Meme - Libs of TikTok: "Nayib Bukele is expected to win re-election tonight in a sweeping landslide victory. Why is he so popular? He did what he was elected to do. He cracked down on crime, jailed criminals & gang members, and murder rates dramatically decreased by 70% last year. In 2023, El Salvador became safer than the US. Destruction is a choice."
Wall Street Silver on X - "🔊... El Salvador President Nayib Bukele with Tucker Carlson "The demise of the USA has to come from within. No external enemy can cause so much damage as an internal operation." "I am from a 3rd world country and I see cities in the US where I wouldn't want to live now. When you see cities in the US eroding so fast, this has to be by design.""
End Wokeness on X - "Homicides are down 92% and President Bukele’s approval rating is over 90%. How did he do this? By focusing on “root causes” and “systemic inequality”? Nope. He cracked down on the gangs, took control of the streets, and threw 65,000+ criminals into prison. We need him here."
Whyvert on X - "Homicide rate 2023. Ecuador: 45 per 100,000 El Salvador 2.4 per 100,000 Hard to exaggerate the success of Bukele. The secret: (a) incarcerate every gang member in the country and (b) stop allowing gang leaders to continue controlling things from prison."
Opinion | Lesson from El Salvador: People prefer safe streets to human rights - The Washington Post - "As a libertarian and a passionate advocate for ending mass incarceration, I wish I could say these two shifts are unrelated. But reality refuses to humor my ideological preferences. Even Bukele’s critics seem to concede that his actions have functionally destroyed the criminal street gangs that drove the country’s astounding crime rate. In the short term, at least, it seems that savagery has restored order to El Salvador’s streets. And the savagery is incredibly popular; as next year’s election approaches, polls have put Bukele’s approval ratings as high as 90 percent, and none of his likely opponents appear to have any chance of an upset. The reason a quasi-police state looks so good to Salvadorans is that so many of them were already living under a police state, except that it was run by gangs such as MS-13. Want to have a business? Pay hefty extortion. Want to own a vehicle? You owe the gang a monthly fee. Want to play soccer on the local field? Sorry, that’s gang turf. Want to have relatives visit you at home? First get permission from the local boss for them to enter his territory. Reject the wrong suitor? He might kill you. He also might kill you just because he can. Residents of gang territory had no recourse, because anyone testifying against a gang member risked death. Bukele’s erosion of due process reversed the power dynamic: Now, you don’t have to testify, you just make an anonymous phone call... As a result, soccer pitches are reportedly now overrun with kids rather than thugs, people can go where they want, and commerce is resuming in areas that used to be no-go zones. I’d like to tell you that such trade-offs don’t exist. But it’s hard to maintain the rule of law when gangs kill witnesses. It’s also hard to fight root causes such as poverty when as much as 80 percent of your territory is controlled by gangs, because gang rule is a cause of poverty as well as a result: Gangs depress economic activity by reducing labor mobility, keeping people off the street, and bleeding business profits through theft and extortion. It’s not entirely surprising that the people of El Salvador prefer the official police state to the freelancers. And this is where El Salvador offers a useful lesson to the rest of us: Do not make people choose between human rights and safe streets, because they will choose safe streets every time... U.S. history shows the same pattern as El Salvador, albeit in a milder form: When crime soared in the latter half of the 20th century, American politics took a sharp lurch away from mercy and toward tough-on-crime policies that eventually led us to lock more than a million and a half Americans behind bars. Even deep-blue New York City elected Rudy Giuliani, a Republican former prosecutor who promised to do what it took to regain control of the streets... The best way to keep people from trading civil liberties for civic safety is to not let crime get out of control in the first place."
Protection from the state is useless if the state cannot protect you from criminals. The libertarians who insist that nothing that requires the labour of others is a human right would rather buy guns and shoot gang members themselves, of course
Meme - "Members of the left-wing activist community lost to senseless murders in 2023
Jen Angel
Anti-racist, Anarchist, Prison Antifa-connected, abolitionist, far-left punk rock reporter. Dragged to death by a Black male
Benjamin X Rowe
"LGBTQ+ Activist," far-left punk rock concert organizer. Randomly shot and killed by a Black male while walking down the street.
Jude Walton
Professional social justice bureaucratic activist for the city of Ann Arbor, MI. Raped & murdered by a Black male during a home invasion.
Ryan Carsen
Injection safe site activist, self-described Antifa. Randomly stabbed to death by a Black male.
