Yesterday, TTC sent along a press release stating that new fines for infractions would come into effect Monday. They’ve had the right to levy those fines since the bylaw was updated, but, we were told, Special Constables have instead been spending all that time “educating” passengers about the new rules. (Oddly, passengers are called passengers, which they are, instead of customers or patrons, which they aren’t.)
All this is a lie, of course. Special constables don’t deserve capital letters and are second-tier cops. They aren’t educators, they don’t educate anybody, and they don’t do anything on their own initiative. Constables demonstrably have not been going around talking to people and “educating” them. Seriously: Do you think they’d bother lumbering out of their Crown Vics for that kind of pussyfooting?
Still, every news outlet in town has dutifully parroted this bullshit, almost as if copying from a news release. Could that be what actually happened?
- Spacers: “Over the past several months, Special Constables have been educating TTC riders about the upcoming changes”
- Tubby: “Up until now, TTC constables only warned of changes to TTC bylaws” (seemingly a more honest description of what might or might not have been going on)
- Free daily commuter paper that litters the TTC: “Although the TTC approved the changes in January, a grace period was introduced to get the word out and put up notices in stations”
In other TTC-pseudocop news, I am just waiting for somebody to try to give me a ticket for taking entirely permissible noncommerical photographs on the subway. I would actually love for that to happen; see you in court.