scottishwobbly:

YES, ALL COPS ARE BASTARDS. EVEN THE “GOOD” ONES. An article from Interregnum

“The murder of George Floyd by a white cop who sadistically tortured him while his 3 partners approvingly watched has rightfully ignited a torrent of protests and riots in the United States and across the world. The look on Derek Chauvin’s face as Mr. Floyd was dying under his knee said it all: “I know what I am doing, I am enjoying it, and I believe I can get away with it. Because I am white. And because I am a cop.”

While most people with half a heart, from the most radical to the most passive, rushed to condemn this extremely blatant abuse of authority, others inevitably proceeded to make further connections. Expanding arguments that have been issued by Black movements and writers for decades or centuries, they reminded us that this was not an isolated incident. This murder was intimately connected to a system. And this cop was not just a lone wolf. This cop had been trained in a specific context, in order to serve a specific purpose, in a police force established by that specific system to protect specific interests. And this system intrinsically relies on racism; from chattel slavery to the modern criminalisation of virtually all Black bodies, racial divisions are used to oppress, exploit, and marginalise Blacks and minorities. Then they are reproduced through the media, popular culture, the school system, and wider society in order to justify this oppression and make it appear natural. And police brutality is the most direct expression of these processes.”