I got this from Earl, who asked for comments.
In a nutshell?
There are only a couple of populations you can ask this of without getting laughed out of office. Black people, and Native Americans.
This is not a coincidence.
Some might think this a rational policy, and some might even prefer it…in fact from what I understand Philly cops have been on a tear lately. But policing is a service that is supported by citizen tax dollars. Many of us are already paying school taxes AND sending our children to private school. Now you want us to pay taxes for police AND do their jobs without deputization, without arms, and without pay?
You’ve got to be kidding me.
I’m 43. Adults in my neighborhood used to “regulate” the area by keeping neighborhood kids and their friends in check.
I see nothing wrong with this at all.
i used to give my boys rides home every now and then. doesn’t mean that me and my 77 thunderbird should take the place of the bus system.
To go along with your bus analogy, think of it as the Montgomery bus boycott. People acted as the public bus line until things got straight.
I’m with you Dr. Spence. The state has the monopoly on security in the public square. If it can’t or won’t produce then the state is irrelevant and you’re left with street justice and its subsequent hazards. This addresses only enforcement and not the cause of most crime.
“until things got straight.”
this is the type of language that obscures. What things needed to be straight? Who got them straight? What means did they use?
Answering these questions should reveal that the Montgomery bus boycott is probably the very last analogy that the police thing should be compared to.
A you said the police get paid to protect and to serve. If the police need more help, recruit more police. Community involvement is critical for every community to be safe. It’s the level of community involvement that I question in Philly. There is a need a need for structural community change in neighborhoods and communities within Philly. It won’t happen the citizens patrols. Citizen patrols have been tried in large and small urban communities in the past. with limited success.
As you said,
In this case, if kids/teens were being destructive, hanging out where they should not be hanging out, and doing small time crimes, people in the neighborhood handled it with a stern talking to, taking it to the parents to handle, and sometimes making those caught fix something they broke.
I am at a loss here. I don’t understand.
Suppose he asked for “block watches”. What’s the difference?
Ed, you’re moving back and forth and I believe that is causing more confusion to you. What does “until things got straight” mean in the context of the bus boycott? I think you’d understand if you fleshed out your statement in regards to the analogy that you provided rather than shifting back to the crime thing.
I’m sorry.
When the bus system in Montgomery did let Blacks sit in the front, after prompting, the Black community walked or carpooled to get to where they were going. Those who carpooled, temporarily, took place of the bus system as far as Blacks are concerned.
You’ve got to be kidding me.
On the one hand, I agree with your initial reaction, and for that reason, I have stayed on the sidelines, as I presume you have. Perhaps as a compromise, you would support a “million man march” to police headquarters once a month to ratchet up the pressure on them to do their job.
But I am beginning to rethink all this, partly due to my empty nest. When the kids were at home, my focus was what they were doing, there whereabouts, who they socialized with, and hoped everyone made it home as intact as they left home each day. They are now on there own and hopefully know what to do, so now I can take a wider view of the world around me.
Not only is it not like the world of my youth, it isn’t even like the world of my children’s youth, and they are in their twenties. The most alarming difference is the violence where so many young people are victim and perpetrator. I realize that crime rates are cyclical, and given time, it will decline, so it is simple to conclude that doing something won’t make that much of a difference incrementally than doing nothing.
I also understand the need to do something. It is somewhat of an indictment of black men to say we need to take it to the street, but as we know, a large swath of black men aren’t really plugged in with their children, and if we are honest about it, there has been a lot of social disfunction, manifesting itself in crime and violence. I was responsible for “policing” my son, but some of his friends didn’t have “a dick” to sweat them. So I did open myself to them on a low level.
On some level, a 10k patrol is needed. I just don’t know if I am comfortable to be on patrol.
Spence. If you ever find yourself in Bed-Sty, Brooklyn, head over to the Satmar Hassidic Jewish section across the street (Park Avenue & Nostrand) from the projects where Mos Def grew up.
The whole place is an oasis of peace. The place is constantly patrolled by Hassidic men and if you car ever should break down anywhere in their quite extensive neighborhood (as mine did a few years ago) it won’t be but two minutes until a friendly neighborhood wacth van will show up in order to inquire “how they can help you”. Satmar kids, and the got A LOT of ’em play peacefully in front of their houses.
