vox--2020-08-07--HBO’s I May Destroy You might be the best TV show of the year

One Good Thing is Vox ’ s recommendations feature .
In each edition , find one more thing from the world of culture that we highly recommend .
In “ Line Spectrum Border , ” the eighth episode of Michaela Coel ’ s mesmerizing , borderline-perfect dramedy , I May Destroy You , Arabella , a young writer played by Coel herself , attempts to kick down a door .
She ’ s been locked out of an apartment where she was intending to crash , and she ’ s not particularly happy about it .
When her stylish boot @ @ @ @ @ @ @ apartment ’ s occupant , her ex-boyfriend , is holding a gun .
She turns and runs .
The door-kicking incident is one of the show ’ s most blatant and physical displays of its core idea : No matter what boundary you put up between yourself and another person , that other person might knock it right down and leave you feeling violated .
Arabella ’ s encounter with her ex isn ’ t nearly as scarring as other boundary violations on the show , but he ’ s still going to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ transgression leaves a mark .
I May Destroy You begins with Arabella ’ s life being ripped in two by a sexual assault she first tries to compartmentalize , before trying to simply slog through the trauma as best she can .
The slog is the only path available to her , but others around her , no matter how sympathetic they are , kind of need her to just be the person she was before her assault .
She has a draft due , after all , and her friends need her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s been through a lot , but the world keeps trying to get her to move on , even if nobody would be so gauche as to say that .
At the center of I May Destroy You , which aired on the BBC in the UK ( where it originated ) and airs on HBO in the US , is the very vagueness contained in its title .
Who ’ s going to destroy who ?
Each and every episode answers that question a little bit differently .
And with nine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ aired in the US , it ’ s safe to say this is one of the best shows of the year .
I May Destroy You shows all of the ways society is built to get you to negotiate on the terms of your own consent , just a little bit In addition to starring in I May Destroy You , Coel is the show ’ s creator , writer , and co-director .
The story was loosely inspired by her own sexual assault , which happened when she was at the height @ @ @ @ @ @ @ critically acclaimed series Chewing Gum ( available in the US on Netflix ) .
“ A young writer is the victim of rape ” is maybe not what you ’ d expect to be at the center of even a dark comedy , but I May Destroy You ’ s strength lies in how unflinching it is in staring directly at Arabella ’ s trauma , while also allowing just enough humor around the edges to keep from becoming pitch black .
The show is not about rape but , rather , survival @ @ @ @ @ @ @ find to withstand even the most mundane violations of our consent .
Sexual assault is hundreds of times worse than somebody you ’ ve asked not to hang out with you continuing to hang out with you — but both violate the boundaries you ’ ve painstakingly built around yourself .
The series is incredibly smart at exploring the ways the world asks us to just let these boundary violations slide , until it actively makes us put up with something we never wanted in the first place .
Every episode features a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ violated .
Sometimes that violation is obvious and easy to spot — a man non-consensually humping another man .
Sometimes , it ’ s a little harder to notice , as when Arabella ’ s best friend Terry ( Weruche Opia ) is asked a series of too-intimate questions at an acting audition .
It ’ s easy to call out the former as sexual assault ; it ’ s far harder to consider the latter as such , especially when Terry offers up more information than she might normally in hopes of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ she just playing along ?
The details of Arabella ’ s rape are hazy , lost to a faulty memory .
She doesn ’ t know who raped her , and it seems unlikely she ’ ll find him .
But even when characters are quite aware of who assaulted them , justice is hard to come by .
In one episode , Arabella calls out a fellow writer sharing the stage with her who takes off his condom while having sex with her .
After she hears from another person that this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ names him publicly as a rapist ( non-consensually removing a condom during sex can be charged as rape in the UK ) .
But doing the right thing rarely feels good in the way we hope it might .
Arabella spends that night clicking “ like ” on all the adoring Instagram comments she receives ; it doesn ’ t stop the emptiness from gnawing at her gut .
None of this would work without Coel , who ’ s brilliant at little flickers of half-expressions that let you know there ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ threatening to spill out of Arabella at a moment ’ s notice .
Her performance is essential , but it also wouldn ’ t work without her writing .
No story quite goes where you expect it to — such as when one episode devotes itself to a lengthy flashback of Arabella and some of the show ’ s other characters in high school .
There are times when the interrogation of consent I May Destroy You is perhaps a bit much — one episode ends with a reminder of all of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ very planet has thrown up in our faces — but at its core , it ’ s a bracing show about all of the ways power dynamics can go sour .
Each and every boundary stretched , each and every door kicked in , each and every bit of consent obliterated is an act of destruction .
And because human beings keep constructing hierarchies that give some people undue power over other people , that destruction keeps rippling outward , a stone thrown in a pool .
I May Destroy You can be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s also a bracingly human one , because it never looks away where other shows might .
It never focuses on the crime when it can focus on the survivor .
I May Destroy You airs Monday nights at 10 pm Eastern on HBO .
Its season finale airs Monday , August 24 .
Catch up with the show on HBO ’ s streaming platforms .
Every day at Vox , we aim to answer your most important questions and provide you , and our audience around the world , with information that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment : to empower you through understanding .
Vox ’ s work is reaching more people than ever , but our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources — particularly during a pandemic and an economic downturn .
Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation , but it will enable our staff to continue to offer free articles , videos , and podcasts at the quality and volume that this moment requires .
Please consider making a contribution to Vox @ @

One Good Thing is Vox’s recommendations feature. In each edition, find one more thing from the world of culture that we highly recommend.
In “Line Spectrum Border,” the eighth episode of Michaela Coel’s mesmerizing, borderline-perfect dramedy, I May Destroy You, Arabella, a young writer played by Coel herself, attempts to kick down a door. She’s been locked out of an apartment where she was intending to crash, and she’s not particularly happy about it. When her stylish boot nearly kicks the door in, the apartment’s occupant, her ex-boyfriend, opens it. He is holding a gun. She turns and runs.
The door-kicking incident is one of the show’s most blatant and physical displays of its core idea: No matter what boundary you put up between yourself and another person, that other person might knock it right down and leave you feeling violated. Arabella’s encounter with her ex isn’t nearly as scarring as other boundary violations on the show, but he’s still going to have to fix his door. Every transgression leaves a mark.
I May Destroy You begins with Arabella’s life being ripped in two by a sexual assault she first tries to compartmentalize, before trying to simply slog through the trauma as best she can. The slog is the only path available to her, but others around her, no matter how sympathetic they are, kind of need her to just be the person she was before her assault. She has a draft due, after all, and her friends need her for emotional support. Yeah, she’s been through a lot, but the world keeps trying to get her to move on, even if nobody would be so gauche as to say that.
Related Michaela the Destroyer
At the center of I May Destroy You, which aired on the BBC in the UK (where it was primarily made) and airs on HBO in the US, is the very vagueness contained in its title. Who’s going to destroy who? Each and every episode answers that question a little bit differently. And with nine episodes of its 12-episode first season having aired in the US, it’s safe to say this is one of the best shows of the year.
In addition to starring in I May Destroy You, Coel is the show’s creator, writer, and co-director. The story was loosely inspired by her own sexual assault, which happened when she was at the height of an early career upswing following her critically acclaimed series Chewing Gum.
“A young writer is the victim of rape” is maybe not what you’d expect to be at the center of even a dark comedy, but I May Destroy You’s strength lies in how unflinching it is in staring directly at Arabella’s trauma, while also allowing just enough humor around the edges to keep from becoming pitch black.
