NOTE: I have written a follow-up post to this, one in which I take back some of the things I said here. If you read this post, please read part 2 as well.
PoliceOne.com used to be a valuable source of information for law enforcement personnel. They wrote articles that contained valuable tips, offered ideas for training, they published articles discussing trends in law enforcement, and they conducted polls of active duty law enforcement personnel regarding related issues across the country.
But that was then.
Now, they have turned into just another leftist media outlet. Most of their “news” articles are just Associated Press (notoriously not law enforcement supporters) articles published in their entirety, lacking any corrections for blatantly obvious errors. I first noticed this a few years ago when they ran a news story regarding a liquor store robbery in which the suspect was described as having fired an “assault weapon” during the commission of the crime. The article included surveillance video from the liquor store, in which the suspect could be clearly seen wielding nothing more than a handgun. The error was so obvious, and as a pro-gun cop, so annoying that I emailed PoliceOne and had a short email conversation with the editor, Doug Wyllie. He explained the source of their information (the AP) and that their agreement with the AP does not allow them to edit the articles. I argued that agreement or not, knowingly publishing bad information is not acceptable, especially for a publication representing law enforcement. He never replied.
Well, here we are a few years later and the number of horribly biased (against the cops) and blatantly anti-gun AP articles that PoliceOne has run just continues to grow, despite the fact that their own surveys have routinely shown that cops do NOT support gun control.
As coincidence would have it, I was just discussing PoliceOne’s unreliability/bias a few days ago on Twitter when someone I follow pointed out an error (bias) in one of their articles.
It appears to me that their being located in San Francisco, CA has drastically affected their ability to focus on the real attitude of the national law enforcement community. Instead, they continue to sound more and more like the average resident of the city in which they reside.
Today, I stumbled upon an article that was written by “Police One Staff” (because no one there was willing to put their name on it?) that is a whopping nine (9) paragraphs long; not a substantial piece by any means. The article was published on February 14 and the title is “More than 200 police chiefs criticize Trump’s ‘law and order’ executive actions.”
It is a short read so I recommend you not take my word for it, read the article yourself. By publishing this piece, which they wrote themselves, PoliceOne has lost ALL credibility in my mind. This is nothing more than a leftist, anti-Trump hit piece. Unless I am taking this article the wrong way (if I am, please explain it to me), they are seriously attempting to cite a group named “Law Enforcement Leaders to Reduce Incarceration” as a group that supposedly represents the overall opinion of law enforcement. Really? I know an awful lot of cops, I am personal friends with three police chiefs, one sheriff, and acquaintances with more than a couple hundred other ranking law enforcement officials, and not a single one that I know would ever dream of suggesting that we need to incarcerate fewer criminals, yet that is the goal of the group PoliceOne is citing.
PoliceOne, you just proved you are nothing but just another mouthpiece for the leftist propaganda machine. You are dead to me. Pound sand a-holes!
-Matt
Update: A couple hours after publishing this piece, I came to find that a friend of mine, whose opinion I greatly value, is personal friends with Doug Wyllie, the editor at PoliceOne.com. He did not contact me regarding this either, but rather I contacted him when I learned of their friendship. It appears my take on Doug, which I based on both the email conversation we had and the articles that have been published on the website, was very far off. I trust my friend when he tells me that Doug is a stand up guy and on our side. For that bad assumption on my part, I apologize.
That said, I still take serious issue with some of the content they have been running lately, and especially with this particular article.
-Matt
NOTE: I have written a follow-up post to this, one in which I take back some of the things I said here. If you read this post, please read part 2 as well.
