Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez @AOC: "Crime is a symptom of a diseased society that neglects its most marginalized people, and we do not solve that problem with police."
.
.
"We are at a time in this pandemic of unprecedented economic desperation. I will bet the farm that that has way more to do with any uptick in crime than the New York City police department's budget.
Because all those billions of dollars somehow have not prevented the uptick in crime that we're seeing right now. And the definition of insanity is choosing to do the same thing over and over and over again expecting different results.
So, you want to put more money, and crime is ticking up, more money, and crime is ticking up, more money, and crime is ticking up. Why do you expect a different result?
Maybe if we rewind, zoom out and give people repeated stimulus checks so that they feel like they can stay in their homes, maybe we'll see a mitigation of crime.
Maybe if we actually funded schools, and instead of having 10 cops pat kids down on their way to class; maybe if they had 10 social workers or councilors or nurses saying "how are things going at home?". 1 in 6 children in the New York City public school system is homeless.
1 in 6 kids. How about we care about giving those kids a stable place to live so that they don't feel that they have to go out? What if we actually funded the summer youth employment program so that teenagers aren't hanging out with nothing to do being teenagers?
That is how you bring down crime. Not putting 10 more tanks on the damn street. That's not how you do that. And by the way one more thing: people who hold a curling iron in a hair salon have to go through more hours of training than a police officer does to wield a deadly weapon.
We have given the New York police department 6 billion dollars. They are choosing not to spend that money on education and training. They are choosing to not make those choices.
And so at this point if you think more money is going to solve this problem, I'm sorry I have a deep disagreement, and I have come to a very different conclusion.
And I am of the belief that crime is a symptom of a diseased society that neglects its most marginalized people, and we do not solve that problem with police. Policing can be a band-aid, or it makes some people feel like it's a band-aid, but it is not the solution to crime."
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