Traditionally the function of the police in the black neighborhoods has been to police the black population, and not the criminal elements. If you live in a black neighborhood, you KNOW, usually by name, who the criminal elements are. So do the police. Nonetheless, our homegrown terrorists are allowed to run amok.
Black men patrolling our streets is not a bad idea at all.
[quote]Many of us are already paying school taxes AND sending our children to private school. Now you want us to pay taxes for police AND do their jobs without deputization, without arms, and without pay?[/quote]
Let me frame your statement as you have put it:
THE BLACK COMMUNITY in Philadelphia should focus its FIGHT ON GETTING THE POLICE to make the BLACK MALES that THEY HAVE RAISED to stop KILLING BLACK PEOPLE in the City of Philadelphia!?!?!? The NERVE of this 10000 man group to ask the BLACK COMMUNITY to participate in saving the lives of THEIR OWN COMMUNITY without pay!
**********
When the cops:
* Arrest Black males – they are said to be running a conspiracy to benefit the Prison Industrial Complex
* Crack down on illegal guns – the people arrested carrying these guns are said to be victims of the gun manufacturers scheme for profit.
This community MANAGEMENT initiative is a good start. It is clear that a change in the assumptions applied during the formative years of these young people who are spreading the violence needs to be addressed.
Michael your comments here are on point. I do not however believe that what Hasidic Jews do in Brooklyn should serve as any type of model for what black people should do in places like Philly or Detroit.
I’ve never said a word about gun manufacturers. I do believe that the police have not traditionally helped black communities…again Fisher is correct here.
But there are two assumptions at work in this initiative that remain problematic for me.
1. The roots of crime committed by blacks are outside of the system.
2. Blacks do not deserve the full benefits of citizenship.
This occasion represents an opportunity to engage in a real discussion about extending the limits of black citizenship. I am all for new modes of conflict resolution that do the equivalent of teaching preventative health. But these resources could and should come from resources that Philadelphia citizens (which INCLUDE BLACK PEOPLE) spend in taxes.
As soon as this is couched either explcitly or implictly as “black crime” you in effect take the problem out of the realm of the political and economic and into the cultural/genetic.
Spence…
“the system”
A quick clarification, please. What is the nature of this system and how is anyone outside of it?
here “the system” means “the state”.
no one is ever outside of the state. BUT the problems of TWO specific communities (blacks and native americans) are often rhetorically placed outside of it. black crime then does not come from problems generated by or solvable by the state (either in part or solely) , but from problems generated or solvable ONLY by THEM.
dood, you the only who has couched any of this in terms of “Black crime”.
Increased levels of guardianship and accountability within the Black community are desirable irrespective of the motivating factors that precipitate the same.
ok, aside from eschewing cheeklocks, esoteric headgear, and peculiar aspects of kashrut law (though there may actually be some value in the esoteric headgear) what aspect of Hasidic community is not EMINENTLY WORTHY of appropriation and emulation?
What Michael spoke to is practical as hell and would elevate the quality of life for folks in any and all urban cores nationwide, not to mention elevating the quality and quantity of Black male interpersonal communion.
Craig, if this isn’t about “black crime” then why is the philly police chief calling on 10,000 black volunteers? why are you talking about guardianship in the black community if this isn’t about “black crime?”
This leads to a second set of questions about guardianship and accountability. How exactly does accountability work in this case? If a volunteer gets jacked in the course of trying to adjudicate a dispute, does he get benefits of some sort? If a volunteer jacks someone who isn’t guilty of a crime, what happens to that volunteer? I know what you mean when you talk about accountability in the abstract…but I don’t see how that is operationalized here.
There are all types of principles and values that can be taken from other communities or other situations. But it seems to me that there are some comparisons that are apt, and some that are not. Harold Cruse in PLURAL BUT EQUAL made I think the best argument for NOT comparing jews to blacks as far as economic development. He argued that they were very very small in comparison to blacks, and migrated to the most open part of the country (to the northeast as opposed to the deep south).
