By Dr.Rai Wilson/Guest Writer
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With all the struggle and all the achievements, we must face the fact, however, that the Negro still lives in the basement of the Great Society. He is still at the bottom, despite the few who have penetrated to slightly higher levels. In consequence, Negroes are still impoverished aliens in an affluent society. Where do we go from here? I conclude by saying today that we have a task, and let us go out with a divine dissatisfaction. America, you must be born again!
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (Atlanta, 1967)
We are in it now. Underreported gatherings of peaceful protest and song have arisen in hundreds of cities across the nation. People of all races, and many nations across the globe, walk shoulder to shoulder decrying excessive police violence. We have seen graffiti, burning buildings, property stolen. There is an enormous outpouring of grief and anger and commitment. It is an unprecedented moment, and will go down in the history books.
But the question remains “what happens next?” What are people actually trying to accomplish? The narrative that the protestors are merely angry and aimless is incorrect. Many of these folks have been in the fight for controlling policing for years and years. They are informed, well-read, and intentional. What might success look like?
Moderate proposals emphasize reforming the police. That is the case for left of center Democrats like Vice President Biden and right of center Republicans like San Diego Mayor Faulconer. Biden calls for standardized use of body cameras, more diverse police departments, and more money being spent on community policing and anti-bias training. Here in San Diego, we’ve increased police funding, but have also emphasized more diversity on the police force, banned the chokehold, mandated de-escalation, and are looking at increased community oversight of police departments. The Berkeley police department is one of the better examples of the efficacy of reform, as it hasn’t had an officer involved shooting in eight years.
Activists such as DeRay Mckesson, a former teacher and leading activist against police brutality, wants to go beyond this. While not against more revolutionary measures, he uses nationwide data from what has and hasn’t worked to put forward steps that can be implemented more rapidly. His organization 8 Can’t Wait suggests that there are 8 measures that have been shown to dramatically decrease the number of those killed by police. Banning choke and strangleholds; requiring de-escalation (such as maintaining distance); requiring warnings before shooting; exhausting all alternatives; requiring officers seeing excessive force to intervene and report; banning shooting at moving vehicles; requiring force only proportionate to the threat; and ensuring comprehensive reporting whenever force is used. Similarly, Democrats in Congress have proposed a national registry of police offenders (right now police files are often closed) and rolling back qualified immunity for police officers. As is, a police officer cannot be prosecuted unless a victim can show that the officer committed an act virtually identical to one for which an officer has already been convicted. It is a staggeringly high standard that explains much of why police are rarely punished for clear misconduct. Mckesson and others also criticize the immense role police unions play in negotiating contracts that shield officers.
There is a growing movement that finds this second line of thought too hopeful. After decades of protest and reform movements, folks in this space think merely coming up with new rules for the police will be inadequate. When one considers that the Minneapolis police department had adopted a number of progressive rules well before the Floyd killing, the helpfulness of reform gets thrown in doubt. When one sees the police--even while fighting off charges of excessive force and knowing they are being filmed--nevertheless arbitrarily arresting peaceful protestors, macing children, regularly targeting journalists with non-lethal weapons and arresting them, beating college, female, and elderly protestors--the extent of what they do out of the spotlight is sobering to contemplate. And we know from video and forensic evidence that police commonly misrepresent events. The seeming futility of adjusting police practice has given support to the defunding movement.
“Defunding the police” is a phrase that is often misunderstood. It does not mean dissolve the police, but rather shift city budgets in order to mitigate the causes of disorder. “Right-sizing” police budgets seems to me a better descriptor, notwithstanding that it sounds like a meal option at McDonald’s. Police departments routinely take up the largest share of city budgets and continue growing irrespective of the trends in crime. But when one thinks of the indicators that correlate with street crime--lack of housing, employment, underfunded schools, food insecurity--these investments are starved for funds. As police themselves say, they are currently asked to do too much, and must be social workers, traffic monitors, accident responders, mental health professionals, housing counselors and more. The defunding movement suggests that city budgets be rearranged such that the police are funded at a lower level, commensurate mostly with their involvement in potentially violent crime, and that city services dealing with other societal ills get a simultaneous infusion of resources.
Finally, there is an “abolish the police” movement that absolutely wants police gone. Adherents to this line of thinking believe that police cause many problems, citing the widely noted brutality, but also sexual assault, over seizure of citizen property, expensive settlements. But also they, like defunders, see police as almost entirely symptomatic. A community where people have dignity and opportunity and support for their needs is a safe community. Camden, NJ, which had been one of the most dangerous cities in America, dissolved its police force in 2013 and reformed it along progressive lines. Homicides and complaints against police have fallen sharply.
This moment has settled the question of whether protest can actually change things. The question of whether peaceful protest changes things is still out there, and needs to be answered by the nation’s councils. After two and a half weeks of protest, statues of racial terrorists have come down in multiple cities, Nascar and the Marines banned Confederate symbols, and the Army has expressed openness to re-thinking the bewildering practice of naming its bases for Confederate heroes.
The NFL has apologized for penalizing peaceful protest (though amazingly avoided the name “Colin Kapernick”) and dedicated 250m$ over the next decade to work against systemic racism. California has divested from for-profit prisons, Senator Rand Paul (R) has introduced a bill to ban no-knock warrants (in which surprised people often resist a sudden and unexpected intrusion and are killed). Minneapolis has cut off negotiations with the police union. Multiple cities have banned the chokehold. Dallas has adopted a “duty to intervene” for its officers. Minneapolis and LA have shifted portions of the police budget to other areas. Officers have been quickly disciplined or fired for excessive force. School districts and universities are moving away from police and to their own security forces.
Perhaps most importantly, imaginative space has been created to rethink an institution that has been central to systemic racism for centuries. People are asking themselves the “naive question” of--why do we do this? If we were trying to create safe, humanizing cities from scratch, is this how we would do it? Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was recently asked “what does an America with defunded police look like to you?”
“It looks like a suburb. Affluent white communities already live in a world where the[y] choose to fund youth, health, housing etc more than they fund police," Ocasio-Cortez explained. "When a teenager or preteen does something harmful in a suburb (I say teen bc this is often where lifelong carceral cycles begin for Black and Brown communities), White communities bend over backwards to find alternatives to incarceration for their loved ones to 'protect their future,' like community service or rehab or restorative measures. Why don't we treat Black and Brown people the same way?”
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