5 ms·

Abolition is the only path forward. You can't reform this.

kevingadd 5y ago
Just going to note since this sort of comment usually gets some really shallow replies: You can maintain law and order without having a bunch of unaccountable armed dudes roaming around doing whatever they want without any oversight, and reform clearly is not changing what we have into what we need. "Abolition" does not mean "so let's move to anarchy"
- surfmike 5y ago
  Any examples showing that’s possible? I don’t know of any society (aside from maybe some tiny islands) where you don’t have some police to maintain law and order.
  - bdcravens 5y ago
    It's a bit of a leap from eliminating "having a bunch of unaccountable armed dudes roaming around doing whatever they want without any oversight" to eliminating all police. A few random ideas: * fewer armed police, and being armed requires a higher level of experience/training/psych evaluation * 100% public access to all police body cam footage. * require police officers to maintain their own liability insurance, and have rates based on the a number of KPIs related to public safety and ethics
    - kevingadd 5y ago
      I'll note that while body cam footage and citizen recordings have helped bring visibility to police misconduct, in general they don't seem to have actually fixed anything. In some cases they increase unrest because now when a police officer is acquitted for doing something, people can look at the footage and get even more upset about it. Cops also frequently disable their cams and aren't punished for it. Body cams might be an example of something that is good on paper but actually just distracts people from things that actually address a problem.
      - bdcravens 5y ago
        To be sure, what I'm suggesting would require a reworking of how those cameras are used and disclosed, and probably would require technical solutions in addition to policy ones. I'm definitely suggesting going far beyond the status quo in an attempt for transparency (pretty much "open sourcing" the camera footage)
    - surfmike 5y ago
      Right. Those all sound like great reform proposals. Particularly I feel like there is too little police training in this country. Parent comment was dismissing reform as a path forward though.
  - GoodJokes 5y ago
  - withinboredom 5y ago
    Compared to the US, the NL seems to have far less cops. The cops are mostly just walking around or driving around.. they never pull you over, you just get a ticket in the mail. So there’s police, doing police things. But they never get involved in your day-to-day life unless you’re doing something obviously illegal. Granted, you can do a lot of things here that is illegal in the US, like prostitution, drugs, sit in the park with some beer and wine, pee in public, etc. Things are way more civil than the US was when I last visited a year ago.
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago
  What do you think abolition looks like, that won't devolve to anarchy? And, do you have a working example?
  - kevingadd 5y ago
    A step multiple municipalities have taken in the past is to disband their entire police department and create a new one from scratch, which makes it feasible to eject large numbers of bad actors who would normally protect each other from expulsion while also setting new policies. I don't personally believe that's a complete solution, but it's a logical step and allows you to retain your existing power structures and systems without having to pass a bunch of new laws and create new roles. There are probably many police departments that would not really benefit from this step or merit it. Another step would be to recognize that you cannot reform american police departments' roles in non-violent crime cases and offload some or all of those entirely to other agencies that don't carry guns. This doesn't fix everything, but it removes many opportunities for things to go wrong while also enabling armed police to focus on the threats that really need them.
    - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
      "Abolish and re-create" is a lot different from "just abolish", though.
      - ziml77 5y ago
        Especially important to differentiate given that some people really do mean abolish. There's a thought that it's possible to get rid police because people will do just fine policing their own home. And along with that they think that we also don't need a judicial system because disagreements can be solved through arbitration. I feel it should be obvious to most people why that's problematic (I don't want to turn this into a massive rambling tangent in a day old thread)
  - decebalus1 5y ago
    See this as an example: https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/06/11/abolish-police-georgia-brutality-crime/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/06/11/abolish-police-georgia-...
dlsa 5y ago
Abolishing police means ... what? I don't understand this. How do you abolish something only to replace it with... a new copy of that something because you didn't change the rules. Wouldn't it be better to just fire complete departments and clear them out from top to bottom? This would let you re-hire as necessary but with new rules in play. You might end up with some of the same old people but they now know the trapdoor can open. Most of the problems with police are at the top. Not the bottom. This includes the laws they use like civil forfeiture and other silliness. That's your real target. Why aren't the abolish people going after that?
- mrtesthah 5y ago
  >replace it with... a new copy of that something because you didn't change the rules. You don't abolish police -- you abolish policing. In order to do this society needs to identify and eliminate the reasons for crime in the first place--i.e., ensuring access to basic needs like food and housing, for one thing. Abolition necessarily involves a transformation of our entire society, and may take more than one generation.
  - throwawayboise 5y ago
    The places in the USA where everyone lives with free food and housing tend to also be the most crime-ridden and violent.
  - Manuel_D 5y ago
    > ensuring access to basic needs like food and housing, for one thing. Plenty of wealthy people still commit crime.
    - fivestarman 5y ago
      Wealthy crime (white-collar) is for more costly than 'non-wealthy' crime (blue-collar)
    - mrtesthah 5y ago
      And yet our justice system doesn't seem to try to stop them.

