This ⬇️⬇️

We need to fundamentally rethink policing and criminality in the United States. https://twitter.com/kwestsavali/status/1297746970996625409
We live in a world in which government law enforcement are, in many ways, allowed to murder citizens with impunity—this is particularly true when the victim is black.
This impunity comes in multiple forms.

1) Qualified immunity - police officers cannot be sued in civil court, entirely disempowering the families and communities of victims

2) Use of force standards - most policies allow for rapid and unaccountable escalation to deadly force
3) The power of police unions in shaping policy around police accountability law (see qualified immunity)

4) The cultural glorifying of police (particularly in media), making it politically difficult to take pro-accountability stances.
So, our government decides what of types behavior are acceptable and can then use force, sometimes deadly, to enforce.

Our government works for the rich, the powerful, the white, the male. This leads to many laws that criminalize poverty and blackness. See ⬇️⬇️
Panhandling law, drug law, cash bail, truancy law, immigration law, ID requirements, private probation, public “indecency”

We need to fundamentally rethink our policing and criminal justice systems.
We need to #defundthepolice and fund social and community programs that help alleviate the CAUSES of crime as well as funding the training of those to handle emergency situations in productive ways.

We need to #abolishprisons and open mental health and rehabilitation centers.
This thread doesn’t touch on many very significant and connected topics: democracy reform, internalized racism, racial capitalism, slavery, etc
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