#warrior cop by radley balko is a good book about police militarization

[angryisokay]

Police militarization? That ball got really rolling with Nixon iirc, with the whole War on Drugs nonsense. Every president since has added to the problem. I guess you could hold Biden double accountable, since he was a key figure pushing the ‘tough on crime’ attitude as a Congressman. Republicans and Democrats have been trying to outdo each other in the ‘who can suck cop dick harder’ contest since the late 70s at least.

Which American president can be fully, or get the most blame, for the over-militarization of the US police?

Because I want to be bet money that it’s a Democrat.

[ginnyweaslays]

80 Books White People Need to Read

Here’s my next list! All links are now for Barnes and Noble! If you are interested in finding Black-owned bookstores in your area, check out this website: https://aalbc.com/bookstores/list.php ; I also have additional resources regarding Black-owned bookstores on my Instagram (@books_n_cats) if you are interested! As always, please continue to add books to these lists! ((please circulate this one as much as the LGBT one, these books are incredibly important)).

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack by Peggy McIntosh

Killing Rage: Ending Racism by bell hooks

Where We Stand: Class Matters by bell hooks

The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin

The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks About Race by Jesmyn Ward

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander

Rethinking Incarceration: Advocating for Justice That Restores by Dominique DuBois Gilliard

Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forget by Mikki Kendall

Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America’s Police Forces by Radley Balko

Open Season: Legalized Genocide of Colored People by Ben Crump

The Black and the Blue: A Cop Reveals the Crime, Racism, and Injustice in America’s Law Enforcement by Matthew Horace and Ron Harris

From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime: The Making of Mass Incarceration in America by Elizabeth Kai Hinton

Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis

They Can’t Kill Us All: Ferguson, Baltimore, and a New Era in America’s Racial Justice Movement by Wesley Lowery

White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide by Carol Anderson

A Promise And A Way of Life: White Antiracist Activism by Becky Thompson

White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin DiAngelo

Disrupting White Supremacy From Within edited by Jennifer Harvey, Karin Ac. Case and Robin Hawley Gorsline

How to Be an Anti-Racist by Ibram X. Kendi

Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge

Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations About Race by Beverly Daniel Tatum

So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo

Uprooting Racism: How White People Can Work for Racial Justice by Paul Kivel

Witnessing Whiteness by Shelly Tochluk

Race Talk and the Conspiracy of Silence: Understanding and Facilitating Difficult Dialogues on Race by Derald Wing Sue

Towards the Other America: Anti-Racist Resources for White People Taking Action for Black Lives Matter by Chris Crass (be advised, this came out in 2015 and is not up to date with current events obviously)

Understanding White Privilege: Creating Pathways to Authentic Relationships Across Race by Frances Kendall

The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identify Politics by George Lipsitz

Waking Up White, and Finding Myself in the Story of Race by Debby Irving

How I Shed My Skin: Unlearning the Racist Lessons of a Southern Childhood by Jim Grimsley

Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi

White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son by Tim Wise

Benign Bigotry: The Psychology of Subtle Prejudice by Kristin J. Anderson

America’s Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America by Jim Wallis

Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We Say and Do by Jennifer L. Eberhardt

Raising White Kids by Jennifer Harvey

Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi

The Guide for White Women who Teach Black Boys by Eddie Moore Jr, Ali Michael, and Marguerite Penick-Parks

What White Children Need to Know About Race by Ali Michael

White By Law by Ian Haney Lopez

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

My Soul Is Rested: The Story of the Civil Rights Movement in the Deep South by Howell Raines

Race Matters by Cornel West

American Lynching by Ashraf H.A. Rushdy

Fatal Invention: How Science, Politics, and Big Business Re-Create Race in the Twenty-First Century by Dorothy Roberts

White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of Modern Conservatism by Kevin Kruse

This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color edited by Cherrie Moraga and Gloria Anzaldua

Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor by Layla F. Saad

Racism Without Racists by Eduardo Bonilla-Silva

The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit From Identity Politics by George Lipsitz

Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment by Patricia Hill Collins

When Affirmative Action Was White: An Untold History of Inequality in Twentieth-Century America by Ira Katznelson

Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde

Habits of Whiteness: A Pragmatist Reconstruction by Terrance MacMullan

Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower by Brittney Cooper

Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America by Melissa V. Harris-Perry

