Have you ever dealt with police abuse of force/brutality, or police misconduct. Was your experience mostly pleasant or negative, and how has that shaped your view of cops as a whole today?
I personally think there definitely needs to be more resources to deal with incidents other than just cops. It seems like any problem that ever happens, people just call the cops since they don’t know who else to call so in some cases the cops being called leads to the situation escalating and lives being lost since the police just aren’t equipped to handle certain situations that they’re called to handle.
Police are more likely to use lethal force when attending to an emergency call when a person is experiencing psychiatric distress. When an individual calls 911 when experiencing mental distress, what they need is expertise in de-escalation, social and health supports & services. Instead, they are met with multiple armed and uniformed police officers. The police have become the first point of access to mental health support for many under-funded communities.
If there were other options to deal with non violent situations than it could prevent these situations from ever happening. We could also quit militarizing the police and better use that funding for stuff that’ll help the community in the long run such as public transportation, schooling, and infrastructure.
It is hard to imagine a more patently absurd policy proposal than defunding the police. It is a proposal driven more by ideology and mere emotion than reasoned analysis, let alone historical experience.
As indeed, San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York City amply demonstrate. In fact, cities are the most likely to have vulnerable populations in desperate need of police protection. See also the feces and needle strewn streets particularly of the former two cities, where out of compassion and their civil rights, the homeless have been left to their fate.
Bottom line, the lesson the question postulates would likely be taught to those least likely to benefit from it and most likely to be harmed. In that connection, there is no need for guesswork as to how this particular social experiment would go as there is ample historical experience - including recent history - to make the point.
After the riots in Ferguson and West Baltimore, the police took a lighter approach to those communities. As night follows day, crime rates, including drug use, burglaries, muggings and even murder, soared. The victims tending to be not the wealthy in those communities, but the poor and lower middle class, as well as small business owners.
The irony is that the nation got to this place because particularly the African-American community, beginning in the late 1980s, grew tired of rising crime rates in the inner city black neighborhoods and began to demand a greater police presence and tougher punishments. Indeed, the demand for the mandatory minimum sentences that President Trump recently abolished - good populist that he is - originally came from the Congressional Black Caucus in Congress in response to the crack epidemic.
Crime remains higher than the national average in most inner cities. These being predominantly African-American communities, and in fact black-on-black crime is by far the worst. This begging the question if blacks believe that "black lives matter."
However, the crime rate has improved dramatically since the 1970s, and so the aggressive policing that was once seen by African-Americans as a source of protection is now seen, set against an improving situation, as intimidating and, in the context of the populist culture, as racist. What was seen in the peril of the hour as urgently needed is now, in better times, seen as oppressive and racist by those who are comfortable and safe.
To wit, the police in many communities are likely to, if not be defunded outright, at least be reduced. Their presence will consequently be reduced and the net result, see again the Ferguson and West Baltimore examples, will be soaring crime rates. The African-American community no doubt then, as they did in the 80s, to complain that the police are racists because they ignore the needs of black communities.
The real solution to this problem, of course, will be accountability in the African-American community. Bigotry in America there will no doubt be, but humans are imperfect and not perfectible and that is not likely to be fixed. However, as a recent CDC study pointed out, the incidence of racial related illegalities between the police and African-Americas is infintesimally small, particularly compared to black on black crime rates and even incidents between black police and black citizens.
Alas, cries of racism and bleating about being victims are for more cathartic than any reasoned analysis of the data will ever be. Thus, the situation the nation finds itself in is not apt to get better anytime soon - if indeed at all.
1 To prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force and severity of legal punishment.
2 To recognise always that the power of the police to fulfill their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour, and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect.
3 To recognise always that to secure and maintain the respect and approval of the public means also the securing of the willing co-operation of the public in the task of securing observance of laws.
4 To recognise always that the extent to which the co-operation of the public can be secured diminishes proportionately the necessity of the use of physical force and compulsion for achieving police objectives.
5 To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour, and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.
6 To use physical force only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient to obtain public co-operation to an extent necessary to secure observance of law or to restore order, and to use only the minimum degree of physical force which is necessary on any particular occasion for achieving a police objective.
7 To maintain at all times a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and that the public are the police, the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
8 To recognise always the need for strict adherence to police-executive functions, and to refrain from even seeming to usurp the powers of the judiciary of avenging individuals or the State, and of authoritatively judging guilt and punishing the guilty.
