Here’s the Black Lives Matter ten-point plan:
It’s a good plan, and Bernie Sanders has the highest ranking [pdf] (8/10) of any politician when scored against it.
(via Kevin Drum)
Update: Apparently this is not the product of the “official” BLM group, but by four activists who are part of the larger BLM movement.
aimai
Excellent. Its what we have been waiting for. This is great.
Frank Wilhoit
The difficulty is that accountability cannot be simply a matter of institutions. Our institutions are broken, partly because no one believes in them. Specifically in this case, an overwhelming supermajority of Americans believe that police (and prosecutors) must be unaccountable in order to do their jobs. There is a generational task for propaganda here.
rikyrah
This is a start. now, they need to divide between what can be taken care of federally, and what are state issues.
JPL
@rikyrah: True. I might add local governments because that’s where the abuse starts.
Laertes
Holy shit that is awesome. Every element of that looks solid.
Mike J
@Frank Wilhoit: When’s that last time a TV show had a defense attorney as the hero? Perry Mason?
On TV, cops and prosecutors are always on the side of good, and are being held back by trivial shit like the constitution.
Kropadope
That’s a very good list. I see two of those, 6 and 9, where the Federal government can mostly address the problem itself. The Federal government could also have a role in 3, 4, 7, and 8; but in these and the rest, we would require some level of community engagement.
How do we get people more interested in local government. My town is considering ending their town meetings for lack of engagement. The internet is nationalizing issues like never before. Also, this list, while wonderful, doesn’t tell anyone about their local situation. I tend to think of my state and local police as pretty damn responsible overall, but I can see that it might be possible that I miss some of their problems because they have mostly avoided sensational headlines.
aimai
@Frank Wilhoit: I think just the opposite. Accountability doesn’t come because of “belief” or “lack of belief” in anything. It comes when the incentives are in place for the watchers to watch each other. It would be quite easy, as a matter of practice (though not as a matter of politics) to change the incentive structure so that police/emts/jailers are not aligned and don’t protect each other. Penalizing everyone on staff or on duty when a prisoner is falsley arrested, or injured, or killed would be a good start. Penalizing the entire hierarchy monetarily would also work. Fines should not be paid out of general funds but from salaries and bonuses for all the officer staff.
If one of the issues is that juries won’t convict because they are afraid that police officers will be harmed in prison I’d be open to the idea that we open a federal former-police-officer prison where former officers could serve the first 1/3 of their sentences until they are acclimatized to prison and the people they arrested before have passed through the system, or something like that. Not that I think that police officers who have commited crimes are deserving of a lower level of punishment, but because I think that juries are reluctant to convict based on some kind of sympathy for these guys that could be obviated by a temporary prison situation.
Jason Smith
I think making a murder in police custody a federal crime would help. There’s a fundamental conflict of interest that the same police and prosecutors that usually work together now have a conflict of interest in violations by the system itself. Hold them accountable in a credible way would be a good line (and only one line) of reform.
Mike J
@Jason Smith: It wouldn’t even have to be murder. Make it a federal crime for law enforcement to file a false report.
BGinCHI
Police union busting is the only kind I would vote for.
BR
This is a great set of 10 policies. I think one important starting point is for those of us in supposedly liberal cities to get our city councilpersons on the phone and demand that all 10 policies be enacted right away. If we can’t show that we can make it happen in such cities, what hope is there for passing it nationwide?
Fair Economist
Yay, somebody posted a link to this! I should have. It’s mostly commonsensical stuff, actually – it’s almost horrifying that we have to have multiple publicized deaths and a major mass movement to even be *talking* about these kinds of reforms.
Marc
Good, solid proposals – this is precisely what is needed.
Roger Moore
@rikyrah:
They do that too. They even have a nice set of guides showing which things should be pushed for at each level of government.
ETA: One thing I’d like to see added is state-level funding for local public health and safety functions like police, fire fighting, etc. to guarantee basic minimal levels of service for everyone. States have already been forced to do that for education, and it’s time to do it for other basic government services. It should help to limit the need for local funding through fines, with all the negative police interactions that creates.
askew
O’Malley’s is 7 out of 10 and I’d quibble with them not giving him credit for diversity in police force.
But, O’Malley’s plan is the more progressive and better plan per BLM and other activists.
His plan is also the only one that addresses the intersection of immigration and criminal justice.
My comparison of the plans is here.
Notice that Hillary’s plan is MIA.
NotMax
OT:
Totally off-topic, but need to vent.
Just concluded two hours of phone tag with the phone company about trying to get connected to a toll-free number on the mainland.
Unable to even dial zero and call the operator.
