowered one of his arms, and pointed something at you, you couldn't see it properly, it looked like a gun. You started to scream at him to stop and stand still, but he didn't. As he got within five metres of you, you made your weapon ready to fire, you screamed again, your mouth dry, but he didn't stop, you pressed the safety catch, got into the kneeling position and fired, one, two, three, four, five shots. He fell to the ground.

It is easy to sit in an arm chair and make a decision based on hindsight, it is convenient to see the morals of the situation, in a warm court room after a coffee break. If a suspected suicide bomber approaches a vehicle check point, a soldier has only seconds to decide whether or not to open fire.

'My sincere regrets. I cannot begin to put myself in the position that they are faced with. I am a family man myself.'

CO19 Firearms Officer C12

Until people have been in a situation for real they should never pass judgement, spin theories or condemn those who have the courage to stand up and place themselves in the position where life and death is decided in seconds. You have no idea what you would do if you faced the situation for real, if you found yourself in the scenario you have trained for, you hope and pray you would do the right thing, but you just don't know.

'If I did not act, members of the public would be killed, colleagues would be killed. I would be killed. I had a duty to protect the public.'

CO19 Firearms Officer C12

One character trait that makes you angry is the one of the 'Armchair critic', if people want to make judgement on brave men and women, they should first stand up, take an oath, be counted, and face the situation.

'I'm responsible for the death of an innocent man. Something I have to live with all my life.'

CO19 Firearms Officer C12.

The stairway to hell......

2008-10-22T20:14:00.003+01:00

You got into a lot of fights as a kid, mainly on the way home from school, to you it was fun, it was all a game. One fight you remember well, about seven years ago, it was round the corner from the local magistrate's court and the local lolly pop lady got involved. You had started the fight, by calling a young lad a 'fat dick head' and immediately after the gobbing off you were on the floor being hit, sporting a blood nose. She waded in, screamed at the top of her voice and used her 'lolly pop' to push the lad off you.

The next day you and your attacker were stood in front of your headmistress being reamed for bringing the school into disrepute, the lolly pop lady had reported you to the school reception by name and demanded you be disciplined. What you remember most about the incident was that when asked who started the fight, your adversary refused to say it was you. He took the blame alongside you, and didn't complain about it.

The above wouldn't happen in the present day though, your attacker would have ended up in a Police cell having been charged with murder, and you would have ended up in a morgue somewhere, stone cold.

Angels and ministers of grace........

2008-06-14T14:19:00.004+01:00

The expectation on those who wear a uniform is always high.

The waiter in the restaurant is always supposed to be polite, to never get angry, to never cause their customer to have cause for complaint. The customer service assistant at Thorntons, although beautiful and pretty, is always supposed to remain professional, to stay cool in the face of a very large Que. The young gentleman in PC World is supposed to remain kind to the customer who clearly has no idea what they want, or what they actually need.

However, the difference between those who wear a uniform to live and those who live to wear a uniform is this, the formers responsibility stops when they take that uniform off at the end of their shift.

It would be very easy for you to avoid your responsibilities, but the consequences of such an action, you could never completely avoid.

C'est la vie.

'It often requires more courage to dare to do right than to fear to do wrong.'

Abraham Lincoln

The price of peace?

2008-05-05T22:19:00.001+01:00

As a brave soldier lay on the ground, a priest gave him the last rites, his murderer was sent to prison for life, he was let out of that jail nine years later, by a 'peace agreement'.

With such an act of injustice being the price of peace, it makes you question the very nature of it, and whether or not it is worth fighting for.

'We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other's children.'

Jimmy Carter, President of the United States.

'Peace is more than the absence of war.'

2008-04-24T21:33:00.001+01:00

As the recruit walked in water up to his neck, holding his rifle above his head, he knew the time was around 03:00 hrs, he had been walking for the past hour and a half and he was tired, soaking wet and he honestly knew that the run back would be hard. In the past twenty four hours he had managed to get thirty minutes sleep, it wasn't enough, every sound in the dark became a threat, his eyes were starting to play tricks on him, he just didn't know how he was carrying on, he just couldn't tell.

As he started to run, his load started to feel that much heavier, he found himself thinking that there must be an easier way to make a living. Maybe he could quit right then and there, that he wouldn't have to run the next mile and a half back to the destination, that he wouldn't have to sleep on a stone cold floor.

Thirty minutes later he was sat down resting, and at that moment if he had any feelings at all, he would have been ashamed of himself, ashamed of what he had been thinking, because at the exact moment he was complaining, brave souls were most likely enduring something far worse, for real:

Meanwhile, teachers across the country go on strike because they think they should be paid more.........

The winds of change.....

2008-02-23T14:51:00.005Z

'It takes a brave woman to do that, you're alot braver than me.'
'No i'm not, I wouldn't sign up.'
'What i'm doing isn't brave, it's stupid, and as a result of no other options.'
'Just answer me one last question before you leave, are you really the idot you seem to be?'
'So long, take care of yourself.'

As you sat in the exam, it dawned on you that you weren't interested in what you were writing on the paper, you didn't even care about arguing the point any more, or answering the question. All you knew was that you were sat amongst people who you didn't know, faces without names, but not just that, faces without voices, or stories.

You finished the exam without any emotion at all, then you got up out of your chair, put on your coat and walked out, without a word. You knew what you had to do, you had been putting it off for so long, so you just went through with it, you filled out the application forms and you decided that this was the right time.

It took six months to go through the process, and about a month ago, you enlisted in your new life, in an organisation that you are so very proud to be part of, it's reputation second to none, you have alot to prove, to yourself most of all.

One thing is certain, you will always be humbled by those who went before you:

'The gratitude of every home in our Island, in our Empire, and indeed throughout the world, except in the abodes of the guilty, goes out to the British airmen who, undaunted by odds, unwearied in their constant challenge and mortal danger, are turning the tide of the World War by their prowess and by their devotion. Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.'

Winston Churchill

Expecting the unexpected.....

2008-01-28T16:07:00.000Z

'Shields? Why do we need those?'
'Do you want to get stabbed?'
'Not really, no.'
'Well she's got a knife, so we shall need these.'
'Hold on, I didn't join the Police to get stabbed.'
'No one does.'
'This isn't Korea, you're pulling my leg right?'
'No.'
'But I mean, come on, Shields?'

You walked into the house with your colleague, hearing the shouting and screaming from the outside, you knew it wasn't going to be a pretty sight, it wasn't. The man was shouting, loosing control, he had already lashed out once before, you could see that by the injuries the woman had already suffered.

Suddenly he started to swing his arms around, you looked at your colleague and he started to try and calm the man down, but you knew it wasn't going to have any affect. You knew that you would have no chance if this turned violent, and it looked like it could turn that way in a flash. You took hold of your radio and put a message through to control, asking for some help, you were trying to hide the uncertainty in your voice, it was difficult, but you managed to.

As you talked to the two parties, trying to by time till assistance arrived, you give advice on a subject you still to this day, know nothing about, it felt like hours but you know now it was just minutes.

Suddenly the man went for a chair, and picked it up, you shouted at his wife:

'Get out now, take your children and go now!'

Your colleague drew his ASP, but there was no room to extend it. You didn't know what to do, so you just shouted at the man:

'Stay back, stay back, don't move, stay back!'

Both you and your colleague stood between the man and his wife, and made sure she made it through the door, she had to go first, you or your colleague had to be last. As you looked at the man, you made sure it was eye to eye, you thought the next thing that would happen would be that he would go to hit you or your colleague across the face with it.

You had no idea what was about to happen, and to this day you still don't understand it, he looked at your colleague, put the chair back on the floor, sat on it and started to sob, he wept, asking, pleading for help, you put your ASP back in your holder and watched as your colleague arrested the man.

That night you arrived home at about midnight, your dad was still up watching television, he asked you:

'Did you have a good time?'

You looked at him and you said:

'It was good, can't complain.'

'You have to take risks. We will only understand the miracle of life fully when we allow the unexpected to happen.'

Paulo Coelho

The curse of an effective memory......

2008-01-13T20:52:00.000Z

As the blue lights reflect on the houses, making most of the small street a low lit blue, he has no idea that what he is going to find will change his view on reality.

The door is opened by a mother, she’s taken a beating, blood is escaping from a cut on her head, her face is tear stained, she cries and let’s him through. She takes a seat on the sofa, and this young Officer’s tutor takes the reigns, asking what has happened and where her husband is, she says she doesn’t know, he’s gone out to calm down.

Suddenly she bolts upright, a thought has come into her mind, she begins to enter the early stages of hysterics, she wants her daughter, and she has no idea where she has gone. The young officer volunteers to go upstairs and look for her, he checks room by room, no sign, the last room is the one with the pink door, he knows he should have checked this one first, he chastises himself for not doing so.

He opens the door, he can’t see anyone, but he knows where to look, because as a younger boy it is where he would hide, if he was scared. He looks under the bed and finds a young girl, she’s crying, he manages to convince her of what he is not convinced of himself, he tells her:

‘You’re going to be alright, you’ll be safe with me, no one is going to hurt you.’

As she stands up, she grabs hold of his leg and hugs it tightly, he doesn’t know what to do. Fighting back tears, he takes her by the hand, down the stairs and into the protective arms of her mother.

Three hours later, he walks to the bus stop, it’s raining and there is no one else around, he scoffs at the fact that it's a cliche. He gets on the bus and sits at the back, he looks around and realises that no one else is there, as he remembers what he knows he will never be able to forget, he puts his hood up and starts to cry silently, uncontrollably. He tries to stop but he can’t, the sound of her cries, the feeling of her tight grip, won’t leave him, to God he wishes it would.

If you had any real courage, any strength of character at all or even a slight hint of bravery, you would admit that this young officer was you.

‘Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.... With all its sham, drudgery & broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.’

Go Placidly, Desiderata.

Above and beyond......

2007-12-27T19:12:00.000Z

Yesterday Police Constable Christopher Roberts fell in the line of duty, he was 47 and had three children.

On April the 18th 1995 a young Police Officer attended a disturbance at a house in Ilford, when confronted by three men he bravely attempted an arrest. He managed to apply one handcuff, but was shot in the chest.

This man was Police Constable Phillip John Walters, age 28.

On May the 21st 2004, a married Police Officer, father of one daughter, responded to assist other Officers who were trying to detain a man who was armed with a knife. He pursued the man along a canal path, and as he attempted the arrest he was stabbed in the heart and fatally wounded.

This man was Detective Constable Michael Swindells, age 44.

When you think of the men and women who have died in the line of duty, there is one thing of which you are certain, it is that to these brave Officers you pail in comparison, because they faced what you would flee from.

'Heroes never die. They live on forever in the hearts and minds of those who would follow in their footsteps.'

Emily Potter

Solace for the accused.......

2007-12-25T14:32:00.000Z

The very beautiful Katherine Jenkins should never go out in public near Mistletoe, it would start a RIOT, because everyman alive would want to taste perfection.

John Redwood states:

'There is a difference between a man using unreasonable force to assault a woman on the street, and a disagreement between two lovers over whether there was consent on one particular occasion when the two were spending an evening or night together.'

Women can be fierce and nasty creatures, in the past you have been slapped, your car has been subjected to eggs and flour, and you have even been threatened with castration by women who feel you have done them wrong. It is not too far from your mind, that one day one woman who feels you have done her wrong, might go as far as to 'cry rape'.

