re. "...perhaps coincidentally, is a PCSO ..."
No, that's the laughing hand of fate.
(Thank you for the sub-heading!)
It's not every day that the Venn diagram covering law enforcement, tiny figurines and internet jargon crosses over, but today is such a day. Reports have it that a police constable whose official number is 1337 has been gobsmacked to find that Lego have brought out a tiny plastic plod who not only has the same number - he is …
Not sure I really get all the hate for PCSOs. I mean, I don't see people laying into (say) classroom teaching assistants, and they are a similar thing conceptually - they don't do the same job as their fully qualified counterparts but they fulfill a role all the same. On the other hand, I've not had so much dealings with PCSOs and maybe they are terrible (but if so this would surely be a case for better training and/or job definition?)
Most happy with Lego choosing 1337 for the copper's number. I can imagine that one sailing straight over some manager's head, which is what makes it worthwhile in my view
The issue is the fact that PCSOs exist solely to make the public think that there are more police officers on duty than there actually are. That's why forces across the country have given them virtually identical uniforms to regular coppers. Some are even considering issuing their PCSOs with batons, sprays and cuffs.
I'm sure that many, even most, PCSOs are decent folk who do their job well. It's just that their job shouldn't exist. Scrap them and use the money saved to employ warranted PCs.
Similarities :
Same hat
Same badge number
Gay moustache.
Overweight.
Same early 1900s costume.
The both carry a large dildo like device ( ooops truncheon).
Most crims could outrun either of them...
Differences:
The playmobil is probably not a member of a masonic lodge.
But they've both got moustaches that wouldn't look out of place in a period drama. OK, so PC Thomas would have to be in an 80s period drama, whereas PC Lego would be more Dickensian London, which means they're really very different, but reality must bend when newspapers seek to write puff pieces.
Still, it took up space in the the newspaper that would, otherwise, have been filled with bile against immigrants, benefits scroungers, gays, politicians, unions, corporations or 'celebrity gossip'.
There was a time when people used to talk about newspapers like this as only fit to wipe your bum. But I wouldn't want to risk it.
"Still, it took up space in the the newspaper that would, otherwise, have been filled with bile against immigrants, benefits scroungers, gays, politicians, unions, corporations or 'celebrity gossip'."
Since when did the public at large require anything more ? The "Illiterati " are not allowed to rise above a level which would allow them to remain autonomous...
"There was a time when people used to talk about newspapers like this as only fit to wipe your bum. But I wouldn't want to risk it."
Rupert Murdoch made his fortune from selling toilet paper....
A 26 letter alphabet isn't enough these days to express ones prowess or "leetness" so the interwebz have mangled numbers and other characters into a new alphabet to somehow elevate themselves above all the normal people who have agreed to standardise on English (are there other "leetspeaks" which are based on other languages???)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leet
This post has been deleted by its author
"Given that it's a common practice to skip everything with leading 0s, I'd think the minimum force size in many cases is 338."
Fortunately,the practice of issuing a number to Police officers predates the practice of having to fit numbers into spread sheets or database fields of fixed length so artificially forcing a Police number to be four digits by adding leading zero or starting from 1000 is not an issue.