The show is not about rape but, rather, survival, and all of the ways we find to withstand even the most mundane violations of our consent. Sexual assault is hundreds of times worse than somebody you’ve asked not to hang out with you continuing to hang out with you — but both violate the boundaries you’ve painstakingly built around yourself. The series is incredibly smart at exploring the ways the world asks us to just let these boundary violations slide, until it actively makes us put up with something we never wanted in the first place.
Every episode features a moment where someone’s consent is violated. Sometimes that violation is obvious and easy to spot — a man non-consensually humping another man. Sometimes, it’s a little harder to notice, as when Arabella’s best friend Terry (Weruche Opia) is asked a series of too-intimate questions at an acting audition. It’s easy to call out the former as sexual assault; it’s far harder to consider the latter as such, especially when Terry offers up more information than she might normally in hopes of getting the job. Isn’t she just playing along?
The details of Arabella’s rape are hazy, lost to a faulty memory. She doesn’t know who raped her, and it seems unlikely she’ll find him. But even when characters are quite aware of who assaulted them, justice is hard to come by. In one episode, Arabella calls out a fellow writer sharing the stage with her who takes off his condom while having sex with her. After she hears from another person that this is a pattern with him, she names him publicly as a rapist (non-consensually removing a condom during sex can be charged as rape in the UK). But doing the right thing rarely feels good in the way we hope it might. Arabella spends that night clicking “like” on all the adoring Instagram comments she receives; it doesn’t stop the emptiness from gnawing at her gut.
None of this would work without Coel, who’s brilliant at little flickers of half-expressions that let you know there’s some vast ocean of rage and sorrow threatening to spill out of Arabella at a moment’s notice. Her performance is essential, but it also wouldn’t work without her writing. No story quite goes where you expect it to — such as when one episode devotes itself to a lengthy flashback of Arabella and some of the show’s other characters in high school.
There are times when the interrogation of consent I May Destroy You is perhaps a bit much — one episode ends with a reminder of all of the ways humans are violating the boundaries the very planet has thrown up in our faces — but at its core, it’s a bracing show about all of the ways power dynamics can go sour. Each and every boundary stretched, each and every door kicked in, each and every bit of consent obliterated is an act of destruction. And because human beings keep constructing hierarchies that give some people undue power over other people, that destruction keeps rippling outward, a stone thrown in a pool.
I May Destroy You can be a tough watch, but it’s also a bracingly human one, because it never looks away where other shows might. It never focuses on the crime when it can focus on the survivor.
I May Destroy You airs Monday nights at 10 pm Eastern on HBO. Its season finale airs Monday, August 24. Catch up with the show on HBO’s streaming platforms.
Correction: Chewing Gum is no longer available on Netflix. Also, Arabella nearly kicks her ex’s door in but doesn’t actually do so. This story has been updated.


vox--2020-08-07--How cities can tackle violent crime without relying on police

One of the most robust findings in criminology is that putting more police officers on the streets leads to less violent crime .
Yet , as recent police killings and violence against protestors have reminded us , policing also produces staggering costs that many communities are no longer willing to bear .
These seemingly incongruous views represent a tension at the core of any efforts to reform , defund , or abolish policing .
Few scholars have wrestled with this tension as rigorously as Princeton University sociologist Patrick Sharkey .
In his 2018 book , Uneasy Peace : The Great @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Life , and the Next War on Violence , Sharkey makes the case that the decline in violent crime in America over the past three decades is one of the most important social transformations of our time .
At the same time , he argues the US ’ s chosen methods for responding to violence have become far too destructive , and offers an alternative vision for public safety that relies primarily on communities and residents , not law enforcement .
We are currently being forced to confront a question that has animated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ How can we continue to reduce violence , but do so using a model that relies far less on police and prisons ?
That ’ s a much harder question than simply asking whether some of the jobs police currently perform can be replaced — and it demands an even more rigorous answer , especially considering the extent to which high levels of violence can devastate disadvantaged communities .
I recently spoke to Sharkey about what ’ s causing the uptick in gun violence in big US cities , whether there is an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reducing violence , his vision for a community-driven approach to public safety ( and the evidence base behind that vision ) , what he thinks the “ defund the police ” campaign gets right ( and wrong ) , and more .
Our conversation , edited for length and clarity , follows .
Can you describe the “ uneasy peace ” that we are currently living through ?
Since the 1990s , violence has fallen by roughly half across the country .
In a number of cities like New York , Los Angeles @ @ @ @ @ @ @ San Diego , and San Francisco , violence has fallen by 70 or 80 percent .
Even places we still think of as violent — Chicago , Philadelphia , Oakland — have seen violence fall by between a third and a half .
These changes have transformed city life as we know it .
As violence falls , public life starts to return .
Parents let their kids play outside , libraries fill up , shopping districts become more lively .
Academic performance rises ; young people are less likely to drop out @ @ @ @ @ @ @ become safe , and businesses return .
There ’ s causal evidence that children growing up in cities where violence is declining are more likely to rise up in the income distribution when they reach adulthood and move out of poverty .
In short , when violence falls , cities start to return to life , and the greatest benefits are experienced by the most disadvantaged segments of the population .
But the paradox is that the methods we ’ ve relied on to deal with violence — primarily aggressive policing and mass @ @ @ @ @ @ @ They have left millions of Americans enmeshed in the prison system with consequences that affect not only the people who are involved in the system but also their families and the next generation .
For several decades now , we ’ ve asked police departments to dominate public spaces through any means necessary .
The police violence that has become so visible recently is a function of that task ; the controversy , the attention , the unrest , the anger toward policing is a response to a strategy to reduce violence that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
That ’ s what I mean when I ’ m talking about the peace being uneasy : Violence has fallen , but we need a new method to address it going forward .
That ’ s a good segue into our current moment .
Multiple cities are currently experiencing a sharp uptick in shootings and homicides — some of which is being blamed on efforts to delegitimize police authority and reduce police presence .
So I ’ m wondering : Is that the trade-off we face ?
If we try to scale @ @ @ @ @ @ @ inevitable byproduct ?
To be clear , there is a pattern of violence rising in the aftermath of these kinds of high-profile protests against police brutality .
This happened after Freddie Gray in Baltimore , after Michael Brown in Ferguson , and it ’ s clearly happening now .
But that doesn ’ t mean that protests against police cause violence to rise .
It also doesn ’ t mean police are the only institution capable of confronting violence .
It means that when we rely primarily on police to respond to all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ playing that role , neighborhoods become destabilized .
That happens for a few different reasons .
One is that police make a conscious decision to step back from their role in being the primary institution responsible for public safety .
That might happen due to increased scrutiny on policing .
It might happen due to shifts in policy , like the fact that NYPD dismantled their plainclothes anti-crime units that respond to many serious forms of violent crime .
It also may happen because law enforcement is slowing down intentionally to make a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ residents may be less likely to work with the police , defer to the police , or cooperate with investigations .
Young people may come to the conclusion that this city doesn ’ t care about me — I ’ m not playing by the rules anymore .
People obey the law when they believe it ’ s legitimate ; when the belief in the legitimacy of this institution is undermined , that can result in a rise of violence .
None of this implies people should stop protesting police brutality .
It @ @ @ @ @ @ @ historically used to reduce violence are unsustainable , and we need to start thinking of a strategy for confronting violence that relies a lot less on those methods .
Let ’ s talk about that strategy .
Can you paint me a picture of what an alternative model of public safety would look like that didn ’ t rely so heavily on police ?
There ’ s a basic conclusion from the research on what creates safe neighborhoods : Police are effective at reducing violence , but they aren ’ t the only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s lots of evidence telling us that other core institutions in a community — institutions that are driven by residents and local organizations — can play a central role in controlling violence .
