I Haven't Called Anyone a Liar: Part One

The twitter exchange that I wrote about yesterday was the second of recent times in which I've had a somewhat excited individual yelling “YOU CALLED ME A LIAR!!!” all up in my face.

A police officer "intentionally losing control" of his vehicle.
Source: caradvice.com.au

I struggle with this. You see, I don't think I've called anyone a liar.

The first incident, the one that prompted me to make this tweet, was a pretty routine one. A taxi driver in a car beside mine spun the wheels of his car in the process of making an expedited departure from a set of traffic lights outside a police station. A young and very excited Constable of Redfern Local Area Command attributed the sound of squealing tyres to me, in part I suspect because the small four cylinder car that I drive is of a type that has become popular with young hoons since the NSW Government placed limits on the types of cars that provisionally licensed drivers are permitted to operate, and set about conducting a traffic stop with me as his intended target.

The young Constable attempted to conduct his traffic stop in a location that was clearly dangerous. I was unprepared to stop in the midst of three lanes of fast-moving traffic where there was no verge, no footpath and no opportunity for anyone to safely exit a vehicle. I had visions of the traffic offense I hadn't committed quickly escalating to a situation where I found myself implicated in a cop getting himself run over by a car. I made various indications of my intent to comply and led the young Constable and his partner in their vehicle to a safe location a couple of blocks away.

If the move to a safe location gave the young Constable some time to calm down, it didn't show. He leaped from his Volkswagen minibus and rushed to my side, veritably steaming from his ears and nostrils. And yes, there is something strangely ironic, if not downright hilarious, about an attempt to conduct a traffic stop in a minibus!

I think he was a little taken aback to find a grey-haired old man at the wheel of my car, seatbelt on, driver's license presented before he even asked, hands where he could see them. When he didn't find the seventeen year old provisionally licensed hoon that he expected, he seemed to turn the bluster up a notch, just to make it clear that it was he who would be in control of this situation!

He couldn't have known that he'd stopped a scholar who has a great deal more than a passing interest in power and in policing. It's probably better that he doesn't know!

What I do know is that policing, like all of the military and quasi-military occupations, is a form of work that very heavily relies on storytelling as a mechanism for establishing shared understandings (Fletcher 1996). My own observation is that storytelling is so deeply embedded in the culture of policing that it regularly and routinely overflows into police interactions with the public.They can't help themselves. They always either speak as though they're giving precise evidence in a courtroom, or in stories.

The excited young Constable did not disappoint. He was very quick to launch into a series of what I call “could haves”. He blustered at length about the things that “could have” happened. I could have crashed my car. I could have hit a pedestrian. I could have, I don't know, started World War Three. (I must confess, I don't remember the precise “could haves”, once I recognised the script that he was following, I didn't bother to listen all that closely.).

Having dispensed with the “could haves”, the young Constable then proceeded to enumerate the “I coulds”. I could charge you with speeding. I could charge you with dangerous driving. I could blah blah blah. You get the idea.

Eventually the young Constable paused to draw breath. I seized the moment and, in as polite a tone as I could muster, uttered exactly these words:

“Officer, please understand that I mean you no disrepect. I did not exceed the posted speed limit. I do not believe that I have done anything wrong.”

Well! Well! How dare I! If he was excited already, that deeply insolent interjection on my part really set him off:

“YOU'RE CALLING ME A LIAR!!!”

I was already pretty bewildered by the whole series of events. This new deterioration really threw me. I. Haven't. Called. Anyone. A. Liar.

Then the penny dropped.

“Officer, I think I realise what has happened. There were two taxis, one on either side of me at those traffic lights. The one on my left broke traction as it departed. My car did not break traction.”

Key words right there. “break traction” is police-speak for “spin the wheels” or “chuck a burnout”. You only need to look at what the Victorian Police did to Lewis Hamilton to understand just how much traffic police hate a good old-fashioned burnout. By a rather intriguing logical fallacy, they consider that “breaking traction” constitutes an "intentional loss of control". Drivers are, of course, required to be “in control” of their vehicles at all times. Determining that a man whose job it is to cause a Formula One racing car to slide sideways around corners with the back wheels spinning 'just so', AND to do so faster than all of the other guys, is not in control of his relatively underpowered street car simply because he caused the back wheels to spin up a bit takes logical fallacy and turns it into logical farce!

When I relayed this revelation (that my car didn't "break traction", not the farce!), the young Constable's facial expression changed. He could see his control of the situation slipping away, and he needed to get back on top, and quick.

“DO YOU KNOW THAT I CAN CHARGE YOU WITH DANGEROUS DRIVING EVEN IF YOU'RE NOT SPEEDING???!!!”

Whoa! Thanks for the admission, Officer!

“Yes Officer, I understand that.”

I said.

“OK, SO TELL ME, WHAT IS YOUR DRIVING RECORD LIKE? DON'T LIE TO ME, THAT IS SOMETHING I CAN, AND WILL, CHECK!!!”

OK, the same admission, twice. Things are looking up! It looks a lot like old mate didn't show up for class the day they covered "Speaking in Riddles That Cause People to Make Admissions They Didn't Intend to Make".

He didn't check my driving record.

We then entered the 'controlled winding down' phase. This is where the young Constable sets about extricating himself from the bizarre situation he has created whilst doing his best to 'keep face' and present a continued air of authority.

At the same time as the young Constable worked at effecting the transition from hysterics to relative calm, his partner emerged from their minibus. I've observed that women officers rarely speak up in these situations, policing is still very much a gender-biased, male dominated work (Fletcher 1996) and sadly this was a gender-biased, male dominated traffic stop. At the young Constable's instructions she set about the theatre of checking over my car, only finding, sadly, that the tyres were in good order and condition, that number plates and registration label were current and properly displayed and that the vehicle hadn't been 'riced' in any way. She 'accidentally' shone her flashlight in my eyes a couple of times, that's all part of the show.

The young Constable wound down by way of a couple more 'could have's and 'I could's, made it quite explicit to me that the goodness of his heart was the only reason that he was 'letting me go' today, and closed with a warning to “be more careful in the future”.

“Yes Officer. Thank-you Officer”.

I wanted to puke.

Works Cited

Fletcher, C 1996, “"The 250lb man in an alley" Police storytelling.” Journal of Organizational Change Management, vol. 9, no. 5, p. 36.