Not really.. it's called sticking to your beliefs. Once they have boycotted pretty much everything mainstream, they can then live in their little bunker and away from civilized society.
Protests following the killing of George Floyd
- Thread starter Abizzz
- Start date
You can literally pick any other developed world country mate. If their police officers are not killing, beating and hospitalising their citizens, ask them how they’re doing it.
How much do you think full riot gear, armoured vehicles, assault rifles, bullet proof vests, and the servicing costs of all those things cost?
Are you trying to suggest it’s harder to not kill and brutalise people, than do it?
Now I’ll start by stating I’m referencing the U.K. police.
Stepping away from the main gist of the thread and I apologise if this comes across as condescending. But the bit I bolded, that implication, that suggestion, the fact I’ve seen it so much across social media over the last week or so.
It has opened my eyes as to how completely ill and uninformed the general population are to the level and nature of crime that is out there and what ‘policing’ actually consists of.
People don’t seem to be able to understand that what they see as ‘policing’ is only the tip of the iceberg. Uniformed officers out on the street tackling low level street crime and the minority brutalising members of the public is actually a very small piece of what goes on.
So when people come out with stuff about dismantling and defunding the police, it blows my mind knowing what I know working in the police.
I’ve turned up to domestic incidents where victims have been choked out, battered, raped, beaten and all sorts by their partners. People get arrested, the investigation is passed on to a police detective and they tell me they’ve got 20+ similar cases, new ones rolling in on a daily basis. They tell me they’re overstretched, overworked and that they desperately need more officers.
Ive turned up to addresses and had to take children into police protection because they’ve been used as drug runners and as part of a child sexual exploitation ring and again I speak to the officers who deal with these things and they tell me again that they’re overstretched and overworked.
The world is a hideous place, people are subjected to horrific things on a daily basis.
A lot of these type of investigations take up a lot of time and effort to be able to make charges against those responsible. They also cost a lot of money. These jobs don’t just involve sitting behind a desk they require extensive work out on the field and the police officers who do this work do not lead normal lives, physically and mentally.
So yeah for you it’s easy to sit there and say imagine what life would be without any police. Or I start to wonder, why do we really need police.
Maybe have a think about the people you don’t see in the news. Have a think that your experience doesn’t equate to everyone else’s experience. Have a think about the victims to the crimes I mentioned before you start asking such questions. Have a think about the women locking themselves in their bathrooms waiting for police as their husbands are smashing down the door.
There’s rightfully been a lot of talk about those in a ‘white privileged’ position imagining themselves in positions of those who are not. And to try and understand what others are going through.
It’s time the same people dishing out this advice heed it because when you say things like “dismantle the police” “defund the police” “ACAB”.
You are failing to take into account what other victims are going through.
You are failing to take into account those officers who are not brutalising or racial profiling anyone and who are overworked and don’t have the resources they need to investigate the hideous crimes that they do.
Its not as simple as picking any other developed country since every country will have a different set of unique problems. For instance, you're not going to find the amount of guns in most other countries as you do in the US. You're also not going to find the level of autonomy and decentralization as you do in the way US states and local communities are set up vis-a-vis the federal government; nor the general suspicion of excessive government regulations or the difficulty in navigating structural change around an existing Constitution that in the current political climate, is nearly impossible to amend. As we've seen in the healthcare debate, things are applicable in smaller states, frequently don't go anywhere in the US.
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No. I don't. Don't get me wrong it's a fairy tale idea. But when you think about it what do they do. Like what do they really do. Where I live, I've never actually seen an officer stop a crime. They usually come in after the fact. My city is currently under a 2 year state of emergency with the military deployed and people are still dying in broad day light. Most effective thing the police do is issue traffic violations.
Having certain agencies to deal with actual issues people have could be a better way to go forward than have a one size fits all plan. There would still be people that investigate crimes, people that try to solve rape cases etc. It's just a thought. But it doesn't seem as farfetched as I once thought.
I used to think it was crazy for police to not be issued guns till I saw that this is exactly what's done in UK. Blew my mind.
What they do is find out who committed the crime and lock them up so they can't do it again. As most criminals are repeat offenders its still a pretty effective way of working. Although in Jamaica it might be different, i have a couple of Jamaican friends and it sounds hairy over there.