Nick Golden
Anti-Racist, Anarchist, far-left punk rock concert organizer. Two Latinos opened fire on an anti-racist backyard punk rock concert.
Josh Kruger
LGBTQ+/ HIV+ / injection safe site / racial justice activist. Killed by Black male during home invasion.
Emma Shatter
"Racial equality" activist for multiple non-profits and intern for Senator Duckworth. Stabbed to death by illegal alien Latino boyfriend.
Ted Lawson
Democratic Party County Secretary, BLM activist, voter rights activist. Random murder by 15 year-old Black male"
Andy Ngô 🏳️🌈 on X - "On Dec. 9, law enforcement in Portland, Ore. raided two properties suspected of being drug trafficking operations and found over 11 million doses of fentanyl. The alleged ringleader, a foreign national named German Ariel Arteaga-Sanchez, who goes by the alias "Luis Funez," was caught after trying to flee from the house in Portland. He was quickly released without bail and skipped court the next day. An all-hands-on-deck manhunt was able to find the fugitive, who was re-arrested on Dec. 13 by the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office deputies. There is now a federal hold on him so that the county/state can't release him immediately again. The photo below shows a black bin bag containing millions of doses of fentanyl."
Meme - "RECORD CRIME
FEWER PROSECUTIONS
EMPTY JAIL BEDS
Mike Schmidt, District Attorney
PORTLAND IS A SCHMIDT SHOW!"
Thread by @wrong_speak on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "When upper-class leftists tell you that you should give leniency to criminal behavior & accept vagrancy, the people who will suffer the most are the poor & working class (especially minorities). This Safeway closure was a destined outcome of their luxury beliefs... Throughout the U.S. in major cities, we've watched as retailers have gone through extraordinary measures to deter theft from happening. It used to be that there was a black market for specific items like cigarettes, requiring an associate to retain them from a secure location. However, now what's happened is that basic items like soaps and toothpaste are being locked away as a final step to slow down the rampant theft. This activity comes at a cost of revenue and at some point, retailers would rather relocate instead of continuing to operate at a loss. Grocery stores in particular are notorious for operating on tight margins as it is and for each item that a shoplifter deems as theirs, they are adding to the demoralization of the retailer and weakening their resilience to remain as an integral part of a community. So, how did we get here? I believe a large part of it is because of the ideological framework perpetrated mostly by upper-class leftist ideologues, whether they be activists, politicians, district attorneys, or academics: they all play a part... By understanding that a leftist's entire belief system revolves around there being a constant oppressor versus oppressed narrative, leaving out any form of nuance because it's ultimately religious dogma, you'll understand why they are behaving counter to common sense. The "system" oppresses anyone that comes in contact with it. Whether it be the government or capitalism itself, they believe their main objective is to oppress. So, stealing from a business, a symbol of Capitalism translates into behaving like Robin Hood: thieves are now heroes. The criminal is the counter-reaction to an oppressive society, and taking from anything capitalistic is much like reparations to them. However, the people who believe this the most aren't the ones who usually suffer the consequences of these luxury beliefs. When criminals leave jail, they don't take refuge in gated communities; they live amongst people who are barely getting by. When leftist district attorneys give criminals a “slap on the wrist” for their behavior, they're signaling that they accept it when they terrorize the poor. However, criminal activity only becomes a problem when it trickles over to the nice part of town because bad things aren't supposed to happen there. Homeless vagrants are supposed to piss on your street, not theirs. Crime only becomes a problem when it affects the cul-de-sacs. Crime typically becomes a topic of concern when it bleeds over into the places where people least expect it to occur. This is the only time when elitists in government will suddenly reconvene to discuss a crime problem: it was always a problem, it just didn't affect them. Defunding the police only makes sense when you aren't inundated with criminal activity and you don't live next to community terrorists. No one in their right mind can look at the guy who's stealing from them and interpret them as victims of an oppressive system: they're thieves. Luxury beliefs always result in uncomfortable outcomes and this closure of a San Francisco Safeway that serves a predominantly Black and Asian community will have the fingerprints of dogmatic leftists on the doors when they close for the last time."
