what’s the end goal here Zohran. ‘Socialism’ (actually social democracy) but with a roving gang of armed and organized fascists that we just ignore? are we just going to kick the issue of systemic racism down the road because it’s “woke 1” to even talk about, until it becomes a powder keg again? this is the actual internal DSA white chauvinism contradiction that MSM are clawing to find but they won’t use it as a real wedge because it’d increase the salience of Defund again
Fundamentally the defeat of the George Floyd rebellions meant the American and Western left in general ate compete shit over the topic of policing; the police are objectively worse than then they were in 2020, yet trust in police WENT UP over the last few years
White people are positively hopeless on the subject, and minority communities are literally incoherent on the topic, everyone knows the police are racist and corrupt yet simultaneously they “trust” them and want their budgets increased
This bizarre state of affairs isn’t the result of some inextricable organic love for the paramilitary hordes that roleplay as public servants, it’s the result of the utter non-existence of an independent worker’s politics and a mass movement presenting an alternative
Zohran presented the best technical example of a policy alternative in the form of diffusing police responsibility and defunding them sneakily through surrounding budget inflation, but that’s all it is, a technical proposal, without a mass movement behind it, capitalist realism and the nonviability of Great Man Theory means it runs smack into a brick wall
And even with a mass movement, the policy has to be advanced in the face of the most powerful and vicious police department in the country, a political juggernaut that is so powerful it could kidnap a previous mayor’s daughter without media or institutional pushback, Zohran isn’t dumb for taking a overly-cautious route in such circumstances, the fault lies with DSA and it’s inability to scale and communicate on this issue
Leadership has a right to caution, the movement underwriting it absolutely does not, DSA is filled with cowards and backbenchers, eternally disillusioned Berniecrats who want to follow their old master into comfortable political obscurity with just enough e-fame to keep it fun
Breaking up and stripping police of responsibilities through the cover messaging of “Reducing police overwork” is a winning strategy in the face of the currently incoherent American public, but it’s not Zohran sole reasonability to advance it on his lonesome, that is a mass movement strategy, “Build third party public safety institutions” is hardly radical nor dangerous and yet DSA is incapable of unified messaging around this basic first step