Details too mundane, but beyond extremely agita-inducing. Whoever invented automated answering trees deserves 3 or 4 circles of Hell all to themselves. For eternity plus 1000 years. With Muzak.
kc
That was put out by the Ferguson activists, not the Black Lives Matter org.
Deray and Netta are NOT affiliated with the Black Lives Matter org. Unless something has changed in the past few days.
EconWatcher
Surprised not to see “assure diversity in police hiring,” but otherwise, this is an excellent list that we can all back. And this is one area (maybe the only one) where glibertarians might actually be of some use. (People like Balko and Tim Lynch of Cato have been pushing for these kinds of things.)
TaMara (BHF)
This great list. This is a place we can start to make change.
kc
@BGinCHI:
That’s the worst part of the plan. Terrible, completely anti-progressive.
rikyrah
EDITORIAL: Time to pack it in, governor
It is time to call for an intervention. Gov. Chris Christie, you seem convinced that you actually have a path to the White House if you but double down on your efforts and simply keep campaigning.
That is not going to happen, Governor. You’ve been out-Trumped by Trump and your poll numbers, unfortunately, reflect that. This will likely be made manifest if you find yourself out of the top 10 candidates for the next GOP candidates debate on Sept.16. You’ll be consigned to a separate debate for what is charitably called “second tier” candidates and less kindly, “the kids’ table.”
For a man who wants to command the bully pulpit, rather than simply be labeled a bully, we know this is not how you thought your presidential campaign would end up.
Four years ago, people were clamoring for you to run for president. This year, not so much.
Many in the state have complained that you have put New Jersey in your rear-view mirror to run for president.
Worse: according to a new Rutgers Eagleton Institute of Politics poll, 54 percent of registered voters say “presidential” does not describe you at all compared to 14 percent who say the term fits you “very well.” New Jerseyans, rarely at a loss for words, think these are better descriptions of you: “arrogant,” “self-centered” and “bully,” to name a few.
Let’s chalk this ill-fated run for the White House up to a midlife crisis.
—
Perhaps you should remember these words of wisdom: “Give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.”
You know you cannot change the poll numbers — accept that and move on.
Come home, Governor.
http://www.courierpostonline.com/story/opinion/editorials/2015/08/21/editorial-time-pack-governor/32131543/
NotMax
@Mike J
The Defenders (good show, made E. G. Marshall a household name at the time) came after Perry Mason. Surely must have been others since.
Joel
One thought on “broken windows” — is it the theory that’s the problem, or the (often racist) means of enforcement that is? I mean, don’t people want to live in intact neighborhoods, without litter and graffiti?
kc
@rikyrah:
Yes, there’s a lot of work that needs to be done at the state and local levels. That’s going to be the hard part, I think.
BR
@kc:
Doesn’t look like to me that they are proposing breaking up the union in any way — just that police shouldn’t get special protections during investigations that nobody else gets.
rikyrah
this is who they are. this is what they’re about and have been for some time.
OWN IT.
………………………..
Trump Campaign Manager Addresses “White Power” Incident
AUG 24, 2015 10:00 AM
There was an ugly moment at Donald Trump’s rally in Mobile, AL, on Friday night. A video from the event captured an audience member yelling out “White power!” during the Republican candidate’s speech. Trump, addressing a massive crowd in his trademark “Make America Great Again” hat, did not respond.
It appears this was not an isolated incident — reports from the event and comment threadsfrom attendees suggest the phrase was shouted multiple times throughout the event, by one attendee or several.
CNN asked Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, about the incident over the weekend, and he suggested that Trump hadn’t heard the racist comment. “I don’t know about the individual you’re talking about in Alabama,” he said. “I know there were 30,000 people in that stadium…who want to be proud to be Americans again.” Trump’s campaign has not returned R29’s request for comment.
Critics have blamed the campaign’s extreme rhetoric on immigration — starting with Trump’s campaign kickoff speech, when he suggested that Mexican immigrants were “rapists,” — for inciting extremist rhetoric and racism among his followers.
CNN host Jim Acosta also asked Lewandowski about a prior incident, when two men in Boston beat up an immigrant man, telling police they’d been motivated by Trump’s message. Lewandowski said Trump would “never condone violence.” Trump also condemned the attack in a tweet.
Trump’s campaign claims Friday’s rally drew 30,000 attendees, which would make it the biggest such event of the 2016 race thus far — though reports from the scene suggest that estimate might be overblown. Trump remains the GOP frontrunner, and his lead in the polls is continuing to grow; hopes from Democrats and Republicans that the business mogul’s popularity is just a passing fad are looking more and more unfounded.
http://www.refinery29.com/2015/08/92787/white-power-chant-donald-trump-rally
Jeff R.
