Transcription
I've been roughed up by enough cops and hung around enough gangbangers to know that I'd never put myself in this situation. And by the ripe age of 21, I realized that there is no substantive difference between gangbangers and police. Cops and gangbangers are roughly hierarchies based on violence, recklessness, and macho posturing. And this hurts people's brains cuz cops wear an oath to uphold the Constitution, but can't recite the Bill of Rights for a 20% pay raise.
And if you kick your door shut in Santa Cruz after cops illegally tried to enter your house or approach your car in San Francisco to grab a sweater after they insisted on stealing your keys, everyone will gladly participate in throwing you on the ground, beating your ass on the cell, and putting you to sleep at SF General. And when you wake up the next morning with no money, no shoes, and no paperwork, you realize that you're not free and you need to avoid these gangsters at all cost. And unfortunately, Renee and Alex learned that lesson too late.
And police violence and culture is totally reasonable considering their circumstances. They're constantly under attack and dealing with society's worse. So they form associations within the department known as the blue code. "If you want to beat this kid's ass for running his mouth, I'll turn off my body camera and lie for you if anything comes of it." And the cops who don't cover for each other get ostracized and retaliated against. Yes, it's human nature. It's not even controversial. Look no further than the Stanford Prison Experiment.
And there's a diminishing number of cops around who possess the ability to not go hands-on for disobeying. And the big irony is that policing culture was derived from gangs that were a construct of prohibition in the war on drugs. For 50 years, the CIA has been embroiled in drug trafficking scandals, where they partner with gangs, which became the pretext for the militarization of the police to deal with the threat that they created.
It's not as black and white as "back the blue" or "defund the police." We're in a positive feedback loop where gang violence is met with police violence. And it doesn't matter if you're a gangster cuz we're all subject to policing and police are on edge. And cops are never going to deescalate their policing so long that everyone they encounter is suspected of having mind-altering substances, gang affiliations, or weapons.
And the only path to deescalation is to decriminalize drugs, kneecap the profitability of gangs and distribution cartels, and then treat addicts as psychiatric patients and not criminals. That's the only path to deescalating the violence of criminals and policing and getting our freedoms back. And you're not going to be able to change my mind, but I'll see you in the comment section anyways.