Stop Defending and Start Defunding the Police

To truly be anti-racist, white folks need to take a stand against the institution of policing.

White people: before you go defending cops and criticizing Black protest, remember the protest slogan, “No justice, no peace.”

As Ijeoma Oluo argues, it’s not enough to be non-racist; white people need to be actively anti-racist. Refusing to hold space for Black anger and making excuses for police officers is a failure to be anti-racist.

Multiple cities around the United States are alight with righteous rage about the murder of George Floyd. Solidarity protests are happening all over the world. Here in Toronto, we are protesting the suspicious death of Regis Korchinski-Paquet in the presence of four police officers. As I watch police meet protests about their violence with more violence, I feel a rage towards the police so overwhelming that I can only call it “hate.”

Many white leftists are uncomfortable with anger, and the forms of blunt language and protest that it motivates. I think they would rather experience social change as an episode of some 80's kid’s cartoon, like Rainbow Brite or the Care Bears. We all come together like the colours in the rainbow. We beam positive energy out into the world. There must be good guys and bad guys, and police officers are the good guys (except for some anomalous few). Bad guys can become good guys with the power of a hug. Change must be comfortable, cute. It…