What Michael is talking about isn’t economic development but social development, so I’d add two things here. First is that the hasidic jews are marked as racially white. The second is that they are united by religion AND culture. Further they are extremely conservative.
Now let’s say we can get over the first two. I’m not sure how we get over the third.
autopoetically brah….,
bringing cats together to jawjack over simple scope and division of labor is a meritorious start. what you got in the opportunistic alternative?
First, how the hasidic jews are marked is irrelevant. that they function en masse is all that pertains to this question. That the chief of police and the mayor are giving carte blanche to the formation of civic militias has me straight sprung. If I lived in Philly, I’d be on this opportunity like cheese on a steak sandwich.
Spend some time with the CME’s, AME’s, and Missionary Baptists…., we’re EXTREMELY conservative and pragmatic in the main.
Spence, he System is a System of Racism/White Supremacy. Craig has another more refined name for it, but I forgot. It’s too fucking esoteric for me. I ain’t that smart. Seriously.
In any case, in such a system there is no such thing as “black crime”. Black folk neither manufacture the basic ingredients for the drugs sold in our communities nor do they manufacture 9mm and Glocks. That stuff is imported from the outside.
Crime is induced and encouraged to keep us confused and mistrustful of each other. That is why the Police does not act in a coherent manner to reduce criminal activity. If we can reduce the level of criminal activity, we’d be able to breathe and THINK a bit more clearly.
We agree that there is no such thing as “black crime.” There is only “crime.”
We also agree that the police has not and does not act in a way that reduces criminal activity.
Finally, we agree that the reduction of criminal activity is a worthwhile effort.
Where do you think we disagree?
That the public system of governance is even a minimally acceptable baseline of community governance standards on which we can or should depend.
You and P6 both have both been acting like that demonstrably lame-assed shit is jesus in a jug or something. Hands-down this is some of the most inexplicably passive receptive rhetoric issuing from Black partisan keyboards that I have ever witnessed….,
What does a private system of governance look like, and what makes it better than a public system of governance?
One version of it looks like the Columbia Home Owners Association and some like it for the limited government-like services it provides.
You asked, I answered.
I still don’t see the problem here. The police can’t stop a murder or a mugging or an assault. They always respond or not.
So you’re willing to backfill the system that’s causing the problem.
If Black folks have to do that, make it a real militia. That’s what they are calling for. If they aren’t armed and deputized they are being set up for failure.
And if the conflict resolution training they say they will provide will work for 10,000 Black men (who, incidentally, are NOT the ones calling for it) it will work for the cops.
Community watch programs can work. I don’t see why this is a bad idea. I just can’t see it.
I think we need to resurrect the term “Niggers”.
Ed, what does the Columbia Home-Owners Association do better than local goverment? Where does the local government support CHA activities?
DarkStar, 10,000 men is NOT a community watch. That’s a difference in kind, not a difference in degree. You need a vastly difference “c and c” system for 10,000 people than even 100 people.
They’re going to TRAIN 10,000 men? Effectively? How long will that take? How much will that COST?
This is a failure on purely practical grounds.
The Time has come. The Army is readying. The War is on. We need to launch a Petraeus-like surge of tens of thousands of Black men into each one of our neighbourhoods and put every gangsta parasite to flight. If the Sunni sheikhs can drive Al-Qaeda out of Anbar we can certainly sweep every Negro hoodlum off each street corner and out of every alleyway in our cities. Not only should we now encourage whistle-blowers to smoke out all the criminals who lurk in our midst but we should establish a Gestapo-like Black Mukhabarat that will develop precise intelligence on each and every crack-dealing & gun-slinging thug on our territory and then launch an Arrowhead Ripper-style blitzkrieg that will scorch the earth and lay waste to every one of these pant-sagging baboons with their “snitches get stitches” stupidities.
Crack?
Cripes, where you been the last ten years? Obviously not in any Black community…
Anyway, good luck with turning your stirring rhetoric in reality.
Xborg is from the UK.
“They’re going to TRAIN 10,000 men? Effectively? How long will that take? How much will that COST?”
The FOI can train them.
Then he has no knowledge of the facts on the ground over here. For this topic, I can ignore him because no matter how it turns out it doesn’t impact him. Might as well ask someone in Beverly Hills.
