A Brief Collection of Thoughts

As time and energy are limited this week (and the heatwave is knocking us around), I've decided to collect a few brief comments on issues together into a single post. 

Justice and predictive policing 

The purpose of our justice system is not solely punishment: it is also about prevention - which has improved in recent years, but we are nowhere near as good on that as, say, Norway (although infinitely better than the USA). 

One important foundation in that is the premise that people can change for the better - to be sure, they can also either not change, or change for the worse, and those options and being in the justice system in the first can be the result of discrimination, destitution, and dopiness (in terms of choices), but it is VITAL for our society that we allow for the possibility that people can get better - EXCEPT with child abusers, where the precautionary principle combines with a history of perpetuation to require that we place the wellbeing of children, some of our most vulnerable members of society, first. (That may be influenced by having been abused myself: I've also been sexually assaulted, so I also support stronger and earlier action against DV perpetrators, but make the action constructive - which does NOT mean focusing on trying to persist with a perilous relationship.) 

The use by police of predictive policing directly attacks the principle of allowing for change for the better - no matter how good the stats are (this claims 95%), the possibility of change for the better must be allowed for. 

I have read personal accounts by former crims where a moment of decency from a police officer or a jail guard led to them turning their lives around: we have to make sure nothing shuts that out, and predictive policing does. 

This tool also says a great deal about the mindset of police, and none of it good. It suggests that: 

• police have a them-and-use (or social class "elitist") mindset, not realising how circumstances or choices can easily tip a "law abiding" citizen into desperation (I know mothers who have stolen food for their children - here, in Australia); 
• police are either unaware of, or not prepared to admit the reality of, social and economic circumstances and discrimination in causing crime, and, perhaps more importantly, that THOSE PROBLEMS CAN BE ADDRESSED EFFECTIVELY BY POLITICAL CHANGE - SOME OF WHICH CHANGE IS CAUSED BY PROTESTS THAT TOO MANY POLICE SEEM TO BE AGAINST BECAUSE THEY CONTRAVENE POLICE IDEAS OF "ORDER" AND "THE QUEEN'S PEACE"; 
• the police advocating for this may have been calloused or traumatised by their work experiences - which SHOWS A NEED FOR THE REST OF THE COMMUNITY TO GET THEIR HEAD OUT OF THE SAND AND DEAL WITH THE RESULTS OF OUR OUTSOURCING OF SAFETY AND WELL BEING TO OTHERS (which I've written about elsewhere on this blog). The recent excesses by police in France are also, in my opinion, an illustration of what can happen when this point is ignored or neglected (police abuses in the USA are just racist). This issue is also being made more apparent by the problems being experienced by front line health workers as a result of the pandemic, and on firefighters by some past major fire disasters. We "just" need a way to that in the front of the minds of the community in a serious and meaningful way that leads to actual changes . . .
  

On the community, we still need to put safety and "first do no harm" front and centre - the recent Royal Commission shows that, but that is an evolving matter and always will be. There are related issues that should also be considered together, to allow some cross fertilisation, and learning from past and refined proposed programmes to prevent violent extremism (“But the really big change is around the empathy, the support, the understanding. You have, rather than a policing approach, an approach that is about how we can work with you to help the ones you love”).

One final point on this: I suspect there are senior police officers who are well aware of all this and are trying to effect change for the better. The problems are likely to not be in force command, in my personal opinion. 

Toxic social media comments

This article basically shows that we all influence each other: post snarky remarks, and others are more likely to do so. 

An awareness of this, and the importance of cutting its spread (just as stopping the spread of COVID-19 was also crucial - and, considering that the "Spanish" flu [called that because it was identified in Spain as a result of wartime censorship in other nations but actually likely came from a US military camp - much as COVID-19 was circulating widely before it was found in Wuhan] killed more people in 18 months than World War One  did in four years, and stopping the spread of COVID-19 has been done reasonably well in many - NOT all - places . . . but we're still in the middle of the pandemic) is a key part of the successful and respected Cure  Violence programme. 

Russian naval threats against a US navy destroyer

On the spread of violence, Russia's belligerence against a US navy destroyer is of concern, and creates exactly the sort of risk of escalating violence that Cure Violence tries to prevent. 

In writing that, I've obviously accepted the US assertion that they were in international waters. Why? Because Russia has recent form on ignoring international boundaries and invading other nations - the USA also has that sort of form, but from longer ago, raising hopes that it has - noting the above - "changed for the better". (Some of this also applies to groups and nations.) 

A question has to be asked, however, about the mindset of the Russian captain and senior officers (and probably the entire crew): what led them to think that it was OK to take such an aggressive act? Following orders doesn't cut it (and hasn't since Nuremberg), so what disinformation or toxicity (yes, along the same lines as happens on social media - or elsewhere) were they fed, and why did they accept it? 

Most militaries spend a fair bit of attention teaching soldiers to identify lawful orders and stay within them (hence the whistleblower from Australia's SAS, other complaints from within, and the refusal of some other soldiers to work with our troops): what needs to be improved (and I am aware Russia's imperialist aggression and the vagaries of international politics are part of this "complexity")?

The USA and #45

I came across some interesting articles this week that I thought I would share. 

1. "The Republican Party is an authoritarian outlier - compared to centre-right parties in developed democracies, the GOP is dangerously far from normal"; 
2. "Why Won’t Emily Murphy Just Do Her Job? In delaying the transition, the General Services Administration chief is acting like an ideologue"; 
3. The ongoing gerrymandering in the USA;
4. "Opinion: Nazi resistance fighters, Holocaust victims and the nonsense of COVID-19 denial"; 
5. and, finally, a fact check on a meme: "Was Trump First US President To Lose Popular Vote, Get Impeached, Then Lose Reelection?" (the answer is yes).
   

May those of you in the USA have a safe Thanksgiving.