Yeah, no, fuck all cops. And please lets not pretend like shit isn’t getting mighty fasc-y all over Europe too…
ALL cops you say?
I have many friends and family who have joined the Scottish Police and given years of their lives to serving their communities, risking their own lives and health. Should I say fuck them too?
I joined the police for six months before deciding it wasn’t the career for me and got back into charity work. Are you saying Fuck Me now or just for the six months I was in? Did my fuckery expire?
How can thousands, millions of people doing a job be reduced to such a binary sentiment.
How can thousands, millions of people doing a job be reduced to such a binary statement
The reason why most people (including myself) say ACAB is because of the system of policing, not the merits of any given police officer. Systems are inflexible and adverse to change. Individual good cops can exist, but once again, the system itself is the problem. A good cop can never fix the system, nor could a hundred, or a thousand. A million could, at best, give the illusion of a good system. People often say a rotten apple spoils the bunch, and I think that looking at policing from the perspective of individual rotten cops, or rotten cops “spoiling the bunch” is problematic when the system itself is rotten. And for participating in the system, yes, all cops are bastards.
Okay I agree with the idea of a rotten system as think that generally many legal or government institutions are rotten and self serving for the rich.
But the flaw in the argument from my perspective is that if all the decent people don’t go into the police, the ones with integrity, a moral compass who genuinely try to help people and do the right thing, then that leaves the bad apples.
So for going into a system and hoping to change it for the better, help/protect their community from criminals and the bad apples and make a real difference in lives, by that logic those people striving for better are still bastards and that just doesn’t feel right to me.
Again no hate here just a genuine conversation
I’m not gonna pick a side here as I don’t wanna fan the flames, but I will say that I have a good deal of bones to pick with police oversight systems (or lack thereof).
However, this got me thinking: would you say the same thing about restaurant servers? By becoming a server in the U.S., are you not perpetuating a tipping paradigm that has systematically denied the working class billions of dollars of wages that un-tipped employees are entitled to? It’s fairly clear that a “good server” cannot fix the system by participating in it, and given that a server makes the same amount of money as a cop—if not more—it isn’t really fair to say that one group “needs” the job while the other does not.
It’s a curious predicament.
I think it’s disingenuous to have a slogan that targets individuals then claim you’re just commenting on the system when questioned. If it’s about the system say the system sucks.
All Carsalesmen Are Bastards!
Defund the dealerships!!!
Edit: I see the bootlicking salesmen are out on Lemmy downvoting.
ALL cops you say?
While acab is probably too generalized a term to apply to ALL police forces in the world… Interpreting acab in absolutes is also kinda silly and needlessly pedantic.
If I were to say all Nazi are bastards… Would we be making the same arguments? Surely there were Nazi that were forced to join the party, surely there were Nazi giving years of their lives to serving their communities, risking their lives and health.
The point of ACAB is to highlight the inherent and institutional failures of policing actions native to the vast majority of western democracies. Where police are primarily utilized to protect property and institutional power, rather than protecting the most disadvantaged communities in our society.
Trouble with that theory is that I think regular people won’t hear something like ‘All Cops Are Bastards’ and immediately think ‘well they probably don’t mean all cops’. It literally says it there.
Maybe because I’m Scottish living in Scotland I’m separate from the US side of the movement/argument but knowing so many good people in the service who have probably done more for their communities than some people spray painting on walls it just sounds so blatant. If it was a different slogan then I doubt people would have an issue with it but not everyone hears all the details about what it apparently means online or whatnot, they just see the words.
No desire to be pedantic at all, just explaining why a lot of folk won’t get behind the message.
Yes, fuck them, and fuck you.
You choose to knowingly join the organisation that was literally created and exists solely to serve the rich and oppress everyone else to do it.
Cops are class traitors who can choose to leave their position at any time, the marginalised people they exist to abuse have no such luxury.
Your feeling are irrelevant.
ACAB
You’re a fucking idiot. I live in a small town up in the mountains in Europe, and some absolute fucking dimwits like you have been going round spraying ACAB on stuff
Our two policemen and two policewomen are the genuinely nicest folk you’ll ever meet and do loads and loads of good for the community. When they’re not busy they volunteer to deliver free meals to the elderly and help out at the charity shop
Tarring everyone with the same brush is something simpletons do, which is probably why they didn’t accept you into the police 😂
So what’s the alternative to police? Just getting rid of them would just lead to militias taking their place which would be much worse.
Defunding them and diverting those resources into social services that have been shown to actually give back in meaningful ways to the communities and safety/effectively deescalate tense situations without committing atrocities while perpetuating systemic hate-based violence.
There does need to be someone with a gun I can call if someone is literally breaking into my home intent on murdering my family. But outside of those extreme and fringe outlier circumstances, society would be much better served by well-funded social workers and emergency first responders who are trained to resolve conflicts while actually helping those in need of it without threat of eminent deadly violence.
Reality is and always should have been cops do cop things. Locally. Traffic shit should be department of transportation. etc. etc.
Make local cops walk local beats and only focus on the community safety and suddenly things get better. ‘Us vs Them’ is a pretty easy thing to spin when they only are a corrective force with a chip on their shoulder.
Proper training, education, and being held accountable for your actions will filter out the bad blood quickly enough.
Defund is frankly a word that was selected poorly. It implies punishment. It only amplifies the ‘Us vs Them’ narrative on both ‘sides.’
ACAB? No. Problem with corruption and a system that spits out at best tight lipped accomplices and at worst zealots brandishing ‘might makes right’ ideals? Yep.
Fix the system and the problem fixes itself.
