Tag: violence

American policing can’t be reformed

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I know all my friends want police violence to stop as much as I do. But we must understand that there are no reforms that can change the values at the very foundation of American policing, and those are white supremacy, patriarchy, and violence. 

We don’t need kinder, gentler slave catching patrols. We don’t need cops that learn to behave better only when we are filming them. We need to starve (defund) the beast while we reinvest in structures designed for community care, restorative justice, and public safety. 

We don’t need to have all the answers to know that the current systems are unacceptable. Let’s educate each other and start having conversations about what comes next.

If you need a place to start, Eight to Abolition and the BREATHE Act offer a way forward.

A conviction is not justice

Mapping police brutality

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I’m sure this only scratches the surface because it only tracks incidents of police violence that are reported on Twitter but I really appreciate folks (including Durham lawyer Greg Doucette) for putting this together.

See also The Guardian‘s site The Counted, which they created to track police killings in 2015 because no-one else was even doing it.

Orlando Massacre: Thanks, NRA

Civil rights and racial justice are gun safety issues

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One of my many brilliant MomsRising colleagues wrote this piece which ties together the threads of surging racism and gun violence in this Trumpist era. She makes it clear why an intersectional approach that encompasses multiple issues at once is required for gun safety advocates to effectively fight the NRA, who works for gun manufacturers and now for the President.

 

By advocating not only for gun safety but civil rights and racial justice, the GVP community will find the voice it needs to engage immigrants and let them know that smarter gun laws would help make their communities safer, and it will finally show the Black and Brown communities that GVP truly is about saving lives and not just about controlling firearms. The Trump Presidency is an opportunity to build these bridges and finally achieve the broad, diverse coalition gun safety advocates need when the balance of power in Washington finally changes and the chance arrives for true gun policy reform.
– Civil Rights Is Now a Gun Safety Issue: Hate and Guns in Trump’s America, by Gloria Pan 3/03/2017