Just going to note since this sort of comment usually gets some really shallow replies: You can maintain law and order without having a bunch of unaccountable armed dudes roaming around doing whatever they want without any oversight, and reform clearly is not changing what we have into what we need. "Abolition" does not mean "so let's move to anarchy"

surfmike 5y ago
Any examples showing that’s possible? I don’t know of any society (aside from maybe some tiny islands) where you don’t have some police to maintain law and order.
- bdcravens 5y ago
  It's a bit of a leap from eliminating "having a bunch of unaccountable armed dudes roaming around doing whatever they want without any oversight" to eliminating all police. A few random ideas: * fewer armed police, and being armed requires a higher level of experience/training/psych evaluation * 100% public access to all police body cam footage. * require police officers to maintain their own liability insurance, and have rates based on the a number of KPIs related to public safety and ethics
  - kevingadd 5y ago
    I'll note that while body cam footage and citizen recordings have helped bring visibility to police misconduct, in general they don't seem to have actually fixed anything. In some cases they increase unrest because now when a police officer is acquitted for doing something, people can look at the footage and get even more upset about it. Cops also frequently disable their cams and aren't punished for it. Body cams might be an example of something that is good on paper but actually just distracts people from things that actually address a problem.
    - bdcravens 5y ago
      To be sure, what I'm suggesting would require a reworking of how those cameras are used and disclosed, and probably would require technical solutions in addition to policy ones. I'm definitely suggesting going far beyond the status quo in an attempt for transparency (pretty much "open sourcing" the camera footage)
  - surfmike 5y ago
    Right. Those all sound like great reform proposals. Particularly I feel like there is too little police training in this country. Parent comment was dismissing reform as a path forward though.
- GoodJokes 5y ago
- withinboredom 5y ago
  Compared to the US, the NL seems to have far less cops. The cops are mostly just walking around or driving around.. they never pull you over, you just get a ticket in the mail. So there’s police, doing police things. But they never get involved in your day-to-day life unless you’re doing something obviously illegal. Granted, you can do a lot of things here that is illegal in the US, like prostitution, drugs, sit in the park with some beer and wine, pee in public, etc. Things are way more civil than the US was when I last visited a year ago.
AnimalMuppet 5y ago
What do you think abolition looks like, that won't devolve to anarchy? And, do you have a working example?
- kevingadd 5y ago
  A step multiple municipalities have taken in the past is to disband their entire police department and create a new one from scratch, which makes it feasible to eject large numbers of bad actors who would normally protect each other from expulsion while also setting new policies. I don't personally believe that's a complete solution, but it's a logical step and allows you to retain your existing power structures and systems without having to pass a bunch of new laws and create new roles. There are probably many police departments that would not really benefit from this step or merit it. Another step would be to recognize that you cannot reform american police departments' roles in non-violent crime cases and offload some or all of those entirely to other agencies that don't carry guns. This doesn't fix everything, but it removes many opportunities for things to go wrong while also enabling armed police to focus on the threats that really need them.
  - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
    "Abolish and re-create" is a lot different from "just abolish", though.
    - ziml77 5y ago
      Especially important to differentiate given that some people really do mean abolish. There's a thought that it's possible to get rid police because people will do just fine policing their own home. And along with that they think that we also don't need a judicial system because disagreements can be solved through arbitration. I feel it should be obvious to most people why that's problematic (I don't want to turn this into a massive rambling tangent in a day old thread)
- decebalus1 5y ago
  See this as an example: https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/06/11/abolish-police-georgia-brutality-crime/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/06/11/abolish-police-georgia-...

dlsa 5y ago

Abolishing police means ... what? I don't understand this. How do you abolish something only to replace it with... a new copy of that something because you didn't change the rules. Wouldn't it be better to just fire complete departments and clear them out from top to bottom? This would let you re-hire as necessary but with new rules in play. You might end up with some of the same old people but they now know the trapdoor can open. Most of the problems with police are at the top. Not the bottom. This includes the laws they use like civil forfeiture and other silliness. That's your real target. Why aren't the abolish people going after that?

mrtesthah 5y ago
>replace it with... a new copy of that something because you didn't change the rules. You don't abolish police -- you abolish policing. In order to do this society needs to identify and eliminate the reasons for crime in the first place--i.e., ensuring access to basic needs like food and housing, for one thing. Abolition necessarily involves a transformation of our entire society, and may take more than one generation.
- throwawayboise 5y ago
  The places in the USA where everyone lives with free food and housing tend to also be the most crime-ridden and violent.
- Manuel_D 5y ago
  > ensuring access to basic needs like food and housing, for one thing. Plenty of wealthy people still commit crime.
  - fivestarman 5y ago
    Wealthy crime (white-collar) is for more costly than 'non-wealthy' crime (blue-collar)
  - mrtesthah 5y ago
    And yet our justice system doesn't seem to try to stop them.