But we ’ ve never thought of these organizations and residents as the central actors responsible for creating safe streets , so we ’ ve never given them the same commitment and the same resources that we give to law enforcement and the criminal legal system .
When we talk about how to respond to violence , the default response @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the police and the prison .
The next model should be one driven primarily by residents and local organizations as the central actors .
Police still certainly have a role to play , but responding to violent crime takes up only a tiny fraction of police officers ’ time .
So the idea here is that we can rely on residents and local organizations to take over most of the duties that [ officers ] currently handle and make sure neighborhoods are safe .
The critique you ’ ll often hear on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ some of these community-based methods for reducing violent crime is not nearly as robust as the evidence base behind policing as a way to reduce violent crime .
How do you respond to that ?
I agree that the research on the effectiveness of policing on crime is strong .
But the motivation for developing a new model for how to deal with violence is the observation that while police may have been effective in controlling violence , that has come with significant costs , which aren ’ t accounted for in any @ @ @ @ @ @ @ come with the type of aggressive , and sometimes violent , policing that I think most of the country is no longer willing to tolerate .
Policing as a method to confront violence is now seen as unacceptable by a large chunk of the population .
I would also dispute that the evidence base for the alternative approach focused on community actors and institutions is not as strong .
We now have a pretty well-established base of evidence telling us that residents and local organizations are at least as effective as the police @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out of the Crime Lab at the University of Chicago , all of which are run as randomized controlled trials , are extraordinarily effective .
The Becoming a Man and Choose to Change programs , which rely on a combination of mentoring and cognitive behavioral therapy ( CBT ) , reduce participants ’ involvement in violence by about 50 percent .
Summer jobs programs have led to over 40 percent decreases in violence .
The READI program , which provides adults most at risk of becoming a victim or perpetrator of gun violence @ @ @ @ @ @ @ currently under evaluation , but the early results have shown extraordinary potential .
Community-based programs that redesigned randomized abandoned lots in Philadelphia to become public spaces reduced violence in and around those lots by around 30 percent .
The Cure Violence programs , which have been cited as if they always work , do have a more mixed evidence base .
I think it is important to be very transparent about that — they don ’ t work every single time .
Still , this can be a very effective model .
Programs @ @ @ @ @ @ @ elsewhere have been rigorously evaluated and shown to be extremely effective at reducing violence .
There ’ s also national data on this .
I carried out a study on the role that the expansion of the nonprofit sector played in contributing to the crime drop .
What we found was that in a given city with 100,000 people , every new organization formed to confront violence and build stronger neighborhoods led to about a 1 percent drop in violent crime and murder .
So the expansion nonprofits focused on building stronger communities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ role in contributing to the crime drop .
The evidence base for a community response to violence is at least as strong as the evidence base for policing .
That ’ s why I don ’ t really think it ’ s about the evidence base — I think it ’ s about a mindset .
In America , policy discussions about violence focus so intently on the police and the prison as the default responses .
We ’ ve been investing in these methods for so long , it ’ s all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to even imagine a different response to violence .
I want to talk about that mindset .
In Uneasy Peace , you talk about our historic approach to issues like violence , poverty , and inequality as one of “ punishment and abandonment ” and warn that if we focus on only addressing the “ punishment ” side of things but ignore making investments in abandoned communities , then reform efforts will ultimately fail .
I think this framework applies to conversations around “ defunding the police.
” If the goal is to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ policing , then slashing police budgets works great .
But it strikes me that this strategy could also lead to an uptick in overall violence levels if it ’ s not paired with investments in alternative mechanisms for reducing violence .
Can you walk us through that broader framework and how it may apply today ?
Calls to defund or dismantle the police are really about how we deal with an institution that is seen as racist and anti-democratic ; what I ’ ve argued for is to shift the focus toward how @ @ @ @ @ @ @ strong communities .
When we make that shift , it forces us to think about not just how to scale back police shootings but what active steps need to be taken to make sure that communities are safe and everyone is welcomed .
For the past 50 years , our model of responding to concentrated urban poverty has been abandonment and punishment .
We ’ ve ignored the challenges of urban inequality and responded by scaling up the policing and prison systems .
Over time , there has been a recognition of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ve moved toward a model that is trying to gradually scale them back .
That means we have moved away from a focus on punishment and toward a focus on justice .
But if we just focus solely on justice , then we ’ re going to end up with a situation where communities don ’ t have the basic investments that they need to be strong , stable , and safe .
That ’ s my motivation for a different approach : to focus not only on justice but also on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ neighborhoods .
I agree entirely that just scaling back the budgets of police departments is going to leave us with neighborhoods that are more vulnerable to a rise in violence .
That ’ s why I make the case for investments in a different set of institutions driven by residents and local organizations that can play a central role in creating safe streets and strong communities .
That ’ s the step we haven ’ t taken .
We started the conversation about scaling back the excesses of law enforcement and the criminal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t had the conversations about the investments that are needed to make sure neighborhoods are safe and no one falls through the cracks .
Let ’ s have that conversation .
You ’ ve called for “ a demonstration project that is both more cautious and more radical than the call to defund the police.
” Can you outline that for me ?
Instead of calling for a rapid change where we dismantle police departments and immediately shift all police responses to other entities , the idea here is to try to maintain @ @ @ @ @ @ @ violence is rising , but also start to plan for what an alternative model for dealing with violence might look like .
There are a few steps .
Begin with a community within a city where the police are not seen as a legitimate institution — where residents are looking for an alternative to law enforcement .
There has to be buy-in from the community where this is implemented and it has to be driven by members of that community .
Second , establish a “ community quarterback ” : a single coalition @ @ @ @ @ @ @ see it as their responsibility to make sure all public spaces are safe in their community .
Third , provide funding to that organization equal to what law enforcement would be provided in that precinct .
For instance , each of Washington , DC ’ s 50-plus police service areas receives , on average , about $ 10 million per year to fund a workforce of roughly 80 full-time employees for a population of around 12,000 .
That ’ s the kind of commitment I ’ m asking for : the same level @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
For far too long , we ’ ve asked community groups to mobilize to respond to violence on the cheap , often without any resources or compensation .
Then allow this new organization to decide how it wants to hire , train , and deploy its resources to deal with all of the incidents that that police departments currently deal with : mental health crises , young people dealing drugs , small-scale altercations that occur outside bars or other hot spots , drug addiction .
Lastly , make a long-term commitment to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ calling for a 10-year commitment .
Give it a chance to fail .
Give it a chance to go through scandals and mishaps and bumps along the way , and know that it ’ s still going to be there in 10 years .
There ’ s no easy way to respond to every challenge in a community .
There ’ s gon na be problems along the way .
So it ’ s really a mayor and a funder that have to be willing to go through these challenges and stick with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decide that there are places where armed responders are still necessary , like gun violence , and could choose what kind of relationship they want with the local police department accordingly .
But in those places , we could imagine a model where even for situations where police are first to respond , they would need to respond with a member of this community coalition with them .
Then , for all other 99 percent of incidents , the members of this coalition would be the first to respond to incidents in public @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : Give an alternative coalition of residents and organizations a chance to play a central role in creating a safe community and give them the resources that we devote to law enforcement .
I just have to believe that , based on the evidence we have , that coalition would be at least as effective as law enforcement , and controlling violence and would come without the costs of law enforcement .
Every day at Vox , we aim to answer your most important questions and provide you , and our audience around @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the power to save lives .
Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment : to empower you through understanding .
Vox ’ s work is reaching more people than ever , but our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources — particularly during a pandemic and an economic downturn .
Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation , but it will enable our staff to continue to offer free articles , videos , and podcasts at the quality and volume that this moment requires .
