Police in Rochford, near Southend in the UK county of Essex, aren't best pleased with the behaviour of Pokémon GO players in the region, accusing them of flaunting lockdown restrictions which cover the entire country at present.
The force posted a social media statement which has now been deleted, but was spotted by the Southend Standard (thanks, Eurogamer) and read as follows:
Whilst patrolling, our community policing team have had cause to speak with a number of different men aged 30+ over the last week, who seemed to feel it is acceptable to attend certain public places within the district, to hunt Pokémon.
Honestly, yes, you did read that correctly.
If that happens to be someone you know, please remind them of the following information shared by our partners at Rochford District Council.
The post was removed following comments from people pointing out that those playing the game were within their rights as they were exercising, which is permitted. However, others have also pointed out that while it's perfectly possible to play Pokémon GO solo, the game encourages people to group together to take part in raids, and therefore could cause problems within the current rules, which forbid meeting with multiple people, even when outside.
In a statement, Essex police force said it had responded to reports of people "making non-essential journeys in the Rochford area last week," and that the tweet was deleted "to ensure the appropriate level of seriousness when sharing crucial partnership and safety messages about the pandemic."
[source eurogamer.net]
Comments 29
Bruh. I can't believe people are still playing pokemon go this much. In 2017 I would expect this but now?
oi mate, you got a loiscence for that pokeman go ye?
Men aged 30+? Sure they were only hunting Pokemon?
Bit of unnecessary geek shaming in the original message perhaps?
But yes..... Lockdown is lockdown, regardless of your hobbies.
@SonOfVon I’m pretty sure that’s the wrong accent, still funny though
Hmmm, I thought Niantic made it possible to do Raids remotely, or did they scrap it? Haven't been on the app since last year.
@Iggy-Koopa Except what they were doing was permitted. ***** the police.
"Men age 30+"
You saying there were only men and no women doing it?
@FantasiaWHT Debatable. Regardless of how people try and interpret the rules, wandering 'round playing Pokémon Go is classed as a non-essential journey, and will undoubtedly lead to people eventually gathering in groups.
Oh, and you may need those police one day, so try not to **** them too hard.
@FantasiaWHT dude... exercise is permitted. If you’re exercising you generally don’t stop, pull out your phone and start playing a game. At which point it stops being exercise and you should stop and go home. And if the intention of the journey is to go to that location to play the game, then that’s a non-essential journey.
People trying to bend the rules is getting the country in further trouble and causing extended lockdowns.
Also, your attitude toward emergency services is reprehensible and unfair; since they can’t exactly respond with “No, f*** you.” If you’re in trouble they’ll come and help you anyway.
@RickD oh, my mistake. I thought it said they were playing a game, not stopping to check a message/notification.
No wait... it did say they were playing a game. Oh, haha, I said that in my comment as well.
I might go for that job, although I’m not sure that being able to spot the obvious is a core skill they’re looking for. If I were you I’d stay well away from it though... you’re clearly not a detective!
Oh I love the idea of government deciding how I exercise, what a great idea.
I'll amend my earlier comment though, ***** the police who make ***** up and needlessly interfere with people's personal lives.
Seriously, a cop sees a person walking alone by themselves, even if they stop to catch something - that idiot cop just increased the risk of COVID spread by having that interaction.
well are they supposed to say oh its fine go in that blocked off area and play pokemon, in fact I'll join you from here haha
Lol. You UK folks have no idea. If you saw how people behave where I live... you'd understand why America has been reporting 250k cases a day. Or more.
@TheSmashTheorist The game is WAY better now than it was at launch.
@Heavyarms55 Sadly, we are probably to many a case of such behaviour thanks to the internet.
Stay safe.
🤣 Must be a slow news day
@TheSmashTheorist it's a mix of pokemon go and let's go that got me back into pokemon tbh, theres a good reason pokemon go is still popular i dont even play mobile phone games lol but it's nice to scan pokestops on way to work, hunt pokemon while I'm on I'm toilet at work ect
Turned 30 last august, dont recognise a lot of pokemon anymore the newer ones but let's go especially (gen1 ftw) reignited my love for pokemon a lot, and I feel on at that age where I dont feel as embarrassed to still like these kind of things
Tl;dr it's a casual game that's also a lot of fun for people who like pokemon, also has no real end game so people continue playing it
I play Pokemon Go on all my walks at the moment.
I'd be going on the walks regardless - they're the only exercise and change of scenery I get and litterally the only thing that breaks up the day, especially crucial when working from home.
There is a lot of context missing from the tweet; if there were a group of people meeting up to play raids then absolutely, send them home. Equally, if someone is walking by themselves with their phone open, that's no one elses business and well within the rules.
But perhaps more importantly, what's with the shaming tone of the tweet?
@Cinaclov
Yeah pretty much this. You're allowed to go out for a walk and play pokemon go if you want. You're allowed to go for a walk with one other person as well.
I'm assuming they were in a group of more than two people, that or the police are just out of touch with reality.
Neither would surprise me, either way the police probably have better things to be doing, than posting on Twitter about pokemon go.
@SonOfVon English is a pretty great language, I concur.
@Wargoose I dont like the way they shame, I recently turned 30 and gotten back into pokemon, we're the age group that remember pokemon first coming out... screw their age shaming!
@TheSmashTheorist That's generally the case when people like a game, as opposed to just jumping on a bandwagon because they need to be told what to play
@Heavyarms55 US does have a much larger population too, doesnt mean UK isnt doing just as bad
Kind of have to take population numbers into account, same when talking crime rates, death rates per year ect
@Doktor-Mandrake To be fair I haven't checked the percentages.
And honestly, after Googling it, the UK has a much smaller population than I realized. I thought it was 85 million.
@Heavyarms55 I think both countries would both be pretty vulnerable to just plain ignorance as well.. people who dont think covid exists, or feel the need to spread the virus around as both regions tend to have those kind of people let's be honest lol
“Lockdown” is perfect. We truly are prisoners of our governments. Aren’t we free to assess risks and make decisions for our own safety and those around us?
@Menardi I feel the same way you do...
Now what do we do? I’ve started buying pure gold. But things do not look good.
@Doktor-Mandrake It's both sad and frightening the degree to which people reject logic and facts. If it shows anything, it's a failure of education on a societal level. Science isn't an opinion. It's a testable, measurable thing. The idea that there's a global conspiracy that's faking a pandemic is lunacy. With that sort of scale, there's no way someone could pull that off, let alone for months and months. And if there were such a group with that level of global control, then it's already over. They already rule the world.
@Fandabidozi Depends on the context really. I've known people to walk mile after mile for Pokémon Go, and that's hardly considered essential when you are supposed to keep very local to home when you are only supposed to be exercising. Given that people are prone to gathering in certain locations while playing too, and I can quite understand why someone would land in hot water for leaving their house in pursuit of Pokémon lol.
FWIW, if you are popping out for a Starbucks then that's hardly considered essential either! Get some bloody instant from your local shop and make do, yer hipsters.
I can't believe that people are still finding ways to interpret the rules to further their own ends at this stage, it's beyond ridiculous.
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