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They should use a phrase like REFORM THE POLICE or IMPROVE THE POLICE and then more people would understand, unlike the OP of this thread.
We love the police where I live. You can call them and talk to them when you need advice, they are very helpful. Right now we're having trouble with a nutty women in our apartment complex (she doesn't live close to me, thank goodness) but she harasses her neighbors and they have to call the police. They are afraid of her.
And our police have to come over and get screamed at by this nutcase woman. Yet they always come and they try to calm her down. This sort of situation is where the police have to know how to handle people by talking to them instead of hurting them or killing them. Our local police must be trained pretty well and ideally all police should be as good as these guys are at dealing with all kinds of people. This is the kind of thing people all over the country are crying out for--police who will help us and protect us, just like they used to. We didn't used to have so many gangs and homeless people or druggies. Police shouldn't have to deal with all of that on top of protecting us. Let them do the job that they are supposed to do, the job they did so well.
I don’t think that is the entire issue though. The police are taking over duties from other departments. I used to work in a state agency. I went to one meeting with several agencies probably about 8 years ago and the issue was that none of us had any money. The response was “well, nothing ever happens unless law enforcement gets involved, because we have no money to offer mental health intervition/X service, etc.” It shouldn’t be that way. There should be resources to help people before law enforcement needs to get involved. Instead, so many resources are put toward the police that there is no money for social services, mental health, etc.
Rich Dems can afford private security. They do not care about the average person. If people do not want the police out of their town then throw the mayors out. If they do not want the police then the police should leave and let them fend for themselves. I loved Kurt Russell in Escape From New York.
This is post is just one more wedge post that tries to convince people that democrats oppose the police and want them defunded. That is not true.
If you paid any attention to what is going on nationally, Joe Biden doesn't want to defund the police. Nancy Pelosi doesn't want to defund the police. Chuck Schumer doesn't want to defund the police. Only a few real nuts want to do that.
What most responsible people want is more accountability. Why do choke holds continue to be used? Why do so many minority people who are unarmed continue to end up dead in altercations with the police? Even though body cams are in use, why does much footage of events still seem to be missing?
First off: THANK YOU for your service and big props to you for having arms and seeing combat. I've actually gotten my knuckles dirty, I've seen some very graphics things, have some rough experiences. Seen family members get shot up, one of them being my uncle who was shot in the balls. However, I've never been in a war so I'm not arguing with you there.
And with the statements in bold, I'm not arguing with you there either. So we're on the same page more than you think.
I'm from the hood, trust me, a lot of my "homies" will constantly tell you "TRUCK THE POLICE!!" and BELIEVE ME when I tell you, they don't want cops in their neighborhoods. I think the average person thinks its silly to defund the police but there's also very powerful, influential people in power who want exactly that. Little to no police. Did you not see what happened in Minneapolis?
Of course I did. And in DC, and in St. Louis, and in San Diego, Oakland, New York,etc.
Like I said, it's ironic that the worse violence occurred in cities with ridiculously high taxes. Defund the police, and change the laws that are just money grabs for city coffers. It's not worth dying for selling individual cigarettes, or CD's. Save the police for crimes where someone might actually get hurt.
Of course I did. And in DC, and in St. Louis, and in San Diego, Oakland, New York,etc.
Like I said, it's ironic that the worse violence occurred in cities with ridiculously high taxes. Defund the police, and change the laws that are just money grabs for city coffers. It's not worth dying for selling individual cigarettes, or CD's. Save the police for crimes where someone might actually get hurt.
San Diego just increased SDPD funding by millions.
Cops have it bad, it is a $h1tty job and everyone complains about the pension/benefits yet those same people are home sleeping while those cops are on duty in the middle of the night. Cops have to follow rules, bad guys don't but they suddenly have "rights!"
The 56 Buffalo cops had it right, resign and let all the loud mouth critics "man the line." The cops have to "up their game" when the bad guys are out there with bigger firepower/better tactics.
Remember the North Hollywood shootout? 2000 rounds fired, 2 bad guys dead/20 injured:
ain't happenin..... only far left wackos want to "defund" the police whatever that means. Complain they're not trained properly so cut their budget? ...lmao ...that's a whole lot of stupid going on there.
This thread has started out as a dumpster fire already, but the point of Defund the Police is not to have no law enforcement, but to imagine a different kind of law enforcement. For example, armed police don't need to be social workers (dealing with mental health, homelessness, or domestic violence,) more robust social services are the answer. Decriminalizing some drugs, and getting users treatment rather than jail time is a part of the process. The idea that many people are so resistant to not having a publicly funded paramilitary organization with no accountability is part of the societal problem we're facing right now.
