FROM ITS GOING DOWN…https://itsgoingdown.org/abolish-police-world-created-them/
The following editorial breaks apart the differences between the neoliberal recuperation of abolitionist politics and what a true embrace of abolition would actual mean. Originally published here.
By Duncan Riley
Ever since the uprising sparked by the murder of George Floyd on the 25th of May by the Minneapolis Police began, two great social forces have been locked in fierce contention over the fate of that city.
On the one side are the rebellious masses of black and brown people, youth, and workers, who, after centuries of police brutality, colonialism, and economic inequality, have hurled their rage against the full force of the State. And, on the other side of the barricades, those directing that murderous force, are the ever-so-liberal leaders of that ever-so-liberal city, shocked to discover how deeply despised they truly are. For two weeks now these two sides have battled it out, the former advancing, gradually formulating its vision of a just society, the latter retreating, falling back on ever more brutal modes of repression.
But, in the past few days, and particularly after the announcements made by the Minneapolis City Council on the 7th of May, this tense dialectic seems to have collapsed into a synthesis – police abolition. However, strong as this synthesis may seem to be at first glance, it carries within it a myriad of contradictions, contradictions which, given time, cannot fail but to erupt into a new wave of social struggle and combat.
To begin to understand these contradictions, we must first determine where the calls for “police abolition” derive from. Certainly, activist groups in the Twin Cities like Reclaim the Block and Black Visions Collective have been doing important decarceral work for years, no doubt lending great strength to the current push to abolish the Minneapolis Police Department. But, at the same time, it is quite clear that the primary impetus behind this new development is the massive uprising which has shaken Minneapolis, and indeed the whole country, to its core. It is this spontaneous rebellion of the oppressed, and not negotiations with the City Council, which has put the words “police abolition” into the minds of millions of people across the country.
Continue reading “Abolish the Police and the World that Created Them… Autonomous Zones Begin!”
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![Protesters rallied in Melbourne, Australia, standing in solidarity with US protesters while also protesting police violence against Indigenous Australians [Ali MC/Al Jazeera]](https://www.aljazeera.com/mritems/imagecache/mbdxxlarge/mritems/Images/2020/6/6/4bd0d566fc9541c6b9692f44c432475a_18.jpg "Thousands protest Indigenous Australians' death in police custody")
