I love how every acab post inevitably brings out a bunch of uninformed libs in the comments talking about how pigs are only bad in America (as though the term ACAB was invented in America…) or how a society without them is completely inconceivable. As though badges grow on trees, like police are just a natural thing that sprung out of the ground.
The primary function of the police is to protect private property and enforce eviction. They’re state agents who are allowed to use violence against working class people, and do so to prevent us from overthrowing the ruling class and redistributing wealth and the means of production. They protect class hierarchy. They attack protestors. They use state violence against the disenfranchised and the marginalized. The “just doing their job” of the police is to protect and preserve the unequal distribution of power in society. They do so by using violence against the working class. The rest of anything else they do is a small fraction of their job and entirely secondary to their primary functions.
When there’s a power vacuum, gangs even worse than the police tend to fill it. Don’t get me wrong, the entire U.S. criminal justice system is rotten to the core, and causes large amounts of pointless suffering. BUT, there needs to be some sort of “police” to enforce the laws of society (and ideally, all those laws would be just). Even the Zapitistas had a form of police.
Also, I find “ACAB” cringe inducing. Sounds like something an edgy 14 year old came up with. And I’m not sure focusing on individuals (cops) instead of the institution itself is helpful.
ACAB as an acronym began in the early 20th century by workers who were striking in the UK. It is a term with a long, complex history behind it. Cops are the institution, so I’m not sure what you mean by individuals. Every member of the police force, from the top down, is a bastard. Every single one. There’s no exceptions to this. The very nature of law enforcement is being a bastard. It is a term that is meant literally. Law enforcement functions as a means to break strikes, to enforce private property and ownership of the means of production, to enforce rent and evictions, to terrorize the impoverished and the marginalized, to collect menial tax from the impoverished who cannot fight back against them, and above all else to act as the legal arm of state violence against working class people.
Individual cops may have done good actions. I’m sure there’s a cop out there who’s volunteered at a soup kitchen, sure. But that has nothing to do with him being a cop. That has nothing to do with the actual role he fulfills in day to day life, with the violence he enacts, with the system he supports.
The idea that police are holding back some tidal wave of horrifying crime is and has always been propaganda. Nearly every single woman I know has been a victim of sexual harassment or violence at some time in their lives, including myself. A lot of them have gone to police before. I don’t know a single person for whom that did literally anything good for them. I know 1 woman who was harassed literally across the country by people including police officers who said she was lying. The police don’t prevent murder. They don’t prevent violence of any kind that’s literally not their job. More often than not they are the ones committing acts of violence for which there are no repercussions.
I still find ACAB cringe inducing, and a bad slogan, but that’s an interesting origin I did not know about. I agree with most of what you’re saying.
I think the phrase “All Cops Are Bastards” seems to focus on cops/people, and not the institution of policing. I’m not sure if it’s effective messaging or not. Maybe it helps with striker or protestor solidarity, IDK.
I think police hold back organized crime (currently, in the U.S.). They maintain a “monopoly on violence.” I think if all police suddenly disappeared, other gangs would quickly take over the job. I.e. forcing people to pay them for “protection,” and stuff like that. This currently happens in many parts of world, and has happened in the U.S. in the past, so I don’t think it’s some far-out idea. As bad as the system currently is, I think a mafia or cartel controlling things would be worse. U.S. police, generally, don’t engage in racketeering or execute you without a trial (it does happen, but is not generally the case).
Don’t get me wrong, I think the current system is evil too, and it needs to be torn down and rebuilt in a radically different way. I agree with thr concept that police currently function mostly to protect capital and the ruling class, and are, themselves, a gang of sorts. But, I think a society will always need to maintain some kind of “police” to remove people who cause harm to others (who would then be rehabilitated, if possible).
I mean, it’s not a slur, but an insult? Sure. Liberals are not allies to leftists, and actively support the same systems we seek to dismantle.
Liberals are not allies to leftists
They can be. Using traditional definitions, the Liberal / Authoritarian axis is orthogonal to the left / right axis
actively support the same systems we seek to dismantle.
Who are we? Poor non cops?
What are we putting in place of the dismantled system? Anarchy? Different cops? Something else?
Because liberalism has failed.
The book argues that liberalism has exhausted itself, leading to income inequality, cultural decline, atomization, nihilism, the erosion of freedoms, and the growth of powerful, centralized bureaucracies.
Lemmy is a bit further left than center. And most liberals tend to fall around the center to center right.
