Vocal Voices

Have you noticed the recent trend by the police to tell people "not to speculate and not to post on social media" about incidents?

Just a few examples:
https://www.expressandstar.com/news/loc ... -continue/
https://www.itv.com/news/meridian/2023- ... and-vessel
https://www.itv.com/news/granada/2023-0 ... -own-hands

Are these fair requests, or are they effectively stifling free speech?

Difficult one.
A bit of both i think.

On the one hand yes the police are trying to stifle free speech. On the other not everything flying around on social media is true, and uninformed speculation on a hot topic can be tricky.

Trouble is, we no longer have the trust in authority and the deference to authority that we used to. The police are trying to say "Shut up and leave it to us", but it just gets ignored.

The police might as well ask the sun not to rise in the east every morning.

Speculation is what people do, especially when there is not much to go on apart from the headlines, and that is down to the media.

The police obviously cannot give out too much information on an active investigation so it is a hard one to control.

What really bugs me is the use of "would" in every utterance they make: We 'would like to ask for...'; We 'would' like to express....'; We 'would' request this, that and the other'.

Living in the past.

They are bound and gagged. #1 son has been sent on a diversity course twice now. The second time they said "don't send him back". Apparently being irreverent is a diversity issue.