Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Many Blacks Would Welcome Police Exit from Their Communities
Glen Ford, BAR executive editor
10 Dec 2019
🖨️ Print Article

“The whole battlefield array of weapons is now deployed in Black and brown communities.”

Donald Trump’s Attorney General, William Barr, is a comedian. He must have been joking when he warned certain communities that they better start showing more “respect and support” for the police. Otherwise, said Barr, these communities “may find themselves without the police protection they need.”

Well, there are lots of people in Black communities that would like nothing better than to see the cops withdraw back to their suburban enclaves and never return. Black folks know that calling the police to help with a family problem is rolling the dice with death. Attorney General Barr has got to be joking, when he pretends that the cops just might withdraw their so-called “protection” from the Black community if folks don’t start giving them proper respect. But, why should anyone respect an occupation army whose mission is to incarcerate and terrorize the community. We need protection from THEM, and will ultimately have to provide that, ourselves. 

The movement for community control of the police is gaining ground, working towards abolishing the police altogether, and creating new and democratic ways of providing community security.

Mass Black Incarceration

Related Podcasts

Involuntary Servitude in the Prison System
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Involuntary Servitude in the Prison System
24 June 2022
Savannah Eldrige is the founder of Coaliton to Abolish Slave
White Capitalist Law vs “Uncontrollable Blackness”
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
White Capitalist Law vs “Uncontrollable Blackness”
01 September 2020
The United States “criminalizes Black Americans,” but Black men “are not looking to be controlled” by this racist system, said Douglas
 Getting Out the Word: #PrisonsKill
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
Getting Out the Word: #PrisonsKill
25 August 2020
The Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee, IWOC, “is committed to the militant organizing of prisoners that takes its leadership and focus from

More Stories


  • Raymond Nat Turner , BAR poet-in-residence
    Preachin’ to the Choir (for Joe, Linda, Tim…)
    26 May 2021
    2020’s hindsight—frost in the rearview mirror. Miles Ahead… I’m Sheltered in Solidarity with National Poetry Month and Jazz Appreciation Month— April in Boston—warm cider
  • The War on Critical Race Theory
    David Theo Goldberg
    The War on Critical Race Theory
    26 May 2021
    The critics want to wipe clear the actual history of racial oppression that is baked into the social and economic structures of the US.
  • Reclaiming the Power of Rebellion
    Elizabeth Hinton, Derecka Purnell
    Reclaiming the Power of Rebellion
    26 May 2021
    The police as they exist today need to be abolished, there’s no question. “Diversity doesn’t change the fundamental dynamics of policing.”
  • Dr. Gerald Horne
    Against Left-Wing White Nationalism
    26 May 2021
    Much of what is called the “left” still insists that the American “revolution” of 1776 is “unfinished,” when history shows that white supremacy was the intended result.
  • BAR Book Forum: Michael Rothberg’s “The Implicated Subject”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Michael Rothberg’s “The Implicated Subject”
    26 May 2021
    Most people contribute to injustice not as direct perpetrators but as indirect participants who enable, perpetuate, benefit from, and inherit histories of violence and contemporary systems of explo
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us