Talk:Joseph Simpson (police officer)

External links modified
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I have just modified one external link on Joseph Simpson. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added tag to http://www.lincs.police.uk/index.asp?locID=436&docID=-1
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090613015727/http://www.johnskelton.org.uk/ to http://www.johnskelton.org.uk/

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Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 19:09, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Joseph Simpson. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20051231142426/http://www.tvpa.police.uk/ to http://www.tvpa.police.uk/

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Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 18:45, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Revision - COI template
An editor whose talk page suggests they are a close family member of this subject has done some constructive work in adding detail about Simpson's family history and professional accomplishments. I've added the COI template as some of the edits seem to be more about glorifying Simpson and defending his reputation from academic criticism than recording a neutral history backed up by citations.

I've reverted some of the changes the editor made to the section about Simpson's personal opposition to the recruitment to police officers of colour. Some of the edits not only misrepresented the work of modern scholars but also introduced personal opinion and assertions which simply aren't encyclopaedic and don't withstand scrutiny (e.g. that Simpson couldn't have held racist views, because his grandfather was a Quaker abolitionist). Semyon-patras (talk) 14:06, 21 January 2023 (UTC)


 * The increasing use of the template inserted as a header in Wikipedia articles, warning of ‘bias’ due to the ‘closeness’ of contributors overlooks two potential benefits that ‘closeness’ may bring: insight and witness.
 * In recent edits the contributor’s assertion that Simpson’s grandfather’s involvement in the ‘Abolitionist’ movement would imply that Simpson did not hold racist views, has been removed.   That assertion  was based on childhood memories and the prominence of a large photograph of the grandfather in the Simpson household (see The Generations in Between pp 51 & 52 and colour plate).  The prominence and significance of this was also mentioned in an illustrated talk entitled Letters from America, 1865: an English Quaker and the ‘emancipated negroes’, given at Wolfson College on 14 February 2019.  A transcript of this talk can be found in the family archives at Coalbrookdale.  The contributor acknowledges this may be a tenuous link and accepts the edit, despite the ‘witness’ and memories of unspecified childhood discussions about the photograph and the issues it raised.
 * Whitfield’s work receives considerable predominance in the section on ‘Recruitment of ethnic minority officers’, with five references.  No indication is given of Simpson’s reasoning; he is long dead and cannot defend himself against such accusations.
 * Furthermore, there is no indication of Whitfield’s background, with over 20 years in the Met, before retirement at the rank of Inspector in 1999.  This may be seen as important, one way or another, given his views.
 * Some may  argue that Simpson’s  decision was advisable, given that racial tensions would continue and indeed be raised further, leading to Enoch Powell’s ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech barely a month after Simpson’s death in 1968, and beyond.
 * However there is clear reference elsewhere to Simpson’s thinking, which takes into account the racial tensions and discrimination of the day, and acknowledges that his decision not to appoint black Special Constables was made ‘in the aftermath of racial disorder in 1958 and the murder of a West Indian immigrant the following year’ https://www.historyandpolicy.org/docs/met_police_training.pdf
 * It would seem appropriate that repetition of the quotes and references to Whitfield’s works is somewhat excessive and should be counterbalanced by the inclusion of this view in the article.
 * The contributor does not wish to enter into a series of contradictory editing sessions but wishes hereby to seek some agreement of what may be mutually acceptable content for this section of Simpson’s Wikipedia  entry, and for the removal of the ‘close connection’ template. Bendavid42 (talk) 10:49, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Reversion in error
In response to my query, ButterCashier apologised and explained on their talk page that they reverted edits to the page in error. I've corrected their changes back to the latest version. Semyon-patras (talk) 20:21, 24 January 2023 (UTC)