> On June 25, 1971, one Robert Hardy appeared at the FBI office in Camden, New Jersey and told agents of a plan by several of his friends to raid the draft board in that city, remove the files, and destroy them. Hardy was one of the gang, but changed his mind. He was immediately hired as an informer and told to return to the gang and report on their plans, which he did. On August 22, the FBI was waiting when the group struck, and twenty-eight were arrested. The trial began on February 5, 1973. Hoover died in May 1972, but his ghost must have suffered a shock as Hardy changed his mind again and became a witness for the defense. He told the truth, namely that the FBI had used him as a provocateur, and that the burglary could not have taken place without him and the burglary tools that the FBI had supplied.
What are the odds the FBI has done this more recently than 1971?
It is a fair assumption that they do this regularly, politics aside one should ask why were there so many FBI agents at the Jan 6 debacle and why didn’t they do more to quell the violence. The origins of Ruby Ridge and Waco are fine examples of insanity. Nevertheless inciting crime and capturing bad guys seems like a game they like playing.
Most of the "foiled lone wolf Islamic attacks" in the US were planned by the FBI. They'd find some kid, radicalize him, recruit him, supply him with dummy weapons, plan a terrorist attack for him to carry out, then arrest him for it.
I had a conversation about this with my French teacher a few months ago
It was striking how different our outlooks were on the effectiveness of protests. Her position was that together, she and her fellow protesters _could_ enact change. When I look around, the stench of preconsigned defeat permeates the space. We've lived in it for so long that we've become blind to it. We've learned to be helpless.
Not to mention, when a fresh face inevitably proposes large scale action, the responses always include FUD about needing to solve the poverty issue first so that participants can even attend such action. The end result is that it's stopped at the idea stage, nothing changes, and six months later a new freah face will repeat the cycle.
Part of the issue is that without social safety nets, much of the public is afraid that missing a week to a month of work will guarantee them homelessness.
I believe this is the intended effect of maintaining some level of homelessness and unemployment in American policy decisions. Full employment and suffering reduction through a strong safety net are the correct moral imperatives, but they reduce the leverage of a central authority. You can see whose priorities win out.
I think there is a soft self-destruction happening among millennials and beyond in the US and similar societies. They have been so worn down by living in a system that refuses to invest properly in them that they are taking the fatalist route of simply refusing to participate in the building of a future.
Limited procreation, disengaging from politics or mindlessly bandwagoning demagogues, deaths of despair, etc… it’s not universal but the trend lines are certainly worrying.
I feel like, historically, protests have beared fruit in America for leftist / progressive causes. Everything from Suffragettes and Civil Rights / anti-Vietnam to the Floyd protests of the modern day. Maybe they didn’t overthrow an entire government but the marked forward progress of each one is clear.
I feel there is currently a bit of of internalized propaganda about protests being stupid or worse. Witness any cause which involves protesting by blocking the street. You get an army of internet trolls talking up the idea that this is somehow evil.
In the civil rights era, events like crossing bridges on foot were a key feature, done by people like Martin Luther King. In the modern era, if you see a protest on the golden gate bridge as an example, they'll be called terrorists and people will advocate for violence against them.
Oh, there was plenty of internalized propaganda about civil disobedience being the "wrong approach" [0] - it is by no means a new phenomenon. Such criticism was common enough during the civil rights
movement that MLK addressed it in Letter from Birmingham Jail:
> You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored.
35 years ago, protesters blocked the Golden Gate Bridge.
I'm pretty sure they were protesting the war with Iraq (Bush the First) in response to Iraq's invasion and capture of oil wells in Kuwait.
But far more clear is my memory of the searing rage of a coworker that day. She was flying on it, the hatred coming out of her mouth.
It shocked me for a couple of reasons. She was close in age to me, just out of school. I think that my college years had led me to presume to most young people would be more sympathetic to opposition of general warfare. There was lots of talk of forcing military enlistment among people our age.
But the main reason was that the trigger for her rage was the temporary threat to her right to drive her car wherever she wanted to.
You think Americans are nuts about their guns, don't you ever threaten their right to kill people with cars.
Any sympathy she could have felt for the protesters' cause was gone because they blocked a highway.
I've been thinking about them recently. Did any of them "directly" threaten capital? I'd argue that Suffragettes and Civil Rights ultimately helped capital. Maybe anti-Vietnem since it directly affected defense contractors income streams?
Can't speak for everybody, but maybe it has something do with hundreds of thousands of us being laid off, and we're just too busy trying not to go under.
i find it interesting that the later actions that Davidson did would be considered "terrorism" under the UK government's legal framework regarding Palestine Action
It evolved into gangstalking via fusion centers contrary to Wikipedia's claim that it's mAsS dElUsIoN which is obviously false to anyone who's done more than a cursory look into it. Look up NSA whistleblower Karen Stewart and also watch the tragic video of Myron May who gives an accurate description of their tactics. Ask me how I know.
"A study from Australia and the United Kingdom by Lorraine Sheridan and David James compared 128 self-defined victims of gang stalking with a randomly selected group of 128 self-declared victims of stalking by an individual. All 128 "victims" of gang stalking were judged to be delusional, compared with only 5 victims of individual stalking."
