Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

They'd have to only attend if off-duty then wouldn't they? One point of police uniform is to identify a person as being a warranted police officer on duty (then there's the appearance of officialdom and the sense of inferiority it breeds in others, the camaraderie, ...). You'd probably need to change the law if you want to allow regular warranted officers to be on duty in civilian clothing, jurisdiction dependent of course.

I don't really understand why you don't want to be able to identify your police officers though - even the UPS drivers wear uniform.




Thank you for making this point. The very last thing we need is to have police disguise themselves as regular folks. It creates a number of dangerous conditions for both the police and the public.

"Who is this random person yelling and waving a gun?" Should I pull over for this random person with flashing lights in their grille?"

It's already bad enough having some traffic enforcement types in unmarked cars or in cars with "ghost" decals.

OTOH, her uniform is very "Aladeen" and while fussing about her uniform is a mostly trivial distraction, having a uniform that is a bit less "Aladeen" would probably short-circuit such criticism. If there weren't more important problems with this person, I would fully support mocking her ridiculous uniform.




Consider applying for YC's Spring batch! Applications are open till Feb 11.

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: