What Is Your Take On This?

[phleb]

This is so bad.

https://uk.yahoo.com/news/racism-cited-factor-police-strip-190654948.html

[dannyk13]

Disgusting, the officers who did this should be immediately sacked.

[youngmafbog]

As Danny says.

[Sqad]

Can't make uo my mind.
I am not sure what racism has to do with the incident, but police officers in London and presumably elsewhere, deal with ethnicity with kid gloves.
It was 2 years ago.

I can't make up my mind.

[naomi24]

Worse than disgraceful - although I can’t see where racism comes into it. 40% of Hackney’s residents are of black and Asian origin. I don’t think George Floyd’s name should have been brought into it either.

[bobbinwales]

Agree with Naomi 100%

[barry1010]

The BBC report https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-60766891

[barry1010]

It happened 15 months ago. The girl's parent/guardian should have been contacted before she was spoken to by the police.
I don't think race had anything to do with it

[naomi24]

Diane Abbott said it was racist. Who would have guessed?

[ladybirder]

I'd have bet my home on it!

[Peter Pedant]

god this is not called Aryan Bank for nothing

[Gromit]

The search was a disgrace. Surely there are laws about how the police can treat a child, and this must be illegal.
Whether the poor behaviour was due to racism is another matter. THeir own report admitted it was institutionally racist. HAS Anything changed.

[sp1814]

People who say they don't think racism was a factor - how would they know?

Did they read the report into the incident?

https://chscp.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Child-Q-PUBLISHED-14-March-22.pdf

[douglas9401]

The school staff need to take a long, hard look at themselves then resign, never to work with children again.

The whole thing's been an over-reaction ending in a damned disgrace.

[Atheist]

Thank you sp. I do find the pointers towards racist behaviour difficult to understand. It's a difficult issue, but there seems to be a view that if the 'victim' feels that racism is involved, then racism is indeed involved. I presume that is the way the law is drafted and, if so, then the police are in a dificult position. Nice to get some hard info from you.

[jourdain2]

Like everyone else, I feel this search was more than required. But I can't see what race has to do with it. Not even if the person concerned does.

[sp1814]

phleb

In answer to your question - this was disgusting.

Inexcusable.

A 15 year old child should not be subject to a strip search without a parent / appropriate adult in attendance.

This ought to be shocking, but after recent revelations (https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/dec/06/two-met-police-officers-jailed-photos-murdered-sisters-deniz-jaffer-jamie-lewis-nicole-smallman-bibaa-henry) it's beginning to feel a but like the latest in a long line of outrages.

[jno]

appalled.

police officers in London and presumably elsewhere, deal with ethnicity with kid gloves

Not in this case, it would seem. If this had ever happened to a white child, you'd think the papers would be full of it ... and yet this seems never to have occurred.

[Hymie]

Based on my personal experience of the UK police force – I would think that over 99.99% of them would see nothing wrong with the actions of these two police officers.

[sp1814]

The question of racism is dealt with in the report thus:

//...one feature believed to have a significance to the experience of Child Q is that of adultification bias.//

//This concept is where adults perceive Black children as being older than they are. It is ‘a form of bias where children from Black, Asian and minoritised ethnic communities are perceived as being more ‘streetwise’, more ‘grown up’, less innocent and less vulnerable than other children. This particularly affects Black children, who might be viewed primarily as a threat rather than as a child who needs support//

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adultification_bias

[Ellipsis]

They were in a school. They know how old she was.

A complete abuse of power by the police officers, a complete dereliction of duty on the part of the school.

As for racism, I think you had to be there. From what I gather, a menstruating black 15-year-old girl was strip-searched by two white police officers while her white teachers stood outside the door waiting, with no reference to her parents. The strip-search extended to asking her to spread her buttocks while they peered up her backside. I'm not surprised she felt it was racist, I think I probably would in her place.