Don’t Do Anything Dumb (DDAD) the new police mantra for 2014

2013 has been a year filled with police videos going viral on YouTube. Many of which were videos of officer acting in an unprofessional way. So many of the people who are responsible for the Below 100 program, are now pushing for a new program. This new initiative is called “Don’t Do anything Dumb” or DDAD.

Sgt. Al Powell is one of the nationally known police authors who are spearheading DDAD. According to Powell DDAD should be pronounced just dad. He had this to say about why the program is needed.

“Everyone is video taping us. Every cell phone has a camera these days. Those GoPro cameras are mounted on ever bike or skateboard helmet. Everything that an officer is doing he/she needs to assume is being taped. Now lets face it, when the officer does good the videos never get uploaded. When the officer fucks up, well then it will be the next viral hit.”

The sergeant told us a bit of his philosophy on policing.

“People naturally want to hate the us in Law Enforcement. We catch someone going 20MPH over the posted limit and give him or her a ticket. They then blame us for being the jerks that write the ticket. The next week someone they know is killed in a car crash. Once again we are the jerks because we are not doing enough to stop speeding. So it is only natural that people want to goad us into a fight then post it on YouTube. Catching a cop being unprofessional helps that natural haltered towards us LEOs.”

DDAD was picked due in part to the popular concept of “What’s Important Now” (WIN), which is a core tenet in Below 100. People seem to be able to easily recall an acronym even under stress. So something easy to recall was created in hopes officers would stop being raging idiots and start being a tad more professional.

“We want people to think as they act. Officers working should be thinking, if this is being recorded what would my dad say if he watched the video of me doing this? So the acronym should be easy and catch on quickly.”

Trainers are currently being certified in the DDAD curriculum. A marketing blitz is planned for early 2014 with many multiple free training opportunities to learn how to avoid doing something dumb. Train the trainer classes are also be scheduled. The hope is that by the end of 2014 every officer is walking into every contact thinking DDAD.