The Occupation of The United States
It is getting harder and harder to beat around the bush about the best thing we can do to survive and thrive in this country and in this world. There is only so much preparedness to do, and only so much it can do, and at some point the best defense becomes taking the offensive. I am probably already on a list but I would prefer not to be on a worse one so for right now I will assume you can intuit my meaning and move on. I'm not saying the thing you think I'm saying, and for legal purposes if I were I'm talking about video games. Release a substantial update to Red Dead Online, am I right?
Last Sunday, Walmart called the cops on someone over a supposedly stolen bag of diapers–the woman in question had paid, but god forbid a big box store lose money, so officers responded. The woman attempted to drive away from officers, is my understanding of the incident at this point, and because cops get to do what they want, an officer opened fire on the vehicle, killing Kohen Wiley, a one-year-old boy, and critically injuring the driver. I am told officers insist they were in danger and the vehicle was being driven toward them; we know this is rarely the case. No one has been charged with shoplifting at this time, so it would appear that never happened. When people gathered to protest the killing at the Walmart on Tuesday, police lined up to guard the store and deployed teargas.
Laws Are Threats, and the Police are an Occupying Army
If you're not already, it is time to regard the police–not just ICE, not just feds–as your enemy. Not just as an organization that occasionally does bad things, but actively opposed to your well-being. They are, in your town, and mine, and every other burg in the US, an occupying army.
I want you to start thinking this way not only because it's true, but because this perspective shift weakens their hold on us. And because they are quite literally a military force, with military equipment and–sometimes–military training, we need every advantage on them we can get. Recognition, then, is a not-unimportant step.
I don't think I really need to provide further examples, but briefly, in case there are liberals in the room:
- Police don't actually solve that much crime. According to the FBI, clearance rates for cases vary wildly based upon the crime itself, but top billing goes to homicide at around 60%. Before that figure sounds good to you, consider that we are talking about the whole-ass killing of a person, and were we in school we would call 60% a failing grade. Property crime clearance rates are far lower–in the teens–meaning the frequent talking point of "who are you going to call when your house gets broken into" that opponents of abolishing the police love to whip out, is completely baseless. Of additional note here is that rape clearances are very low as well, despite being in the higher-priority classification of violent crime. I wonder why that is.
- Police don't keep good records. There is no federal mandate to compel departments to keep track of their use-of-force incidents, for example. They also provide records to the public as a function of least importance, meaning records you have a right to see can take quite a while to actually receive–stymying civilian oversight.
- Police act with impunity. Cops kill over a thousand people a year. These killings are frequently not justified, but cops are charged with a crime in these instances only 1-3% of the time, and convicted thereafter only around 56% of the time.
- Police sexually assault people at more than twice the rate of the general population. Nearly 2,000 officers have been charged with child sexual abuse over the last twenty years–do the math here, as 1-3% of cops are regularly charged with crimes–and cops regularly go after at-risk populations like the houseless, sex workers, and people with drug dependencies.
- And obviously, police far and away take out their C-student aggression on minorities. Violence against people in mental crisis, People of Color, or LGBTQIA+ folks are far more frequent per capita than against white people–Black people, in specific, being around three times more likely to be killed by a cop than a white person, and five times more likely to be assaulted.
These are the actions and behaviors of an enemy occupier, not any sort of guardian of the civilian populace. Consider also that the Supreme Court explicitly stated law enforcement is under no obligation to actually protect and serve and we are left with pure "law enforcement", meaning they are protecting the status quo, not you.
How to Trip Up an Army
We start by never, ever–ever, I mean it–calling the cops. Never give them the excuse to come to your home, to interfere in your business, to provide the possibility of violence in what is almost certainly a more-peaceful scenario than after the cops come around. Did someone hit your car? I don't care. You are not required to call the cops, often enough–so don't. You may need to file a police report, but this can be done online and does not require a cop to come around and shoot you because your hands weren't in the right place. Are your neighbors being loud? Talk to them. Crazy, right? But the alternative is several people with guns coming to your neighbor's house because you thought they were playing Taylor Swift–which I understand, but that's still an overreaction.
Be proactive by creating an environment in your neighborhood which would not need to even think about calling the cops in the first place. Build relationships with your neighbors, provide for the people around you, and watch out for one another. If you have crime in your area, start a community defense network rather than outsourcing the solution. Help the people around you so that the cops don't have the excuse to come around–help replace the windows that are broken so they never get to do broken-window policing. When police do come to your area, observe and record them openly, and in groups. Encourage and spread the viewpoint of cops as an occupying army to grow the number of people who react suspiciously to the police to rob them of any inadvertent accomplices.
Disable their intelligence networks by removing Ring cameras and aggressively pursuing the removal of Flock cameras with your city government. Resist the construction of data centers in your area. Engage in some light flyering or wheatpasting of anti-cop propaganda, especially that which lets folks know they are being surveilled. Also, not that I'm saying do this, but these cameras can be cut down, spray painted, or otherwise rendered unusable pretty easily.
Finally, know your rights so that you can exercise them to their fullest extent. Where and when you can, refuse to cooperate with the police. Don't consent to searches, don't identify yourself until legally compelled, don't comply in advance of any request. Halt their movement by making yourself a problem. Understand that this refusal comes with risk, but if you are in a position to take that risk, do so.
If this doesn't seem like enough, well, you're right. It's not. We all know what is enough, but this is a place to start.