Gangsters in Blue

Over and over again, law enforcement demonstrates that they are not only interested in forcing their alien vision of “law and order” on the people they’re supposed to “protect and serve”, but that they are actively hostile and sadistic towards the protestors. We’ve seen this before, like in Miami’s ‘06 FTAA protests:

The resentment has come out full force, now. On Democracy Now!, the arrested journalists told how the police would tighten restraints when detainees complained about how tight they were. The psychology of the human beings in law enforcement is becoming a serious menace and is being actively promoted in their training:

The police brutality that we’ve seen in Denver and St. Paul this week is the result of ongoing indoctrination of the police against protesters, especially any protesters of the left-wing stripe. Local police departments have been militarized to deal with protesters, with much of this militarization happening during the Clinton administration. After 9/11, local police were further turned into anti-terrorist organizations, with the effect that they see their work as fighting terrorists. Local police are also bringing home the terror tactics that the U.S. has been using in dozens of countries around the world for the past century.

The war on terror has escalated into an increased war on the “rabble” of America, most significantly protesters and anarchists. This doesn’t surprise us, because the U.S. government has always been at war with dissidents of many kinds.

We do not have any hope that the police will change their attitudes or their ways. The purpose of the police is to act as the violent arm of capital and the state. The only way for the people to stop the police is to stand up to them, abolish the police and build a different society which needs no police.

Indeed, this jives with my own research: police are being trained to see civil society as their zoo full of mere animals to keep in line, and many are adopting an abusive relationship with their “wards”. Witness their open sadism in St. Paul:

The sad part about all this is that these attitudes towards the public are going to make the jobs of officers who genuinely want to get along with the public much more difficult. While many officers may look forward to the police state as their chance to beat up hippies (see the end of Daniel Clowes’ Like an Velvet Glove Cast in Iron for a perfect portrayal of this attitude), I’d advise them to take a good look at Iraq. The officers there are targeted by insurgents and are never safe, on or off duty. It’s easy to be a bully when you can still go home to your family in relative safety - a police state turns street protestors from prey into predators. Moreover, it was arguably the attitudes of American soldiers (including cops in reserve units) that turned the people against them and their police. Not only are these attitudes quite similar to those displayed by cops in the twin cities, the attitudes may even be brought back by soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan to new careers in domestic law enforcement.

If cops want to militarize their jobs, they need to consider the down side for themselves, their families, and their communities. There’s a lot more civilians than soldiers and officers, and continuing abuse - including the branding of activists as terrorists - just threatens to push Americans over the edge the same way Iraqis were pushed. If civil society is lost, cops may look back fondly on the days when the public merely committed minor property damage.

If you’ve been paying attention, you’ve been witnessing a huge leap forward towards a police state over the past week. In addition to the preemptive raids, extralegal break-ins, illegal detentions, disappearing citizens, news media harassment, and general displays of unprovoked violence by law enforcement, we’ve witnessed a very aggressive strategy of mass arrests. Here’s some choice documentation on their strategy for trapping and processing as many people as possible - protestors or not.

While apologists for cops may represent indiscriminate arrests as necessary, it’s actually incredibly sloppy police work. They just declare a “national security event” and suddenly there is no need for self-discipline or judgement whatsoever. Why should people take cops’ authority seriously when they prosecute their jobs so carelessly? If national security is truly at stake, why sweat a few broken windows?

Imagine if this was their response to any suspected crime: just arrest everybody near the scene! Why not just arrest everybody in the city, or the state - surely if everybody’s under arrest, there’s nobody to get in the way of the convention. Cities are a lot safer if you get rid of the people, law enforcement seems to think.

Yet isn’t this the modus operandi of any totalitarian state? By denying everybody freedom and granting police maximum prerogatives to detain, surveil, and otherwise harass citizens, a government blurs the distinction between being under arrest or being free. People under despotic governance experience a sliding scale of captivity, to be moved up or down at the discretion of unaccountable bureaucrat/captors.

