by frog
I can scarcely believe this Police recruitment poster. In fact, I initially thought it was a photoshopped spoof when I saw it over at LudditeJourno a couple of days ago. But there’s a link to a NZ Herald story from a couple of weeks back that authenticates it.
Cue in the “Clint Rickards wasn’t ever convicted of anything” brigade no doubt, who will again accuse me of being anti-Police, but I would have thought running a recruitment campaign that simultaneously puts down older women who enjoy sex and revives not-so-distant memories of predators in uniform sexually exploiting young women is a particularly dumb thing for the Police to be doing, especially given yet another report critical of Police culture has just been released.
Published in Society & Culture by frog on Tue, January 25th, 2011
Tags: Clint Rickards, misogyny, police, police culture, Police rape
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
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Did you ever think it was meant to be light hearted and grab attention, are you really suggesting “older women who enjoy sex” would be offended by the ad ? But i guess it is lucky to sat in every day of the Clint rickard trial so you are well positioned to comment on his guilt/innocence.
[frog: I knew one would crawl out from under a rock sooner or later. For the record, I did not comment on Rickards' guilt or innocence, but on those like you who attempt to argue that because he was found not guilty his behaviour was fit and proper conduct for a Police officer to engage in.]
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I doubt any of the women raped by police officers would consider it “a bit light hearted”.
The Louise Nicholas rape case aside, one of the allegations against Rickards (that never went before the Police Disciplinary Tribunal, because he resigned before it was heard) was that while on duty he had sex with a young woman across the bonnet of a Police car in a public place. Is that “a bit light hearted” too?
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A poster like that one just confirms what crack pots most of them are… It is offensive and does nothing to advertise for new recruits. no wonder they are called pigs!
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Unlike RJS131, I didn’t think it was an attempt at a joke about those incidents. Well, I did assume that when I first saw it, but once I learned that it was a real police ad rather than a spoof, I concluded that the only way they could have considered it acceptable is if they didn’t think of it in that light.
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We all know NZ Police dont think before advertising anything, they did it with the whole Thumbhole Stock = MSSA thing when they tried to force their “opinion” on firearms owners in 2009.
High Court in Palmerston North ruled against them in 2010 saying that they cant advertise an opinion as law and had to pull the advertising.
[frog: Joke deleted. Sorry to be a prude, but apart from being offensive it adds nothing to this discussion and would likely just derail it.]
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As far as own goals, it’s almost as bad as the classic UK Conservative party election poster with a photo of a rubbish bin and the slogan “Even when Conservatives talk rubbish it makes sense”.
It was supposed to refer to the privatisation of rubbish services, I think they did bin them, but only after printing a vast number.
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Serious ad hominem attack. Ugly…
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But certainly not funny.
Nothing like Monty Pythons ‘Join the modern vice squad specialising in sex, drugs, bribery, corruption and so much more etc etc.’
Does anyone remember those?
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Then there is that old cockney song that goes in the chorus;
‘It’s only right and proper
For each and every copper
To do a little burglin
On the side.’
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Serious ad hominem attack. Ugly…
At worst it is in keeping with rjs131′s usual level of contribution.
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It’s simply an ad targeted at young men as being in demand – from older women to the police force looking for new staff. It may be offensive to others, but probably not to the target audience …
Some people get offended at ads for alcohol – but they also target the demographic. If the ad targeting the demographic does not offend others, they have probably got the ad wrong.
The only issue I have with it, is that it suggests police want only younger men and not younger women … , so should be balanced by another advert – though here is where there needs to be some sensitivity … – possibly a job for a woman who wants a job including a lot of variety ..
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Nothing like Monty Pythons ‘Join the modern vice squad specialising in sex, drugs, bribery, corruption and so much more etc etc.’
I always figured those were the old vices… the modern ones would be… ?
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Yes Drakula, you have to keep up with the terminology. The “cougar” has gotten some play now…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cougar_Town
…which I have not seen and don’t intend to watch
BJ
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What! Like this SPC?
We’ve
got a lot in common
with sugar daddies,
We like em
young too.
Besides being incorrectly worded, there are serious undertones going on in both phrases; they’re offensive on many levels.
An offense to one age group should not be dismissed because it presumably does not offend the targeted age group, which I strongly doubt is an actuality anyway.
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Perhaps the fine print of the poster should read: “If your not offended by this ad you should join the Police”?
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There’s a first time for everything – what a bunch of nancy boy sissy wowsers some Greens are.
It’s an add targeted at the demographic – it makes marketing sense, just the same as other ads are designed to do.
