Police Brutality
Levar Burton shares his experience being stopped by police.
Word of warning:
A black person describing their own experience uses the n-word in this clip. Please remember this is not a word for white folks to repeat, and the conversation about whether or not black folks should use it should be left to their own community. It is a slur used by white folks historically to describe and harm black folks. As a result it is not for white folks to have an opinion on, unless they are asking fellow white folks not to use the word.
Levar Burton shares what he does when stopped by police and what he taught his son to do.
We discussed 8 Can't Wait: 8 Laws/Reforms to ask police forces to enact to end police brutality. However we also discussed how in many cities these are not enough. It is not enough to adopt these practices in writing we must hold our cities accountable to them. Los Angeles has all 8 and yet still has many incidences of police brutality.
We discussed what the call to "Defund the Police" means. Pastor Maggie was clear that while a small minority do want a world without police, MOST people calling for defunding are actually asking for a re-allocation of funds to help support social services in the community that would prevent crime before it happens. This would be mental health funding, funding for housing, schools, after-school programs, jo
Finland and Utah have implemented experiments into simply providing homes for the homeless. Rather than attempting to treat all the other symptoms that come out of homelessness. While their solutions and implementation are not perfect they have found that this has been more effective AND more affordable than leaving people on the street. As a result less policing of the homeless is needed.
https://scoop.me/housing-first-finland-homelessness/
https://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459100751/utah-reduced-chronic-homelessness-by-91-percent-heres-how
This article explains how America's 3 largest Psychiatric facilities are jails. This highlights the need to reallocate funding from our Justice system into mental health care.
https://www.kcur.org/2018-04-30/insane-americas-3-largest-psychiatric-facilities-are-jails