Want to Scare the Bejesus Out of Your Kid With a Fake Call From the Cops? There's an App for That.
Hey parents, aren't there days when you wish you could have a cop call and yell at your kids for you? Who doesn't occasionally want to invoke fear of a SWAT team busting down the door when Junior just won't pick up his Legos?
Now you can! Get your very own call from the cops for 99 cents. A new app will generate a fake call from "Sergeant Friendly" admonishing your kid by name for failing to do things like sleep in their own bed or clean up their toys. (There's a free version, but it doesn't have a full library of nags.)
"Hello, this is the police department," the call begins after a computer-generated voice bleats the child's name. "I heard you haven't been eating all of your food lately….I'll be checking in on you later to see that you're eating all of your food. I have to go now and catch some bad guys." And then there a police siren.
According to the press release I received today, this is the genesis of this not-at-all creepy app:
I was visiting a mall with my two youngest children when both of them began to misbehave. I was embarrassed by their behavior and was willing to do anything to get them to listen. I told them that the mall police were watching them on the security cameras and that they needed to be good. At that moment, I thought to myself, how nice would it be to have a personalized phone call from a police officer to correct or reward your child's behavior.
I contacted my wife to tell her my idea and she thought it was brilliant. After giving it some thought, the app was developed and now it's available on Apple and Android devices worldwide for FREE. The character I created is Sergeant Friendly. He is a police officer that children can look up to as a role model. I didn't want to scare the children, so I made him very approachable and likable. The first time I tried the app with my children, ages 3 and 5, they corrected their behavior immediately. About 10 minutes later, I arranged a second call to them so that Sergeant Friendly could praise them for being good. They were ecstatic and could not wait to tell me what Sergeant Friendly had said to them on the phone. "Daddy, Sergeant Friendly just called me and told me that he is proud of me for being good".
And the kicker: The creator of the app is a police officer.
The funny thing is that I happen to be a Friendly Police Officer myself with over 18 years of experience. I hope your child loves the app just as much as mine do. Thank you.
On a far more grim note, here's a reminder about what can happen when parents actually call the police on their kids.