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They had been trying to "reform" the Minneapolis police (where George Floyd was killed) for years, but the police union had successfully blocked even the most m

by s17n 5y ago

They had been trying to "reform" the Minneapolis police (where George Floyd was killed) for years, but the police union had successfully blocked even the most moderate changes. There are similar stories everywhere. "Defund the police" is a good slogan because it makes it clear that you have to pick a side - the police have made it clear that "reform" is not going to be possible through cooperation. This isn't to say that there aren't plenty of individual officers who would support, or at least not obstruct, reform, but without destroying the existing institutions (police unions, primarily) that perpetuate the status quo, and disempowering the individuals who are committed to it, nothing is going to change.

sschueller 5y ago
People who don't live in areas of police corruption don't know this and will "vote" for the other side because they don't know what is meant with defund the police.
- tunesmith 5y ago
  Right, because the intended meaning is different than what the words literally say.
  - a_shovel 5y ago
    Defund means "withdraw funding for", not "withdraw all funding for".
    - tunesmith 5y ago
      That is literally incorrect. You can google "defund" and the first definition is "prevent from continuing to receive funds". And it's common usage, as well - anytime a government passes a bill to "defund" a bill or a department, it means they are basically without money.
      - a_shovel 5y ago
        Saying I'm "literally incorrect" just makes me wonder what "figuratively incorrect" would mean in this situation. You've made multiple comments under this article about how "defund" can only possibly mean removing 100% of funding. Sometimes other people use words differently from the way you do personally. You need to adapt your interpretation to their usage, not the other way around.
        tunesmith 5y ago
        No I have not. I've made multiple comments about how "defund" is often, and reasonably (see definition and common usage), interpreted as such. Just expecting people to adapt their interpretation in the figurative way you want is not reasonable, and is not a winning political strategy either.
adamrezich 5y ago
why do you consider "the police" a single unified group (aside from some "individual officers")? "the police" are not a federalized entity (yet(??)), so it seems at the very least disingenuous, but also possibly dangerous, to lump tens of thousands of people from disparate cities and counties and states into a single amorphous group, and then generate a slogan that "makes it clear you have to pick a side" on how you feel about them. has anything good come from this pattern of overgeneralizing and then generating purposefully disingenuous propagandistic terms to force people to "pick a side"?
- ruined 5y ago
  the police see themselves as a single unified group. this is actualized through culture (thin blue line, sheepdogs), organization (80% unionized, literally the state), and informal local agreements (gangs, corruption, coverups)
- geofft 5y ago
  Because every police department is organized in the same general way and has the same incentives. It's not at all about the individual officers - it's that organizing the police in this way has a corrupting influence. (Or, at best, it attracts people who wish to abuse power in various ways.) As mentioned upthread, this story of the small town that has turned into a front organization for a police force that, were they not operating under the label "police," would be a gang of highwaymen, is a pattern that repeats itself a lot! When you see something that happens repeatedly from many different individuals who all happen to be in the same circumstance, Occam's Razor demands you at least consider investigating the circumstance and not the people. There are almost certainly a large number of genuinely good and kindhearted and well-intentioned people in the employ of various police departments. They should leave their jobs, lest they stop being good and kindhearted and well-intentioned and become dangerous to society. Ideally, they would do that of their own free will; alternatively, we can defund their payroll. I have no problem with the individual former police officer merely by virtue of their former employment, and I am more than happy to judge them as an individual on their own merits.
  - adamrezich 5y ago
nsxwolf 5y ago
“Defund the police” is one of the most shockingly terrible slogans I’ve heard in my life. I know a lot of life long Midwestern Democrats that gasped in utter dismay when they heard this term and saw that yup, this is in fact what our party is going with. It inspired some of the most insane and vile hatred I have ever witnessed. Not being able to see that really just means you are out of touch with huge swaths of Americans of every political persuasion.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- a_shovel 5y ago
  "Defund the police" is not a slogan. It's a policy demand. It's not designed to appeal to Midwestern life-long democrats. It's designed to fix a problem. The activists promoting the demand are out of touch with huge swaths of Americans, but by symmetry, that means huge swaths of Americans are out of touch with the activists who, through their activism, research, and personal experience, know the nature of policing in America is closer to Brookside, Alabama than to what their Elementary school teachers told them about the police.
  - mindslight 5y ago
    > "Defund the police" is not a slogan. It's a policy demand ... designed to fix a problem The "police" in this article are not a cost center, but rather a profit center. So, problem fixed? I agree that the cancerous police budgets consuming municipal budgets is a problem, but the even deeper problem is that they're not bound by the law they purport to uphold. "Defund" does nothing to advocate for legal accountability, which is the primary problem.
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    There is no shortage of people all over the political spectrum who absolutely abhor the status quo of law enforcement in the US. You could have had the problem fixed already if you a) didn't go off half cocked with a stupid slogan that appeals to pretty much nobody b) thrown the conservatives a bone by abolishing the ATF or something.
everdrive 5y ago
It’s not necessarily a good slogan if you live in a high crime area, where better or more policing might be highly desired. At least in the press, people calling for the defunding of the police were often co-located with some of the more violent riots of the last few years. I can appreciate that there are arguments to suggest that this is a false comparison. However, it must be admitted that the slogan was confusing and divisive, whereas not all issues around policing were nearly as divisive. (For example, there was broad support, and rightly so, for the jury verdict in the George Floyd case. )
- kmonsen 5y ago
  Everywhere in the US is a high enough crime area that people need the police to feel safe.
  - jimmygrapes 5y ago
    Why?
    - kmonsen 5y ago
      I have lived in NYC and Bay area. Both times safe places in those areas. And sure I have never seen a crime happen. But very close to me (like 15 min of walking), there are major armed crimes happening. There are enough guns and people willing to use them in this country that it is just not safe without the police. There are many reasons for this, I probably agree with most of them, but until they are all solved we need the police. I grew up in Norway, did not feel like this there at all. Of course crime does still exist, but I would not care how far it was to my local police station. Also lived in the UK, felt very safe compared to the US.
  - crawfordcomeaux 5y ago
    A feeling of safety comes from within. Establishing a brutal traumatizing system that isn't oriented toward healing doesn't create a culture of safety, but of emotional codependence on violence.
kmonsen 5y ago
That is exactly why it is stupid, if you force people to pick sides they will pick the police. I don't really love them, but I also don't want them gone and would not feel safe with no police. I am super left wing, but if you force me to pick a side I am choosing the police without much thinking. I understand not everyone thinks like this, but if you want to win elections in a two party system you need a broad coalition. You will not find a broad coalition that is willing to pick the side you want here.
- crawfordcomeaux 5y ago
  You are making life choices without much thinking, by your own admission. You're allowed to do that. Some of us choose more thoughtful paths and recognize 2-party systems as inherently abusive because they're out of alignment with reality, which is inherently nonbinary.
  - ctoth 5y ago
    You are making life choices without much consideration of political and electoral reality, by your own admission. You're allowed to do that. Some of us choose more pragmatic paths and recognize that our individual dislike for 2-party systems does ~nothing to change the fact that we actually physically currently live in a 2-party system which is inherently binary. If you want to win elections, build coalitions. If you want to rant about how abusive the current system is, you can do that, but don't expect to actually win anything.
    - crawfordcomeaux 5y ago
      I don't allow existing systems to limit my thinking like that. Optimizing a part or feature of a system that doesn't need to exist is an element of dumb design. Pragmatism demands exploring ideas beyond the existing systems, otherwise we'll remain trapped in them.
      - kmonsen 5y ago
        The system can only be changed by the current political parties, so at the very least you need to build a coalition to change the system.

