Let's Talk about the Calgary Police Service

[Locke]

The 'Thin Blue Line' mentality is dangerous. Its dangerous because it creates an 'Us vs. Them' mentality which is inherently contradictory to 'Protect and Serve' because in this context 'Them' is....well...Us.

[GordonBlue]

Originally Posted by #-3

I've thought of the thin blue line thing as a way of expressing that cops will protect cops, not explicitly saying it but still implying and justice is not equal for officers because the enforcement arm of the law will rally around them. It's kind of like all of those back in blue stickers indicating certain vehicles are exempt from traffic enforcement.

To me it's a shockingly cynical statement, and the last time I was in the southern US is was pretty disturbing to see the shear number of thin blue line / thin red line flags. Telling me the enforcement arm of the state puts a much lower value on those of us who aren't part of their club.

Yeah. I've always heard and felt the thin blue line is the police version of Omertà.
No ratting out your fellow cops no matter what they do.
There are tons of stories of what happens to cops who don't toe the thin blue line.
totally an us vs them thing. protect your own.

[Parallex]

I think the phrase is tainted with the longstanding "code of silence" implication and the flag/pin/patch is further tainted with it's appropriation by people and groups opposed to racial justice.

Honestly, I think they should just ban all pieces of individual flair. They're a police service not a real world Chotchkie's... make your uniforms uniform.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by Parallex

I think the phrase is tainted with the longstanding "code of silence" implication and the flag/pin/patch is further tainted with it's appropriation by people and groups opposed to racial justice.

Honestly, I think they should just ban all pieces of individual flair. They're a police service not a real world Chotchkie's... make your uniforms uniform.

[GordonBlue]

Another one happened, I see.
Woman was stalked by a guy in a truck, masterbating, she called 911 and the Calgary cops didn't bother to show up.

[btimbit]

Originally Posted by GordonBlue

Another one happened, I see.
Woman was stalked by a guy in a truck, masterbating, she called 911 and the Calgary cops didn't bother to show up.

Cops say they charged the guy

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by GordonBlue

Another one happened, I see.
Woman was stalked by a guy in a truck, masterbating, she called 911 and the Calgary cops didn't bother to show up.

Why would you stick around to see if the cops showed up?

[GordonBlue]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Why would you stick around to see if the cops showed up?

The issue is it seems the cops didn't seemingly want to respond to the call. Wouldn't you like to know why they didn't?

Someone calls 911, the response shouldn't be " do you really need us to show up?"

[BlackArcher101]

So did they show or not? Surely they must have if the guy was charged?
How do you know what was in the queue at the time of the call?

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by GordonBlue

The issue is it seems the cops didn't seemingly want to respond to the call. Wouldn't you like to know why they didn't?

Someone calls 911, the response shouldn't be " do you really need us to show up?"

I had to look up the incident. If it’s the one with the long wait before police came to get a statement, then yeah that’s pretty messed up. If there were officers nearby and no-one responded until 45 minutes later, especially downtown, then there are either some serious logistics problems or a serious attitude problem with CPS officers.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

Ok before we start in with the victim blaming here’s some more detail. It’s not a good look for the CPS. But I guess they’ve got bigger issues on their hands, like coordinating flair. The only reason they found the guy is she took down his license plate.

here’s the actual TikTok she made.

https://www.tiktok.com/@macjeanjorda...ial_sharing=v1

She said she heard the dispatcher confirm an officer would be there.

Forty minutes passed.

“Finally a police officer calls her and says, ‘Can we do this over the phone?’ I heard that through the phone myself,” Walsh said.

“We were both shocked because it was very clear from the beginning that we needed a police car on-site and she needed to get home safe. And it was clear to us that this wasn’t a priority.”

Walsh is a bystander who decided to help the woman when the police refused to show up.

Walsh said the woman asked if an officer was still coming.

“He said, ‘Well, someone can come. You know, I can come I guess, I just started my shift though. Did the dispatcher say someone was coming?'”

The woman, reeling from what just happened, decided to file a report later.

