The Shooting Gallery: Police Violence MEGATHREAD

[Valmy]

So that is not so crazy. Really just police reform. It is a little misleading to present it that way.

[The Larch]

I agree politically it has gone very well for BLM.  They just need to watch out for over-reach.  On Twitter I've seen a bunch of calls to Defund the police, or get rid of the police - I don't think there's any public appetite for anything like that.

(...) "defund the police" isn't going to play well. I absolutely agree with the idea that take some of that generous police funding and move it to social services where it would be better spent. That's a bit more fine grained than "defund the police" though obvs.

All the news pieces I've seen on the issue go on that direction, moving budget from police to social services, it's not just slashing the police budget just because.

[HVC]

I mean we need to have police. They just mean disbanding the current organizations and start new ones right?

who are you going to hire though?

[Grey Fox]

So that is not so crazy. Really just police reform. It is a little misleading to present it that way.

It is union & expertise breaking tho.

[Oexmelin]

I mean we need to have police. They just mean disbanding the current organizations and start new ones right?

It's three different things:

1) Disbanding organizations that are too hopelessly corrupt to be reformed.

2) Defunding those that remain, so that the enormous amount of money that go to police go to people who would do a much better job. So many calls to police about neighborhood disputes, mental illness emergencies, drug addict in crisis etc. are needlessly escalated into violence and imprisonment by officers who are clearly unqualified to answer these specific challenges. This is especially true in the US where training is minimal in the best of circumstances, and funding is enormous.

3) Some are indeed pushing for the elimination of police forces. It's indeed radical, but not utopian. Police forces are a relatively recent innovation, not a natural or inevitable institution.

[HVC]

you won't get true change in the police force until you "break" the unions. not sure how that will get done though, and what, if anything, will replace them

[Grey Fox]

It might seems more insane to use because we start wondering who's going to wage the war on drugs & the other dumb things our police forces enforce from previous racist government edicts.

[merithyn]

I mean we need to have police. They just mean disbanding the current organizations and start new ones right?

I've heard that it's really about ending the Unions. They're seen as the number one problem in fixing this situation.

[Oexmelin]

you won't get true change in the police force until you "break" the unions. not sure how that will get done though, and what, if anything, will replace them

Ask all the Reagan fanboys.

[Syt]

Just had a look, because the number seemed insane. Based on the 2020-21 budget for LA, 41% of the city's budget goes to the police ($1.857B out of $4.486B): http://cao.lacity.org/budget20-21/2020-21Budget_Summary.pdf (page 12)

They make up 44% of the city's salary budget.

[Valmy]

3) Some are indeed pushing for the elimination of police forces. It's indeed radical, but not utopian. Police forces are a relatively recent innovation, not a natural or inevitable institution.

Sure if by recent you mean mid 19th century. As much as I want to bring offenders to the magistrate like the ye olde days I don't think that is going to make things much better.

[Tamas]

The comment that prompted my question was a comment by a (black) guy who said it took just one week of white kids being treated the way blacks have been treated for decades to suddenly get momentum on police reform. And I couldn't help thinking that he had a point.

I am sure it plays the part but that's not it. First of all the original incident with Floyd is one of the most brutal clear-cut gut-wrenching episode of the long series of documented racist violence by the US police.

Then you have this series of also well documented police brutality during the protests which I am sure helps fuel it, and offset the "them blacks are looting again" narrative.

[derspiess]

I mean we need to have police. They just mean disbanding the current organizations and start new ones right?

I've heard that it's really about ending the Unions. They're seen as the number one problem in fixing this situation.

Then why don't people say that?

[Admiral Yi]

Question for the room, because it came up in my Twitter feed, and I genuinely wonder.

Would we see the same amount of public support for the protests against police brutality and racism, if it was overwhelmingly black protesters who protested and were assaulted by the police?

I.e. does the copious footage of white Americans being treated so harshly increase the overall positive perception of the movement?

I don't see the evidence for that.  Protest crowds seemed to be mixed race from the beginning.  I've only seen the one survey, the one that Timmy linked, and it came out fairly early in the process.  There's the proposed bill about stopping transfer of miliitary surplus to police.  Was that introduced because Pelosi cared about white protestors and media being abused?  I wouldn't say so, but how can you really know.  The question, and the assumption underlying it, seem designed to maintain permanent grievance.  Otherwise why ask it? 

[garbon]

We are all conditioned to support the police and other first responders so getting so much of the country turned against them takes some truly shocking tone deafness and inteptitude.

Is the 'we' in this sentence, white people?