Police often fall into the category of you don't know why you need them until you do need them.
Yes no undercover cops posted in the train to catch people walking between cars. NYPD is kindof like a crime family when you think about it.
Don’t get me wrong, his work is great. But with every data-driven narrative, there are pitfalls and they don’t often tell the entire story. What’s dangerous about his approach, is that he thinks cops can be reformed. But history tells us otherwise. Every time you try to reform, they only end up more powerful. And his approach isn't going to be an exception that magically works. It is just a stopgap before cops return to doing what they do best. If anything, it will only make it worse when the same discussions come up again in the future. There is a shitload of resources out there. But this is a good guide. It has everything you need and dates back to how long this movement has been in the making.
Honestly, if someone doesn't on at least some level support black lives matter, they probably are racist. At that point they should just own it.
I think the idea of "no more police" is more about having specific agencies to deal with specific emergency responses. I wonder if you think the same person responding to domestic violence cases are the same people responding to child exploitation rings. From my reading and understanding its more about stop using police for every single thing that requires a first response personel. I think there is a huge difference between "policing" and "investigating " . I cant speak to UK policing, just my own experiences in my own country. I definately think we need people that can respond to criminal emergencies, Just like the woman locked in her bathroom, but why does it have to be this jack of all trades department . Maybe what we do need is specialised people for specialised issues that are trained for the job at hand.
as i said, two days ago i thought the idea was absurd, I no longer think it's absurd as I initially thought. You make some valid points to counter the argument but i still think its not as wacky as i first thought .
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*anti-racism critic
I wasn’t suggesting anything.
Other developed countries don’t have the violent crime rates that we have, let alone the sheer number of firearms being used on each other or on themselves. Use of force and deadly force is then inevitable. I’ve been to many countries where the police are either unarmed or have very little power/authority, and it’s because there’s no need for it. Those countries don’t have guns and have very low violent crime rates and are relatively peaceful. America is not so, unfortunately.
And yes i know full well how costly police are. Some things they can do away with as they’re unnecessary. Some things like my bulletproof vest, gun, PPEs, life-saving equipment (nar-can, cpr mask, tourniquet, first-aid kits, and those that you mentioned are kind of necessary to do my job don’t you think?
Pretty much. They are stealing a living if you ask me. While teachers remain underpaid and schools fight for resources. I know teachers, social workers who are better equipped to deescalate fights than cops will ever be.
The regressive right and their snowflake safe-space sensibilities strike again. Political correctness gone mad!
Yes but this is investigating crimes. And then carrying out punishment for committing it. I think people like that need to exist its the "policing " part that i wonder about. Randomly pulling up to me while im a street corner to shake me down for ganja isnt doing the bold. Or pulling me over and throwing me into the back of a pick up to go to the police station lock up becuase you didnt like my tone isnt doing the bold. Investigation of crimes really needs to happen. I do wonder if having 3000 more cops on top of 10000 cops to police the streets is a neccessary aspect needed. It may be. I may be naive but I have never really had a great relationship with police and policing . I used to think it was crazy to say cops dont need firearms. till i saw UK police. I stop taking what i saw as norms as things that can never be changed or removed.
Fair post but i do question how effective the police are at dealing with some of these examples (despite the best of intentions to be clear). And while i accept that these things are depressingly more common than most believe i also wonder, are they actually common? I've bolded a sentence and i kind of wonder if this thought isn't an issue depending on how wide spread you'd apply that. A possible level of bias that, while entirely understandable, isn't helpful.
Maybe part of the problem is police going from a call of some horrifying, awful shit to something relatively trivial dealing with a obnoxious dickhead that leads to a not entirely appropriate reaction when looked at in isolation.
Then theres the problem of this thread casting a pretty wide net and comments relating to american policing (or individual american states policing) annoying and offending people involved with drastically different systems and vice versa. Maybe theres an element of truth to his comment as regards Jamaica, i wouldn't know.
