Thread by @DoubleEph

So there’s now something of a challenge with #EndSARS. I’m a bit conflicted because, strictly speaking, disbanding and redeploying the SARS men is the only thing can *technically* be done

This is because the SARS guys are regular police officers who get posted to the SARS unit (often after paying bribes to get deployed there). No one joins SARS directly. And you can’t fire all police officers who are in SARS. Tricky

But this doesn’t mean disbanding is of no effect. It has been centuries since Thucydides gave us the insight that when in a group, humans often behave more discreditably than they would ordinarily do as individuals

I guess the immediate challenge now is to ensure that we don’t get SARS by another name once things quieten down. The important point of all of this is that the police need to change the way they carry out their duties. In that sense, SARS was merely a lightning rod

As a friend of mine put it - the sweet spot for SARS and police harassment in general is politically powerless people who have some economic resources. Well, they’re not politically powerless anymore as #EndSARS has shown