Demilitarize police. Defund broken initiatives. Reimagine and transform policing. End systemic racism in the criminal justice system. Yes to all those things and more. But if the plain meaning of your slogan is "disband all police departments," you won't win and it isn't helping.
PS/ The context for this statement is that I'm a former criminal investigator and criminal defense attorney who worked in the criminal justice system for years and has sat on policing reform committees that did real-time work enacting meaningful change all stakeholders supported.
PS2/ Anyone who says reform movements aren't moving fast enough is 100% right. These protests will transform, augment, and speed reform efforts like nothing has in decades. But if you say reform efforts are useless, that's historically inaccurate. Cash bail is already going away.
PS3/ The other thing the protests are doing is centering community members in a way that should've always been the case in the police reform movement but hasn't always been. That doesn't mean other stakeholders won't still be at the table going forward. They will be, and must be.
PS4/ It hinders the *insanely* hard work hundreds of thousands will do in the years ahead to pretend public defenders, judges, police officers, probation officers, GALs, parole officers, politicians, social workers, rehab workers, clergy—etc.—won't be at the table going forward.
PS5/ It's mostly white progressives who aren't part of the police reform movement who are going around social media telling key stakeholders in the criminal justice system to "sit down." What's actually needed is for all stakeholders to *stand up together* for fundamental change.
