Abolition of the Police

One thing I am not in favor of is arming other public servants and responders, so they have to focus on doing their jobs AND on possibly using lethal force if it is warranted. This is a big reason (though certainly not the only reason) the idea of arming teachers horrifies me. I know I have a hard enough time in the classroom sometimes, especially during labs, dealing with all the questions, issues with equipment, answering student questions, dealing with distraught students, that I can't remember where I just put my class notes or keys down sometimes. Having to be hyper alert for any threats and the need to be aware of my gun at all times would not be workable, unless I no longer perform the other aspects of my job with any focus or seriousness. I don't think social workers, paramedics, crisis counselors etc. would have success with this either.

One thing I've wondered about is why police are opposed to being issued "smart guns" that can only be fired by the person the weapon is registered to. Is it because the technology is still too glitchy, or is it because there's just a principle there they oppose? It seems like the widespread dissemination of this technology would reduce the risk of someone stealing an officer's gun and using it on them (there was a shooting of a police officer here in Sacramento a couple of years ago where that actually did happen). Heck, it would improve gun safety in other situations too, such as within homes with children, or if someone purchases a gun to protect themselves from an abusive partner or from ex who is stalking them.

Bola Wrap : new technology for the police
https://wraptechnologies.com/

Is it true that your kids in schools have practices for if someone comes in to shoot up the school? Or is that massively over-stated? (I'm guessing the second, because they'd all be traumatised by the practices, yes?)

mccardey said:

Is it true that your kids in schools have practices for if someone comes in to shoot up the school? Or is that massively over-stated? (I'm guessing the second, because they'd all be traumatised by the practices, yes?)

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They did it in our school. And yes, it was traumatizing, although in different ways for different kids.

[h=1]St. Louis Mayor Gives Out Names and Addresses of Protesters Who Want to Defund Police[/h]

mccardey said:

Is it true that your kids in schools have practices for if someone comes in to shoot up the school? Or is that massively over-stated? (I'm guessing the second, because they'd all be traumatised by the practices, yes?)

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We have them in Canada too. A coworker was extremely unsettled by how fun his 7 year old thought the drills were.

Roxxsmom said:

One thing I am not in favor of is arming other public servants and responders, so they have to focus on doing their jobs AND on possibly using lethal force if it is warranted.

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Whoa. Totally forgot that had come up as a suggestion. That's kinda the opposite of the direction I was thinking, which is to generally remove guns from the population, including the police (I'm anti-second amendment the way it's currently interpreted, and really don't want to derail this discussion with that).

I'm also now thinking that paramedics need to be defunded as well. Many who go into the career are wanna-be cops and they are demonstrating their authoritarian tendencies lately. The OD administered to Elijah McClain at the behest of the police, and their refusal to enter the Autonomous Zone in Seattle demonstrates that they will only ever do as they are told. I propose nurses and nurse practitioners replace paramedics.

mccardey said:

Is it true that your kids in schools have practices for if someone comes in to shoot up the school? Or is that massively over-stated? (I'm guessing the second, because they'd all be traumatised by the practices, yes?)

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I'm an elementary school teacher (equivalent to primary Down Under, yes?). We have at least one practice every year; it's required. Local police will assist the principals with safety checks. Usually they don't open the door to check inside the classroom but will look in the windows and rattle the door handle. One time a police officer opened the door, I didn't recognize him, and I nearly threw a desk at him. If there hasn't been a shooting in the news recently, the kids think it's fun. If there has been one, they are frightened out of their minds. We also go into full lockdown if there is any chance of a dangerous intruder in the area. Fireworks and trucks backfiring have literally sent us hiding in the corner, armed with furniture and dictionaries, wondering if this is the day we're all going to die. This was the first year we didn't have at least one in the five years I've been teaching.

I've read about news stories where the police force simulates an attack with someone pretending to be a shooter and even shooting blanks. That's not a widespread practice. Usually we just hide and talk about what to do if . . .

RedRajah said:

[h=1]St. Louis Mayor Gives Out Names and Addresses of Protesters Who Want to Defund Police[/h]

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What do you think, ignorance or malice?

And in related news, there's been another shooting at Seattle's CHOP (Capitol Hill Occupied Protest).

CNN: CHOP shooting in Seattle autonomous zone kills man and critically wounds boy The "man" turned out to be a 16 yr old kid.

Police Chief Best said if the goal was to promote black lives matter, it was time to end this occupation. There have been 4 shootings, with the deaths of two young black men (16 and 19).

"Defunding police" is really bad messaging. And I'm very strongly on the BLM side.

MaeZe said:

What do you think, ignorance or malice?

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I'd go with malice. She had that meeting where she recieved the proposals earlier in the day. Presumably she at least scanned over them, so she knew that names were included - that the protesters were brave and honest enough to put their real names down.
And, she then read out the names? This is only excuseable if she routinely reads out everything on papers she's handed. Personal notes, like 'smile here', 'wave vaguely at mountains' or notes from her staff such as 'he's an idiot, but throw him a bone', 'don't worry, X will backtrack later'. Does she normally do this? Don't think so.

