Police told terror ads too terrifying offensive

The Association of Chief Police Officers has been told not to re-broadcast an anti-terror advert it ran on TalkSPORT radio. The advert urged people to call the "Anti-Terrorist Hotline" to report suspicious behaviour such as anyone paying with cash "because he doesn't have a bank card", or keeping his curtains closed "because …

[Adam Salisbury]

"and he keeps his curtains closed because"

Well that's the entire population of night shift workers and those who live with them branded as terror suspects eh?

Nice going Plod

[Anonymous Coward]

Me too

Well, I keep my curtains closed because screen glare hurts my eyes.

Fuck you, coppers, no wonder nobody likes you anymore.

[Anonymous Coward]

I used to live

next to a bus stop, and i kept my curtains closed! There's nothing like sitting on the sofa, watching tv, and having a bus full of people staring in your window at you for a minute or so, while they wait for it to set off again.

[Eden]

OMG I'm a terrorist!!

My flat overlooks a busy main street/road and has large windows so naturally we keep the blinds down most of the time as I get tired of drunk idiots from the pub next door trying to talk to us or having to sneak past my own windows when I get out the bathroom or bed in less than full attire.

As my wifes company has folded I'm also pertty permenantly overdrawn so simply draw all my cash needs out each pay day as my card inevitably gets locked quickly as our bills go out of just my wage putting me overdrawn and I need cash for petrol and food.

That makes me a terrorist apparently!

Idiots.

[Bill Fresher]

Fit the bill

Well you certainly sound a little angry about your unfortunate situation... which is probably what starts a lot of people off on the path of terror, init.

[Eden]

Anything to do with the return of detections

With the police "Detections" returning I'm wondering if this is related.

Close my curtains/blinds so people walking down the high street can't see into my bedroom, and I'm a terrorist.

Leave them open and if I dare to get out of bed naked or have sex then as the public can see into my bedroom from the main road I'm guilty of multiple other offences...nice!, that will look great on plods detection sheet.

[Pete 2]

Well, that's every teenager on the list

doesn't talk to anyone, keeps their curtains closed, doesn't have a bank account.

Just pull the wagon up outside the local school and herd 'em in. the world won'tbe any safer - but at least the amount of shoplifting will go down

[Anonymous Coward]

Ye gods

common sense has surfaced, if only a little.

[Anonymous Coward]

Not Good Enough

This ad ran some serious shivers down my spine. It is a near-perfect replica of some of the posters and radio announcements from the age of Joseph Vissarionovich. It stirred some "genetic memory" from the days when 90% of my extended family on my mom's side got their marching orders down that corridor in the basement that finishes with that famous wall painted in institutional green.

Banning this ad is not enough.

It should be unbanned and run repeatedly in parallel with the Stalin ones so people really get a sense of perspective on what is a democracy and what is a country run by a deluded offspring of a church official (any likelihood is probably purely coincidental).

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Not Good Enough

"...and what is a country run by a deluded offspring of a church official..."

Er, you do realise that Brown's not PM anymore?

Also, since Stalin's regime heavily persecuted the church your comparison there may be open to some criticism...

[Anonymous Coward]

I do realise that Brown is not a PM anymore

That is exactly my point.

We are apparently having an attempt to return back to democracy (let's see if it lasts). It will be good if the coppers are reminded about it properly not just through a symbolic slap on the wrist.

[Trevor_Pott]

"Symbolic slap on the wrist"

Why symbolic? The pold in your country want to bring back witch hunts? Bring back the stocks and pillory just for them. Remember that the police can only execute their duties because the citizens of your country consent to being policed. Maybe you should take a lesson from the French and get out in the streets once and a while.

The only way that idiots like this ever learn is to prove to them that despite all their efforts, all the money, sweat and risk they have taken to make everyone terrified all the time…

…you aren’t afraid at all.

[Z 1]

Chilling

"Be a government informer. Report your family and friends. Fabulous prizes to be won!"

I was wandering through the underground the other day and did a double take at one of the tubes information posters on CCTV. It said "We are watching out for you" and just as I looked, someone walked passed and their arm managed to obscure it partially for a second, enough for it to read "We are watching you". Sent a shiver down my spine.

[John Smith 19]

@Z 1

"Be a government informer. Report your family and friends. Fabulous prizes to be won!"

One of Red Dwarf's finest episodes.

Not nearly so funny when you still seem to be living through it.*

Mine will be the one with the DVD's to "1990". One of Edward Woodward's least know jobs. another one you felt ACPO and NuLabor felt would make a good training manual.

[TimNevins]

DVD's

AFAIK this was only broadcast once on TV.

I wasnt aware it was on DVD. Is this a new development?

[Stacy]

Another dwarfer!!!

I couldn't help but think about that as well...

I just can't believe that someone would even think that was a good thing to send out!

[Anonymous Coward]

Government Informer?

iN this case it's not the government, it's ACPO. Seems that our new government aren't caving in to every request from the police. Maybe they've realised Gordon's planned police state is a bad idea, or maybe it's just something they're doing to save money (I'm with the latter) either way the end result is a good thing.

[serviceWithASmile]

wtf

all that is needed is a reward for ratting on your neighbours and we are repeating past mistakes, comrades.

[xj25vm]

Well done terrorists - you done it after all

It looks like the terrorists have achieved their goals after all. Turning our society in a bunch of fear mongering, suspicious, out of our minds lunatics who have willingly sacrificed their freedom, quality of life, humanity - because we are obsessed with absolute, abject fear.

So, according to this radio advert, every loner, slightly missfit, miss-adjusted, everybody who is a little bit weird, a little bit unusual, a bit non-conformist, uncommon in any way - will end up being the target and victim of our 'safety-for-all' antiterrorism effort. All we have to do is just keep our heads down and act like a flock of sheep - making sure we don't do anything different then the next guy - and the next after, and the next million. I was brought up in a communist regime - and this all starts to look pretty much the same. We were told the same things by the internal 'security' police about keeping an eye on our neighbours for the sake of the 'mother country'. My goodness, it really looks like one of those scary futuristic films. When the hell did people stop having any balls and started caring so little about their freedom and their soul?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not quite,

as you have to add the unspoken "and is slightly coloured" to get to terrorist. If you are a white loner or misfit then you must be a paedo....

[Goat Jam]

When?

"When the hell did people stop having any balls and started caring so little about their freedom and their soul?"

I could tell you the answer succinctly but it is pretty high on the politically incorrect scale.

Suffice to say that when you have a particular demographic group who has a natural predilection to seek out safety over all other concerns attaining political superiority within society combined with the opposite demographic who have a natural predilection to offer (the appearance) of safety to the safety seeking demographic while at the same time wanting to incapacitate or destroy all the non alpha members of their own demographic group in then you end up with a situation such as this.

The alpha members of the protecting group end up doing whatever it takes to engender fear in the protection seeking group in order to attain power over the non alpha portions (majority) of their own group.

Eventually it is their arrogance that leads to their downfall. Ultimately they will go far enough down that road that they begin to believe they have subdued the non-alphas to the point that they are no longer a credible threat and they have the enforcement structures sufficiently in place to contain whatever resistance they do manage to mount.

At this point they decide that they no longer need to actively manipulate political support from the safety seekers at which point the safety seekers who enabled the entire totalitarian mess in the first place finally get a taste of what they have wrought.

Time passes until ultimately the whole thing collapses, usually due to economic failure.

Rinse lather repeat. The human race seems incapable of learning.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nicely put!

That is all!

Apart from the fact that it should be tattooed on the faces of Labour politicians who will then have a lifetime of other people reading it back to them.

Will it change their fascist/PR/short-termism mentalities, probably not. Hopefully they'll be out of power for several generations now and, again hopefully, we'll have more of a common-sense approach and gradually get back some of the freedoms they were so quick to take away, and their acolytes who at the head of every 'Public' organization like ACPO will gradually be replaced.

