The values of BLM have long been shared by many Americans who have taken "indirect" action. They have voted based on the values, shared their views with people who wanted to listen and maybe sent letters and emails to the people in power. Change was attempted through influencing others to do the right thing.
This is a slow way to create change, and may not be effective. What happened to George Floyd motivated people to take more direct action. They broke with the expected way to cause indirect change and made more noise. Large protests and other actions to _demand_ change rather than relying on "safe" influence.
I believe that Americans who want to help achieve the policy goals of BLM can best do so through direct means.
In practice this can be done by taking a page from the libertarian playbook.
The BLM demands can be boiled down to: "the state, in it's current form, is insufficient and can not be trusted"
Trying to change this insufficient and untrustworthy institution isn't easy. It naturally resists change, and a coup is not something that should be done lightly.
But what about circumventing the state? Liberalism, and Anarcho-capitalism especially, has long claimed that a state may not be necessary. Whether or not you believe that to be true, the proposed mechanisms for a society without a central government could still be actively used in the BLM fight.
Here is a practical example:
Demand: "A systemic inquiry by the Office of the Independent Police Review Director to gauge whether there has been adequate disciplinary action taken against officers who use force against black people living with mental health issues"
Direct solution: Set up a bounty to incentivize investigative journalism into these cases. There are easy-to-use platforms to arrange such collection of bounty-money already, and it can be spread through social media. As the bounty grows, so does the motivation for investigative journalists to claim it. Pay-out only happens to journalists who manage to uncover and publish a strong case that a specific officer did not receive adequate disciplinary action.
Result: The failings of the current system gets exposed. An effective inquiry happens outside of the established Independent Police Review. It is clear that this was possible and necessary, yet the system did not take action. Trust in the system crumbles. The state has to adapt; it has to change. If people lose trust in the system, and find they can only get justice by circumventing it, this is the beginning of the end.
My example may not be the best. My overall proposal is for the regular American to find ways to *directly* cause the positive effects instead of relying on influence alone. When such a move is successful it creates positive change right away *and* becomes influential on the political scale as well.
Anybody can contribute to a bounty. There are likely platforms that already support such a thing, so setting it up may not be that hard either. Worst case it takes a BLM software developer to get the ball rolling.
Weaponizing Capitalism
The values of BLM have long been shared by many Americans who have taken "indirect" action. They have voted based on the values, shared their views with people who wanted to listen and maybe sent letters and emails to the people in power. Change was attempted through influencing others to do the right thing.
This is a slow way to create change, and may not be effective. What happened to George Floyd motivated people to take more direct action. They broke with the expected way to cause indirect change and made more noise. Large protests and other actions to _demand_ change rather than relying on "safe" influence.
I believe that Americans who want to help achieve the policy goals of BLM can best do so through direct means.
In practice this can be done by taking a page from the libertarian playbook.
The BLM demands can be boiled down to: "the state, in it's current form, is insufficient and can not be trusted"
Trying to change this insufficient and untrustworthy institution isn't easy. It naturally resists change, and a coup is not something that should be done lightly.
But what about circumventing the state? Liberalism, and Anarcho-capitalism especially, has long claimed that a state may not be necessary. Whether or not you believe that to be true, the proposed mechanisms for a society without a central government could still be actively used in the BLM fight.
Here is a practical example:
Demand: "A systemic inquiry by the Office of the Independent Police Review Director to gauge whether there has been adequate disciplinary action taken against officers who use force against black people living with mental health issues"
https://blacklivesmatter.ca/demands/
Direct solution: Set up a bounty to incentivize investigative journalism into these cases. There are easy-to-use platforms to arrange such collection of bounty-money already, and it can be spread through social media. As the bounty grows, so does the motivation for investigative journalists to claim it. Pay-out only happens to journalists who manage to uncover and publish a strong case that a specific officer did not receive adequate disciplinary action.
Result: The failings of the current system gets exposed. An effective inquiry happens outside of the established Independent Police Review. It is clear that this was possible and necessary, yet the system did not take action. Trust in the system crumbles. The state has to adapt; it has to change. If people lose trust in the system, and find they can only get justice by circumventing it, this is the beginning of the end.
My example may not be the best. My overall proposal is for the regular American to find ways to *directly* cause the positive effects instead of relying on influence alone. When such a move is successful it creates positive change right away *and* becomes influential on the political scale as well.
Anybody can contribute to a bounty. There are likely platforms that already support such a thing, so setting it up may not be that hard either. Worst case it takes a BLM software developer to get the ball rolling.