To be quite honest, if you had any feelings at all, this would scare you more than the thought of having a loaded firearm pointing at your head, why? Because if you are shot dead, you are just that dead. But if a woman that you have slept with decides that it might make her feel better to tell someone you raped her, your life will be quite literally, worse than hell.

You would be arrested, subjected to many humiliating procedres, some of your family would believe you, others would disown you, your name would most likely be paraded through the newspapers, whilst her name would be kept secret, you wouldn't know who was on your side, and worst of all, you would face losing your freedom, on the decision of twelve people you don't even know, about whether or not her tears were genuine.

Women are raped, they are subjected to degredation, and such actions are abhorent and need to be punished to the fullest extent of the law, but one thing people should never forget aswell, is that this society is rife with double standards, and in a situation where it is 'he said, she said', neither side should hold the high ground.

'Young men do not want to have to take a consent form and a lawyer on a date, just as young women have every right to go on a date and to say 'No', having it respected.'

John Redwood, Member of Parliament.

Freedom of choice.....

2007-12-23T19:21:00.000Z

You’ll be honest; the thought of two men having sexual relations doesn’t come up in your top one hundred, but the thought of two beautiful women doing the same, comes up in your top five.

In a lecture a while back, the topic of whether or not homosexuality was biological or not came to the floor, an older chap at the back decided to make his views known:

‘It’s disgusting, they choose to be gay, just thinking about it makes me feel ill.’

You decided to take the opposite position:

'They don’t choose to be gay, it’s how they are born.’
‘Bollocks.’
‘So you’re telling me that one day a person wakes up and decides to risk being beaten up for being gay, to risk being disowned and hated by their own family, they walk down the street and suddenly think to themselves that a person of, shall we say, the same sex, is a better prospect than one of the opposite gender? Is that what you’re telling me mate, because I’m not sure where you’re coming from?’

To put to death a common misconception, Homophobia means a fear of homosexuality and homosexuals, not hatred.

Whatever a person might be, black, white, gay, straight, bisexual, Christian, Muslim, even fans of ‘Take that’, have the right to be treated equally, with equal respect, they have the right to feel safe, to be safe.

Do homosexuals choose to be as such? Who gives a flying fuck whether they do or they don’t, they still have the right to be who they want to be.

‘What?’
‘Just thinking…’
‘About what exactly?’
‘Your beautiful body, rapped in tinsel, and that cute little mole on your……...’
‘Stop it, people will hear you!’
‘What, like they heard you yesterday?’
‘Don’t!’
‘I can’t help it, you just look so amazing, you temptress.’

You choose to look at your girlfriend when you’re shopping in Tesco and imagine her naked, your choice? Too bloody right, no one can take that away from you, just as no one without just cause, whoever they may be, has the right to take away the freedom of choice away from another.

'My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.'

Adlai E. Stevenson Jr.

Actions defined by thought......

2007-12-12T21:54:00.000Z

A while ago as you were on your way to ASDA you stopped at a set of traffic lights in your car, at a major junction, and the gentleman next to you was speaking on his phone, rolling back and forth to the white line, also he was operating his car radio. At this point you signaled to him politely with your hands to get off his phone and concentrate on the road, followed by a thumbs up from you he proceeded to mouth 'Fuck Off', not his best move of the day.

At this point you thought about just letting it go, which you decided to do, after all, it wasn't the crime of the century and as you were in your car there wasn't really much you could do. But as you both drove away you seemed to be going in the same direction. All the way to ASDA.

Then you did something rather stupid, you made a point of parking right next to him, and making sure you got out of your car at the same time as him, the conversation went something like this:

'Excuse me mate, don't use your phone while you're driving it's dangerous.'

'I can do what the hell I want to do, fuck off!'

'I beg your pardon?'

'You heard what I said.'

'Yes I heard it loud and clear, don't swear at me.'

'What you gonna do about it?'

At this point you really wanted to walk away, your girfriend was in the car and she certainly didn't need to see you getting your arse kicked by some idiot, but you made the decision that walking away wasn't really an option. You told her to lock her door and stay in the car. You remember exactly what you said next, you have no idea why you do, it's just burned onto your memory:

'Actually mate, i'm a copper, and if you want three points, a sixty pound fine and to be arrested for a Section 4 Public Order Offence, carry right on being an idiot.'

At this point his face changed completely, he looked like a kid, like he had been caught masturbating by his mother, a mixture of embarassment, and complete and utter terror. He started explaining many things at once, apologising profusely and trying to back track over the past five minutes of his life. After being given a few stern words of advice, he got in his car and left.

After taking your girlfriend home, you managed to get a few seconds to browse the news, a young Police Officer had been beaten up by a gang of youths earlier that day, whilst he was off duty trying to stop them behaving badly on a bus. It didn't sit well, and you promised yourself that never again would you get involved.........

Have you kept that promise? Well, is the sky yellow?

'The real world: no time to do it right, but always time to do it over.'

Rex Jaeschke

Getting it right......

2007-12-03T16:27:00.000Z

You once had a rather intresting conversation with your manager:

'I thought I had Bank Holiday Monday off, actually I told you I wanted it off, and you said it was alright, because I work weekends and Monday is a weekday.'
'Yes, but i've set you on for it now.'
'No, you seem to be misunderstanding what i'm saying here. I've made plans.'
'It's double the money.'
'It's not about money, it's about making the right choice.'
'What's so important you can't work?'
'The girl with the most beautiful eyes i've ever seen, she's fucking amazing.'
'I should have known, but I've done it now so it can't be changed.'
'That's not a problem, I won't turn up though.'
'What?'
'You heard me, i'm not giving you an ultimatum here, i'm telling you i'm not working Bank Holiday Monday, and i'll quit before you sack me.'
'Hold on, wait a minute. I'll sort it out.'

Eight months later you still work for her at the same place, you don't know the young woman anymore, for this you sometimes ask yourself a question: Knowing what you know now, having the benefit of hindsight, if you could go back in time, would you change anything?

Without fail, you would do the same thing, you wouldn't work, because that day you spent, looking into her eyes, talking to her, listening to her, watching her, can't be replaced. Sometimes you don't think of her, but one thing is certain, you will never forget her.

'Instead, she left, I ironed my shirt, went to late turn, nicked a guy for being wanted on warrant. Came back, cleared out the flat, cleaned it, and slept on the floor in an empty flat that we once called home.'

Area trace No Search.

Opinion or Incitement?

2007-11-30T18:56:00.000Z

You only watched 'Question Time' last night, because you noticed that Mrs Caroline Flint was on the panel. Smart, sexy, intelligent, remarkably vivacious, she is, what you believe to be, the epitome of woman and a reason for younger men and lesbians, to become enthralled in politics.

One of the issues that came up was whether or not the British National Party leader Nick Griffin, should have been let into the 'prestigious' debating arena that is the Oxford Union, to speak about his views and policies. Yes, Mr Griffin may have, as far as you are concerned, extremely misguided opinions, but still, he should have the right to express them.

Mr Griffin almost didn't actually get to deliver his speech, because quite a few people seemed to think he shouldn't be allowed to. The irony here would have been quite amusing if it weren't pathetic, these people were outside exercising their right to free speech, whilst protesting that Mr Griffin shouldn't be permitted to exercise his.

You wonder if they actually realise how much they hindered their own cause?

Mrs Caroline Flint seemed to think that he shouldn't have, you couldn't disagree with her more though, and in essence, if she wishes to have a 'debating' session with you on a one to one basis, you certainly won't turn her down, after all, 'debating' with her, would bring new meaning to the term.

'I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.'

Voltaire.

24 hour protection?

2007-11-20T20:12:00.000Z

'When are you intending to get off?'
'In about ten minutes.'
'Got a date?'
'Sort of, if I don't get to the flower shop soon and get some for my darling, you'll be doing scene preservation at the scene of my murder.'
'Good luck with that, but why the urgency?'
'She hates it when I don't tell her about what I do, you know, on duty.'
'Are you dead?'
'No.'
'Well tell her to be grateful for that.'
'I think i'll stick with flowers sir.'

Once a long time ago, as you made your way to a situation that didn't sound too friendly, the very large, unshaven, seasoned Officer gave you some advice. He said that you should come in to the station, do whatever is asked of you, for however many hours you are prepared to do, put in your expenses claims on time, never let your feelings show, and never tell anyone about what you see, what you feel, or what you do, unless it's a funny story, which in that case, he said, 'tell all'.

Recently you read this article, and you thought to yourself, how do Police Officers, both Special and Regular, deal with what they see, with the abuse they take, with what they have to endure, with the stress the job brings, with the constant threat that one day they may be on the other side of the line?

There are times when being in the Police is fun, times when it is hard, times when there is laughter, times when there are tears. Some may bottle it all up, keep it all inside, others may let it out, turn angry, lose what is left of there faith, some may make jokes, turn to humour to preserve what they hold dear, others, like yourself, may not be affected by it at all.

You have not seen war, nor witnessed the worst of humanity, and for that you thank God.

'We who have seen war, will never stop seeing it. In the silence of the night, we will always hear the screams. So this is our story, for we were soldiers once, and young.'

Joseph Galloway, We Were Soldiers.

The road to hell.....

2007-11-13T18:29:00.000Z

Sometimes, as you look in the fridge and notice that half of your Cranberry and Elderberry Juice has been consumed by someone else, you have the urge to throw your brother on the floor and slap him till he owns up and promises to buy you some more to replace it.

It's the same with your 'voluntary occupation', as another person you have arrested decides he loves the words 'No comment' so much he has to say them in response to everything, you think about easy it would be to jump over the desk and strangle him with your ASP until he tells the truth. You know you won't do this though, because you won't get paid for it, you won't receive any thanks for it, you'd most likely go to prison for it and you don't care anyway, because all the guy has done is smash up his ex wife's garden fence, plus you'll be going home soon, and you'll never think about him again.

However, in a situation where the crime is so severe, or the information required is so necessary, as to the fact that it may save many lives, you can understand where the action of 'coercion' or 'torture' could be justifiable.

Yes, maybe innocent people would be tortured in the process, there is no doubt about that, but is this a price worth paying? Yes, you think it is. After all, Cranberry and Elderberry Juice doesn't come cheap, especially when you are surviving on a Student Loan.

'You may question our means, but never question our motives.'

Adam Carter, Spooks.

Of the highest regard....

2007-11-11T22:21:00.000Z

At just twenty four years of age, whilst under heavy enemy shell fire, he took care of the wounded, even though he had been hit four times by pieces of shell, he continued saving lives. Only after he had done his job, did he report his own wounds, and seek medical attention.

For this amazing act, this dedication to his fellow soldiers, he was awarded the Victoria Cross.

This man was Captain William Barnsley Allen, Royal Army Medical Corps.

On this day, all those who served, many of whom died, are remembered:

'They ask me where I've been,
And what I've done and seen.
But what can I reply
Who know it wasn't I,
But someone just like me,
Who went across the sea
And with my head and hands
Killed men in foreign lands...
Though I must bear the blame,
Because he bore my name.'

Back, Wilfred Gibson.

Tears, there can never be enough.....

2007-11-04T19:36:00.000Z

Granted, the most beautiful member of staff hadn’t been working, but it had been a rather interesting day, customers had been polite, and apart from one small incident, you hadn’t really had cause for complaint. With closing time fast approaching, besides the staff, there was only a family of three left in the store, a young couple with a little girl, their daughter.