by s17n 5y ago

sschueller 5y ago

People who don't live in areas of police corruption don't know this and will "vote" for the other side because they don't know what is meant with defund the police.

tunesmith 5y ago
Right, because the intended meaning is different than what the words literally say.
- a_shovel 5y ago
  Defund means "withdraw funding for", not "withdraw all funding for".
  - tunesmith 5y ago
    That is literally incorrect. You can google "defund" and the first definition is "prevent from continuing to receive funds". And it's common usage, as well - anytime a government passes a bill to "defund" a bill or a department, it means they are basically without money.
    - a_shovel 5y ago
      Saying I'm "literally incorrect" just makes me wonder what "figuratively incorrect" would mean in this situation. You've made multiple comments under this article about how "defund" can only possibly mean removing 100% of funding. Sometimes other people use words differently from the way you do personally. You need to adapt your interpretation to their usage, not the other way around.
      - tunesmith 5y ago
        No I have not. I've made multiple comments about how "defund" is often, and reasonably (see definition and common usage), interpreted as such. Just expecting people to adapt their interpretation in the figurative way you want is not reasonable, and is not a winning political strategy either.

adamrezich 5y ago

why do you consider "the police" a single unified group (aside from some "individual officers")? "the police" are not a federalized entity (yet(??)), so it seems at the very least disingenuous, but also possibly dangerous, to lump tens of thousands of people from disparate cities and counties and states into a single amorphous group, and then generate a slogan that "makes it clear you have to pick a side" on how you feel about them. has anything good come from this pattern of overgeneralizing and then generating purposefully disingenuous propagandistic terms to force people to "pick a side"?

