Police in the U.S. kill between 400 and 1000 people every year; meanwhile, the number of what the FBI calls “Law Enforcement Officers Feloniously Killed” averaged 51.1 per year from from 2004-2013.
The number of people killed by the police in the U.K. between 2004 and 2014? 23.
Crime and violence in the U.K. and the U.S. aren’t strictly comparable–after all, far more Americans die violent deaths than do Brits. But what if we tried an experiment?
What if, instead of buying armored vehicles, sniper rifles, and camouflage uniforms for our police, we decided to call an armistice? What if we decided to emulate the British, and disarmed the police?
Crime might spike.
On the other hand, we might create a dramatic change in relations between people and police.
We might find people confronted by police officers whose primary tools are persuasion and discussion, not stun grenades, tear gas, and Glocks, would see that the police need help from the public.
We might find that the police, stripped of their arsenal, would take a kinder, gentler, and more respectful attitude towards people.
We might find that such a police force would attract more men and women for whom policing is about building communities that regulate themselves peacefully; we might find that such a force would repel those for whom the power of the gun and the badge are symbols of power and privilege.
We might discover that a police force can be a force for citizenship and for the polity. We might discover that we can rebuild the community and the trust that the overweening power of the police have helped destroy.
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