Outraged by the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, a wilderness survival trainer spent years undercover climbing the ranks of right-wing militias. He didn’t tell police or the FBI. He didn’t tell family or friends. The one person he told was a ProPublica reporter.
I read the whole thing and while it’s troubling, it also lines up with what I’ve believed to be true about the police for a long time.
The more troubling stuff is honestly the people outside of law enforcement involved. This stood out, for example.
Also, personal opinion, I think this is part of why Trump wants to disband the FBI. I think he knows the police are in his pocket and that he just wants to give the investigatory powers of the FBI over to local police to they can harass, violently abuse, and imprison the populace with impunity. (Not that they don’t already, but even worse than it currently is)
This is why “defunding the police” mattered even though nobody liked hearing it. They’ve been the US’s best armed and best funded street gang for decades. We’re really entering mafioso territory here, where you’ll have local cops asking for protection money “Real shame if something happened to this land” style.
The rot is deep. Leftists need to be organizing, but not for violence, rather for taking care of one another in response to the violence we all may soon be subjected to. Do not organize in cleartext channels, always use open source well-audited encrypted platforms such as XMPP, Matrix/Element, Wire, SimpleX, or Signal.
If we ever disbanded the police, we would need a new force of some type fully prepared to police the old police, who will not let go of their power over the populace willingly. If they even get a whiff of losing their jobs for being authoritarian shitbags, they will clear out every precinct of weaponry, armor, and other gear and immediately become an occupying force terrorizing our populace. The police themselves are, ironically, the biggest reason we would need police after disbanding the police because they’re already addicted to a self-narrative of being “the real victims” and treating the US populace as the enemy.
I almost forgot a really important part of the story!
I do think it’s beautifully emasculating that they were so easily tricked by a gay man, and I do hope it drives them up the fucking walls.
I kinda had the same feeling after reading it, I’m disappointed that I wasn’t surprised, as in, I kind of figured the cops were all in these groups anyway but the confirmation doesn’t give me the feel goods.