Heavy: An American Memoir by Kiese Laymon

I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown

An African American and Latinx History of the United States by Paul Ortiz

Blueprint for Black Power: A Moral, Political, and Economic Imperative for the Twenty-First Century by Amos N. Wilson

The Man-Not: Race, Class, Genre, and the Dilemmas of Black Manhood by Tommy J. Curry

Freedom Is A Constant Struggle by Angela Davis

Your Silence Will Not Protect You by Audre Lorde

Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America by James Forman

The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism by Edward E. Baptist

The Price for Their Pound of Flesh: The Value of the Enslaved, From Womb to Grave, in the Building of a Nation by Daina Ramey Berry

Slavery by Another Name: The Re-enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II by Douglas A. Blackmon

The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America by Khalil Gibran Muhammad

The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America by Richard Rothstein

The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit by Thomas J. Sugrue

From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America by Ari Berman

One Person, No Vote: How Voter Suppression is Destroying our Democracy by Carol Anderson

Antiracism: An Introduction by Alex Zamalin

The Racial Healing Handbook: Practical Activities to Help You Challenge Privilege, Confront Systemic Racism, and Engage in Collective Healing by Anneliese A. Singh

Chokehold: Policing Black Men by Paul Butler

Democracy in Black: How Race Still Enslaves the American Soul by Eddie S. Glaude

Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America by Michael Eric Dyson

Things That Make White People Uncomfortable by Michael Bennett

When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors

[mintybreakfast]

Ok, so for starters, these riots/protests (cus let's not ignore the idea that both these protests and the riots are stemming from similar grievances).

George Floyd is just the latest in a chain of people who have been killed due to police impunity. This one was just so blatantly unjust that it lit the powderkeg.

Now, people all over the entire country are up in arms because of police abuse.

Good. It's about fucking time.

Years ago, on fact, decades ago, this issue was brought up in books such as The People's History of the United States and more recently in The Rose of the Warrior Cop by Radley Balko.

The militarization of the police, through psychological training or by way of outfitting has been a huge problem for years.

The police have increasingly, especially through validating avenues such as COPS and other such popular TV shows, tried to prove themselves as selfless heroes for the camera.

Actually... I'm losing my focus here and I have to stop. If I were writing this on a private computer and I could hide this until it was finished... Well, good for me. But I don't know how to do that here without publishing it.

So I apologize for not having this entire thing perfectly fleshed out. It's not because I don't want to, but because I'm stupid and I don't know how to

[theprettynerdie]

A great deal of my knowledge of history, politics, and international affairs comes from the books I read. I highly recommend them, especially in the age of Trump:

A People’s History of the United States, Howard Zinn: By my junior year of college, my politics had shifted from relatively conservative (yup, I leaned Republican for most of my life) to moderately liberal. After reading this book, I was firmly liberal. The sheer amount of information Zinn presents that you never learn in school is incredible. I consider this essential reading for every single American.

The Zinn Reader: Writings on Disobedience and Democracy, Howard Zinn: An indispensable collection of Howard Zinn’s writings on everything from race, to war, to social justice. Some of the best essays: Machiavellian Realism and US Foreign Policy: Means and Ends, Law and Justice, The Problem Is Civil Obedience

Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel, and the Palestinians, Noam Chomsky: Written in 1983 after the Israeli invasion and occupation of Lebanon, Chomsky utilizes primary sources (translated from Hebrew and other languages by Chomsky himself) hardly, if ever, presented to an American audience to reveal the truth about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Any Jews who support the Israeli government would do well to read this, and then try to justify themselves.

Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War, Michael Isikoff & David Corn: An indispensable book about the failures and crimes of the Bush administration that led the US into a costly, unnecessary war in Iraq. Everyone needs to read this book. Absolutely jaw-dropping.

Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2003-2005, Thomas E. Ricks: Written in 2006 in the wake of the disastrous invasion of Iraq, this book gives extraordinary military insight to complement the focus on the political end of the Iraq War. A good companion piece to Hubris, and great insight into military strategy for those of us who haven’t studied it before.

Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America’s Police Forces, Radley Balko: Astonishing and infuriating, and absolutely essential. This book is no liberal anti-cop smear: It is a bold and honest look at the government’s dangerous practice of preparing our police across the nation to violate all of the constitutional rights we hold dear, and denying accountability. 

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, Michelle Alexander: A companion piece to Rise of the Warrior Cop, focusing on the racism that underlies nationwide law enforcement.