Then not only do I get to repeat the two questions you did not answer, I get to add one.
Who’s going to fund it?
The FOI had a contract to provide security for at least one public housing joint in New York. They did good work.
They do not have that contract now. When it was made public who the X-Men were, the contract was broken.
The FOI will not be funded by any government or government agency. You know that. Your alternative is direct support from the community…a private tax, in effect. Good luck with THAT, too.
“Your alternative is direct support from the community…a private tax, in effect.”
After Jam Master Jay was murdered I did the calculations with exactly this type of project in in mind. The income from one 40 city concert tour of Hip Hop and R&B artists would finance the whole venture.
“Then he has no knowledge of the facts on the ground over here.”
The black community in the UK has an incredible homicide problem. Manchester in particular.
Gangs are a major problem.
From what I understand there were also complaints that they were heavy handed in their use of force. Part of this is likely anti-NOI sentiment, but this gets to another question that I have already asked once. Let’s say they do have a funding source. What happens when one of the volunteers goes overboard? When you in effect privatize policing duties you remove accountability TOTALLY. What type of redress would a public housing tenet at the end of an FOI beatdown have access to?
(Fisher slipped by me.)
I’m not familiar with the Manchester issue, and would like more information. Do you have cites at the ready? I’m surprised given the severe limits placed on handguns in Great Britain. How are the homicides being committed?
Spence, are these people serious about this thing? If we raised the money, would we be able to get this thing going and bring in the FOI to train folks?
I got nothing to say about that for the same reason I ignore his stirring rhetoric.
Not enough info in that for me to make a judgment. I note, though, the implicit recognition that Philly can’t pull it off.
But like I said, good luck with that. Hell, I’d buy a ticket (as a gift…truthfully, the seat would be empty).
They shoot people in the UK, too. Illegal guns are easily obtained everywhere in the world, including the UK. You need to google the issuse. My info is a few years old.
The actual reason was they were said to be handing out anti-Semitic literature.
“I got nothing to say about that for the same reason I ignore his stirring rhetoric.”
Well, his rethoric aside, Xborg is good in researching stuff. I hink we need to challenge him to bring us the figures and facts as far as the UK is concerned.
But not in connection with this.
One of the real problems we have in solving problems is crossing shit up via boilerplate rhetoric instead of making a disciplined examination of the facts and options. Makes us spin out into all manner of shit that’s irrelevant to the topic at hand.
We’re getting better at avoiding that…your blog, Michael, presents real opportunities to fuck it up, yet you tend to hold it down proper-like (which is not a blanket endorsement of all the stuff that’s raised at Assault–no one should expect that from any of us). I really think the public nature of our blog discussions are helping force that, where past private mailing lists didn’t let in any air or light sometimes.
And this particular comment is another possible diversion, so I’ll let it go for now.
“One of the real problems we have in solving problems is crossing shit up via boilerplate rhetoric instead of making a disciplined examination of the facts and options. Makes us spin out into all manner of shit that’s irrelevant to the topic at hand.”
Well Xborg ain’t exactly one of my fans. He called me an intellectual twirp or midget or something like that. But he’s done some real interesting research on Farrakhan and presented it in a creative manner.
I guess I’m a a bit more tolerant of our seemingly out-there Brothers and Sisters, as they tend to think out of the box (such as your favorite, the Mayor of Blacktown and my favorite – truely – Cobb).
Besides, who am I to criticise? Plenty of folks think I’m a complete nut job.
I actually think that Xyborg’s comments are helpful in illuminating one of the clear problems associated with this issue, even though Xyborg isn’t on our side of the Atlantic. His language IS boilerplate rhetoric, but that’s often where we see how ignorant these options are.
Fisher, you noted that we needed to bring Nigger back.
When I first read this I thought about Chris Rock.
We know what happens when the police get the identification thing wrong, locking up or putting the beat down on innocent people because they look or act the wrong way.
What happens if we privatize the security force?
That would all depend upon the terms, conditions, and methods agreed to by the members of the neighborhood watch.
It’s funny to me that all the naysayers lack direct personal experience with this problem domain and have no organic connection to any similar activity in their own communities.
