7 ms·

People seem to think the police exist to enforce laws and justice. The police exist to maintain and protect existing power structures, including the police the

People seem to think the police exist to enforce laws and justice. The police exist to maintain and protect existing power structures, including the police themselves. A lot starts making more sense in that context.

mulmen 3y ago
The police should exist to enforce law and justice. This prevents mob rule. You are correct that police do not currently serve this purpose.
- jakelazaroff 3y ago
  The police do prevent "mob rule" today. They use violence to keep a minority of wealthy people atop a social hierarchy. When the "mob" below acts up, they violently quash them. Like, think of any mass social protest movement. Who is the primary "boots-on-the-ground" opposition? It is always the police. It will always be the police. That's what they're there for.
  - postalrat 3y ago
    Do you think that it's actually possible to avoid having a group a people that feel they've been cheated somehow?
    - jakelazaroff 3y ago
      No, but I don’t really see what that has to do with anything.
  - mulmen 3y ago
    I’m describing an ideal future state. You’re describing the suboptimal current state. This is why I emphasized “should”. In my city the police deliberately avoid enforcing basic traffic laws and petty crime in a bid to get more funding. As that continues more and more of my neighbors arm themselves. At some point the scales tip and the people take matters into their own hands. Police can abuse their power in the short term but it can’t continue forever.
    - jakelazaroff 3y ago
      I actually suspect you’re describing what I’d consider a suboptimal future state, but it’s hard to tell because most of these words are pretty vague. Like, what exactly is “mob rule”? Why am I supposed to fear it? Why is it worse than today’s system of rule by a powerful unaccountable minority? Why is it per se good for the police to enforce laws and fight crime? Those are both social constructs that can target anyone we want them to. 60 years ago, they would have prevented me from marrying my wife; 90 years ago, they would have prevented me from fleeing genocide. What happens in your ideal future state if the rich and powerful refuse to change unjust laws? If people rise up against oppression, what happens?
- pineaux 3y ago
  Actually, that is not the reason why they should exist. That is the story you are told. But this story has never been true, the propaganda is just a bit more effective these days. I mean. Look at: Paw Patrol, Miami Vice, Tokyo Vice, the Wire, Criminal Minds, Chicago PD, Southland, Bosch, Law and Order: all of them, law and Order: all of them, CSI: all of them, Luther, The Shield, Reno 911, etc. I mean this list is just from the top of my head. We are being indoctrinated in our image of the police. Some rotten apples are shown, but in the end they are always The Good Guys.
  - mulmen 3y ago
    Uh. Cops are certainly not always portrayed in media as the good guys. The Wire and Reno 911 aren’t even positive portrayals. On top of that media portrayals are irrelevant in this context. The alternative to a state monopoly on violence is mob rule. You can call that state entity whatever you want, police, militia, whatever. But some regulated construct needs to exist. If you can’t separate that concept from the current model of policing it’s unlikely we can have an interesting conversation.
- nrdxp 3y ago
  Well, if you are talking about the United States and the supposed Supreme Law of the Land that nobody seems to be too well educated on nowadays, actually it is the job of local militia to defend and enforce civil order You can not have a free society without a populace taking responsibility for their own. There is a reason the slogan "freedom isn't free", was a big thing in America til just a generation or two ago. The second you start delegating things like safety to the gov you've lost. Just look at modern America, a giant portion of folks cannot survive without gov assistance now, and look where that got us. How can you oppose a corrupt gov if you cannot even survive without it? Unless you are so brainwashed (as many still are) that you think that the total lack of privacy and agency in modern America is both good, and somehow fitting to the intent of the Constitution as written.
  - Sohcahtoa82 3y ago
    > actually it is the job of local militia to defend and enforce civil order Doesn't that encourage vigilanteism?
  - rootusrootus 3y ago
    > Just look at modern America, a giant portion of folks cannot survive without gov assistance now Boomers are more than “a generation or two ago.”
  - krapp 3y ago
