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Comment by BitwiseFool | Hacker News Reader

>"I'm glad some precincts burned down last summer. I'm glad a bunch of cops quit, and the ones remaining are all on edge, maybe negative reinforcement works on them too xD"

Be careful what you wish for.....

Edit: You may hate the cops, but do you really think that mobs will be more accountable than the police?

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> Edit: You may hate the cops, but do you really think that mobs will be more accountable than the police?

Considering cops currently face accountability that approaches 0, yes.

I just don't how see burning down precinct buildings leads to anything better. A controversial opinion, it seems.

It's not the burning that directly leads to something better. It's more like a natural consequence caused by failing to adequately address people's need for something better; people who feel powerless in their quest for justice will treasure morsels of that justice whereever they can get it, such as direct attacks on the public institutions suppressing them.

The good that can come from it is motivation: it's more clear than ever that gradual reform is not occurring, and something has to change at a fundamental level. Enabling people to get justice civilly will sharply reduce the number of people resorting to incivility.

Well, it may not be the most constructive way of dealing with police abuses, but it's one of the vanishingly few consequences police have faced for their malfeasance and unfettered violence.

I don't follow; what need the gp be careful of?

(I do see the post is now flagged but presume that's users disagreeing & abusing the flag button as it's within guidelines; I see what users may disagree with but still don't see what they should be "careful" about)

I copied/quoted the part from the GP that stood out to me. I was just gobsmacked that the GP was glad precincts were burned down. I'm weary of mob and vigilante "justice".

Ah; the edit makes more sense.

We're each entitled to our own perspective, but fwiw, I think you'll struggle to find any cohort less accountable than the police. Whereas "the mob", being traditionally a phrase used broadly by established powers to derogate the opposition, is almost by definition always the cohort held most to account in any given situation.

Furthermore, perhaps one of the biggest false assumptions many seem to have about abolition movements is that there isn't reasoned proposals for (existing or new) accountable institutions to fill potential voids left by abolition.

Understandable. I'm coming at this from a "violence begets violence" perspective and my fear is escalation.

I agree. I've just seen evidence of police being the primary source of escalation too many times.

> You may hate the cops, but do you really think that mobs will be more accountable than the police?

To the currently politically powerful who disproportionately control what is done by government, no.

To people on the other side of that power imbalance? Well, who do you think the mobs are, and why do they use that mechanism instead of the formal political system to attempt to impose accountability?

Obviously, not a desirable durable state of affairs, the desirable condition is to resolve the power imbalance in the formal systems. But if you can't convince those who control those systems that the systems they control will be forcibly rendered irrelevant if the imbalance in them persists, that is unlikely.

But those who are powerless can also suffer at the hands of the mob. In fact, they're more likely to do so than the powerful are.

USA police have shot and killed roughly a thousand people a year for many decades. Over that time period three police have been convicted of murder. [0] I can't imagine a less accountable mob. If nothing else, a greater percentage of any mobile vulgus would feel guilty and turn themselves in.

[0] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/police-officers-convicte...

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