As you swept the floor, you began to think of how, if Shania Twain came through the door, you might make conversation, you were snapped out of this pleasant dream by a sharp pain in your legs, you looked down and saw that the little girl had run straight into you. Bending down to her level, you looked at her, she smiled and you laughed:

‘Hello there, what’s your name?’
‘Chantelle.’
‘That’s a pretty name, how old are you?’
‘I’m three.’
‘That’s a lovely jumper, and a trendy skirt.’
‘I know, it was for my birthday.’

At this point you couldn't help but smile, you turned to her Mum who had come over:

‘She’s really cute, does she want some free chocolates?’
‘I doubt she’d say know to that!’
‘Hold on, I’ll be right back.’

You went over to the counter and found a box full of chocolates, usually you aren’t allowed to give more than one per customer, but you felt that this was an exception. As you put four in a box, one of your colleagues came up to you:

‘Who are they for?’
‘A girl.’
‘Can’t you get her phone number without using bribes.’
‘Don’t be an idiot, she’s three.’

Leaving him to continue flying around like an F-15 on hydrogen fuel, as he usually does, you took them round to the little girl. You put them in her tiny little hand and she smiled innocently; if you had any feelings at all what she said next, in the cutest voice you have ever heard, would have had you forcing back tears:

‘Thank you, but I’ll have to save them for later, when I get home.’

You remember the children most of all, you pray for them above all others, because whilst the guilty party is hard to find, the young children are always innocent, but they always come off the worst, and as injustices go, it is the hardest to take.

On the path, to self destruction?

2007-10-20T17:26:00.000+01:00

'United States Air Force Chief Master Sgt John Gebhardt cradles a young girl as they both sleep in a hospital. The girl's entire family was executed by insurgents; the killers shot her in the head as well. The girl received treatment at the US military hospital in Balad, but cries and moans often. According to nurses at the hospital, Gebhardt is the only one who can calm down the girl, so he has spent the last several nights holding her while they both sleep in a chair.'

Meanwhile..........

Johnathan Ross is on four million pounds a year.

A man is stoned in the street, he dies of a heart attack, the pieces of shit who did this to him are locked up for only two years.

Brave British Soldiers don't have enough ammunition.

It's fucking obscene.

'And Jesus said, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.'

Luke 23 Verse 24.

Facing a steam train, with a potato gun?

2007-10-14T23:13:00.000+01:00

Maybe some people shouldn't be allowed to have children, should passing on such a diluted Intelligence Quotion be unlawful in society?

'You can't do owt, ya just a blue band.'

As he stood there taunting a young PCSO, you decided enough, was enough:

'It's not clever, it's not cool, and it certainly isn't brightening my evening.'

'Ya wot?'

'Listen very carefully chap, take your hands out of your trousers and behave, before you embarrass yourself.'

'Fuck you.'

'Excuse me?'

'I was talking to him, he can't arrest me.'

'No he can't, but I can, and I will.'

At this point his girlfriend came across:

'Leave it Darren, it isn't worth it.'
'Can you take charge of him and make him behave himself, because if he doesn't, i'm going to have to lock him up and that won't do anyone any good.'
'I'll do my best.'

She turned to her boyfriend and stated in a clear and somewhat audible tone:

'Stop being a prick and go home. I'll -- call -- you -- in -- the -- morning.'

As you stood there watching, you expected her to end up flat on her back with a black eye, but instead he walked away, with his tail between his legs. You and your partner got back in the car, ready to make your way to the next emergency call.

The rest of the night didn't go so well, three in the can for Section 5, one for Drunk and Disorderly, one for Assault on Police and another for ABH.

Sitting in front of the computer, the clock ticked over to 2.20 am, you looked at the numbers, covering a population of over one hundred thousand, six Police Officers were on duty. You walked out the door of the police station, hoping that you wouldn't get attacked on the way home, because you knew that if you called the Police, they wouldn't be able to help.

However, even when they are faced with almost impossible odds, police officers up and down the country still do their best, they go where you still fear to tread.

'The impossible often has a kind of integrity which the merely improbable lacks.'

Douglas Adams.

The way the wind blows.....

2007-10-11T19:38:00.000+01:00

Name: Stupid Bitch
Crime: Waving a firearm around on a train, infront of women and children.

Hopefully this stupid little girl won't wave the gun around infront of an armed Police Officer, she would surely be shot dead. Next the photos of her as a baby would materialise, the mother would go on television in tears, because of this the Officer would be made to look like a mindless thug, people would want an enquiry, and the Officer's head would be on a chopping block.

If Jean Charles De Menezes had been a suicide bomber, Sir Ian Blair and the brave Police Officers who shot him would have been heroes, as it turns out they are everything that's disgusting. People are calling for Sir Ian Blair's head, and the Police Officers who shot Mr De Menezes to be named and shamed.

One minute a person can be a hero, the next they are a villain. One moment they can be picking up a commendation for bravery, the next they are receiving a written warning from a Superintendent. It's a dirty, crazy, messed up world, but it's a world where Annabella Sciorra is, so on that beautiful note, you say it can't be so bad.

'Public opinion, though often formed upon a wrong basis, generally has a strong underlying sense of justice.'

Abraham Lincoln

Here you go again........

2007-10-01T20:08:00.000+01:00

'Could you prove it?'

'How do you mean?'

'As a copper, could you prove it?'

'I'm not a Copper.'

'Alright then, as a 'Special', could you prove it?'

'No.'

As your call sign was requested on the radio, you knew it wasn't going to be good news, you were due to go home in twenty minutes, your girlfriend would be waiting for you to pick her up in an hour, and the last showing at the cinema was in an hour and a half. As you heard the message, you won't lie, all you wanted to do was go Off Duty. But about a minute after the request, you and your collegue were traveling to the scene, you knew where you were going.

You only have to commit a total of 200 hours a year to duties, just five percent of what Regular Officers have to do. With this statistic in mind, you remembered that you had been to this address before, twice, once near Christmas, and once a few months later, at that time, you predicted the colour of blue would most likely light the same street again.

Upon arriving at the house, crying could be heard from inside, clearly that of a young child, you stepped out of the car and followed John to the house. You had no idea what would be on the other side, only that you wouldn't be talking about it in the car on the way to the cinema.

As he knocked, you couldn't help but think, here you go again.........

'Nothing is written in stone, and even if it was, stones can be broken.'

Andrade

Beauty, in the face of adversity.....

2007-09-23T19:06:00.000+01:00

'Over there.'
'The blonde one?'
'No! The other one, she's fit as.'
'Personally I prefer the blonde.'
'She's not my type.'
'Slim, with curves that look amazingly sexy?'
'Her mate, has to be.'
'I beg to differ.'

As a deluded young mother, who does not realise that in today's society it is not advisable to care about anyone but number one, lets her children play near deep water, and then says:

'If you're walking down the street and you see a child drowning you automatically go in that water.'

As four year old children are stabbed to death, you remember something beautiful:

Maybe you were disorientated from the second can of energy drink you had guzzled on your break, but her eyes were the first thing that caught your attention. When a woman applys alot of make up around her eyes, it usually hides what's really there, in her case however it seemed to magnify her beauty. Her stunning blonde hair, flowing over her shoulders effortlessly, fair skin that looked smooth and light to the touch, certainly she was the best looking young women you had seen all day, no doubt.

Seing women who look as good as her is a very rare occasion in your time, it's only happened a few times so far and you certainly weren't expecting to ever see her again, but still you thought you would be ready if it happened. God must have been listening and watching, because a few weeks later she walked through the door again. This time the sight of her hit you even harder, not painfully but surprisingly. You've always had a taste for women who wear there hair down, free flowing, this time however, your taste was immaterial, her blonde hair was tied back, but still you found her attractive.

She smiled at you, it took you by surprise, but it wasn't an effort to return the favour, because the warmth of her manner radiated like a bright sun. As you walked past her again, you winked and smiled, taking a bold step, but not having the courage to let the opportunity pass by. Minutes later, you walked by the line and she was nowhere to be seen, you looked up and down, still she wasn't visible.

Seconds later, she came into your line of sight, she wasn't walking she was skipping, she smiled beautifully, her face lighting up with complete delight, she hugged her friend and shouted:

'I got it!'

You walked away with a smile on your face, thinking and wondering, how something so beautiful, so spectacular could ever be created. With that sight in mind, maybe heaven is not a place after all, but a moment where feelings from one person, can be felt by another, without even a word exchanged between them both.

You wouldn't know though, because as a Police Officer, feelings are an alien concept to you, and always will be.

Sisters are doing it......

2007-09-13T12:20:00.000+01:00

You won't lie, you used to believe that women shouldn't be allowed to be Police Officers, that they weren't 'cut out' for doing the job, that really the only way they could contribute would be by dealing with female victims. You have had the pleasure of being paired with a few female cops so far, all these shifts were interesting experiences, but one was exceptional:

The first time you ever saw this Officer walk into the briefing room, you were completely taken off guard. You had only ever seen one female officer all your life, and that was from a distance. With her long blonde hair swinging over her shoulders and amazing eyes, you began to realise that maybe doing the job for free, wasn't so bad after all. If sights like this were common place in the Police, you would sign yourself up for more hours each month, gladly. She welcomed you, more so than the other Officers, she was friendly, in the car she would laugh and joke. You knew the debate about whether women can actually do a good job as Police Officers would come up:

'So Julia, do you think women like yourself can actually cut it as bobbies?'

'I've been in this fifteen years, so yes I think they can.'

'Fifteen years, I was three when you started.'

'Don't, you're making me feel old!'

'You certainly don't look it.'

'Creep. There are advantages to being female in this job, people see me as less of a threat, I feel it's helped me out alot. But don't get me wrong, there have been times when I've showed up at a job and people have been like: 'What's a woman gonna do about it?'. But I suppose I've just got on with it.'

'No one will ever be perfect for the job, every one's got good and bad points, right?'

'That's the one, the modern police force being representative of the community it serves'

'With lines like that, why aren't you Superintendent?'

'I'm a woman, glass ceiling and all that.'

Even in the face of what she thought was an obstacle, she still managed to have a sense of humour. She went on to tell you all about how, as a single mother, she had to juggle work and the kids. Even though she had clearly a stressful life, she still managed to have a smile for almost everyone, except the man who told her to 'Fuck Off'.

Despite what politicians would say, the Police is still very much 'a man's world', even in it, she did her job to a high level of competency and she maintained her status as a woman, a beautiful woman at that.

Misguided feminists beware, whilst still shaving their underarms, doing their hair, make up and nails, talking softly and with womanly charms, women are doing exactly the same job as a man, and in many a case, doing it with more competence, humour and self respect.

'Remember, Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in high heels.'

Faith Whittlesey

Turning a blind eye....

2007-09-06T11:26:00.000+01:00

'What would you do?'

'How do you mean?'

'If you were walking through a shopping center and there was a bomb scare?'

'I'd be so scared i'd run away.'

'No you wouldn't.'

'I'll give you a piece of advice, never be a person that sprouts bravado and bravery, because no one knows what they will actually do in a situation until it actually happens to them.'

'You've got a point.'

'With my brains in my crouch, how could I not.'

Your Sociology teacher taught you about bystander apathy, he was someone who you respected and admired, the way he said things and what he said will always be on your mind, one being more than other's was the story of a woman called Kitty Genovese. As he explained how she was stabbed and stalked you thought that it was just one of the 'standard' murders, but the reason you remember it is that as she died, many 'respectable' people watched and listened to her screams, and did virtually nothing to stop it.