So she knowingly exposed these people and her excuse is, what, 'Oops'?

jennontheisland said:

We have them in Canada too. A coworker was extremely unsettled by how fun his 7 year old thought the drills were.



Whoa. Totally forgot that had come up as a suggestion. That's kinda the opposite of the direction I was thinking, which is to generally remove guns from the population, including the police (I'm anti-second amendment the way it's currently interpreted, and really don't want to derail this discussion with that).

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Unfortunately, in the US, high powered military style weapons aren't going away any time soon. I wish they were, but after too many massacres to count anymore, it's pretty clear the political will simply isn't there.

I'm also now thinking that paramedics need to be defunded as well. Many who go into the career are wanna-be cops and they are demonstrating their authoritarian tendencies lately. The OD administered to Elijah McClain at the behest of the police, and their refusal to enter the Autonomous Zone in Seattle demonstrates that they will only ever do as they are told. I propose nurses and nurse practitioners replace paramedics.

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EMTs and paramedics are both very different from RNs (and from one another too) in their focus and skill sets. There is overlap, certainly. Nurses can do many of the thing Paramedics do, but their focus is very much on the care of patients in clinical or hospitalization situations, where paramedics are about stabilizing patients for transport and caring for critically ill patients en route. The range of medications paramedics can administer is more limited, for instance, but they are allowed to perform certain invasive procedures without direct supervision of a physician in certain emergencies. Both paramedics and RNs have two year degrees (with some prior courses required for admission to their programs), but there is a different emphasis.

Nurse practitioners are actually clinicians, similar in scope to PAs (in fact, some programs train NPs and PAs side by side, and the degree they get upon completion depends on whether they had an RN coming into the program, or a bachelor's degree). They can actually be primary health care providers in some specialties, and in some states can even prescribe certain medications and make certain diagnoses. They have more extensive training, at a "post graduate" level after getting their RN degree.

In my state, paramedics are often associated with the fire department, and in fact many are also firefighters. Firefighters have their own issues, unfortunately, and there are certainly instances of abuse and misconduct. I don't know if there's the same cultural issues as with the police and the so-called "Blue Wall," but pretty much every institution in our country will be affected by the racism that is so embedded in our culture. But police can legally use lethal force on civilians, and this puts them in a special category, imo.

I don't know how we are going to reinvent public safety from the ground, though. I guess we'll see how it goes in the cities that are trying to change things.

AMCrenshaw said:

don't have...an omerta to abide by.

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I grew up in a firefighter household and am not sure this is true.

MaeZe said:

What do you think, ignorance or malice?

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The two aren't mutually exclusive, but it's certainly an abuse of power, and that person should be removed from office.

People should be allowed to express their political views without intimidation from government officials.

MaeZe said:

"Defunding police" is really bad messaging. And I'm very strongly on the BLM side.

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I agree with this. The unpleasant reality in the US is that it's hard to get any sort of political change without a number of those capricious white, middle-class voters behind it. Frustrating, but still true. And white, middle-class voters tend to be more afraid of crime than they are of being killed or beaten up by police. I've seen a lot of hand wringing on social media from some folks who are basically in favor of police reform but are worried about calling 911 when they witness a crime or are afraid there is a prowler on their property and not having a police officer sent.

That's the stark difference between White and Black experiences in the US. While many White people have had some less than pleasant experiences with the cops (I was hassled by them a few times as a teen, and no one likes getting speeding tickets), but most White People have had times when they were happy to see the police and feel they can safely call them when they are in trouble. There was a time we were broken down by the side of the road in a rainstorm, a couple of hours into a cross-country move with my animals and suitcases in the back of my pickup (we had a camper shell). I was happy when the state trooper stopped. He called a tow truck (this was 1999, and I didn't yet own a cell phone) and gave us (dog included) a ride to a motel that was right next door to the mechanic. He was polite and helpful, and I was glad to have police that night.

It eventually occurred to me that the guy might not have been so friendly and helpful had we not been White. I think of my own privileged experience whenever I've read about the fates of poor Terence Crutcher or Corey Jones.

What I don't know is how much of the hand wringing on social media by white people over defunding the police is genuine misunderstanding versus hiding behind semantics to oppose the entire BLM movement, kind of like the people who deliberately misunderstand and deflect to "all lives matter." And I can't think of a catchy, inspiring phrase that encapsulates the concept of rebuilding policing from the ground up and of radically changing how peace officers are organized, administered, trained and held accountable.

Sat Nam! (Literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Depends on what you mean by "Defund."

If you're planning on getting rid of police completely, that sets your society up for vigilantes, which have never been easy on minorities. If you mean, cut the funding for expletive deleteds without implementing anything else, you'll end up with even more ignorant expletive deleteds than we've already got. Even if you are better able to balance your budget.

Vetting the people you hire costs money. And anyone authorized to use force needs to be vetted...preferably by people who have also been vetted.

And so the defunding rhetoric concerns me.

But if you mean let's put more money in schools, mental health programs, and other community programs, if you mean rethinking how tracking bad guys is done, then I'm all for it.