    So you want to disband all police and leave police powers entirely in the hands of "local militias", which according to current definitions of the 2nd Amendment are (reading notes) literally any American with a gun? Like these jackasses[0]. You want to give these people the right to arbitrarily arrest, detain and kill because two centuries ago Thomas Jefferson saw the horrors of the French Revolution, got the biggest boner of his life and thought "how about that, but a whole country, all the time?" No thank you. I don't trust the cops but I trust my fellow armed Americans even less. At least the police, ostensibly, have a system they have to abide by other than a piece of parchment saying "everyone gets as many guns as they want, no questions asked." What you're advocating is essentially gang warfare. Also, "freedom isn't free" became popular as a meme from South Park making fun of the wave of jingoistic, patriotic BS songs after 9/11. It costs a buck o'five, by the way. [0]https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-53891184 https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-53891184
johndhi 3y ago
Does that make sense? It doesn't to me. The phrase "power structures" isn't even one most people understand (I'm not sure I do, and I'm a lawyer) so it's hard to believe the hundreds of police organizations that independently exist across this country exist to maintain them. Police exist because they were funded by governments. They are the way they are because of the various incentives, organizational politics, their day-to-day experiences on the job, and the minds of the people who staff them. Rather than declaring them part of a fascist plot, why not just try to think about where improvements can be made?
- TaylorAlexander 3y ago
  It makes sense that the police exist to enforce existing power structures, yes. The people in power (wealthy individuals and organizations who can buy political capital, and the politicians that represent them) use the police as a threat of and actual tool of violence to subdue anyone that would challenge their power. > Rather than declaring them part of a fascist plot, why not just try to think about where improvements can be made? The first step to fixing a system is to understand it. Taking a valid description and twisting it in to an accusation of a "fascist plot" is a great way to ensure you will never understand the system in the way which is required to actually improve it.
  - asdfman123 3y ago
    We're all trying to frame things in a way that will logically lead our preferred solutions. But the description "police exist to enforce existing power structures" implies that the power structures are illegitimate, which suggests that the police are as well, which in turn suggests we should tear it all down and start over. But I've never seen anyone who 1) recommends tearing everything down and 2) has a realistic (or even defined) plan to rebuild it.
    - slowmovintarget 3y ago
      I've seen plenty of anarchists who do recommend tearing everything down. Antifa has clothed themselves in the name of supposedly being against fascism, but they define fascism as any current system of government. They're anarchists, though the media covers them as "activists." You're right about number 2, though.
justapassenger 3y ago
This is just a sound bite. Police has lots of problems in USA. But go live in the country without effective police force first, and then talk about how police isn’t here to enforce laws and justice.
- ubermonkey 3y ago
  Not a great argument. Police here are not interested in justice, and this is trivial to prove based on their behavior. Courts have also ruled that police have no duty to protect citizens. Policing in the US is fundamentally broken. That there exist places with worse policing problems does not mean ours are not serious, foundational, and endemic.
  - justapassenger 3y ago
    > Police here are not interested in justice, and this is trivial to prove based on their behavior. Is it? There are bad stories, sure. Horrible ones, yes. Police officers who should be in jail for life - yes! But there’s also a tons of good stories, that just don’t get reported, because they don’t generate outrage and clicks.
    - ubermonkey 3y ago
      That's a hilarious and counterfactual thing to assert on a thread noting that cops literally steal more money from people than criminals do. Cops do what is easy, by and large. The overriding motivations in the job do not align with the values that the public would actually WANT from a police force. They are not required to "protect and serve," and have actually argued in court (and won!) that they are not required to protect anyone. They are protected by a union with absurdly outsized power, which prevents real accountability in all but the most egregious cases. These unions and their fellow-travelers work hard to prevent common-sense recordkeeping on national violent incidents by cops, and to avoid any kind of national peace officer licensing and certification that would keep bad cops "fired" by one city from just drifting to the next town over and continuing their behavior. Cops, in the US, are part of the problem. https://theap.substack.com/p/what-do-cops-do https://theap.substack.com/p/what-do-cops-do

mulmen 3y ago

The police should exist to enforce law and justice. This prevents mob rule. You are correct that police do not currently serve this purpose.