It is important to correctly recognize this trend towards a police state. The myths of freedom, civil rights, and the rule of law must be maintained. So instead, the government institutes the police state on demand - invoking it when necessary, and then dispersing it without a trace and shrugging, “what fascism?” You’re never free, really - you just enjoy perpetual probation until the next time the government flips the switch. Under arrest? That’s a relative term; just check the threat level.

This is exactly how police states arrive historically - in easily ignored, irregular spurts. Those are perfect opportunities to train officers in their new attitudes towards citizens, gather data on the effectiveness of tactics, and experiment with new strategies for oppression. The trick is always for the people to wake up before the slow metamorphosis passes the point of no return.

Sadly, it’s clear to me that we’ve probably missed our last chances to reverse these trends. With the P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act granting the legal cover for whatever our rulers want to label as “terrorism” and impenetrable secrecy about anything else, there’s no recourse in “the system” for citizens to air legitimate grievances. Meanwhile, any direct action is dealt with in the most brutal manner possible (yes, they could be more brutal - but that would impact the efficiency of their actions).

So if we’re in a police state now, what do we do? Obviously, there was a point at which the citizens of Germany in the ’30s gave up on speaking out. There was a point at which the Soviet citizens stopped protesting the Bolshevik treachery. Throughout history, people who found themselves under a totalitarian government had to face a terrible fact: that the modes of democratic society were no longer tenable.

But to admit to yourself the horrible truth, that we have lost our country, that is the truly difficult thing. Keep in mind, however, that it has always been through denial, self-deception, and lack of honesty on the part of the people that totalitarianism has gained a foothold. We must be courageous, pragmatic, and most of all careful. The rules have changed, and if we’re going to play this game we do well to use our time-outs to strategize, not simply to feel sorry for ourselves. In other words, as much as I hate to say it, we’re going to have to unlearn the bad habits of citizenship in a democratic republic.

The silver lining in the police brutality at the RNC this week is really that the activist movement might finally see themselves on the other side of the rubicon. As John Robb explains:

Very cool demonstration from Minnesota of how police forces have been militarized. In addition to the five fold growth in SWAT forces since the 90’s, there’s been a shift in attitude. All likely due to a misdirection of GWOT Homeland security $$ and thinking towards domestic protest. The side effect: the heavy handed approach here will cause a quick shift protest to the open source/disruption model if things deteriorate. Protest is dead. (my emphasis)

It’s time for the activist movement to modify their tactics to reflect the new environment. Flaunting our outrage in the hopes of media attention and citizen backlash has failed. Throwing our bodies on the gears of the machine has not slowed it, let alone stopped it. Protesting every violation of our rights just demonstrates in spades how vulnerable and dependent we are. Demonstrating and organizing just provide easy targets for agent provocateurs, infiltration, and extralegal, preemptive harassment.

Protest doesn’t work in a totalitarian police state. Acknowledging that condition is the first step towards fixing it. Whatever we’re going to do, it’s time to start doing it underground. It doesn’t have to be violent, but it does have to be realistic about the threat.

Here’s how you don’t fight injustice occurring right before your eyes:

…the crowd of 50 or 60 students, outraged at the police’s ongoing assault, and doing nothing about it other than yelling at the cops and indignantly demanding their badge numbers—apparently in the fantastical belief that a The Law is somehow going to protect them from violence at the hands of its own rampaging hired goons.

Luckily, there are some heroes in the twin cities who are willing to take things into their own hands:

You could argue that I don’t know the full story, but by now police have simply discredited themselves in my eyes. When in doubt, I go with the non-professionals.

Well, I’m sure you’ve heard about the preemptive raids on groups planning to protest at the Republican convention in Minneapolis. I don’t really have much to add to what’s being said elsewhere on the net. It’s an outrage and it breaks my heart that I can’t stand with them, but my place was definitely in Louisville this weekend. And with the convention being toned way down, I wonder if the protests will have the same effect.

It’s therefore important that, as much as I hate to repeat news better reported elsewhere, we all talk about the horror that’s occurring in Minneapolis on our own outlets. Better yet, call the jail where many are held to demand their release; the number is (651) 266 - 9350. Don’t be silent - bring this up in conversations, and let people know exactly how free we are in this country! The police are going to keep pushing the envelope of oppressiveness unless we can build a broad consensus that their actions are simply wrong.

