Yahoo News’ Mike Bebernes is asking the question, and, while he gives some interesting reasons why there has been little reform, he misses the biggest one
Has the opportunity for police reform already closed?
The police killing of George Floyd in late May ignited a nationwide protest movement that saw thousands fill the streets in cities across the country. The goals of the Black Lives Matter movement cover many areas of American society, but the most immediate demand is reforming the role of police in communities.
Floyd’s death, along with the fatal police shooting of Breonna Taylor, helped draw public attention to reform measures that activists have been promoting for years. At the height of the protests, it appeared that lawmakers in many places were ready to make substantial changes. New York City and Los Angeles announced they would reduce police budgets. The use of police chokeholds was banned in several states. The House of Representatives passed a sweeping police reform bill. The most substantial move was taken in Minneapolis, where the City Council voted to disband the police entirely.
As time has passed, though, the momentum for reform appears to have waned, and many of those planned changes have stalled. New York lawmakers have been accused of using “funny mathâ€Â to hide the fact that police funding wasn’t really being cut. The House bill died in the Republican-led Senate. Minneapolis’s plan to dismantle its police force has gotten bogged down in bureaucratic red tape.
The shooting of Jacob Blake on Aug. 23 offered, for many, a stark reminder of how little has changed about policing in the U.S., despite the massive social movement that was ignited just a few months earlier.
All the various hurdles and delays that have impeded police reform efforts in recent months may mean the country has missed its chance to truly reimagine the role of police in society. After spiking in June, support for Black Lives Matter has gradually trended downward and public opinion of the police has improved, polls show. The issue has also become increasingly politicized, with Republicans holding up reform bills at the national and local levels.
Damned hurdles and delays! How dare people discuss this stuff! Just Make It Happen! Anyhow, Bebernes offers what the pessimist and optimist views of this are, rather than really delving into why, things like
- Pessimism: the police unions (suddenly, liberals hate unions) standing in the way (they really aren’t, as long as reforms do not endanger police officers, but, darned sure when it comes to defunding them)
- Optimism: Democrats disagree on specifics but share a common belief that change is needed (well, yeah, they want to defund the police, except in their own neighborhoods)
Also optimism
“This will be a fight waged at the local level — a war fought in city council chambers, budget offices, and other modest rooms, led by city officials who feel emboldened by the emergence of the largest protest movement in American history. Those fights rarely make national headlines, but their effects can be more important than the bigger ones.†— Andrew J. Hawkins, Verge
Reforms should occur at the local, county, and state level, not the federal, but, regardless of all Beberness and others he quotes write, the main reason there has been little done, and a lot of backtracking in places like Minneapolis, is because of the riots and threats that started almost immediately. And once you started seeing this violence by BLM/Antifa/leftist white entitled college kids spread around the nation, people tuned out. Does anyone think 100+ nights of violence in Portland helps the call to defund the police, much less basic reforms?
Most people agreed there needed to be some reforms, though they might not agree on the reforms. Now? No one is talking about it except the hardcores, and no one listens to them, not when they are a reason that more police are needed. Not when they’re a reason that federal, county, and state law enforcement has to be brought in to places like Portland, and even the National Guard, because of lots of lawlessness and violence.
Do you think the average U.S. wants the police defunded? Nope. They lost their chance for reform with their Crazy.
