Instigator / Pro
0
1474
rating
2
debates
0.0%
won
Topic
#2922

Defund the Police

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Winner
0
1

After 1 vote and with 1 point ahead, the winner is...

Bugsy460
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
3
Time for argument
One week
Max argument characters
10,000
Voting period
Six months
Point system
Winner selection
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
1
1494
rating
4
debates
25.0%
won
Description

"Defund the police" became a popular outcry in June 2020 following the murder of George Floyd. Defund means “to withdraw financial support from.” It does not necessarily mean to take away all funding. I will argue in favor of lowering police budgets than what was allocated for fiscal year 2020 (the budget that was agreed upon in 2019) by 5% or more before all the social unrest. In this debate I will be focusing on mid size to large cities across the U.S.

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@Unpopular

I know a lot of people are calling the topic vague, but I'm really excited for it. Gives me a chance to attack it from two sides.

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@RationalMadman

In that case I apologize - I've been a tad stressed with people who aren't quite as substantive as you are -*cought* Coal *cough* they just like citing experts and expecting that to convince me... and then calling me "opinated" for not instantly agreeing, a tad frustrating I'm sure you might agree

From the Brookings Institution: “Defund the police” means reallocating or redirecting funding away from the police department to other government agencies funded by the local municipality. That’s it. It’s that simple. Defund does not mean abolish policing. And, even some who say abolish, do not necessarily mean to do away with law enforcement altogether. Rather, they want to see the rotten trees of policing chopped down and fresh roots replanted anew. Camden, New Jersey, is a good example. Nearly a decade ago, Camden disbanded (abolished) its police force and dissolved the local police union. This approach seems to be what Minneapolis will do in some form, though the nuances are important.

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@Theweakeredge

You actually do agree with me, I said it's the minority of both who spiral the cycle on.

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@Sum1hugme

Indeed - however, that's already tried to be implemented.... several times, and across a literal century - in fact - there were three very distinct times of changing the police force - and it hasn't reduced the effect - the entire concept of a police force is a bit too corruptable, and the concept focused on punishing, whenever the best thing for the country is rehabilitating and separation - those are the most empirically sound method of defeating crime (aside from education and equity of income), and the police fundamentally miss that

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@RationalMadman
@Theweakeredge

Police need more situational training and psychological evaluations.

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@RationalMadman

Just... no - that isn't emprically true - MOST criminals aren't violent, thats just a fact of the matter, in fact they are scared of being violent; however, those who have had more interactions with police become more violent - because they are treated no differently from criminals who are violent - its a very direct relationship - even if these cops were all traumatized (which, they aren't that's a very blatant broad stroke) that's not an excuse to be increasingly violent - they should either get help or not be permitted with the safety of others - its that simple

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@Theweakeredge

I am left-wing and very pro-BLM but the violence cycle is indeed a cycle.

This is actually not just a racism issue of course (that is an issue with who they are more willingly aggressive with but this is an ancient thing from the beginning of our species to now).

The more aggressive wrongdoers are usually the initial aggressors in any new society. This inspires hostility from the enforcers of peace and order (not always cops in our species' history, sometimes more like antihero mafia).

These enforcers then start to forget that not every criminal is as brutal and fast-to-attack as the one or two who ended up killing or severley wounding one of their fellow policemen/policewomen. They begin to become vigilant, actively and passionately ready to 'disarm and disable' before the average criminal has even got over the initial panic and frustration with the sudden situation they've found themselves in.

This cycle has a next stage. People who are friends and families of the trodden upon, become increasingly hostile to said enforcers. People who would never before have spat at, verbally lashed out, really try and wrestle with and physically overpower the enforcers, suddenly are a lot more willing and ready to do so as they feel it's pure life or death and that these are pure-evil demons apprehending them.

This typically (in civilised societies) leads to reform and 'let's be friends again' from the government and law enforcement in a weaving limbo where the one or two criminals who really are rabid psychopaths, sociopaths etc kill off, severely wound, put-in-a-coma some cops and the partners get PTSD from it and vow to never let one of the criminals get the upper hand in a confrontation again. So on and so forth.