Rob Henderson on X - "Luxury beliefs are ideas and opinions that confer status on the upper class, while inflicting costs on the lower classes. The luxury belief class conflates criminality with poverty even though the vast majority of poor people don't commit crimes. But because the luxury belief class sympathizes more with criminals than their victims, poor people suffer. Here's how the thinking goes: the luxury belief class has more respect for criminals because they believe lawless behavior is justifiable in an oppressive society. Ordinary poor and working class people who just want to go to work and take care of their families are suckers or dupes who uphold an unjust system, and thus deserve to be victimized."
The left like to claim there is no link between, say, Islam and terrorism, because there're so many Muslims but most of them aren't terrorists. Yet most poor people don't commit crimes
End Wokeness on X - "Canadian police warn residents not to post videos of thugs stealing packages: "You cannot post the images... we have a presumption of innocence & posting that could be a violation of private life" -Comms Officer Lt. Benoit Richard"
Wesley Yang on X - "Didn’t you know? The police are here to suppress the rights of ordinary citizens being victimized by criminals in defense of the rights of the criminals victimizing them…"
Man busted for smoking in subway charged with 2020 Queens murder - "A murder suspect was nabbed when he was stopped for smoking in the subway by NYPD cops who then quickly discovered he was being sought for a 2020 Queens slaying, police said Monday. On Friday, transit cops in Brooklyn stopped Luis Hernandez, 36, for smoking. He would have been released with just a summons, but when officers ran his name they learned he was wanted for murder."
This is why the left hate broken windows policing
Beat Cops Cut Crime
Police Presence, Rapid Response Rates, and Crime Prevention - "This paper estimates the impact of police presence on crime using a unique database that tracks the exact location of Dallas Police Department patrol cars throughout 2009. To address the concern that officer location is often driven by crime, my instrument exploits police responses to calls outside their allocated coverage beat. This variable provides a plausible shift in police presence within the abandoned beat that is driven by the police goal of minimizing response times. I find that a 10% decrease in police presence at that location results in a 7% increase in crime. This result sheds light on the black box of policing and crime and suggests that routine changes in police patrol can have a significant impact on criminal behavior."
Since the left don't want police to patrol or be seen...
Broken Windows Works: Don’t Be Fooled By Latest Efforts To Discredit It. - "Though “disorder might not elicit crime,” the authors claim, they agree that “there are certain types of disorder that can create ecological advantages for criminal activity.” The creation of such environments is exactly how Kelling and Wilson described the process of neighborhood disorder—absent community control—leading to the promotion of antisocial behavior. “Disorder does not encourage crime,” O’Brien and his coauthors go on, “but makes it easier to commit crimes.” This, too, merely paraphrases Kelling and Wilson, who wrote in 1982 of the “folk wisdom that happens to be a correct generalization—namely, that serious street crime flourishes in areas in which disorderly behavior goes unchecked.” Elsewhere, O’Brien, et al. use narrower definitions of key Broken Windows concepts to attempt to discredit its conclusions. They radically understate the concept of urban disorder, for example, by describing it as “the presence of litter or graffiti.” They dismiss the idea that trash on the ground “could inspire people to commit acts that they have never even considered,” but the notion of disorder that Broken Windows described was about much more than just litter or graffiti... Cities’ abdication of their responsibility for civility and public safety signaled to everyone, including potential wrongdoers, that no one was in charge... Many of today’s successful criminal-justice programs and interventions, including the Department of Justice’s Operation Weed and Seed program, incorporate Broken Windows thinking... they’re ideologically opposed to the proactive policing that Broken Windows fosters, because it draws sharp moral lines and is unafraid to make judgments about environments and behaviors. My colleague John Wright and I have shown that some theories in criminology are embraced and lauded if they’re liberal in approach, while others are shunned or pilloried, if they have conservative overtones. In academia, a conceptual framework that contributed to record-setting declines in homicides, gun assaults, armed robberies, rapes, and public-order crimes—making cities safer and more prosperous—is considered conservative, and thus, wrong. But in the real world, the positive impact of Broken Windows has been profound. No amount of shifting or narrowing definitions can undo its lessons."
Pierre Poilievre on X - "After 8 years of Justin Trudeau, car thefts are UP 34% across Canada - with a staggering 106% jump in Montreal & 217% jump in Toronto. While this happened, Liberals doubled down on their catch-and-release justice system. Now, they are meeting to discuss how to reverse the damage they’ve done."
Damn greedy insurance companies increasing premiums!
