police

Police and nonviolent means: Pacifists at the service of oppression

by Andy Alexis-Baker 24 July 2010

Some Christian pacifists have worked to make the police “less violent” by advocating for less lethal weapons than firearms, such as tasers. In a recent editorial in The Mennonite, for example, Everett Thomas who is also a city council person in Goshen Indiana, claims that he raised money to buy tasers for the Goshen city [...]

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Police violence caught on tape. Videographers go to jail.

by Andy Alexis-Baker 10 July 2010

In the early 1990s, video emerged out of Los Angeles showing a mob of police officers beating a black man, Rodney King, who was clearly subdued by their power. That was a wake-up call to the nation—particularly white people—that “officer-friendly Mayberry” has never existed for black people. The shocking footage caused LA prosecutors to bring [...]

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Welcome to Cop-enhagen

by Nekeisha Alexis-Baker 22 December 2009

Police in riot gear brandishing pepper-spray. Protesters arrested without provocation. Handcuffed bodies sitting on cold concrete streets. Physical abuse on caged human beings. Deliberate humiliation and the denial of so-called “basic rights.”
These are the kinds of mementos thousands of eco-activists will take home after vigorously protesting the failed Cop-enhagen talks on what I like to [...]

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Memphis officials scrooge over the homeless for the holidays

by Nekeisha Alexis-Baker 8 December 2009

Late last week, an alert on the Catholic Worker e-list caught my attention. The subject line of “War on homeless accelerated in Memphis” grabbed my attention by itself, but given that we just had the annual Jesus Radicals conference in that city, I was even more intrigued. I was sad to read the following message, [...]

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Power and Practices: Engaging the Work of John Howard Yoder

by Andy Alexis-Baker 19 August 2009

A new book has just been released that engages the work of John Howard Yoder: Power and Practices: Engaging the Work of John Howard Yoder, edited by Jeremy Bergen and Anthony Siegrist. Scottdale, PA.: Herald Press, 2009.
Herald Press describes the book this way:
A new generation engages the theology of John Howard Yoder. These essays wrestle [...]

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Police Power: President apologizes

by Andy Alexis-Baker 24 July 2009

If anyone has doubted the power of the police in American society, today their power was front and center. President Obama was asked a question about the unjust arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr. during a prime-time news conference earlier this week and commented that he thought the police had acted stupidly in arresting a [...]

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Police and Racism

by Andy Alexis-Baker 21 July 2009

The latest high profile case demonstrating institutional racism among police just broke today with the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr., Harvard Professor of African and African American Research, was arrested by Boston officers. The police received a call that somebody was breaking into a home in an upscale Cambridge, Mass. neighborhood. Since it is [...]

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Less police, less crime (NYC)

by Andy Alexis-Baker 18 July 2009

One of the most commonly held misconceptions about police in this nation is that if there are more police on the streets, there will be less crime. A new report from the New York Times, however, reveals that despite a 16% drop in the number of officers in the past decade, crime has not risen, [...]

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