A letter to today's Times sought to restore some balance in the the face of media's orgy of police bashing after the police deployment to control the G20 rioters.
Sir, As a former senior police officer I feel a need to write in support of my ex-colleagues. The vast majority of people at any demonstration will be ordinary law-abiding citizens who would not, in the normal course of their life, dream of committing assaults against anyone, least of all a police officer. It is heartbreaking, therefore, to see the very people you have sworn a duty to protect turn into savages when taken over by mob mentality. Each demonstration will contain a
hardcore rent-a-riot group whose sole aim in life is to attack the Establishment and disrupt our everyday way of life. They are well practised and trained in the ways of mob control and marshal their forces with well-targeted malice. They openly boast about assaults on officers and how they "won" the last confrontation.
Please do not get carried away with the stories about the very few officers who break ranks and go beyond that which is acceptable. Spare a thought for the thousands of others who stand there getting stuck in the leg with pins and nails, kicked mercilessly out of view of the cameras, spat at, threatened and generally treated with utter contempt.
As an expatriate I can tell you that the television coverage is doing nothing to harm the very high reputation that the UK police enjoy on the Continent. I have spoken with Italians who laugh at the coverage and find it unbelievable that no teargas, baton charges or water cannon were in evidence. They marvel at the level of restraint shown by the police, so please spare a thought, therefore, for the British bobby.
PETER GRIFFITHS
San Lucido, Calabria
Tuesday, 21 April 2009
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About Me
- David-Barfield
- Notes on the classics of French literature. During my years of teaching, I wrote thousands of pages for my students. Preferring not to discard all these years of work, I am posting them on the Internet as a resource for teachers and students and I am using my blogsite as the portal in order to give access to the individual books. During my university course, I was an Assistant for one year in Arras and my nostalgia for Georges Brassens stems from these happy days- now long gone- when his songs were first being recorded and he was all the rage among the student surveillants. When I opened this Blogsite many years ago, I used David Barfield, my maternal family name, as my Internet alias. My actual name is David Yendley and if any of my past students come across this site, I send them my best wishes. They were great company to be with.
