Defunding Police not working out.

[onlinebiker]

I like this idea. It's not like saying "just educate a bunch of rookies and they'll stay beat cops forever." Long enough in the system , they move up the ladder, yeah? So the police chiefs and lieutenants will become those with that education too.

I was watching a thing about this police psychologist who talked about the damaging cycles of building pressure that cops get into. Where they get a rush from working the streets and find trouble relating to things at home. So they work more, in this high threat environment every day, never getting down time because going home and doing domestic stuff feels like a depression of the rush from work. But if they don't get that down time, that high alert mindset builds and builds until they start having stress and trauma responses, making mistakes.

If police officers were educated to understand the psychology of those they deal with, it would extend to understanding what is going on inside themselves and recognizing what they themselves need. I think that cycle sounds addicting and not a lot of people have tools to break down what is going on inside nor having any solutions to fix it.

An adjunct to this might be to restrict cops to dealing with things that require cops, and have social workers deal with the rest. I don't really see the need to send out a car and two cops with guns, batons, tasers, pepper spray, and body armour to deal with a homeless person sleeping on a bench. Maybe it would be better to reserve them for things like active shooter situations and robberies in progress.

Boru

Your solution SOUNDS good....

But......


In the real world?


Cops will tell you - rightly so - that the most dangerous calls they have been on SEEMED like not much at all till things went sideways in a big way in a big hurry.

You are putting a SHITLOAD of pressure on dispatchers - who frequently have an incomplete, unclear view of the situation. This isn' t TV with a script you get to follow.

What WILL happen is your social workers will get sent into what turns out to be a rather lopsided firefight. 
Keep in mind - with budget restraints being what they are - when you take on MORE social workers - you are going to have that many less cops. When the shit hits the fan - you might not have enough armed cops to help out. Or you could send in more targets....errr... social workers....



It' s the advantage of all cops being armed.