One of the Black Lives Matter leaders commented that to solve this problem of racism and racial profiling leading to unfair treatment of blacks by police officers we need more community based policing. Sure, that makes sense, but could that really solve the problem? In the past it has cleaned up crime, but it has also led to the capture of more criminals and thus, a larger jail and prison population. Still, there has been a bit of research on this topic and I’d like to point out a very smart book to read on this subject, the book is:
“From The War On Poverty to the War On Crime” by Elizabeth Hinton, Harvard University Press, Boston MA, 464 pages, May 2016, 978-0674737235. By the way there is a great YouTube Video with the author done by the CSPAN TV Book Review Program, I definitely recommend it and then read the book after viewing it.
In the book, Elizabeth Hinton reminds us of the romantic notion of having the police live in the district, community that they are policing. We all believe this is smart policy, but rarely used in our modern American society – why? If it works, why aren’t we doing this? Fact is; in many cities across the United States we already are. Indeed, the City of Baltimore does, and yet, they still had a huge issue there with the shooting of a black man, while running away from police. This book and the recommended philosophy of community policing is also directly apropos to the Dallas Shootings and the pot boiling over on race-relations – policing robotics – gun control – Black Lives Matter protests.
Question remains; if community policing is the key, then why have a top down Federal Government set of guidelines and Federal Government intervention every time someone claims that a shooting was racially-based and for no reason. If we have community based policing, shouldn’t it be the community that gets to decide, not the media or the Federal Government?
Yes, it is true, I offer more questions than solutions, but these are the tough questions that we need to ask before we allow the Administration, or the media to blow events out of proportion causing more protests, that lead to more riots, more vandalism, more shootings and more racial tensions in this great nation. I ask that you please consider all this and think on it.