Most people on the left don’t like liberals because in their desire to be “the adult in the room” by dismissing anything more radical than the status quo, they get in the way of people trying to bring forth important change. As an activist, it’s not very fun to see someone take a milquetoast centrist position and call you radical while continuing to uphold the status quo that we are peotesting against while claiming to despise the status quo. These liberals, though often well meaning, end up being the great stumbling block to freedom MLK was talking about.
From the perspective of the left, if you see someone who is making it harder to make necessary change (ex: ending the war on gaza, stopping police violence/police abolition, being a cop, etc) is a pretty nasty sight.
Is lib a slur? No, but it’s certainly an insult, and it’s aimed at people who aren’t used to being called out for their political positions by someone who isn’t conservative.
Also, as an anarchist, I find it fun to lib bash every once in a while :3
The rich love to make liberal a slur. Because to be liberal means you’re against tyrants. So now with more divided factions their minions can exert more power
Do you really think all cops are bastards or is it like a easy thing to type instead of “corrupt cops are bad” or something?
These people have such an oversimplified view of the world that there’s no reasoning with them. They can’t comprehend that people would join law enforcement for any other reason than denying people civil rights.
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be a police officer out of truly caring about and wanting to improve your community. Sadly what happens is those good meaning people are the minority and there are countless cases of them being harassed and outed, sometimes even assassinated, by the bad cops who are the majority.
When you have an entire occupation, in every state, doing shady shit, killing bystanders, killing innocents, even killing the people they were sent to help, it is a huge problem that can not be ignored. They act without consequences and it needs to stop.
Good cops are awesome. I love good cops. I wish them the best and hope they make it home safe.
If you want to truly care and help people, be a firefighter. Be a medic. Get into the mental health industry. Feed people. Teach. Build. There are near infinite ways to help people, that don’t involve walking around the city dressed, literally, to kill.
Violent crimes consistently trend down. We actually don’t have too many people randomly killing others. When we do, it’s a big fucking event, that could have probably been avoided entirely with some more of those mental health people I mentioned before. BEST case, a cop does something after blood has been spilled.
At best a cop thinks they want to help people, and thinks the best way to do that is with violence.
Bizarre.
The fact that anyone can say “all” this is that speaks to such a misunderstanding of their reality.
It’s like choosing to refuse certain lengths of the spectrum. How many years are they going to force themselves to live colorblind?
Seems like you are trying to oversimplify their world view so you don’t have to question your own.
All. Because the ones who aren’t corrupt fucks either look the other way, or try to report the bad ones and get bullied off the force.
You say “all” but I’m pretty sure you only mean the ones in specific countries. In most European countries they simply do their job and don’t have a negative connotation (apart from people getting angry when they have to pay fines for speeding / parking wrongly / etc.).
Requirements and training also are much harsher here.
Just assume anyone making a post on the internet in English is American, because they have the majority of the publicly discussed issues and post most of the English content.
You’ll be less confused and not lots people off by studying a “well aktchually” in where it’s not needed.
Woo, I disagree. I mean, statistically that can’t be true.
Do you have a proposed alternative to law enforcement?
Southern Occupation style military police detachment,
A soldier fresh out of bootcamp has more trigger discipline and de-escalation training than your typical blue bastard anyways, and the federal military answers to the federal government, so they can’t negotiate qualified immunity agreements or any of that shit, and their funding is already provided, so no quota meeting traffic ticketing.
There are all sorts of ways to make police less shit. Maybe police should not have the means and freedom to arbitrarily apply violence. It doesn’t take much imagination to think maybe acorn cop shouldn’t have a gun.
Sure, let’s start with not making armed thugs the first line of defense. Your average traffic cop, contrary to what the bastards will say, doesn’t need a gun. The presence of one only intensifies the situation.
Easy counterpoint: traffic stops are dangerous!
Counter to the counterpoint: they’re only dangerous because cops are jumpy. A person being pulled over for a traffic stop is being interrupted - UNDER THREAT OF STATE SANCTIONED VIOLENCE for what most likely boils down to either a speeding ticket or an excuse to ID the driver. Naturally someone in that situation may do something rash.
Wellness checks. Those are a big one, too. Glen’s suicidal, got his gun to his head? What should we do? Call 911 obviously! They’ll send out someone with some mental health training. A paramedic at least! What do you mean they sent out a jacked up jackboot who won’t stop shouting “drop your weapon”? He’s already got a gun pointing at his own head, what’s another gun do to help this situation?