@Mike J:
Rumpole of the Bailey. OK, so he’s English. And the last episode was produced in 1992. Still, “Never Prosecute!”
wasabi gasp
Maybe I missed it, but a quick scan of the Campaign Zero site revealed not one mention of Black Lives Matter.
rikyrah
Stabenow is a yes on Iran Deal
https://twitter.com/lrozen/status/635828229459329024
NotMax
@Jeff R.
Quite possibly Leo McKern’s finest hour(s).
Big ole hound
#1 should be elimination of closed grand jury probes into police indictments or misconduct. Leave it to a DA or open the grand jury process for these instances. Everything out in the open. CA is trying to pass such a law now.
gene108
@askew:
O’Malley will get crushed in Maryland by either Hillary or Bernie, if he’s still in the race.
If you can’t carry your home state, you are not a serious candidate.
Chris
@Mike J:
I think Matlock was the last one.
As I recall, Boston Legal (though not about a public defender) had its moments – but even if pandered to the consensus at times, like Shirley’s story about her father being an idealist who became a defense attorney to stand up for civil rights and equal treatment, and ending up broken and disillusioned by the thought that all he was doing was putting drug dealers and muggers back on the street. This kind of stuff has become so mainstream and accepted that even shows that aren’t particularly right wing or pro-cop pick them up just by osmosis.
gene108
@Joel:
I think there were a lot of ideas about how to combat the very real problem of record high crime rates, by the early 1990’s. Broken windows policing is one of those ideas.
I think the problem with a lot of the police policies in place now is they were adopted 20-25 years ago, when the crack epidemic was a big problem in urban America, crime rates were rising year-after-year, and there was seemingly no end it sight to it.
Things have changed dramatically, with regards to crime rates, but police still seem locked into the mindset of a generation ago.
In short, you have solutions to problems that no longer exist.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
David E Kelly’s shows were usually about heroic defense attorneys (when they weren’t yuppie soap operas) weren’t they? LA Law, that other one, the one with Captain Kirk, and that one with Kathy Bates nobody watched?
JMV Pyro
@askew: You’re beginning to remind me of that one character from Mean Girls.
Stop trying to make O’Malley 2016 happen. It’s not going to happen.
SatanicPanic
@Joel: It seems like not the best use of police resources to track these kinds of property crimes. I mean, sure if someone calls it in, fine, but figuring out why a window in an empty building is broken should be handled by another department. Whichever does building inspections, for instance
kc
@Mike J:
Well, there’s “How to Get Away With Murder” . . .
NotMax
@gene108
*cough* Romney *cough*
List of major-party United States presidential candidates who lost their home or resident state
kc
@SatanicPanic:
I don’t think “broken windows” policing means conducting extensive investigations to see who broke the windows; it means policing vigorously so that no windows get broken in the first place.
I could be wrong . . . .
Roger Moore
@Joel:
They may want to live in neighborhoods like that but find that the price of constant police harassment and almost every young man in the neighborhood winding up with a police record is more than they’re willing to pay. The problem with broken windows policing is that it effectively criminalizes ordinary activities, like hanging out, if you happen to live in the wrong neighborhood.
It’s possible that the policy could be rescued by tightly limiting the kinds of offenses that the police are going after, but I think it’s mostly a losing cause. What those crumbling neighborhoods need more than policing is jobs. If they continue to be centers of unemployment and underemployment, and the people living there don’t have enough money to fix things, they’ll continue to decay. If the people living there have jobs and hope for the future, they’ll fix their problems with no more police work than any other neighborhood.
Bobby Thomson
@rikyrah: yep.
constitutional mistermix
@kc: I put in an update, thanks.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Joel:
As I understand it, the problem with “broken windows policing” is that it doesn’t actually do anything about the graffiti or broken windows themselves. Instead, the focus is on arresting people for things like public urination, selling loose cigarettes, etc in the name of reducing minor street crime. The theory is that if the cops are constantly arresting people for minor crimes, major ones won’t happen because the criminals will be afraid of getting caught.
If the point was to send the cops out as volunteers to help paint over the graffiti and fix the broken windows, it might be more successful.
Bobby Thomson
Not sure what “lowering the standard of proof” means. If that means convicting people even with reasonable doubt, that’s a nonstarter.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@gene108:
This. The adversarial, us-against-them style of policing is totally unsuited for our low crime rates (and, frankly, didn’t seem to do much to reduce crime rates even when it was in vogue).
Some cities are returning to foot patrols, which are a much better way to reduce minor property crimes than having cop cars screech to a halt when they see guys hanging out on a corner.