What’s wrong with saying that younger men are in demand for jobs with the police …
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Alright, so this tag line has ruffled the feathers of some posters, and understandably so. What about having an “invent a tag-line for the Police” competition? After all, if we put our collective heads together, we could get a non offensive tag-line that targets the audience as well.
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Another PC softie john-ston?
And what was offensive to cougars in the poster frog? Was/is any cougar offended?
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Not at all SPC; I was just suggesting that instead of complaining about offensive tag-lines, perhaps we could suggest some others that would have the same impact on the target audience.
Those who have read my comments in the past will know that I am far from a PC softie and I have copped my fair share of flak.
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Not specifically cougars… all women would I think, be put off by it.
BJ
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Here’s one suggested by LudditeJourno at frog’s link above:
Big ups to the cops if they were to run that one, but I’m not holding my breath.
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Well it goes to show that the police don’t appear to have a very high level target audience;the poster seems to be dog whistling to the level of dogs!!!
Not that I have anything against dogs (the canine veriety)
bjchip; thanks for that I am more enlightened now that I know what a cougar is.
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Sort of confirms my thinking that Police should be recruited from those who had some life experience outside the police first.
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It’s not a case of designing things for a target market, it is a case of most adverts being written by young men that think this sort of thing is funny, and some-one older going “err, we’ll give it a go”.
There is an poster up on a window in a shop near the Basin Reserve in Wellington selling advertising services. The poster says
“Expose Yourself to a wider audience”
And, you guessed it, a flasher with a raincoat pulled open.
Oh, very witty. Hilarious. Clever. Hip.
If you are a muppet.
Sounds like the same firm that did the police advertisement.
I might have to become a millionaire businessman just to tell them they’ll never work for me, they are that bad.
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We’ve got a lot in common with feminists. We like to catch rapists too.
Fail. (IMHO). Here are more fails:
“Drive faster than a boy racer”
“Keep 10% of all the tickets you write”
“Next year, the job comes with a gun”
“You’ll visit 20 pubs every Friday”
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When will the government apologise and make an appropriate offer of compensation to the women who spoke up about police behaviour in the Bay of Plenty?
When will this guy loose his job? Two criminal investigations in less than 12 months and like Rickards resigned to stop the internal investigation.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/3900137/Moss-named-top-cops-as-job-referees
When will this guy be demoted? Leaked information to Rickard’s mates, and now teaches at the Police College.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/4057914/Top-job-goes-to-censured-officer
When will this guy be recalled from London? Refused to co-operate with the IPCA, all sorts of sexual harassment allegations and surprise surprise is from the Bay of Plenty
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/4288993/NZs-London-cop-had-been-accused-of-sex-harassment
Until these bad apples are held to account – not promoted – not given jobs where they can do more damage – then the ghost of Clint Rickard’s lives and his stench lingers.
The Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct was about stopping bad apples from being promoted and protected. When will this happen?
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On behalf of a bunch of feminists who’ve railed against the Police on many occasions, I can confirm that there’s nobody doing any thinking whatsoever there. We have attempted to find an intelligent, well-read, policy spokesperson on many occasions, without success.
The advertisement was probably dreamt up after a session at the NZPHQ bar, involving one senior policeman describing the plot of a movie he’d seen involving older women, followed by another senior policeman suggesting that’s make a good tag-line for the recruitment campaign.
Note the continued use of the words “senior policeman”. If there was a single woman involved in the hierarchy at that level, this kind of thing would not see the light of day.
“C’mon guys, get real, you wanna drag that whole thing out into the air again when we’ve only just buried it since the last time?”
The ability of Police officers at senior level to accommodate any concept of the reality of how ordinary people think is abysmal.
I’m sure not only are young women who may have been considering a career in the force cringing, but also a sizable proportion of young men may be having an “ewww” moment over this advert.
Net usefulness to recruiting = 0
Police force developing a sense of propriety? Yeah, right!
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If the argument is, this is an ad the police cannot run because of “the past”, then the same rule applies to others.
Those associated with being PC, should not cry wolf too often over the minor things lest they/we/you be ignored when the real important stuff comes up.
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SPC, have you been watching the news? The word is that there hasn’t been any real progress in changing the culture within the police. This poster is just one piece of evidence to further support that conclusion. It no about the past but the ongoing moral trainwreck of our police.
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It’s not so much evidence that the police culture is unchanged, so much as evidence that the police don’t see a need to change. If they were concerned about their culture and realised that it contained unacceptable practices, they wouldn’t be putting this sort of material out into the public realm.
