"ABOLISH the police? But how would we stay safe?" (June 2020)

"ABOLISH the police? But how would we stay safe?" (June 2020)

abolition

policing

English

Using resources from MPD150, the slideshow explains how police abolition would still keep people safe.

@wretched_flowers_

https://www.instagram.com/p/CA59D-eFTzE/

2020-06-01

Archived: 17 June 2021

Instagram

Matthew Salzano

Instagram Slideshow

https://www.instagram.com/p/CA59D-eFTzE/

1. "ABOLISH the police? But how would we stay safe?"
Police abolition work is not about defunding every department instantly. It's about a gradual process of strategically reallocating resources, funding, and responsibility away from police and toward community-based models of safety, support, and prevention.
2. The people who respond to crises in our community should be the people who are best-equipped to deal with those crises.
Rather than strangers armed with guns, who very likely do not live in the neighborhoods they're patrolling, we want to create space for more mental health service providers, social workers, victim/survivor advocates, religious leaders, neighbors and friends--all of the people who really make up the fabric of a community--to look out for one another.
3. "But what about armed bank robbers, murderers, and supervillains?"
Crime isn't random. Most of the time, it happens when someone has been unable to meet their basic needs through other means. By shifting money away from the police and toward services that actually meet those needs, we'll be able to get to a place where people won't need to rob hanks.
To really "fight crime," we don't need more cops; we need more jobs, more educational opportunities, more community centers, more mental health resources, and more of a say in how our own communities function.
4. "We're asking cops to do too much in this country... Every societal failure, we put it off on the cops to solve. Not enough mental health funding, let the cops handle it... Here in Dallas we got a loose dog problem; let's have the cops chase loose dogs. Schools fail, let's give it to the cops... That's too much to ask. Policing was never meant to solve all those problems." —former Dallas Police Chief David Brown
5. But why not fund the police and fund all these alternatives too? Why is it an either/or?
It's not just that police are ineffective: in many communities, they're actively harmful. The history of policing is a history of violence against the marginalized. And it's bigger than just police brutality; it's about how the prison industrial complex, the drug war, immigration law, and the web of policy, law, and culture that forms our criminal justice system has destroyed millions of lives, and torn apart families. Cops don't prevent crime, they cause it, through the ongoing, violent disruption of our communities.
6. It's also worth noting that most social service agencies and organizations that could serve as alternatives to the police are underfunded, scrambling for grant money to stay alive while being forced to interact with officers who make their jobs even harder.
In 2016, the Minneapolis Police Department received $165 million in city funding alone. Imagine what that kind of money could do to keep our communities safe if it was reinvested.
7. What about reforms like body cameras, civilian review boards, implicit bias training, and community policing initiatives?
Video footage (whether from body cameras or other sources) wasn't enough to get justice for Philando Castile, Samuel DuBose, Walter Scott, Tamir Rice, and far too many other victims of police violence.
Other reforms, while often noble in intention, simply do not do enough to get to the root of the issue.
8. History is a useful guide: community groups in the 1960s also demanded civilian review boards, better training, and community policing initiatives. Some of these demands were even met, but universally, they were either ineffective, or dismantled by the police department over time.
Recent reforms are already being co-opted and destroyed: just look at how many offers are wearing body cameras that are never turned on, or how quickly Jeff Sessions' Justice Department has moved to end consent decrees. We have half a century's worth of evidence that reforms can't work.
It's time for something new.
9. This all sounds good in theory, but wouldn't it be impossible to do?
Throughout US history, everyday people have regularly accomplished "impossible" things, from the abolition of slavery to voting rights.
What's really impossible is the idea that the police departments can be reformed against their will to protect and serve communities whom they have always attacked.
The police, as an institution around the world, have existed for less than 200 years--less time than chattel slavery existed in the Americas. Abolishing the police doesn't need to be difficult--we can do it in our own cities, one dollar at a time, through redirecting budgets to common-sense alternative programs. Let's get to work!
10. Who wrote this? And how can I learn more?
Wretched Flowers copied this text (with some minor edits for brevity) from MPD 150, a Minneapolis-based initiative challenging the narrative that police exist to protect and serve. Read more about their research and actions at mpd150.com. They also suggest reading the following:
The End of Policing by Alex Vitale
Are Prisons Obsolete? By Angela Y. Davis
Abolition Now! Ten years of Strategy and Struggle
Against the Prison Industrial Complex
Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power in America by Kristian Williams
The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
Police Unbound: Corruption, Abuse and Heroism by the Boys in Blue by Anthony V. Bouza

(From the FAQ on @mpd_150 ‘s website)

There are 10 slides. Each has pink serif text written on an olive green background. A black scalloped border is used to delineate between heading and body text on most slides. "Via @MPD_150" is written in the corner of each slide.

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