jakelazaroff 3y ago
The police do prevent "mob rule" today. They use violence to keep a minority of wealthy people atop a social hierarchy. When the "mob" below acts up, they violently quash them. Like, think of any mass social protest movement. Who is the primary "boots-on-the-ground" opposition? It is always the police. It will always be the police. That's what they're there for.
- postalrat 3y ago
  Do you think that it's actually possible to avoid having a group a people that feel they've been cheated somehow?
  - jakelazaroff 3y ago
    No, but I don’t really see what that has to do with anything.
- mulmen 3y ago
  I’m describing an ideal future state. You’re describing the suboptimal current state. This is why I emphasized “should”. In my city the police deliberately avoid enforcing basic traffic laws and petty crime in a bid to get more funding. As that continues more and more of my neighbors arm themselves. At some point the scales tip and the people take matters into their own hands. Police can abuse their power in the short term but it can’t continue forever.
  - jakelazaroff 3y ago
    I actually suspect you’re describing what I’d consider a suboptimal future state, but it’s hard to tell because most of these words are pretty vague. Like, what exactly is “mob rule”? Why am I supposed to fear it? Why is it worse than today’s system of rule by a powerful unaccountable minority? Why is it per se good for the police to enforce laws and fight crime? Those are both social constructs that can target anyone we want them to. 60 years ago, they would have prevented me from marrying my wife; 90 years ago, they would have prevented me from fleeing genocide. What happens in your ideal future state if the rich and powerful refuse to change unjust laws? If people rise up against oppression, what happens?
pineaux 3y ago
Actually, that is not the reason why they should exist. That is the story you are told. But this story has never been true, the propaganda is just a bit more effective these days. I mean. Look at: Paw Patrol, Miami Vice, Tokyo Vice, the Wire, Criminal Minds, Chicago PD, Southland, Bosch, Law and Order: all of them, law and Order: all of them, CSI: all of them, Luther, The Shield, Reno 911, etc. I mean this list is just from the top of my head. We are being indoctrinated in our image of the police. Some rotten apples are shown, but in the end they are always The Good Guys.
- mulmen 3y ago
  Uh. Cops are certainly not always portrayed in media as the good guys. The Wire and Reno 911 aren’t even positive portrayals. On top of that media portrayals are irrelevant in this context. The alternative to a state monopoly on violence is mob rule. You can call that state entity whatever you want, police, militia, whatever. But some regulated construct needs to exist. If you can’t separate that concept from the current model of policing it’s unlikely we can have an interesting conversation.
nrdxp 3y ago
Well, if you are talking about the United States and the supposed Supreme Law of the Land that nobody seems to be too well educated on nowadays, actually it is the job of local militia to defend and enforce civil order You can not have a free society without a populace taking responsibility for their own. There is a reason the slogan "freedom isn't free", was a big thing in America til just a generation or two ago. The second you start delegating things like safety to the gov you've lost. Just look at modern America, a giant portion of folks cannot survive without gov assistance now, and look where that got us. How can you oppose a corrupt gov if you cannot even survive without it? Unless you are so brainwashed (as many still are) that you think that the total lack of privacy and agency in modern America is both good, and somehow fitting to the intent of the Constitution as written.
- Sohcahtoa82 3y ago
  > actually it is the job of local militia to defend and enforce civil order Doesn't that encourage vigilanteism?
- rootusrootus 3y ago
  > Just look at modern America, a giant portion of folks cannot survive without gov assistance now Boomers are more than “a generation or two ago.”
- krapp 3y ago
  So you want to disband all police and leave police powers entirely in the hands of "local militias", which according to current definitions of the 2nd Amendment are (reading notes) literally any American with a gun? Like these jackasses[0]. You want to give these people the right to arbitrarily arrest, detain and kill because two centuries ago Thomas Jefferson saw the horrors of the French Revolution, got the biggest boner of his life and thought "how about that, but a whole country, all the time?" No thank you. I don't trust the cops but I trust my fellow armed Americans even less. At least the police, ostensibly, have a system they have to abide by other than a piece of parchment saying "everyone gets as many guns as they want, no questions asked." What you're advocating is essentially gang warfare. Also, "freedom isn't free" became popular as a meme from South Park making fun of the wave of jingoistic, patriotic BS songs after 9/11. It costs a buck o'five, by the way. [0]https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-53891184 https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-53891184

