Prof. Davis' time has passed, I'm afraid.
These mid-1960's screeds, square pegs hammered into the round holes of the 2020's and today's issues, have a tinny sound to the ear, despite being updated with 2020's issues and 2020's sloganeering.
But, let's let all the high-minded philosophical musings pass for a moment and cut the issue down to size:
Prof. Davis has categorically stated that she does not believe that a racially just society can be created outside of a communist governmental structure with the coercive power to enforce it. If she has recanted any of her prior views, I am not aware of it; so I assume they are still in effect.
For the sake of the discussion, let's strike the word "communist" and replace it with "authoritarian", because coercive government behavior is not limited to communism.
Her point is that racial equality must be *enforced* coercively by an authoritarian central government, because the majority race in the USA (AND the US federal government, AND the two political parties, AND the Constitution of the USA) are either unwilling or unable to create and enforce the coercive policies which (in her opinion) are necessary to implement equality.
So, what is necessary is a REVOLUTION, one which sweeps aside the existing government, political parties, and Constitution.
Now, in practice, what is the first-line defense against a political revolution?
It's the police, of course. Revolution requires law-breaking and the destruction/theft of personal and public property; it's those pesky police which would, on a non-ideological basis, act as a barrier to any revolutionary movements.
This is why the "list of demands" in the defund movement doesn't just include reasonable questions like "do we really need uniformed cops to make calls with social workers" and "are no-knock warrants worth the inherent risks", but also include demands that military-level gear cease being transferred from the Feds to local police departments; they want the government (state, local, feds, whatever) to voluntarily level the playing field between police and revolutionary forces.
The regrettable part of all this mess is that a reasonable dialog about policing and minority communities has now ended; it's being used as a façade for a revolutionary movement that wishes to tear down the republic in total and create another one from the ashes (and I do mean ashes, economically speaking) that would ensue.
The next few years will tell us if this ends well or not.