Please @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

One of the most robust findings in criminology is that putting more police officers on the streets leads to less violent crime. Yet, as recent police killings and violence against protesters have reminded us, policing also produces staggering costs that many communities are no longer willing to bear. These seemingly incongruous views represent a tension at the core of any efforts to reform, defund, or abolish policing.
Few scholars have wrestled with this tension as rigorously as Princeton University sociologist Patrick Sharkey. In his 2018 book, Uneasy Peace: The Great Crime Decline, the Renewal of City Life, and the Next War on Violence, Sharkey makes the case that the decline in violent crime in America over the past three decades is one of the most important social transformations of our time. At the same time, he argues the US’s chosen methods for responding to violence have become far too destructive, and offers an alternative vision for public safety that relies primarily on communities and residents, not law enforcement.
We are currently being forced to confront a question that has animated Sharkey’s work for years: How can we continue to reduce violence, but do so using a model that relies far less on police and prisons? That’s a much harder question than simply asking whether some of the jobs police currently perform can be replaced — and it demands an even more rigorous answer, especially considering the extent to which high levels of violence can devastate disadvantaged communities.
I recently spoke to Sharkey about what’s causing the uptick in gun violence in big US cities, whether there is an inevitable trade-off between reducing police presence and reducing violence, his vision for a community-driven approach to public safety (and the evidence base behind that vision), what he thinks the “defund the police” campaign gets right (and wrong), and more.
Our conversation, edited for length and clarity, follows.
Roge Karma
Can you describe the “uneasy peace” that we are currently living through?
Patrick Sharkey
Since the 1990s, violence has fallen by roughly half across the country. In a number of cities like New York, Los Angeles, Washington, DC, Dallas, San Diego, and San Francisco, violence has fallen by 70 or 80 percent. Even places we still think of as violent — Chicago, Philadelphia, Oakland — have seen violence fall by between a third and a half.
These changes have transformed city life as we know it. As violence falls, public life starts to return. Parents let their kids play outside, libraries fill up, shopping districts become more lively. Academic performance rises; young people are less likely to drop out. Families invest in neighborhoods as they become safe, and businesses return.
There’s causal evidence that children growing up in cities where violence is declining are more likely to rise up in the income distribution when they reach adulthood and move out of poverty. In short, when violence falls, cities start to return to life, and the greatest benefits are experienced by the most disadvantaged segments of the population.
But the paradox is that the methods we’ve relied on to deal with violence — primarily aggressive policing and mass incarceration — have had staggering costs. They have left millions of Americans enmeshed in the prison system with consequences that affect not only the people who are involved in the system but also their families and the next generation.
For several decades now, we’ve asked police departments to dominate public spaces through any means necessary. The police violence that has become so visible recently is a function of that task; the controversy, the attention, the unrest, the anger toward policing is a response to a strategy to reduce violence that has been intact for several decades now.
That’s what I mean when I’m talking about the peace being uneasy: Violence has fallen, but we need a new method to address it going forward.
Roge Karma
That’s a good segue into our current moment. Multiple cities are currently experiencing a sharp uptick in shootings and homicides — some of which is being blamed on efforts to delegitimize police authority and reduce police presence. So I’m wondering: Is that the trade-off we face? If we try to scale back policing, is rising violence the inevitable byproduct?
Patrick Sharkey
It’s not an inevitable trade-off.
To be clear, there is a pattern of violence rising in the aftermath of these kinds of high-profile protests against police brutality. This happened after Freddie Gray in Baltimore, after Michael Brown in Ferguson, and it’s clearly happening now. But that doesn’t mean that protests against police cause violence to rise. It also doesn’t mean police are the only institution capable of confronting violence. It means that when we rely primarily on police to respond to all forms of violence and then police stop playing that role, neighborhoods become destabilized.
That happens for a few different reasons. One is that police make a conscious decision to step back from their role in being the primary institution responsible for public safety. That might happen due to increased scrutiny on policing. It might happen due to shifts in policy, like the fact that NYPD dismantled their plainclothes anti-crime units that respond to many serious forms of violent crime. It also may happen because law enforcement is slowing down intentionally to make a statement.
A second piece is that residents may be less likely to work with the police, defer to the police, or cooperate with investigations. Young people may come to the conclusion that this city doesn’t care about me — I’m not playing by the rules anymore. People obey the law when they believe it’s legitimate; when the belief in the legitimacy of this institution is undermined, that can result in a rise of violence.
None of this implies people should stop protesting police brutality. It means that the methods we’ve historically used to reduce violence are unsustainable, and we need to start thinking of a strategy for confronting violence that relies a lot less on those methods.
Roge Karma
Let’s talk about that strategy. Can you paint me a picture of what an alternative model of public safety would look like that didn’t rely so heavily on police?
Patrick Sharkey
There’s a basic conclusion from the research on what creates safe neighborhoods: Police are effective at reducing violence, but they aren’t the only ones who are effective.
There’s lots of evidence telling us that other core institutions in a community — institutions that are driven by residents and local organizations — can play a central role in controlling violence. But we’ve never thought of these organizations and residents as the central actors responsible for creating safe streets, so we’ve never given them the same commitment and the same resources that we give to law enforcement and the criminal legal system. When we talk about how to respond to violence, the default response in the US is always to focus on the police and the prison.
The next model should be one driven primarily by residents and local organizations as the central actors. Police still certainly have a role to play, but responding to violent crime takes up only a tiny fraction of police officers’ time. So the idea here is that we can rely on residents and local organizations to take over most of the duties that [officers] currently handle and make sure neighborhoods are safe.
Roge Karma
The critique you’ll often hear on this is that the evidence base for some of these community-based methods for reducing violent crime is not nearly as robust as the evidence base behind policing as a way to reduce violent crime. How do you respond to that?
Patrick Sharkey
I agree that the research on the effectiveness of policing on crime is strong. But the motivation for developing a new model for how to deal with violence is the observation that while police may have been effective in controlling violence, that has come with significant costs, which aren’t accounted for in any of those studies. It’s come with the type of aggressive, and sometimes violent, policing that I think most of the country is no longer willing to tolerate. Policing as a method to confront violence is now seen as unacceptable by a large chunk of the population.
I would also dispute that the evidence base for the alternative approach focused on community actors and institutions is not as strong. We now have a pretty well-established base of evidence telling us that residents and local organizations are at least as effective as the police in controlling violence.
The programs run out of the Crime Lab at the University of Chicago, all of which are run as randomized controlled trials, are extraordinarily effective. The Becoming a Man and Choose to Change programs, which rely on a combination of mentoring and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), reduce participants’ involvement in violence by about 50 percent. Summer jobs programs have led to over 40 percent decreases in violence.
The READI program, which provides adults most at risk of becoming a victim or perpetrator of gun violence with transitional employment and CBT, is currently under evaluation, but the early results have shown extraordinary potential. Community-based programs that redesigned randomized abandoned lots in Philadelphia to become public spaces reduced violence in and around those lots by around 30 percent.
The Cure Violence programs, which have been cited as if they always work, do have a more mixed evidence base. I think it is important to be very transparent about that — they don’t work every single time. Still, this can be a very effective model. Programs in New York, Baltimore, and elsewhere have been rigorously evaluated and shown to be extremely effective at reducing violence.
There’s also national data on this. I carried out a study on the role that the expansion of the nonprofit sector played in contributing to the crime drop. What we found was that in a given city with 100,000 people, every new organization formed to confront violence and build stronger neighborhoods led to about a 1 percent drop in violent crime and murder. So the expansion nonprofits focused on building stronger communities and working against violence played a big role in contributing to the crime drop.
