Differences

[AirForce1]

I am writing this as a informatory thread. I was just wondering if the occupation is police office, law enforcement agent, ect........ where did the term COPS originate? Why is it that some people take being calle a COP and not a LEO as a sign of disrepect adn others are fine with it.

I dont see it as a derogatory term, but then again I am asking becasue I dont know. I am really anxious to be a part of the great people who serve the towns and cities they do, but just wanted to know where it all started. Thank you all in advance.


Once I leave the military I have decided to move to TN. Anybody know of any good cities to check for jobs with?

[icecoldblueyes]

not a COP

but... I found this a while back on Merriam Webster's website:

Several colorful stories circulate concerning the origin
of cop. One is that cop was shortened from copper, a
name given because the first London police (or members
of some other early police force) wore large copper
buttons on their uniforms. Another version has these
officers wearing star-shaped copper shields. Details of
such word origins vary freely, as the stories are
their own justification and people who repeat them
seldom see a need to offer supporting evidence.

An entirely different approach to explaining cop is through
the first letters of a phrase such as 'constable on
patrol' or 'constabulary of police' or (least likely of
all) 'chief of police'. This story has it that, in
signing reports, policemen (presumably the same ones who
wore the copper buttons or shields) abbreviated the
official phrase beside the name, writing something
like "John Smith, C.O.P."

The truth is simpler, if less entertaining. Around the year 1700
English gained a slang verb cop, meaning 'to get ahold
of, catch, capture' and perhaps borrowed from Dutch.
This word is somewhat unusual in having remained slang
to this day, unlike most slang words which either
die out or become more respectable over time. By 1844
cop is recorded in print as being used to refer to
what police do to criminals, though it is probably
somewhat older in speech. In very short order the -er
agent suffix was added, and a policeman became a
copper, one who cops or catches or arrests criminals.
This usage first appeared in print in 1846. The
connection with the metal copper must have been made almost
at once in the popular mind, for a British newspaper
reported in 1864 that "as they pass a policeman they will
exhibit a copper coin, which is equivalent to calling the
officer copper." The noun cop shortened from copper
appeared in print in 1859.