I know it impossible for broadsheet to avoid the "women as courageous victims" meme, but could you try *reading* the articles you link to ?

She wasn't sacked. Reporter Nina rejoined the police to film a documentary. She then left of her own accord. Presumably to continue her actual job as a reporter.

Additionally the Chief Constable public ally apologised for the behaviour and pledged to investigate - but you won't mention that will you.

I presume you will print a correction and apology for this .

The problem lies in here:

She would not reveal how much she was paid for her investigation, but admitted the foray into journalism had ended her police career.

I thought she was discretely admitting she'd been fired over it, as well. A quick search confirmed Ms Hobson did quit the second time around, but I'd say the linked article was ambiguous with the above quote. That aside, reading some of the things she did capture on film, I understand why folks were upset! http://www.sundaymirror.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=16981150&method=full&siteid=62484&headline=exclusive-exposed--cops-at-work--name_page.html

What I don't understand is why you seem to feel so defensive. None of this is an attack on you, or on a group to which you belong, and as an emergency service volunteer myself, with family in other branches of emergency services, I'd say the criticism of this particular department was justified. After all, this is a blog, and while Rebecca would be doing the right thing to post a correction, one doesn't read a blog expecting the height of investigative journalism.

Onto the issue at hand, I'm afraid that the criticisms leveled at Ms Hobson's former police force are not isolated either to Britain or to the police alone. Rape is still not taken seriously by many law enforcement groups, protocol is loosely followed if at all, and evidence is carelessly overlooked. Of course, the only difference between the treatment of rape and the treatment of theft in this regard is the attitude and tendency to disbelieve the victim. Perhaps it might be helpful if interested parties started their own rape investigation assistance groups, similar to how the ASPCA operates in many places. Such groups could serve as a clearinghouse for survivor support service information, provide immediate counseling through the investigation process, ensure rape kits (with emergency contraception) are available, and potentially assist with gathering evidence within similar bounds to the ASPCA. Naturally, their services would apply equally to men, women, and children, they'd also be uniquely suited to assisting any sort of child abuse case, not neccesarily sexual.

For the record, because I'm afraid things usually devolve down these lines here: I can't see this as a men vs. women issue. Men and women both should be displeased with the way this group treated them. That this showed up in a women oriented blog refers a) to the woman who did the investigation, b) to the specially heinous treatment of some crimes against women in this group, and c) women happen to be people, too, and as such have a right to be upset about this sort of thing.

Broadsheet by its nature is always woman vs men. I miss the days when salon was about people rather than groups.

I didn't find the article ambigous - it was quite clear to me. It certainly made no mention of "sacking"

You reference the Sunday Mirror - thats like referencing fox news on clinton - seriously. They're one of the page three tabloids (Nude pics on page three). They will sensationalise *anything*

I don't doubt there were problems at the station and but we see no evidence that she attempted to confront them or take it up with her superiors. Instead she quit, then returned to make money off it.

Its easy for people to slag police until they find they need them. My wife had the misfortune to be seriosly assaulted and the police were fantastic - caring professional and have followed up over the course of several years to see how she's doing.

Police see a lot of nasty shit which most poeple just don't want to know about.

Late here, keep forgetting points - one more and I'm off

Why do I feel defensive - because its typical broadsheet. Traister is so stuck in the women victim mentality that pervades BS that she makes up a completly false statement:

An 11-year veteran of the Leicestershire Constabulary in the U.K. has been sacked (as they say) for secretly filming her colleagues

Its just not in the article - it says something completly different:

Ms Hobson, who is now unemployed after leaving the force

Its farcical.

Despite a regular group of people insisting that Broadsheet is inherently men vs. women, I don't see it in the entries themselves. The letters that follow those entries are another story entirely, but I'd say half the problem is self-fulfilling prophecy. It seems that the same group that criticizes Broadsheet as automatically men vs. women is also found broadly criticizing feminism, as if feminism were all one big happy cohesive family itself, as inherently anti-male, with roughly the same arguments. As I see it, highlighting problems women face, including systemic problems in how men in a society are conditioned to treat women, is helpful for everyone, including the men. After all, if men are conditioned to treat women badly in some respect, there are at least two problems going on a) men are treating women badly, and b) men are being conditioned.

On the topic at hand, that there are good police officers is not in question. Bringing up that a pocket of the police force has lost discipline does not in any way discredit police in general. Pointing out that there is a systemic problem in emergency services re: rape investigations does not mean police aren't doing heroic things everyday despite this. I think we'd all agree things are never conveniently black or white. What's really going on here, blackpaw, is an expose of one police force is being treated here (in the letters mostly) as anecdotal evidence condemning all police and anecdotal evidence of one incident involving the police is given to counter it. Either way, police corruption and even loss of morale is an issue effecting all citizens regardless of gender. After all, reports are that they drove past an elderly man bleeding because it happened to be near the end of their shift.

As for linking to Mirror, I know very well that they're a tabloid and therefore sensationalistic. Take what they have with a grain of salt, by all means, I linked the article not for an example of good journalism but because it essentially gave a run down of the program made with this footage. Even if undue emphasis was given to the seedier aspects of the show, some things are unacceptable under any circumstances. Any member of emergency services, police included, is morally obligated to stop to help someone on duty, off duty, or at the end of their shift not withstanding. Other matters were played up as if they were matters of corruption that weren't: getting discounts at restaurants, picking up takeout while on duty, and so on.

This one instance aside, and the fact that law enforcement is hard, lowpaid, and thankless also, studies of police forces have consistently found an unacceptable level of corruption. Why this is the case is up to your pet theory, but we might want to think closer to home, say with the special treatment the police gave the teenaged son of Sheriff Haidl when it came to his two attacks on underage girls and drug involvement.