Granted, some people called the Police and one woman called out to the man to 'let that girl alone' but no one went out to investigate the screams or to see what was happening, the killer ran away, but due to there being no intervention, he searched for her, found her, sexually assaulted her, and then murdered her. If one of these 'bystanders' had gone out, maybe it would have been different, maybe this young woman, only twenty eight years old, would have got married, had children and lived a life of happiness and joy.

The point here includes the war in Iraq, just because everyone can't be helped, it doesn't mean no one can. Yes the circumstances in Iraq were similar to many other countries around the world, but to take a stand somewhere, in one Country, can set the standard for the other's. If a person is arrested for assaulting a Police Officer, charged, prosecuted and sent to prison, maybe another person will think twice before they attempt to murder one.

If there's one thing you are sure of, is the fact that you would most likely have done nothing more than the 'respectable' New Yorkers who sat by and listened. If there is one thing you are, it is a coward. You believe in self preservation, above all else, if a bomb exploded in a town centre, you would run away from the carnage, not towards it.

Therefore a question that always plays on your mind when you put on the uniform, is why do people stand by and do nothing? Why did the young man stand across the road and watch as two girls beat up a young lad on his way home from school? Why did the next door neighbours just watch television as a woman screamed for help? Maybe you should be able to answer your own question here, but you don't have any feelings about why, however if you did, their sense of apathy and selfishness would sicken you.

Yes you may be a hypocrite, but you're a hypocrite with a point that is hard to ignore.

'I have a very strong feeling that the opposite of love is not hate, it's apathy, not giving a damn.'

Leo Buscaglia

A world, beyond redemption?

2007-08-24T16:26:00.000+01:00

You used to believe it wasn't, but after reading this, even belief itself is hard to comprehend.

'Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.'

Deuteronomy 31:6

A reason, or an excuse?

2007-08-19T21:05:00.000+01:00

'My kid's, my kid's have left me, my wife walked out. I'm begging you, let me out.'
'We can't, we've got a job to do.'
'Come on mate, I can't take this anymore, I'll get down on my knees if I have to.'
'We don't have a choice, we can't.'
'I can't believe I'm crying, but please, you don't have to do this, please let me go.'
'I can't.'

You won't lie and say you've had troubles in your life, because you haven't, but you have always seen the world as black or white, if a person commits a crime, they should do the time. Whatever it may be, if they are without a defence, they should take their punishment, not try and get away with it by sprouting excuses from left to right .

Hiding behind excuses is cowardly, a person should stand up and take responsibility for what they have done. If a man looks at another man's girlfriend and wolf whistles, it doesn't give that man an excuse for killing him. The only defence for committing a crime, should be the defence of one's physical self, or the defence of another person's physical self.

The law is a shield, not a sword, justifiable reasons are like diamonds in the sand, rare and easy to recognise.

This quote describes the state of the terrible world you live in:

'I think if people see this footage, they'll say, 'Oh my God that's horrible,' and then go on eating their dinners.'

Jack Daglish, Hotel Rwanda.

The Broca Divide.......

2007-08-16T12:06:00.000+01:00

Lee is a good Officer, he tutored you, and when you go out on duty (very rarely) you usually work alongside him. About an hour before one of these shifts was to end, as you sat in the passenger seat looking at him, he started to get a tad exasperated, 'Piece of shit car, why can't they give us the one's like the Met have? I was down in Leicester the other day, parked up in the yard, next to a great fucking machine, couldn't believe it.' As he persevered with the starter, it eventually cranked up, 'Finally, it's like trying to get a girl with massive tits into my bed at night, impossible. I read the log, this one looks like a good job, what was the address Joe?' You looked down at the print out sheet and read him the address.

After an interesting car drive, hearing all about how the job is quite 'crap' and as he so amusingly put it 'full of wankers with califlowers on their shoulders', you arrived outside Number 23. As you looked out the window at, what looked distinctly like a run down building that had just been attacked with a dustbin lorry, you felt quite bemused.

As both of you walked down the path to the door, the upstairs window opened and a young girl's head popped out (not literally), she soon withdrew and you heard her shouting down, 'Mam, copper's are ere, one's got a skinhead and the otha one looks like a baaaaaabbbbbbbyyyyy!!' With that comment ringing in your ears, you took point and banged loudly on the front door. What emerged, was not a pretty sight, actually to be quite frank, it was a disgusting sight. A middle aged, fat woman, with 'I'm a bitch, sue me.' written on her pink t-shirt.

'Ya don't need to bang so loud, I was on the lav.' At this point you turned and looked at Lee, who you could tell was quite enjoying the entire debacle, you asked the 'Bitch' if you could come in to take details regarding the incident, she replied quite honestly, 'Yeh you can like, but i've got to go and pick up me son soon, so I ain't got much time.' As you entered the house, looking up at the newly painted walls, you couldn't resist, 'Nice place you've got here, I like what you've done with the walls, very diverse.' Two minutes later you felt like you were on an episode of Jeremy Kyle, hearing all about how a young gentleman with a very perculiar name, 'Gimmo', who she had known for years and slepped with on numerous occasions, had put a fence post through her window and then passed out on the front lawn from 'alcohol poisoning.'

All in all, you and Lee ended up spending more than thirty minutes sat on a brown sette, listening to an account of events in between shouts to the girl upstairs, 'Turn that fucking music down, now!' Eventually Lee took charge and reminded her about her son, to which she made a false sign of concern and showed you the door. As you followed Lee down the path back to the car, he muttered under his breath to you, 'That t-shirt she was wearing was the only thing that told the truth in that house.' You made a grunting noise and concured.

The next A4 sheet of paper on the clip board told Lee where to drive to next, 'This one looks like it's gonna be a quicky, in and out, shit job.' You could smell his optimism, and you responded with agreement. Deep down you had the same thoughts, the amount of times you go to houses and come out thinking that it really was a waste of time, out numbers the 'worth whiles' at least ten to one.

Lee is a very animated guy, as you made your way to the address he informed you with more pearls of wisdom on how the job is 'crap' and full of 'bureacrats who screw cops out of expenses and over time'. You responded with the usual noises, about how you 'understand' and how you won't ever become a 'full time officer', without a serious change in circumstance. Suddenly he slammed on the brakes, 'Fuck, we've missed it, it was back down there.' Seconds later, the car arrived at the address, you felt like you were still one hundred yards down the road, but by the by, it was a lovely house.

This time as you both walked down the long path, past several nice cars, you were greated with a lovely smell, birds singing, and as you pointed out to Lee, there were some seriously amazing flowers growing in the garden. You had a feeling that this wasn't going to be what you thought, and low and behold, it wasn't. You knocked on the door gently and it was opened by a middle aged woman with what clearly was a tear stained face, with mascara running down her cheeks. Between cries she explained, 'I'm ever so sorry for calling you out Officers, but i've just got back from Devon and i've found this.' She showed you the ransacked rooms, draws upturned on beds and continued to cry through her account.

After Lee had done his job, and you had assisted best you could, you both made your way to the door. Lee went through and started to walk down the path, but the woman grabbed hold of your fleece, 'You look far too young to be dealing with me crying away, i'm sure there are people who really need your attention, i'm sorry for making such a fuss about it.' You didn't really know what to say, you'd never had someone you know to be a real 'victim' say this to you. You didn't know if Lee would go back the next day, you would be sat in a Lecture, but what you did know, was that you would most likely never see this woman again, ever, so you made sure that what you said was the right thing, you remember it word for word, you'll never forget it, 'Don't say that, you really don't have to apologise, it isn't your fault, it isn't.'

Then she did something that you didn't expect, that you had no idea how to respond to, she gave you a hug. Afterwards, you followed Lee down the path and got in the car, after the door was shut there was complete silence, all the way back to the police station nothing was said, no banter, no complaints, no wise cracks. As Lee went off to do paperwork, you completed your note book, you was about to go Off Duty when he tapped you on the shoulder, and in his native accent asked, 'You did good today kid, you alright?' You walked towards the door, and turned back just as you opened it, 'Sound as a pound my friend, see you on Thursday.'

'You think you know who you are? You have no idea.'

Officer Ryan, Crash.

An offence, to offend?

2007-08-10T18:48:00.000+01:00

Why can't people just understand that part of this free world, is the term free speech?

In society today, far too many people are offended, far too easily. Everyone has the right to an opinion, and no matter what that opinion might be, they have the right to express it. Fair enough, if they want to express their desire to kill all Black men under the age of 50, in the middle of a market square, then they should be locked up, and the key thrown away.

But have the police taken it too far? Has it come to the point where a Police Officer can't mention the word black, female or homosexual in a negative sence, without being branded racist, sexist or homophobic?

Are Police Officers tied up investigating offences that really arn't offences, but allegations of offence?

You don't care if a person is male, female, black, white, gay, straight or an American, if they have broken the law, and they need to come in, they will be arrested. If a person thinks this opinion is racist, homophobic, sexist or Anti American, then they can sue you.

'If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you should go back home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross; but it's not for the timid.'

Q, Star Trek: The Next Generation.

True bravery....

2007-08-03T19:26:00.000+01:00

'The day is coming,
The drums are drumming,
If you know one, say a prayer.
There's mothers crying,
And fathers sighing, a-huh,
War is in the air.

The trains are fillin' up with boys,
Who've left behind their favorite toys,
They're goin' over there, over there,
Where someone has to die.

Over there, over there,
Where ours is not to reason why.
Over there, over there,
Where someone has to die.'

Over There, Chris Gerolmo.

A first time, for everything......

2007-07-30T21:08:00.000+01:00

No one knows what's going to happen next, least of all you, they both think they are indestructable, infallible and as 'hard as nails', but then so do you.

You stand there watching, thinking that it's going to 'kick off', hoping that it won't, you have the urge to walk away, but instead you move into the middle of them. They both have at least six inches on you, you shout to be heard, trying to get their attention, eventually they both go quiet, and suddenly, you don't know what to say, your voice goes silent, ten seconds later, they are both given a choice.

One chose wisely, he walked away, the other ended up in the back of a police van, on his way to the custody suite.

Before you joined the Police, you hadn't seen genuine:

Squalor.
Despair.
Violence.
Hatred.
Envy.
Degredation.

'For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.'

Jeremiah 29:11

Catch 22......

2007-07-19T21:53:00.000+01:00

The night had drawn in, the street lights were long gone, the car headlights were the only way you could see the road ahead, and the orange lights on the dash board were the only illuminations that revealed her exceptionally pretty face, suddenly her lovely voice you desire to hear, perked up and asked:

‘So, if I were to put on my dressing gown and entice you up to my bedroom, would you sleep with me?’

You won’t lie and say that you prepare yourself for every situation whilst on duty, it’s not possible, and that is one of the things you love about playing at being a Policeman, but never have you been so aware that what you say, reflects on how a person responds, especially when the question, has been asked by a woman.

Now you knew that either way you were stuck, like eating eight chocolate éclairs and then trying to get out of a car, stuck. Say yes too quickly, she might think all you want is to get her into bed, say no too quickly she might think you aren’t attracted to her at all.

So you took a little breath, thought about how breathtaking she looks when wearing a dressing gown, how it seems to grip her heavenly curves in all the right places, and you told a stupendous lie:

‘No.’

Resisting temptation is very much part of a Police Officer’s job, resisting the urge to beat the hell out of a detestable man who has just slammed his wife’s head into a wall, the urge to make a wise crack about a male shoplifter who happens to have the aroma of women’s perfume exuding from his person or the urge to tell a senior officer to get out from behind his desk.

