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Speaker 1: Most days, the war fields distant, like a bad dream

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Speaker 1: from your early childhood. You remember it in gasps and flashes,

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Speaker 1: moments of horror and pain and laughter and confusion that

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Speaker 1: leap unbidden into your consciousness. Sometimes you have nightmares. Sometimes

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Speaker 1: you can smell the bodies of your neighbors buried under rubble,

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Speaker 1: mingled with the acrid reek of gunpowder. But for the

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Speaker 1: most part, the war hides in the back of your

8
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Speaker 1: mind as you try to get on with your life.

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Speaker 1: After the war ended, he wound up migrating from Canada

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Speaker 1: to the Pacific Northwest. The old United States had balkanized

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Speaker 1: into a mishmash of functional, semi functional, and failed nations,

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Speaker 1: and of those, the Northwest seemed to be your best option.

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Speaker 1: It's weathered the end of the United States and the

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Speaker 1: brutality of climate change better than most places, thanks mainly

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Speaker 1: to the low population density, and of course the water.

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Speaker 1: Fresh Water is in short supply these days, not just

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Speaker 1: in America but across much of the world. Global agricultural

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Speaker 1: output never quite recovered from the loss of the United States,

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Speaker 1: and famines are common. You guess They've always been common,

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Speaker 1: but not in places like Virginia and Florida, not until

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Speaker 1: now you read yesterday that and much of the Old South,

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Speaker 1: lack of clean water and adequate food has dropped the

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Speaker 1: average life expectancy to under fifty years. You should feel

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Speaker 1: bad about that, you know, but you don't. The dominionists

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Speaker 1: wound up in charge of most of those states, and

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Speaker 1: to you it feels like karmic justice that they've been

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Speaker 1: the once hardest hit by the shifting climate. That's not

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Speaker 1: to say that you and your new neighbors haven't suffered.

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Speaker 1: The wild fire season is now a full six months,

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Speaker 1: sometimes eight most days. The fires are the first thing

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Speaker 1: you check on when you wake up. Where you live,

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Speaker 1: it's not uncommon to have to evacuate two or three

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Speaker 1: times a year. So far, your apartment building hasn't burned down,

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Speaker 1: though so far there's coffee now. At least your supply

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Speaker 1: is ration and the stuff you can usually afford is

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Speaker 1: cut with chicory and other herbs. But after the years without,

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Speaker 1: you aren't about to complain about some adulterments. You say,

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Speaker 1: we're two full cups every morning before you lock up

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Speaker 1: your flat and head for the bus stop to go

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Speaker 1: to work. None of the pre war industries have really

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Speaker 1: recovered either. So one of the few job fields that

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Speaker 1: has actually expanded is border control. The sheer frequency of

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Speaker 1: tornadoes and mud slides has rendered huge chunks of the

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Speaker 1: South and Midwest almost uninhabitable for much of the year.

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Speaker 1: Flooding has done the same for many coastal cities. If

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Speaker 1: the USA had survived, a strong federal government might have

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Speaker 1: been able to mitigate some of that damage. But now

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Speaker 1: much of North America is effectively a failed state. There's

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Speaker 1: no FEMA, no c d C, no one looking out

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Speaker 1: for people in many, many, many parts of the old

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Speaker 1: United States, and so the more stable chunks of the

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Speaker 1: US have become magnets for refugees. Your job, more days

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Speaker 1: than not, is to tell these people that they are

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Speaker 1: not welcome. Your first customers today are a family from Alabama.

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Speaker 1: They hand you their passports, ragged things printed on cheap paper,

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Speaker 1: and I'm blazoned with the all too familiar logo of

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Speaker 1: the Fiery Cross. You take the documents and thumb through them.

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Speaker 1: It's mostly for show. You already know you're not going

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Speaker 1: to let them in. You look up at the family.

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Speaker 1: The father and mother both look to be in their

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Speaker 1: mid forties, although you know they're a decade younger than that.

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Speaker 1: They're both skinny, with lined, worn looking faces and an unhealthy,

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Speaker 1: malnourished yellow tinge to their skin. Their son looks to

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Speaker 1: be a little better fed, although you can tell he's

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Speaker 1: still far too small for a boy of fourteen. You

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Speaker 1: would have guessed ten. The woman cradles a baby girl

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Speaker 1: in her arms. One look at its too thin hand

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Speaker 1: and rasping little fingers is the first thing that ignites

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Speaker 1: your sympathy just a little bit. You've seen babies that

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Speaker 1: small before, and you know they don't tend to live.

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Speaker 1: For a few long moments, your conscience nudges you to

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Speaker 1: show mercy and let them in. Both adults look at

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Speaker 1: you with pleading eyes, and for just a second, you're

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Speaker 1: back on the war, scraping your fingers bloody, trying to

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Speaker 1: pull concrete and plaster off the buried bodies of your friends.

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Speaker 1: You look down at the weathered fiery cross on their

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Speaker 1: passports and remember the first time you saw that logo

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Speaker 1: and blazoned on the hood of a stolen humvy. The

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Speaker 1: old anger rises again, boiling up from somewhere deep in

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Speaker 1: your diaphragm. You take one more hard look at the

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Speaker 1: dying infant, and then into the eyes of the man

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Speaker 1: and woman who used to be your fellow citizens, you

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Speaker 1: tell them no. Up on my wall, next to my

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Speaker 1: writing chair is a print of a painting called The

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Speaker 1: Fall of Nineveh. The painting is from eighty nine, but

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Speaker 1: the battle it depicts occurred in six hundred and twelve

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Speaker 1: b c. Nineveh was then the capital of the Assyrian Empire,

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Speaker 1: which was the greatest power on earth at the time.