The evidence base for a community response to violence is at least as strong as the evidence base for policing. That’s why I don’t really think it’s about the evidence base — I think it’s about a mindset. In America, policy discussions about violence focus so intently on the police and the prison as the default responses. We’ve been investing in these methods for so long, it’s all we know — it’s hard to even imagine a different response to violence.
Roge Karma
I want to talk about that mindset. In Uneasy Peace, you talk about our historic approach to issues like violence, poverty, and inequality as one of “punishment and abandonment” and warn that if we focus on only addressing the “punishment” side of things but ignore making investments in abandoned communities, then reform efforts will ultimately fail.
I think this framework applies to conversations around “defunding the police.” If the goal is to just reduce the injustices that come with policing, then slashing police budgets works great. But it strikes me that this strategy could also lead to an uptick in overall violence levels if it’s not paired with investments in alternative mechanisms for reducing violence.
Can you walk us through that broader framework and how it may apply today?
Patrick Sharkey
Calls to defund or dismantle the police are really about how we deal with an institution that is seen as racist and anti-democratic; what I’ve argued for is to shift the focus toward how we can most effectively create safe and strong communities. When we make that shift, it forces us to think about not just how to scale back police shootings but what active steps need to be taken to make sure that communities are safe and everyone is welcomed.
For the past 50 years, our model of responding to concentrated urban poverty has been abandonment and punishment. We’ve ignored the challenges of urban inequality and responded by scaling up the policing and prison systems. Over time, there has been a recognition of the injustice those systems, so we’ve moved toward a model that is trying to gradually scale them back. That means we have moved away from a focus on punishment and toward a focus on justice. But if we just focus solely on justice, then we’re going to end up with a situation where communities don’t have the basic investments that they need to be strong, stable, and safe.
That’s my motivation for a different approach: to focus not only on justice but also on the investments that are needed to create safe neighborhoods. I agree entirely that just scaling back the budgets of police departments is going to leave us with neighborhoods that are more vulnerable to a rise in violence. That’s why I make the case for investments in a different set of institutions driven by residents and local organizations that can play a central role in creating safe streets and strong communities.
That’s the step we haven’t taken. We started the conversation about scaling back the excesses of law enforcement and the criminal legal system. But we haven’t had the conversations about the investments that are needed to make sure neighborhoods are safe and no one falls through the cracks.
Roge Karma
Let’s have that conversation. You’ve called for “a demonstration project that is both more cautious and more radical than the call to defund the police.” Can you outline that for me?
Patrick Sharkey
Instead of calling for a rapid change where we dismantle police departments and immediately shift all police responses to other entities, the idea here is to try to maintain stability in communities at a time when violence is rising, but also start to plan for what an alternative model for dealing with violence might look like.
There are a few steps. Begin with a community within a city where the police are not seen as a legitimate institution — where residents are looking for an alternative to law enforcement. There has to be buy-in from the community where this is implemented and it has to be driven by members of that community. Second, establish a “community quarterback”: a single coalition of organizations that are brought together and see it as their responsibility to make sure all public spaces are safe in their community.
Third, provide funding to that organization equal to what law enforcement would be provided in that precinct. For instance, each of Washington, DC’s 50-plus police service areas receives, on average, about $10 million per year to fund a workforce of roughly 80 full-time employees for a population of around 12,000. That’s the kind of commitment I’m asking for: the same level of commitment that we give law enforcement. For far too long, we’ve asked community groups to mobilize to respond to violence on the cheap, often without any resources or compensation.
Then allow this new organization to decide how it wants to hire, train, and deploy its resources to deal with all of the incidents that that police departments currently deal with: mental health crises, young people dealing drugs, small-scale altercations that occur outside bars or other hot spots, drug addiction.
Lastly, make a long-term commitment to this new coalition; I’m calling for a 10-year commitment. Give it a chance to fail. Give it a chance to go through scandals and mishaps and bumps along the way, and know that it’s still going to be there in 10 years. There’s no easy way to respond to every challenge in a community. There’s gonna be problems along the way. So it’s really a mayor and a funder that have to be willing to go through these challenges and stick with an organization.
Now, communities may decide that there are places where armed responders are still necessary, like gun violence, and could choose what kind of relationship they want with the local police department accordingly. But in those places, we could imagine a model where even for situations where police are first to respond, they would need to respond with a member of this community coalition with them. Then, for all other 99 percent of incidents, the members of this coalition would be the first to respond to incidents in public space.
That’s the proposal: Give an alternative coalition of residents and organizations a chance to play a central role in creating a safe community and give them the resources that we devote to law enforcement. I just have to believe that, based on the evidence we have, that coalition would be at least as effective as law enforcement, and would come without the costs of law enforcement.


vox--2020-08-07--The pandemic hasn’t stopped Native Hawaiians’ fight to protect Maunakea

“ It almost seems like it never happened , ” Pua Case tells Vox about her time in the encampment at the foot of Maunakea , a dormant volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii and the tallest mountain in the world .
While she lives only a 30-minute drive away , she says , “ I have to go back and look at videos or pictures to remind myself that we were really up there.
” For nearly nine months , she and other kiaʻi , or protectors , were sleeping in a parking lot over a lava field @ @ @ @ @ @ @ road up to Maunakea ’ s summit .
From the Pu ‘ uhonua o Pu ‘ uhuluhulu camp , protectors kept watch for construction crews for the Thirty Meter Telescope ( TMT ) — planned to be the largest telescope in the Northern Hemisphere — through windstorms , hail , and overnight temperatures that dipped well below 30 degrees Fahrenheit .
In Hawaiian traditions of creation , the mountain is an ancestor and shares genealogical ties with Native Hawaiians , or Kanaka Maoli .
It is one of the most sacred sites — @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Hawaiian culture .
For kiaʻi , protecting the mountain from desecration is more than a cultural responsibility ; it ’ s a lineal duty to those who came before them and the generations who will succeed them .
When the pandemic hit , kiaʻi were already assessing the threat of construction and considering the impact on resources .
After determining that there was no imminent threat , they decided to pack up their site , which hosted anywhere between 30 and 3,000 people at any given time .
Should an attempt be made @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they could be back up there in half an hour .
Still , their departure from the mountain was marked by emotional exhaustion and trepidation for what was to come .
It also presented familiar challenges .
Before the latest standoff on the mountain , many kiaʻi had spent years tirelessly writing letters , submitting testimony to city council meetings , combing over management plans , and trying to monitor the movements of multiple parties with vastly more power and resources than they ’ ll ever have .
Today , they continue that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the mountain , they could offer their physical presence to inspire supporters , who could be shielded from the invisible — and , certainly , less romantic — work kiaʻi had been doing behind the scenes .
The movement has a robust social media presence that acts as a direct line of communication between the front line and its supporters abroad .
The Protect Mauna a Wākea Instagram account , one of two accounts that had been operating from the camp , has 136,000 followers who rely on photos and videos of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ into the action .
Under lockdown , the movement is challenged with keeping supporters , who are used to seeing dispatches from the mountain , engaged and connected to it .
“ It ’ s constant , ” Case says .
“ You have to be a presence or you ’ re going to disappear .
And you can ’ t afford to disappear when you ’ re talking about your lifeways , your culture , and the very continuance and protection of the places that are connected to you.
” Kiaʻi have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a string of legal challenges , petitions , and protests over the past decade .
But the fight for Maunakea gained national attention a year ago , after Hawaii Gov .
David Ige announced that construction would be cleared to begin on July 15 .
That morning , kiaʻi awaited the construction crews .
Some had locked themselves to a cattle guard that was built into the Mauna Kea Access Road — the only road up to the summit .
But then , a line of elders , or kupuna , formed farther @ @ @ @ @ @ @ road .
It was their blockade that inevitably became the front line .
