Debate:If "all cops are bad", what should replace them?

This is a Debate page. Feel free to add your own spin on the story. Please keep it civil! This debate was created by Blake Gripling.

Proposition

A LOT has been said about law enforcement in the past decade, especially in light of the George Floyd murder and subsequent civil protests. An increasing number of people have called for either defunding police departments or even abolishing the system outright, opining that they are corrupt to the core and no amount of "good cop, bad cop" arguments can save an already tainted system, especially in America where long-standing controversies of racial profiling and brutality against minorities are rife even to this day (even when a portion of LEOs are from the same groups who are vulnerable to such atrocities themselves), and that any and all popular portrayals in media are immediately tarred as "copaganda", even otherwise innocuous children's shows such as PAW Patrol where a police dog character named Chase was the centre of controversy.

If the concept of policing is bad and therefore must be eradicated, who and what should replace them? Some have argued in favour of things like "drug legalization, regulation, and harm reduction instead of the policing of drugs" and extensive societal reform, but at what cost? How would society transition from a system that's so ingrained in our lives yet is deemed by some as an archaic if not barbaric way of keeping people in check? Not to mention that some jurisdictions such as in Germany have programs in place to keep their LEOs from screwing themselves up unlike their 'murican counterparts, in particular orientations towards anti-racism and constantly reminding them that they're not Nazis. Similarly in Iceland, when a suspect was killed in the 2013 Árbær shooting, the police there reportedly expressed regret over what was an unprecedented killing; Iceland enjoys its status of one of the safest places in the world, attributed to its well-structured society and small population, alongside other Nordic countries (save for some cranks in Norway, Sweden and the like), and yet they do have at least a nominal police force to keep things in check more or less. That being said, the city-state of Singapore also enjoys a low crime rate, but we all know how it gained the dubious reputation as "Disneyland with a death sentence".

• Bumped in hopes of driving further discussion. Blakegripling ph (talk) 02:50, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't pretend to have all the answers, as I believe such a proposition would require a ton of experimentation to see what would succeed, but the first thing we can do is start reinvesting in social infrastructure that was torn down in the 80s and 90s. The police used to not be the ones you'd call if someone was having a mental crisis, and for many good reasons. Homelessness too shouldn't be an issue dealt with by the police, although way too many local elites are all too happy to call on some trigger happy cops to "deal with" undesirables in their midst.

Liberia actually gave cash and therapy to criminals, and it went a long way towards reducing shootings and other violent crimes. (See here.) This can be easily explained by the fact that a lot of crime is economic in nature, so if you give people the support they need they're much less likely to commit crimes. This goes back to the reinvesting in social infrastructure thing. There are also "mobile crisis teams" that some municipalities are using instead of the police to respond to crises, although there is an understanding among them that if they are overwhelmed to call the cops. Making police much more accountable to the community can also go a long way in harm reduction.

Also an argument can be made that the police don't even really "work" as advertised. Look at the number of solved crimes that target minority communities versus white communities. There's a marked difference. The police are also not at all obligated to "protect and serve." Their job isn't to protect the public, but to "enforce the law."

This also entails critically analyzing what "enforcing the law" actually entails, like asking who actually benefits from the police, or whose interests is enshrined into law and which the police enforce. It's certainly not yours or mine, we have little effect on public policy. However, money talks, and money can and does affect policy. So a common argument is that police don't protect the public, they protect the interests of property.

There has been plenty of literature written on this subject already, and there is active research going on into police abolition. So I think you'll find a lot more insightful answers there than anything written here on RationalWiki. Still, with that in mind, given everything I've written above, I would go attack this issue on multiple fronts personally. There doesn't need to be an absolute replacement all at once all or nothing sort of deal. I would argue that we should research alternative means in dealing with social deviancy, of which there are already promising avenues, make the police more accountable to the community, and invest in social infrastructure that make the police unnecessary in a lot of situations. Carthage (talk) 03:09, 21 August 2024 (UTC)

I'd also like to mention how LEOs in the Philippines have also been subject to scandals, like when a torture chamber with a roulette called "Wheel of Torture" was reportedly discovered in Laguna, allegedly for the officers to satisfy their lust for schadenfreude. The police procedural teleserye by ABS-CBN entitled Ang Probinsyano was accused by the now-defunct CNN Philippines of being copaganda, not helping matters was the rather unhinged brutality the series' protagonist committed against a major villain in the show's finale. ^{— Unsigned, by: Blakegripling ph / talk / contribs}

This argument is hopelessly americocentric. And even if it weren't - seriously - "all cops?" even "all American cops?"

If sensible responses are expected then the premise should start with some kind of defensible proposition.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 15:10, 23 August 2024 (UTC)

Cops enforce a system. If the system is bad, then by virtue of enforcing that system the cops who enforce that system are bad. It's a systemic, not individual, critique. Quibbles like this miss the point. Carthage (talk) 21:03, 23 August 2024 (UTC)

That's absurd. What if the system is "good"? Then "All cops are good?". The logic here is hopeless.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 18:40, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

Would you prefer if it the OP said "if the police as an institution are irredeemable, and should be replaced, what should replace them?" Notice the question wasn't "are the police 'bad' or not," but "if the police are bad, what should replace them. Carthage (talk) 20:27, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

That would be better - though it would better to confirm the hypothetical before talking about solutions.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 05:57, 27 August 2024 (UTC)