We have this many places in Europe. The police are not even allowed to wear guns in Norway (and frankly do not need them) unless there is some special intelligence or something making a reason for it. That does not absolve the need for state controlled monopoly on violence. It only means that is should be limited and wielded with the utmost care.
There does need to be someone with a gun I can call if someone is literally breaking into my home intent on murdering my family
well-funded social workers and emergency first responders who are trained to resolve conflicts while actually helping those in need of it without threat of eminent deadly violence.
If we do things properly, then no one should have a need to break in to your house (because everyone’s material needs would be met), and if you’ve given someone reason to kill you, calling someone with a gun to kill them isn’t going to solve anything. If they’re mentally unwell, calling a person with a gun is even worse.
The second option you gave is more than enough 99.99% of the time.
Some degree of community defence might be imperative, but it should never be one person with one gun who is in charge of “enforcement”, but everyone would be trained and everyone would have access, and in a time of real need (like an external and violent threat to the community) those ready and available can do what is needed, but again - killing someone isn’t it 99.99% of the time.
Much worse for who? Who does the police actually benefit today? and who is it harming? do you care about those people? The police are not even legally required to protect you, and don’t in practice, why do you think they do anything to benefit society? Why are you so desperate to maintain the boot on your neck?
Thousands of people and organisations have answered your question in great depth over the years, all you have to do is be willing to set your obvious existing bias aside, and look.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_abolition_movement
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/anonymous-manifesto-for-the-abolition-of-the-police
https://abolitionistfutures.com/latest-news/9m1jx98mayqvorjm7ij8x0zv9g5f85
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/rose-city-copwatch-alternatives-to-police
Much worse for who?
My point is: if police were completely abolished, conservatives and the far right would feel very unsafe and immediately form militias that enforce their values. That would be much worse for everyone who doesn’t share their values, of course.
I get that in many countries, police is badly regulated and you might say that this wouldn’t actually change much, but I’d rather seek more accountability for police, compared to a complete abolishion, leaving a power vaccum that’ll be filled by right wing militias with zero accountability.
Divesting seems good to me though, much of the police is certainly overfunded (due to law and order populism) and does useless shit (like the war on drugs), while education, social workers and programs against poverty are severely underfunded. Changing this would surely help a lot with crime reduction and other issues.
Thanks for the links by the way, I will look more into them when I have more time to see if my concerns regarding abolishion are addressed.
Not saying the concept of police is bad, but the situation here is that some cops have been such assholes that all the good cops quit. Now only the worse individuals remain, and they protect each other so they fear nothing
Robert Peele’s Nine Principles of Policing are a good start:
- To prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force and severity of legal punishment.
- To recognise always that the power of the police to fulfill their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour, and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect.
- To recognise always that to secure and maintain the respect and approval of the public means also the securing of the willing co-operation of the public in the task of securing observance of laws.
- To recognise always that the extent to which the co-operation of the public can be secured diminishes proportionately the necessity of the use of physical force and compulsion for achieving police objectives.
- To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour, and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.
- To use physical force only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient to obtain public co-operation to an extent necessary to secure observance of law or to restore order, and to use only the minimum degree of physical force which is necessary on any particular occasion for achieving a police objective.
- To maintain at all times a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and that the public are the police, the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
- To recognise always the need for strict adherence to police-executive functions, and to refrain from even seeming to usurp the powers of the judiciary of avenging individuals or the State, and of authoritatively judging guilt and punishing the guilty.
- To recognise always that the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them.
I’m not American, and the article linked is by a European about Europe…
Swing and a fucking miss, clown… lmfao 🤣
I’m from germany and I’m scared about the future. The far-right is getting more and more voters. It’s not just the USA who is fckd.
Thanks for sharing our pain. I don’t understand how people pretend that Europe isn’t going thru the same stuff like we are in the US.
Inflation, migration debates, cost of living crises, rise of authoritarianism, income inequality, all of this is and has been global. Some places affected more than others depending on what you look at.
Also Europe:
“Let’s do this obviously good thing for the sake of the whole continent.”
“No, because it would help France.”
Haha sounds about right!
Is this based on actual event or is it a general joke?
Let’s not forget brexit. Americans aren’t alone in their dumbassarry
Literally facist? I know about a few right wing ones, but none of them seem actually facist
Musolini’s grand daughter sends her regards:
Giorgia Meloni is Italy’s current prime minister and also happens to be a proud founding member of the Neo-Facist party, and is the granddaughter of Benito Mussolini.
The fascist parties that want to stop immigrants on the borders? Remind me who was the previous president in US and who’s controlling the house now…
Initial comment about dumbassery not in the USA.
Reply back about additional dumbassery not in America.
You: bUt WhAt AbOuT aMeRiCa?
Stopping immigrants at the border would actually be a horrendous policy and have devastating economic effects. Literally advocating for a terrible US policy that could be seen as inhumane and unethical.
i hate these memes that group entire countries or continents into one homogeneous blob and assumes that one is inherently better than the other
It’s the best way to sow division. Put everyone into discrete groups and tell them that the other groups are bad.
Yep. I can remember not too long ago that French police blinded people when dealing with the yellow jacket riots. Also the president’s bodyguard being there dressed as a cop and hospitalised someone instead of protecting the president. There’s also the murder of Stephen Lawrence in the UK and every year here there’s multiple cops charged with raping women or using excessive force against a minority.
Cops are shit everywhere.
Also in Finland, on 6th day of December (2023), on our independence day, the bastards prohibited the Helsinki ilman natseja (Helsinki without nazis) protest, beating the antifascist protesters and ramming into them with fucking horses, but they welcomed the nazi parade with open hands. Interesting.
