Who needs cops anyway?
Who needs cops anyway?
102 comments
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I feel like this sounds like a great idea until you end up with a bunch of unregulated militias run by the George Zimmermans of the world in every red state with a government who doesn’t give a shit, but I’d absolutely love to be proven wrong
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We already have that. Cops with qualified immunity are almost definitionally an unregulated militia
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Cops still have rules of engagement. Whenever you think “this could not get any worse” it could actually get worse. A lot worse.
We could have large gangs of white men conducting pogroms, moving house to house shooting anyone they found who wasn’t white. They could be torching every house and creating wildfires that destroy large sections of the cities.
This is all the kinda stuff that happened in the past. Antisemitic pogroms in Europe in the 20th century and earlier, for example.
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The fact that they commit less brazen violence than unregulated militias of the past doesn't change the fact that they are unregulated militias. How many times have you read about the bastards being punished for "excessive force" (read, cold blooded murder in broad daylight), then found that their "punishment" was a few months of admin leave and a new job in another precinct? Regulations don't exist unless they're enforced, and we have a wildly long public record of cops breaking the law followed by the legal system choosing not to enforce the law in those cases.
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No, that’s not how it works. Regulations do exist even when they’re not enforced 100% of the time. Otherwise no regulation would ever exist since no regulation has a perfect track record of enforcement.
The other side of the coin is community norms. Most laws that regulate behaviour need to operate within a space of norms. Look at prohibition on alcohol for example. It was WIDELY disregarded (at speakeasies for example) because it was a regulation that disregarded norms around alcohol consumption in the US. On the other hand, alcohol consumption is illegal in some Muslim countries and the law rarely needs to be enforced because norms against alcohol consumption are deeply embedded in Islamic beliefs.
The same can be said around regulation of police. Different police cultures exist in different countries. Police in countries other than the US vary quite a lot, and in some countries the police have very strict norms of professionalism and non-violent conflict resolution. Police in the US frequently have a warrior mentality and the literal belief that they are entering a war zone when they go to patrol in certain neighbourhoods. Is it any wonder that they don’t develop any bonds with those communities so that they don’t feel any reluctance to behave like violent thugs?
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I'm not complaining about spotty enforcement of the law against American police, I'm complaining about things like qualified immunity or the thin blue line shit used to protect cops from consequences when they explicitly and clearly break the law. A regulation with less than perfect enforcement is still a regulation. A regulation with legal doctrine (QI) explicitly stating that it can be broken with no consequence however absolutely stops being a regulation.
I generally agree with the content of your second two paragraphs, but i do not see how they are relevant to discussion about whether the police can accurately be called an unregulated militia. Yes, law is subjective and generally defined by the mores of the society that follows it. "Cops don't have to follow the law and should be allowed to murder people with no consequences" is absolutely not part of the zeitgeist
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"Cops don't have to follow the law and should be allowed to murder people with no consequences" is absolutely not part of the zeitgeist
Tough on crime politics continues to be very big in a lot of places where the worst police abuses occur. For every one of those stories where a cop seriously injured or killed someone unjustly, you can find people in that community cheering for, not protesting against, the police. The “thin blue line” and “blue lives matter” flags and bumper stickers are very popular and frequently displayed by people who are not cops themselves.
Qualified immunity came out of Pierson v. Ray (1967), a landmark case right in the middle of the civil rights movement. There are many people in the US who continue to believe that civil rights are a mistake and that the government should’ve cracked down on the civil rights movement much harder. Watch a movie like Dirty Harry (1971) if you want an example of popular reactionary sentiment towards civil rights. Rather being called a villain, Clint Eastwood’s character was seen as a hero defending American values against violent leftist thugs.
That all said, police are still regulated by use of force rules. Here’s a case from December 2024 where a Fort Worth Texas cop was fired for unjustified use of force.
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That officer was "fired" for similar abuses from a different department in 2013. Eventually being reinstated AND given back pay before then moving to Fort Worth and doing it again. He received no punishment and it is very likely this case will resolve in a similar fashion. The police union is currently defending him, this will end up in arbitration just like when he was fired in Irving.
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The police union is one of the worst unions in existence. You’ll get no argument from me on this one. They’re every bit as bad as the Catholic Church at shuffling bad apples around to different communities instead of ostracizing them completely.
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Or the meth making bikers with the enormous pile of firearms decide they want to run the county. Jan 6 happened because one side was absolutely not afraid to use violence and another side wanted to play fair and by the rules.
Never underestimate the capacity of assholes to be assholes.
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It’s called the local police
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102 comments