Do you know how narrative works? Because we’re going to get a hard lesson in narrative.
The George Lloyd murder and subsequent widespread protests against police brutality. For the record, I am in full support of all of these peaceful protests; but reject any and all violence and vandalism/looting. Two wrongs don’t make a right.
The calls for reform to American policing (and elsewhere) are strong; and justified. The increased militarism of some forces, lack of proper training – especially de-escalation, added with some long standing failures of civic and government leaders to address long standing poverty and racial inequality issues has led to this moment. Again.
Lo and behold: #defundpolice.
I’ll just remind readers that I am fully in favour of policing reforms; every community large and small deserves a well trained police who maintain the peace and are active in their communities. We’re not there yet. A militaristic approach to peaceful protesters is a warm breath away from the Banana Republics we’re all pretending we’re opposed to. I didn’t see any riot police or national guard patrol or harass crowds gathered to demand hair cuts. (covid19)
But, “defund police”?
Here we get to a serious divide between rational left, and stupid-left. To take the hashtag at face value, some are arguing that police forces be abolished and their funding be wiped from budgets. Surely that’s not what they mean, right? Well not exactly, its a meme around ‘police reform’.
Cool. So why didn’t you say so?
Because on cue, opponents of the left have seized the moment and now argue that THE DEMOCRATS want to abolish police by defunding it. Its false, and Joe Biden has been forced to pivot to deny that narrative.
But you can guess who’s gonna run with it.
Donald Trump.
Of course he is. He’s trying to pin the Democrats and Joe Biden *as* ANTIFA, who now want to abolish police forces in America; risking the health and safety of Americans..it might work.
What some Canadian bloggers and far left activists don’t get is that the layers of Canadian political themes don’t apply in America. The NDP and Green Party of Canada have no parallel in America. Democrats would position themselves just right of the Liberal Party of Canada and Republicans would be somewhat right of the Conservative Party of Canada. NDP/GPC would be off the map. So attaching our narratives to the American political realm is out to lunch.
I hope that the lions share of voters dismiss this as a stunt. There are consequences to having Trump in office for another four years; one of them being a further militarization of police, crushing of first amendment freedoms to state a couple risks. Joe Biden is a flawed candidate to be sure, just like Hillary Clinton was; and as flawed as the Barack Obama Presidency. But the shortcomings and flaws of Biden et al, are far superior to Trump *delivering* on his agenda.
Weaken Biden means to Elect Trump.
my2bits
The view from Pete 