In other societies they never try to be friends again.

It is not nearly as simple as 'cops are the mean ones', I know they can be indeed but the initial aggressors in any society were typically the worst of criminals who traumatised the fellow cops and made them feel a deep need to be fast and brutal in their taking down of any criminal, in fear of what they'll do.

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@RationalMadman

no.. the FBI "CAN" interact with the public, but would you disagree that the public deals with the police force much much more prevalently? Furthermore, the police departments DONT have specialized units for some of the most commonly occurring crime, and treat every shoplifter as if they are a violent criminal - even though criminology teaches you that shoplifters and violent criminals are usually VERY separate - in fact - Police violence has incentivised a lot of violence in criminals

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@RationalMadman

5% or more.

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@Theweakeredge

That's why the departments are specialised, so that what others lack expertise at, the others step in and assist with.

FBI does deal with the general population, it's CIA who doesn't.

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@RationalMadman

Uhuh - swat, that's almost it - they are not specialized enough -FBI are not the ones mainly dealing with Citizens, the police are, and the police lack any department specifically for riot control that is properly trained or field-psychologists that help mentally-ill people - they lack fundamental processes that would be best translated into separate units, with the entire idea that there should be a "guard" being scrapped, as its sole point - deterrence and capture of criminals - is doing more harm than good

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@Sum1hugme

Also, within the FBI there are several distinct specialisations, one being what the standard agent is; literally it is called 'agent'.

You have:

Agent

Profiler

Explosives expert

Negotiation expert (work closely with profilers but specialise in negotiating with criminals in emergencies whereas profilers specialise in long-term, slow and deep reads on criminals).

Then you have the undercover specialists. Any agent can be undercover but the undercover specialists are specially trained in acting skills, rivalling the average professional actor in fact.
Then you have the IT technician (often could just as easily work for NSA).

The final category is director/leader, who began as other types.

You do have FBI-dedicated medics but you can't truly call them a branch of law enforcement.

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@RationalMadman
@Theweakeredge

That's kind of where my mind went. Like swat. Or dea

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@Theweakeredge

There are already specialised cops and equivalent agencies to the general police departments, especially in the US.

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@Sum1hugme

People often conflate abolish and defund - and the two certainly don't connect necessarily - you could defund the police to the point that they were abolished, but that likes saying cutting and eradicating are the same because you cut something until it was eradicated" do you see what I mean? Defund means to lower the funding that something gets - not what everybody thinks it is.

now me personally - I would argue that we ought to abolish the police and replace it with much more specialized task forces, kinda like a hospital has different nurses and doctors for different types of injury - anywho - that is distinctly separate from this debate, they are often correlated in the eyes of the public, but it is not always the case. To critique this resolution, I would make it: Resolved: The US Government ought to significantly defund the police

Lowering by how much? This is way too easy for Pro to play semantics with.

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@Sum1hugme

That's "abolish the police" not "defund the police." I have noticed some comments on DART saying that defunding the police was the most idiotic idea ever. Let's see if anyone steps up.

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@Unpopular

Kind of, but it's much harder for con to argue against lowering police funding by a little, rather than against eliminating police funding. I'm not sure I disagree with a reduction in funding. But defunding (as per the definition I read), that seems extreme.

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@Sum1hugme

That seems unnecessary per the intro I already gave (you seemed to notice I was not arguing to take away all funding) but I did it. Are you interested?

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@Unpopular

The definition I read on lexico is, "prevent from continuing to receive funds". You should clarify your definitions to prevent confusion.

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@Sum1hugme

Defund means “to withdraw financial support from, especially as an instrument of legislative control.” Nobody has any issue with the word "defund" when people talk about defunding schools or defunding social programs. Is it really necessary I change the title of this debate? What part of my position is unclear to you based on the introduction I shared?

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@Unpopular

"defund" is not the same as "lowering funding".