Well the statement "abolish the police" in the title is pretty clear, and do you realize your last line pretty much makes clear your true intent and destroys any claimed social motivation you attempted to use as a counterargument? - "not having a publicly funded paramilitary organization" (in other words - abolish the police).
Police reform can be achieved by various methods, social programs likewise can be funded by various methods. Decriminalizing some drugs - heck that's free and is already underway. You want money for social programs - city and country governments have lots of fat, waste, and inefficiency in all departments - start with government pensions. Or a city can increase taxes. Or bust city government unions. But the only thing you will accomplish by "defunding the police" is an undermanned and untrained police force.
When schools need change - do you "defund schools"?
Of course I did. And in DC, and in St. Louis, and in San Diego, Oakland, New York,etc.
Like I said, it's ironic that the worse violence occurred in cities with ridiculously high taxes. Defund the police, and change the laws that are just money grabs for city coffers. It's not worth dying for selling individual cigarettes, or CD's. Save the police for crimes where someone might actually get hurt.
The problem with that is, there isnt enough of that type of crime to justify such a large and extensive police force...they need the little stuff, that almost ensures there will be plenty of people breaking those laws on a daily basis, for them to arrest.
I think the main issue is that the police should serve and protect- the people. Not the legislature, not the mayor, not the city commission, etc. They should serve and protect the communities in which they serve and be a part of those communities. Instead, they are militarized and people in the communities often think of cops (rightly) as the enemy. People call the cops for domestic disputes or suspected domestic violence and they come in guns blazing and shoot people.
I agree that there should be some more testing to weed out personalities that are prone to violence. There are many complaints that people in law enforcement are more prone to domestic violence than others. Why is that? Is it a personality type that this job attracts? In the past (a while back) a federal court also allowed weeding out candidates who scored too high on intelligence testing... they didn’t do as much testing on interpersonal skills and how people would react in certain situations. It isn’t just about being smart intellectually, but being smart in terms of emotional intelligence and knowing what to do when faced with stressful situations. If someone’s first reaction is to pull out a gun or react with violence, they do not need to be pursuing a career in law enforcement.
IMO, some cops are more prone to domestic violence, in part, because they are traumatized by what they've seen and experienced. They have PTSD.
But...in my life, I knew a couple of different cops who were youngish, like I was, and they were jerks and a holes. So...I DO think there's a certain personality type that is attracted to being a policeman for the power it gives them. Maybe it has something to do with being large and in charge, when they never were in civilian life. I don't know. Just a guess.
And the reason they don't like cops to be TOO smart is because they want someone who will blindly follow orders without question. Especially in training.
I currently know A cop. He's my age and retired now, but he was one of the good guys. He could see and understand some of the ridiculousness some of the younger cops get involved in and steer them away. Help them grow up in a way.
I've known this guy since I was like 19 yrs old. He decided he wanted to be a cop because he was the kind of guy who drove a souped up car that always seemed to catch the attention of the local cops, who would always stop and pull him over for no good reason, so he decided HE would become a cop, and wouldn't be THAT kind of cop that harassed people for the sake of harassing people. He is, what I would classify as a "straight up kind of guy".
Cops are recruited from the same demographic as the career military and tradesmen. Guys who do 'hands-on' work, get themselves dirty in the process, but also have a respectable enough job to have something to lose usually. They tend to have no time for layabouts and ne'er-do-wells. That's completely independent of race as well.
It's funny when I see black/Hispanic/Asian cops get accused of racism, because they're acting 'just like the white cops'. I think it's to do with the fact that regardless of what race you are, if you're putting on boots in the morning and do shift work you end up having contempt for the type of fellow you find strung out on drugs in the middle of the day doing nothing in particular. Over time you'll lose your patience with people who eff up their lives and have an excuse for everything. People react differently, some guys will have the temperament to keep their sense of humor about it, be chill about it, others become hardened and bitter. You probably shouldn't be a street cop for 20 years..but then the public sector structure kinda encourages you to stick it out for as long as possible.
In my mind, and in my experience, there's two types of harsh police critics - those that get arrested by police and those at the opposite end of the spectrum - children of privilege living vanilla lives. It's like the famous Leonard Bernstein cocktail party for the Black Panthers. Radical chic, slumming etc.
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