‘Abhorrent’: Qld Coalition slams Labor’s ‘weak’ stance on youth crime crisis following alleged murder of 70 year-old grandmother Vyleen White - "Mr Bleijie said the community, state, and whole of Australia was in shock and blamed the Labor state government for not listening to warnings from Queenslanders while demonstrating a lack of support for law enforcement... Mr Bleijie blamed the state government for its weak youth justice policy arguing there were fewer police on the beat. "The very first thing the Labor government did when they came to power in Queensland in 2015 was to weaken all the youth justice laws," Mr Bleijie said. "Believe it or not, the Labor Party's policy in Queensland is to put the rights of the offenders before the rights of the victims. "We've been warning the Labor government about this, but they've kept down this road of policy reform and weakening youth justice laws, not supporting our police, not giving the resources they need, and now we have the youth crime crisis." Mr Bleijie highlighted the prevalence of youth crime as not just an issue in Far North Queensland, but something which impacts the north, south, east and west of the state."
Five boys arrested in relation to death of Queensland grandmother - "The Queensland Opposition is being accused of 'playing politics' after the death of 70-year-old Vyleen White and an Ipswich shopping centre."
If you oppose the left's pro-crime laws, that's playing politics
Looks like those responsible were future doctors, lawyers & engineers
Girl charged in swarming case re-arrested over TTC assault - "One of eight girls alleged to have been involved in the swarming and killing of a Toronto homeless man has been rearrested and charged with assaulting a man at Wilson Station"
Clearly, reforming bail is inhumane
Longest-serving NYPD commissioner lashes out at 'deteriorated' state of city - "Kelly, 82, said the visitor he quoted was complaining about the number of migrants outside the Roosevent Hotel intake centre in Manhattan and “mentally deranged” homeless people on the street. The tourist was also upset because stores had many items locked away due to the increase in shoplifting in the city. But the complaints didn’t end there. “We know subway crime is still very much an issue, and it’s keeping people off of the subways,” Kelly said, adding that subway ridership was still below what it was before the COVID pandemic. “People are afraid to go on the subways."... “The cops are working hard. The police department is way short of police officers,” he said. “People don’t want to become a cop these days. They know the restrictions. They know that police officers have been demonized and vilified throughout the country, but certainly in New York, as well. They see the assaults on police officers. There are no consequences.” And Kelly pointed his finger squarely at New York Mayor Eric Adams, a former police captain, for taking power away from the city’s cops. “The city just agreed to a consent decree which is absolutely ludicrous,” Kelly said. “It ties the hands of police officers trying to police demonstrations. It ends the practice of kettling to help move demonstrators into a particular area. I have no idea why they did this. The mayor said it was a bad idea, but he signed it anyway because the lawyers told him to do it. “That’s not leadership. That’s not what you’re supposed to do, but that’s where we are.”"
Aaron Gunn on X - "This is insane. Jeremy Vojkovic, a man who raped and burned a woman alive, is being allowed to roam unescorted on Vancouver Island, despite a psychiatric assessment that expressed “grave concern” over the risk he poses to the public AND the objections of the victim's family. Why must law-abiding, taxpaying Canadians continue having their safety put at risk to appease monsters like Vojkovic and the catch-and-release justice system of the Liberals and NDP?"
Conservative War Machine on X - "WATCH: Virginia Democrats are trying to push through a soft-on-crime bill that would provide leniency to 701 first degree murderers, 77 second degree murderers, 556 abductors, 325 rapists, and 762 robbers."