What an epidemic of Black commentators suffering that maleficent particularity in their psyches called Wiseacring….,
Craig you place a high value on interpersonal work and direct experience. I understand this. But this type of rhetorical move gets us far away from a discussion of theory in favor of pure practice. And I think that’s part of the problem we find ourselves facing.
Put another way. Are you suggesting that I have to smoke crack in order to be able to tell my children that smoking crack is a bad idea?
And even on the pure practice tip…on the topic…how are you going to train 10,000 people? What’s the command and control look like? How are you going to PAY for it?
Boilerplate ain’t cutting it.
wow Spence, I’ve never seen you bust an elementary fallacy before. coming from you magne, that’s some comedy gold…,
5-15 at a time. the same way we’ve trained them to use VMB for realtime crime watch calling. we do one neighborhood at a time, in fact, we’re starting a new one tonight.
tackling the problem space on the ground with a group of folks operating in good faith produces wonderful and unexpected emergent insight in how to break a problem up and solve it in manageable increments.
nayno from the armchair is a helluva drug P6 – it reminds me of that wallstreet journal editorial braintrust video you posted a couple months ago….,
as for paying for it, the endgame I’m looking for is the autopoetic emergence of neighborhood associations. neighborhood associations collect modest dues from the residents/neighbors.
(We pay $100.00 year)
we also do organized fundraising. when a neighborhood association is a duly incorporated entity, it can approach the city in a structured way, harnessing the expertise of selected members to present projects and activities in an optimally effective manner, both conducive to political sanction and public support and funding.
There is immense power in a single neighborhood association. When these in turn affiliate into geographic CAN’s or consolidated associations of neighborhoods – they wield immense power within a municipality and become the primary drivers of all kinds of publicly funded quality of life intiatives.
Duh.
Craig, do you have a calculator?
It will take more than TWO YEARS to train your 10,000 men at 15 per class. That’s after raising the funds and recruiting the people, and assuming it only takes one day of training…which it will not. They wouldn’t be training people to watch a monitor; they’re talking conflict resolution, and having them out on the street.
Say it takes five days training. That’s ten years.
As I said, this is a failure from the very start, for purely practical reasons.
Go into the neighborhoods they’re talking about. Ask them for $100 per month.
See Craig, Philly’s not talking about doing ANYTHING YOU’RE SUGGESTING. And I’m talking about Philly’s request, not what anyone would make of it.
You’re answering questions no one has asked.
Hmmmm… you’re tempting me…
But naw, you might, however, wanna experience living in a cracked out neighborhood.
Craig, do you have a calculator?
And your point is? That the problem will be gone two years hence?
and you’re pulling one of the lamest people of the word tricks I’ve ever seen Earl.
between Spence copping a logical/rhetorical stance that would make my 8th grader blush, and you now pretending that a number that that police chief pulled out of his ass actually has any substantive bearing on the actual subject – which is mobilizing a community to solve a problem that incompetent incumbent public officials cannot solve given the structures within which they operate – I’m witnessing a level of “progressive” managerial incompetence that’s coming perilously near to the danger levels of negro conservative psychological malfeasance.
No. My QUESTION is, when do you see any beneficial effects? The city may die first.
The city may die anyway. What’s Gary like nowadays?
Gee, we’re not discussing article linked at the top of the page?
I must be in the wrong place.
.
Well, what else can we expect from obsolete farm equipment?
I guess the problem would be gone then? But in the meanstime, just in case it doesn’t…
uh-yeah…., that rigid control of discussion for god-only-knows what purpose – cause it sure doesn’t conduce to any emergent quality of discourse only applies at P6.
(and frankly, though it may be what you do – it doesn’t work very well there either…,)
What’s Gary like? A stray chicken in every pothole.
—
What I would have liked to see in this discussion is some engagement of the black police officers who are already n-degrees more trained than any of the irregulars might promise to be. So if Johnson has any organic feet in his own black community, one wonders where the black policeman’s benevolent society has been all these years. If it’s going to start, by co-opting and reforming the infrastructure and money that’s already in play, then that has to be ground zero. And I think the fact that this hasn’t been mentioned means that bridge has already been damaged, destroyed or perhaps never built between The Bottom and City Hall.
