Don't Mock The Inflicted

It’s not big and it’s not clever.

You know who you are.

I cannot believe the waves of negativity I feel in the canteen every month when the new edition of the award winning magazine The Sharp End hits the specially constructed and taxpayer funded holders. There are more scoffs and howls of derision than you get at an average Prime Minister’s question time. One day I fear someone is going to choke on their 999 breakfast.

Thankfully the Home Office appear to have thought of this potential problem. It’s the only reason I can think of for their insightful disclaimer in the small print:-

‘…the Home Office accept no responsibility for damage or illness that results from advice given in this magazine’

Even the Met Federation don’t seem to be that enamoured with being sent enough copies to pass around to their entire extended families. I think that they should have led by example and used the handy text number to subscribe. Then, like me, they would be the first to read it every month. I believe it definitely gives me the jump on the average villain as my regulars have recently been commenting on.

Only the other day I was discussing the merits of colour psychology (issue 16 if you missed it) with a tipsy domestic assault suspect when I was part of a team carrying out a cell re-location on him. He was (almost) speechless when I told him that he would have been in a much better mood if we had been lucky enough to have been pinning him down in a state of the art cell somewhere in Gwent. In fact he stopped trying to kick my teeth down my throat long enough to enquire:

“Are you a ******* sheep ******* then you ****?”

Knowing that our cells aren’t equipped with bright yellow door frames I continued my end of the conversation from the safety of the other side of the heavy steel door. As I pointed out to him, yellow is a calming colour and he would have been feeling less fraught if the door frame had been painted thus. I could hear him clearing his throat, but before he could butt in I thought I’d let him know about the benefits of having a broad blue border painted around the walls of the cell.

I have to say that I was hoping for some constructive input from him as I had doubts about this one. I can understand that the line could help the visually impaired define the boundaries of the cell. I mean every visually impaired person has this scheme in their own homes don’t they? It was the more the belief of psychologists that certain shades of blue encourage truthfulness that I wanted his views on. You see, the police have traditionally worn blue for many years and I can’t say that it has had the desired effect on most of the people I speak to. Maybe we should try a lighter shade?

Unfortunately the conversation ended there as I had to close the wicket to avoid the mouthful of saliva and mucus aimed at me. His muffled reply, although following the blue theme, didn’t sound like a suggestion I could put forward to the Uniform Department.

I went off, armed with my scientific proof, to see if I could convince the Custody Sergeant to spring for some yellow paint.

Sadly though, he was a scoffer.

(…to be continued…)