What is meant by "Defund the Police"?

I’m just talking about the title of the movement, by the way.

They don’t want the police to have tanks or military gear.
Defunding isn’t the issue, though. The issue is angry jocks and sociopaths getting away with terrible behaviour. Police that report other police are harrassed.

Police that are harrassed and even raped by other police don’t feel safe reporting the bad apples.

We need to make it safe to get rid of the bad cops. This has nothing to do with money and more to do with penetrating a culture of “no snitching” and keeping the status quo the same.

Here’s an excerpt on a good cop that tried to do the right thing. His name is Adrian Schoolcraft:

“After voicing his concerns, Schoolcraft was repeatedly harassed by members of the NYPD and reassigned to a desk job. After he left work early one day, an ESU unit illegally entered his apartment, physically abducted him and forcibly admitted him to a psychiatric facility, where he was held against his will for six days.[1]”

@Blackberry, You didn’t see what I posted just above your post, I guess.

…That is what should the accurate title of the movement be, so everyone would know what it’s about, just from the title?

@flo
Political movements are what is called “nebulous”.

Many different people have different ideas about how things should be handled.

I don’t think it is well defined in “the movement”. I think there are those that truly believe we should have no police. Defunding them…taking away all funding…is a quick and easy way for bureaucrats to do just that. Yes, we can have a police force, but we won’t pay them…with the understanding no one will work for that police force. That is pretty much what was meant when it was first brought up. Then the politicians started trying to bandy words…well, defunding doesn’t really mean defund…it means to find other ways to deal with issues! That, then, opens the door to other possibilities….let’s hire social workers! Let’s reroute the money to better housing! Let’s spend more money on education! All of these are bogus suggestions at their core. Yes, social workers could do some of the things police do. But let’s take a “what-if” for a moment. Let’s say there is a domestic disturbance call. Police aren’t allowed to respond to this so we send the social workers. Well, it’s night time and they aren’t really on duty…they are on call. So it takes longer for them to respond. When they get there, any violence going on may have been going on for much longer than it should. And when they get there, let’s say they are confronted by some guy who is drunk on his ass or drugged out and is beating his wife. And now a social worker shows up. Will that guy give them any credibility at all? What is the social worker going to do…try to reason with him? Tell him to STOP…or he’ll say STOP again? Eventually this could easily devolve into such a violent event that the cops have to be called.
The idea of “defunding the police” is a way of doing away with anyone that would try to enforce the law in any meaningful way. And let’s step back a moment and follow through on the idea that it is just to stop allowing the use of “military” equipment. First off, how many of the cops you see every day are actually using that equipment? It is basically reserved for SWAT teams. And if the SWAT team is called in, things have devolved into a shit storm. At that point I say let them use whatever they need to restore order! But what is happening in reality is that some of these leftist strongholds like NYC is that they are slashing the police budget by a huge percentage. It isn’t getting rid of just equipment, or not buying more equipment, it is literally removing positions and pay for police. So now, you are asking fewer police to do even more for less and expect them to be just as responsive as they were. What you are seeing is what “the movement” wanted…police leaving their jobs. They have had enough.

Let me explain this in a way to easily understand.
Recently, California has allowed people to eat road kill. If you hit a deer with your car, you can throw it in your car and take it home to butcher. Seriously.
But on the way home, you have to stop at the Post Office.
You see, the State legislature knew they needed some local official to verify the animal was dead. They didn’t want to create a new government job just for this, so they gave this responsibility to the local postmasters.
Seems silly, right? But it’s real.

The legislature has been loading the local police with extra responsibilities for years. They have to handle well checks, animal control, dealing with drug offenses, including helping those in recovery.
Defunding actually means giving those duties to other agencies, so the police can focus on their primary responsibility.

@filmfann It also means demilitartizing the police forces: Lowering their budgets so that they cannot buy surplus military materiel like tanks which shouldn’t be a part of the local police force’s equipment.

It is liberals attempt to demonize all law enforcement. Inductive reasoning. Doesn’t apply.

@si3tech Perhaps you’re right.
Maybe there are reasons not to demonize the police, just because the pump 7 bullets into someone’s back at point blank range, in front of his children.
Please explain.

@filmfann I would agree, except the “Defund the Police” was not created because people felt the cops were overwhelmed with other duties.

@filmfann So which is it? The cops are overwhelmed or they need to be demonized because they are evil? You’re trying to play all sides here. If you want to demonize them, I would say you need to get away from identity politics and look at individuals. There are cops that are assholes, but the large majority are not. And by treating them all as one, all you are doing is making life more dangerous for us all. And the question becomes, why are you identifying them all as the type of person that represents the huge minority of the population of cops? You are still treating the wrong-doers in the country as innocent angels as well. Some of them are complete assholes who pushed things to the point of getting shot. The cops had to defend their lives. So why don’t we demonize all the population because of the action of a few? Every time someone gets stopped for speeding they should be shot because they are just like those idiots that start a shoot out with the cops, right? That is the logic of identity politics.

I can tell you that in Children’s Services, when there was a call about something going on and there was a chance that the situation would get dangerous (or more dangerous than usual), the social workers would go but not without the police. No social worker is going or should be expected to go to a situation where it is volatile and the people involved may be armed, when the social worker is not armed (and social workers, at least in the County I work in, are not allowed to be armed). It sounds all well and good to say “give the work to social workers” but it’s not too practical. Just my opinion, having done that work.

I don’t agree with @seawulf575 on many things but he makes good points about going into a situation where people are drunk or whatever. Eventually, the police are coming anyway. The social workers are either present but with limited staff at night so they’re not showing up quickly, or some counties they’re on call (most counties) and have to get in touch with the police to go to someone’s house because a single worker, or even two workers, most often women workers, are not going knocking on a stranger’s door unannounced in the middle of the night without some type of armed backup.

My favorite regarding the above is one of the “protesters” needing assistance, immediately as her baby stopped breathing. *She got the police immediately who set in motion the necessary action and saved the baby’s life. *Much depends on your frame of reference. In that case, as in most the police were the heroes.

@seawulf575 I am a moderate, so I am often mis-described as playing both sides, when I am actually in the reasonable center.
I am not saying all cops are bad. I grew up around policemen. There are cops in my family, and in my friend’s families. I am saying people get angry with all cops because of the behavior of the bad ones. I have seen policemen do horrifying things, and I have seen them do incredibly brave and correct things.

@si3tech Isn’t if funny (in a sad way) when those protesting against the cops suddenly want immediate action when they are in need of a cop?

I’m trying to find the ideal title of the (movement or not movement) if it doesn’t want to be misunderstood, i.e a term that all parties would agree on.

@flo I’d like something like “Reimagining the police” or “Rebuilding the police” but unfortunately no one asked me!

A friend of mine says “Unburden the police”. That works for me.

Ok, could reimagining, rebuilding mean (to the anti “Defund the Police” party) make it even more military-like, and target (be more violent) some group/s way more, etc.
and “Unburdent the Police” could be misunderstood as “it’s just that the officers who do anything wrongful is just because of exhaustion, that’s all.”

“Defund the Police, Abolish DHS and ICE”. What a great platform for a party to run on. Accompanied by violent protests and looting. The Democrats are shooting themselves in both feet, but are too stupid to understand that. They believe the idiotic polls!

@crazyguy They believe that all they have to do is say “It’s Trump’s fault!” and the media will spread that narrative and the people will believe it. They got the first two pieces of that down pat. Where they are falling short is that most people don’t believe it.

@seawulf575: I agree 100%. The number of stories I have seen that blame 100% of the violence on “White Supremacists” when all the videos show 95% black people is mind-boggling.