someone just asked me about an abolitionist view on justice for Breonna Taylor’s killers, so I am gonna say what I said to them publicly as well in case it’s helpful (I know lots of people are talking/thinking about this rn)

YES, Breonna deserves justice. We should never stop pushing for that. But what will arrest do? What kind of justice does the carceral system serve? It’d punish these already violent men into a system designed to further squash everyone’s humanity who enters it.

Plus, as someone else on here said (sorry I cannot find the exact tweet!) - these individuals aren’t the source of the problem. They made those choices, they shot those bullets, but they have the power of the police behind them. Policing itself is also her murderer

So to push for justice is to push for accountability for these men - I would personally like to see them not just fired but never able to get another police or private security job again - yes, absolutely

But to push for justice for Breonna is to also keep pulling down the whole system that killed her. Pushing for abolition itself. Modeling a better world in which what happened to her - what has happened to so many people - never happens again

(not to mention that cops get special treatment that often explicitly holds up racist hierarchies in jail, as @jolenestarshine says) https://abcnews.go.com/US/minority-jail-officers-barred-guarding-cop-charged-george/story?id=71370624

Anyway I am just sharing this because I hope it is helpful in some small way? I hope everyone has a good night

(Also I just want to say this is a quick tweet thread about a bigger-picture view; it is meant to provide a different angle than the carceral, individual-punitive lens we’re all so used to looking through)