09/26/2016

Hi everyone and welcome back to Thoughtful Mondays here at Blog Medley! We’re headed into the last week of September and we’ll soon be seeing the usual lovely Canadian red, orange, and gold coloured maple leaves as the trees change their colours. Talking about colours, I read on the CBC the other day that the Toronto Police will be changing the colours of their cars too, from the current white base colour (with blue and red mixed in) to a dark gray base colour. This new design is a horrible one and when I saw the pictures, I could think of a million different reasons not to change Toronto’s police cars to the new design. But since I don’t have that much space here I’ll limit it to the top 3 reasons in my mind why Toronto police should seriously reconsider the new colour for their police cars.

1. The visually impaired will not be able to see it

Having been a spokesperson for the Foundation Fighting Blindness for many years and interacting with numerous people of all ages, young and old, afflicted with a variety of eye diseases with varying degrees of severity, I can definitely tell you that the visually impaired will absolutely not be able to see the new dark gray police car. And it’s not just the colour blind, it’s every person that’s afflicted with an eye disease that will have a very difficult time seeing this police car in public. If the Toronto police had run this by any Ophthalmologist worth their salt, the new design would have been rejected, period. In a previous blog post, I mentioned that 10% of the Canadian population is visually impaired. That’s a pretty big chunk of our population and as all Canadians are aware, most of our population, including those with visual impairments, lives in big southern cities like Toronto. Besides arresting criminals and solving cases, the Toronto police are suppose to aid and support the citizens they serve and protect. How are they going to aid and support the visually impaired living in Toronto when they can’t even be seen/seen easily? Granted a person can just pick up a phone and dial 911 but as we’ve all done in the past, when we’re in trouble we tend to look around for help first and hope a police car is nearby before dialing for help.

2. The new dark gray base colour is unfriendly and intimidating

The Toronto police and their various spokespeople have taken great lengths to explain how this new colour will “modernize” the police car and give it a much cooler and “stealthier” look. It might be stealthy but the visually impaired surely can’t see it (pun intended). I think I’ve stressed that enough so let’s look at it from another angle. I mentioned that part of a police officer’s job is to serve and protect the community. Part of that “serve and protect” includes interacting with the local citizens, helping out at local events, and various other things aimed at fostering goodwill and communication with the locals. Here’s a simple question for the Toronto police: How do you plan on doing fostering goodwill with a car like that? Not only does it look ugly, it frankly gives off an unfriendly and intimidating aura. Instead of looking like its coming to a citizen’s aid, it looks more like the person in dire straits will be arrested or worse. May I remind the Toronto police force that white stands for peace and justice. Why else would so many other police organizations across the country and the world use it as the base colour for their police cars? With the new gray design, no child will ever think a police car is trustworthy. It’s just too intimidating to a child. And if children, who are extremely sensitive to colours and other abstract concepts, are afraid of the new police car design, do you think their parents and other adults will find it comforting?

3. The Toronto police is not the secret service

As everyone knows, the Toronto police already have a number of stealth cruisers in use from chasing down the ordinary driver that goes over the speed limit to hunting down the next “Godfather”. If they want more stealth cars, they could’ve just ordered more or converted some of the current white cruisers to stealth cruisers. There is absolutely no need to convert the entire force’s fleet of white cars to stealthy dark gray ones. Unless of course the police’s aim is to ticket more drivers. I jest but really not only is it a waste of time repainting all the police cars it’s also a waste of money. The police claims it won’t cost a dime under their new “life cycle program” which I’m assuming new paint jobs but hey if you walk into home depot and take a look at their paints, each of them has a different costs due to colour and manufacturer. Thus I highly doubt there’s “no cost” to the police force’s new paint job. Besides, the police isn’t suppose to play secret service agents. They’re suppose to serve and protect the citizens out in the open where people can see them.

And while I might be criticizing the Toronto police for choosing their new colours, I’ve always supported the work the police does. In fact, during university I actually met a fellow student who helped out many times in various circumstances and he went on to successfully join the RCMP. I’m extremely happy to have met him and proud to call him my friend. Due to privacy and security reasons, I won’t post his name here but if you’re read this you know who you are I hope you enjoyed reading this insightful post on this colour debacle and for those that enjoy anime, don’t forget to come back on Wednesday over at Anime Wednesdays here at Blog Medley!

© 2016, Anson Wu. All rights reserved.

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