Abolish the Police

hey

Chapo Trap House and the rise of the dirtbag left

previous thread starts there

Once you abolish them, how do you keep them abolished?

using the military, of course

policing should not be abolished

federal standards of policing should be established and enforced via funding. the department of transportation has done wonders for getting EMTs all to similar levels of competence across the country.

Federal standards would be useful, possibly even great, but totally impossible in the current political climate. Or in any political climate I've seen in my lifetime. Or that I've read about in US history. Or that I can imagine occurring before I die.

i support the concept, but human beings like to persecute each other violently

also it's the end of the world

is human beings persecuting each other violently referring to the police or non-police?

how did everything on my ilx become tinier when i clicked this thread

both, all, etc xp

i'd abolish the motherfucking goddamn US military murder machine first tho

i think the police should be abolished but it should be done in a very slow and secretive manner to stop everyone from doing crimes *because* there are no police

People who carry weapons as a hobby should probably be abolished before we abolish the professions where people sometimes carry guns

Reminds me of a reddit thread where some dude was weighing the pro et contra arguments re: the 2nd amendment and leaning slightly toward more control before suddenly concluding, without the faintest trace of irony, that no matter which side of the fence you're on, the fact that guns are fun is so utterly undeniable that all other considerations are irrelevant, confirming the farseeing wisdom of the Founding Fathers™.

Oh, really

policing involves a lot of activities that don't involve brutal, nay fatal, violence. And policing has been part of civilization since BCE2K and earlier, probably. if we follow Bardach's Eightfold Path, we're hardly into step 3 - "construct some alternatives." If we want to reform the business that is policing, we have to figure out who should do it, and what institutions should define how it is done.

#NoCopAcademy still holding it down at Chicago City Hall pic.twitter.com/45zKClRmdI

— Sarah Lazare (@sarahlazare) March 28, 2018

This is a good piece on Hong Kong protestor efforts:

https://lausan.hk/2019/how-to-abolish-the-hong-kong-police/

Abolish the police.

otm

do it yesterday. i am losing my mind at ppl who think this dumbass eight is enough plan or whatever the fuck it's called is anything. how do i get off the internet.

liberals are convinced that they can turn the police into nice boys who really care for the people they are funneling into the prison industrial complex

but if cops had to announce "i'm going to shoot you" before they shot you, maybe that would be your ticket to heaven. it would CHANGE. EVERYTHING.

i just remembered one time deray mckesson was speaking at a conference i was at, and i knew there was no one i could talk to who would understand why he sucks, so i went to get a pastrami sandwich and came back when it was over

How was the sandwich

it was great, i want another

I prefer the defund/shrink approach to abolish. There is a bad historical meme going around now that policing originated with slave patrols, which is sort of a distorted half-truth. Societies of all kinds have always had some form of policing or other. Ours is clearly bloated, hyper-militarized and racist and needs to be radically reduced and changed.

Abolish the uniform guys, retain parking enforcement and grizzled detectives hiding hearts of gold under their gruff exteriors

Societies of all kinds have always had some form of policing or other.

citation needed

it is not relevant to me whether the origin was in slave patrols. we can keep kurt wallander around to solve violent crimes, and we can keep all the stars of parking wars. everyone else has to go.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police#History xp

oh, so you mean "modern civilization" not the hundreds of thousands of years of hunter gatherers, OK.

IMO that history shows the problems that resulted from the "first fence" more than anything:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/560830.My_Name_is_Chellis_and_I_m_in_Recovery_from_Western_Civilization

not only is it broadly modern civilization but it's far from a continuous history and most police forces in their modern organization, powers and tactics aren't much older than the mid 19th century

on the other hand even if they were ordained by god in the garden of Eden abolish the fuckers

oh ok so we should build a neoprimitive society with 7 billion people on the planet, that should go well

well the 19th century was when much of the world's population urbanized

this isn't a reformist thread

NV otm

they are agents of capital and should be shown no remorse or mercy

as i said, the police as constituted today are very much a function of the capitalist societies that introduced them, form something else by all means but the police institutions we have were rotten at conception

and they don't keep us safe, either

this seems as good a place as any to vent: my local solidarity rally tomorrow is not allowing anti-police signs. I wish them the best with it but I'm going to pass. Small city in Canada.

there's probably other threads for cautiously liking the police tbf

Without first dismantling capitalism, there's no practical difference between abolishing the police and privatising it.

I don't think short-term commitment to abolition can be used as a gatekeeping device for conversations about how to move forward from where we are now.

it is true that we must first seize the means of production before the withering away of the state can occur

anyway the specific bone of contention was that the police are not a natural offshoot of the state of nature who must always be with us as sinful fallen humans

thank you, yes that is what I was saying

You know that old canard, "It's easy to criticize the police but you'll soon change your tune when you actually need them"? Well, I think I've said it here before but whenever I've actually needed the police - break-ins, muggings etc - they have proved to be completely useless and generally given the impression they couldn't give a flying fuck.

Add laziness and ineptitude to their list of sins.

here here, NV. I will have to work to have this discussion more, locally, soon.

ok just spitballing here but what if we abolished the police

hm interesting expand on that

the first time i got burgled the first 15 minutes of interaction with the cops was persuading them we hadn't done it ourselves cos we lived on a "bad" estate

love to burgle myself

there are certainly cops who tell the truth. i knew one of them quite well. but on the whole, you have to assume that a profession where you are above the law (because you are the law) will attract an extraordinary number of people who, subconsciously or very consciously, desire to be above the law

like judge dredd, for example

It's always a quandary innit. Or not cos one is ideally expected to be objective, neutral etc to represent the law and they're not easily attained human qualities. Like no ones a robot and everyone has a perspective and all like that. So it's almost like one isn't going to be an ideal cop or something. Like.

I mean it's almost like one should do away with the idea.

during the chris dorner thing in LA, one of my friends lived on a street where the cops had a mistaken dorner sighting and two cop cars set up on diff sides of a street and had a gun battle with each other, with the cops on either side thinking that the innocent people trapped between them were firing back. When it was in the news later all the reports said more than 10 shots were fired (this was reported by the police to the news) but when I walked down the street the next day the entire block was shot up, bullet holes everywhere like a loony tunes ep, garages, trees, like 100+ shots. I think a few years later the police quietly released a report saying there were 70+ shots.

<carried over from the shooting thread>

someone in my small 50/50-right/left town posted to Reddit and basically said "what will the cops do with my guns if i turn them? i've always been a gun guy, but i just can't be a part of this anymore"

police probably hide under their damn desks till he leaves

I was listening to a podcast last week, Behind the Bastards or something, talking about factions of police firing on police causing a lot of police death or at least mutilation, while trying to deal with criminals. Also talking about a new commissioner coming in and suggesting police fire sawn off shotguns from moving vehicles at crowded streets while in pursuit of criminals. Extent of projected collateral damage seems to be a bit callous really.
Other possibility for podcast may have been the anarchist bombing episodes of Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff One of the 2 Haymarket Affair episodes. seems like there was more chaos coming from the forces of law than the anarchists.

Director of the Texas Dept of Public Safety tells @ShimonPro that none of the 19 officers in the school attempted to break into the classroom where the children & teachers were massacred bc they believed suspect was barricaded in and that “there was time” to get keys to the door.

— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) May 27, 2022

"yo we gots good time, how many people could he kill in 30, 40 minutes? we could get lunch now even"

just infuriating

CW: DISTURBING CONTENT

Student calls to 911:
12:03—whispered she's in room 112
12:10—said multiple dead
12:13—called again
12:16—says 8-9 students alive
12:19—student calls from room 111
12:21—3 shots heard on call
12:36—another call
12:43—asks for police
12:47—asks for policehttps://t.co/CzkuF1llq1

— Mike Baker (@ByMikeBaker) May 27, 2022

sorry, there should probably be a disturbing content warning on that tweet.

can a mod put it in hide text, maybe?

I hope the thing that sticks with people is the image of police pushing, tazing, hand-cuffing unarmed parents while too shook to go in and save their kids. Like this is the even darker version of someone calling the cops for a noise complaint and they show up and kill your dog.

Legislators responded to the 2018 Parkland school shooting by hiring police officers in every elementary, middle and high school in Florida. It didn’t make students safer. Instead, it led to this: https://t.co/ew9NxbWfBe pic.twitter.com/ykc5win0hm

— Samuel Sinyangwe (@samswey) May 26, 2022

https://twitter.com/defendATLforest

The mother who rescued her two boys from the #Uvalde gunman says she’s being harassed by cops at her own home

Angeli Rose Gomez said she had to separate from her boys "just so my sons don't feel like they have to watch cops passing by, stopping” https://t.co/v25mLGzeaa pic.twitter.com/VHwwQUEYTq

— philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) June 26, 2022

remember when kids dying was this line in the sand that even the most cast-iron hearted could not cross, and the actions of a loving mother to save her kids by any means necessary was praised rather than mocked?

yeah, me neither. fuck the police. fuck THOSE police. they're just angry that the mom had the balls to do what they wouldn't.

She disobeyed The Police and must be punished

It brings me no pleasure to report that ACAB includes Queef Cop pic.twitter.com/07JrPdgSjX

— Scoob (@Scoobydouchebag) June 27, 2022

I’m dying

THREAD. A few additional thoughts about Biden calling for 100,000 new cops and billions more for surveillance at a time of rising fascism.

— Alec Karakatsanis (@equalityAlec) July 25, 2022

the guy knows what he’s talking about btw ^

Talk about funding a Neo-Nazi army

This other thread of his is v good too

THREAD: One of our clients was an 11-year-old Black child taking a shower before bed when DC police burst into her bathroom, pulled back the curtain, and pointed guns at her naked body. Cops said they found a little marijuana on her dad (who didn't live there) two weeks before.

— Alec Karakatsanis (@equalityAlec) August 4, 2022

The controversial West Side police academy will have mock neighborhood for training — raising the total cost of the project to $128 million. Here's what it will look like: https://t.co/77Mfg2RXpj. pic.twitter.com/oa2lB7tJo1

— Block Club Chicago (@BlockClubCHI) August 10, 2022

Now every Chicago trainee cop will be able to pretend they're Seal Team 6 training to take down Osama's compound

It will all be worth it to finally end mental illness in this cpountry.

suspended with pay, natch

Two Indiana officers were suspended after a stunning courtroom revelation that police thought a potential town council candidate was anti-police and arrested him, stopping him from running for office.

During a July 19 hearing, Franklin County Prosecutor Chris Huerkamp dropped charges that included drug possession against Trevin Thalheimer after an officer and witness recounted how Brookville police talked about Thalheimer. Huerkamp, who also did not pursue a rape charge police had investigated, said he was “disturbed beyond words” by the alleged police conduct and reported the incident to the Indiana State Police, which launched a criminal investigation. The transcript of the hearing was made public Monday.

Brookville Police Chief Terry Mitchum and the investigating officer, Ryan Geiser, were suspended with pay from the nine-person force Thursday by the town’s council, which ordered them to stay away from other officers and town property. The council installed an interim chief in a brief emergency meeting and said it would begin searching for a permanent replacement.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/08/10/indiana-police-arrest-political-candidate/

man how does this stuff keep happening?! so confusing, must just be an incredible unbroken string of coincidences stretching back hundreds of years

it's okay folks, just a few more bad apples to chase out and then things will be just absolutely hunky dory

Indiana's new state motto is "More Oklahoma than Oklahoma."

Eric Adams's New York doesn't have the money to pay for lifeguards at the beach past 6pm during an August heat wave, but it has plenty of money to send a team of armed cops to arrest someone for swimming at the beach without a lifeguard. https://t.co/HR9l6sT0FU

— Sam Feldman 🌹 (@srfeld) August 10, 2022

arresting people for not showing their ID immediately because they're in the water, typical NY policing (though not NYPD this time). classy.

really cannot recommend this newsletter highly enough

https://substack.com/profile/9600332-alec-karakatsanis

Idk about this one - https://newrepublic.com/article/167627/defund-social-workers

Tbh it’s not that there aren’t reasonable points in there but a pretty godawful headline and opening.

"Then Louise Casey’s second report into the Met is due in March, and is expected to be as damning, if not more so, than the first report, which found huge failings in how the force investigates officers. It led Rowley to admit that hundreds of racist, misogynist and corrupt officers have been allowed to continue to serve in the Met"

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/16/met-police-david-carrick-one-woman-act-of-bravery-abuse

Met Police commissioner Mark Rowley says the force was investigating 1,000 sexual/domestic abuse claims involving about 800 of its officers - @BBCNews reports.

— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) January 16, 2023

In the UK police are to be given more powers to crack down on protest.

Worth repeating that police do not require an DBS certificate to work, which virtually every other job that comes in contact with the public does, because apparently it’s fine for them to vet themselves https://t.co/6gpPWIZY4W

— thierry ennui (@alexeptable) January 25, 2023

i didn't know that. unfuckingbelievable

Some police officers came round to my friend's house after their downstairs neighbour died and they had to bust in. One officer took her housemate's number – she thought for official purposes. No, instead he texted her 'Hey, how are you?'

— Moya Lothian-McLean (@mlothianmclean) January 26, 2023

The 363-page report condemns the force as institutionally racist, misogynist and homophobic. Staff routinely experience sexism, it adds. There are racist officers and staff, and a "deep-seated homophobia" in the organisation.

In London, Baroness Casey says policing by consent - the idea ordinary people trust the police to act honourably and be held accountable - is broken.

The report says leadership teams at the top of the Met have been in denial for decades, and there has been a systemic failure to root out discriminatory and bullying behaviour.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-65015479

Guess what happens next?

First the inquiry, then the crime

Who'd have thought it, eh?

London Evening Standard crowing about how they're gonna put undercover officers to uncover bad behaviour in the met. Yeah, that'll do it.

maybe there's a few good apples

There is always another view.

The influence of what sorry? pic.twitter.com/CvhJvC6qeU

— Tom Williams (@shirleymush) March 21, 2023

Fucking lunatic

I'm sorry to say we won't be able to hold the Metropolitan Police Commissioner to account tonight for the Casey Report's findings of institutional racism, misogyny and homophobia because his press office have again excluded #C4News

— Krishnan Guru-Murthy (@krishgm) March 21, 2023

It's astonishing he's still in post.. the stuff he's been talking about as responses are such weak-piss penny-ante crap. He seems completely out to lunch!

almost wish khan hadn't finished cressida dick because she should be front and centre eating shit for this. except she would just brazen it out like she always does. then again if you were in charge of an operation where someone gets murdered and it doesn't so much as pause your rise to the top why would you ever expect consequences.

The Irvo Otieno story is another example of how it isn’t just that police aren’t trained to be mental health workers, but people with mental health problems are despised and feared in the US. Truly sickening country