MattR
@Mike J:
This. And make sure it also covers any statements made in support of search or arrest warrant applications.
SatanicPanic
@kc: Oh, that makes more sense.
Oatler.
@Mike J: Shows like Hawaii 5-0 openly editorialized about it in the early 70s. Now that the “barriers” they once complained about have been smashed by badge bunnies like Scalia, and these modern police procedurals are just plate-spinning with cleavage between lonnnng commercial breaks.
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
Curiously enough, Car 54, Where Are You? addressed this (albeit humorously) over 50 years ago.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Bobby Thomson:
I think, though, that most juries and judges start cops off with an almost impossible level of “reasonable doubt.” When you have stories like the cops who chased down unarmed people in their car, jumped up on the hood, and shot them multiple times through the windshield, how on earth is that NOT at least negligent homicide? How was that a reasonable action by those cops? But most prosecutors, judges and juries seem to have an attitude that if a cop did it, it must have been legal.
gene108
@NotMax:
Romney did not lose Massachusetts in the Republican primary.
O’Malley will get crushed by the tag team of Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders in the Democratic nomination process. EDIT: In Maryland
Tommy
Great program but I have to admit I don’t understand the angst against broken window policing. Sure it can be taken to an extreme but maybe mow your lawn. Have some respect for the community you live in.
elmo
@Oatler.: God I hate to say anything even remotely positive about Scalia, but for all his many, many flaws, he isn’t a badge bunny. Thomas is, for sure, but he isn’t. He’s actually been good on 4th Amendment issues, believe it or not.
Ugh. Now I need a shower.
Roger Moore
@Tommy:
The problem with broken windows policing- at least as it is implemented- is that it basically criminalizes being a young black man who lives in a poor neighborhood. The police hardly ever catch people committing real property crimes, so they wind up hassling any young black men they see on the assumption that they were probably about to commit a crime the moment the police went away.
Roger Moore
@elmo:
Scalia has also been a big defender of the confrontation clause of the 6th Amendment. It makes me think that he really does have some genuine literalist tendencies; when something is there in obvious black letter text, he’s pretty good about protecting it. He just doesn’t want to draw any obvious inferences, e.g. that for a right to have any meaning, there must be some way of actually defending it.
schrodinger's cat
Some people are taking the broken windows in the broken window theory of policing too literally. This theory has its origins in game theory. The premise being, that if you let petty crime go unpunished that leads to breakdown of law and order in the future. Or put another way if you come down hard on pan handlers and squeegee men, you won’t have to deal with serious drug related crime down the road.
The reasons to oppose it, are that it targets minorities and poor disproportionately. The other reason the evidence to support the broken windows theory especially in crime fighting is spotty at best.
Tommy
@Roger Moore: And I am so against that. Maybe my understanding of “broken windows” policy is miss guided. Or lacking.
different-church-lady
@rikyrah:
We’re in this together.
different-church-lady
@schrodinger’s cat: I think it’s worse than that — it gives the hard-asses “permission” to crack down on things that aren’t even crimes. Like looking the wrong shade of skin.
I guess it started off as, “Hey, let’s start giving a shit about how our neighborhoods are deteriorating,” and turned into “Toe the line, and I’ll tell you where the line is.”
I believe community pride is a real thing, and genuinely helpful. We’re social animals, and the concepts behind “broken windows” have some legitimacy — by saying in little ways, “Hey, we’re not going to just let everything collapse” you’re affecting the psychology of the group in a positive way. But you’re right, a certain kind of person (and this should come as no surprise) will use that for personal manipulation instead of improvement.
Tommy
@schrodinger’s cat: My understanding came from reading Neil Postman. He was very literal about the topic. He talked about actual broken windows. Fix them if you care about where you live. Mow your lawn. Clean up the trash on your street. Start with the little stuff and bigger things will happen. If the police have to give you a ticket for not doing those things then so be it. Gosh did I just sound like a Republican :)!
gvg
check broken windows policing on wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory It’s only at the end that it mentions how it hides racist behavior. Before that I was struck by the info that cities that didn’t implement something like it had about the same results which to me shows it just didn’t work. I also think the actual theory wasn’t really meant to be a police only activity. It seems to me that things like code enforcement, trash pick up and a bunch of other things would be needed to actually live up to the theory. For some reason the result has been just a bunch of police hassling people, when as described, that wasn’t what I thought it should be.
Its become sort of a dog whistle though and I don’t think we can allow it to continue.
different-church-lady
@gvg:
The reason is that human beings are involved. Always messy, that.
NotMax
@Tommy
Getting the cops out of their weaponized cocoons (patrol cars) and back to walking a beat and intimately knowing a neighborhood would be a good start.