Most Police Officers realise that when they join the job, in some cases they will be dammed if they do, and dammed if they don’t. If you act on your urges, there will be consequences, be they serious or minor. If you don’t follow your instincts, you’ll have to go home with your tail between your legs, knowing that you compounded free speech, one thing that should never be taken away, and that is the essence of a society that braver men and women than yourself, have fought and died to protect.

'Impossible situations can become possible miracles.' Robert Schuller.

Not what it seems.......

2007-07-10T16:46:00.000+01:00

Three things you expect to encounter in a shift:

A large plasma screen television, purchased on finance from a catalogue.
A teenager who thinks he/she is the king/queen of the world.
A motorist who won’t move out of the way, even when confronted with flashing blue lights and a loud siren.

A while ago you purchased a film called ‘Notting Hill’, and only recently got around to watching it. The circumstances surrounding its purchase, you will never forget, but it wasn’t the best film you’ve ever seen, however, whilst you were watching it you noticed something. Throughout the film various shots are shown of a bookshop, showing the passage of months, but in every shot, a woman was shown attending to her child in the alleyway next to the shop, the same woman, the same child, even after months had past by.

This woman and little child reminded you of the human race, and more specifically the Police Service. Over the passage of time, nothing has changed; Officers still go to the same kind of calls, to the same kind of addresses, arrest the same kind of people, filling out the same paperwork, driving the same derelict vehicles, having the same kit shortages and of course, encountering the same red tape.

However, what attracts many to the job, is the fact that what is going to happen next, only God knows. One minute you're about to go off duty, three hours later you're still on duty, sat in a car outside a warehouse, freezing your arse off, next to a collegue who picks that moment to discuss how he had a kebab earlier, and now feels the call of nature.

You believe in paradox, but the job of the Police, screams it loud enough for anyone to hear.

'Actions are always more complex and nuanced than they seem. We have to be willing to wrestle with paradox in pursuing understanding.'

Harold Evans

Toy soldiers......

2007-07-04T23:09:00.000+01:00

'What's wrong with you?'
'What do you mean pal?'
'For free, are you stupid?'
'No, just apathetic.'
'Full of shit more like, how old are you really?'
'Young, put it that way bro.'
'You alright, going home?'
'Sound as a pound my friend, as always.'
'Matcho man.'
'Something like that, so long chap.'

As she sat infront of you, two black eyes, bruises on her face, she maintained he didn't mean it, she didn't cook his food right, the way he liked it to be served. Even when she had been subjected to such degredation and humiliation, she found a way to blame herself, she found a way to exonarate the guilty. The training taught you how to arrest the person who hit her many times, slammed her head into a pedal bin and an ash tray over her head, but not how to deal with a victim, a real victim. That you know, can never be taught, and it can never be mastered, every victim is different, and every time you walk through a door, you know you'll fail to deal with the situation in some way, but every time you do fail, you feel like you at least win another opportunity to try again.

When you were younger, before you joined the Police, you used to believe that anyone could change their life around, with help from the right people, with enough time, anything could be possible. Some people who you come across when you are on duty however, just can't be helped, no matter what you do for them, the police in general, what social services do, the courts and the charities, it never works and it never will.

Sometimes as you look at the victims, you ask yourself is it best to be a toy soldier, doing what you can, with what you have to offer, taking the flack, the abuse, the accusations, or is it best to walk away, and leave it all behind. One day you know you'll have to answer with the latter option, and that, if you had any feelings at all, would scare the hell out of you.

'Step by step, heart to heart, left, right, left, we all fall down, like toy soldiers. Bit by bit, torn apart, we never win, but the battle wages on, for toy soldiers.'

Martika - Toy Soldiers.

Meanwhile..........

2007-07-01T21:08:00.000+01:00

When the man who stole the Chief Constables 'diversity training action plan' is found, the arresting Officers are accused of over reacting:

The price of idealism.....

2007-06-29T00:21:00.000+01:00

Sometimes you sit, wondering to yourself, if there is any kind of hope, for this world, for what people call home, for what people call a place to live. You wonder if God, wherever he may be, whoever he may be, whatever he may believe or choose to say, will forgive people for what they do to each other, but as you think this you just wonder whether or not God left this planet, this pathetic excuse for a world, a long time ago.

You stood there, by the water, looking across, and waiting. You know she’s usually late, you haven’t known her for long, but its one thing she’s always been honest about, she leaves the house the minute she is supposed to be at her destination, the mark of a young woman who is responsible for her own destiny, who makes her mark without effort. As you turn around it hits your senses, not with a tap, but with explosions of colour, of expression.

She’s walking towards you, her thumbs in her pockets, long flowing hair, a smile so bright, glowing with such delight, it could light up a runway in the dead of night, you can see her from afar, and you know, that as she get’s closer, the view will become even more special, even more extraordinary. To your amazement, your prediction of scenery unbeknownst to beauty, is false, she waves at you, as she does you notice that the view is far more fantastic, far more stunning, far more unbelievable, than imagination could ever hope to depict.

When you remember things like this, you think to yourself, that maybe God is still here, maybe he didn’t give up, and maybe he didn’t leave this world having failed in his purpose, to create beauty, beyond what optimism can astonish.

'Show me a hero and I’ll write you a tragedy.'

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Playing roulette, without a ball?

2007-06-22T16:49:00.000+01:00

She thinks she’s going to meet friends, she thinks she’s going out to have a good time; she’s young, naïve, innocent, not ready for the world outside. She want’s a friend so much, that when two appear out of thin air, two appear from the shadows, she’s so eager to believe, so desperate for companionship, that she let’s her guard down, she believes that people aren’t only out for themselves, that maybe someone cares.

What she doesn’t know, is that the friends she is going to meet, are luring her into a trap, luring her to humiliation, to degradation, to harm. Over three miles from home, she meets them, but it’s not two, it’s three. As she realises she has been set up, it’s too late, she’s taken by surprise, one of the three jumps on her, and holds her down, another starts to hit and scratch her, not playfully, but with such force that her nose breaks, that her lips splits in half, that her forehead and cheeks start to bleed, while the other, the third, films the act, on a mobile telephone.

What could have got to you, what could have made your blood boil, if you cared, was not the act of violence, of senseless behaviour, but the way in which three girls, of such a young age, of what should be such an innocent time of their lives, could plan an act of betrayal so meticulously, with such precision, vindictiveness and hatred, and then sit in custody and be amused by it.

‘It is the failing of youth not to be able to restrain its own violence.’ Seneca

21 minutes.........

2007-06-13T14:56:00.000+01:00

'And I never passed a cry for help,

though at times I shook with fear,

and sometimes, God, forgive me,

i've wept unmanly tears.

I know I don't deserve a place

among the people here.

They never wanted me around,

except to calm their fear.'

'There was silence all around the throne

where saints had often trod,

as the policeman waited quietly,

for the judgement of his God,

"Step forward now Policeman.

You've bourne your burdens well.

Come walk a beat on heaven's streets,

you've done your time in hell.'

Idol swine?

2007-06-11T00:14:00.000+01:00

Police Officers are lazy, idol and of course, they don't care. Because when they go home at night, usually in the dark, they just switch off, all the things they have seen, heard and felt during the hours that fell before them, are gone, they will never remember them, they will never lay awake at night seeing the faces, the crying, the weeping of the children who can't take it anymore, the destroyed lives, the children who have no hope for the future, because their parents have destined it to be, the sloth that some live in, the greed that influences so many actions, that cause such wrath, the lack of humanity that seems to plague the God forsaken streets of this country.

It really is time that all Police Constables were made redundant, that all Special Constables were told their services are no longer required and that all members of Police Management were flogged for their services to the community. Because after all, Police Officers only hand out speeding fines and arrest innocent people, they only sit in the station and eat food, they only watch Television when they should be out on the beat.

They never die for what they believe to be right, they never brave fire and certain death when people might be in danger, they don't care about people they don't know who are standing in a pool of petrol trying to end it all, they most certainly don't risk serious personal harm on routine calls and they are always backed up by their common sense driven and forward thinking Police force.

'You want to trust me. I know that. But you're holding back that little bit. Tell me what happened. I'm not going to write it down or anything. I'm going to sit right here. You see no...I have no pen in my hand. Nothing up my sleeve. Please, don't look at me as a cop. Look at me as a friend. Look at me as a friend.'

Detective Frank Pembleton, Homicide: Life on the Street.

Least of all you.......

2007-06-07T14:39:00.000+01:00

You walk to the locker room, take off your jacket,
put on your tie and sigh, it's another shift in the life,
you take your seat, body armour on the chair,
coffee infront of you, you pray for your collegues to be safe and protected.

They know you're a volunteer, so they wonder why you do it,
you won't ever tell them, because it's what you keep inside,
two hours in you go to a call, it's not a lovely sight,
people could have been hurt, it's one in the tank.

On the way to the custody suite, you ask the man why,
why he had to do what he did, why he didn't just move on by,
the man doesn't answer, he just mumbles under his breath,
that it's life in general, it delt him a bad hand.

Three hours later, another two calls,
one of assistance required, another to the drunken halls,
then it's the interview, this man is not a bad man,
he has two kids, a heart that's grown cold.

He's declined a solicitor, a very big mistake,
but what you find hard to believe, he doesn't know it,
twenty minutes later, it's another life destroyed,
a moment of madness, that even you can't resolve.

You walk to the police car again wondering why, a few pints at the wrong time, if he hadn't been standing near the car,
it would have been a different ending, but in the dark and the cold,
you walk to your car, ice on the windows, a stench in the air.

You sit at the wheel turning the radio on,
suite No3 by John Sabastian Bach, sitting there thanking your Lord God, for keeping it all being safe and sound,
praising him for seeing justice done, even in this warped way of society, but most of all thanking him that you're not full time,
that fact with gratitude most of all.

Meanwhile........

2007-06-05T14:47:00.001+01:00

Posters advertising a vacancy in the force diversity unit are not met with suprise, but with concern and admiration......

Risking it all, for justice?

2007-05-27T20:57:00.000+01:00

'So sir, what happened?'

'I was stood looking at the dvds, when I heard some shouting. Somebody shouting what I thought was 'Stop him!', so I turned around and saw this guy running towards me.'

'What happened next?'

'Well I looked passed him and saw two dudes from Asda and a security guy chasing him.'

'Then?'

'I thought he'd done a runner after nicking something, so I jumped on the guy. Didn't really think about it to be honest, I just did it, now I think about it maybe I shouldn't have, should leave it to you coppers who are trained to fight these dick heads.'

'You'd be suprised chap, i'm all mouth, no trousers. Just ask my girlfriend, she's still waiting for that necklace I promised her at Christmas, she kicks my ass all the time.'

When the curtain falls, it's time to get off the stage. When the time arrives, it's time to take action, or is it? When this happens, you understand why people just don't want to get involved.

It's only words.....

2007-05-21T12:29:00.000+01:00

When ever you are confronted by a situation where you may need to use force, chasing a man with an iron bar, or maybe a twelve year old boy, who just happens to be six foot three, you always think of this, afterwards.

You've never seen so many cops before, you counted at least twelve, all in one place, at one time, it was like a buffet. Short cops, tall cops, young cops, old cops, good looking cops, not so good looking cops, male cops and female cops.

In the centre of all these cops, the reason why they are all there, is a man, about six foot, with a beard and his son. You have no idea why every cop and his dog has congregated, but you're there anyway. The man is showing all the warning signs of violence, clenching his fists, foaming at the mouth, and as you watch from the front, you know he's going to blow, you feel it is a certainty.