And it'd be good to require all people who have that kind of authority to do community service (the way some offenders do) in the communities that those in authority are most likely to brutalize at the beginning of their training and every year thereafter. Kind of hard to brutalize people you get to know as human beings.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

Siri Kirpal said:

that sets your society up for vigilante

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I genuinely don't understand what you mean by this or why you believe this is a logical conclusion.

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Part of the problem that many of us have with the police force is this: their presence is one of violent overseers who are significantly more likely to do us harm than to help us. State violence needs justification, unbiased oversight, and clear limits and consequences when misused. Policing in the US frequently lacks all three of these things. And there are legitimate concerns that they cannot be addressed with reform alone.

That we might all be under attack by the bogeyman the moment the police are gone is not a compelling argument. Large segments of the population are already under attack... by the police. That's the point.

3 Aurora officers fired over photos depicting choke hold near Elijah McClain memorial

According to APD, the photo was taken on Oct. 20, 2019 in the 1700 block of Billings Street. The three officers were on-duty and had just completed a call in the area when they took a selfie near McClain’s memorial. Wilson said when questioned, the officers said took the photos to "cheer up a friend."

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I wonder if that friend was Jason Rosenblatt, one of McClain's killers. They sent him (and another officer) the photo and he texted back "Ha ha." The police union is upset that the officers weren't given "due process." I can name a lot of Black men, women, and children who weren't given due process, but rather a death sentence for selling cigarettes, carrying a gun sold in a store inside that store in an open carry state, sleeping on one's own home, and in this case, walking home.

Florida police laughed about shooting rubber bullets during protest, video shows

Fort Lauderdale police released footage showing officers laughing and celebrating after shooting protesters with rubber bullets during a late May protest against police brutality.

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“Beat it, little f---er,” an officer can be heard saying after shooting projectiles at a protester. The protester appears to have tossed tear gas at the police and to be walking away.

Later, one officer asked another if his body camera was off, and the second officer incorrectly said it was.

“Did you see me f--k up those motherf----rs?” one of the officers says on the video.

“I got the one f---er,” the other officer replies, as the two officers laugh.

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Cops in Riot Gear Stormed a Violin Vigil for Elijah McClain

On Saturday, activists in Aurora, Colorado, convened for a peaceful rally and march to demand justice for Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old Black man who died after a brutal arrest by local police last August. The event included a violin vigil, a nod to the fact that McClain was an accomplished violinist who was known for spending his lunch breaks putting on concerts for the cats and dogs at a community animal shelter. Footage from the event shows a group of quiet participants, most of them socially distanced, holding signs and observing as a few violinists perform at dusk — and then the arrival of a group of officers in riot gear, charging into the crowd. According to attendees, the police went on to deploy pepper spray and use physical force.


Images shared on social media show lines of officers in helmets, bulletproof vests, and gas masks marching onto a lawn outside the Aurora Municipal Center on Saturday evening, aggressively dispersing people. Attendees say police used, or threatened to use, tear gas — a chemical weapon — on protesters. A spokesperson for the APD denied this allegation on Sunday, telling the Cut: “Tear gas was not used yesterday. There was pepper spray deployed but tear gas was not used.”

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And cops like these get lots of shiny toys to use against the public they're supposed to serve. Like bayonets.

Top military officer: Troops were issued bayonets in DC unrest

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has confirmed a report by The Associated Press that some of the service members who were mobilized to Washington, D.C., last month in response to civil unrest over the killing of George Floyd were issued bayonets. Defense documents obtained by the AP show some were not trained in riot response.

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FL Sheriff: I’ll deputize gun owners if violent protests erupt

“Tearing up Clay County, that’s not going to be acceptable. And if we can’t handle you, you know what I’ll do? I will exercise the power and authority as the sheriff and I’ll make special deputies of every lawful gun owner in this county and I’ll deputize them for this one purpose.”

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There are a lot of George Zimmermans in Florida.

How do you reform a system that racist, militarized, corrupt, and out of control? Really? I could post dozens of stories like these and do it again tomorrow. Better to build a new model and implement that. This one is broken beyond repair.

Sat Nam! (Literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Oh, I'm aware that attacks by police on blacks and other minorities are a problem; I'm not debating that. Not at all.

I was looking at history here in the West. When there aren't any police, those with the weapons (usually white) take things into their own hands. I don't think any of us want to repeat that.

The question for me is how we avoid both the current rock and the potential (and historical) hard place. How do we keep white nationalists and their collaborators out of police systems, if we keep police systems? and if we don't keep police systems, how do we keep a lot of highly armed white nationalists from taking their place without any restraints?

I do see considerable potential in rethinking how policing is done. As I mentioned upstream, we can vet our police better, insist that all police do community service in areas they might otherwise target (i.e. get acquainted with people of other colors), improve education (for everyone), improve mental health programs (for everyone) etc.

Where am I coming from? Well..... I've lived to see homeschooling turn from a brainchild of liberals (and still used by a few) to a means of keeping your kids from learning science and from rubbing elbows with non-whites. I remember when we thought the mental hospitals needed to go because so many people were being kept against their will, and then what happens is mentally unstable people end up in prisons instead of hospitals. So...yeah, I'm concerned that what seems righteous today will turn into tomorrow's nightmare.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal