You and others are saying that police departments should be defunded rather than supported by revenue policing, which is bullshit. Tax support is the best option by far, but no police is worse even than the status quo. Unless you believe that we’d be better off without the police, in which case you’re a dangerous lunatic.
Like I’ve said multiple times, we need to get rid of the war on drugs. That would reduce tremendously the “need” for so much of the police work that goes on. Legalize, regulate, closely monitor the heavier users of the more addictive and dangerous drugs, and constantly educate AND research. That’s how.
Revenue policing is inherently corrupt, dictatorial, oppressive, and unjust. It should not be tolerated under any circumstances.
People should not get service that they are not willing to pay taxes for. I am not in favor of defunding vital government operations. What am in favor of is not enabling voters to continue to make poor decisions to the detriment of the poor and minorities. They should not have an option of fiuding the service they want by using the color of authority to harass, exploit, and oppress the most vulnerable people in their community. If they are not willing to pay taxes to sustain police protection, they should not get police protection.
No it’s not, not that it has anything to do with whether PDs should be properly funded by taxes (and they should be).
Selma, Alabama in the 1950s would have been better off (at least for black people) without the police. It’s not lunacy to say that. Through most of American history, the police were the enemy of black people, including the vast majority who were (and are) law-abiding and peaceful. I think it’s likely that there are still some (hopefully very few) police departments who carry on this unfortunate tradition.
You’re lying, because I didn’t advocate not funding the police through taxes. Stop lying, liar.
The best option is funding police properly through taxes. If that doesn’t happen, funding the police through shakedowns (a la Ferguson) is not the next best option – not by far. Cutting services is better, and taking debt is better (and again, not as good as proper tax funding). You asked which is preferable between cutting services and taking on debt.
Bullshit. Absolute, complete nonsense. Even if the police are no better than dictators, without them and a system of laws and government, you are guaranteed to have a dictator appear, and one that would make Selma then look like a fucking utopia.
You are, as those on the left so often do, making the perfect the enemy of the good. Improvements in civil rights didn’t come by removing rights for everybody, they came by extending those rights to everybody. Everyone, no matter what their skin colour or income, deserves the protection of the government. That there are flaws and holes in that protection is not an argument for removing it entirely, and to think it is is, frankly, incredibly fucking stupid.
No, cutting police services is not a better option. Not for anybody. Yes, revenue policing sucks, and is hugely unfair. But, it’s still better than having no law at all. Vastly better. Just have a look at historical crime rates - I’m talking centuries ago, before any form of effective law enforcement - and you’ll see it was far higher than even the worst places today, and punishments were far more severe.
Revenue policing, or getting my hand chopped off for stealing bread to survive? I know which I’d pick, and I can’t fathom why you’d prefer the latter.
Really? What possible good did the Selma PD do for black people that was greater than all the brutality they inflicted on them?
Thinking that such PDs were anything other than an enemy of black people at the time is bullshit and complete nonsense.
For black people at the time, it was in effect a brutal totalitarian state. Unless you include places with slavery, government doesn’t get much worse than the Jim Crow south was to black people.
I’ll take this to anyone advocating removing government or removing rights, Mr. Straw Man.
Excellent straw manning – a wonderful argument against anyone advocating for anarchy and hand-chopping. I’d prefer the bad Ferguson PD to anarchy. But I’d prefer fewer Ferguson PD officers responding only to serious crimes (i.e. cutting services), or the Ferguson PD taking on debt, than the Ferguson PD as it was found by the DOJ.
This is the kind of thing people say when they know very little about history. You suggest here that the problem pre-Civil Rights Movement was that the police did not equally protect everyone. But the actual problem was that the police actively targeted black people to enforce Jim Crow, while also doing very little to protect them. It is not a wild exaggeration to say that in lots of parts of the South pre-1960-ish, black communities would have been better off without police.
Yep. When I say Jim Crow police were the enemies of black people, I don’t just mean they didn’t protect black people as much as white people – they actively attacked and brutalized black people. They were the active and violent enemies of black people – thugs in service of the white power structure, used to enforce the “inferior” status of black people.
Revenue policing is nothing but another organized crime entity. Of course shutting down the police department is better for the local people. Especially in this case the black community.
However, what puzzles me is the idea that barring law enforcement from using revenue policing will have as its only possible consequence a complete absence of a justice system.
In this country. In this day and age?
There’s a Sheriff’s Department at the county level. There’s state-level policing. Even the federal government has resources to step in if a truly anarchic situation results.
If nothing else, democracy exists. Someone can have a proposition put on the ballot to dissolve the municipal corporation so that its functions are merged with the surrounding areas. Someone can propose a tax hike. Someone can go to the state or federal government to ask for emergency funding. Someone can propose that the municipality borrow money until these issues are resolved.
So many options. Revenue policing is never necessary and should never be permitted.
Another good point – shutting down the Ferguson PD doesn’t mean anarchy for Ferguson – it just means that County and State police will step in until a new PD is created (or responsibilities are shared out in other ways).
Hey, pretty young white girl shot dead when she walked into a police station to seek help. Maybe white folks will care now? — http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/01/26/3615294/kristiana-coignard-shot-cops-longview/
So, you think that without the police black people would have been free from oppression and violence? Bullshit. It would have been worse.
But you know what? It was changed. And not through abolishing or defunding police departments, but by political and social pressure. The same should be continuing to happen now, where there are real problems. That would include, as someone said earlier, ending the ridiculous war on drugs.
I’ve said before that better treatment for mental illness should be available. But it’s not the police’s job to provide that care, and they have every right to shoot someone who comes in pointing a gun at them. Even if they’re a pretty white girl.
[Moderating]
Steophan, saying “fuck you” to other posters is a violation of the pits language rules. Please avoid doing this in the future.
No warning issued.
[/Moderating]
Crazy white people waving guns around have the same right to be shot by police as crazy black people waving guns around.
Where the hell did I say that? Do you have a straw-man reflex or something?
LOL. The only difference would have been that the armed thugs brutalizing black people wouldn’t have been wearing uniforms.
Sounds good to me. And the DOJ should also be investigating the bad PDs, and if they’re breaking the law (as they assert the Ferguson PD is), then they should face consequences. PDs don’t get to break laws just because they’re PDs.
It doesn’t matter what “rights” the police should have. What matters is what we want them to be trained to do.