I've mostly stayed out of this debate, but reducing ideas about how to improve communities and policing as a "socialist utopia" is dismissive and not constructive. Pitting those ideas against "reality" is equally dismissive. We shape our reality, as we do our society, our communities, and how we treat each other. We can't improve what we refuse to talk about, and we won't improve if we just accept "reality" as it is without making at least some attempt to consider and try new approaches where current ones continue to fall short.
@dunno I apologize for sounding dismissive and losing my temper, although I had been trying to be constructive before. The whole issue and the extreme-left wing discourse are a bit of a trigger to me, considering my background. I've come from a country where, for 13 years, we lived under the rule of people who would preach EXACTLY the same things that have been said here and it had at least two gigantic nefarious effects:
1 - it bankrupt the country, leading to the (involuntary) destruction of the then-growing social protection net, ruining the economy and throwing the cities into chaos and violence.
2 - it made the political "pendulum" swing all the way to the other side, gave strength to far-right movements, that ended up taking the power and making things even worse.
There is a reason why my home country went from the most promising developing country, in all aspects: it had a strong, fast-growing economy, was investing in science and education, crime rates hit the historical minimum, record low unemployment, income catching up with developed countries at a fast rate, our social security net was even wider than Canada's (at least on paper, considering the income differences: truly universal healthcare, free public education, from grade one to PhD, a reasonable public pension structure...),
However, they never took the time to go out and look at where we needed to change: less investment in law enforcement led to an increase in crime, even with people leaving poverty because, as I said, some crimes will exist regardless of what we do, and with less police, people will feel more comfortable to commit those crimes; The government intervened so much in the economy, to sustain the big social-security that it went bankrupt, bringing tons of companies with it, creating a big economic crash that put hundreds of thousands of people in the streets in extremely vulnerable conditions, prone to drug abuse and criminal activity as their only means of survival.
In the middle of it all, they decided to try the kind of approach you mentioned and, as noble as the goals were, when they decided to reduce the investment in law enforcement for Psychosocial Support Centers, it was more expensive and far less effective than it would have been to restructure the police forces to be able to handle the INITIAL contact with vulnerable people that are in desperate situations (mentally ill and houseless people that end up with substance addiction problems and whose "criminal" behavior is just a reflection of their vulnerable conditions, not greed, hatred, etc...). It resulted in overcrowded, underfunded and underserving support centers that couldn't handle the demand and ended up being closed or only operating in more affluent areas, where the residents pitched in to keep them running so they wouldn't have to deal with homelessness at their doorsteps. And it wasn't tried in one or two cities, they did it in basically ALL of the major cities in Brazil, at least 40 cities with more than 500k inhabitants, from the ones in the poorer regions (just as poor as the poorest big cities in Africa) to the 8th richest metropolitan area of the world (where income is comparable to developed countries such as Spain, Italy and Israel). It simply does not work in real life as much as we believe it will and, even if Canada is much richer and has much more fiscal room to afford it for longer, eventually it is financially unsustainable and will jeopardize the very existence of ANY social security and put the country in a course that resembles much more the worst parts of the US than the better parts of Europe.
The ultimate bad result, in Brazil, was that we're losing it all and it gave way for the far-right movements to unify under a group of morons. They're populist, anti-democratic and are doing as much damage to the economy as the previous government, but they're also using the terrible state that they found the country in as an excuse to subvert everything that was built in the 1990s and early 2000s: the social security net, the free, business friendly economy... Because the far-left went too deep, with no moderation and no foresight, as noble as their intentions might have been, they're directly responsible for what the far-right is doing now, destructing EVERYTHING they did and more.
I immigrated to Canada primarily for reason unrelated to these problems, as moving out of Brazil was a lifelong dream and had much more of a cultural identity factor than anything else. That said, I don't even consider the idea of coming back, now, because of all of these things (and some more) . It is a self imposed exile, you may say, because now, the choice between Brazil and Canada isn't about liking the weather, or feeling more integrated here or there, or liking and feeling more culturally related in one or the other. It is about having 5x the violent crime rates in the safest big city as the most violent in Canada, or about having universal healthcare, but having to pay a fortune for private because the public hospitals don't have alcohol, gauze and doctors, or paying 60k for a Toyota Yaris (and the average income being less than 16k/year), it is about having the highest rape cases per 100k/hab and fearing for my wife's, my mom's or my sister's safety every time they go out to buy a loaf of bread.
So I hope you understand why the extreme left arguments that you have been defending are a major trigger for me. Again, I do apologize for the way I treated you, as it is not your fault that all of this happened.
As for my taking on policing, I think you lost focus of what my proposal is, when rejecting it: redirect the money we spend on "hard on crime" policing and, from the recruitment phase, hire people with:
1 - more diverse ethnical backgrounds, not because of some stupid quota to clear someone's conscience, but to be more sensible to the needs of the population they serve, be more reflective of our diversity and have people equipped to deal with issues in a way that is more in touch with the reality of our communities (especially First Nations, that are under represented and ridiculously vilified and antagonized);
2 - with social assistance and psychology backgrounds, trained to ASSIST the vulnerable people that they encounter, without treating them as criminals. They don't need to be social workers or psychologists, but they need to have a good understanding of how to make the first contact with these people a good one, that can open these people up to being directed towards the professionals that will give them the help they need;
All of this, while still being trained and capable of "regular" police work, of preventing crimes and enforcing laws. It includes making our streets safer for everyone. It includes the people who, unfortunately, live in them (temporarily, we all wish, I'm sure). It is nor rare for these people to be victims of various crimes (having their few possessions stoles, being beaten up by greedy drug dealers or rich white kids with no sense of morality, etc...). This reform (or re-fund) of the police is only part of the solution but an important one, because inevitably we will have people ending up in vulnerable and unstable conditions that will need help, on our streets, as much as we will have crimes happening. It's not just putting lipstick on a pig, but rather taking the time to understand the needs of ALL of the agents in the society and address them in the best way possible, all while being cost-efficient in order to maintain the (extremely) fragile fiscal balance of our governments, so we don't end up being another Brazil or, god forbid it, another Venezuela.