[Anonymous Coward]

ahh so

The business that trades under the name ACPO wants to frighten the general public into asking for more police, particularly expensive senior policemen looking at terrorism. Is this suspicious behavior of a business association that wants to expand? or is it dedicated policemen working for a safer country, or is it proof of a slide into a police state where being odd or different is to be communicated to the police, I guess the STASI is a bit of a pinup for ACPO..

Write to your MP asking why so much public money is given to the private business that is ACPO.

[Anonymous Coward]

A terrorist or....

Somebody who is growing dope?.

Pays in cash - Yes

Doesn't talk to anybody - Yes

Keep the curtains closed - Yes

Sounds just like the average urban dope farm to me.

[Loyal Commenter]

Except for:

1) Urban dope farms exist and are relatively common.

2) These can be found by police helicopters using infrared cameras, and good old-fashioned detective work.

3) As such, they represent real, hard, unglamorous, potentially dangerous work (think booby-traps) for plod. For which paper work has to be done.

[The Indomitable Gall]

Also...

Other demographics fit this profile. The one that springs to mind is illegal immigrants. Didn't they want us to grass them up a wee while ago? It wasn't popular. Another one is benefit cheats and tax dodgers. Didn't they want us to grass them up a wee while ago? That wasn't popular either. I'm sure lots of other criminals are the same.

There was a second advert that mentions a guy who's looking for a new house using Google Maps/Earth, has three lockups full of "his mother's stuff" and bought a flight with cash. Sounds a lot more like a housebreaker and/or fence to me.

So are they just using anti-terror as a way to catch people involved in standard domestic crime?

Would the police do such a thing? No, it's not like they've used anti-terror stop-and-search to catch domestic criminals or anything that bad....

[Stu]

Oh don't worry about weed-growers

The plod are using their night-vision goggles to look out for houses with unusually high heat signatures coming from the loft. Another surveilance nightmare for the rest of us.

Infra-Red Night vision can't see thru glass as it goes, otherwise I'd think the plod are recording predator-vision style porn as they fly around the city gazing into everybodys bedrooms at night.

I wouldn't put something like this past todays 'vigilant' coppers - no better than the drooling security guards who sit watching changing room video footage at department stores.

[TimeMaster T]

"Night vision" vs. Thermal Imaging

Unless the tech has changed drastically in the last few years normal "Night Vision" or "Light amplification" equipment like goggles and scopes cant see beyond the IR wavelengths that are very close to visible light. You can see "near IR" sources like IR lasers and LEDs but not longer wavelength heat signatures like in Predator.

For that kind of imaging you need to use a different rig altogether. The "Thermal Imaging" cameras are the ones that they use to find heat anomalies on buildings, like those caused by grow lights left on 24/7. Both types see in infra-red/heat but the wavelengths and hardware are very different.

[Anonymous Coward]

hmm

Betray your family and friends!

Fabulous prizes to be won!

[Atonnis]

Erm....that's scary...

I don't talk to my neighbours much, since who does nowadays - especially since I'm a single white male living alone...I try to pay with cash as much as I can because I can track my money far more easily by getting out cash and limiting my expenditure...and I have my blinds down all the time because the bunch of annoying teens who pass my house and stare in my window regularly drives me absolutely nuts.

So according to this advert I'm suspicious and should be reported...because I'm a single guy who likes to track his expenditure and doesn't like being gawped at in his own home I should have my life put under scrutiny, my reputation ruined and possibly lose my job because people would never trust me again?

I'm glad it's been banned...hopefully the w*nkers who made this advert will have their own lives scrutinsed first.

[AlistairJ]

The irony

All of this oppressive policing is coming to you from the generation who grew up in one of the most liberal regimes in human history.

The future is black, comrades.

[AndrueC]

Two out of three ain't bad

I don't talk to people much because that's the way I am. Sorry. Just not very sociable.

I keep the curtains drawn at the front upstairs to keep the rooms cool, and blinds mostly drawn downstairs because I value my privacy and/or the sun makes it hard to watch TV.

I suppose the saving grace is that I'm the exact opposite when it comes to spending. I hardly ever use cash and frequently have nothing in my wallet except plastic.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Two out of three ain't bad

I really think that that stick-on window frosting stuff is the way forward. Looks a lot nice than manky net curtains and you can get it with holes in so you can still peer out.

Er, but anyway.

[Pawel 1]

Even better idea

Here's what people in continental Europe used for a long time: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Vitrage1477.JPG

You cannot see anything from the outside through it (well, unless you're standing with your nose against the glass) but it doesn't block any light entering in. Apart from these, they also have normal curtains as well for the evening (as then, when the inside is brighter than the outside, the inside is perfectly visible).

I've got no idea why these never got popular in Britain - especially after learning that they are fairly popular in France.

[Semaj]

a

They exist here but are seen as old fashioned these days in favour of blinds.

We call them "net curtains".

[Anonymous Coward]

Sticky window frosting

Just the thing for the discerning terrorist. Now with selected classic texts to liven up the neighbourhood!

[Lionel Baden]

OH FFS

I keep my curtains closed as much as possible

A: i dont want people to see my computer on the way home from the pub and think fuck it ill have that., Plus i hate the light behond me cant see anything on my screen

B: Kids running round naked.

C: ill let the missus explain the third reason !!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I must then be a Terrorist

I have curtains closed all day, and profer paying for thing in shops with cash. And to Jo Blogs on the street it dosn't seam that I have bank account.

Now I have curtains close because the sun shines all day on computer monitor and also makes it imposiable to talk with clients using a Webcam as the sun glares in to it. Programing all day log with sun shining on screen isn't that easy, so shut curtains and to lazy to open then after 6 hours.

I think in job description of Police:

1) Are thick as two planks, good your hired.

[neb]

@Anonymous Coward

you are a manfrommars and i claim my finders fee whilst you are sent for re-education in a friendly work farm in the falklands

[Lionel Baden]

Hang on .....

I get it ...

This doesnt apply to us .....

It must be only if you have a beard and turban !!!!!!!

makes much more sense now .....

[live2give]

I live next door to that that guy! could it be that 1).. .2)...

1) He is a POSSIBLE terrorist, in which case boy do I feel stupid for not noticing before I read the ADVERT.

2) Hes not and...

-He lives on his own as his mother died and never married or had a girlfriend.

-Pays by cash as he is 50 odd years old and has always paid for items in cash(hes doesnt have a pc or the need for modern fangled tech).

-He closes the curtains because he doesn't want filthy netted curtains or the scum that roam the streets peering into his house whilst he's at church.

Brings neghbourhood watch(list) to a whole new level.

[Anonymous John]

Damn2

Coat please. I might as well hand myself in before the police come knocking.

[Anonymous Coward]

Happened to me

I used to live up North. Lost my job but lived in a 3 bed house. Neighbors never saw me (went out early looking for a job, stayed late at the library).

Turned out later they thought I was the Provo's quartermaster, busily burying gear for their (presumed) impending Leeds campaign.

Had my Mother not turned up and been her usual self it was only a matter of time before my back door disappeared one night and I would then spend the next 28 days explaining where I'd stashed the guns, ammo and semtex.

Not having guns, ammo or semtex in the first place this would have been difficult.

Welcome to the state of fear.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Happened to me

Alright, alright, let's calm down for a second and remember that

a) This sort of advice has been chucked around before and society hasn't crumbled

b) The point of the story is that this sort of advice has been found to be a bit off, like, so there is no suggestion it is being adopted as a social norm - in fact there is considerable resistance to it

c) Most people remain happily oblivious to the habits of those around them and the only people likely to get paranoid and squeal on their innocent neighbours thinking it's their civic duty are the kind who would probably have effed with your ess before, because they're nosey idiots.