Walsh, who stayed with the woman until a friend arrived to drive her home, said she has filed a formal complaint against the Calgary police.

https://calgarysun.com/news/local-ne...3-aa5f2ffd4d95

[btimbit]

That is a pretty serious logistical breakdown then, wow

[WhiteTiger]

I might remind folks to remember that you are getting less than half of the full story, and you are getting the part best designed to appeal to your emotions.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

I’d love to hear how it could be less than half. Seems pretty cut and dry. You have an independent witness saying she heard the police officer say he didn’t want to attend the scene. Doesn’t leave a lot of room for interpretation.

Can this be done over the phone?

No, I’d like an officer to attend the scene.

Ok, I’ll be there in xx minutes.


Done. No news story. No complaint. No women feeling unsafe and unsupported by the police.

[cam_wmh]

Originally Posted by WhiteTiger

I might remind folks to remember that you are getting less than half of the full story, and you are getting the part best designed to appeal to your emotions.

Yeah? In a situation as detailed like this, why would a car not be sent?

[Sliver]

I had one of those officers in my shop this week with the Canadian flag and a blue line through it. Fataing pathetic. What an embarrassment. I swear some of these guys think they're Rambo parachuting into a hostile jungle. You're in fataing Calgary. Give me a break. It's a job. Do it and then go home. You're not a fataing super hero standing between Calgarians and our own demise. Like, can you please not deface the Canadian flag with your bloviating stupidity and just wear the uniform sans flair?

[Sliver]

I have met cool cops, btw. It's just this thin blue line thing was always cringe, but snowflaking around because your governing body wants it gone and you won't comply is literally pathetic.

[WhiteTiger]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

I’d love to hear how it could be less than half. Seems pretty cut and dry. You have an independent witness saying she heard the police officer say he didn’t want to attend the scene. Doesn’t leave a lot of room for interpretation.

Can this be done over the phone?

No, I’d like an officer to attend the scene.

Ok, I’ll be there in xx minutes.


Done. No news story. No complaint. No women feeling unsafe and unsupported by the police.

Her problem was the wait time. However, since she was no longer in danger, the offender was gone, all the pertinent info was acquired (through the 911 call), she is considered to be 'safe', so the call goes lower on the triage list. So she's going to end up waiting until an officer is free, which is an unpredictable amount of time.

She can't be given a specific time frame when an officer will be there because that time can't be predicted. Heck, we (911) used to close out our calls with "An officer will be dispatched as soon as possible, one should be in contact with you in anywhere from 5 minutes up to five hours." but we had to stop doing that, because folks would call after 5 hours assuming police forgot about them. Now we just say "an officer will be dispatched as soon as possible."

I don't know the exact conversation between the officer and her, so I can't (and wouldn't anyhow) comment on that. However, I have been on the 'officer side' of the call plenty of times (as C911 often makes these calls for the officer).

I imagine that when an officer was finally freed up to speak to her, he called her to see if A) she was still there, and B) she still wanted to see police in person or was ok with doing a report over the phone/email. Because it is quite common for people who have been waiting for more than 15 minutes to go someplace else (going to sit in a nearby Tims for instance). It's also not uncommon for folks to realize that they don't want to see police, especially if they can provide a statement over the phone or by email.

[WhiteTiger]

Originally Posted by cam_wmh

Yeah? In a situation as detailed like this, why would a car not be sent?

Because she's safe, the bad guy has left the scene, and all the necessary backend investigative work can be done in the patrol car or district office. The officer can get her statement by phone or email.

If there's one thing that COVID has done, it's made a lot of police services realize that there is a LOT that they can do electronically, and emailing of witness statements is a huge one.

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by Sliver

I have met cool cops, btw. It's just this thin blue line thing was always cringe, but snowflaking around because your governing body wants it gone and you won't comply is literally pathetic.

I really don't understand the process commencing over this right now. You're a police force and were told you can't put an extra badge on your uniform that isn't part of the standard uniform?

It represents some pretty ****ty things in North America, everyone knows that. So they're told they can't wear them. Awesome, easy peasy, done. Then suddenly I read that the police don't like that and are upset and therefore they have called off the directive to remove the badges?

Like, I really don't understand how this is allowed? Even Mcdonalds employees can't wear a badge that has nothing to do with their standard uniform, and if hundreds of McDonalds employees banded together and said we all like this badge, it means something to us, that would change nothing. The badges would be off or the employees wouldn't be working there. So baffling to me.