I love the PSNI pages on Facebook and I follow quite a few of them. Some of the pages are strictly factual and ask for information and witnesses to crimes that have recently occurred. That’s fine because of course social media is one of the best ways to gather information but those are the kind of posts that I glance at, see if it’s anything to do with me and then scroll on past. They aren’t going to stick in my memory or prompt a whole complex thought process and I’m more likely to pay attention to a memo that I’ve seen for the third time that hour.
Other PSNI pages have managed what many think to be impossible: the perfect blend of humour and straight-faced seriousness. While I’m sure the person responsible for those pages is an asset to our police service, I seriously think they’re missing a trick as some kind of comedian. Reminders about the illegality of drink driving and anti-social behaviour could become monotonous if they’re seen every weekend, but instead some PSNI district pages choose to put a spin on their warnings and we all learn a little more about the less obvious consequences, such as the luxurious microwave meal and thin bed liner that you can look forward to if you’re idiotic enough to break the law.
There was a post this weekend that made me stop and think. It was a post of a different sort again: a post that reminded you that there were real humans behind the uniforms. It’s easy to forget sometimes that every job is done by a person who has real thoughts and feelings. No matter what their personal opinions, they still have to fulfil their role to the best of their ability because the general public is relying on them and has certain expectations that they assume will be met.
But these are real men and women and they’re men and women who carry guns on a daily basis as a standard part of their uniform.
With growing up here and seeing police presence at all kinds of community events aimed towards families, it took me a fair number of years to fully register the fact that our police force does carry guns. In fact, when I went to England for the first time as an older teenager and saw a police officer on the beat in Nottingham, I found it strange that their hips were lacking a holster. Then again, I also couldn’t get my head around the fact that he was on his own. When I spoke about this in a criminology class one day, the English students found the way that our police force operated as totally bizarre. Within the one country, we have such a range of what constitutes as “normal”.
We’re the only police force in the United Kingdom that routinely arms its officers, rather than only the specialist firearms unit and it’s something that is often the subject of controversial debate. Such a debate occurred under a post by PSNI Craigavon as to whether officers should be carrying the standard G36 when on patrol near a school, which was done in response to a child being approached by a stranger the week before.
In an ideal world, many of us would likely prefer our police force to not be armed when doing routine work. However, as it stands, that isn’t possible. We may be more than a decade into the peace process, but there still remain a significant number of people who aren’t willing to move into the present. It’s not unusual for us to turn on the evening news and hear of bomb scares and attacks on the police. Criminals are going to arm themselves with whatever they can do the most damage with so we should surely be glad that when facing them, the police can do more than aim for their knees with a baton. It’s a rare occasion when a police officer has to deploy their weapon as it’s seen as the very last resort and their first aim is always to shoot to incapacitate rather than shoot to kill, which is a totally different priority to those who are perhaps focusing their crosshairs on a person in the green uniform. If my life is being threatened, I’m going to feel a little more hopeful knowing that that last resort exists.
As much as I dislike guns, I do understand their necessity in the hands of the PSNI. MI5 have the threat level for Northern Ireland-related terrorism within Northern Ireland as severe, meaning that an attack is highly likely. In May, the threat level from Northern Ireland-related terrorism in Great Britain was raised from moderate to substantial, meaning there is a strong possibility of such an attack. We’re in an era where the faces of police officers are blurred out when they are shown on news footage at the scene of a crime. The threat is real.
We’ve a long way to go until the PSNI will be in a position to go out on the streets without a gun. Last week, leaflets were posted on cars in East Belfast that said “All PSNI informers will be put out of this area.” That charming missive was decorated with a gunman aiming a gun much larger than those the police carry. Those behind the leaflet may not have explicitly stated how an informer would be “put out”, but as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.

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The police officer posting on behalf of PSNI Craigavon is known only as S but their posts remind us of their humanity. Reading it wasn’t quite like reading the posts that came before or after it. This one was personal. I could almost imagine the person typing it having to take a steadying breath as they collected their thoughts. I could see them going to give their children an extra hug after writing about their fear that their child could get hold of the gun thinking it was a toy. I could almost feel their vulnerability seep through the screen.
S was posting from the heart and ended with, “[murderers] are the reason we have guns. Yes guns can be scary, but we are trained to use them properly; to use them to protect you and I from the evil that men do. I have sworn an oath to do my best to keep you safe. Please allow me to keep myself safe.” Perhaps we’ll reach a point where the PSNI has a huge overhaul. Perhaps then they’ll get rid of the guns, sell off the water cannons and donate their 25kg riot gear to a museum because the threats will have all but gone. If the terrorist groups disappear completely, rioters stop trying to seriously injure or kill police officers and improvised explosive devices stop appearing under cars and near parks, then it’s a turn for the better and something that we all surely hope for, however vain that hope may be.