I suggested on my blog one jack move that I think people in The Bottom could do that would galvanize the national media, which is instead of 10000 black men starting a militia, have 1000 black men camped out at police HQ demanding jobs as cops. I think that would be the most effective protest move since LA in 91.
Lemme tell you somethin’, y’all. I don’t know about y’all West Coast Obsolete-Farm- Equipment-thinking folks, but in Harlem or Brooklyn, when a sister walks by in an NOI outfit, none of the terrorist homeboys on a corner even THINKS about touching her. No cat calls. no, “Yaaooa”, no “what up shortie?”, none of that. No gun play. None of that.
But a cop? Sheeeet.
The coppers are damaged goods who couldn’t manage their way out of their present organizational predicament if their lives depended on it.
Hell, I’m a little shocked given your extended sojourn into the ways of management consulting that that model of incumbent change and progression obstruction didn’t first come to mind? Isn’t that, in addition to specific subject matter or domain expertise, what you’re most often called in to do, effect a little needed change and help guide the change management process?
Public sector entities operate under such draconian regulations, policies, procedures, and collective bargaining – that management consulting change agency probably wouldn’t apply. But it’s at least more onto than suggesting that the folks who’re being underserved should appeal to the clusterphukked entity that underserves them to simply do better.
My upfront rejection of what Spence and P6 were on about was rooted in the complete absurdity of that premise.
But let’s be practical about it, even at a really dumb level. If a black volunteer civilian goes Bernard Goetz on some scum banger, does the DA look the other way? Probably not. Probably you get Jena Six. But if that same black man had a badge and a government-issued firearm. That’s what we could call justice. No reform necessary.
Dang, no time. Got research to do and design and code to crunch, but…
How do you pay for training? Get the churches and schools to donate training place. There you go.
Uh-yeah…,
You might call such a shell game justice, in much the way your co-partisans are wont to call an oil-jacking “democracy building” but then your current odd-bedfellows status with P6 would come to a jarring halt.
Philadelphia has a highly unusual governance structure…., looks like badges could be issued from the sheriff’s dept…, more particularly, however, it appears that that governance structure along with institutionalized “worst practices” may have something to do with how incapable the police force is of doing any better.
y’all West Coast Obsolete-Farm- Equipment-thinking folks,
What does that mean? Since you’re apparently referring to me, I’d like to know how I’m being insulted.
Let’s recap.
Who thinks the Philkadelphia Chief of Police’s plan…NOT your alternative but HIS plan, train 10,000 Black men in conflict resolution and send them out to patrol the streets…will actually work?
You on the West Coast? Didn’t know that.
In nay case. It’s not an insult. It’s an acknowledgement of what we are. We all are obsolete farm equipment. We just need to stop thinking like farm equipment.
We need to think like farmers.
Farmers plant stuff. They do things. They don’t discuss the fact that the sun might not shin at night all day long.
They make things grow starting with a bit of soil and little seeds.
http://assaultonblacksanity.blogspot.com/2007/09/farm-equipment-for-sale.html
And that gets us WHERE exactly? Is training JUST about a place?
Craig, there are all types of ways we can imagine neighborhood associations combining to garner resources from the state. No one disagrees that this endeavor is worthwhile. But the discussion at hand IS about Philly. This isn’t an attempt by me or anyone else to exert an unfair amount of control over the discussion. The Philadelphia police officer isn’t asking that neighborhood associations organize to even THINK about, much less demand resources from the state.
The police officer is blaming black people for the problem that he’s in charge of dealing with, and then not offering ANY resources in dealing with this issue. Not training, not loot, not accountability mechanisms, not enforcement mechanisms, not ANYTHING.
Now if you want to GET us to a place where we can ask another set of questions (how might neighborhood associations combine to get more resources to engage in conflict resolution? what models are scalable at low costs?) we can move there. But while that is a conversation worth having….that isn’t the conversation that the Philly initiative paves the way for.
Nah. Staten Island.
Okay, I get what you’re saying.
Philly wants black men to patrol the streets, gratis http://t.co/rJDzHzNx