In the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder and subsequent protests against police brutality – a twist has formed in the fold.
People have been asking to defund and demilitarize the police, and the city of Minneapolis – where George was killed by the cops – has actually decided to disband the police department.
Now, some of you might be asking what happens when defund or disband the police? What happens to public safety and emergency calls?
Police started from being slave catchers
Let’s start by going over the history of the police. For the majority of human society, the police didn’t exist. It came into existence only after the rise of capitalism which created a disproportionate amount of property for a few rich people while the majority starved. The purpose of the police here was to protect the rich people’s property from poor and exploited people.
In fact, the first batch of American police was created just to catch slaves who had escaped plantations and forced labor.
If you want to understand this in a simpler way, if you steal $100 from your employer then the police will catch you and put you in jail. But if your employer cuts $100 in your paycheck for no reason then the police will do literally nothing about it.
Police department’s budget is so much higher than everything else combined
You should also know that the police department budget is much much higher than the budget for education and healthcare and community support services.
Most of this money is spent on weapons, riot gear, assault equipment, tear gas, rubber bullets, flash grenades, water cannons and so on. A lot of money is spent on training the police to practice violence. Hardly any money is spent on training the police to engage in conflict resolution and non-violent intervention.
It was very much clear when the cops showed up in full riot gear with unlimited amount of weaponry and bullets, while the doctors and nurses treating Coronavirus are forced to wear garbage bags instead of PPEs.
Why should we reduce the police budget?
Now, many cities have begun slashing the funds that are allotted to the police department. Los Angeles would cut down $150 million from a planned increase in the budget, New York has proposed to cut from the $6 billion police budget.
It seems fair considering that police in almost the entire world creates more problems than it solves. They are often late, they harass the victims, take bribes just to register a case, and in many cases, they take the side of the criminal when the criminal belongs to an oppressor class. Or they arrive late, just take notes, and then the case falls on a dead end since they do nothing.
In other cases, they unfairly target poor people, minorities, trans-people, and other oppressed classes.
The most dangerous crimes are the ones that Police doesn’t care about
Many a times, most of the non-violent crimes committed by the lower classes exist only because they are pushed into such a position where they have no other option for their survival.
However, other serious crimes such as tax theft, wage theft, hoarding black money, inciting war, bombing people in foreign countries, human trafficking, rape, poisoning rivers and water, destroying natural resources, forcing people into overworking, turning prisons into neo-slavery camps are committed by the rich and privileged. But they never get charged for it.
Police’s job is often to stop the poor people from retaliating against their oppressors.
What are the options if we don’t have police anymore?
If in any case, the police departments start to get disbanded and defunded indeed, there are many ways for us to move forward.
Cahoots is a non-profit mobile crisis intervention program that handles mental health calls and they have been around for 31 years. Last year they responded to 20% of the 911 calls, and their budget for the entire year was just $2 million – much less than what it would cost police to do the same thing.
Other organizations exist which have been responding to situations such as mental health issues, drug overdose, homeless people, and so on.
In cases of rape and sexual assault, police officers have known to often harass the victims so these cases could be handled better by social service workers anyway who offer emotional support and legal advocacy.
And they were more effective as well since they had the empathy and compassion which police officers lack.
There are better ways to use the money
In America and most of the world, teachers are forced to buy school supplies from their own pocket money, and doctors are forced to buy masks and gloves and PPE from their own money to treat Coronavirus patients. There is simply too much money being spent on police, and too less on education and healthcare.
Even though police departments may not get completely disbanded, they would get defunded and most of their assault weapons and assault gear should be taken away.
The money could be redirected into education, healthcare, and employment programs – and there will be less petty crimes in society if people just had a better quality of life.
For emergency response where someone could be in fatal danger, there could be a tactical team that obviously is not going to need billions of dollars every year.
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