If you’ve been following this story then you know just how frightening this passage is:

A jury verdict that cleared a police officer in the drug-raid shooting death of an unarmed woman will allow other officers to do their job without hesitation, police union officials said.

Because, clearly, unloading a hailstorm of bullets into a closed bedroom door in a house you know ahead of time has a family with children present is not something about which you should have the slightest hesitation whatsoever. And hesitation (in other words taking a moment to think about what you’re doing) is something that cops have been told for years gets them killed; therefore, end of story, no possible competing interests worthy of consideration from a public policy perspective at all, period. Don’t worry about that, officer; it’s just a flesh wound, and you’re just doing your job.

If only we understood the unique, existential dilemma of police officers, doing a difficult, dangerous job day in and day out with so little appreciation! Why can’t the pussified public suck it up and understand that officers are professionals who are trained to do, well, whatever they feel like doing at any particular moment, which is by definition “professional” and “heroic” and goddamnit who are you to question them, anyway? And we can’t have any breaks in the thin blue line, so any officers who might disagree with Lima’s professional law enforcement standards will dutifully shut up and let the press frame the entire profession’s reaction to the verdict as “cheering”.

I’ll say it again: if the only way you can do your job safely is by endangering others, don’t act like you’re doing the rest of us any favors. If you’re going to frame this issue in a way that pits cops against citizens, don’t be surprised when you lose public support.

If you don’t read the FlexYourRights.org blog, you’re missing out on good legal information that can seriously help you out on police encounters. There’s even a video they’ve produced to train people on how to deal with the police. While I think it’s good operating procedure to behave as if none of your rights will be upheld by cops, knowing your rights gives you insight into police tactics and actions to which you are likely to be subject. And if you silently observe police behavior, rather than complaining about how bad the cops are on the scene, you may be more likely to simply get out of the situation or at least present evidence to a court that catches police off-guard. Remember: no information you provide on the scene can help you; save any argument you want to make for the judge.

Anyway, the latest FlexYourRights.org blog article deals with a predictable complaint: that helping people protect their rights impedes law enforcement work. As I’ve previously remarked, that’s a feature, not a bug. We should put up the maximum resistance possible to all authority, because it is our cooperation with and obedience to the state that enables and empowers it. However, since the state has a monopoly on the investigation and prosecution of legitimate crimes, should we always refuse to cooperate?

The first thing I’d say is that the maxim of conduct I’ve emphasized is my opinion; before adopting it, you think about it carefully. There are undoubtedly exceptions - my point is that, ideally (and when is a police encounter “ideal”?), you should be in control of the encounter rather than them. You should choose what to say rather than them directing the flow of information; you should choose whether you stay or go rather than them. When in doubt: shut up and trust nobody!

And what about cases where legitimate crimes necessitate the provision of information to investigating law enforcement officers? It is here that FLR.org has wise words:

The situations in which our advice to remain silent is more likely to make a difference is in cases in which the police suspect a crime may be afoot, but don’t have evidence and must intimidate the suspect into self-incrimination, i.e. “If you have drugs, we’re gonna find ‘em. You might as well just hand it over and we’ll go easier on you.” Again, this will have no effect on clearance rates for reported crimes, except, ironically, to the extent that this type of policing draws resources away from investigating unsolved violent crimes.

With regard to requests to search (which you should always refuse; if they have a warrant, they won’t ask!):

The crimes that take the biggest toll on our communities aren’t solved through warrantless searches. Police who are investigating a rape, robbery, or murder aren’t using consent searches to investigate their suspects. Overwhelmingly, consent searches are used to attempt to discover crimes that weren’t known until the search was conducted. They have absolutely no impact on clearance rates for reported crimes. (my emphasis)

This makes sense: when there is an actual crime being investigated, police already have powers that don’t require them to trick you into self-incrimination. Only when they are fishing for a bump in arrest rates will they try to engage you in a conversation without providing for your immunity or legal representation. So deny them the chance: do your part to put the kibosh on the proactive, intrusive, authoritarian police state!

