Reviews tagging 'Drug use'

The End of Policing by Alex S. Vitale

12 reviews

careinthelibrary's review against another edition

challenging hopeful informative sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Death, Murder, Police brutality, Racism, and Violence

Moderate: Hate crime, Classism, Deportation, Drug use, and Mass/school shootings

alyssa_s10's review

informative medium-paced

4.25

This book was not really about police abolition, it was mostly about police reform. It has a number of good ideas, like the decriminalization of drugs and sex work. 
There are a couple of quotes I like from the book such as "Police are the thin blue line between the have and the have not." as well as "The only law deserving of our respect is an unprejudiced law. One that protects everyone everywhere."

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality, Racism, and Gun violence

Moderate: Drug use, Violence, and Death

Minor: Sexual assault, Drug abuse, and Addiction

mandkips's review

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality, Gun violence, and Racism

Moderate: Death, Drug use, and Violence

Minor: Sexual assault, Drug abuse, and Addiction

natanbcpc's review

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

4.25

A very good introduction to police abolition. Each chapter focuses on a specific issue and analyses why our current approach is bad, positives and shortcomings of proposed reforms and police-free alternatives to deal with the issue.

The book is very American-centered, although it references other countries every now and then, but a lot of stuff still applies elsewhere.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Police brutality, Violence, and Racism

Minor: Drug use, Homophobia, and Transphobia

cianarae's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality, Gun violence, Drug use, and Violence

skudiklier's review

challenging informative slow-paced

4.75

I've been reading this book for almost an entire year at this point; this is for several reasons, and shouldn't just be taken as "wow this book is slow/dense." It is a very comprehensive look at the areas in which policing fails, the reasons for these failures, the way these failures are systemic, and ways we can help replace policing with other solutions. It is also very dense in the sense that it's a lot of facts, statistics, and figures, with very little to break it up. For me that's harder to get through, so I read it very slowly over the course of a year. But I would highly recommend this book, especially to those who think the police should not be abolished. I have a hard time imagining how someone could read this book and come away still thinking the police are a force for good. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality

Moderate: Ableism, Confinement, Death, Drug use, Drug abuse, Forced institutionalization, Gun violence, Hate crime, Islamophobia, Mass/school shootings, Murder, Physical abuse, Racism, Trafficking, Violence, Xenophobia, and Transphobia

Minor: Sexual assault and Rape

novemberscorpio's review against another edition

informative reflective slow-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Police brutality and Racism

Minor: Drug use and Drug abuse

readalongwithnat's review

challenging informative slow-paced

4.0

This is a really eye-opening book that discusses a ton of different topics related to policing, including some I didn’t anticipate, but appreciated learning more about. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Death, Drug use, Forced institutionalization, Gun violence, Mass/school shootings, Police brutality, Racism, and Slavery

book_enjoyer's review

challenging informative medium-paced

4.25

A thorough breakdown of the failures of American police. I don't know that this book would sway a hardcore cop supporter, but it's a great introduction to the problems in our current system and some potential solutions to push for. Each chapter covers a different aspect of policing--the war on drugs, the school-to-prison pipeline, etc--and provides an overview of how the law enforcement works, empirical evidence of how that enforcement doesn't benefit society, and some possible alternatives. It's a heavy read but a very necessary one, and I appreciated how detailed and specific Vitale is.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism, Addiction, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gun violence, Hate crime, Murder, Pedophilia, Racism, Sexual assault, Torture, and Police brutality

etosaurus's review

challenging informative

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Violence, Xenophobia, Slavery, Sexual assault, Racism, and Gun violence

Moderate: Child death and Drug use

I'm sure my tags are incomplete. This book covers a lot of horrible violence perpetuated by police officers in our society.