Policing What, Exactly?

I don't know if this helps anybody, or spurs an idea of where to start fixing things. But during the George Floyd protests, I researched the background of policing for a blog post, and I found people pointing to three predecessors.

• Slave patrols, of course.

• Early border patrols, especially keeping Chinese people out.

• Private security in England, "protecting" ships from the American colonies from potential thieves through intimidation.

The system protects property, real or abstract, at the expense of people.  When it isn't about protecting property, it's about white supremacy. We built the system on those premises. Even with the nicest possible cops, it still means that this sort of crap happens, instead of stopping mass shooters.

We probably need to scrap the entire system and rebuild it.  No recruiting practices or reforms can overcome the fact that we built policing around premises that the overwhelming majority of us can no longer support. We risk too many people with "protecting and serving," and even the people not at risk get worn down by the fear of that eventual risk.  And if you want to ask "what about X?" for something that you think that police do regularly, then (a) please look it up, first, to make sure that the police actually deal with X, (b) consider that, in most white neighborhoods, ignoring speed traps, it's actually pretty rare to see a police officer, and we're basically fine...

In considering where we might go next? Check out Campaign Zero's work, which inexplicably doesn't preview well, here. campaignzero.org.

And if anybody wants my full blog post from almost three years ago, it's here.

Pardon any poor proofreading, back then...