Via Rad Geek I found some great footage that demonstrates just how difficult it can be to be silent in the face of aggressive police tactics:

When this guy tried to remain silent, the cop threatened arrest for “impeding an investigation”. It’s important to know that cops can lie. Legally, they are under no obligation to be honest with you in any way, shape, or form. So how are you possibly going to be able to negotiate with these people?

Remember, you live in occupied territory. Your country has been conquered by a foreign power from the city-state of Washington, D.C. These cops are the troops. The sooner you stop depending on the government, the police, or any institution outside yourself for your safety and the protection of your “rights”, the better prepared you will be for these kinds of encounters.

A freedom based on myths of rights and liberties upheld by strangers is no freedom at all. If you want to be free, build your freedom in the real world: on your ability to choose your attitude, to control yourself, to select your values, to opt-out of the system to the extent possible, and to pick your battles. Don’t blow it trying to showdown with the occupation authority, especially when they have the upper hand.

One more thing: it may seem like a contradiction for me to say that, while you should operate as if none of your rights will be upheld, you should exercise your right to remain silent. I don’t think you should remain silent because you have the right. Stay silent because:

1. They are unlikely to compel you to talk. If they torture you, obviously nobody would blame you for talking. And yes, that probably won’t happen - but this is what I’m talking about: retooling our expectations to reflect our actual experience, not our theoretical rights.
2. Stalling the cops is the safest and simplest way to interrupt their occupation activities. Why should you not “impede their investigation”? By holding the cops up at the scene, you’re doing the community a small favor - the amount of time you delay them keeps them off the streets causing possibly worse trouble.

It’s in that same spirit of passive resistance that I’m considering following a rule of refusing to sign any future traffic tickets. Of course, signing a traffic ticket is not an admission of guilt; it just means you’re pledging to show up for your court date. The alternative to signing is going before a magistrate, which means arrest. If you can possibly afford the inconvenience, it is one way to drain the occupation force’s resources.

What other ways can we passively resist and gum up the administration of the American occupation? I’d be interested in your thoughts.

This is great legal advice (and surprisingly hard to follow when you’re on the spot). It’s also a key strategy for passively and non-violently resisting the occupation army in your neck of the woods. They require on-the-ground, tacit information of the community to operate. Don’t volunteer to participate in the system.

The more I read about police and judicial misconduct, the more I’m convinced that the best strategy when dealing with the government is to operate as if you have no legal rights. The problem with the supposed “rights” we have as citizens is that we depend upon others to enforce them. This dependency is so deceptive because the same people who are supposed to uphold our rights are the ones who have an incentive to throw us in jail. So don’t take anything for granted: hold your tongue and wait to talk to a lawyer. Comply only with force, or threats thereof.

Any interactions with law enforcement should be on your terms, at a time and place of your choosing, and for your purposes and not theirs. The government always tries to pressure, scare, or cow us into surrendering to and complying with their interests - interests that are necessarily counter to ours. Resist the urge to reason with an institution that has no conscience and can legally lie without consequence. Stay calm and silent.

If you have the time, also check out the cop who follows the speaker in the video. Very, very frank look into the mind of an officer and, by extension, the system.

[Police brutality] isn’t irrelevant. It is the boiled-down essence of what is relevant in politics.

Martial law just gets us into a whole constitutional debate that none of us want to have. Far easier to simply give your law enforcement personnel military vehicles, military outfits, military weapons, and a military mandate. After all, if they scare, rough up, or hurt the population a bit, it’s a small price to pay for officer safety. You can have the benefits of an occupation force with none of the pesky insurgent resistance.</p

The only price is our way of life. Oh, I know that’s what we’ve spent the last century and a half fighting wars and sacrificing countless lives to protect. But, really, wouldn’t you rather your own government occupy you militarily than some other government? I think the choice is clear.

The photo is from the raid on the Texas polygamist sect. Hat tip to Radley Balko.