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Naming Matters

I would really like to change our country so that police do not regularly kill people of color, let alone mistreat them on a regular basis.  It felt as if we were on the cusp of some systemic changes with high-profile cases of police casually killing POC in front of cameras.

If the movement to change this had consulted with their opponents such as the police unions and politicians that have built their careers on the rhetoric of "law and order", they could not have come up with a worse slogan than "Defund the Police".

This has given their opponents such a gift in terms of rhetoric, in terms of fundraising, in terms of turning undecided voters against them.

It focuses the attention on a means instead of an end, allowing dishonest people to run wild with their claims of anarchy.  It has failed miserably.

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