SoupCatcher
@NotMax:
Wow, you’re not wrong about that Car 54 episode. Thanks for the link.
I especially liked the short segment, starting at around 16:30, where they show the charts for minor crimes and major crimes in the district. A nice simple visual rebuttal to Broken Windows type thinking. It resonates with how I feel policing can be implemented versus how it usually is implemented – especially today – where police seem to sort the world into three categories: police, victims, and perpetrators.
Roger Moore
@Tommy:
The problem is with a difference between broken windows policing as it is explained and how it is experienced. The theory sounds reasonable- we try to catch low-level offenses both to keep neighborhoods nice and to prevent low-level offenders from progressing to bigger crimes- and even as a positive for those poor minority neighborhoods. The problem is that in practice, the police don’t catch many low-level offenders of real crimes in the act, so they wind up hassling anyone who’s around for bullshit offenses like loitering and public intoxication.
And, as other posters have pointed out, there’s no serious attempt to fix the things the supposed signs of public disorder. Police may arrest people for graffiti, public urination, or petty vandalism, but they don’t scrub the graffiti off, wash away the urine smell, or fix the broken windows. The result is that the neighborhoods still look like they’re full of vandals, and now most of the young men there have arrest records that make it harder for them to find gainful employment, even if they’re never convicted or even prosecuted.
That last one is actually a very important point of social justice. Our society treats people who have had any kind of negative interaction with the police as deeply suspect. Just having an arrest record can harm your chances of getting a job or a loan, even if the arrest was complete bullshit. Having an actual criminal conviction can make it even harder, even after years of staying on the straight and narrow. We need to do more to make sure that arrest records are expunged if no charges are filed, and that criminals who have paid their debt to society are given a genuine second chance.
different-church-lady
@wasabi gasp:
I’m thinking maybe it’s time we started viewing BLM more as a hashtag than an organization, and push really hard to elevate the concrete stuff like Campaign Zero as much as we can.
[suppresses urge to rant yet again about how fuckin’ corrosive Twitter culture is.]
Tommy
@NotMax: Yes. Yes. Yes.
I mentioned Neil Postman in another comment. In his book The End Of Education he tells a fable. That the city of NYC was falling apart. The mayor realized he had 200,000 citizens, school students, that might make a difference. They’d start by painting their schools and fixing the broken windows. But they would/could do so much more.
When I hear broken windows that is what I think of.
different-church-lady
@Roger Moore:
Which works fine as long as it’s met with an appropriate low-level response.
Which is ain’t in too many places at the present time.
Roger Moore
@gvg:
Part of the problem is that we’ve gutted the parts of our government that might be able to help fix things. It’s part and parcel of the Conservative worldview that only the punish and break things daddy state deserves to exist and that the fix and nurture mommy state needs to be eliminated.
Omnes Omnibus
@gvg: The theory behind broken windows is appealing. The way it is practiced in the real world is pernicious. It needs to end.
Tommy
@Omnes Omnibus: A place we can agree. The concept is stellar. The execution not so much from the comments here, which I have no reason to think are wrong.
SoupCatcher
@Roger Moore:
This is one of my pet peeves. Legally, as an interviewer, I’m not allowed to ask a prospective employee if they’ve been arrested. Convicted, yes. Arrested, no. But, in practice, I’ve been asked about arrests in a number of interviews or on applications. As an interviewee, even knowing my rights, it’s hard to correct the person who is deciding whether or not to hire you.
schrodinger's cat
@Tommy: No the concept is not stellar, game theory is not a good predictor of actual human behavior. This is another reason why so many economic theories suck at making accurate predictions.
goblue72
@different-church-lady: BLM started out as a hashtag – literally. Which only later then morphed into a series of decentralized, loosely affiliated direct action happenings.
The corporate mass media, which is constitutionally unable to comprehend what spontaneous grassroots social movements actually look like, insisted on framing BLM as an “organization” which must then have “leaders” *(aka “managers” or “owners”). When the reality is that BLM didn’t start as an organization (its a fricking hashtag after all), and only recently started coalescing into something resembling the early stages of a proto-organization. Demands that BLM “take a position” or propose policies is kind of akin to demanding that the wind tell you the weather.
Reminds me of the early days of Occupy Wall Street – which quite literally was organized as a media stunt by two guys at the anti-consumerist magazine Adbusters. And the media immediately demanded it be an organization with “leaders” who could speak on “behalf of OWS”.
Omnes Omnibus
@Tommy: I don’t really buy into the theory behind it. All I said is that the theory is appealing, not that it is valid.