johndhi 3y ago

Does that make sense? It doesn't to me. The phrase "power structures" isn't even one most people understand (I'm not sure I do, and I'm a lawyer) so it's hard to believe the hundreds of police organizations that independently exist across this country exist to maintain them. Police exist because they were funded by governments. They are the way they are because of the various incentives, organizational politics, their day-to-day experiences on the job, and the minds of the people who staff them. Rather than declaring them part of a fascist plot, why not just try to think about where improvements can be made?

TaylorAlexander 3y ago
It makes sense that the police exist to enforce existing power structures, yes. The people in power (wealthy individuals and organizations who can buy political capital, and the politicians that represent them) use the police as a threat of and actual tool of violence to subdue anyone that would challenge their power. > Rather than declaring them part of a fascist plot, why not just try to think about where improvements can be made? The first step to fixing a system is to understand it. Taking a valid description and twisting it in to an accusation of a "fascist plot" is a great way to ensure you will never understand the system in the way which is required to actually improve it.
- asdfman123 3y ago
  We're all trying to frame things in a way that will logically lead our preferred solutions. But the description "police exist to enforce existing power structures" implies that the power structures are illegitimate, which suggests that the police are as well, which in turn suggests we should tear it all down and start over. But I've never seen anyone who 1) recommends tearing everything down and 2) has a realistic (or even defined) plan to rebuild it.
  - slowmovintarget 3y ago
    I've seen plenty of anarchists who do recommend tearing everything down. Antifa has clothed themselves in the name of supposedly being against fascism, but they define fascism as any current system of government. They're anarchists, though the media covers them as "activists." You're right about number 2, though.

justapassenger 3y ago

This is just a sound bite. Police has lots of problems in USA. But go live in the country without effective police force first, and then talk about how police isn’t here to enforce laws and justice.

ubermonkey 3y ago
Not a great argument. Police here are not interested in justice, and this is trivial to prove based on their behavior. Courts have also ruled that police have no duty to protect citizens. Policing in the US is fundamentally broken. That there exist places with worse policing problems does not mean ours are not serious, foundational, and endemic.
- justapassenger 3y ago
  > Police here are not interested in justice, and this is trivial to prove based on their behavior. Is it? There are bad stories, sure. Horrible ones, yes. Police officers who should be in jail for life - yes! But there’s also a tons of good stories, that just don’t get reported, because they don’t generate outrage and clicks.
  - ubermonkey 3y ago
    That's a hilarious and counterfactual thing to assert on a thread noting that cops literally steal more money from people than criminals do. Cops do what is easy, by and large. The overriding motivations in the job do not align with the values that the public would actually WANT from a police force. They are not required to "protect and serve," and have actually argued in court (and won!) that they are not required to protect anyone. They are protected by a union with absurdly outsized power, which prevents real accountability in all but the most egregious cases. These unions and their fellow-travelers work hard to prevent common-sense recordkeeping on national violent incidents by cops, and to avoid any kind of national peace officer licensing and certification that would keep bad cops "fired" by one city from just drifting to the next town over and continuing their behavior. Cops, in the US, are part of the problem. https://theap.substack.com/p/what-do-cops-do https://theap.substack.com/p/what-do-cops-do