Matt Gurney: The police have given up. They've surrendered - "We've all heard variations of this before, right? "Just give up your wallet" when you're mugged. "Just get out of the car" during a carjacking. You can always replace things. Right? The problem is that, in the other scenarios above, you're out and about in public. There's no guarantee of safety in public, as much as we all wish otherwise. The advice now being given by Toronto police isn't what to do when someone jabs a gun into your ribs in a seedy back alley, but how to avoid being harmed by bad guys in your own home. And the police advice is "Make it so easy on them that they have no reason to hurt you."... The police don't have any expectation that they're going to stop the bad guys, and you might get hurt if you try and stop the bad guys, so let’s not try. Let the bad guys have your stuff, no questions asked. It's your best chance to avoid injury. Like I said above, folks, it's not that I don't take the police at their word. It's that I do take the police at their word. That's the problem... If there's any consolation, it's that it ain't just the normal people the police are giving up on. Just a few weekends ago, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had to skip out on a dinner gala in company with the visiting Italian PM because the police couldn't secure the venue against those protesting the Gaza War. The best they could do was escort a cabinet minister to safety, and even that seemed touch-and-go. So it's not that the police are playing favourites, per se. They're being admirably consistent and fair: they can't secure anything. They can't protect anyone. This is the truest form of equality, I suppose. We’re all on our own... I don't know if that's going to play out exactly as the police think it will. This seems more like a recipe for some would-be car thief getting blown in half with a 12-gauge shotgun than it does a compliant population. I'll be accused of hoping for that outcome for even having mentioned it. Far from it. I think that's about the worst thing that could possibly happen. The homeowner defending themselves or their property would probably end up being just about the only person the Toronto police would exercise any haste in arresting. The shooter would have the book thrown at him by courts looking to “set an example” against “lawlessness” and “vigilante justice.” He'd be locked up faster and longer than any of the guys kicking down doors. That is, after all, the Canadian way... So yeah. I’m not hoping for this. But we’ll be lucky to avoid it. A broadly shared sense of personal safety and security is the absolute bedrock precondition for any functioning civil society. And where that sense of security doesn’t exist or has been lost, people don’t stack their valuables by the door. They do other things. They form neighbourhood watches or patrols. They establish justice systems along tribal lines, or religious ones. They build walls around their communities, and/or throw their lot in with any strongman with some hired muscle and gumption. Or you count on the king to send in the army when the bandits get too close to the villages. That is the lesson of history. It took us until about two centuries ago to figure out the concept of professional civilian police and neutral courts, and it seems to have gone out of fashion already. We don’t think about any of this much in Canada because we’ve had it so long we’ve forgotten that security isn’t the default norm of human existence — it’s actually rather the opposite. That’s why every society throughout history has devoted time and energy to public order — not always justice, I stress, but safety... It would be nice if we had a political class that was willing to assert itself over the police forces they are responsible for, instead of hiding behind the convenient fib that politicians can never interfere with policing matters. It would be nice if Canada's weird domestic politics didn't make it so awkward for us to acknowledge that the Port of Montreal is a problem that we should fix, and would fix, if every level of government involved didn't know how, uh, awkward that could get. It would be nice if our cars weren't designed in ways that seemed almost intended to make stealing them as easy as possible."
Damn car theft culture and victim blaming!
Opinion: For months, police have been signalling we’re on our own. Now, finally, they’re telling us - The Globe and Mail - "Had the comment been made in isolation, perhaps it wouldn’t have been so irksome to so many Canadians. But there has been a palpable frustration with police of late, based on the increasingly ornamental role police now appear to be taking in maintaining law and order. The disorder caused by protests over the war in Gaza is the most visible example. For months, pro-Palestinian protesters have shut down busy intersections, gathered outside businesses, and rallied outside consulates – all fair game. But on more than a few occasions, these protests have veered into intimidation, with demonstrators assembling outside synagogues, Jewish community centres (in Montreal, protesters recently blocked people from accessing the front door) and in heavily Jewish neighbourhoods. Police stood by while protesters uttered threats during a demonstration inside the Toronto Eaton Centre in December, and watched as protesters physically barred would-be attendees from a Liberal fundraising dinner earlier this month. Police also failed to control the crowd that had gathered outside of the Art Gallery of Ontario just days before that, when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was scheduled to host Italy’s Giorgia Meloni. Embarrassingly, the event had to be cancelled... But it’s not just about the protests. Statistically, crime is up in big cities such as Toronto and Montreal, and there are more signs of disorder visible to those going about their business in those downtown cores. It has become normal, for example, to see open drug use or acts of violence on public transit. Auto thefts have skyrocketed; according to police, home invasions and auto theft rose 400 per cent last year. Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw recently said that carjackings in the city have more than doubled in 2024. And – not unexpectedly, considering the war in Gaza – reported hate crimes in Toronto have surged since Oct. 7. The solution routinely proposed by police is a bigger budget to hire more officers since, in Toronto, the number of officers on the streets has not kept up with population growth... If the police aren’t seen to be doing their jobs – controlling crowds, maintaining access to public spaces, apprehending car thieves instead of telling people where to leave their keys – our collective faith in one of our most important institutions crumbles. And when citizens can’t trust that police will keep them safe, they can start to take measures into their own hands."