“ I saw them sitting in lawn chairs and folding chairs on the road , all bundled up with blankets and sleeping bags , ” said Andre Perez , one of the kiaʻi and a nonviolent direct action trainer for the Hawaiʻi Unity and Liberation Institute .
He was the acting police liaison that day .
“ I knew that something powerful was happening .
The elders were stepping into the fray and taking charge.
” They held that line @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state of emergency on July 17 , clearing a path for law enforcement to begin making arrests .
Multiple agencies arrived on the scene ; there were officers brought in from other islands , three state agencies , and the National Guard .
It wasn ’ t long before kiaʻi , hundreds of whom had gathered there around their kupuna , were sitting in front of a massive militarized police presence dressed in riot gear and armed with chemical dispersants and a long-range acoustic device ( LRAD ) — a sonic weapon developed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ emits high-frequency sounds at extreme volumes to disperse crowds .
Whatever aggression law enforcement expected from the crowd that day never materialized .
Kia ‘ i sat in purposeful silence as 38 of their kupuna , many in their 70s and 80s , were arrested and escorted — and , in several instances , carried — away to awaiting police vans , crying but resolute .
The air above the crowd was periodically punctured by sobs , singing , and chanting .
“ We didn ’ t want to give the police any @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ Our discipline was our safety.
” Images and video footage of the arrests sparked public outcry across the island chain and overseas .
It was the stark , visible disparity between the resistance and the state response that galvanized a native movement and brought supporters from around the world to their cause .
For nearly nine months after , kupuna never left the spot they first occupied .
A tent was erected to shelter them as they sat on the road , and a volunteer village formed overnight , equipped with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ even a “ university ” grounded in Native Hawaiian science and culture .
They hosted locals and musicians from neighboring islands , curious tourists , relatives from other Indigenous movements — the camp flew flags gifted to them from Palestine , Tibet , Guam , Standing Rock , Cherokee , and Navajo , Aotearoa , and the Indigenous Australian people , among others .
Even Hollywood celebrities like Jason Momoa and Dwayne “ The Rock ” Johnson , who felt connected to the movement through their Polynesian heritage , came to pay their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ also on hand to assist kupuna , some of whom experienced altitude sickness and even mild strokes while keeping watch over their sacred mountain .
Many kupuna had preexisting health conditions that made their taking a stand challenging — and yet , they stayed .
After five months and $ 15 million spent on officers and supplies to manage the conflict , Ige withdrew state and county law enforcement from the mountain .
At the same time , he requested additional funding from the House Finance Committee as a “ contingency amount for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ activism , including but not limited to Maunakea.
” In late December , kiaʻi reached a temporary agreement with Hawaii County Mayor Harry Kim to clear the access road with his assurance that TMT would not attempt to begin construction until the end of February 2020 .
They caught a break when the deal expired ; the observatory ’ s leadership had yet to determine when construction could begin .
In the midst of the pandemic , the future is uncertain .
Kiaʻi don ’ t know when or if they ’ ll @ @ @ @ @ @ @ standoff .
Since the lockdown , some have returned to the mountain to stand at the ahu , the altar erected alongside where their camp once stood , and for years where many have offered prayers .
It is ground that they hope someday to only have to hold in prayer , rather than resistance .
The new giant telescope promises access to “ the very edge of the observable Universe , ” an opportunity to discover places that were previously unreachable to humankind .
“ It will enable a new frontier of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and evolution of the universe , including the search for life on other planets , ” the University of California , one of the project ’ s funders , said in a statement to Vox .
“ The potential for scientific discoveries is truly unlimited.
” But kiaʻi say it ’ s precisely this argument that gives cause for opposition : There are some places that humans aren ’ t meant to go , and the summit of Maunakea is one of them .
The summit is firmly the province of the gods @ @ @ @ @ @ @ such as the kahuna , or priests , or the ali ‘ i , high chiefs — were permitted on the mountain in order to perform ceremonies of affairs , and they wouldn ’ t stay long .
It is sacred not only in its religious capacity but also because of the lack of oxygen .
At 13,796 feet , there is 40 percent less air pressure at the summit than at sea level .
Visitors are advised to heed signs of altitude sickness and pulmonary and cerebral edemas .
Even employees at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at that elevation .
“ It ’ s a place where humans don ’ t belong , ” says Noe Noe Wong-Wilson , one of the kupuna arrested that day .
“ Where gods reside.
” The area between Maunakea , Mauna Loa , and Hualālai volcanic mountains are sensitive environments and culturally significant landscapes .
Roughly 20 miles from Kona to the west and almost 30 miles from Hilo to the east , the area is extremely remote .
The only other substantial activity in that area is at the Pōhakuloa Training @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Pacific , where the US Army conducts live-fire training a few miles down the road .
On those rare nights when the harsh weather conditions would relent , kiaʻi still had to fall asleep to the sound of machine gun fire carried over the camp by an eastward wind .
And as they laid their heads down in their tents , they could feel tremors underneath them from the impact of explosions .
“ It feels like a little earthquake , ” says Wong-Wilson .
“ Every time , it just hurt @ @ @ @ @ @ @ don ’ t understand why Kanaka and locals would go through the trouble to contest a telescope , an instrument of science that beckons humankind to reach for a higher purpose .
Many have reasoned that the telescope must represent other longstanding issues for the Hawaiian people — such as the 1893 illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom by American and European businessmen , aided by the US military , which paved the way for US possession of the islands and , eventually , Hawaii ’ s induction into statehood .
“ I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ way to express some frustration over these issues that have not been addressed in the past , ” Gordon Squires , vice president of external affairs for the TMT International Observatory , told Hawaii News Now .
It ’ s a position those in the movement have heard repeatedly from their opposition , and to Kamanamaikalani Beamer , a longtime advocate for the preservation of Maunakea and an associate professor at the University of Hawaiʻi at Manoa ’ s School of Law and School of Hawaiian Knowledge , the argument is entirely dismissive @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Look , we ’ re sorry [ about ] the overthrow , but don ’ t make us hurt for it ’ is so dislocated from the reality of the situation .
The scale , the amount of degradation , and the density of the existing telescope facilities on Maunakea — it ’ s all too much.
” Squires , meanwhile , has called the project — whose budget has now climbed from its initial projection of $ 1.4 billion to $ 2.4 billion — “ a bargain for the people of Hawaii @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we understand our place in the universe.
” But what many onlookers find perplexing , and what opponents of the telescope certainly find frustrating , is that TMT already has the licenses and land required to develop on a backup site : La Palma in Spain ’ s Canary Islands .
It is a far less contentious option , and yet Maunakea remains TMT ’ s first choice for the project ; the summit ’ s higher altitude and cooler temperatures make it a “ slightly better ” site to capture infrared light @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Avi Loeb , told the Associated Press , thereby enhancing the telescope ’ s imaging capabilities .
“ I think we can all agree that Maunakea is a great place to view the stars , ” says Beamer .
“ But that ’ s not all Maunakea is.
” TMT leadership and proponents have also vehemently denied that the project ’ s presence would disturb any cultural resources or sites at the summit .
But historical mismanagement of the summit ’ s natural and cultural resources has been well documented since the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ i have no doubt that the addition of an 18-story building — slated to be the largest building on the Big Island — will be any different .
“ In the Western perspective , people want to draw a line in the dirt and say , ‘ It ’ s only sacred in this spot here , where you stand ; therefore , we can build 500 feet to the left of that because that ’ s not sacred anymore.
’ And we say that the landscape of the summit , which has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a spiritual landscape , ” says Wong-Wilson .
“ Once they dig two stories into the ground and put in all the roads and outbuildings , and then the five-acre structure , they ’ ll have done damage that ’ s irreparable .
