Criminologist and former NSW Police detective Vincent Hurley, who went viral lecturing politicians on Q+A, says there are immediate solutions to keep women and children safe.
This was great. My biggest hesitation with all these protests about domestic violence and spending a Billion dollars combating it was that I didn't know what was possible to do about it. Other than de-normalising violence, I couldn't see what the point was. You can't exactly pass a law saying it's illegal to assault and kill people - it's already illegal.
So, I disagree with this guy on one point: We don't all know what immediately needs to be done. I had no clue, at least.
I love that when he was challenged, he had a list of things that needed to happen. Now. And he seems to only just be getting started. I'm sold - we need to listen to the people in the trenches who are facing domestic violence. They're the ones who know what needs to be done.
When it comes down to it, cops are the ones dealing with a lot of shit other people avoid. Like you're saying, we should consider what they have to say about it.
Also, we should give them mental health support. It's a stressful job with abundant opportunities for trauma. Even if we have no empathy for them, it's in our best interest to provide tools and support to the people dealing with violent and mentally ill people. But that's a whole other conversation.
Why on earth would we have no empathy for them? I cannot imagine what it takes to hold and comfort a 10 year old child dying in my arms who has been stabbed by their parent. With two kids around that age myself, I'd be a complete wreck! And he's attended up to 20 domestic violence calls in a night! For years!
"ACAB" gets a lot more attention in America than here. Partly because of that country's gross problem with guns, which thankfully largely does not exist here. And also partly just because American media is so ubiquitous over here and around the world. But it's no less true that ACAB in Australia than it is in America.
That doesn't mean every action taken by every individual cop is bad. It has never meant that—in America or here. This cop is doing a good thing right now. He's using his voice as an ex-cop to try and help a real problem in our society. It's notable that part of what he asks for is funding for non-police organisations that help with domestic violence situations.
But he's also a former member of an organisation that is part of the problem with domestic violence. Committing domestic violence at a higher rate than the general population, and helping each other cover it up. He may not have actively done that himself, but was he speaking out about it while he still served? Heck, where is he speaking out about that part of the problem even now?
It's a tough job, and giving them adequate mental health services to help deal with that difficulty is absolutely fair. But that shouldn't in any way take away from them receiving all the same "vitriol" you've seen directed at them in America. Because they've more than earnt it.
Here in Seattle the cops don't fly an American flag outside their union headquarters, only the "thin blue line" flag. In their salary negotiations they sacrificed a week of back pay so their back pay could start on 1/6/2021 (the date of the Capitol insurrection) instead of the end of their last contract. Dozens of our police here in Washington participated in the insurrection. They were under a consent decree for civil rights violations for a decade. When a cop recently ran over a college student while going 74 mph in a 25, the vice president of the police union was caught on camera laughing with the police union president and saying "she was 26 anyway, she had limited value." Police here have a dismal crime clearance rate, often don't respond at all to property crimes, or take forever. During the protests in 2020, they were absolutely savage with protestors.
I have no empathy for the police, here in America at least. They are an occupying, militarized force that has zero accountability to the people. Maybe if they started treating citizens like human beings, and holding themselves to a higher standard, I would.