Another One Bites The Dust

I was sorry to see that another police blogger has decided that discretion is the better part of valour and is to take down the blog next week. I have followed PC Bloggs since he was a PCSO and enjoyed reading of his step up to become a sworn Constable. Ave Atque Vale.

There have been many police blogs, and they have had a significant casualty rate. Shift work and unsocial hours leave a fair bit of time to trawl the Web, and to add one's own five penn'orth to the blogosphere. Indeed when I look at one of the site meters I often notice addresses ending in .pol or even .gov, which suggests that a few officers while away dull periods in the office with a bit of surfing. A handful of police blogs have become a significant presence, but they differ, I think, in one significant respect from this one. I grumble; most bloggers grumble, especially those of us who are trying to make some sense of Government policy. But I like to think that I have more in common with Tom Reynolds' Ambulanceman's Blog in trying to inform as well as grumble. The predominant tone of too many police blogs is a chippy negativity that is understandable if not necessarily excusable in men who work closely together and sometimes have to put themselves in harm's way. The soldiers in Wellington's army probably moaned non stop about the officers, the sergeants, the food, and everyone who got in their way too. But the difference is that soldiers fight a common enemy, whereas the police have to protect and support the public by tackling crime. In too many posts police bloggers seem to regard the public as alien and hostile. One refers to a local housing estate as 'the Swamp' and I have read a post about 'The Evil Poor'. It's like reading about British squaddies holed up in Basra, and policing shouldn't be like that.