The Brief: #8toAbolition is an eight-step plan to abolish policing in communities and schools to eliminate police brutality. It refutes #8CantWait's guidelines for police reform.

Bluesquiggle
DEEP DIVE

In the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement, many are urging their communities to defund the police, but 8 To Abolition has another proposal: remove them altogether.

On June 4, Campaign Zero unveiled their set of eight guidelines to reduce police brutality. The celebrity-backed campaign called #8CantWait cited eight policies that should reduce by up to 72 percent of police violence if the department doesn’t already have any of the policies already in effect. The campaign was met with mixed reviews. Many criticized the campaign which included policies like, warning before shooting, exhausting all alternatives before shooting, and banning shooting at moving vehicles. They deemed it ineffective and more so, not a permanent fix.

8toAbolition.com appeared within a day or so to refute the program. Abolitionists and #8toabolition supporters are spreading the message across Twitter.

The site, which is organized by police and prison abolitionists, condemn 8 Can’t Wait’s campaign as being, “dangerous and irresponsible, offering a slate of reforms that have already been tried and failed, that mislead a public newly invigorated to the possibilities of police and prison abolition, and that do not reflect the needs of criminalized communities.”

#8toAbolition details actionable steps to completely do away with the police force and rather use those funds towards programs and educational resources that treat the root of the problem in communities. This campaign hopes to “build toward a society without police or prisons, where communities are equipped to provide for their safety and well-being.”

Abolitinists’ want to defund the police, demilitarize communities, remove police from schools, free people from jails and prisons, repeal laws that criminalize survival, invest in community self-governance, provide safe housing for everyone and invest in care, not cops.

As of June 8, Twitter user @MicahHerskin, noted 8cant wait’s website has since been updated to include “abolition” as part of their reform standards.