>

Punching down on two minorities at once? Good ole Republican policy. If he could have thrown immigrants in there, it could have been a hat trick for Republican goodness. Missed opportunity.
There is literally nothing in this document that is even remotely controversial. >

It doesn't matter what's inside. Pretty sure he thinks or has supporting data that him going after Critical Race Theory gains him points. What else does he really care about? He is walking a fine line trying to win his voter base in the primary over Trump, but doesn't become so hated he loses the main election.
Anyway, the name sounds hostile, that's enough. Names matter more than the content when you are deal with crowds. For example, defund the police was probably the dumbest slogan of the last decade. Especially when *reform/modernize/ was readily available.
The vast majority of voters are not going to look at the details. And I'm not even trying to call voters stupid. People have their own lives to deal with. Work, Kids, Bills, Stress, whatever, there is more information out there than we can handle. And your thing is probably in the background. In this new social media environment the name of something is incredibly important. >


Anyway, the name sounds hostile, that's enough. Names matter more than the content when you are deal with crowds. For example, defund the police was probably the dumbest slogan of the last decade. Especially when *reform/modernize/ was readily available.

Oh my god THANK YOU. That slogan was practically serving the Republicans scores of extra votes on a silver platter. It was all over every single fucking campaign, and easily stretched to "Dems want to unleash all the violent criminals on you and your family. Vote for the party of law and order today!"
Democrats already tend to suck at messaging but "Defund the Police" was so obviously going to play right into Republicans' favor. Yeah Republican mouthpieces will twist and flat-out make up shit on us, but giving them actual reams of thousands of people saying "defund the police!" is extreme-sounding enough that it makes the actual lies sound more believable and less out there.
Defund the police sounds like it means "terminate all police jobs ASAP" and no follow-up plan. People easily jump right to the danger and chaos of suddenly having no law enforcement.
"Reform the police" would have been better. >

"Defund the police" is an accurate description. The people who want to defund the police do not want to reform the police. They believe that we have already tried to reform the police and it has failed miserably. We keep giving police more money to "reform" with "training" and nothing changes. They want to defund the police and use that money (because it's so much money) to improve our society (for example, to house the homeless and feed the hungry) >

One really can't safely kick out all law enforcement without something else ready and capable stepping in to fill the same basic functions right away, so I'd argue defund would still fall under reform. Just removing law enforcement suddenly and entirely is a well-proven recipe for theft and violence, and hurts public perception of the group/s that did the removing.
Which also reiterates that it was an awful-sounding slogan that handed a silver platter directly to Republicans. "Defund" also brings the mental image of firing 660,288+ people suddenly, which also plays nicely into "Republicans are the party for jobs and the economy!" >

I'm not super well-versed in abolitionism, so I'm a little out of my depth here, but there's two basic avenues of response to that. On the one hand, there are abolitionists who believe that the current system is so bad that just getting rid of it entirely would be an improvement. On the other hand, there are those who want to replace the police with a variety of civil services, many of which already exist. The End of Policing is a good place to start in terms of how people are thinking about non-police solutions to the problems that police theoretically solve (mostly, things people think they do, but they aren't particularly effective at) in current society.
The reason "defund" is the term they use is because they specifically want to take money away from the police and give it to these other groups. It's a better, more specific word for what they want.
I understand how the GOP will turn on it, but at the same time, I've watched the left pussyfoot around GOP potential reactions for years, and I'm tired of it. They're going to go ballistic either way, so we might as well say what we mean. >

Thank you for the resources!
But please know this conversation chain was not about what "defund the police" really meant and the actual steps intended to address the problems. The conversation was solely about how bad of a chant "defund the police" is, because of how it sounds.
It turns people off so instantaneously with fear and knee-jerk "but then who will stop the criminals" that people won't even consider listening at all to "woah there here's what we actually mean and the list of what we actually want to do to fix the problems."
Republican media will keep twisting and making shit up, but that doesn't mean we should hand them such easy and actually genuine videos of masses of progressives chanting "defund the police." It immediately terrifies tons of people with a far more real, dangerous, and widespread threat than, say, drag queens reading to kids or gay people getting married does. And since they actually had video of thousands of people chanting it, it makes the twists and outright bullshit seem more believable.

I understand how the GOP will turn on it, but at the same time, I've watched the left pussyfoot around GOP potential reactions for years, and I'm tired of it. They're going to go ballistic either way, so we might as well say what we mean.

Same here, but I believe we shouldn't go all-out with absolutely everything. Psychology and politics are always in play and working with how psychology works instead of casting it aside helps people be more effective. I'm in the psychology field so I also see it everywhere...there are times and things where it is better to be brazen and all-out, and times and things to be more strategic and diplomatic about.
I also just plain wanted to take a moment to vent about this one particularly awful chant, because I am so tired of shit-tier messaging by the left not just shooting ourselves in the foot, but simultaneously handing a gun to Republicans and regressives on a silver platter and inviting them to shoot us in the foot too. >

This is Advanced placement. This is a college curriculum course. This is an elective.
Republicans would have you think people are being forced into this. That's not the case at all. This is just flat-out hatred >

This is a typical fishing story issue, so this elective, college-level course will suddenly turn into “they’re teaching African studies to our kindergarteners, think of our children!” in no time at all >

"I heard they now have these African Critical Race Queer Theory classes and they're teaching it in Kindergartens in liberal states. You have these kids squatting in litter boxes listening this nonsense all day."

Joe Rogan in about 10 minutes >

Joe Rogan: takes massive bong hit "These teachers are killing society!  5 year olds learning about critical race theory, it's being taught by drag queens while they talk about gay grooming!  And is it a coincidence that these schools have people with 5G phones in the building?  I think not!" >

Also Rogan:
Guest #1: "I don't think any of this stuff about Kindergarteners being taught critical race theory is true"
Rogan: "yea....i don't know. Maybe..i see what you're saying"
Guest #2: "They're literally harvesting adrenochrome from these Kindergartners and that is why they all of a sudden all believe theyre cats....because they replace the kid's medulla oblongata with a cat's pancreas!"
Rogan: "That makes SO much sense! you're right! I heard about this....it's wild man" >

Guest 2 is definitely Eddie Bravo. Ugh. >

Even worse than that fucking Johnny bravo guy >

Johnny needs education on boundaries and consent.
Eddie needs education, period.