This campaign is not going to make us into a nation of nosey idiots. If anything it's only going to make us into a nation of Orwell-misquoting hysterics.

I'm as concerned as anyone about our rights and freedoms (and know a bit about all this having written about it) but I also have a bit more faith in things not actually being that drastically bad, and people not being mindless gullible fear-driven douchebags who keep diaries of their neighbours' every curtain-twitch. Have a little more faith in society - it's a lot bigger than politics, and is still composed mostly of perfectly decent and rational individuals. It's alright, you know. Be vigilant, keep tabs on this sort of crap, yes, but don't run out into the street (or in this instance, this thread) screaming and waving your arms around.

Actually, if you feel you would like to run out into the street screaming and waving your arms around about this, you should go with that impulse, because I would like some peace and quiet and time to contemplate how lucky I still am and will continue to be and how most of the rest of the world would probably walk over broken glass to be in my position.

K? K.

[Mike Smith]

Orwell-misquoting hysterics

Good points Sarah, all of them, but there is still the fact that a body of very senior policemen saw fit to release this Stalinist piece of scaremongering crap. Put simply, they should have had more bloody sense in the first place. And if it turns out they knew full well what they were doing, what does that say about the mentalities of the UK's senior law enforcement people?

Just my 0.02.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Orwell-misquoting hysterics

Yeah, they should, but these things have a great way of correcting themselves, as we're seeing.

I'm really not suggesting there's nothing to worry about here, just that there isn't that much to be consumed with worry about. Why be consumed with worry if you don't need to be?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be consumed with worry,

be happy?

[Anonymous Coward]

d)

The real problem, as I see it anyway, is that the police even comes up with spectacularly bad ideas like this. That is, there's apparently a state of fear stuck in their minds complete with a strong compulsion to infect the rest of the population too. That's not what the police force is for, dear police force, or at least not as principally envisioned.

But you do have a point that running around flapping arms and havin' a good froth at the mouth isn't exactly productive. So, everyone, cool down, close the curtains, and write a nice friendly polite letter to your MP asking them to step up pressure to launch the long-overdue police functioning and anti-terrorist measures effectiveness reviews.

[thenim]

while I tend to agree generally...

I have to say that an "individual" may be rational and sensible (except the folk who form their opinions based on the crap in the daily wail), unfortunately as a collective, "people" are pretty stupid and gullible...

So yes, there are a sensible few, like the ones piping up here in rage, but it only takes a stupid few to get something like this out of control... (case in point: this particular campaign made it through to a public broadcast!)

There are are so many parallels going back in history, it's scary... And what's more scary is that these senior nitwits who approved this campaign, should have been in the "sensible majority" - but clearly weren't, and more importantly, clearly not aware of history!

So, I say, what we need to do send the fucking idiots responsible for this cockup (and any future ones) on a GCSE course in History!

[Anonymous Coward]

@Sarah: Nothing to worry about?

If you happened to be a photographer, you'd probably think differently. Coppers, security guards, etc. have been hassling photographers going about their job for years now, stopping, searching, arresting and detaining them, and deleting lawfully taken images, under the pretence of "anti-terrorrism legislation" (specifically, sect. 44). Even though the application of sect.44 has been declared unlawful by the European Court of Human Rights, the Met has stated that it will continue to use it.

You should have a look at http://photographernotaterrorist.org/ if you're not already familiar with it. It does not paint a pretty picture.

This advert is only the next step, extending the harrassment from a specific group of individuals (photographers) to a larger one (single males), instilling fear and hysteria into the general populace. It looks as if you're lucky enough not to be a member of either group.

Unless you're white, female, middle-aged, married with 2 kids, a car and a dog, it's only a question of time until you are targeted too.

We already live in a police state. There are more CCTV cameras than in any other civilised country on the planet, people are regularly harrassed by the police, they can be arrested without reason or access to a lawyer for exessively long periods of time, DNA samples of innocent people are collected and stored without any time limit, councils employ counter-terrorism surveillance against a mother who fibs to get her kid in a better school, to name just a few. And I haven't even mentioned international travel yet (air-based or otherwise).

The Stasi would have creamed their collective pants.

Black helicopters for obvious reasons, and AC because anything else would be silly.

[Pete 2]

Boiling a frog

is done slowly, so it doesn't notice - not all at once so it jumps out of the pot

> This sort of advice has been chucked around before and society hasn't crumbled

Usually when this sort of advice has been chucked around, the country has been at war and the population has been exhorted to look out for spies or saboteurs - with the internment of those thought most likely. The problem with this campaign is that we're not at war, it breeds fear and if not a bad thing in its own right is a step down the path of heating the pot with the frog in it. We have to push back against this sort of absurdity, otherwise the heat gets turned up.

[CD001]

differ

----

people not being mindless gullible fear-driven douchebags

----

And that, Ms B, is where we differ... most people are mindless, fear-driven douchebags as far as I can tell. ;)

[42]

Agreed

"This campaign is not going to make us into a nation of nosey idiots"

You are that already, oh wise head censor.

[Intractable Potsherd]

For your points to be correct, Sarah ...

... you would have to show that there has never been a progression from sane and sensible society to one driven by fear and constant surveillance by the ordinary people in society. You cannot do this, because it isn't true. Without going a hundred years back, Germany and the Soviet states prove you wrong. Even Britain does - compare the society we have now, with its ridiculous emphasis on suspicion of ... well, anyone really,* with the society of the 1970s. The progression is clear, and whilst we might be seeing a slight reversal, there is no evidence yet that it is more than a blip.

By all means, try to keep things in perspective, but do not get complacent.

* e.g. photographers, men in places where children are, people with Middle Eastern appearance, Muslims, people buying "too much" fertilizer/sugar ... (list not intended to be anywhere near complete).

[Sarah Bee]

Re: For your points to be correct, Sarah ...

I'm not complacent, not at all. I just think that fear of these things can become a greater problem than the thing itself.

I would never suggest there is no problem - there's evidence enough in this thread. It's notable that the posters who have experienced victimisation are more measured in tone than the ones who apparently haven't.

I wasn't making any definitive statements, so it's not a matter of being proved wrong or otherwise, I think. But yes I take your point.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice points Ms B (ooer)

But if we didn't have arm-waving idiots who rant on these pages, you'd be out of a job!

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Nice points Ms B (ooer)

I wouldn't, actually. Moderating is only one of several tasks I perform here. They'd probably keep me if only because I make really good tea. I mean, really good tea, if I do say so myself.

[John F***ing Stepp]

Yes they had one (snicker) now they have another.

(Advertisement writer on couch; therapist with notepad.)

"How long have you had these feeling that people are out to get you?"

"Since Blair sir ," Breaks down sobbing, "Tony and George were mean to me."

"Hm," makes rather cruel note,"I see, the terrorists had already won at that stage."

[Jerome 2]

You too can help protect our glorious nation

Join the ranks of the inoffizielle Mitarbeiter today.

[Anonymous Coward]

NOT too terrifying. TOO insulting more like!

The ad is an insult to anyone who prefers to keep their lives PRIVATE from everyone else. Not everyone is a Me-me-me, must-become-the-next-z-lebrity kind of person. My curtains are shut often, I also prefer to pay cash, so how does this make me a terrorist?

And you guys are not helping with a misleading headline.

[Keris]

If you have nothing to hide...

... you have nothing to fear. Isn't that what they say? So just leave your windows clear (leave your doors unlocked as well in case the pold want to come in), with all your valuables and bank details on view, because if you try to hide them or pay with (shock, horror) cash then you are obviously a bad person.

Now if only I could persuade some nice rich people to do that. Leadership should start at the top, yes? So why is the door to No. 10 Downing Street closed?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you hide nothing...

... you get done in for indecent exposure. Of course, that's the friendly infallible ever courteous plod for you, so you truly have nothing to fear. Carry on then.