I’m not a legal scholar. I don’t claim to have all of the answers, and honestly yes - an armed protection force is probably a necessity, from a societal safety standpoint, but they absolutely do not need to be the first line.
ALL cops are bastards, yes. It’s in the title.
Each and every cop could have chosen not to be a bastard. Some of them weren’t bastards when they started, but by the time they’ve been in it long enough to identify as a “cop” they’re a bastard. They are either actively participating in the system that the state uses to violently enforce their whims, or are complicit by virtue of continuing to perpetuate the establishment. Some of them, a vanishingly small minority, have the moral character to go back to not being a bastard, of they quit the police force, but until then, they cop, they bastard.
So in your perspective not all cops are bastards.
They may become bastards over time or may become a complicit part of the system, and if they decide not to be bastards, they may be kicked out, but at any time there are non-bastard cops
I agree. That’s what’s so silly about this taunt.
It is unproductive and exposes your unwillingness to deal with the complex reality.
Chanting an obviously incorrect slogan backfires pretty hard upon every utterance.
It sure is here.
Nope. The moment they’ve self identified as cop, they become bastard.
The slogan isn’t incorrect, you simply choose to look at the individual actions, which yes, CAN be good actions, whereas others apply it to the institution that is the police force. If you are a part of that force, you are complicit in being a bastard.
Were all the gestapo bastards? Or did some of them do a few good things while participating in MASSIVE amounts of state sanctioned violence?
ACAB isn’t about corruption, it’s about the fact that all police enforce all laws no matter how bad, as a condition of keeping their job.
That’s absurd on its face. Cops routinely look the other way in tons of minor civil code violations they don’t judge as damaging to society.
Cops have the discretion to enforce laws.
Some use that discretion poorly and they suck and some use that discretion well and they’re fine.
Discretion is just selective enforcement. Lots of people do a thing. But cops only think it’s damaging to society when the wrong kind of people do it. That thing might just be existing.
Maybe that punishment involves jail time, but more likely it means being harassed, or put in cuffs for a while but let off, or just be intimidated by a guy who can legally whisper “I fear for my life” into a body cam and then kill you.
ACAB means cops either participate in that system, do nothing to stop it, or try to stop it and get forced out.
Taaangent?
You asked about ACAB and got an answer about ACAB. This feels like a cope.
Hardly a tangent. If a cop is otherwise good, his simple existence within the establishment of “cop” is enabling the continued existence of that establishment, while also providing obfuscation for the shitbags, letting people like you say not all cops are bastards. In the famous words of Tim minchin, “if you cover for another mother fucker who’s a kiddy fucker the fuck you mother fucker you’re no better than the rapist” - replace “kiddy fucker” with any of the atrocities police are regularly known for.
The establishment is corrupt, you cannot be party to it and be innocent, period.
People always try to invoke “just a few bad apples” forgetting the rest of that phrase.
One bad apple spoils the bunch. Doesn’t matter if you’ve got a squad of Clark Kent boyscout types, the fact remains that if they can deal with even one Lex Luthor being a shitass in their uniform without actively trying to put a stop to that situation, they’re all suspect.
Normally it’s unreasonable to expect someone to stick their neck out just for the sake of doing the right thing alone, but these people menace society with military kit and weaponry under the premise that they’re the exception to that. They tell us all the time that it is their job to risk their lives to stop people from getting victimized, so it’s more than fair to judge them when they don’t hold themselves to the same standard when dealing with their own.
Sure, let me know if you see someone using that phrase.
I don’t follow your ensuing logic that because a cop could be corrupt you should treat them like they are corrupt.
“They’re all suspect”? Okay. So is everybody else.
But the presumption that they’re all corrupt or acab is silly and unrealistic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jswgEdJTrfU here’s a really famous guy using that phrase, though I will admit he’s got a few felonies under his belt.
PEB: Policing Enables Bastards
- Shorter
- Not literally wrong in case there’s a mountain town of thirty people with two cops on the force that have never covered for a corrupt cop
I don’t know in what shithole of a country you guys live to hate cops, but here they are just decent, helpful protectors they ought to be. Never ever met one single piece-of-shit-cop in my life. There surely are rotten apples, but that is due to being human, not being a cop. There is no field of anything where everything’s sunshine and lollipops. Maybe it’s a case of how you treat them? You know, like give respect, earn respect? That thing?