9 To recognise always that the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them.
I can't speak for the US. What I know surrounding the issue of defunding the police is minimal but enough to know that defunding isn't the best idea. It's more like a restructuring and deep analysis of where the resources need to go, such as training. I agree that training in the area of de-escalation is important but it leaves another side of the issue: the dangers of the job and the toll it takes on the officers. That's something else I think is important to keep in mind. Like I said I don't know much for the case of US but I'll muse on it anyways.
For my country, I know there's also a desire to say things like defund the police but it goes much, much deeper than that. It's the corruption of the police. Policing isn't seen as a noble profession but as an opportunity for a racketeering game. It may as well be a mafia over here. If anything, the police is underfunded and the moral aspects aren't dealt with properly. It makes it harder for the general public to take them seriously or see them as part of an institution that will help them. It has a lot to do with what they're taught, the fact that being a police officer brings about a certain amount of power and many don't hesitate to fall for that.
When it comes to psychiatric distress, that's an interesting point. Seems to me that police might be better off as backup in case it turns violent and emergency nental health professionals can be dispatched as well. But how can that be implemented? Maybe it's already the case I don't know. And how to know when it is in fact a case of psychiatric distress? If it's an emergency, the best thing they can send, in my opinion, would be the police.
When it comes to developing infrastructure, I agree as well. But there also needs to be the guarantee of maintaining that infrastructure once built, or in the process of. And for that police presence is needed if in areas of high crime. I don't know what you have in mind in terms of funding that, but I think that is a major responsibility of local government and making necessary cutbacks.
Yes, they put too much towards the police and they are yet not properly trained to handle situations that social workers or mental health experts should handle. Remove some funding from them put them towards these areas.
So each call gets properly handled with proper personnel. I know you already stated it, but i truly agree with it.
And of course if we could use this money to help the community. Teach the youth in high crime areas there are better ways, and how they can achieve it. Plenty of children want this but don't have any resources to get them. Begin investing in children's future by helping them to be successful instead of trying to use armed uniformed people to intimidate and punish them.
Educate them help with food drives in these same neighborhoods that the quality of food in the neighborhoods are far less than other communities. I could go on but this gets the point across
Yes. I think we give police too much responsibility here in the U. S. A.
#1: Have to fight crime. #2: Help prevent crime. #3: Manage traffic accidents. #4: Make sure people are driving safety. #5: Manage or try to manage the mentally ill, drunk or drug addicted out in the streets. #6: Deal with domestic problems of other people.
The police system is broken in the U. S. A
Asking too much from police officers will eventually hurt their mental state and they will do a horrible job out there because the daily stress of other people's B. S. can wear anyone out.
The U. S. needs to create and well fund a agency that is soly responsible to manage traffic accidents and enforcing traffic laws, that way it will significantly reduce public and police interactions which a lot turns out bad.
Moreover, create another agency that deals with domestic disturbance and mental illnesses.
Police aren't professionals in those two areas so it's useless and unfair to put them in such situations.
Let police only deal with crime and criminals and raise the standard of policing in the U. S. A. and everything should work fine.
In my experience, cops are dicks, but that's just because I live in a relatively safe and wealthy suburb where cops are useless so you get these people who larp as real cops, thinking they're tough or actually useful for anything besides settling disputes for Karens or pulling people over for going 10mph over the speed limit.
In other places, people grossly misunderstand how difficult it is to be a cop, how the pay is so low the only incentive is holding on for 20 years until you retire and that you're helping the community. They constantly have to interact with the scum of the earth whose every word out of their mouth is a lie.
I don't really understand what people think they're accomplishing by "defunding" the police. I guess it's just part of their fake little civil-rights crusade...
And I suppose I'm one to want the system to collapse so we can rebuild it, and just get to the point where we execute certain criminals rather than put them through the revolving door that is the justice system.