[DrXym]

The real message

Does the man at the end of your street have a swarthy complexion or look a bit foreign? Does he ululate or jabber in some guttural mockery of English? Does he work in a corner shop? Does he have a hook for a hand? This may mean nothing, but together it could all add up to you having suspicions. We all have a role to play in combating terrorism. If you see anything suspicious, call the confidential, Anti-Terrorist Hotline on 0800 XXXXXX. If you suspect it, report it.

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other hand

I keep my curtains closed, pay cash and don't know my neighbours, and I am a terrorist, so they're not totally barking up the wrong tree here. I think this ad was a useful public service, I'll be opening my curtains and paying with my debit card from now on.

[blackworx]

Apparently

There's another, equally sinister, ad that has been allowed to stand. Something about spending time looking at aerial photographs and paying for flights in cash.

ACPO need their arses kicked into touch.

[The Indomitable Gall]

I heard that one...

...and I thought "who has lots of storage space, looks at photographs of houses and buys things in cash." I realised it wasn't a sophisticated international terror cell, but a professional housebreaker.

[LinkOfHyrule]

Woah

If I'm ever in my local branch of some soft furnishing emporium and some shifty fella comes in to buy curtains, I had better call the cops. They will raid his house, find the curtains and do him for processing terrorist materials!

f'king idiots!

[Jolyon Ralph]

But do they have an SLR camera?

That's all that was missing from Plod's Entirely Accurate Description of Terrorists.

[serviceWithASmile]

or

"Plod's Entirely Accurate Description of Terrorists."

P.E.A.D.O ?

sorry - reading too many DARPA articles :)

[Anonymous Coward]

Terrorism?

I think the ad is intended to be terrorism - social control terrorism... but alas...

Given the IRA or whatever they're calling themselves is currently blowing the fuck out of belfast, I think the anti-terror money would be better spent the way that it used to be spent... Infiltrating and disrupting an organisation which has for decades terrorised the British public - we all remember the _REAL_ bombs going off, non of this backpack of TATP crap which doesn't really do much when compared to 2-3 tonnes of SEMTEX or C4 in a white van, driven by a white man, parked in a loading zone and left only for a few minutes before BOOM!

Now we're in fear of "internation extremists" when we have extremists blowing bombs up down the road, and heaven knows what's next... UK mainland attacks again?

international extremists give people a "right" to be xenophobic - that "right" is as wrong as slavery - it's racism pure and simple, government and police endorsed racism. e.g. putting up cameras in the areas populated by asians - no, certainly no racial profiling there at all...

[CD001]

Hmmm

Live in the West Midlands do we?

[Anonymous Coward]

translation of text

The man at the end of the street doesn't talk to his neighbours much, because he thinks, quite rightly, they're all cunts. He pays with cash because the banks are cunts, and he keeps his curtains closed because his hobby of wanking himself into a coma is considered public indecency if he doesn't. This may mean nothing, but together it could all add up to you realising that actually, he's probably exactly the same as the rest of us.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: translation of text

So, your neighbour thinks his neighbours are all cunts, is what you're saying.

Tee hee!

[Tony S]

@Sarah

Who says you don't have a sense of humour!

That's another keyboard ruined - I must stop drinking tea when reading the comments.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: @Sarah

I don't know - who says I don't have a sense of humour, Tony? I will fight them.

[Tony S]

@Sarah

" who says I don't have a sense of humour"

Not me - I wouldn't dare!

"I will fight them."

Oh, in that case it's the guy who lives on his own, keeps the curtains closed, and pays for everything with cash! (shit... that really does sound like me!)

[Anonymous Coward]

@Sarah

"I will fight them."

Is this where we stop discussing the article in question and all ask for Playmobil?

[Anonymous Coward]

@Mycho@Sarah

Simply put yes! Playmobil is the way forward here..

[Anonymous Coward]

re:re:

essentially... oh, wait. what? (damn your intelligence with semantics! )

[blackworx]

Re: translation of text

"keeps his curtains closed because his hobby of wanking himself into a coma is considered public indecency if he doesn't"

Who'd'a'thunk it? Frankie Boyle is a commentard!

PS: new keyboard please.

[NB]

silly plodface

I keep my curtains closed because my bedroom faces a road and I don't want the local populace gawking into what basically amounts to my sanctuary when I'm playing my Xbox or trying to have a nap/watch TV etc.

I pay in cash because that makes it easier to track my expenditure.

I don't talk to people much because I'm not a very sociable person.

Holy shit I must be a terrorist?

Fucking idiot cops.

[Anonymous Coward]

Huh

"based on trends identified by police and had been amongst evidence given in court at recent terrorism trials"

Would those be the photographers that you apprehended for acting suspicious? Or the kids you throw down stairs? Or perhaps the journo who wrote your name down and was taller than your shortest officer?

I've known coppers to do the curtain-cash-no-talky thing too you know..

I had a good laugh when I read this.. then felt like a good cry. This is the shit we've signed on to accept? I don't know whether they're trying to incite a riot, or maybe they need help in reducing the plods on the street courtesy of mob action; but this is getting ridiculous.

[Anonymous Coward]

To all bomb makers:

If you open the curtains and pay with plastic the police will never suspect you.

[Ad Fundum]

The ads have been running for ages

Only a variation of existing adverts has been kiboshed - in different formats these ads have been running for some time. They've been in print and most notably on billboards, which has led to some serious lampooning on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/groups/they_must_think_were_all_morons/

[John H Woods]

They've missed some...

Has a smartphone - easy anonymous browsing - terrorist

Has an ancient payg phone - easy anonynmous calls - terrorist

Has children - good cover for being a terrorist

Childless - obviously a terrorist

Has a heavily encrypted wifi network - terrorist

Has no encryption on wifi network - terrorist

Goes to the mosque - terrorist

Goes to the church - good cover for being a terrorist

Pretends not to have a religion - terrorist

Basically - is not one of us, where 'us' starts off as 'white' and then narrows all the way down to 'member of ACPO' as things progress.

[envmod]

one off the wrist

I shut my curtains when I'm staging the six-inch olympics in my living room. last thing i want is a SWAT team bursting through my door when I'm on the vinegar strokes.

[Just Thinking]

The scary part

These traits "had been amongst evidence given in court at recent terrorism trials". I hope they had a hell of a lot more than that.

[Mike Smith]

There, fixed if for them

The following message is brought to you by TalkSPORT, the Anti-Terrorist Hotline and the Ministry for State Security. The man at the end of the street owns a camera and takes pictures of buildings and people with it. He pays with cash because he says he doesn't want a bank card. He doesn't like visitors and won't let uninvited people into his house. He keeps his curtains closed at night and has lights on until all hours. He has brown skin and a black beard. He has been seen coming out of domed buildings and associates with other brown-skinned individuals, and speaks to them in a foreign language. He doesn't go into pubs. He is polite and distant and keeps himself to himself. This may mean nothing, but together it could all add up to you developing xenophobic paranoia. We all have a role to play in combating terrorism. If you see anything suspicious, or if he nicks your parking space, call the confidential, Anti-Terrorist Hotline on 0800 XXXXXX. If you suspect it, report it. Be alert, citizen. Enemies Of The State are all around us.

[Roger Varley]

Nothing new here ...

remember Mr Winston Kodogo ...

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Nothing new here ...

Right, listen, I will reject any Orwell references in this thread from hereon in because all you're doing is diluting ideas of great power and I won't have it. Seriously. If you respect his work so much then don't parrot it at every opportunity - maybe it is relevant, but we're all aware of that, being literate and preoccupied with civil liberties and all.

If I had a quid for every Orwell reference I've moderated here (with a fiver for each instance of "It's a novel, not a manual"), I could quit.

[Loyal Commenter]

Except, Sarah

That that was a 'Not the Nine-O'Clock News' reference.

[The Fuzzy Wotnot]

Ermmm

That's from "Not the Nine O'Clock News", nothing to do with Orwell.