Some nations and states have a better handle on policing and comments like defund the police will come off as completely absurd. But from your comment it sounds like it isn't working all that well from your point of view either. Everyone taking a step back and questioning where and how improvements could be made might not be a terrible idea, no? If nothing else as a means of resetting peoples attitude towards police a bit which is quite damaged in some places and makes the job harder than it needs to be.
The BBC is a shocking organisation. Anti-racism critics ffs.
There is a need to fundamentally review our Police Force structures.
The Black Lives Matters movement has brought this to a head, but for a long time now many elements of the service have been lacking. Some of that is due to evidence requirements and how it is obtained, but many people feel the Police as a public service is becoming more distant and impervious to change.
Today Policing is a multi-faceted requirement, very different from when it first started and although have been through what might described as 'organic change' e.g formation of 'Flying squads'; Drugs Squads; Vice-Squads; Major Case Squads over the years, quite often these new developments are retrospective and have to spend much of their initial formation time in trying to become proactive, but the law doesn't really allow for that. An overall 'root and branch' approach is needed and its likely there will be an outcome where three major Policing Services and one dedicated Intel support service are formed
Para-Military (terrorism and rioting, mass revolts); Major Crime (organised crime including overseas elements ); Social Policing (and low level crime, and links to social services, e.g. domestic violence, child abuse, etc.). Arguably these should all be run on a national basis with a command structure that suits the primary needs of that service. A support network for intelligence gathering that can inter-link between all three services will be formed and controlled jointly.
Para-military and Major Crime Policing will be imposed, only Social Policing will require the consent of the public, and all three services will be required to get a 'head of the curve' as a standing order/requirement..
The Black Lives Matters movement has brought this to a head, but for a long time now many elements of the service have been lacking. Some of that is due to evidence requirements and how it is obtained, but many people feel the Police as a public service is becoming more distant and impervious to change.
Today Policing is a multi-faceted requirement, very different from when it first started and although have been through what might described as 'organic change' e.g formation of 'Flying squads'; Drugs Squads; Vice-Squads; Major Case Squads over the years, quite often these new developments are retrospective and have to spend much of their initial formation time in trying to become proactive, but the law doesn't really allow for that. An overall 'root and branch' approach is needed and its likely there will be an outcome where three major Policing Services and one dedicated Intel support service are formed
Para-Military (terrorism and rioting, mass revolts); Major Crime (organised crime including overseas elements ); Social Policing (and low level crime, and links to social services, e.g. domestic violence, child abuse, etc.). Arguably these should all be run on a national basis with a command structure that suits the primary needs of that service. A support network for intelligence gathering that can inter-link between all three services will be formed and controlled jointly.
Para-military and Major Crime Policing will be imposed, only Social Policing will require the consent of the public, and all three services will be required to get a 'head of the curve' as a standing order/requirement..
This is a fair point. I don’t know how it is in your respective countries, but homelessness has increased drastically in the past several years here in California. Most of the transients on the street have some type of mental illness, and there have been some high profile encounters with police that have gone bad. Mental illness training has never really been in police training curriculum until recently and it showed with unlawful and excessive uses of force.
Today more and more departments are dedicating a Mental Evaluation Unit to respond to mental illness calls or anything relating to the homeless. They usually have extra training and roam around with a civilian psychologist clinician offering resources, shelter,etc
My brother lives in San fransisco . I know the problem there is basically a national emergency . In my country one year the police basically rounded up all the homeless people off the city streets and dumped them in the woods. Was pretty bad. There is no real viable solution for it. Sending police to "clean them up" is counter productive
What's dangerous is failing to address real problems and real grievances. If a tweet from a tea company does anything to help then great. If it doesn't help, then that's just another disappointment, or maybe just another tiny invisible step to something better. What it doesn't do, is anyone any damage.
Try looking at it from a different angle, if you can't say or don't want to say "black lives matter" - then ask yourself why not. Maybe try looking at what opposition to that slogan actually means, because for many of us that opposition would sound awfully like "black lives don't matter," and that's probably not what you, or your business really want to declare to the world.
