Essay: Police and Security Department

choice one topic to write one eassay
Topic A
When we give up on truth, we concede power to those with the wealth and charisma to create spectacle in its place. Without agreement about some basic facts, citizens cannot form the civil society that would allow them to defend themselves. If we lose the institutions that produce facts that are pertinent to us, then we tend to wallow in attractive abstractions and fictions. Truth defends itself particularly poorly when there is not very much of it around.
Social media is no substitute: It supercharges the mental habits by which we seek emotional stimulation and comfort, which means losing the distinction between what feels true and what actually is true.
excerpted from “The American Abyss” by Timothy Snyder
The New York Times, January 9, 2021
Topic B
...In America in 2020, calling the police to report anything but the most urgent, severe threats has a significant chance of making things worse…
“A lot of things we consider to be criminal aren’t criminal,” said Keon L. Gilbert, an associate
Professor at Saint Louis University’s College for Public Health who studies racial disparities in
policing. “They’re public health issues that have gone unaddressed.” ... police departments are not subject to the training, transparency or accountability of government social service programs…. Training on mental illness, substance abuse and de-escalation is often perfunctory.
“Police are effectively armed social workers with minimal training in social work,” said Michael
Sierra-Arévalo, an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin who has spent more
than 1,000 hours in police department ride-alongs. “Officers are trained to believe that the world is incredibly dangerous and they’re socialized to think about crime and violence all the time.”
Officers bring this mindset to all of their calls, whether they’re responding to a shooting or a shoplifter. And once they arrive, they have few tools other than arrests to mediate disputes.
“Policing is a system designed to create interactions doomed to become catastrophes,”
Sierra-Arévalo said.
Should I call 911 if....
Michael Hobbes, Huffpost