But suddenly out steps an Officer from the crowd, he talks to the man, asking him politely to calm down, he shows him respect, he remains calm throughout the situation. Moments later the man is, in return, calm, he's no longer a threat. The man is then arrested by the Officer, and you and your collegue are selected to transport the man to the custody suite.

This constable, who stepped to the front of the group, who dealt with the situation with skill and complete professionalism, you have been crewed with him on a few occasions and you can say this, is most likely the best Cop you have ever had the pleasure of working with.

But sometimes, words are not enough, with the changing climate of policing today, it's no wonder that this can happen, and the criminal who did it, will most likely be out of jail in a few years, no justice.

Not for the faint hearted......

2007-05-11T00:56:00.000+01:00

‘Don’t you ever think you’ll die?’
'I'm more likely to die from your dirty looks when I say something sarcastic.'
'You don't fool me you know.'
‘You’ll come to my funeral right? And say something nice?’
‘It’s a dangerous job.’
‘I’ll remember that next time I’m filling in a crime report.’
‘Don’t joke.’
‘It’s what I do best.’
‘I thought that was charm.’
‘Both.’
‘Be careful.’
‘Yes ma’am.’

If there is one thing you arn't, it's heroic. You would run, not into the fire, but towards the water, you'd rush towards safety, not into danger, to rescue those trapped in the dangerous. You'd ignore screams for help, to concentrate on your own survival, you would stand there, like a stone statue, when action was required to save something dear.

Police Constable Richard Gray had a wife, two grown up sons, he had been commended five times for bravery, rescued a man from certain death, served in the armed forces, in Northern Ireland and sworn an oath to queen and country.

This Officer bravely entered a house, to save, to rescue, to protect, and for that he paid the ultimate price. For this act, of courage, of spirit, of bravery, of self sacrifice, he will never be forgotten, he will always be remembered.

'A man has honor if he holds himself to an ideal of conduct though it is inconvenient, unprofitable, or dangerous to do so.'

Walter Lippmann

Trying not to remember, but remembering never to forget......

2007-05-04T23:42:00.000+01:00

You arrive outside the house, your colleague pressers the 'reset' button, the blue lights turn off, people are congregating outside, as you step out of the car curtains twitch as people want to see what's going on.

You make your way over to the scene, and your collegue makes his way to the house across the street, where apparently the offender lives. The young woman who has just been burgled, in broad daylight, while she was in the house, is forcing back tears, so you make a joke to try your best to lighten the situation:

'I am a real copper ma'am, i'm not a stripper, you're safe now.'

You usher her into the house, so she can sit down, you wait for your collegue to arrive. As you sit there on the sofa, taking down information about what has happened, she starts to cry, weaping openly, with her neighbours standing next to her. She sobs, through the tears she tells you about the invaluable posessions that have been stolen, not the expensive television, that can be replaced, but her mother's jewelley, her wedding ring, presents from her family and mementos of trips she went on as a child.

She looks at you, as if you know what to do, as if you know how to sort it out, how to help her. You look up to your collegue, who continues to take details, and you know the only thing you can do is ask one of her neighbours:

'Can you get a drink of water for her please, thank you.'

Sometimes when you go to bed at night you see the face of this woman, crying, sobbing, weaping infront of you, but for some reason, you can't think of her name, you just can't.

You lay there, trying to remember her name, one day it will come back to you, you will remember, but for now you don't, and for that you are deeply ashamed, deeply.

'You ask me who was murdered on this day six months ago? I wouldn't know. Not their names, anyway. I tend not to forget the faces.'

ADA David McNorris, Boomtown.

Just a game................

2007-04-30T21:15:00.000+01:00

You jump from behind the door, aiming towards your enemy you fire your weapon, one shot, two shots, three shots, blood spatters all over the wall behind him, he falls backwards to the floor.

You run, towards the stairs, fast, very swiftly you reload your weapon, ready for the next enemy who lies in wait, you perform a forward roll, and slow motion takes place, you aim for his head, and one, two, three shots, propels him backwards, blood flying from his head, he screams in agony.

You dash, trying to beat the clock, the hostage is still a captor, you have to make it, one, two, three, four shots to the next offender, he takes a little more time to kill than the others had, but round the next corner you come face to face with the hostage taker, he's using this little girl as a human shield.

You have to do something, you can't just stand there and watch, that's not why you are there. You take hold of your sniper rifle and aim using the scope, his head in your sights, you take the shot, a bang rings out, his head explodes with a red mist, he falls to the ground.

Something flashes up in front of you:

OBJECTIVE COMPLETE.

To a young Police Officer like you, computer games are just that, games. They are not reality, and the actions that you perform on screen, you would never attempt to duplicate out in the real world.

But Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold thought differently, they killed twelve of their fellow students, one teacher and wounded twenty four others. To them, it wasn't just a game.

Heads or tales?

2007-04-23T00:52:00.000+01:00

His:

'Then we went up to her flat, she opened a bottle of wine and we talked. Then I went to kiss her, and she couldn't stop herself. I grabbed hold of her and we rushed to the bedroom, when I took her clothes off, she took my clothes off, I lay on top of her, inside of her, as we kissed and moved, we both came numerous times. I left the next morning, early as I had to get back home.

I was sat at the dinner table, surrounded by my family who I love, when the knock came at the door. We all thought it was Uncle John, as his seat was allways the last to be filled, but it wasn't. It was two Police Officers, they had come to arrest me for raping a woman, I didn't know why she would say I had raped her, I couldn't understand. They put me in handcuffs, and took me down the garden path to the police car, in front of my family, friends and neighbours. As I sat there in the back of the car, one of the officers told me to stay calm, he cautioned me, I knew it only too well.

When they found me guilty, I couldn't believe what I was hearing, how can an innocent man be guilty, how can I be guilty of something I didn't do. On the way back to the prison, I cried, for the whole time, I couldn't believe it.'

Her's:

'Then we went up to my flat, he opened a bottle of wine and we talked. Then he went to kiss me, but I backed away. He didn't stop, he grabbed hold of me and forced me against the wall, I tried to scream, but nothing came from my mouth. He pulled off my pants, then he opened his trousers, he forced himself inside of me, I began to cry, I couldn't do anything.

I don't know why I'm here at the the police station, it's just that I feel he has to be punished for what he did, he had no right to take what he did. I can't let him get away with it, it's like he.........he took what I treasured most. He raped me, mentally and physically.

I'm glad he's going to be punished, it feels like I can finally get some closure, for what he did, for what he might have done to other women. When this man raped me, I felt like I was powerless, after he left me I felt like nothing would ever be the same again, I have cried myself to sleep every night since, I can't sleep in my bed without wearing shoes, for the fear that I may not be able to fight back, if he comes back to rape me again, but it's on its way back to normal, his sentence is the first step.'

All the above quotes are fictional, and have been written by yourself, but sadly, they remotely resemble a truth.

When it comes to the crunch, when it comes down to the wire, the only people who know what actually happened at the time, what is the complete and utter truth, are the two who were there at the time, it's he said, she said:

'Yes but her words can put him in jail for ten years.'

Det Elliot Stabler, Law and Order: Special Victims Unit.

When the time arrives......

2007-04-14T23:55:00.000+01:00

'What is an Iceberg composed of?'
'Ice, I suppose, sir.'

At 11.40pm 95 years ago, the RMS Titanic struck an Iceberg in the Atlantic Ocean, at 2.20am it broke into two large pieces and sank into the ocean.

As many life boats floated nearby, the men in command of them, both Officers and Ratings, their passengers, listened to the screams of the dieing men, women and children in the freezing water.

One Officer however, who was in command of lifeboat 14, couldn't just listen to the screams of the dieing, he couldn't. He tethered 5 life boats together and transferred his passengers to them, he then took his own lifeboat, along with the men under his command, into the area of the sinking:

"Looking towards the spot from which the voice came I saw a young man about six foot, very slender and sinewy. His face was clear cut and of the fine British red. He had keen, deep set, merry black eyes."

That fateful night, he organised the rescue of four people from the freezing water, and many others on a nearby collapsible life boat.

This man, was Fifth Officer Harold Lowe.

The best are British.....

2007-04-13T17:57:00.000+01:00

You wish it could be Christmas every day:

Now this is one reason why British Police are considered the best in the world.

Also, the way in which Joe Public stopped his car and dashed out to lend a hand, suprised you somewhat.

'Then where does the power come from, to see the race to it's end? From within.'

Eric Lidell, Chariots of Fire.

The million dollar question......

2007-04-11T18:26:00.000+01:00

Heaven opened, and out stepped:

Sometimes you ask yourself, what would you do, would you stand by and watch or would you help, would you oblige your duty of care, whilst risking your own safety and your office of constable?

These four Police Officers did, and for it they were accused of RAPE, some of these Police Officers are affected so much by the accusation that they have resigned, or taken leave with stress.

He then admits that he has lied, the event was a complete fabrication.

Sometimes, you wonder to yourself, why bother?

You recently went to a dance performance that a young lass you know was performing in. The dance school that organised the show has a section for younger prodigys, as you watched these little children dance to 'Somewhere over the rainbow', one of them started singing so loud that the audience started laughing, then she started waving at everyone, smiling from ear to ear.

A Police Officer at you station once said, and you quote:

'This is about the only job that can make you feel every emotion at once, even when you're not at work.'

He couldn't be more right.

'Who says the little son of a bitch needs a motive? He took my seat, bang! He's looking at my girlfriend, bang! I need those shoes, bang!'

Det Max Greevey, Law and Order.

Actions, the fruit of all truth.

2007-04-08T22:56:00.000+01:00

There was once a young man, he claimed to be the hero, he allways said he would never leave anyone behind, because he cared about everyone, because he was a strong leader. One day he was walking home with a friend, as they turned a corner, they came upon a young lad from another school being attacked, whilst he stood by and watched, the friend he was with attempted to intervene, but was knocked to the ground. As his friend and the other young lad tried to fend off the assault, he stood there, frozen to the spot.

You make it clear to most people, especially women, that you will most likely never say:

'I love you.'

'I want you.'

'I care about you.'

As there is one thing that you believe in life, it is that actions are the fruit of all truth, it is by your words you may be heard, but by your actions you will be judged.

Anyone can say words, but it is by their actions that they will be known, that their actions will show who they truely are.

'Of course I take my work home with me, i'm saturated in it. The job doesn't get hung up in the wardrobe with the uniform, never has done. It's in my skin, my hair, seeping from every pore, a part of every tear. It goes to bed with me, it shapes my dreams, fuels the nightmares.'

Sir James Anderton, Ex Chief Constable, Greater Manchester Police.

Sculptured in the heavens?

2007-04-02T20:19:00.000+01:00

You've layed eyes on many women, perhaps too many to count, but you've only ever seen three women who you can describe as being the epitome of physical beauty, these you will never forget:

October 11th 2005, Emma: The lecture you were in was making you contemplate an exodus, she was wearing a white hooded top, blue jeans and white trainers, her long black hair was her first attribute that transfixed your gaze, it was shiny and straight, it reached down to the middle of her back. She had a fringe, perfectly sculptured down to her eyebrows, sweeping across her brow, bright pink lips, beautiful bright blue eyes, a smile that could melt even the coldest of hearts. You once saw her in a knee high skirt, her legs were golden and long, her feet were so pretty you couldn't take your eyes off them.

