Comment by schiffern

5 months ago

This is why New Zealand's police recruiting ad[0] a few years back was so brilliant. They used humor to intentionally de-select this "warrior cop" mentality, and emphasize public service instead.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9psILoYmCc

3 comments

schiffern

Reply
Doxin  5 months ago

The dutch army did something similar in one of their ads. They had a whole series of ads where they showed a short skit illustrating some property they do or don't want in the army. Then the ad shows two checkboxes, "suitable" / "unsuitable", with one of them getting colored in. This[0] specific one from that series is quite explicitly showing they don't want people who like "playing" with guns too much.

There's a compilation here[1] in case anyone wants to see some more. Most of them don't require any language and are decently funny.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-qyjkj7Vj0 [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiqFysi883Y

mikrotikker  5 months ago

Surely you want to select for warrior cops especially in a place like the USA to be able to handle things like school shooters and violent meth heads?

Is it better to hire a diplomat and make them a warrior or hire a warrior and make them a diplomat? When lives are on the line id choose the later tbh.

  • schiffern  5 months ago

    As Uvalde showed us, in extreme situations we need professional, competent cops, not (wannabe) "warriors."

    The warrior cop mentality is the worst combination: it teaches police to be simultaneously afraid of their own shadows and belligerent and trigger-happy. The all-too-predictable result is that they escalate and shoot innocent people in nonthreatening situations, and then fail to lay down fire when it actually is life-or-death.

    https://www.thebulwark.com/p/the-warrior-cop-ethos-and-the-s...