"Caught in possession of thick lips, black curly hair and holding an offensive wife."

[Roger Varley]

Errmm

and "looking at me in a funny way" as well ....

[Roger Varley]

Re: Nothing new here Orwellian reference?

The Orwellian character was Winston Smith. You're possibly a tad young to remember Mr Winston Kodogo.

[LesB]

Before your time?

Wasn't Winston Kodogo the gentleman who kept being arrested in a Not the Nine O'Clock News sketch?

[Mike Smith]

Is this your hedgehog, sir?

Never realised that Kodogo was Swahili for Smith.

Oh, suddenly I feel rather old.

[Geoff Campbell]

That wasn't Orwell.

Sorry. I'll get my coat, shall I?

GJC

[Sarah Bee]

Re: That wasn't Orwell.

Heh, sorry GJC, the 'Winston' just reminded me. I was being bolshy.

I didn't mean to belittle anyone's own experience, by the way - I know there are some real horror stories, some of which are here, and it's a disgrace.

[Grease Monkey]

Acpo?

The significant thing about this is that the ads were placed by acpo. Wind back a few months and the government were right behind the police on creating a police state, the new government don't seem to support them at all. It smacks somewhat of the good old USSR doesn't it? Report your neighbours for not being conformists.

However don't they need reasonable suspicion to start surveilance. I don't think paying cash, keeping your curtains closed or not talking to your neighbours would be accepted as reasonable suspicion by the courts.

Remember the suss law? The police have been trying to bring that back for a long time.

[lpopman]

titular reminiscence

I remember the suss law very well.

During the late 80's and early 90's I used to play pen and paper RPG's at my friends house on the other side of town. It would not be uncommon to see me (long-haired and swarthy at the time) in the small hours of the morning carrying two document cases (much larger than briefcases). I would be stopped and searched quite regularly, and have my cases gone through.

It all verged on harrassment, but I could do nothing under the suss law.

Oh shit, I've just realised....I don't have a bank account, I keep my curtains closed due to sensitive eyes and have aspergers, so I have problems socialising. I must be a terrorist, so they were probably right to check my cases after all.

[Anonymous Coward]

let me fix that for you:

"The man at the end of the street doesn't talk to his neighbours much, because it's none of your business. He pays with cash because it's none of your business, and he keeps his curtains closed because it's none of your business"

[Anonymous Coward]

Time to rein in ACPO once and for all...

ACPO really do need castrating. Under successive NuLabour Home Secretarys they were shamelessly over-indulged to the point of incredulity - their influence on policy and law making is staggering (most of it going on behind closed doors, well away from public inquiry, of course). They receive public money and proceed to use it to undermine civil freedoms, whilst actively seeking to criminalize ever-greater numbers of the population by inventing and promoting sinister new offenses (such as 'cartoon' pr0n). Offenses that in more sober times would get laughed out of court as bordering on the insane.

Yet still we indulge these uniformed clowns, still we allow them to weasel their way into policy making, into the legislative process.

And when we see all that bad law go into effect, the prison population doubling, we shake our heads and fancy we might just build more prisons since there are clearly so many criminals around. Pfft!

These adverts, banned or not, are what you get when you fail to control the authoritarian, self-promoting tendencies of your national police force. ACPO, along with other high-echelon police service organizations in the UK, all feel they can get away with this kind of malevolent propaganda - because the last lot in government proved to them they could. Hopefully this present Coalition will prove rather less amenable to their self-interested agenda.

Time will tell.

[Spongibrain]

There's a few more they can use (assuming Mr Gilliam would let them)

"Don't suspect a friend, report him"

"Be Safe: Be Suspicious"

"Trust in haste, Regret at leisure"

"Loose talk is noose talk"

and how about this one

"It is absolutely right and fair that those found guilty should pay for their periods of detention and the Information Retrieval Procedures used in their interrogation".

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh yes,....

....Brazil, the film that 1984 should have been.

"Have you got a 27B/6?"

[Lottie]

Egads!!

That describes my entire street. I live in an area populatedmostly by students and night shift workers. Many of the neighbours are immigrant workers whicxh means they hardly pop out and say "what ho deary, nice weather" and most pay in cash for stuff as most of the shops round our way don't take cards.

I live in a terrorist hotbed. What am I going to do? If I don't act on my unreasonable fears, the terrorists win!

oh wait.

[ShaggyDoggy]

Normal

What is the state of the country, when normal behaviour is considered suspicious ?

Oh wait ...

[Anonymous Coward]

OK then

Well, I never have any cash on me, and frequently wonder round in the all-together with the curtains open, so I must be OK.

Paris - loves being in the all-together too.

[Anonymous Coward]

OMG

"The following message is brought to you by TalkSPORT and the Anti-Terrorist Hotline. The man at the end of the street doesn't talk to his neighbours much, because he likes to keep himself to himself. He pays with cash because he doesn't have a bank card, and he keeps his curtains closed because his house is on a bus route. This may mean nothing, but together it could all add up to you having suspicions. We all have a role to play in combating terrorism. If you see anything suspicious, call the confidential, Anti-Terrorist Hotline on 0800 XXXXXX. If you suspect it, report it."

I hadn't realised this OMG brilliant. I have phoned about at least five of my neighbours, obviously they are terrorists, I just though they was paedo's? There are six or seven teenage hoodies in the area as well does anyody know if the ACPO could get them lifted at the same time?

[The Fuzzy Wotnot]

"Yarp!"

When I read that I had images of the plod rounding up the local yobs and "making them disappear", then the local head-plod stating "It's all for the greater good."!

[Anonymous Coward]

Telephone Number

Is on the Met Police web site btw. Way to go fellow commentards. Have now finished reporting neighbours and am just starting on some of the more suspicious folks in the office. Should I report the dozy cow that short changed me? Or perhaps this is going a bit far?

Just told the nice policeman about the local hoodies and they agree with me entirely. Walking round the estate with a heavy sun tan, covering your face with your nike top but wearing jeans that are so obviously hand me downs because they hang below your arse is clearly suspicious behaviour ffs.

[Anonymous Coward]

Somone in my local

Described my house as 'the one which always has its curtains closed' :(

[Tigra 07]

Terrorists have stolen the phone number?

Why did you blank out the terrorist hotline phone number Reg?

[Anonymous John]

Re Terrorists have stolen the phone number?

I don't think Sarah wants several armed plod smashing her door down at 6 in the morning, because an El Reg commentard has reported her for having offensive curtains or something.

[The Cube]

The ACPO should be first against the wall

We need to take a more French approach to dealing with those who have put themselves in charge of this country. A history of mass guillotining seems to work as a strong deterrent to this sort of behaviour, perhaps making a suitable example of those responsible for this ad would serve the same purpose over here?

The terrorists ruining this country are not the few religious nutters who want to make exploding chippatis of themselves but the evil scum bringing forth a new world order that must have Orwell spinning in his grave and the Stasi green with jealousy.

Perhaps we can start by asking the CIA to "render" the ACPO to Uzbekistan where they can be suitably "questioned" until they freely admit their conspiracy to undermine democracy in the UK?

[Anonymous Coward]

That French approach...

... ultimately saw France end up with more centralisation. It's still a fantastically badly run country full of silly bureaucratic cruft and whatnot. Beware of what you ask for, you might get it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Me too

I keep the curtains closed, can't see my PC screen otherwise.

I pay by cash, yeah, because I'm bankrupt, its easier than trying to persuade a bank to give me a card.

I don't talk to anybody, yeah, thats me too. I'm deaf, verbal communication is difficult and frustrating for me.

Anon because by that criteria, I must be a terrorist.

[Andrew the Invertebrate]

1985

Plod - "So what's your neighbours name?"

Citizen - "It's Mr Buttle, with a B"

[Anonymous Coward]

You're making jokes about this

I'd also laugh if it hadn't happened to me.