> On June 25, 1971, one Robert Hardy appeared at the FBI office in Camden, New Jersey and told agents of a plan by several of his friends to raid the draft board in that city, remove the files, and destroy them. Hardy was one of the gang, but changed his mind. He was immediately hired as an informer and told to return to the gang and report on their plans, which he did. On August 22, the FBI was waiting when the group struck, and twenty-eight were arrested. The trial began on February 5, 1973. Hoover died in May 1972, but his ghost must have suffered a shock as Hardy changed his mind again and became a witness for the defense. He told the truth, namely that the FBI had used him as a provocateur, and that the burglary could not have taken place without him and the burglary tools that the FBI had supplied.
What are the odds the FBI has done this more recently than 1971?
It is a fair assumption that they do this regularly, politics aside one should ask why were there so many FBI agents at the Jan 6 debacle and why didn’t they do more to quell the violence. The origins of Ruby Ridge and Waco are fine examples of insanity. Nevertheless inciting crime and capturing bad guys seems like a game they like playing.
Most of the "foiled lone wolf Islamic attacks" in the US were planned by the FBI. They'd find some kid, radicalize him, recruit him, supply him with dummy weapons, plan a terrorist attack for him to carry out, then arrest him for it.
That's a dangerous conspiracy theory.
No self respecting liberal would believe such a thing.
"Why don't Americans protest?", everyone wonders...
Edit to clarify: perhaps the various sentiments described in the replies didn't come about entirely organically
I had a conversation about this with my French teacher a few months ago
It was striking how different our outlooks were on the effectiveness of protests. Her position was that together, she and her fellow protesters _could_ enact change. When I look around, the stench of preconsigned defeat permeates the space. We've lived in it for so long that we've become blind to it. We've learned to be helpless.
Not to mention, when a fresh face inevitably proposes large scale action, the responses always include FUD about needing to solve the poverty issue first so that participants can even attend such action. The end result is that it's stopped at the idea stage, nothing changes, and six months later a new freah face will repeat the cycle.
Part of the issue is that without social safety nets, much of the public is afraid that missing a week to a month of work will guarantee them homelessness.
I believe this is the intended effect of maintaining some level of homelessness and unemployment in American policy decisions. Full employment and suffering reduction through a strong safety net are the correct moral imperatives, but they reduce the leverage of a central authority. You can see whose priorities win out.
I think there is a soft self-destruction happening among millennials and beyond in the US and similar societies. They have been so worn down by living in a system that refuses to invest properly in them that they are taking the fatalist route of simply refusing to participate in the building of a future.
Limited procreation, disengaging from politics or mindlessly bandwagoning demagogues, deaths of despair, etc… it’s not universal but the trend lines are certainly worrying.
I feel like, historically, protests have beared fruit in America for leftist / progressive causes. Everything from Suffragettes and Civil Rights / anti-Vietnam to the Floyd protests of the modern day. Maybe they didn’t overthrow an entire government but the marked forward progress of each one is clear.
I feel there is currently a bit of of internalized propaganda about protests being stupid or worse. Witness any cause which involves protesting by blocking the street. You get an army of internet trolls talking up the idea that this is somehow evil.
In the civil rights era, events like crossing bridges on foot were a key feature, done by people like Martin Luther King. In the modern era, if you see a protest on the golden gate bridge as an example, they'll be called terrorists and people will advocate for violence against them.
Oh, there was plenty of internalized propaganda about civil disobedience being the "wrong approach" [0] - it is by no means a new phenomenon. Such criticism was common enough during the civil rights movement that MLK addressed it in Letter from Birmingham Jail:
> You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit ins, marches and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored.
[0] https://reddit.com/r/PropagandaPosters/comments/1l7b30j
35 years ago, protesters blocked the Golden Gate Bridge.
I'm pretty sure they were protesting the war with Iraq (Bush the First) in response to Iraq's invasion and capture of oil wells in Kuwait.
But far more clear is my memory of the searing rage of a coworker that day. She was flying on it, the hatred coming out of her mouth.
It shocked me for a couple of reasons. She was close in age to me, just out of school. I think that my college years had led me to presume to most young people would be more sympathetic to opposition of general warfare. There was lots of talk of forcing military enlistment among people our age.
But the main reason was that the trigger for her rage was the temporary threat to her right to drive her car wherever she wanted to.
You think Americans are nuts about their guns, don't you ever threaten their right to kill people with cars.
Any sympathy she could have felt for the protesters' cause was gone because they blocked a highway.
And nowadays, if this happened in Florida, she could pretty credibly run the protesters down in the street and avoid even getting charged.
I've been thinking about them recently. Did any of them "directly" threaten capital? I'd argue that Suffragettes and Civil Rights ultimately helped capital. Maybe anti-Vietnem since it directly affected defense contractors income streams?
Can't speak for everybody, but maybe it has something do with hundreds of thousands of us being laid off, and we're just too busy trying not to go under.
This is why people need to be protesting not the other way around.
i find it interesting that the later actions that Davidson did would be considered "terrorism" under the UK government's legal framework regarding Palestine Action
It evolved into gangstalking via fusion centers contrary to Wikipedia's claim that it's mAsS dElUsIoN which is obviously false to anyone who's done more than a cursory look into it. Look up NSA whistleblower Karen Stewart and also watch the tragic video of Myron May who gives an accurate description of their tactics. Ask me how I know.
Please share, new rabbit holes are the best rabbit holes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_stalking
this sums it up nicely:
"A study from Australia and the United Kingdom by Lorraine Sheridan and David James compared 128 self-defined victims of gang stalking with a randomly selected group of 128 self-declared victims of stalking by an individual. All 128 "victims" of gang stalking were judged to be delusional, compared with only 5 victims of individual stalking."
This is not a good rabbit hole
Nothing changed.