I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard the New Zealand Police get mocked for not carrying guns on their person and keeping them in the boot (American translation: trunk) of their cars. Well, a recent hostage crisis in Auckland might poor some cold water on that image, especially with visuals such as:

But don’t worry, there’s still plenty of reason to hold onto the panzy ass image we’re all used to. Just take a look at this photo from the window of my flat where a bunch of police officers are protecting protestors who want better public transportation (I’ll ignore the irony that the photo also clearly shows construction work being done to… what do you know… improve public transportation.) Anyway, there are almost as many cops (the guys in the yellow jackets) as there are protestors - just the kind of hard core image we all expect to see.