Defund The Police! Remember This One?

By TLS

Defund the police!

OMG! This subject, while a little dated, recently came up. To summarize and provide a little history to this concept for those who may be unaware or have forgotten, this stemmed from excessive uses of force notably against African Americans. However, there is no shortage of other examples of extremely poor police to public encounter outcomes.

The growing number of these encounters as well as the high profile cases, sparked nationwide outrage and protests on a near new high level. Protester’s demanded better. Soon though, organizations began chanting and lobbying to defund the police. As if this would solve the problem, rather than making things a hundred times worse.

Defunding the police, what a horrible abomination of an idea. Only an anarchist that wants the world to burn would support this position. Because, without some sort of a policing force society would quickly descend into anarchy. Defunding the police is not the answer.

The better, much better, solution would be to increase funding. Ideally, with that funding, police forces across the country would be focusing on improving recruitment and retention of higher-quality candidates. Then with a better population to work with, the bulk of that increased funding should go to improved training.

Unfortunately there is no shortage of dirty or corrupt individuals in law enforcement, and lets not forget, throughout society. However, the vast majority are likely good quality people regardless of competency level as a law enforcement officer. Many of the very poor outcome encounters sparking the protests were the direct results of poorly trained or inadequately trained individuals who also possibly should never have become a police officer in the first place.

There is also historical momentum at play here. The police were not originally intended to be a huggy-feely response force. Police were intended to uphold laws, ensure the public safety, and arrest and detain troublesome individuals. Society today has become much more complicated and as a result law enforcement agencies need to adjust tactics, policies and procedures. A large portion of today's police officer duties would benefit from de-escalation training.

Mental health issues are becoming a much greater concern in modern society. Much of this comes from simple mental health pathological disease processes. Some of these issues are severely exacerbated by substance abuse and addiction problems. Many who have worked in law enforcement or worked with law enforcement and interacted with this population knows that jail and incarceration is usually not the best choice or solution, even though police are typically the first responders to these situations.

Law enforcement would be greatly aided by more than a hammer in their toolkit. Many law enforcement agencies are beginning to partner with crisis units. Ideally, police would respond to an incident, identify this is more a crisis incident rather than criminal, secure the situation, and then call in a crisis response team trained in behavioral and mental health issues. These crisis response teams often have better resources and or better confinement facilities to deal with the individuals than law enforcement agencies.

Defunding the police is not the answer and was never remotely close to the answer. Defunding the police was primarily a tantrum-crying fit by ignorant naive individuals who refuse to acknowledge the world is messy and difficult. Will there continue to be bad outcomes between police and the public? Yes absolutely. However, better training and resources would greatly reduce the frequency of those bad outcomes.

There will always be bad outcomes from bad individuals, from both sides of the problem. The solution is to overwhelm the police side with competent high-quality officers, to the point that bad outcomes become a very rare occurrence. Defunding isn’t the answer, better people with better training is. And that takes money, a lot more money.

If you want a safer future, demand better, not worse. Cutting resources won’t protect anyone. Smarter training, stronger recruitment, and better crisis response will. Don’t buy into slogans. Push for solutions.