I’ve been pretty critical of the police (and until real change is seen probably always will be) but my brother is a police officer and I’m pretty amazed at the frequency of some of the stuff he sees. He’s only been doing it for a couple of years but sometimes he’ll see things in a week that your average person won’t see in a lifetime. This doesn’t mean I can give a pass to any of the abhorrent things that law enforcement have done, no one held a gun to his or other officers heads and made them sign up, but a lot of it is pretty fecking grim. I think you may have a point about how that can lead to dysfunction in the more run of the mill type calls.
Totally agree. It’s a mess. SF and LA especially. Police hands are tied because they have rights to be out in public, but people who live by or have businesses are understandably disgusted by their presence and behavior when off-meds. And the powers that be (police chiefs, mayors, city/district attorneys, city councilmen) don’t really want cops to take enforcement action on them because it’s bad press.
More than 50% of our radio calls for service are for mentally ill or homeless. Most of our uses of force are on them too. Many of our officers wish they could round them up and drop them off in another city. Lots of neighboring departments do that shit to us, those feckers!
sorry all, getting off topic
Which doesnt mean they are racist, maybe (I dont know these people obviously) like me they are critical of the movement itself, I can't deny the good intentions from the people of the movement of being anti racist, im anti racist just to confirm with you, like every thinking individual should. Im also anti fascist by the way but im not in favour of the anti fascist movement Antifa. The message 'black lives matter' in the protests we are saying here is completely muddled now iv lost the message as its conflated with other things which in my opinion goes to far like bringing statues down and jumping on them like a mob, injuring police, causing damage, graffiti and vandalism, there is a correct way to do this. Il give a pass on them breaking the law giving that these demonstrations are happening illegally to be a matter of fact in a time when we are facing a global pandemic and have strict rules never seen before with social distancing and gatherings.
With the reasoning to you actively not speaking to your Uncle now it's sad to me you feel that way, im assuming from your statement on the basis of hes posted about more about looting etc whats the problem? Isnt that an absolute given that he, me or others would be horrified by the George Floyd incident?
I see this sort of theme a lot and again to me it just doesn’t even comprehend. This idea that officers you see out and about patrolling are a different entity to the ones investigating complex crime.
They’re not different, they’re the same, part of the same police force. They do the exact same jobs but just on a different level of crime. They interact with suspects and victims, they take statements, they seize and gather evidence, they go to court to give evidence, they arrest people. They all go through the same officer safety training, they all get paid the same. Most detectives, begin as uniformed officers. This idea and theory about making them separate or them not being part of the same thing is fantasy. We all work together. Some people move along from just policing in the streets to more complex crime but it’s all intwinned and on the same platform.
How do people expect there to be an entirely new agency or force conducting investigations to ones conducting street policing. It’s just not even remotely realistic. Even within the force, uninformed police officers simply have to be the first point of call with most reported crime.
Ive seen a lot of people say police shouldn’t be dealing with mental health, and I agree. In fact I’d say this is one area that definitely needs an entirely seperate insititution but it is actually the ambulance service that are responsible for mental health. Unfortunately due to the unpredictability of a person suffering from a mental health crisis, ambulance services are reluctant in a lot of these instances to attend these calls and so they simply pass these calls on to police.
thats actually incredibly sad to hear. There really needs to be a solution for this
Totally agree. It’s a mess. SF and LA especially. Police hands are tied because they have rights to be out in public, but people who live by or have businesses are understandably disgusted by their presence and behavior when off-meds. And the powers that be (police chiefs, mayors, city/district attorneys, city councilmen) don’t really want cops to take enforcement action on them because it’s bad press.
More than 50% of our radio calls for service are for mentally ill or homeless. Most of our uses of force are on them too. Many of our officers wish they could round them up and drop them off in another city. Lots of neighboring departments do that shit to us, those feckers!
sorry all, getting off topic
Right so cut police budgets and put the money into mental health care facilities.
win-win
Just incredible.
what a mess.Totally agree. It’s a mess. SF and LA especially. Police hands are tied because they have rights to be out in public, but people who live by or have businesses are understandably disgusted by their presence and behavior when off-meds. And the powers that be (police chiefs, mayors, city/district attorneys, city councilmen) don’t really want cops to take enforcement action on them because it’s bad press.