June 13th 2006, Nicola: As she approached you for the first time you were sat at a desk, bored with data imput, she was wearing a red top, long grey trousers and high heeled black shoes, her short blond hair, falling over her shoulders, sweeping from left to right as she walked. Her slim body, hips to mesmarise even the most polite of men, her eyes an example of piercing beauty, her pale fair skinned face, soft lips, beautiful red cheeks sending a message of control, leaving any man in her wake.

Febuary 22nd 2007, Gemma: Wondering if you were out of your depth in the library you sat at the desk, you began to hear footsteps, soft without haste, she was wearing a black and white top, the first thing you noticed about her were her eyes, dark brown and deep, the shield to her soul. The first time her voice fell upon your ears you lost all sense of perspective, soft and sensual, her smile something from the dreams of many a lonely man, shimmering to the point of twinkling in the lights. Her curvacious body, perfectly sculptured by the hands of a God, who left no room for error.

Some people believe that money makes the world go around, you disagree, women make the world go around, well, they do for you anyway.

Rub the lamp, wish for apathy.

2007-03-25T23:49:00.000+01:00

As a very poor student you require something that seems to make the world go round, the small pieces of paper with the Queens Head on, that people pay into banks, building societies and on occasion, Post Offices. You recently took a job at weekends, some Saturdays, some Sundays, telling yourself that it's all about the money, you thought you wouldn't enjoy it.

You are at the till, waiting to serve, when two young boys of about four or five run up to the counter, they stand side by side looking up at you (they have to be really small to do that), smiles beaming from ear to ear and they ask so politely:

'My name's Tom and he's Oliver. Can we have two ice creams please? Thank you.'

As you served these two young chaps, you began to pray, that they won't have to see the things that make this world a terrible place to live in, that they won't ever feel so depressed by the actions of others, that they won't ever be reduced to being so angry that they want to kill.

That they won't ever have to see disgusting squalor that makes them want to be sick, see a woman so racked by drug addiction that most of her teeth are missing and those that arn't are eroded by malnutrition, have to watch a family cry because their lively hood has been taking away by three drunk men using chairs as weapons, to find a woman holding a knife because she can't stand to live any longer.

Gerald Coates, a christian preacher, the founder of Pioneer Network of Churches once said that he purchased a Television set, on the side of the box was the slogan:

'Bringing the world into your home!'

He told the delivery men they could put it straight back on the trolley and take it straight back out again.

Reading this article, you can understand just why he would make that request.

'Your feelings will always be a part of your police work. The more you try to deny that, the more control they'll have over you. We work with different permutations of sex all day, sometimes all night long. Don't worry when you feel something. Worry when you don't.'

Capt Don Cragen, Law and Order: SVU.

Collateral damage?

2007-03-20T19:34:00.000Z

As two children watch from the sofa:

‘He hit me.’
‘She threatened to kill me.’
‘Yeah but, he hit me.’
‘Actually she hit me.’
‘No, but yeah, after you threatened to kill me.’

Sometimes Police Officers just don’t know who to believe and when you go to domestics you know what has ACTUALLY happened will never come to light.

However, when you go to a house and find a woman in tears, her young children crying from the stairs, when she looks at you as if you are the only person in the world who can help her, you just want to find the bastard and say to him:

‘Let’s go outside and you can dance with a man for a change.’

The Bible says:

"Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them; for it is to those who are childlike that the Kingdom of the Heaven belongs."

Matthew 19 Verse 14.

Playing marbles, with diamonds?

2007-03-17T21:27:00.000Z

This brave Police Officer took a stand:

'Clearly aggrieved by what had happened, PC Coffill got out of the car, a black Ford Ka, to remonstrate with the two youths. He was then punched in the face by Turner and fell heavily to the ground, sustaining a serious head injury as a result. Medical evidence subsequently indicated that PC Coffill had also been kicked in the head at least once as he lay on the road.'

He now lays in a coma, requiring round the clock care from his family.

The two pieces of pondlife who did this to him have had their sentences reduced, reduced by some fucking incompetent judge, you wonder how she sleeps at night, and you know the answer, most likely quite soundly, knowing that Police Officers are out there protecting her.

By doing what she has done, she has reduced the value of life and safety of not just Police Officers, but of everyone.

In your own personal opinion the judge, if she should even be allowed to call herself such, should resign from her post and be charged with perverting the course of justice, and the sentences of these two pieces of shit should be increased to life in prison, with a minimum tariff of ten years.

'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.' Martin Luther King.

The court of public opinion.....

2007-03-11T13:31:00.000Z

In today’s society some people just don’t want to listen, they don’t want to be told and they certainly don’t want to be forced.

You can just imagine the email that might be sent to all the Officers in your force:

‘Before you arrest someone, you will ask yourself the following questions:

Is this person black? Will you be called a racist?
Is this person a homosexual? Will you be called a homophobe?
Is this person white? Will you be called a racist?
Is this person female? Will you be called sexist?
Is this person male? Will you be called a feminist?
Is this person younger than you? Will you be called ageist?

This list is not exhaustible.’

If she is black, brown, white, pink, yellow, blue, or even a fan of The Backstreet Boys, it doesn’t matter, she committed a crime, she then resisted arrest, she also assaulted police:

‘This proved to be fruitless because as soon as she was released she again tried to grab my genitals and scratch me in the area of my eyes. I struck her again with no visible effect. I now struck her as hard as I was physically able in an attempt to deaden her arm in the bicep and upper shoulder area so that she could be restrained again.’

Next please?

Yesterday you saw something that could effect even the hardest of hearts, a woman holding her child, by the lake, feeding the ducks. The young girl was smiling, her mother was laughing, this made you realise that perhaps it’s not too little, too late, perhaps Ernest Hemmingway was right:

‘The world is a fine place and worth fighting for.’

Old fashioned, not sexist.

2007-03-04T17:52:00.000Z

‘Yes, I would like my wife to raise the children while I go out to work.’
‘That’s sexist, you’re on of these men who want us all chained to the cooker.’
‘Sounds good to me.’ (Sarcastically)
‘You bastard, and you’re a copper.’
‘What’s that got to do with anything?’
‘You shouldn’t have the view that women are the weaker sex. It’s wrong.’
‘Where did I say that?’
‘You did, you said women should stay at home and look after the kids. You just said it!’
‘No I didn’t, I said I’d like it if my wife was to do that, but I’d respect her right to do what she wanted. If she wants to wear saucy lingerie when she goes to bed with me, I won’t complain. If she wants to wash the pots too, I won’t complain.’
‘That’s wrong, you’re gonna get a slap in a minute.’
‘Don’t tease me, and then dash my hopes. Car insurance is one area that is sexist in favour of women, and don’t say you don’t take advantage of the discounts, because I happen to know your car is insured with that ‘Sheila Wheels’ firm.’
‘That’s, well, you bugger, you can’t speak about women like that, and it’s sexist!’
‘Alright, what would you say if suddenly you saw a man walking through the streets in a dress, wearing make up and leather knee high boots, with tights?’
‘That’s just stupid, that’s what women wear, and he’d look like a twat.’
‘Sexist.’ (Sarcastically).

‘Sexual Offences Act 2003: Rape

A person commits an offence if HE intentionally penetrates the vagina, anus or mouth of another person with HIS penis.’

One of the girls who you know from University thinks she’s an authority on rape; she wants the courts system changed so that the burden of proof rests on the male that he has to prove he didn’t commit the alleged rape. You’ve had a few discussions with her on the subject; all have turned into arguments, she might be a feminist, but her beauty can sometimes distract you, phenomenally.

You have a scenario:

Gemma, Sarah and Louise take hold of James from behind, they force him on the bed, they take off his clothes, tie his hands and feet to the bed. James doesn’t wish to consent to the encounter, but an erection occurs. Gemma, Sarah and Louise take turns to have forcible and none consensual sex with James, during which he screams for help and pleads with them to stop.

According to Law in the United Kingdom this isn't rape. Should the law be changed?

Equality for women means equality in privilege and responsibility, nothing more, and nothing less.

Banter, a beautiful language?

2007-02-25T21:15:00.000Z

Being in a library can be an interesting experience, you never know what you’re going to get, all the books on the shelves, their knowledge surpassing your own by multiples of thousands, it can be humbling for a man, for anyone.

As you sat there, at the desk, you heard footsteps, light, far from hasty, a tad on the gentle side, you looked up, expecting to see an old age pensioner look-alike, with grey hair and a pair of huge glasses, instead what met your eyes was beauty herself, long black hair, a curvaceous body, her amazing stance setting you back in your chair. In the conversations that followed she did one thing you don’t find many women doing, she bantered, intelligently, ferociously, fearlessly, without backing down, it was an amazing thing to witness, an experience you’ll never forget.

As you left the library you did something you’ve never done before; you made an instant judgement, you imagined her to be intelligent, an expert at flirtatious behaviour, fighting her natural human weakness of pessimism with a wonderful sense of humour, breaking many a man’s heart without knowing it, but in the same action lighting up their world, with candles that could illuminate The Apostolic Palace.

You’ll most likely never find out if she has all those qualities, all those abilities, yes you’ve judged women before and that you regret, but this time you didn’t think of anything negative, and that feeling of only drawing on the positive, was so marvellous, that one day you hope you’ll be fortunate enough to re-create it.

'When standards of decent behaviour fall, the abnormal becomes the normal and people are almost brainwashed into thinking that evil is good.........Someone has to draw the line and it can be done only through the Police......The law is rooted in rightiousness and Christian principle, I have no difficulty about enforcing it.'

Sir James Anderton, Ex Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police.

Naiveity, food for fools?

2007-02-20T20:04:00.000Z

'He's a good bloke Joe.'

'How do you know?'

'Well my mate told me he is, and she knows him well.'

'Oh right, she's known him for a while then?'

'About two weeks, so it's alright.'

'Two weeks is a life time, i'm sure she knows him inside out.'

'I didn't ask for sarcastic comments.'

'No one does, i've had girls crying their eyes out on my shoulder, saying that they thought a guy was 'alright', but when they got back to his house all he wanted to do was stick his cock inside of them.'

'He's not like that, I know he's not.'

Sometimes you ask yourself how people can afford to be this naive.

You were naive once, so much so that you thought that no one would ever hurt you, that everyone was happy in this world and that everyone was nice to one another, you soon woke up, you soon realised that life is not all roses and lillies, in fact it is roses then lillies.

It amazes you, to the point of disbelief, that some people are so naive they would call someone they have only just met a friend, or that they would go back to a person's house having only just met them in a Night Club. It is a bad, corrupt, dangerous world, not everyone has the same morals, not everyone lives by the same rules.

'It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all.'

Perhaps Alfred Lord Tennyson would like to tell that to some of the people who's spouses have cheated on them, or to those who have had friends betray them coldly. You can guess that he wouldn't get a warm and fuzzy reaction.

In a world where people betray each other with a single action, where violence is just another reaction, where innocent men are knifed in the street, where innocent women are raped in back alleys, in their own homes, by people they trust, it's hard to care, it's hard to be optimistic, it's even harder to sleep.

Sometimes you ask yourself, if God will ever forgive you for what you have done, will he ever forgive others for what they do to each other?

This gives you hope:

"Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you." Ephesians 4:32

Meanwhile...........

2007-02-19T23:49:00.000Z

At a divisional training session, Police Officers are issued with a new piece of kit, especially for use when dealing with drunk members of the public:

Playing God?

2007-02-17T17:26:00.000Z

Approximately 46 million murders a year are committed without justice.

