Fighting Crime With Gran Turismo

Potrzebie

Awhile back I dreamed up a PSA that will probably never be aired. It showed a bunch of street toughs in Bulls jerseys, muscle shirts, bandanas -- you know the drill -- playing basketball on an asphalt playground, when suddenly the game stops. They look out through the chain-link fence surrounding the playground at five bad-looking cops in uniform. It looks like a hot, sweaty day. Kind of like something you might have seen in Do The Right Thing.

There's a moment of tension as the cops approach the players. Then finally one of the cops motions for the kid holding the basketball to give it to him. He gives the cop a look, as if to say "Come and take it."

And all of sudden a basketball game breaks out, with the cops (not wearing their weapons but otherwise in full uniform) and the kids shooting, passing, deking around one another, and then smiles all around at the end under the message.

I don't know who it would be a PSA for, but the idea of the cops and the kids having a bit of common ground seemed like a good one to me. Apparently others think so as well. I found this piece via the wonderblog Boingboing:

Police in Edinburgh have found a new way of keeping naughty kids off the streets, out of trouble and in the library - but they're not going there to read boring old books, obviously.

According to the Daily Record, a new scheme was recently launched in the Moredun area of the city to combat anti-social behaviour through the power of games.

The local library has been hosting weekly PS2 gaming contests, and hoodies and happyslappers have been flocking to compete with police officers at the likes of Gran Turismo 3, Tiger Woods Golf and Pro Evolution Soccer - once they've worked out what a library is, of course.

OK, the part about not knowing what a library is is kind of a cheap shot, but I'm glad someone else has ideas as good as mine.