More than 50% of our radio calls for service are for mentally ill or homeless. Most of our uses of force are on them too. Many of our officers wish they could round them up and drop them off in another city. Lots of neighboring departments do that shit to us, those feckers!
sorry all, getting off topic
what do you do when the people dont want to stay in the mental health facilities, and dont want to take their meds. Montego bay where i live there is a particular mental ill man that doesnt want to go, and even when he has to after he did some vandilsation , he only wants one particular cop to take him as he trusts him. But he goes takes his meds, doesnt want to stay and is back in the streets pissing about. Its a real problem that cops cant solve and more mental facilities *may not solve
i think there are cases where people can be forcibly held in a facility if they are a problem to society and a danger to themselves.
Where’s the accountability? The mayor and governor should be all over that.
It’ll be interesting to hear if the cops come up with any real solutions or will they bluster and blow smoke and/or re-direct?
if they don’t want to be part of the change, then get rid and find someone who will.
if they don’t want to be part of the change, then get rid and find someone who will.
This is why it's dangerously simplistic, of course black lives, asian lives, white lives, trans etc matter it's a complete given. Id suggest tea companies stay out of politics personally we don't need them to morally compund on us in a similar way to Gillette like before (although these incidents are highly different)
It's true If I was a large corporation owner PR wise in this hyped up age of it of course I would be doing what I believe would look good for me aka virtue signalling thats the unfortunate reality but im privileged as just a worker to have the freedoms to criticize the nuances of this movement whereas I would feel shackled if I was a celebrity or a corporation because of the cancel culture and the 'social justice' of media today...but even that is changing
Some interesting stuff in this thread on how Leopold attempted to deflect criticism of what went down in Congo
I mean, considering the very thread you're in and the fact that it has reached 152 pages, clearly it's not a complete given. This isn't directed solely at you, but sometimes it feels like people think something like "well I'm not racist, so how can racism exist?"
Just to begin with I’ll post these links.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-52418650
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopula...ticabuseinenglandandwales/yearendingmarch2018
Estimates put child sex abuse figures at about 20,000 a year. And remember that this is ONLY reported ones. I apologise for pointing this out because it is fecking grim but do not make the mistake of thinking these issues aren’t widespread and aren’t happening on a daily basis because sadly they are.
I do agree that it is the American system that is what is mainly being discussed but the problem is people in this county are trying to relate these American problems and making out as such that it’s the same here.
You’ve got protestors kneeling down in front of unarmed British police and saying ‘hands up don’t shoot”.
You’ve got people posting names of people they heard about two days ago who died after ingesting wraps of coke, choking and people saying it’s as a result of racist U.K. cop brutality.
And again yeah cops are expected to go from varying different types of calls but honestly what is the alternative?
A 999 service for domestic calls? a separate one for robbery calls? a seperate one for shoplifting ?
I mean how would this work? People are envisioning this perfect fix model but it does not exist because the world and the people are completely imperfect and completely unpredictable.
I don’t know enough about American policing as a whole to give a full opinion on things. Although it’s pretty clear they’re getting it badly wrong with their use of force in particular. And of course the institutional racism.
But the idea that U.K. policing is as bad as US policing is absolutely farcical. Not something you’ve said but the opinion is now widespread and is feeding into this anti police agenda which is resulting in unarmed British police officers being assaulted.
I can’t speak for the American force but things in the U.K. are improving but there is still so much to improve on. But defunding the U.K. force would be a complete disaster. The level of domestic and child related abuse crime is not decreasing. Yet there are less detectives (The Met have began a direct entry method for graduate detectives in the last few years to try and combat this but then that creates its own problems. You need to get that experience dealing with the smaller crimes out on the field before you go on to the more complex ones). Stripping money away is not going to solve anything. Neither is daft suggestions that people should call their neighbours and report crimes for them to handle.
To me it’s clear the met have taken a step back and attempted to change things. The problem is it will never be perfect and it only takes one or two incidents for the perception to be that things are awful again. And the met are hugely aware of their perception and public relations matter deeply to them ( as it should) but if it gets to the point which is what we’re seeing now with officers being put in danger with no protection (just so it doesn’t look bad) officers will not stand for that. And there is already a lot of upset officers after what’s gone on over the last few days.
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ffs