I was talking about real cops in more civilised countries. Not untrained us-american gun-monkeys. For the US my statement surely isn’t valid.
You know, I’ve also never personally had too bad of an encounter with a cop. I mean, I was falsely arrested once, but the cops were chill, only half of them had their guns pointed at me for no reason. They were just doing their job though, the others were all super chill!
No. Doesn’t matter. You see DAILY that people are victimized. Not just in the states, you can look through this very thread for accounts of other people from other countries with terrible stories.
The very system of the state giving some non-elected individuals sole legal authority to excise violence against their peers, even ostensibly to prevent crimes we all agree are crimes, creates a power dynamic that leads to all sorts of problems we see today.
There might be bad daily incidents here too. Sure. Even if it were 10, what about the tens of thousands of incidents where cops just were helpful and/or protective? Same like with plane-accidents. Millions don’t happen but the one that does makes the media.
I really don’t see the problems you do. Cops here are highly selected (a weekend full of assessments of all kind, physical, intellectual and psychological evaluation). From like 300 participants, 0-3 get chosen. Then follows 3 years of training and regular checks. Not every country is like the USA which seems to recruit nutjobs and then give them a 2 week crash course.
But, for the sake of the argument: what is the alternative? No cops at all? What do you do if you’re in need of help? Elect cops? That already seems to work great with politicians /s
I’m not an expert on any of this. Just a caveat, I’m sure anything I propose will have it’s share of flaws.
State law enforcement (men armed with guns apprehending private citizens) should be the LAST step. For in-the-moment intervention, cops are already useless - unless they happen to be on site already, whatever violence happen, will happen before they get there. There’s no good answer to stopping a determined violent individual, short of empowering people to defend themselves and others around them.
I think there’s always going to be some level of violent crime. Some people simply don’t function the same way. For these people, we clearly need some kind of active response force. It’s use should be limited, based on hard fact and actual threat to civilian life. We also clearly need some kind of (humane) separation for people who cannot or will not rehabilitate, people who cannot be reintegrated into our society. These are two of the only acceptable uses of state violence, in my opinion.
I don’t know the exact way it would look, but I’d like to see a move towards communities looking after themselves and those around them, in all aspects, and this includes safety and security.
Unfortunately, for property crimes, the only way to actually enforce property ownership is through violence, either direct threat of violence (break my shit and I’ll end you), or state violence (break my shit and the state will send armed men to apprehend you unless you reimburse me). We have to determine what level of property security versus violence we seem acceptable. I tend to fall a bit more extreme towards violence not being okay to protect property - I don’t think there’s a single piece of property worth killing or maiming an individual over. Thus, if the only way to protect property is this level of violence, I believe it is wrong to intervene. I don’t believe it is right for the individual to intervene, and I don’t believe it is right for the state to intervene. The sad truth is that most of what the police force does now is enforce these types of crimes.
“did you used to be”
Followed by a quip about an IQ score. Something something glass houses…
Hell yeah brother, no guns no police!! Hold up someone just stole my car and is extorting my family… Someone help plz :(
yeah, if there’s no cops around who’s gonna show up 4 hours late and shoot my dog after I report a robbery??
Is your dog on a leash or put in a kennel? Why are you reporting a robbery? You don’t need the police man!
Because cops routinely get anywhere in time to stop a crime. That’s one of the biggest flaws with the ‘cops make safe’ argument. They only work as a deterrent to crime if they’re actually there right when the crime happens. The only time they show up with any expediency is when there’s money to be protected.
Also, victim blame more.
Hold up someone just stole my car and is extorting my family
Someone like the police
Police are largely a gang of thugs, they serve Capital, not people.
Solving root causes makes police far less important.
So what do you propose for solving root causes and enforcing regulations? You have a Disney movie I could watch?
Expanding social programs and employing social workers instead of police for mental health crisis events.
Crime happens because of poverty and desparation for the most part, not because some people are born evil.
Socialism would eliminate the biggest sources of poverty.
I mean, most individual crime comes from poor socioeconomic conditions. People don’t feel the need to steal shit, for instance, if they aren’t starving. Scarcity (be it real, physical scarcity of goods, or a perceived scarcity in, say, opportunity) creates motive for crime. Reduce scarcity, reduce crime.
More Zach Snyder;
Marxists argue that the economic system of capitalism itself causes crime. The whole system is based on the exploitation of the working class by the ruling class, leading to the ever-increasing wealth of one class and ever-increasing poverty of the other. source