Moreover, valid theory or not, the fact that it not only does not have the effects its supporters claim is reason enough but has multiple negative effects means it needs to go.
Cervantes
@JMV Pyro:
Whatever you believe about O’Malley, you may be missing the point of the whole “democracy” thing.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Roger Moore:
This, too. “Broken windows” has an appealing name because it implies that something is going to be done to actually fix the broken windows, clean up the graffiti, etc. when in reality it means that people who live in the neighborhood get constantly hassled to see if they’re committing minor crimes and nothing ever gets cleaned up because the city doesn’t want to spend the money (or, these days, doesn’t have the money to do it).
It’s easier to blame the neighborhood residents for the physical disorder and harass them for minor stuff because these people live like animals than it is to give them the tools they would need to get it cleaned up.
Cervantes
That’s tantamount to saying he marched with MLK — who cares?
(Or words to that effect.)
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
I don’t think they are thinking “It must be legal.” I believe that they see the things that cops see. Most of the time it’s criminals or at least people accused of crimes. Like the old line about if all you ever see is nails, the only tool you need is a hammer. Cops and prosecutors see people accused unfairly every day but they also see a lot more guilty people. Granted they don’t always care if they confuse the two. But the point is from their perspective there is still a lot of crime. And what was one of the defining traits about neighborhoods with high crime rates? Lots of people hanging around, petty theft, etc. If you don’t or won’t or can’t make the connection that reasonably paying jobs cure almost all the ills, you are not going to make the connection that arresting people for doing nothing is going to make it a high crime area. Rinse/repeat.
A side note, I’ve noticed that a lot of local politicians started out as prosecutors and use that as a stepping stone to higher office. And they do this by saying how tough they were on crime. A conflict of interest? Looks like it to me.
Ruckus
@Tommy:
If you don’t have a job and have a hard time making ends meet, the money to purchase and operate a lawnmower is not going to be very high on the list of necessary things. And if you are in that position it probably isn’t even your lawn, you are renting it.
Cacti
@Ruckus:
This.
Broken windows police policies are rarely applied to neighborhoods made primarily of single family homes with lawns.
Cervantes
@schrodinger’s cat:
Why do you say that?
If I had to credit specific people for the approach, I might pick Jane Jacobs and Nathan Glazer, then in the ’80s George Kelling and James Q. Wilson — no game theorists among them.
Ruckus
@wasabi gasp:
You’ve gotten other answers on this but I didn’t see this side of it.
So what? Is this a good policy? Yes. That is all that matters.
BobS
That’s a good “ten-point plan”. It’s just too bad that Bernie Sanders told the people who presented it to him prior to Netroots to fuck-off.
Omnes Omnibus
@BobS: Are you intentionally obtuse or merely an idiot?
Cervantes
@Omnes Omnibus:
?
BobS
@Omnes Omnibus: Did you intentionally misspell racist or are you merely dyslexic?
Omnes Omnibus
@Cervantes: Certain commenters are incapable of discussing BLM without bringing Sanders related hurt feelings into it.
FridayNext
@Mike J: @Mike J:
@Frank Wilhoit: When’s that last time a TV show had a defense attorney as the hero? Perry Mason?
Just off the top of my head all of these shows either featured or included heroic, or at least sympathetic, defense lawyers: Matlock, LA Law, Boston Legal, Allie McBeal, The Practice, Harry’s Law, and even Hill Street Blues had Joyce Davenport.
BobS
@Cervantes: Certain commenters are incapable of discussing BLM without pointing out they acted like assholes in Phoenix and Seattle.
Omnes Omnibus
@Cervantes: @Omnes Omnibus: And yes, I do realize that Sanders is mentioned in the OP. The focus on the hurt feelings as a justification for ignoring the underlying issues is not.
Cervantes
@FridayNext:
What a list!
But how could you forget Petrocelli? (No need to answer that.)
And wasn’t there also a related genre, where it was mildly subversive private detectives rather than lawyers who showed up the cops? Cannon and The Rockford Files, for example?
Cervantes
@Omnes Omnibus:
A) Someone who is “intentionally obtuse or merely an idiot” might equate the two following and unrelated items: (1) a political or practical objection to tactics employed early on by some self-styled BLM activists; and (2) a complaint about alleged (and mere) “hurt feelings.”
Can we agree on this?
B) No one here means to do the above.
Can we agree on this as well?
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Cervantes:
The tactic worked. So what, exactly, is the valid ongoing argument about its effectiveness that you’re seeing? I don’t see, say, It worked, but it shouldn’t have as being a valid argument against the original actions.
