Do you have a bunch of idiotic posts on your Facebook page about cities completely doing away with their police forces?

Because Democrats used ineffective ridiculous phrases like Defund the Police or Dismantle the Police, and some extremists actually do want to get rid of the police altogether in their city, but I realize that isn’t what most people mean.

If you need to explain a slogan the slogan isn’t working. It took what, 5 or 6 years to explain Black Lives Matter to the point that the masses get it. Even still there is push back, and that was easier to understand than these saying about the police. There are so many better words to use than defund or dismantle.

I’m one of the people saying you are going to want to call the police when someone is robbing your house. Even Cory Booker, the mayor of Orlando, both black, and many other black leaders with police experience or responsibility agree it was probably a bad choice of words and areas with heavy policing usually warrant it.

I am seeing discussions like that on Fluther but not so much on FB.

Today, the mayor of Minneapolis was on the morning news on TV. He said they are not doing away with the police but they want to reform the department. He said the big obstacle is the police unions. I work for a union and so I understand how that works. Both sides have to follow the contract which gives the employees certain protections.

I just saw ten minutes of some sort of congressional hearing and a Democrat in Congress, I don’t know his name, called out his fellow Democrats for not speaking out against this crazy talk of defunding the police.

Honestly, it reminds me of Republican congressman not willing to say Trump has a horrible idea or is doing a horrible things.

Why not say Reorganize the Police, or some other something that makes more sense.

You can’t just change the definitions of words and get a total buy in. It’s like Christians trying to explain submit doesn’t mean subservient or that when they say Mormons are cult it isn’t the Oxford definition of cult. Having a secret definition within your community is not advisable when you want a nation to respond.

Biden’s response, I saw it last night, was terrible in my opinion. He said something about withholding federal funds, which just furthers the message of taking money away and doing away with the police force.

Who came up with the slogan anyway?

@JLeslie: When they say “defunding” I think it’s accurate because they are talking about removing funds from the Police forces’ budgets. What they should say to clarify is “partially defunding” which would be more accurate. For example, in NYC, DeBlasio is talking about moving some of the police budget to social services and mental health services. So it’s not totally taking all the money from the police budget, but some. I think by headlines saying “defunding” without the clarification of specifying “partially,” it’s either to make the headline brief or to sensationalize it so people read it or run with it and repeat it.

@jca2 Yes, I realize that they are talking about “reallocating“ funds, maybe they should use that word. The way it is being presented is like all cops are bad, and showing complete disrespect for the police, and I think that’s a mistake.

I saw an interview with a man who trains police and he said in a lot of police departments there is one or two bad apples and the entire department knows who they are and hate when the cop shows up on a scene, because he is sure to escalate things. That needs to be addressed.

As far as increasing social services I’m all for that, but when an argument is getting out of hand between spouses, a counselor might be very helpful to calm a situation, but the counselor will still need a cop along.

The ultimate hope would be to reduce crime by addressing underlying problems in society that are causing such mental distress, violence, and lack of conscience for that matter.

It’s well known that three words works. It’s good for chanting. Lock her up! Build the wall! It’s been used well before Trump. The thing is it has to be understood for it to be effective. IMO.

So…what is cutting back funding for the police supposed to accomplish?

@Dutchess_III Like we said above, it is supposed to move the funds to more social services so people don’t need police intervention, and so the police are not handling situations they are not trained for.

I don’t think that’s gonna work. They were trained to handle people like George Floyd. I don’t think budget cutting would have changed that outcome. The asshole killed him for free.

@Dutchess_III Seems like you didn’t understand what they meant by defund either. Maybe not so dumb. The slogan is dumb.

Don’t know why you’d say that. I said I’m not sure taking funds from the the police department and sending them somewhere else and sending the elsewhere would work. IMO, the most important thing they could do is tighten up their hiring practices.