I'm a chemistry student, went back to my flat with a couple of textbooks when my next door neighbour saw me- (first time in the three years I lived here that I've met the neighbours).

Usually pay in cash to the local shop, as it doesn't take credit cards.

And what happens- the local police take me into custody for a little chat about terrorism, and confiscate my notes as they could be used for bomb making (yes, I'm studying about explosives for my course).

Now, every few days the Police come round "just to see how it's going".

[Mike Smith]

Gone way beyond a joke, mate

In a few years time, they'll be burning scientists like they used to burn witches. Civil engineers, physicists, chemists, biologists - all heretic sorcerers who dabble in Forbidden Knowledge.

[blackworx]

Re: You're making jokes about this

"Now, every few days the Police come round..."

Get yourself a lawyer mate. Take them to the fucking cleaners then move house pronto.

Sad that I had to add that last bit.

[ciaran]

So denounce yourselves!?

So don't wait for your neighbor to denounce you, do it to yourselves first!

Also that would stick one in the eye of the system...

[xyz]

Isn't this by the same bunch who....

...brought you the infamous "got 2 mobiles" - you're a terrorist, some years back?

ACPO Ltd...a bunch of twats.

[Anonymous Coward]

Joking aside

this is exactly how the Gestapo operated in Germany in the 30s - actively encouraging people to inform on neighbours who were deemed to have behaved in any way out of what was regarded as the "ordinary". This started off as meaning anyone who may be a spy but very quickly ended up meaning anyone who opposed the Nazi party and then anyone who was homosexual or a communist and then anyone who was Jewish.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIAFHjL3ZMg

Personally it scares the living hell out of me.

[Anonymous Coward]

No Joking is the answer

A fair while ago in this country we all lived under the threat of total Nuclear destruction. The government of the time published a document 'Protect and Survive'. So all the folks in the country started storing up brown paper and buckets of urine to build improvised shelters for indeed that was the advice in the official publications.

Yea right of course they did! OK now you are wondering how this is relevant.

Most people are fairly reasonable, even the police, and will eventually realise how stupid they are making themselves look. It is almost certainly true that serious restrictions on social liberties have been imposed, and resisting this is a good idea. But the levels of paranoia displayed by some of the commentators here are on the same level as the aforementioned publication. My advice to you and most of the others here is go, have a beer or two, get laid and smoke a fag. Chill out.

[Anonymous Coward]

I was

I was sat on the train the other day and chuckled to myself about the unattended baggage thing as I was sat next to the pile of unattended bags in the unattended bag section next to the nice seat.

But yeah, I tick all 3 of those boxes, the only time the curtains is when my mum comes down from Scotland to check I'm still alive.

But yeah 1) I don't talk to the people around me becouse I'm anti-social, shy and, not at all a people person, when I smile and nod it looks more creepy then inviting so I don't do it. I also don't really like people, most of my friends say that I not so much have friends instead I have people I tolerate.

2) I pay cash becouse I'm paranoid of using the machine and it saying "unauthorised" then looking stupid and paniky, and probably having some psychological brake.

3) I keep my curtains closed becouse I don't particularly like glaring light, or the outside, and becouse I use the curtain rail to hang my idol tapestries.

People have very real social problems (myself for instance) and the ever growing fear that you may not fit in, and that people think you're weird, and that might mean they think you're doing something wrong, and then you may have the police and others persecute you. Fear upon fear upon fear building up and crushing you. So you withdraw ever more deeply.

My problems are borderline. I don't like interacting in large groups, or most open venues, I move towards social situations that are "safe" for me. I avoid clubs, bars, town centres. I prefer what friends I have to visit, or host events at their houses or somewhere private like kareoke boxes. I don't trust people, and can't connect. I'm caught in a constant paradoxical state of not wanting to be close but needing to be close. I've been worse, and I've been better. I go through cycles, and I obsess about things that have happend long ago that others would have long since forgotten about. But for the most I get by at work, and with my small social circle.

98% of people who do those things listed arn't dangerous, they're trapped. Another 1.998% are running dope farms or other dodgy establishments, and the last 0.002% may be wannabe terroistas who are going to blow themselves up and the old bill probably already know about them.

All in all if you have someone like that living near by, invite them to dinner and build up a friendship instead.

[Jacqui]

teleworkers

Hmm, first the gov tries to get us to telework to reduce the congestion. Then some private company funded by backhanders from the police and gov decides to issue terrorist threats on the radio telling folks to panic about anyone who works from home.

Anyone found the original stazi or french ss poster version of this?

[Anonymous Coward]

@Sarah

O Esteemed Moderatrix:

Yes, you're lucky - feel free to count yourself so, and enjoy it.

But the point here is that some people aren't - this ad doesn't exist in isolation, it's part of a bigger picture in which the Police feel free to assault innocent people without fear of punishment, and the gummint put people in prison or indefinite detention without a fair trial. Just because it hasn't happened to you (yet) doesn't mean it's not real, and if you really do care about civil liberties, you ought to be getting more airiated about it. The problem with feeling lucky and enjoying it is that it comes dangerously close to denying the reality of other peoples' genuine experience of injustice.

I'm lucky too, in that I've never been on the receiving end of anything as headline-grabbing as the Menezez debacle or the hundreds of anti-terrorist raids in which people have had their doors smashed in and their computers confiscated, only to be told a few days later "You are not a terrorist, now go home but don't expect even an apology, let alone any compensation for your busted door, loss of earnings, ruined reputation etc."

But I have been on the receiving end of police unreasonableness, under sus laws, public order, anti-terror etc - and it's very very frightening (in one case leaving me with post-traumatic stress for years), even when it doesn't result in a charge or a prosecution (as it never has with me). And I'm white and middle-class, so I can hardly imagine what it's like for those who match the typical terrorist profile.

(Though worryingly, as a regular user of both cash and curtains, perhaps I now do match the typical terrorist profile.)

But I have a top tip for avoiding most police unpleasantness - stay away from London. There may be other places to avoid too, but the Met do seem to be particularly at odds with their community, and I know that my local Bill in Staffordshire are just lovely - even winning a Stonewall award for being a gay-friendly employer.

AC because I wouldn't want my misspent youth catching up with me...

[Anonymous Coward]

yep, it's fine when it happens to "the others"...

but when it's you getting dragged off to the cells accused of a serious offence and expected to essentially prove your innocence it's a different matter.

Luckily for me I remembered to ask for the duty solicitor, who promptly tore the bastards apart by pointing out that the git who made the phone call accusing me of child abuse was the same git I had been complaining about for years for harassing me.

Didn't stop the plod calling the Social Services child protection mob in and having me banned from my own home while the dozy bastards put 2 and 2 together.

One nervous breakdown and ongoing PTSD + depression + drink problems later and frankly, call me a sceptic, but I no longer trust ANYTHING or ANYONE connected to the police. And I live in an area where the cops are regarded as pretty reasonable. Sod living in the Met's patch.

[Anonymous Coward]

Piss off Plod!

My Aunt refuses to have a passport, refuses to have a bankcard, does not have a driving license, suffers from cronic asthma, arthiritis and her vision is quite poor. She pays cash for everything, she has to have a bank account to collect her disabled benefits.

My mother-in-law is quite similar, she has a bankcard but has stashed in a drawer as she hates using it. She also has no passport of driving license.

Most old folks hate using cards, don't often have many mates left and more often than not will not have lots of official docs like passports and driving licenses.

So basically a large proportion of the over 60's with health problems are terrorists according to the thick-as-two-shorts coppers!

Is this a cunning plan by the "Gubmint" to bump off the OAPs to save on the pensions? "Sorry Guv, we brought the old biddy in after she was reported for being a terrorist but, oh dear, she fell down the stairs and never got up.".

