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You posted this elsewhere but to be clear, you are wrong. The defund the police movement, at least the one in the US that gained popularity between 2017 and 20

You posted this elsewhere but to be clear, you are wrong. The defund the police movement, at least the one in the US that gained popularity between 2017 and 2021, was explicitly aimed at eliminating the concept of policing. The belief is that because policing began with South Carolina slave patrols (it did not, but that doesn't matter) that the whole concept is corrupt and changes in execution won't fix the heart of the problem. In order to fix it, policing needs to be entirely destroyed and rethought, from first principles. The funding would be allocated towards community building and outreach a la the Cure Violence programs in NYC. Since crime is of course solely an economic and mental health issue, with proper education, stipends and mental health resources crime can be eliminated without needing a police force at all. Some of the elements aren't bad, but taken together it was not a good idea.

steveBK123 3y ago
It's like the orange man and whether you take him seriously or literally argument that many of his defenders used. When the defund movement had people marching with ACAB & abolish posters regularly, it's hard to argue it meant anything else. A thought exercise for the word re-definers defending the term: If your CEO walked on stage and said "we are defunding __" where __ is the division you work in.. would you be like "oh good it means I'm going to work on better stuff now" or "oh shit let me get my resume up to date". We can make lots of arguments like "they chose the wrong word" but I don't think we should argue that the word means something else just because it helps the slogan make more sense.
steveBK123 3y ago
>> The belief is that because policing began with South Carolina slave patrols Yes! This one always cracked me up and is so American centric. As if history began in 1776 or 1492 or 1619 or whatever date people want to use. No other civilization in the history of humanity ever had law enforcement? We had to invent it, and of course the bad people invented it.

steveBK123 3y ago

It's like the orange man and whether you take him seriously or literally argument that many of his defenders used. When the defund movement had people marching with ACAB & abolish posters regularly, it's hard to argue it meant anything else. A thought exercise for the word re-definers defending the term: If your CEO walked on stage and said "we are defunding __" where __ is the division you work in.. would you be like "oh good it means I'm going to work on better stuff now" or "oh shit let me get my resume up to date". We can make lots of arguments like "they chose the wrong word" but I don't think we should argue that the word means something else just because it helps the slogan make more sense.

steveBK123 3y ago

>> The belief is that because policing began with South Carolina slave patrols Yes! This one always cracked me up and is so American centric. As if history began in 1776 or 1492 or 1619 or whatever date people want to use. No other civilization in the history of humanity ever had law enforcement? We had to invent it, and of course the bad people invented it.