The way that it looks now will never be recovered , and that , to me , is unacceptable .
All the money in the world will not make up for that.
” There ’ s no telling what the fight ahead looks like for the movement , other than @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the TMT International Observatory has announced that construction will not likely begin until 2021 , the project is pursuing significant funding from the National Science Foundation , which would present a new set of federal regulatory obstacles that could further postpone construction by at least another three years .
Still , Squires says it isn ’ t a question of “ if ” construction would happen , but “ when.
” “ We ’ re absolutely committed to finding a way forward in Hawaii , ” he said to Hawaii News Now on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the most recent standoff began .
The University of California also doubled down on its commitment to the project , saying , “ TMT remains committed to integrating science and culture , providing the best possible stewardship of Maunakea , enriching Hawaiian culture and heritage , and supporting educational opportunities as it enables this global scientific collaboration centered in Hawaii in the interest of humanity.
” The governor ’ s office did not respond to Vox about the state ’ s involvement in the private project ’ s progress in the future .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Japan — one of two countries investing public funds into the project — and met with key TMT stakeholders there , signaling his commitment , as he stated in his emergency proclamation a year ago , “ to seeing this project through.
” As far as kiaʻi are concerned , though , they still have a job to do : protect the mountain ; stop the project for good .
In July , to commemorate a year since this latest standoff and the kupuna arrests , a slew of online events and actions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in “ # TMTshutdown week , ” including topic-focused talks via Zoom , film screenings , and a letter-signing campaign to TMT ’ s board of governors , project partners , and other affiliated stakeholders urging them to halt any further attempts at construction .
Kiaʻi also recently submitted testimony at a UC Board of Regents meeting on July 30 , where its chair John Pérez concluded that the board would continue discussions of the telescope at a later date .
Meanwhile , charges against the 38 kupuna still stand .
While kiaʻi @ @ @ @ @ @ @ might spare a moment to marvel at what has transpired over the past year .
“ I think most people thought we would get squashed .
We were up against a billion-dollar project , ” says Beamer .
“ And yet we were able to turn the tide .
Despite all that it takes to stand against something like this , to risk what we ’ ve spent our lives building , people did it anyway .
And we did it out of courage.
” On July 15 , 2019 , construction for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ year later , it still hasn ’ t broken ground .
Every day at Vox , we aim to answer your most important questions and provide you , and our audience around the world , with information that has the power to save lives .
Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment : to empower you through understanding .
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“It almost seems like it never happened,” Pua Case tells Vox about her time in the encampment at the foot of Maunakea, a dormant volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii and the tallest mountain in the world. While she lives only a 30-minute drive away, she says, “I have to go back and look at videos or pictures to remind myself that we were really up there.”
For nearly nine months, she and other kiaʻi, or protectors, were sleeping in a parking lot over a lava field that marks the beginning of the access road up to Maunakea’s summit. From the Pu‘uhonua o Pu‘uhuluhulu camp, protectors kept watch for construction crews for the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) — planned to be the largest telescope in the Northern Hemisphere — through windstorms, hail, and overnight temperatures that dipped well below 30 degrees Fahrenheit.
In Hawaiian traditions of creation, the mountain is an ancestor and shares genealogical ties with Native Hawaiians, or Kanaka Maoli. It is one of the most sacred sites — if not the most sacred — in Hawaiian culture. For kiaʻi, protecting the mountain from desecration is more than a cultural responsibility; it’s a lineal duty to those who came before them and the generations who will succeed them.
When the pandemic hit, kiaʻi were already assessing the threat of construction and considering the impact on resources. After determining that there was no imminent threat, they decided to pack up their site, which hosted anywhere between 30 and 3,000 people at any given time. Should an attempt be made to initiate the project, they knew they could be back up there in half an hour. Still, their departure from the mountain was marked by emotional exhaustion and trepidation for what was to come.
It also presented familiar challenges. Before the latest standoff on the mountain, many kiaʻi had spent years tirelessly writing letters, submitting testimony to city council meetings, combing over management plans, and trying to monitor the movements of multiple parties with vastly more power and resources than they’ll ever have. Today, they continue that labor from their homes.
At least on the mountain, they could offer their physical presence to inspire supporters, who could be shielded from the invisible — and, certainly, less romantic — work kiaʻi had been doing behind the scenes. The movement has a robust social media presence that acts as a direct line of communication between the front line and its supporters abroad. The Protect Mauna a Wākea Instagram account, one of two accounts that had been operating from the camp, has 136,000 followers who rely on photos and videos of kiaʻi to draw inspiration and feel plugged into the action. Under lockdown, the movement is challenged with keeping supporters, who are used to seeing dispatches from the mountain, engaged and connected to it.
“It’s constant,” Case says. “You have to be a presence or you’re going to disappear. And you can’t afford to disappear when you’re talking about your lifeways, your culture, and the very continuance and protection of the places that are connected to you.”
A timeline of resistance
Kiaʻi have opposed the telescope’s construction in a string of legal challenges, petitions, and protests over the past decade. But the fight for Maunakea gained national attention a year ago, after Hawaii Gov. David Ige announced that construction would be cleared to begin on July 15.
That morning, kiaʻi awaited the construction crews. Some had locked themselves to a cattle guard that was built into the Mauna Kea Access Road — the only road up to the summit. But then, a line of elders, or kupuna, formed farther down, at the start of the road. It was their blockade that inevitably became the front line.
“I saw them sitting in lawn chairs and folding chairs on the road, all bundled up with blankets and sleeping bags,” said Andre Perez, one of the kiaʻi and a nonviolent direct action trainer for the Hawaiʻi Unity and Liberation Institute. He was the acting police liaison that day. “I knew that something powerful was happening. The elders were stepping into the fray and taking charge.”
They held that line for two days before Ige issued a state of emergency on July 17, clearing a path for law enforcement to begin making arrests.
Multiple agencies arrived on the scene; there were officers brought in from other islands, three state agencies, and the National Guard. It wasn’t long before kiaʻi, hundreds of whom had gathered there around their kupuna, were sitting in front of a massive militarized police presence dressed in riot gear and armed with chemical dispersants and a long-range acoustic device (LRAD) — a sonic weapon developed for use by the US military that emits high-frequency sounds at extreme volumes to disperse crowds.
Whatever aggression law enforcement expected from the crowd that day never materialized. Kia‘i sat in purposeful silence as 38 of their kupuna, many in their 70s and 80s, were arrested and escorted — and, in several instances, carried — away to awaiting police vans, crying but resolute. The air above the crowd was periodically punctured by sobs, singing, and chanting. “We didn’t want to give the police any reason to escalate,” said Perez. “Our discipline was our safety.”
Images and video footage of the arrests sparked public outcry across the island chain and overseas. It was the stark, visible disparity between the resistance and the state response that galvanized a native movement and brought supporters from around the world to their cause.
For nearly nine months after, kupuna never left the spot they first occupied. A tent was erected to shelter them as they sat on the road, and a volunteer village formed overnight, equipped with a kitchen, solar trailers, and even a “university” grounded in Native Hawaiian science and culture. They hosted locals and musicians from neighboring islands, curious tourists, relatives from other Indigenous movements — the camp flew flags gifted to them from Palestine, Tibet, Guam, Standing Rock, Cherokee, and Navajo, Aotearoa, and the Indigenous Australian people, among others. Even Hollywood celebrities like Jason Momoa and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, who felt connected to the movement through their Polynesian heritage, came to pay their respects.
A team of medics was also on hand to assist kupuna, some of whom experienced altitude sickness and even mild strokes while keeping watch over their sacred mountain. Many kupuna had preexisting health conditions that made their taking a stand challenging — and yet, they stayed.