Yes, but not for the reasons you think. You have police letting ANTIFA and BLM burn down cities, letting murderers out on parole, however, if you dare to walk on the 'Black Lives Matter' mural in Manhattan, you get a ticket. There are 21 cops at all times guarding that piece of shit. They won't even bat an eye when someone rips off a store, but if you try to run your business, there will be a wall of cops preventing law abiding citizens from entering an establishment because the mayor doesn't like it, not because there is an actual law against it. The police are escorting midnight flights of unaccompanied illegal minors in to cities around the country who were trafficked to the U. S. by coyotes using them as human shields. These are victims of sex trafficking that the government is complicit in trafficking and the cops protect it. The city will try to defund the police, yet those same police will use a ton of resources to protect the politicians who are trying to defund them, so they don't suffer from their own stupidity. As long as police enforce unconstitutional edicts, pushed out by governors and mayors outside of any legislative authority, I am done with the police. I have a nice armory I can protect myself. I don't need the thought police to come a correct me, while letting actual violent criminals run rampant. So excuse me, but if your a cop and you use your power to afflict the citizenry while letting violence, crime and assault go unnoticed, I don't give a fuck about you. I have no use for cops that blindly follow orders and violate their own conscience and that actual law of the land they take an oath to protect. Yeah, get rid of them. We can divert the funds to a city 'Corpse Clean up Division' to rid the streets of those who made the wrong move on the wrong person. I would be 100% fine with that.
I truly believe the people who pitched this 'defunding' idea have absolutely no clue how to address the issue, nor do they understand human nature. They are simply talking out of their ass just to appeal to the emotionally distressed to appear like they're doing something about it... when in reality, there is no viable alternative.
Explain how defunding the police will work.
Explain how the government will responsibly allocate these funds, knowing their track record with taxpayer dollars. They can't even get schools right, and schools are fairly well funded. They are just poorly managed. Throwing money at something will not solve the problem, and taking money away will definitely make the problem worse... This is a politicians way of solving things. Is it any wonder why they suck?
Typically, a mental health crisis involves a person who is beyond reason, full of adrenaline, and are often determined to 'defend' themselves, violently if necessary. If family members and loved ones—who are the most qualified to de-escalate the situation, imo—have resorted to calling the police... then it likely means de-escalation hasn't worked, nor is it likely to work.
Explain how a "social service officer" or "social worker" will handle the situation. Will they have to be unarmed? Good luck with that... I'm not so sure anyone will be wanting to sign up for a dangerous job that they can't defend themselves in.
Short answer, no. You're going to cause more problems than you solve.
For a longer answer, yes I've had bad experiences with the police. I don't think it's wise to rely upon the police for your personal safety. I think demilitarizing the police is a good idea, that police should be civilian defense not a light military response. The police need more training. However, you don't disarm the police, you don't get rid of them and replace them with social workers, you don't waste our time and theirs making them enforce meaningless or even harmful laws. The police aren't meant to be a mental health social call. Their job is to stop a threat, with as little violence as is possible. Someone swinging a knife around or trying to kill another person isn't going to be stopped with a chat.
No we should not. If there were no police, it would have to be the military who would respond to any violence-related emergency calls and I don't think military would just sit behind a barrier and politely ask the armed robber to be so kind and put the gun down. The only reason for "militarising police" is the rising aggressivity of people - if they repeatedly ask somebody to please step away from the vehicle and the person refuses to comply and starts shouting, how can they be sure the person isn't just gonna grab his gun and start shooting at them? If people listened and followed law, then the police wouldn't need extra protection.
Every part of the emergency response system has its important role and if you defund one of the, it would be the common folks who would suffer due to the lack of responsiveness in case of emergency.
As a libertarian, I do believe it's almost impossible that the current police is the best model that could be implemented. I would even agree that hardcore force could be replaced by many different possible options how to respond to or prevent bad situations. I also did a lot of thinking on how to best phase out failed government services. Cutting funding without allowing time and incentive for alternative structures to develop first is the fastest way to cause a giant disaster. Rising crime is a direct proof of that. Defunding the police is a worthy end goal, but please do not do anything silly in the name of that cause.
Like I have always said we are being led down a path of destruction our government has sold us out things are going to be changing they have us all programmed all these deaths of covid-19 and now the police department it's going to happen sooner or later that they're going to try to do away with our Police Department. I don't like cops I'll be honest with you. But I will tell you something if they try to get rid of my place first I will stand right next to the police and I will fight for them to keep their jobs because the last thing that we want is to be under a martial law of the government's police Department or any other type of or form of law there's no way in this world that I would never get rid of our Police Department better be careful what you ask for because if you get it you're not going to be happy whatsoever. There will be ten times the abuse that goes on
Defund the police? NO! Who would ensure overall safety?
Better education and training of police on how to deal with situations where violence is a last resort.
