Hello Kitty, Shame On YOu!

Behavior modification can take strange forms. Food is a great motivator, as Pavlov found out...at least with dogs. The nuns thought kneeling on pencils while holding dictionaries at arm's length worked just fine as well. Pop was a bit more straightforward, preferring anything hard enough (and handy enough) with which to whack me on the rear. Advertisers tend to use curvaceous models and/or sports heroes as prompters. All of these methods work, I guess, though some tend to be effective only on the short term. Publishing names found in books connected with...uh...unseemly activities has brought down many a politician and social magnate as well. Embarrassment might be the best method, and the police in Thailand have grabbed onto it in order to effect corrective behaviors among their own.
It seems that the Thai police officers have trouble adhering to the law's letter with regard to misdemeanors such as littering, parking illegally and arriving late to work. Not wishing to have their officers set a bad public example, those in power attempted stern warnings but found them ineffective. Sterner measures were in order!
Colonel Pongrat Chayaphan decided that for such minor offenses, his officers would suffer the most degrading embarrassment he could think of: they are required to wear armbands for an entire day on which the logo of "Hello Kitty" is emblazoned! For the uninitiated, "Hello Kitty" is a cute, stuffed animal kind of depiction of a kitty sitting atop two hearts. Imagine the degradation of having to wear this ALL DAY! I can see this if a guy is trying to direct traffic to the mirthful amusement of drivers, but these guys have to wear the armband around the office! They are not allowed to go outside thusly attired. HUH? Maybe fellow officers can think of more effective jibes, but I'd be a LOT more embarrassed if I had to wear "Hello Kitty" outside. Stopping a snickering traffic offender would only happen once. Chasing bank robbers? Forget it!
Maybe they know something in Thailand that we don't know, but I really think they need to get a couple of nuns in there to straighten those guys out!