Discussion
Universities and The Police don't have much in common, but there are some interesting parallels in these institutions.
They are both old and deeply woven into the governmental, social and economic fabric. Interestingly universities are much much older than police.
They both have strong tendencies to reproduce a certain kind of values.
Conservatives want to destroy or "reform" institutions of higher learning, Leftists want to destroy or "reform" policing and both underestimate the task.
AFAIK, "defunding police" isn't by itself "abolish the police" but "stop funding an ever-extending unaccountable murdering force", which is actually a quite popular platform once explained that way.
Abolish police is a far-left position that has many merits on its own once someone understands history, but it's not the same as "defund police".
It's delusional to think that DSA candidates can defend abolition, but they certainly can defend defunding.
@lienrag @futurebird I believe the priority should be to prevent crime rather than punish it after the fact. With properly funded education and (mental) healthcare, there would be less work for the police in the first place, so they wouldn't need as much money. Now I'm not naïve enough to think that crime could be eliminated entirely, so some manner of police force is always going to be needed, though it could very well look quite different from what is typical today.
@lienrag @futurebird A small example of what is possible is perhaps that British police are not routinely armed. Unsurprisingly, police shooting people is quite rare here. They still have other issues, of course, but that aspect is, I think, something that should be valued.
@futurebird plus the university system is itself very far from being a leftist engine of higher learning https://mastodon.social/@urlyman/117211415550914805
I'm starting to think that in this half baked theory it'd make more sense to categorize universities as Liberal rather than leftist. I just like universities so that's my bias making that assumption. But universities grew out of the Catholic church (of all things) though this isn't the whole story.
I guess it would be as correct to say that universities "grew out of the church" as it would be to say "police grew out of slave catching patrols"
Both true, but not the whole story.
And I'm just thinking about how these institutions are very durable because of the way they shape people's entire lives. Not just as they act on people but for the participants.
I've been suggesting that "detectives need better education" but this change would disrupt entire career paths and mentorships... it's why attempts to "reform" don't seem to do anything.
These systems have their own internal logic and values.
@futurebird we live in complexity but perpetually seek convenient narratives
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I'm just saying there is something similar in saying "what if we didn't need police?" from the left to saying "what if we didn't need universities?" from the right. Most people find both of these questions alarming without feeling the need to articulate why. You can discover a lot about left and right wing visions of utopia by examining these questions.
More important as of late in the US anti-intellectual right wing extremists have made more progress implementing a know nothing vision.