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The culture problem is endemic in the wider context as well as within the Police; we haven’t had a Police “force” since 1958, yet still almost everyone struggles with not adding that word automatically after they have written “Police”
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solkta, that is irrelevant to the point I was making. If the ad was used to recruit people to another group it would not be an issue.
And the ad probably came from a private company which the police paid for and used.
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Hm! I’m starting to question your motive here SPC? The advert is obviously wrong when applied to all other job recruiting. It is particularly wrong when applied to police work considering the mentality many have within that group. What is really irrelevant is that you think an advertising company initiating the advert makes it in some way less offensive.
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So you concede that it may not have been an ad made by the police?
And you concede that the past of the police is irrelevant to whether the ad is appropriate or not?
As to your outright claim that the ad is offensive, I don’t think it is.
Much of the focus has been because of the police past they should not have made this ad, and somehow their ad shows they have not moved on.
But I doubt they did make it, and those who did, did not think the ad itself to be offensive. And nor do I.
You just think the ad is wrong then …
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Ah no! I do not concede anything. The usual way things work is that an advertising company is approached for their services, they come up with a few ideas and these are presented to the client, who then chooses the advert they want to run with. Although I would not put it past some cop coming up with the idea in the first place.
Yes! I think the ad is offensive and indicative of a police mentality that must change. The connotations involved are way past just being PC illiterate, they are offensive to the general public and many in the target group. So what is your defense motivation SPC?
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The ad is not offensive because you say it is. Is it not offensive because I say it isn’t?
And there is no way that those who made the ad saw it as offensive to those in the target group. Someone in the police obviously agreed.
It’s not offensive to the general public because some are offended – the world is full of adverts that some find offensive …
My defensive motivation? You’re the one trying to make a disagreement about the issue personal … .
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Unfortunately, I think it will assist the Police in recruiting. It will assist in recruiting the sort of young men who should NOT EVER be Police officers.
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SPC
Ah no! I’m trying to understand your reason to defend the (generally accepted as offensive) advert. Whether that is a personal reason is your business, but there has to be some substance for your belief that the advert is not offensive?
Let’s take this for instance:
http://www.italymag.co.uk/italy/palermo/pink-hitler-poster-causes-offence
Personally I find this advert funny but can understand why people would be offended. Being that I was not directly affected by WW2, the people who have been are now in a minority. Like the police recruitment advert, the offense clearly outweighs any mirth we might achieve and an advert does not have to cause widespread offense to be deemed offensive. It has to be determined as offensive to people under a reasonable deductive process. One which you’re not displaying here.
So far the debate is 14/2. Your argument that it’s not generally offensive is incorrect.
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Do you understand sampling Todd? And why polls have to be of some size and represent diversity to be representative?
Offense to some, does not define offensive.
I have no problem taking a minority position on an issue, even here.
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Do you have any insight into why only one out of every three New Zealanders who are victims of crime bother to call police for help? (Victim of Crime Survey, 2010). What the report says is that New Zealanders do not trust police or believe police will help.
This advert further undermines police credibility. Offensive or not. I know of 15 people who as a result of this advert have said something like: “that’s why we don’t trust them. i don’t want people who reply to that advert in my house, near my wife, daughters or children”.
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More than half of all the crime in New Zealand falls on just 6 per cent – just over one in 20 – of the adult population, a survey shows.
And if you’re a young, poor, brown city-dweller, you’re much more likely to be a victim of crime that an old, rich, white person living in the country.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10695021
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So apart from the obvious (people only report crime if they think there is a point to it – that police can do anything useful for them) there is the issue of the same underclass that are crime victims not wanting to resort to them the police and the related court process to sort it. Given they see the police and the court process as not giving them a fair go – or the people being convicted as not having had a fair go etc.
As to why some women don’t report some crimes has nothing to do with “police” at all – but going public.
But the fact remains – all sorts of people with issues about the police will make the phone call and ask for assistance when they need it – even those people you say they would not want near their wives and children (John Key in uniform perhaps) and that apparently requires more young men to be available to be trained as officers.
I just don’t see the ad as indicative of police attitudes, it probably came from an agency – it was so clearly designed to capture the attention of the targeted demographic.
Some people here seem to think that police should have to operate with a what would the public think about us having that ad, because of our past – well that makes one wonder how individuals with a past operate in their daily lives if they also had to live like this.
So I suppose those convicted and regarded as guilty because of what other people have done with their same identity, race, religion or sexuality, or their job – somehow reflects on them all and they are collectively guilty.
Even the police minority is deserving of some slack – well at least on the smaller issues.
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