Funding for additional support, for example, non-police personnel trained in dealing with mental disorders. When someone calls 911 about a mental issue, they would show up along with the police.
NOTE: Bad actions by police get huge coverage by the media, and that stirs people up. If you look at the statistics, for every "bad" police action, there are hundreds (maybe even thousands) that are not, where police properly handle the situation and maintain safety and enforcement of laws.
I've never had a negative interaction with law enforcement, but then again I've never given them a reason for it to escalate. I get pulled over, I have my license, registration, and proof of insurance ready. I treat them with respect and cooperate fully. At no point do I try and escalate the situation, cop an attitude, or argue with them. If I don't agree with why I was pulled over, I handle it accordingly.
Defunding the police won't help matters any at all. If anything it will make things considerably worse, that much has already been proven. However I do agree certain reforms and aspects do need to change. For example protecting officers with records of brutality needs to end, also regular counseling especially in the event of a traumatic event should be encouraged.
Serious reform and training. The reason cops are so aggressive is because they are trained through fear tactics. this was to keep officers safe from getting killed in the line of duty. but it added to the chances of them killing someone that never posed a real threat to begin with. The Kyle Dinkheller case and the Miami Dade Shootout are two examples used to train law enforcement. they use them in a context which can make a young officer more ready to be aggressive or fearful.
Absolutely not, they're underfunded already and we need to triple, if not quadruple the police presence in the nation to tackle violent crime in the nation.
My experiences have been great so far, very professional and nice, which will happen in almost every scenario if you do your part in working with them instead of yelling at them like a lot of people do.
If you want funding for other things, defund teachers unions and cut the salaries of politicians at least in half then we can actually make a positive difference in society, way too much money goes to those people who either do nothing at all, or intentionally sabotage themselves so they can turn around and ask for more money.
Police is a service payed by money that's been forcefully taken away from you.. Should we defund the police? Really that's the question you want to ask?
Imagine if I run an antivirus service for your computer and you have no saying in whether or not you can accept or refuse the service. Do you really ask "should we defund that antivirus guy?"
How is police funded in the first place? When you go to work or make money in any way, a slice of that is forcefully taken away from you (the euphemism for that is "taxing"), and that's the money police is funded by.
So your question is basically "Should we stop giving our money to thugs that's supposed to protect us from thugs?". It's a bizarre question to ask if you understand how the system works.
It may be that your 911 service needs the revamp and not just dropping everything at the cops door, In the UK the equivalent of your 911 (999) covers Police, Ambulance/Paramedics, Fire, Coastguards (Nothing like US Coastguards, more of a rescue service), Mountain Rescue Teams, and First Responders in Isolated areas who have the training and equipment to keep people alive until Ambulance/Paramedics or Mountain Rescue Teams can get on site.
No, they should be better funded for training. I also think an alternative program can be tested, but it should have a close police response should it go sideways. If the alternative program works, then less policing is needed and numbers adjust on their own.
*watches and waits for the "oh you must be a **** lib* or "if you dont like it, you can leave*
Wondering to those who post negative comments.. please answer this.. ☒ How did your 1/6 stunt work for you? ☒ What was rigged? who won? ☒ Lock Whom Up? ☒ Build what wall? ☒ What kind of people on "both sides"?
ahh 2 disagree.. They must think that Biden didn't win the election
Anonymous
(30-35)
+1 y
Defunding the police is one of the stupidest ideas a first world country like the US could have come up with. All the cities that cut police funding saw increases in crimes which resulted in those same cites having to "refund" the cops , in just a few months. We need more cops and more money to solve crimes. This whole " lets get social workers to deal with certain situations" , will fail badly because there's no common sense and logic behind that thinking based on reality. In fact , 85% of social workers have reported being assulted on the job and now you're putting them in higher risk situations without protection.
No I think the opposite - more funding should go to the police. Perhaps for better training, but defunding the police is purely stupid. Who are you going to call if there's an emergency? Nobody, nobody will be there for you.
Defunding the police just means to give it less funding because police in America are becoming militarized. They already have a big budget so there’s no need for us to increase their budget.
Lastly, I’ve already explained the things your pointing out
Read this book Police a Field Guide and tell me wtf you still need police for without resorting to your standard utterly nutless cowardly ad hominems. If you don’t even know what an ad hominem is you got no business showing up in public
