I was walking my sister's dog this morning out on the icy streets, and even icyer sidewalks ,of suburban New Jersey while listening to NPR's Morning Edition. David Greene was interviewing Tanya Faison ,head of the Sacramento chapter of Black Lives Matter. Her group has been active over the last year leading protests over what they view as the murder of Stephon Clark by police. Stephon was black. On March 2,2019 ,when the Sacramento district attorney announced the results of her investigation into the incident, she exonerated the police involved resulting in a resurgence of public outrage and large scale protests organized by BLM. NPR likes to talk about " driveway moments " . This was my " icey sidewalk moment ", especially when Faison said " Our chapter is more of an abolitionist chapter. You can't just reform the law... we need to rely more on each other. " She was talking about policing, not slavery. When it comes to police and policing, she's against them. She believes civilians will pick up the slack once the police are abolished. This remark got my attention. It made little impression on the radio host. Maybe the time allotted for the interview didn't allow a follow-up question. I'd like to have heard more. For me this was a bomb shell.
Up till today I'd never heard anyone advocate abolishing police, I.C.E. yes, but not all police. Once back to my tablet I could do a quick search of the internet and discover Faison' s remarks on NPR were not an aberration or a one off. They're fairly mainstream in the Black Lives Matter movement. They even make an appearance in their manifesto and platform which call for a " defunding of the systems and institutions that criminalize and cage us. " Calls for the abolition of police forces, prisons, and the entire structure of the justice system have shown up in numerous statements by prominent BLM activists going back to at least 2016, and probably earlier. As I said ,this was a quick search.
It's not hard to imagine what our world would look like without police ;without a justice system to investigate, arrest, convict, and incarcerate people like Stephon Clark . For a while I'd enjoy the difference. My run ins with the law are infrequent. Now and then I'm stopped for riding my bike where the law says I shouldn't. It would be nice to go my way without looking over my shoulder wondering if I'll be stopped. My glee would be short lived. The people I'm sharing the road with will feel similarly liberated and begin using my piece of the highway as a passing lane. Darwinism would rule. The largest truck gets right of way. Mad Max here we come!
The chaos of the roads would hardly compare to the mass disruption in neighborhoods like Stephon Clark's. Police became aware of him when a neighbor called 911 to report that someone was outside breaking car windows. In Faison's world the call would have gone out to the neighborhood vigilance committee or something. No telling how that confrontation would have gone down. I suspect little better, assuming their patrolman are armed, or arrived on time, or Stephon reacted in the same erratic way, ignoring their orders to stop and show his hands, and holding his girlfriend's cellphone out in front of him as if it were a weapon. We can guess how abolishing police would look in poorer neighborhoods. Things would get pretty ugly pretty fast. Nights would be unbearable. In the better neighborhoods there would be privately funded security patrols, more gaited communities, concertina wire everywhere, and walled in homes. The better parts of town already look this way in parts of the world where police departments are corrupt and ineffective, and crime is rampant. I saw this for myself in Bogota Columbia in the seventies and have heard hair raising tales from South African refugees.
In a way I can admire Faison's anarcho- libertarian approach to bureaucracies. I'm all for reducing the scope of government. I love the idea of holding every program and bureaucracy up to scrutiny and asking is this something we can reduce, reform ,or do without, but this is a discussion for adults. By adults I mean people who are capable of honestly considering the results of their proposals. Tanya Faison is not. Let's not forget that her central idea is that the justice system ought to be abolished. " We can't just reform the law. " ,she reminds us. Thats a childish approach. She's disqualified herself from the discussion. BLM is out of touch with reality. It assumes the worst about existing structures it opposes and arranges false narratives to suit faulty assumptions. On the slippery streets of public policy reform Black Lives Matter always takes a spill.
Up till today I'd never heard anyone advocate abolishing police, I.C.E. yes, but not all police. Once back to my tablet I could do a quick search of the internet and discover Faison' s remarks on NPR were not an aberration or a one off. They're fairly mainstream in the Black Lives Matter movement. They even make an appearance in their manifesto and platform which call for a " defunding of the systems and institutions that criminalize and cage us. " Calls for the abolition of police forces, prisons, and the entire structure of the justice system have shown up in numerous statements by prominent BLM activists going back to at least 2016, and probably earlier. As I said ,this was a quick search.
It's not hard to imagine what our world would look like without police ;without a justice system to investigate, arrest, convict, and incarcerate people like Stephon Clark . For a while I'd enjoy the difference. My run ins with the law are infrequent. Now and then I'm stopped for riding my bike where the law says I shouldn't. It would be nice to go my way without looking over my shoulder wondering if I'll be stopped. My glee would be short lived. The people I'm sharing the road with will feel similarly liberated and begin using my piece of the highway as a passing lane. Darwinism would rule. The largest truck gets right of way. Mad Max here we come!
The chaos of the roads would hardly compare to the mass disruption in neighborhoods like Stephon Clark's. Police became aware of him when a neighbor called 911 to report that someone was outside breaking car windows. In Faison's world the call would have gone out to the neighborhood vigilance committee or something. No telling how that confrontation would have gone down. I suspect little better, assuming their patrolman are armed, or arrived on time, or Stephon reacted in the same erratic way, ignoring their orders to stop and show his hands, and holding his girlfriend's cellphone out in front of him as if it were a weapon. We can guess how abolishing police would look in poorer neighborhoods. Things would get pretty ugly pretty fast. Nights would be unbearable. In the better neighborhoods there would be privately funded security patrols, more gaited communities, concertina wire everywhere, and walled in homes. The better parts of town already look this way in parts of the world where police departments are corrupt and ineffective, and crime is rampant. I saw this for myself in Bogota Columbia in the seventies and have heard hair raising tales from South African refugees.
In a way I can admire Faison's anarcho- libertarian approach to bureaucracies. I'm all for reducing the scope of government. I love the idea of holding every program and bureaucracy up to scrutiny and asking is this something we can reduce, reform ,or do without, but this is a discussion for adults. By adults I mean people who are capable of honestly considering the results of their proposals. Tanya Faison is not. Let's not forget that her central idea is that the justice system ought to be abolished. " We can't just reform the law. " ,she reminds us. Thats a childish approach. She's disqualified herself from the discussion. BLM is out of touch with reality. It assumes the worst about existing structures it opposes and arranges false narratives to suit faulty assumptions. On the slippery streets of public policy reform Black Lives Matter always takes a spill.
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