That’s not the argument. If you want to argue with me, do that. As I said earlier, the Minneapolis police and their union are being absurdly resistant to change here, including attempting to fight to get the murderous officers that did this back on the force.
I'm not arguing that any of that isn't a problem. I was expressing skepticism at the notion that disbanding the police is going to do more good than harm. Which isn't an academic discussion, because it's what Minneapolis has stated it will do, with the promise of replacing it with...something.
The UK disbanded the old Northern Irish police force (The Royal Ulster Constabulary) and reformed it as the Police Service of Northern Ireland in 2001, which has been a marked improvement in many ways. It's definitely doable to attempt to carry out large scale change.
Places have disbanded their police force to form different solutions before, typically a new police force. I do think in this case the emphasis will be put on creating a generally disarmed force with more training for their intended responsibilities and more specific divisions. Many of the responsibilities will be moved to social workers, such as handling outbursts from the mentally ill. Given the current scenario I would recommend a dillineation between detectives, traffic enforcement, emergency response, and law enforcement, but I’m not too confident on that. At the very least create separate groups for tasks that require weapons and tasks that don’t.
I'd guess that if they have a strong union as suggested in the media, they'll just go on strike or work to rule or something like that. I can't see police officers risking their lives facing down rioters if they know the police department is going to be disbanded.
Ok, but that's replacing the police with police. If (or rather when) Minneapolis reorganizes the police force under a different name and leadership, the people who wanted the police gone are just gonna come back to light more things on fire. I'm pretty sure the primary beneficiaries of this vote by the city counsel are the Minneapolis area U-Hauls as a bunch of people already on edge make the decision to get the hell out of Dodge.
Golly gee, it's almost as if the overwhelming majority of vehicle- and transportation-related citations don't actually penalize citizens engaged in reckless or risky behavior, but rather generate revenue for municipal, county, or state governments by way of needless and often excessive fines and fees.
Hint: the job isn't the problem. The problem is the job provides qualified immunity while entailing no duty to protect, while giving workers the prerogative to employ force up to and including to kill, not only absent adequate oversight but with the active protection of supervision, management, and labor organization. While carrying a core presumption of guilt in a justice system built to presume innocence, and empowered by woefully inadequate, and in many cases outright toxic, training curricula.
This is disingenuous at best, considering less than a third of firearm-related deaths in the US are actually murders or non-negligent manslaughters. Two-thirds of firearm-related deaths are suicides.
Or if you want an example on the american soil, albeit on smaller scale, Camden NJ and their remodeling of the town's police force.
Which would be a dealbreaker if all protesters were in agreement the only way to improve things is outright abolishing all police force now and forever.
Not in those numbers.
The trick is not to just reconstitute the police force under a different name and leadership. Overhaul its ethos, remit, organisation, accountability, etc., and if necessary a decent chunk of its staff, too. A lot of serving officers would surely continue in the new organistion, but there's the opportunity to clear out a lot of the less constructive ones and replace them with officers aligned to a new program. Although I think an extreme shake-up can work on a psychological level to jolt people who might be stuck in their ways into new ways of thinking.
I don't think most people are appreciating the philosophical divide between themselves and a lot of the "thought leaders" about at the moment. Like, the Democrats are unveiling the Justice in Policing Act of 2020 (announcement here if you'd like to see an eloquent statement of intent before a rambling, incoherent mess of Nancy Pelosi), but it's like they aren't actually listening to what people are saying. Mind you, based on the summary I've seen, it actually looks pretty good. I have not yet found a deliberate poison pill in here, they may actually want to pass this bill. And if I'd consider it, they can probably get it through the Senate, which is actually sort of a dangerous game the Democrats are playing since that would likely mean Donald Trump gets his name on not just prison reform but also police reform, and people might notice he's not the obstruction they claim he is. Anyway, I'm getting distracted.
That article also says this.
On another note, I think part of the problem with the discussion here is the assumption everyone is coming into it with, whatever your assumption on why this is happening is informs what you think the solution should be.
Strawmen are easy to knock down. They don't even fight back.
variety.com
What do you mean "phonies"? People who are pretending to be something, but aren't?
In that case, they did a great job of fending off Bigfoot, the chupacabra and the Martian invasion fleet, too.Edit: I mean, fuck, we've got milita-types doing "Antifa" patrols in tiny towns and then declaring victory when nothing happens.
In Klamath Falls, Oregon, victory declared over antifa, which never showed up
Towns from Washington state to Indiana have seen armed groups begin patrolling the streets after rumors spread on social media about an antifa invasion.www.nbcnews.com
Yes.
Watch the video (highly recommended). Read the link, or type her name in to google.