A beautiful and unparalleled event occurs, two join as one, a life is created, a life that could one day grow up to be a credit to the human race, a scholar, a doctor, a fire-fighter, an entrepreneur, a nurse, a teacher or even a Police Officer.

You believe that life begins at conception, therefore in your personal view, abortion is murder. There is no way around this, if a mother was to smother her child while her baby was asleep, there would be arrests, interviews, charges, juries, twelve good men and true, convictions and sentences. If a woman was to walk into a clinic and have an abortion, none of the above would happen, as in this case the killing of her unborn child would be legal, to the point of it even not being immoral.

Life begins at conception, and abortion without a life saving reason is murder, walking into a clinic and having an unborn baby ‘terminated’ is pre-meditated murder, she thought about it, she planned to do it, she did it.

You also put another spin on this:

If a woman was to drink alcohol whilst pregnant, and as a direct result of this alcohol her baby was to die, you believe there should be a law where she can be severely punished. If a man was to hit a woman in the stomach, and her baby was to die as a result of this punch, then he should be punished with the same severity.

Because the baby that was alive, that was destined to be beautiful, intelligent, brave and a credit to the human race has been killed, stopped in their tracks, their important and valuable life taken from them.

This child is 22 weeks old, the mother of this beautiful child, this exceptional creation, can still have an abortion, she can end this life, by 'suction or vacuum aspiration'.

There are other outs, other options, other routes, adoption, fostering, even contraception in the first place, to name a few.

'I've noticed that everybody that is for abortion has already been born.' Ronald Reagan

Free will, it's a beautiful thing............

2007-02-13T00:10:00.001Z

‘She’s a twat Lauren.’

‘Abused as a child, not her fault.’
‘Do you actually believe that shit or are you just being difficult?’
‘I’m trying to see both sides of the story, we have to look into why they do what they do, just sending them to prison and leaving them there isn’t going to help them.’
‘I haven’t got a problem with throwing the bitch in jail, then throwing away the key and sticking food through her letter box at meal times.’
‘It’s like prostitutes, they have issues too.’
‘Yeah like what, where and how to get their next fix? Oh i’ve got an idea, let’s shag random strangers for money, it’s better than mugging people or robbing cars. Or perhaps better still, they could not get hooked on scag in the first place.’
‘Same old Joe, you don’t care about people, you don't take the time to find out why they get where they do.’
‘Tell that to the kid who I helped social services take away to a safe place after his mother and father treated him like a rag doll. He’s worth caring about, for him i've got all the time in the world.’

A quote from 'God's Cop: The Biography of James Anderton' helps to illustrate your point:

'Alive, the 42 year old prostitute had not been a pretty sight. Dead, she made even hardened Police Officers retch........................as the coat parted, so Vera's intestines spilled to the ground, unveiling a madman's mutilation.'

People who perpetrate heinous crimes, of robbery, of rape, of drug dealing, of murder, should be sent to jail, no matter what happened to them in childhood, in adulthood. No one forces them to do what they do, they have something called 'free will' it's a beautiful thing, 'responsibility' is a beautiful word, it's just a shame some people will try anything to avoid it, to be an exception to it, the only way is to force it upon them.

Servants without scars?

2007-02-10T15:28:00.000Z

You are sat in the station reading an interesting book, when you hear your call sign being mentioned over your airwave, you and your colleague are being dispatched to an address where a woman is threatening to commit suicide.

After a ‘swift’ drive, you arrive at the address with your eyes in the back of your head, your colleague thinks he’s Jenson Button, of course he is. You’ve been to this address multiple times, your colleague has also, so much so that you know the occupants by their first names, and you know the neighbours by their first names too.

You can understand why she would want to commit suicide, she lives in a ‘shit hole’, her neighbours are worse than the Manson Family and she has no prospects, none at all. Her house smells of urine, her television doesn’t work, she sleeps in a bed that isn’t really fit for a human being, no carpets, no wall paper, nothing of value at all, it's hard to see, it's even harder to forget.

Even though you know you should feel some resentment towards her for threatening to commit suicide when it is clear she has no intention of doing so, taking up your's and your collegues time that could be spent on the real victims, on those who actually are in need of help, you can’t help but feel responsibility for her.

Some say that those who actually want to commit suicide, those who actually want to end it all, manage to on the first attempt. Those that fail, those that tell people they are going to commit suicide, via text or phone, or in person, are just attention seeking. The problem with calls to the Police, where people tell control operators that they are going to kill themselves, means that the Police have to attend the scene, to make sure she/he is safe, even if it is the eighth call of the day, from the same address.

'I didn't say I was different or better. I'm not. Hell, I sympathize; I sympathize completely. Apathy is the solution. I mean, it's easier to lose yourself in drugs than it is to cope with life. It's easier to steal what you want than it is to earn it. It's easier to beat a child than it is to raise it. Hell, love costs: it takes effort and work.' Detective William Somerset, Se7en.

'A man died and you want to close down the whole hospital.'

2007-01-31T20:47:00.000Z

You ask people to keep the Jean Charles de Menezes shooting at the forefront of their mind when they read the following quote:

'She's made me a whipping boy because I founded CI5. But I didn't, you did, society did. If there were no fires you wouldn't need firemen, and in God's name and I invoke him sincerely, I wish you would make me, my organisation rudundent. I wish you would make the streets clean again, I wish you would give everyman, whatever his colour or creed the right to be to feel safe again. But that's not to be, not yet. So like it or not you need us. That's why i'm asking you, pleading with you, don't destroy us, don't cut us down, not until you've got something better to put in our place.

A jungle, that's where it's at, with mad beasts crawling through it and we are the hunters. You showed us photos, carpets ripped up. But what about these? Faces grown old before they were ever young, destroyed and racked by drug addiction. Girls barely out of their teens selling their bodies, their experience to the highest bidder. These are the streets we have to walk, not the bright streets, the mean ones, devoid of hope and all humanity. We walk them, and we brush aside some of the dirt, not all of the dirt just some, so there's less to offend when you come along.

And now you're going to take whatever teeth we have left, why? Because someone got hurt, because a man died? I didn't want that, and I regret that. A man died and you want to close down the whole hospital, because like it or not that's what we are, the surgeons, a messy, sometimes bloody job and oh yes our knives are sharp and we have to operate fast and quickly to cut out the desease. The deasease hurts, but so does the surgeons knife! Which would you prefer? It's your choice.'

George Cowley, CI5 The Professionals.

To the point of surrender?

2007-01-27T16:12:00.000Z

One thing that annoys you, that makes your blood run hot, is violence or the threat of violence against Children. When you walk down the street and you see them smiling, when you see them running around you realise that perhaps this world is worth fighting for, perhaps it isn’t too late to give up yet.

You were driving home, listening to the radio and you heard this. You are a fan of Tony Blair, he is a good man and his heart is usually in the right place, but letting this happen without making a stand, without stopping it, is just ludicrous.

‘Morris admitted three offences of causing a person under 16 to engage in sexual activity without consent, and one of sexual activity with a child under 16.’

This man has ADMITTED to sex offences against young boys, he also has PREVIOUS convictions. Because of John Reid’s recommendation the Judge can’t send this bastard to jail, he can’t remand him in custody, he has to let him back out in the community.

You’ve got an idea, instead of sending fewer Criminals to jail, why the hell doesn’t this government build more jails? Or even if that isn’t an option, house six criminals in one cell, you won’t lose any sleep over it.

Meanwhile.............

2007-01-26T17:58:00.000Z

At Police Training College, the newest recruits to the Police Service are bemused as they are issued with their Personal Protection Equipment:

Adam and Steve?

2007-01-24T22:35:00.000Z

Everyone has prejudices, everyone has personal opinions, this includes Police Officers, of that there is no question, so you start by saying that as a Special Constable, your personal opinions do not effect your duties.

Sir James Anderton, former Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police, had a very outspoken view on AIDS:

'Everywhere I go I see increasing evidence of people swirling about in a human cesspit of their own making.'

You agree with his view on this, and believe it can be applied to all sexually transmitted diseases, but with certain conditions attached.

'Human cesspit' you believe should be taken to mean illness, a lack of health, leading to squalour and disfunction, with a hint of self pity. There are many symptoms of STDs, all very unpleasant, therefore making it as the dictionary defines, sewage, refuse and waste, in other words a 'cesspit'.

When a person, be they male or female, contracts a STD, through circumstances that are not beyond their control, you believe it is their own fault and they deserve what they get. If they die from this so be it, while that will be a tradgedy and a sad time for the family, it is like a smoker dyeing of lung cancer, therefore it is clearly 'of their own making'.

They were informed of the consequences, they did not listen, they chose not to change their ways, therefore they died.

The Bible States:

'Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders.' 1 Corinthians 6:9

The Quaran States:

'What! Of all creatures do ye come unto the males, and leave the wives your Lord created for you? Nay, but ye are froward folk.' Quran , 26th sura, trans. Pickthal.

You won't start by hiding behind the words that many people use: 'I have friends who are gay.' because you don't have any friends, gay or otherwise. Whilst you may not completely agree with what homosexuals do with each other, you have no problem with them personally, you do not hold any malice or ill will towards them in the slightest, they have the right to do what they wish, that right is one you will never question.

'AIDS is not just God's punishment for homosexuals; it is God's punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals.' Jerry Fallwell

You don't agree with that quote, if Jerry Fallwell replaced the word 'homosexuals' with 'fornicators', then yes, you would completely agree.

However you do say this, if Homosexuality were the normal way, wouldn't God have made Adam and Steve?

Reversal of Justice?

2007-01-22T00:00:00.000Z

Police Cock up Youth Plan

You left school only a few years ago and when you had finished school for the day you went home and read books or watched television, you certainly didn't go out and cause trouble for members of the public.

You've got a better idea, instead of giving out food, why don't these Police Officers issue Penalty Notices for Disorder instead, they would be much more effective, it would be interesting to see how many of the little shits came back to act in an 'anti social manner' the next day, after they found themselves £80 out of pocket.

'Justice without force is powerless; force without justice is tyrannical.' Blaise Pascal

Apathetic, about belief...........

2007-01-21T16:22:00.000Z

Muslim WPC refused to shake hands.

Start the Kangaroo court, declare her guilty of bringing the force into disrepute and swiftly execute justice by sending her to the gallows.

If only there were an obvious solution, no wait there is, in the words of Dorothy Parker:

'I shall stay the way I am, because I do not give a damn.'

It seems the media has blown something out of proportion once again, if this WPC didn't want to shake the hand of Sir Ian Blair, she didn't have to, it is that simple. You admire her for standing for what she believes in, for refusing where others would have obeyed, it takes a strong person to do that, that fact no one can deny.

What is the issue here? In short, there shouldn't be one.

Recently you were in the writing room, doing a statement and you heard this over the radio:

'Any mobile at Toytown, can you attend a immediate at 32 Noddy Road? Joanne Jameson has been assaulted by her boyfriend again.'

One of the other officers in the room decided to tell you his thoughts on the subject:

'Third time in two days, could it possibly be because she is a complete gobshite and goes after him with knives all the time? If only forced relocation to a town far away were force policy.'

Send Kain Forestor to the address, with his words of wisdom what could possibly go wrong:

'If we don't take care of the customer, perhaps they'll stop bugging us.'

Meanwhile............

2007-01-16T00:02:00.000Z

A member of the public becomes disconcerted when two Police Officers ask to use his bathroom........

'Take your time Steve, i'll watch for the IPCC.'