IdahoFlaneuse
@Roger Moore: I totally agree with the issue of removing arrest records in the cases where charges are dropped and the defendant is judged not guilty. I would like to see the prosecutors and police that cite arrest records face fines, leave without pay and for the habitual offenders loss of their jobs.
Calouste
@Ruckus: Nice website, good policies. Now, does it have any people behind it besides the four that designed it?
Going back to the discussion last week about Clinton meeting with BLM, we now have a defined plan. But how do we know that is what most of the affected people want, and what their exact priorities are?
Cervantes
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
Without my commenting on your paraphrase of me, are you asking what could possibly be wrong with a tactic that “works”?
I’ll just leave you with a question I assume you’ve faced many times before in your life, with parents, children, friends, bullies, lovers, jilted lovers, saints, bridge partners, Soviet agents, cats, the IDF, kudzu, Republicans, and so on: just assuming they tried a tactic and it “worked,” would you say therefore that it was the right thing for them to do?
Notice: That the tactic “worked” is merely an assumption in this scenario.
Also be advised that it’s a glorious afternoon here in the mountains. I must away now and will not be able to respond — and therefore will not mind in the least if you only consider the scenario silently and do not want to waste your time writing about it!
different-church-lady
@goblue72: Yes, what you say was my understanding of the situation. With my statement I was implying treat it like the hashtag that it is. I think your description of it turning into a “proto-organization” is a good one.
But in the meantime (and respectfully put) there appear to be actual organizations out there that are prepared to do something concrete. If we want to solve this problem — and I’m pretty sure everyone here does, somehow — then we need light as well as heat. Why wait around for BLM to coalesce when there’s others already prepared to step into the void? All the shouting, all the hashtags, and all the shiny media objects in the world will not stop blacks from getting killed by hothead cops. It’s going to take real change in policy and in police culture, and Campaign Zero seems to understand that a hell of a lot more than proto-BLM does.
schrodinger's cat
@Cervantes: What is the theoretical basis for this theory then? I remember reading a paper in my game theory class which used game theory to justify the broken window theory. I can’t find that paper right now, but will post a link when I look up my notes.
FridayNext
@Cervantes:
I did say it was off the top of my head. I vaguely recall Petrocelli and when you first mentioned it I thought “wasn’t he a teacher” and then a quick trip to IMDB suggests I confused him with Lucas Tanner. And right you are about PI’s. Most plots of shows about private dicks involve someone in a jam of some sort, and that typically means being falsely accused of something by the police. Your mention of Rockford reminded me of the talented tv barrister Beth Davenport. Now there was a spin-off that needed to be made. (If they paired her with the bus driver from The Simpsons they could call it “Davenport and the Otto Man.”)
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Cervantes:
FWIW, I was not actually paraphrasing you personally. I actually can’t figure out what your beef is with BLM, because they keep doing the things that their supposed allies tell them they should do, and the goalposts keep being moved.
Do you honestly think that the above 10-point agenda would be getting the attention it is now without those two interruptive protests? Do think activists would have gotten a one-on-one meeting with Hillary Clinton, or had local activists open a Sanders rally without those two protests happening first?
I guess I’m not understanding what the long-term damage is here, other than to some white people’s feelings. If you can articulate it, please do. Calling for an end to police violence should not be a divisive issue for liberals, but apparently some people (not necessarily you) see it that way.
I’m stuck inside at work, so no mountain enjoyment for me this afternoon.
Ruckus
@Calouste:
Not if people don’t get behind it. What exactly does it take to make changes that are way beyond needed? That’s my point, it’s good policy, put forth by some who seem to be invested but maybe have no more than that. Why do good ideas seemingly have to come from on high to be taken seriously? These folks aren’t serious?
Is it good policy? Yes, it most certainly is. So we have to make it work. Spread the word. You change one mind at a time. So rather than throw up one’s arms and exclaim that it isn’t a big enough idea to bother with, make it a big fucking deal.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
Also, too, as far as I can tell, there are three basic groups of people who have opinions about BLM’s original two interruption protests:
1. People who had no issue from the beginning (my reaction was, “Someone got shouted down at Netroots Nation? Next you’ll tell me that bears poop in the woods!”)
2. People who had a problem with one or both initial protests, but who reconsidered after they saw the success the tactic had in bringing attention to the topic.
3. People who continue to have a problem with the initial tactic and don’t think that any level of development past the initial interruption excuses the interruption.
At this point, I’m not sure what to do with people in group 3. I suppose that the movement can just continue on with productive action like the 10-point plan and hope those people move into group 2 of their own accord, but for some of them, it seems like no action other than shutting up about police violence will make them happy.
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne (tablet):
Well stated.