[JaitcH]

Useful insight into Plod mindset & 'thought process'

This, in Plod terminology, is INCITEMENT or maybe even RACIAL INCITEMENT. But the insight into what passes for Plod thoughts is very interesting .. and useful.

Many people are unemployed and unlikely to become bank customers - they like people with money - and what if people choose to keep their curtains dawn.

Next thing the 'Englisman's Castle' will be required to divest their estates of all leafged shrubbery exceeding 6 feet in height. Maybe they should ban all those gause/chintz curtains that prevent plain view of house interiors.

Or could it be that due to Plod budget reductions means they are abandining police cars for surveillance and masses of detectives are riding around on the upper decks of buses peeping in windows.

They could ask Google to run two sets of cameras on heir Streetview cars: a lower one for Google and a higher one for Plod.

Then building regs will need rewriting banning bedroom windows not facing the road, in case some miscreant tries to commit his crime in private.

As for myself, I will continue to use cash because any supposed privacy connected with banking or cards of any type is totally illusory. And a closing hint for terrorists: use a debit card and your bedroom curtains open!

[codemonkey]

@Sarah

"contemplate how lucky I still am and will continue to be and how most of the rest of the world would probably walk over broken glass to be in my position."

Just because the rest of the world may be daft enough to want to be in your position, doesn't mean that your position is anything like "human sensible". Every one into a gas chamber would rather be at the back of the queue, I dare say. No matter where you are, you're still in the queue.

It's called "thinking beyond".

Peace.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: @Sarah

What a lovely positive outlook you have there.

[Oliver 7]

Did you know...

...that in Holland, almost everyone leaves their curtains open all the time, even at night. One explanation of this is due to the Dutch national character - a spirit of openness and also one of order, i.e. the housewife would be ashamed to close the curtains as it would imply an untidy house. I also had another explanation (from a Dutch person) who suggested that during the war the Nazis made the Dutch keep their curtains open at night so they could be seen and the habit just stuck, i.e. "I have nothing to hide". Now that's just sinister!

No Nazi symbol unfortunately!

[Daz555]

Not the first time

They have run these adverts before - I remember last year there was one about keeping tabs on your colleagues at work - colleagues under suspicion are those who minimising their screen when you walk past, look at google maps and check flight times. Beyond belief, it really is!

[Anonymous Coward]

Didn't realise this

I have now reported the bloke who sits opposite me at work. Well for having a fairly heavy sun tan, and wearing a purple shirt. Oh and the 17 year old at the local coffee shop. She did try to do me out of nearly a 4 quid..... OK so I may have exaggerated a little on the phone, but it is pretty god damn obvious she is trying to obtain illicit funds for terrorist activities.

Gonna have a look round the office now and see if I can spot any of these terrorist screen minimizers . WTG Thanks for the tip Dazzar.

[Anonymous Coward]

And you've still go hugely more chance of dying in a car crash.

And there's still no talk of banning cars.

Funny old world.

[Anonymous Coward]

If it's about risk...

The most dangerous thing that most people in the UK have to deal with is our kitchens. We should ban home cooking and make everyone live on takeaways.

Oh wait, they did that in Scotland and Glasgow Airport still got hit.

Booze icon because, well, used to live in Scotland.

[Gordon861]

Title

But isn't the Red Dwarf quote going to become true soon with people ratting on their neighbours for claiming too much Benefits in order to win cash rewards?

[Anonymous Coward]

So...

I thought that when the ASA responded to complains from such small amounts of people it was over-reacting and pandering to a vocal minority. At least that's the impression I got from other ASA related threads here...

(NB: I think that the advert should have been banned, I just thought I'd say...)

[John H Woods]

ASA will respond to a single complaint...

... none of their deliberation usually takes into account how many people complained, just how justified the complaints are.

[jake]

I was a Punk in London in the late '70s ...

The way I see things brewing, you lot are fixing to make Brixton, Handsworth, Toxteth & Chapeltown look like a tea party[1] ... Seriously, remember back when the sus laws were abolished? Remember WHY?

The more we forget history, the more we are doomed to repeat it ...

[1] Yes, I know, the irony is not lost on me ...

[Sarah Bee]

Re: I was a Punk in London in the late '70s ...

I seriously doubt, Jake, that many of the posters in this thread will ever take to the streets. They'll mostly stay at home and draw their curtains on principle.

[Anonymous Coward]

Blackpool

Hey Jake did you make Rebellion in Blackpool at the weekend? Funny the taxi driver was telling me on the way home that it is one of the best weekends for a night out in Blackpool. The punks never cause any problems. I was there for errrm my stag night btw.

[Anonymous Coward]

The thing

The thing about "taking to the streets" against something like this is you need a leader that appeals across the board. There is no leader, there will be no taking to the streets. There are lots of bits and pieces here and there but nothing central.

I'm sure if someone could tie together all the different groups photographes, anti-centralised data and snooping, anti extreme terror law (20 odd day laws, secret evidence), anti unfair treaties with the US, ant-extreme porn law people, moderate muslim groups, anime fans, artists, comedians, anti war people and a host of others then something could change, but individually they are easy to marginalise fear of being accused of being a supporter of terrorists/soft on terror, soft on crime, a paedophile, a sexual deviant, a coward (contradictoraly).

There are no leaders, there is no movement, beyond the niche.

The elements are there but there's no focal point and for the past 30 years we've had our confrontational nature bred out of us. I remember at school it was all about being part of the group, not being in competition with each other, that kind of thing.

[jake]

@Sarah; @titus; @AC14:23

Sarah ... I'm afraid you are correct. That's what scares me.

titus ... I haven't been to Blackpool in over 15 years. I haven't even been back to Blighty in 10 or so. These days, I only fly when I'm at the controls (I don't like being treated as a criminal for the duration of the time I'm under the eye of airport so-called "security") ... and none of my aircraft can go more than 2200 miles or so without refueling ;-)

AC ... There were no "leaders" in the afore mentioned riots. People are animals, and when you push animals to the breaking point, they snap. Get ready. It's gonna git ugly ...

[G Wilson]

Moronicus policicus

Every time it's suggested police should actually do more low-level things like "increase patrolling on foot", ACPO will offer up some jabberer to point out this would distract from important stuff like "fighting international terrorism". And that fight consists of this kind of tosh?...

The problem this story is scratching isn't so much the rise of our own stasi, but something way more prosaic (and alarming in its own way) - UK police are confusing their prized "operational independence" with just "independence", and are morphing into a spinning, market-researching, advertising and political campaigning body. Only, being a bunch of middlebrow Express readers, they are, by-and-large, incredibly bad at it - and probably can't be trusted to keep their policy positions and subsequent prejudices distinct from their policing duty. Ms May, while pushing for elected police chiefs, ought to be prohibiting police-led campaigning of all stripes. Eliminating ACPO, which appears to do little else, would be a grand start.

[Anonymous Coward]

Question

Not being versed in the classics like you are I'm not sure, but can something be both 'prosaic' and 'alarming'?

[Anonymous Coward]

Google definition

Define: terrorism

"the calculated use of violence (or the threat of violence) against civilians in order to attain goals that are political or religious or ideological in nature; this is done through intimidation or coercion or instilling fear"

sound like any goverment you know? Seems like the taliban are just less subtle about it

[Ally J]

We paid for this....

We lucky taxpayers fund ACPO, and they are funding in their turn the creation of this ad. (And the broadcast slot, which probably wasn't cheap.)

(Paris because we haven't seen her much, and she does stuff behind closed curtains.)

[Anonymous Coward]

Anti TERRORIST legislation

Why do I suspect that this is a case of plod trying to improve their clearup stats for other crimes.

