> Sorry to say but who ever decided that the phrase "defund the police" is good or smart made a huge mistake.
Yet we're here talking about it, repeating the phrase. So I disagree.
Yet we're here talking about it, repeating the phrase. So I disagree.
The lower classes are not treated like this in any way, shape, or form. My family spent many years being targeted and harassed by local small town police in various jurisdictions. Driving a car that is more than ten years old is a great way to attract police attention. Driving a new F-150, they just smile and at you and hollar "Nice truck!".
It did cause me to get very aquianted with my civil rights though. At the end we were pretty good at thwarting the harassment using a variety of methods to assert our rights.
When I was 18 I ran over two brothers on purpose and skipped town. They were on drugs and beating someone in my passenger seat to death. Their sister blocked the front of my car so I threw it in reverse and floored the gas. They were inside the passenger door that was open, sweeping them under the car (a Ford Thunderbird).
Anyway, when the police caught up with me at work the officer saw that I was a clean cut white boy with a new car and decided on the spot that I had already been punished enough (after confirming I was there to buy/sell drugs). My car door was wasted. He just chuckled and left after mentioning the brothers were still in the hospital in really bad condition.
I thought for sure I was going to prison. I have more stories like this.
I’ve got a bridge to sell you.
The power in America is at the very top with wealth and favors. The middle class has no real say in anything. I’m pretty sure most people would agree that they have no pull with their congress people after voting. But ultra wealthy people sure do.
Edit: I left out corporations and lobbyists.
It's not as if they only had this one horrible slogan and everything else is "softer language" or exactly the same. Yes, a new slogan that has some bite was a good idea, the one they went with was a horrible mistake that only made it harder for them to accomplish their goals.
Many many people want changes to the way police operate, no one wants a police force that doesn't have any funding.
"Make America Great Again" means literally nothing. At least defund the police states a concrete goal. Don't even get me started on how bastardized "Critical Race Theory" has become.
A goal that no one wants. Every one wants police to exist. That means they want police to be funded. The minute that slogan reached the public conservatives started with "If they are successful you won't have police when you are in danger because they will have no funds to help you". The slogan has done more to hurt the changes of meaningful change than to help it.
Conservatives are fearful by nature. They always suspect that some group of "others" is out there just waiting to take everything they love from them. Many of them live in rural/remote areas where "others" aren't as prevalent and police response times are poor. They still love police though, in part because they want to feel safe and protected, but also because they like to see "others" being punished. They really love punishment. They're convinced that fear of punishment is the only thing standing between order and chaos. The harsher the punishment, the more peaceful the world. Police represent order, safety, and help keep the "others" in control. Defunding them is not an option for these people.
The slogan is not the problem. People wanting police in its current form are the problem.
It also fails to address what the difference is between police and "civilian services" that perform exactly the same function, what will stop the new service providers from becoming exactly what the current one has become, or how breaking up the current organizational structure into multiple entirely separate organizations tasked with extremely limited roles would produce greater efficiencies and effectiveness.
I agree that police are poorly suited for mental health work and I think we would be much better off getting mental health professionals in that role to help the person in crisis, probably along with police backup (for safety). Police do a very poor job of both helping people with mental illness and keeping people safe while responding to mental health crisis, but with oversight and accountability they could do one of those things very well.
I agree that traffic cops don't need to be armed to the teeth to pull over speeders and that they shouldn't use unmarked cars, but I think it's pretty useful that when they pull someone over they can see if they are a wanted criminal, determine if the car they are driving has been stolen, and arrest people who are intoxicated. They can do those things because they are working under a single organization. The cop pulling over speeders has access to criminal databases updated by other police officers in other departments (like the ones dealing with homicide, missing persons, and stolen cars) and can take dangerous people to a jail cell to be watched over by jailers who are also other police officers. Having all those different types of officers under one umbrella organization means that hiring practices, training, and polices can be consistent between them, that inter-departmental communications can flow easily, and that oversight can be simplified and consolidated. Imagine how much more work it would take to get multiple different "civilian" organizations to work together, handle passing around access to highly sensitive information securely, and to monitor them all individually.
They entirely hand-wave police preventing and stopping violence by saying that "In most incidents of violent crime, police are responding to a crime that has already taken place." which is great for "most incidents" but none of the rest of them. They say police are "ill-equipped" to investigate crime, ignoring the fact that every crime that has ever been investigated and justice was served happened because they did their job. Yes, there are problems, but no alternative organization has ever done a better job and they say nothing about why or how their "specialized service" would.
Ultimately their plan to replace police with "New Police but somehow also not connected to an institution of policing" isn't compelling. All of the fundamental problems with oversight and regulation are still unsolved. All of the problems with police unions and the relationship between law enforcement and the court system are still unsolved. It's "New Police", but less organized, and less capable.
It's a whole lot easier to reform and manage one system, than try to reform and manage countless separate unaffiliated systems trying to do the exact same job in different ways. Change is needed, and not all of their ideas are terrible, but there's no reason we couldn't accomplish them without making the problem larger and harder to manage and there's no indication on that website as to why that wouldn't be case with hundreds of totally separate New Police forces doing the same essential job of policing.
I do get the frustrations expressed by those taking the more extreme view, but it comes off as more of an emotional outburst than a path forward. It's understandable to be frustrated and outraged enough to want to abolish policing entirely at this point, but it's also not constructive or helpful.
The good thing is that everybody is pretty clear on what the problems are, but I fear that those seeking radical/counterproductive changes to society like getting rid of police entirely will hold back the rest of us either by rejecting anything that doesn't burn the justice system to the ground, or by convincing others that there's no hope in reformation of what we have today while offering no actual solutions leading people to feel helpless and defeated at a time when the message people need is "Change is possible and necessary, we just need to insist on it and work to make it happen"