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Ta-Nehisi Coates The Myth Of Police Reform

Satisfactory Essays

Within the article, “The Myth of Police Reform,” the author points out how police respond to a lot of problems in our society that should not require police intervention. This is clearly an explicit argument because the author states that, “Fear and compliance have their place, but it can’t be every place.” This editorial is meant for everyone because it brings up numerous examples of people being shot, chased, or arrested over issues that shouldn’t involve violence. It also gives examples including different ages, races, and gender. Most of these narrations end up with someone getting shot over a silly reason whether it is someone running around naked or some kid tripping on mushrooms. These examples help us infer that every problem cannot be handled by force. Some may disagree with this, but the police can make mistakes just like the rest of us. Honestly, this paper seems very one sided. As soon as he says something noble about the police, he has something just as bad to counter it. …show more content…

I’ve never heard of the The Atlantic, but Ta-Nehisi presents himself as an average person, which is key for this editorial because it makes it a lot easier to relate with. Unfortunately, this article is in the political section so, some may not even see this. That’s too bad because Coates has a strong passion for reforming our police for the better. His example about how police use power to maintain “peace” instead of authority was very insightful. The only thing that caused me to question the writer’s credibility was when he brought up the relationship between African Americans and the police. I thought this was somewhat irrelevant to his main claim because we want police reform for everyone not just African Americans. Although the author did not include opposing views, I think this benefited him because it would take away from his main

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