The police (and other bodies) have a pretty impressive record of using anti-terrorist legislation in order to catch perfectly ordinary criminals. It needs to be stopped, but this looks like a continuation of the practice. For example, crooks especially small time ones are more likely to use cash than cards (which isn't the same thing as saying everybody who pays cash is a crook, before the flames start). If you were using your house to store say stolen goods or knock off designer gear or maybe grow weed you might want to keep the curtains closed. And if you were just a indoor tenant gardener the neighbours would be unlikely to see much of you. And the police would be interested in you if you happened to be up to any or all of those things, but it wouldn't make you a terrorist.

OTOH I fail to see why a terrorist would want to pay cash, except perhaps when buying the tools of his trade. I have no idea why a terrorist would need to keep their curtains closed, it's not like they'd be practicing in the living room on a wednesday afternoon. And I'm pretty sure that there's no evidence that any of the convicted or indeed dead terrorists in Britain over the last few years didn't talk to their neighbours. Indeed I seem to remember the neighbours of one particular "terrorist mastermind" telling every journalist who would listen that their neighbour had seemed a perfectly normal, friendly bloke.

So are ACPO really looking for terrorists or are they after criminals? Lets say the average man in the street thought his neighbour was a bit dodgy and growing weed or maybe selling stolen gear, would he shop him to the police. Probably not. But if he thought that same neighbour was a terrorist? Probably. So are the police out to convince us that everybody who is in the slightest bit dodgy is in fact a terrorist.

Smack of the rhetoric of Tony Blair. You know the sort of thing - "if you're not on my side you must be a terrorist".

[serviceWithASmile]

@sarah

going on the abnormally high number of posts you've made in this thread, it looks to me like you've got a "Bee" in your bonnet!

*nudge* *wink*

don't you go reporting me now just to get back at me :P

[Sarah Bee]

Re: @sarah

Who do you think reported comments get reported to?

I am exasperated by hysteria, that's all.

[Blitheringeejit]

@Sarah

> I am exasperated by hysteria, that's all.

Ever wondered if you might be in the wrong job? I don't visit to the Vulture Central forums to hear a mild-mannered polite exchange of reasonable views...

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed not.

For that we have the daily fail.

[Anonymous Coward]

ERM

Not to stop the hysteria of one direction and point it at myself, but why the vitriol against the "plods"? You can bet the average plod is probably cringing with horror at this as much as anyone else, and worse because s/he's associated with it. And they've probably got a new form to fill in when all they want to be doing is nicking burgulars and such.

Just strikes me that just because the boss commissions some numb-nuts communications company to make a stupid ad, doesn't make every plod responsible. Would you want to be taken to task for every bad decision your boss ever made?

[Anonymous Coward]

RE: ERM

Hey AC expect some major down voting on this comment. I used the phrase 'The Police do a fair job in difficult circumstances ....' in one comment on here, and got 42. I mainly put this comment on here because of all the references to the police being c***s. Which given that these are the folks who tend to end up at the sharp end when things go wrong seems grossly unfair.

What some of the folks on here don't understand is there paranoid assumption that the state is out to get them is wrong. Now don't get me wrong the reaction in this country, and across the developed world to terrorism has caused a significant curtailment of social liberties. But ya know -

There is -

No area 51

Men did land on the moon

Lady Di isn't now living on an Island with Elvis having decided to duck out of the lime light

The average Policeman doesn't want to beat the average man on the street to a pulp

etc etc.

Things have now swung one way, and pretty well will swing back the other way. Tony and Gordon are gone now. Lets see what happens in the next year or two?

[Anonymous Coward]

@Titus Technophobe

On the whole Mental Health Nurses and Paramedics are far more likely to be seriously injured in the line of work then the plod, and less likely to have it reported on in the media.

And I suspect you got a lot of down votes for your condesending tone as much as anything else.

[Anonymous Coward]

You may be right

But then again it is frequently Police who seem to get stabbed, shot at etc. I have little time for the arm chair warriors on here who want to comment on either Mental Health Nurses, or the Police. This may have something to do with the tone.

[Witty username]

No Area 51?

So Groom Lake air base is just a myth?

[Anonymous Coward]

Kinda agree with you...

...I'm very sure there are countless ordinary coppers who see the berks in ACPO cavorting about the headlines and really do cringe. But why don't these ordinary coppers ever speak up? It would be nice - no, actually reassuring - to know that down-to-earth, everyday coppers felt every bit as incensed as Joe Public about this kind of idiocy.

The shame of it is, that the last time anyone serving in the ranks of the police service tried to expose the lunacy within he was censured pretty smartly and prevented from blogging about it ever again.

But I still take your point. This is not ALL policemen and women. Of course not. What makes it dangerous, though, is that it's just a few of the very top-ranking officers. If this little episode is yet another example of their 'executive' thinking, then there really is a cause for very genuine concern.

[Anonymous Coward]

holy crap, am I a terrorist?

Yesterday I had bottles of chemicals and measuring cylinders in the bathroom, and later on, the curtains closed for ages. I also paid for a bottle of mineral water just beforehand, with cash.

Should I turn myself in?

Saying "no, officer, I was developing film in the bathroom, and had the curtains closed while colour-correcting the scanned results" might be unwise. We all know that photography practically is terrorism anyway- I should beat myself up now, get it over with.

[Anonymous Coward]

Clearly the real problem lies in...

...the completely unregulated market in curtains.

For some unfathomable reason it's perfectly acceptable in modern society to go into a shop and spend hundreds of pounds on a set of completely opaque curtains without having to go through a background check or show identity.

I'm glad ACPO have clarified the problem, now we need to know more about this shady operation which goes under the innocent cover name of 'John Lewis'.

The Home Office: Be Safe, Be Suspicious.

[Scorchio!!]

Digital footprint

So innocent citizens wishing to avoid leaving a digital foot print, the better to keep Big Bro out of their lives, are suspicious? I suppose the Met will leap into their graves with a sense of gladness and joy, knowing that it is all for Big Brother and the Party.

[Bram]

ACPO?

I have had the pleasure to work with ACPO and most of the policing bodies, and I can tell you that they are deluded in a very special way...

They promote diversity, equal opportunities fairness etc. but the reality is you can do all the above as long as you do it their way there is no room for deviation from the senior management's plan and they always know best.

They live in a bubble where they are saviours to us all and if they don't do what they do then civilisation will come to sticky end.

We do need to ask what do we need the police for?

I personally want the police to be on hand when my house gets robbed not beating down civilians and intimidating normal joe bloggs

[Anonymous Coward]

Met spoke on behalf of ACPO?

Why did the Met, a police force, give a public statement on behalf of ACPO, a private limited company?

[silver darling]

Deductive policing?

How do i connect 'the man at the end of the street' with 'closed curtains' , 'not using a card' and 'not speaking to neighbours' unless I'm the shopkeeper where 'the man' shops either living in the same stair, or I the shopkeeper live in the same street and I often discuss the spending habits of my customers with other customers, or follow them home.

Ok, perhaps I the shopkeeper run a 'Military Excess and TNT' store very close to 'the man at the end of the street' or 'the man' keeps buying large amounts of soda bicarb, nutmeg or hair dye for cash from his nearest/my cornershop. So, if somehow I make these connections, should I not merely dismiss 'the man at the end of the street' as an imbecile incapable of making an effective terrorist attack and probably from the same 'terror cell' responsible for all the other recent dud 'attacks' ?

If this is the real size of the threat that al-quaida poses (and the cops seem to think it is) can't we cut that anti-terrorism budget a tad Dave, or simply ask shopkeepers to put up a sign 'Nutmeg - Card only' ?

[Anonymous Coward]

To think about it...

It's nothing quite new. To take something contemporary - www.somethingawful.com/d/comedy-goldmine/dvd-piracy-posters.php

These posters do have a great lulz potential.

"he uses a deodorant, wears a black suit and buys batteries[...] but together it means he may be a zombie ninja robot"

"...but together it means he may be an anticommunist"

"...but together it means he may eat babies"

"...but together it means she may be a witch"

well, you got the idea.