When I first started reading up on the #DefundThePolice movement… I had a lot of questions. How does this work? Would we still be safe? What happens if you actually need to call the police… for like a real, legitimate reason?! So I figured many of you had these same questions and wanted to share what we’ve learned here.

On Tuesday, we did an in-depth interview with a real life Michael B. Jordan from Just Mercy (if you haven’t seen it yet, you should and it’s free on Amazon for the month of June). David Jeffries is a criminal defense attorney in New York City who used to be on the inside prosecuting criminals before helping people on the outside. If you want to know more about him, just click here (we won’t tell your mom).

Mr. Jeffries shares what reforms are on the horizon in the criminal justice world and gets granular on #defundingthepolice. Lastly, we discuss how everyone can get involved helping to push these reforms forward before signing off. You can listen to the full episode on our new podcast, Sup Babe.

Over 1,000 people are killed by police in the US every year. The UK, Germany, Japan & Australia kill 5 people/year on average.

Why #DefundThePolice?

1. The police are over funded in most states.
2. The police are over utilized and under trained in certain situations.
3. Other community services are better equipped to handle some issues police respond to.

Among other reasons… this is completely not an exhaustive list!

What Does #DefundThePolice Actually Mean?

Defund the police does NOT mean taking every dollar out of the police system. It means reallocating money from local and state police budgets and reinvesting into communities, mental health services and social service programs.

Another caveat: there is some debate on this. The meaning seems to be falling on a spectrum with people on both sides. What we’re explaining represents what we believe is the middle ground (aka most commonly used meaning).

60% of US victims were unarmed or not involved in a crime. The ones that needed help could have been better served by a social worker (stats courtesy of Campaign Zero).

If you want a cute shareable toolkit on this info, click here. Or feel free to send this blog post to someone who needs to read it!

xoxo,

nicole rosé