Abolishing the Police

This is almost verbatim what LGBTQ activists were being told. They didn’t listen, and they made major advances.

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You mean anywhere in the world? Nothing I said is american exceptionalism. Ask yourself this: why is it so damn important to be able to disperse a crowd that every cop department around the whole world specializes in it? Why is it so damn important to keep the roads open? What is so damn precious that keep a standing occupation force on the payroll? Hint: it’s not only to save their own useless carcasses, and it’s not to hand out tickets.

Every time police escort scabs or materials or product across a picket line a strike is being violently suppressed. The reason they need to be able to disperse civil society is to break picket lines. The reason for extraction teams are to suppress sit down strikes. The reason to keep the roads open is to keep the profit extraction happening.

Without the ability to secure the means of production, and the transportation infrastructure, their whole system crumbles. Everything else follows from this fact.

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Are any of these plans actually working in major cities right now?

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I hate to break it to you but this is not a country full of rational intelligent people looking for mutually beneficial solutions. It is a country full of bigots and entitled rich people looking to justify their selfish behavior. Source: every single political issue in the country.

what what

http://www.citypages.com/news/minneapolis-city-council-members-consider-disbanding-the-police/570993291

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I’m pretty well on the record as not liking Biden and finding it appalling that the Democratic Party doesn’t actually fight on Medicare for All, but you’re kind of making my point here. You think the Democratic Party is going to lead the charge to abolish the police?

It’s a fine line. It’s helpful to have some people saying that to move the Overton window, but it’s going to hurt us if a lot of people are convinced that’s what Democrats want to do.

I don’t, I think a majority of Americans absolutely do. Probably like 70% of them. If you’re baffled by that, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m not sure it’s even in the top five most baffling things right now among Americans beliefs. It’s going to have to get in line.

I mean in the US.

Obviously to protect the movement of goods and services within the economy.

I don’t think escorting stuff across a picket line is a violent suppression of a strike. It’s fighting the strike, but it’s a lot more complex than you make it out to be.

You and I are also never going to agree on this because I do not want to socialize the entire economy.

Even here, they want to replace it with something else. They don’t just want to abolish it. They are also 2 out of 13 members.

But, hey, I hope they do it and it works and can be a model and we can try it city by city.

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I’m marking your response down as a “no,” but there were most definitely working societies that had abolished slavery at the time. Sorry, but this is just too much like the anarchocapitalist rhetoric of yesteryear.

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I’m not really talking about the actual theory and policy of it. I’m talking about the political reality of it.

Public opinion is not static. Why start bargaining from a compromise position?

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who are the parties is this grand negotiation exactly?

It might hurt Democrats to be perceived as lacking principles and only pushing policies that help them get elected.

Exactly. When there is no support you don’t change your position. You go out and create support until it reaches critical mass and your goal becomes reality.

I mean, I’m arguing for reform that would help and against abolition that is politically impossible, and you’re telling me I’m wrong because reform is politically impossible?

I feel like I’m starting bargaining from the left-most edge of the Overton window right now. Not only that, I’m not even talking about compromising, I’m just trying to push something that we might be able to count to 218 with in the House and 50 in the Senate with a Dem president.

Or, manage to get establishment Dem votes in numerous cities with.

I’m also not saying that we have to do that and stop trying to do better. We’re at our own one-yardline, and I’d like to pick up 15-20 yards here and then keep the drive going and see what’s working or not working.

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Instead of “abolish police”, maybe you should re-brand it as “repeal and replace the police” and let everyone read into the second part of that whatever they desire.

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ITT progressives fall into the exact same trap of bargaining against themselves that the Dem party has been stuck in since the New Deal.

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I"m not sure the specifics of the arguments going on, I just noticed people say earlier today it was a pipe dream and this got published today so I posted it. Not sure where the 2 of 13 comes from. This quote seems to suggest otherwise:

Fletcher says the entire council “to some degree” has been discussing disbanding the police department as an option.

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[quote=“PocketChads, post:5375, topic:1904, full:true”]Ok thanks for cutting my post in half for your own masturbatory proposes
[/quote]

My dude, it seems like a reasonable q to ask “has this actually worked for a major city in the real world?”

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Feels more like you want to establish the run.

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I’m not so sure about that. I’m not sure that many people on this forum held deeply thought out views on how to deal with law enforcement in this country 7 days ago. Myself included. And I oscillate on what to do next myself.

My point is we’re stuck in a trap where we say “Gee, Thing would be great, but it’s politically impossible, so we shouldn’t even talk about it. We should instead all advocate for Less Great Thing.”

The right does the exact fucking opposite thing, and wins because of it. Whereas we compromise with the right before they even ask us to.

We’re going to be the side of anarchy and hating police officers anyways in the eyes of the deplorables. We might as well get some mileage out of it.

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Not sure how accountable they are and mostly they didn’t get militarized in the first place.

Do you have any broad info on accountability of police elsewhere?

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