Very little cuts through as ridiculous when we’re living through ‘Boris’ Adventures in Wonderland’, so it’s quite impressive how the Metropolitan Police has grabbed attention at the Mad Hatter’s Jab Party. In fact, the Met’s festive social media campaign, ’12 Days of Christmas Crime’, is so absurd it may actually work.
Each day on the Met’s Twitter page they’ll be opening a door of a virtual calendar to reveal 12 wanted suspects. Today, door number 1 revealed a picture, complete with falling snow, of Andrew Claffey, who is ‘wanted for assault and carrying a knife’. Now without knowing the details of the incident, it seems fairly poor taste to jolly-up the hunt for a knife-wielding attacker. I’m all for ‘getting into the spirit of things’ but crime probably doesn’t benefit from a bit of Shakin’ Stevens. Reactions on Twitter have been understandably ‘mixed’ - everything from mockery to derision. ‘Have you opened number 10 yet…’ was the winner in the Boris Johnson category of retorts, but the more pedantic had plenty to chew on: ‘the 12 days of Christmas don’t start until Christmas day and doesn’t have a ‘calendar’ where you open doors like advent does.’ Most simply asked: ‘Who signed this off?’.
Well, no doubt it was signed off – and hailed as ‘disruptive’ - by the only person in the Met who has the Twitter password, but perhaps people are being hasty in condemning it entirely. Firstly, the video itself, played on a 5 second loop, has indelibly imprinted the face of Andrew Claffey on my mind. He looks like James Franco playing Jimmy White, and I swear to Santa I’d recognise him in the street – particularly if it were softly snowing. As such: job done, really. Indeed, as well as being alert to Claffey, I cannot wait for the next 11. And who’s going to be the Christmas Day criminal? A Mr Big presumably, the baddest guy of the year. In years to come, you can imagine criminals actively competing for the top spot, carrying out ever greater crimes as the big day looms. Admittedly that wouldn’t be so great, but on the bright side, the Met’s Christmas Day Criminal could become as beloved an institution as the Queen’s Speech or the Christmas Number One.
Look, as with the inverse law of social media, where anyone who’s successful at social media is someone to avoid socialising with at all costs in real life, the Met’s Twitter ineptitude should be viewed as a sign they’re busy doing actual work. Although, with the news that they won’t be investigating the Christmas Parties at Number 10 going down like a stocking full of turds, it may be worth ramping up the ‘12 Days of Christmas Crime’ content. How about adding a prize for identifying a suspect? Imagine the public engagement if it said, ‘help us find Andrew Claffey and win a Playstation5.’ I’d be going door-to-door right now.