Cops offer free doughnuts — and snarf them — in outreach video about respect
If you can’t beat the stereotype, make it work for you, right?
So here you go: Cops eating doughnuts are a viral hit in Iowa.
In a new outreach video promoting respect within the citizenry, officers from the Ames Police Department and the Iowa State University police department plow through stacks of doughnuts.
They offer free ones to people who “donut disrespect, donut discriminate, donut harass and donut hate.”
The outreach campaign is an overnight sensation, gobbling up more than 200,000 views by Tuesday morning after the city’s police department posted it on its Facebook page Monday.
“Spring is always a time about new beginnings,” Eric Snyder, community resource officer for the Ames police, told the Des Moines Register. “The message this year is respect.
“Respect is a very basic message anytime you want to do it. Respect is cross-cultural.”
Snyder appears in the video with ISU officer Anthony Greiter. They sit side-by-side at a table, a plated pile of doughnuts in front of each. Powdered doughnuts. Chocolate-glazed doughnuts. Blueberry doughnuts. Doughnuts with sprinkles.
As they eat they talk, their words muffled by the cakey goodness they shovel into their mouths.
Thank goodness for subtitles.
At the video’s end they make an offer no self-respecting college student could pass up: “Donut make bad decisions and we’ll give you free donuts.”
It’s a serious offer. Free doughnuts for the next two weeks.
The video touched off a bit of banter on the city police department’s Facebook page. (One female commenter wanted to know whether the officers were single.)
Commenter Sarah Anne Martin: “No clue where Ames is but I’m over here laughing in Benbrook, Texas! Super cute video! Send donuts.”
Ames Police Department: “We are right in the middle of Iowa. Come visit, it’s beautiful, and tasty, this time of year.”
Commenter Sally Lockhart: “Donut talk with your mouth full.”
Ames Police Department: “You try enjoying a donut and sprinkling in some knowledge at the same time. It’s a hole lot of work. We didn't want to glaze over the message but we didn't have a lot of time so we had to sacrifice our manners this one time. Donut hold it against us.”
People wanted to know how many doughnuts the officers had to eat to make the video, so the departments posted an outtake video so they could count themselves.
You can also hear the director warning the officers, as they dissolve in laughter over a flubbed line: “Don’t spew the doughnuts. Keep ’em in the mouth.”
This story was originally published April 19, 2017 at 12:10 PM with the headline "Cops offer free doughnuts — and snarf them — in outreach video about respect."