A list has been asked for since BLM started. A well written one has been presented. And people are going, well this isn’t BLM, or who are these people to be presenting this list or there are plenty of organizations why do we need another…… Well the problem still exists so where are the current organizations lists or programs?
JimGod
@Mnemosyne (tablet): Count me in number 3. This 10-point plan had NOTHING TO DO with the protests in Phoenix and Seattle. The people who put this plan out are actually ORGANIZED, something BLM is not and which will likely result in that movement’s failure. The meeting with Clinton last week also exposed most of these BLM protesters as slacktivists who have no policy goals. Campaign Zero appears to be where it is at with having actual policy that officials can implement and will succeed or fail regardless of how many theatrical protests the BLM people keep carrying out.
Cervantes
@schrodinger’s cat:
Hmm … Isn’t a theory a theoretical basis?
Leaving aside such conundrums … I have already mentioned above the people I think of as originators of the approach. They are commonly described as sociologists — whatever those may be!
Meanwhile, if you do find the article you’re thinking of and can cite it, that would be great. I’ll check here in the morning. Thanks.
Cervantes
@FridayNext:
I like your style!
And we should talk more. Or rather, it would certainly help me. My memory of anything, but especially of so-called popular culture, is hazy. I keep making ridiculous statements about the past. Don’t tell Kant but I could really use you as a crutch!
Meanwhile, have a great afternoon.
schrodinger's cat
@Cervantes: Ok so if not game theory what is this broken windows theory based on? A hunch? experimental data? what? what other logical construct?
Cookie Monster
@Jeff R.: If you’re counting English shows, “Silk” (2011-2014).
Cervantes
@schrodinger’s cat:
Thought I had addressed these questions. Must have been opaque. Sorry.
When you wrote that “this theory has its origins in game theory,” I replied that “if I had to credit specific people for the approach, I might pick Jane Jacobs and Nathan Glazer, then in the ’80s George Kelling and James Q. Wilson” — none of them a game theorist. Adding Philip Zimbardo to the list, you can look up these people and their contributions.
singfoom
Jesus fucking christ. Let’s keep arguing over the messenger instead of the message. Those who presented the Campaign are part of BLM. Those who protested in Phoenix and Seattle are part of BLM. Are they the exact same people? No, but they’re all part of the same group. The protests MADE SANDERS A BETTER CANDIDATE even if you’re butthurt about it.
So here’s the list of policy proposals. The discussion about the tactic of interruption is kind of late at this point isn’t it, the horses are not just out of the barn, they’re in the next pasture (writing policy proposals)
BobS
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): We’ll never know if a more conventional approach (i.e. a dialogue with Bernie Sanders) would have worked, since a few assholes felt compelled to throw tantrums first. Sanders seems like a reasonable man, so my guess is yes, a dialogue with him would have worked.@Mnemosyne (tablet): Group 4: people who agreed with virtually everything in the “ten-point plan” prior to Phoenix and Seattle (like Bernie Sanders, for instance) but who continue to think it was assholish to throw tantrums before approaching Bernie Sanders with a fraction of the respect that the assholes demanded in their tantrums. Fortunately, some adults have compiled a “ten-point plan”, albeit somewhat late.
wasabi gasp
@Ruckus: This thread seems to have run its course, but a reply is probably in order since my comment (which was mostly an observation) can be interpreted this* way.
My comment recognized what appears to be a distancing by the Campaign Zero activists to the activities of BLM. The extent of the distance is not clear, but it certainly appears deliberate. Yet, wherever I’ve seem the CZ Plan mentioned, it’s introduced as a BLM production. Beyond inaccurate, this strikes me as disrespectful and, by my opinion of BLM, detractive.
* Calouste makes a valid point from a perspective of sympathy for BLM. It’s not a point that I share, though.
Nathan Tyree
@Jason Smith: Agreed strongly.
BruceFromOhio
Then its time to shut that motherfucker down, natch.
mclaren
This isn’t just a campaign Black Lives Matter should be supporting, everyone in America should be supporting this. EVERYONE.
Bobby Thomson
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
If the problem is that people in charge of interpreting the reasonable doubt standard simply interpret that standard differently when it comes to the acts of police, what law could possibly change that? We will always have jury nullification, and judges will always be in charge of interpreting the standard. What this sounds like is establishing a standard of proof for criminal trials that is objectively lower/higher for one class of criminal defendants by design and not interpretation. That doesn’t sound like something I can get behind as a matter of equal protection, and if that principle were ever legitimized I don’t think it would lead to the results we want.
Possible alternatives: “I will appoint judges who apply the law fairly regardless of who has been accused.” I mean, that’s basic Mom and apple pie stuff there.
AxelFoley
@BGinCHI:
Co-sign.