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Title: On Policing Author: Critical Resistance Date: January 2009 Language: en Topics: police, anti-state Source: http://criticalresistance.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/CR-statement-abolition-of-policing-2009.pdf
Policing is the practice, empowered by the state, of enforcing law and
social control through the use of force. The roots of policing in the
United States are closely linked to slavery, the capture of escaped
slaves, and the enforcement of Black Codes and Jim Crow. Police forces
were also routinely used to keep new immigrants to the US “in line” and
to prevent the working classes from making demands. Clearly, not much
has changed. Policing is still set up to target poor people, people of
color, immigrants, and people who do not conform to socially acceptable
behavior on the street or in their homes. For example, police frequently
target women, queer and gender non-conforming people, people of color,
and young people just based on their appearance or behavior. The choices
police make about which people to target, what to target them for, and
when to arrest and book them play a major role in who ultimately gets
locked up.
Some of us are comforted by the option of being able to call someone
when we need help. Some of us are told from a very early age that the
police are our friends who will help us when we’re in “trouble.” But the
impact of policing on many of our communities—more people beaten and
killed by cops and the growing number of our friends, family members and
loved ones being locked away behind bars—shows us that the police hurt
rather than help us.
Policing is, in its very nature, in opposition to self-determination.
The practices of watching, questioning, intimidating and arresting
people—through the use of force are violent practices. Not only do cops
use threats of violence—the guns on their hips, the clubs on their
belts—to control people, they often use force in making stops,
inquiries, and arrests. Harassment of people on the street or “stop and
frisk” practices—stopping people to frisk them for drugs or weapons—are
tools often used to intimidate, monitor, and control poor people and
people of color. While we’re told the police are on the street to stop
or solve “crime”, their very presence is a way of enforcing social
control, and actually creates more violence.
When people die at the hands of police, more often than not, the state
concludes that the use of force was reasonable... Police review boards
are completely useless.And even though some people argue that police
abuse is an isolated problem that can be blamed on the actions of rogue
officers, it is really a systemic problem that is fundamental to the way
the policing system in the US is built and maintained.
In recent years, the militarization of the police has increased
dramatically. Not only has US law enforcement come to resemble the US
military more closely, but it has also begun to be equipped with the
same technologies. From providing training in tactics and instruction in
using certain types of equipment to the cooperation between the military
and domestic law enforcement at the US/Mexico border, militarization of
law enforcement has meant that the US has become another space within
which the military can operate and has meant that residents of the US
are potential military targets to be eliminated.
The same way that locking people in cages does not help us build the
healthy, stable communities we want, relying on the state to force
people into acting in ways that serve the state doesn’t encourage the
kinds of cooperation, trust, and accountability we know are at the heart
of building what we truly want.
Instead of relying on the violent establishments of police and prisons,
what if we got together with members of our communities and created
systems of support for each other? We are capable of looking after and
caring for one another, providing each other with our basic human needs,
creating community self-determination. Relying on and deploying policing
denies our ability to do this, to create real safety in our communities.