Those of you who listen to my podcast and follow my blog know that I have no love lost for the authorities. I believe that many of our institutions have been corrupted beyond the point of deserving much respect, let alone the benefit of the doubt.
“The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom. For in all the states of created beings capable of law, where there is no law, there is no freedom.”
–John Locke
So, when I saw what happened to George Floyd, I was outraged and hoped that changes would be made to prevent this sort of thing from happening. This should not happen, and cops who do this should be fired, stripped of benefits, and brought up on charges – every single time. And no one should disagree with this.
That said, we should also not allow the sort of violent response to stand. We should push back against the violent and hateful tactics and negotiate a real solution. Looting your local neighborhood does nothing to solve this problem, and most everything to worsen it.
We need to find ways to express ideas peacefully and have a dialogue. Today, we’ll talk about some of the problems with police and the violent protests, as well as some potential solutions to the problems between police and the black community.
Some of the problems I’m seeing with police:
- Police enforcing unjust laws
- Police using bad tactics to restrain people
- Police using too much force due to incompetence or poor training
- Justice system covering for cops
- Lack of discipline for police due to unions
- Bad discussions about the actual problems at hand with people talking past each other
Some of the problems I’m seeing with the riots:
- Attacking the very people you purport to defend
- Hatred does not solve hatred, but multiplies it
- Peaceful people are having their voices hijacked by radicals
- Violent radicals don’t actually care about the core issue of police violence
- Anger is not being directed at the problem
Some potential points of improvement:
- Punish cops immediately for excessive force: don’t make the mob call it out first
- Get rid of police unions and make it easy to fire and bring charges on cops
- Listen to the concerns of black people and don’t come back with statistics against experiences
- Explore sources other than race for some of the conflicts- unjust laws, focus on nonviolent lawbreakers, poor training
- Look for common ground and start there
