by BayAreaEscapee on 8/17/22, 2:43 PM with 56 comments
by usednet on 8/17/22, 3:30 PM
Hiring more police is not the simple solution, there needs to be a fundamental cultural shift among American police away from militarization.
by petey_pillpress on 8/17/22, 3:56 PM
What would make more of a difference for crime--expanding police budgets in cities that already outspend dozens of foreign militaries or investing those resources in systemic changes to provide people wellbeing and economic stability?
by skciva on 8/17/22, 3:25 PM
by abeppu on 8/17/22, 4:38 PM
Relative to other rich countries, we have more homicides. But if you look at homicides/100k vs Gini index for all countries, we're right in the middle of the pack. Perhaps if we actually want less crime, we should try to create a more equal society.
https://www.gapminder.org/tools/#$ui$projector:true;&model$m...
by jjk166 on 8/17/22, 4:45 PM
This is hardly surprising if you dig a little deeper. There has been a long trend throughout the US of reduce spending on dedicated public services -> shift remaining responsibility for those services to local police -> increase police budget to handle additional workload -> budget issues -> reduce spending on dedicated public services. The problems all those services were dealing with fester, leading to lower quality of life and worsening socioeconomic situations for residents, which in turn increases both demand for these services and crime rates. At the same time while the cops are doing inadequate jobs dealing with problems they are neither equipped nor trained for, they are pulling resources away from the job they are actually supposed to be doing. These penny pinching policies have ironically fiscally ruined many communities across the nation. Unfortunately many have dug themselves so deep that the damage is likely irreversible, especially when you consider demographic trends that are depleting these communities of their young, their wealthy, and their skilled citizens. Those communities that can be saved will likely need a complex cocktail of creative measures and external assistance. Any simple proposal like "just hire more cops" is as laughable as "let them eat cake."
by wahnfrieden on 8/17/22, 3:36 PM
by hackeraccount on 8/17/22, 10:51 PM
Punishment is very severe on the face of it. Long jail sentences; even the death penalty is possible in more then a few places. Even after you've served time a criminal record will affect you for the rest of your life.
The effect of that though is a weird laxness. The harsher the penalty the greater the temptation to give people multiple chances. The greater the penalty the more effort you need to put in to making sure that the person you're putting away really committed the crime. All of this means it takes longer to actually convict anyone. All of which increases the temptation to let people out on bail while the wheels of justice are turning.
The end result is that people commit multiple crimes with no consequences until they finally trip the line and the consequences are a metric ton of bricks falling right on their heads. And this is affecting people who almost by definition are not good at making long term plans on possible future rewards or problems - if they were they'd be tax payers.
A better system would - in my opinion - be one that comes down very fast with relatively small consequences on criminal behavior. If I knew that people who shoplifted $20 worth of goods were almost certainly going to spend a week in jail - even if there would be no record of them doing that jail time anywhere - I honestly think that kind of petty crime would be greatly lessened.
Frankly (and please don't ask me Kitty Dukakis type questions ) I think the general principle goes all the way through criminal conduct.
by Test0129 on 8/17/22, 3:44 PM
This conclusion is questionable. While the data seems to suggest we have an astonishingly high imprisonment and recidivism rate I don't think the thinly veiled "abolish the police" argument, coupled with it's typical race-based arguments, will solve anything.
We can really, truly, improve an unfortunate necessity of society by a few things in my estimation:
1. Regular psychological evaluation for police and yearly training on de-escalation coupled with firearms training. Additional scrutiny for people with previous experience in combat roles in the military. Lack of sufficient firearms qualification should prevent you from carrying a firearm under qualified immunity, additional PT should be done every 6 months and two failures removes you from the force.
2. Removal of most of qualified immunity. Your job was never "get home safe".
3. Defang the police union which by-and-large is how police get away with murder. Force police to carry malpractice insurance instead (value > 1MM).
4. Disincentivize crime hunting as a method of police keeping their job. For example, your next review at the precinct won't look so good unless you have N number of arrests. This can be done either by punishing police for over-policing, or changing laws that are designed to imprison people for trivialities (minor drug charges, child support, etc).
5. De-militarization of the police and a return back to the "old" times. Police should walk the beat and mingle with the people. As it stands now they drive around in veritable IFVs with more weaponry than is even close to reasonable for their day to day job. Right now they are closer to UN peacekeepers than civil servants.
6. Undoing Castle Rock v. Gonzales which allows police to not have any duty to defend.
7. Most importantly, seriously scrutinize the roles and motivations of DAs and their relationship with judges who are responsible for perpetuating the majority of non-violent crimes that put people in prison for decades.
Of course none of this will ever happen because the true purpose of the police is compliance and control, not safety. If you don't believe me think really hard about how comfortable you are talking to the police, and then think about how comfortable you are talking to a firefighter. The police are simply the meat enforcers of The State and so any desire to change them is simply wishful thinking. Even the military is nicer to citizens in an occupied country than the police are to their own countrymen. It's frankly shocking.
by mrozbarry on 8/17/22, 3:53 PM