The police are active in arresting people for self-defense, so
Crime is surging and Canadians are being left with one message: You're on your own - The Hub - "Suggesting that citizens simply give up and make it easier for car thieves to steal their property reads like an admission that the police have lost control over a dangerous and costly problem. Auto thefts are exploding across Canada, with Ontario in particular becoming a “candy store” fueling a rail pipeline that runs to the Montréal ports and global markets directed by organized crime. In Toronto, vehicle theft is up 150 percent over the past six years, with insurance associations listing it as over a 1.2 billion dollar problem. The city’s police chief recently stated that there were over 12,000 vehicles stolen in 2023—a 24 percent increase in a single year and a 300 percent increase since 2015. A vehicle is now stolen approximately every 40 minutes in Canada’s most populous city. It is not reasonable to tell citizens to fend for themselves against such sophisticated and motivated adversaries. Organized crime expands its tentacles into all opportunities for extraordinary profit. The pandemic has created many such exploitable distortions, including human trafficking, trading in counterfeit vaccines, and coordinated shoplifting. In the case of auto theft, prices of newer used vehicles have been driven sky-high due to the scarce availability of new inventory and supply chain disruptions for microchips, which slows down production. With a lucrative market at their feet, organized criminals have exploited loopholes in Canadian law to run circles around police officers. The first involves simply taking advantage of jurisdictional ambiguities and the inertia that results when multiple agencies involved in combating auto theft bump up against one another. When a car is lifted from an innocent person’s driveway, it is often then parked for a day or two in a public place and monitored by thieves at a distance to determine whether the vehicle is being electronically tracked. This is most often done by private companies whose owners contract for these services. If these companies are actually able to locate the stolen vehicle, they typically mobilize police. However, if there are no suspects on the scene, these officers treat the theft as a low-priority call. Remember they also have assaults, break-and-enters, and domestic violence to deal with. Often, thieves will then move that untended vehicle by train, which is under the separate jurisdiction of railway police. It could then arrive at Montreal shipping ports, under the watchful gaze of the Canada Border Services Agency. Keep in mind, on a typical day, there are mere single-digit CBSA agents available to monitor thousands of shipping containers at a major port. Even if police know a vehicle is in a particular port yard, it becomes a needle in a haystack. There is but a minute number of border agents literally working against the shipping clock to find it. Meanwhile, regular police are often left waiting on judicial warrants to lend assistance. The second loophole criminals regularly take advantage of is recruiting legal minors (often members of street gangs) to conduct commissioned theft. The entire thrust of Canada’s youth justice system is to avoid incarcerating young people in secure facilities in favour of encouraging their rehabilitation within—and reintegration into—the community. In other words, young car thieves stand to earn healthy payments from organized crime syndicates while risking little custody time. When the thieves are adults, delays pending trial mean suspects are likely to be released on bail for months on end with a level of supervision stretched thin to the point of near nonexistence"
The Weekly Wrap: The Liberals abandon the centre - "After successive decades of rising crime, Canada’s crime rate actually fell by nearly half between 1992 and 2012. This progress was driven by various factors, but a key one was the role of ideas. In the context of high urban crime rates in the 1970s and 1980s, conservative scholars—particularly in the U.S.—advanced the case for what was sometimes described as the “broken window theory” to restore law and order. The subsequent decline in crime in North American cities represented a major validation of the “broken windows” model and the norm-shaping role of deterrence to improve the conditions for law, order, and public safety. The past decade or so has by and large witnessed the abandonment of those effective policing strategies. They came to be viewed as too insensitive to the socio-economic factors behind crime and the extent to which they fell (or perceived to fall) disproportionately on racial minorities. We’ve therefore seen a liberalization of law enforcement and policing which places a greater emphasis on responding to the underlying causes of criminality. The most powerful expression of these intellectual trends was the “defund the police” movement which received significant attention in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death in 2020. Although no jurisdiction fully defunded its police force, the movement’s ethos has influenced the operations, practices, and staffing of law enforcement in various cities across North America. The recent spike in crime demonstrates the soft-headed fallacy behind these developments. The pendulum has now swung in the direction of a pervasive “underpolicing” problem in many cities. Yet there’s nothing compassionate about subjecting the public to disorder and insecurity—especially since the consequences of crime disproportionately affect low-income individuals and racial minorities. It must be said that a lot of this type of progressive thinking is quite literally preferencing the interests of criminals (regardless of their circumstances) over their fellow citizens. As a political matter, it’s an unsustainable approach to these issues."