After five months and $15 million spent on officers and supplies to manage the conflict, Ige withdrew state and county law enforcement from the mountain. At the same time, he requested additional funding from the House Finance Committee as a “contingency amount for any upcoming projects that may attract community activism, including but not limited to Maunakea.”
In late December, kiaʻi reached a temporary agreement with Hawaii County Mayor Harry Kim to clear the access road with his assurance that TMT would not attempt to begin construction until the end of February 2020. They caught a break when the deal expired; the observatory’s leadership had yet to determine when construction could begin.
In the midst of the pandemic, the future is uncertain. Kiaʻi don’t know when or if they’ll return to the mountain to resume their standoff. Since the lockdown, some have returned to the mountain to stand at the ahu, the altar erected alongside where their camp once stood, and for years where many have offered prayers. It is ground that they hope someday to only have to hold in prayer, rather than resistance.
A battle for the heavens
The new giant telescope promises access to “the very edge of the observable Universe,” an opportunity to discover places that were previously unreachable to humankind.
“It will enable a new frontier of discoveries about the contents, nature, and evolution of the universe, including the search for life on other planets,” the University of California, one of the project’s funders, said in a statement to Vox. “The potential for scientific discoveries is truly unlimited.”
But kiaʻi say it’s precisely this argument that gives cause for opposition: There are some places that humans aren’t meant to go, and the summit of Maunakea is one of them.
The summit is firmly the province of the gods. Historically, only select individuals — such as the kahuna, or priests, or the ali‘i, high chiefs — were permitted on the mountain in order to perform ceremonies of affairs, and they wouldn’t stay long. It is sacred not only in its religious capacity but also because of the lack of oxygen.
At 13,796 feet, there is 40 percent less air pressure at the summit than at sea level. Visitors are advised to heed signs of altitude sickness and pulmonary and cerebral edemas. Even employees at existing observatories have reported feeling fatigued working at that elevation.
“It’s a place where humans don’t belong,” says Noe Noe Wong-Wilson, one of the kupuna arrested that day. “Where gods reside.”
The area between Maunakea, Mauna Loa, and Hualālai volcanic mountains are sensitive environments and culturally significant landscapes. Roughly 20 miles from Kona to the west and almost 30 miles from Hilo to the east, the area is extremely remote.
The only other substantial activity in that area is at the Pōhakuloa Training Area, the largest military installation in the Pacific, where the US Army conducts live-fire training a few miles down the road. On those rare nights when the harsh weather conditions would relent, kiaʻi still had to fall asleep to the sound of machine gun fire carried over the camp by an eastward wind. And as they laid their heads down in their tents, they could feel tremors underneath them from the impact of explosions. “It feels like a little earthquake,” says Wong-Wilson. “Every time, it just hurt our soul.”
TMT proponents say they don’t understand why Kanaka and locals would go through the trouble to contest a telescope, an instrument of science that beckons humankind to reach for a higher purpose. Many have reasoned that the telescope must represent other longstanding issues for the Hawaiian people — such as the 1893 illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom by American and European businessmen, aided by the US military, which paved the way for US possession of the islands and, eventually, Hawaii’s induction into statehood. “I understand that talking about TMT is a way to express some frustration over these issues that have not been addressed in the past,” Gordon Squires, vice president of external affairs for the TMT International Observatory, told Hawaii News Now.
It’s a position those in the movement have heard repeatedly from their opposition, and to Kamanamaikalani Beamer, a longtime advocate for the preservation of Maunakea and an associate professor at the University of Hawaiʻi at Manoa’s School of Law and School of Hawaiian Knowledge, the argument is entirely dismissive. “Trying to say, ‘Look, we’re sorry [about] the overthrow, but don’t make us hurt for it’ is so dislocated from the reality of the situation. The scale, the amount of degradation, and the density of the existing telescope facilities on Maunakea — it’s all too much.”
Squires, meanwhile, has called the project — whose budget has now climbed from its initial projection of $1.4 billion to $2.4 billion — “a bargain for the people of Hawaii and the people of the world as we understand our place in the universe.”
But what many onlookers find perplexing, and what opponents of the telescope certainly find frustrating, is that TMT already has the licenses and land required to develop on a backup site: La Palma in Spain’s Canary Islands. It is a far less contentious option, and yet Maunakea remains TMT’s first choice for the project; the summit’s higher altitude and cooler temperatures make it a “slightly better” site to capture infrared light, Harvard’s astronomy department chair, Avi Loeb, told the Associated Press, thereby enhancing the telescope’s imaging capabilities.
“I think we can all agree that Maunakea is a great place to view the stars,” says Beamer. “But that’s not all Maunakea is.”
TMT leadership and proponents have also vehemently denied that the project’s presence would disturb any cultural resources or sites at the summit. But historical mismanagement of the summit’s natural and cultural resources has been well documented since the first observatory was constructed; kia‘i have no doubt that the addition of an 18-story building — slated to be the largest building on the Big Island — will be any different.
“In the Western perspective, people want to draw a line in the dirt and say, ‘It’s only sacred in this spot here, where you stand; therefore, we can build 500 feet to the left of that because that’s not sacred anymore.’ And we say that the landscape of the summit, which has no line drawn around it, is a spiritual landscape,” says Wong-Wilson. “Once they dig two stories into the ground and put in all the roads and outbuildings, and then the five-acre structure, they’ll have done damage that’s irreparable. The way that it looks now will never be recovered, and that, to me, is unacceptable. All the money in the world will not make up for that.”
The fight ahead
There’s no telling what the fight ahead looks like for the movement, other than that it will be difficult.
While the TMT International Observatory has announced that construction will not likely begin until 2021, the project is pursuing significant funding from the National Science Foundation, which would present a new set of federal regulatory obstacles that could further postpone construction by at least another three years. Still, Squires says it isn’t a question of “if” construction would happen, but “when.”
“We’re absolutely committed to finding a way forward in Hawaii,” he said to Hawaii News Now on July 15, exactly one year since the most recent standoff began. The University of California also doubled down on its commitment to the project, saying, “TMT remains committed to integrating science and culture, providing the best possible stewardship of Maunakea, enriching Hawaiian culture and heritage, and supporting educational opportunities as it enables this global scientific collaboration centered in Hawaii in the interest of humanity.”
The governor’s office did not respond to Vox about the state’s involvement in the private project’s progress in the future. But in February, Ige traveled to Japan — one of two countries investing public funds into the project — and met with key TMT stakeholders there, signaling his commitment, as he stated in his emergency proclamation a year ago, “to seeing this project through.”
As far as kiaʻi are concerned, though, they still have a job to do: protect the mountain; stop the project for good. In July, to commemorate a year since this latest standoff and the kupuna arrests, a slew of online events and actions was organized for their supporters to participate in “#TMTshutdown week,” including topic-focused talks via Zoom, film screenings, and a letter-signing campaign to TMT’s board of governors, project partners, and other affiliated stakeholders urging them to halt any further attempts at construction. Kiaʻi also recently submitted testimony at a UC Board of Regents meeting on July 30, where its chair John Pérez concluded that the board would continue discussions of the telescope at a later date. Meanwhile, charges against the 38 kupuna still stand.
While kiaʻi can’t afford rest, they might spare a moment to marvel at what has transpired over the past year. “I think most people thought we would get squashed. We were up against a billion-dollar project,” says Beamer. “And yet we were able to turn the tide. Despite all that it takes to stand against something like this, to risk what we’ve spent our lives building, people did it anyway. And we did it out of courage.”
On July 15, 2019, construction for TMT was scheduled to begin. One year later, it still hasn’t broken ground.