we can talk about North Preston's Finest and East Preston's Finest

I was a bit surprised on CBC supper hour news last week to hear the words "North Preston's Finest" spoken. I thought maybe it was a slip or an editing error on the air. You had to watch for it a bit. But it's online too here and here.

It seemed to be a self imposed taboo for the last few years for any local print or broadcast news outlet to ever speak of the rival Preston gangs North Preston's Finest aka NPF and East Preston's Finest aka EPF. I mean I generally don't know anything and I know about NPF and EPF. so the media certainly knows. and I've known going back to the liquordome brawl way back. It's so weird watching the news over the years and its like after hours club shooting here, Preston shooting there, Mineville shooting somewhere else and the media chooses to mislead the public just talking about some unspecified "gang" activity while for whatever reason leaving out key information about specific rival gangs.

Consider some of the other coverage. The media pretty much publishes detailed org charts on the Spryfield Marriott and Melvin groups and everyone is ok with it. and it's not like people apply labels to Spryfield as a whole over it. It's just an activity that a tiny percentage of Spryfield people are involved in. so why the code of silence all these years over NPF and EPF? well I guess now the word is finally out so perhaps we'll be hearing more of them in the months ahead.