ruined 5y ago
the police see themselves as a single unified group. this is actualized through culture (thin blue line, sheepdogs), organization (80% unionized, literally the state), and informal local agreements (gangs, corruption, coverups)
geofft 5y ago
Because every police department is organized in the same general way and has the same incentives. It's not at all about the individual officers - it's that organizing the police in this way has a corrupting influence. (Or, at best, it attracts people who wish to abuse power in various ways.) As mentioned upthread, this story of the small town that has turned into a front organization for a police force that, were they not operating under the label "police," would be a gang of highwaymen, is a pattern that repeats itself a lot! When you see something that happens repeatedly from many different individuals who all happen to be in the same circumstance, Occam's Razor demands you at least consider investigating the circumstance and not the people. There are almost certainly a large number of genuinely good and kindhearted and well-intentioned people in the employ of various police departments. They should leave their jobs, lest they stop being good and kindhearted and well-intentioned and become dangerous to society. Ideally, they would do that of their own free will; alternatively, we can defund their payroll. I have no problem with the individual former police officer merely by virtue of their former employment, and I am more than happy to judge them as an individual on their own merits.
- adamrezich 5y ago

nsxwolf 5y ago

“Defund the police” is one of the most shockingly terrible slogans I’ve heard in my life. I know a lot of life long Midwestern Democrats that gasped in utter dismay when they heard this term and saw that yup, this is in fact what our party is going with. It inspired some of the most insane and vile hatred I have ever witnessed. Not being able to see that really just means you are out of touch with huge swaths of Americans of every political persuasion.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
a_shovel 5y ago
"Defund the police" is not a slogan. It's a policy demand. It's not designed to appeal to Midwestern life-long democrats. It's designed to fix a problem. The activists promoting the demand are out of touch with huge swaths of Americans, but by symmetry, that means huge swaths of Americans are out of touch with the activists who, through their activism, research, and personal experience, know the nature of policing in America is closer to Brookside, Alabama than to what their Elementary school teachers told them about the police.
- mindslight 5y ago
  > "Defund the police" is not a slogan. It's a policy demand ... designed to fix a problem The "police" in this article are not a cost center, but rather a profit center. So, problem fixed? I agree that the cancerous police budgets consuming municipal budgets is a problem, but the even deeper problem is that they're not bound by the law they purport to uphold. "Defund" does nothing to advocate for legal accountability, which is the primary problem.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  There is no shortage of people all over the political spectrum who absolutely abhor the status quo of law enforcement in the US. You could have had the problem fixed already if you a) didn't go off half cocked with a stupid slogan that appeals to pretty much nobody b) thrown the conservatives a bone by abolishing the ATF or something.

everdrive 5y ago

It’s not necessarily a good slogan if you live in a high crime area, where better or more policing might be highly desired. At least in the press, people calling for the defunding of the police were often co-located with some of the more violent riots of the last few years. I can appreciate that there are arguments to suggest that this is a false comparison. However, it must be admitted that the slogan was confusing and divisive, whereas not all issues around policing were nearly as divisive. (For example, there was broad support, and rightly so, for the jury verdict in the George Floyd case. )

kmonsen 5y ago
Everywhere in the US is a high enough crime area that people need the police to feel safe.
- jimmygrapes 5y ago
  Why?
  - kmonsen 5y ago
    I have lived in NYC and Bay area. Both times safe places in those areas. And sure I have never seen a crime happen. But very close to me (like 15 min of walking), there are major armed crimes happening. There are enough guns and people willing to use them in this country that it is just not safe without the police. There are many reasons for this, I probably agree with most of them, but until they are all solved we need the police. I grew up in Norway, did not feel like this there at all. Of course crime does still exist, but I would not care how far it was to my local police station. Also lived in the UK, felt very safe compared to the US.
- crawfordcomeaux 5y ago
  A feeling of safety comes from within. Establishing a brutal traumatizing system that isn't oriented toward healing doesn't create a culture of safety, but of emotional codependence on violence.

kmonsen 5y ago

That is exactly why it is stupid, if you force people to pick sides they will pick the police. I don't really love them, but I also don't want them gone and would not feel safe with no police. I am super left wing, but if you force me to pick a side I am choosing the police without much thinking. I understand not everyone thinks like this, but if you want to win elections in a two party system you need a broad coalition. You will not find a broad coalition that is willing to pick the side you want here.

crawfordcomeaux 5y ago
You are making life choices without much thinking, by your own admission. You're allowed to do that. Some of us choose more thoughtful paths and recognize 2-party systems as inherently abusive because they're out of alignment with reality, which is inherently nonbinary.
- ctoth 5y ago
  You are making life choices without much consideration of political and electoral reality, by your own admission. You're allowed to do that. Some of us choose more pragmatic paths and recognize that our individual dislike for 2-party systems does ~nothing to change the fact that we actually physically currently live in a 2-party system which is inherently binary. If you want to win elections, build coalitions. If you want to rant about how abusive the current system is, you can do that, but don't expect to actually win anything.
  - crawfordcomeaux 5y ago
    I don't allow existing systems to limit my thinking like that. Optimizing a part or feature of a system that doesn't need to exist is an element of dumb design. Pragmatism demands exploring ideas beyond the existing systems, otherwise we'll remain trapped in them.
    - kmonsen 5y ago
      The system can only be changed by the current political parties, so at the very least you need to build a coalition to change the system.