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Speaker 1: It was torn apart when an alliance of Meads and

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Speaker 1: Babylonians rebelled against the empire and destroyed it in an

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Speaker 1: orgy of apocalyptic violence. The painting captures the horror of

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Speaker 1: the moment quite well. A wall of flames consumes the horizon,

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Speaker 1: burning through whole districts of the world's mightiest city. In

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Speaker 1: the four A ground, civilians wail and rend their garments

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Speaker 1: as they huddle around the last of their nation's wealth,

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Speaker 1: gold and silver baubles that have now lost all meaning

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Speaker 1: and all power in war's fiery crucible. It's a beautiful

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Speaker 1: work of art, but aesthetics alone are not why it

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Speaker 1: sits in my home. Nineveh is Mosle. Mosle is, of course,

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Speaker 1: one of those cities that's lived long enough to accrue

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Speaker 1: a handful of different names. The Fall of Nineveh depicts

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Speaker 1: the very first time that ancient city was torched by

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Speaker 1: the fires of war. In two thousand seventeen, I watched

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Speaker 1: Nineveh fall again. The soldiers who conquered it were a

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Speaker 1: mix of Kurdish Peshmerga, the descendants of the Meads, and

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Speaker 1: Iraqi soldiers, most of whom were from the area around Baghdad,

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Speaker 1: which is, of course Babylon. Two wars years apart, boiled

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Speaker 1: down to a conflict between the same groups of people.

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Speaker 1: It's enough to make you feel a sense of the

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Speaker 1: hopeless inevitability and the cyclical nature of history. The people

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Speaker 1: I met in Mosele had no illusions that they were

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Speaker 1: living at the end of history. They didn't even believe

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Speaker 1: they'd seen nine of A fall for the last time

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Speaker 1: in their lives. There was a widespread, dogged acceptance that

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Speaker 1: the next war was a right around the corner. Here

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Speaker 1: in the United States, our nation's youth and wealth has

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Speaker 1: insulated us from this same sense of historical inevitability. We

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Speaker 1: tend to view the American Civil War as a singular act,

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Speaker 1: one shocking moment in history. That will never be repeated.

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Speaker 1: But on a grand historic scale, it wouldn't be at

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Speaker 1: all weird for a region as large as North America

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Speaker 1: to see a civil war every century or two. In fact,

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Speaker 1: it would be weirder for this continent to find itself

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Speaker 1: forever at peace over the weeks that it could happen

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Speaker 1: here is run. I've received quite a lot of feedback

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Speaker 1: from my listeners. As with everything else in this country,

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Speaker 1: I've noticed a distinct difference in the responses from my

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Speaker 1: coastal northern Midwestern listeners and my listeners in the South.

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Speaker 1: I think the old Confederate States are the only part

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Speaker 1: of this country that has a similar attitude towards the

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Speaker 1: inevitability of historic cycles that I saw over in Iraq.

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Speaker 1: It's I've as if you know where to look, what

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Speaker 1: else is the South will rise again, but an expression

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Speaker 1: of faith in the idea that the old conflicts and

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Speaker 1: hatreds that toward this nation apart will do so once again.

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Speaker 1: So is a second American Civil War inevitable? Maybe? But

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Speaker 1: I for one, I'm going to move forward with my

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Speaker 1: life as if it is not. I can't let myself

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Speaker 1: believe that because the Second American Civil war would mean

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Speaker 1: the end of life on Earth as we know it.

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Speaker 1: The United States exports more food than any other country

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Speaker 1: on the planet. We produce almost as much food calorically

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Speaker 1: as India or China, but we do so much more efficiently,

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Speaker 1: which is why cheap American food stuff has become the

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Speaker 1: backbone of much of the world's diet. Canada and Mexico

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Speaker 1: are number one and number two recipients of American food exports, respectively.

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Speaker 1: It's hard to comprehend the scale of disaster a second

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Speaker 1: American civil war would bring to the rest of the world,

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Speaker 1: but it's worth noting that the two nations would be

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Speaker 1: forced to take in the most American refugees are also

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Speaker 1: the two nations most reliant on the food would stop

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Speaker 1: flowing during any serious civil conflict. There are other reasons

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Speaker 1: for the rest of the world to fear a second

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Speaker 1: American civil war. For one thing, the world is running

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Speaker 1: out of fresh water. The US Agency for International Development

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Speaker 1: currently predicts that by twenty twenty five, one third of

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Speaker 1: all human beings will face severe and chronic water shortages.

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Speaker 1: The Middle East, North Africa, and Sub Saharan Africa are

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Speaker 1: all currently the hardest hit, but the world demand for

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Speaker 1: water doubles every twenty one years, and the United States

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Speaker 1: currently has the third largest freshwater reserves on the planet.

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Speaker 1: It's hard to say precisely what impact a civil war

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Speaker 1: would have on the global water crisis, but it would

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Speaker 1: not make it better. Perhaps the most important global side

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Speaker 1: effect of a second American civil war would be how

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Speaker 1: that war will contribute to climate change. The US military

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Speaker 1: is currently the number one consumer of petroleum worldwide. It

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Speaker 1: is suspected to be the number one contributor to climate

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Speaker 1: change via emissions worldwide as well, although this is hard

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Speaker 1: to say for sure, as in every climate change treaty

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Speaker 1: we've ever signed, military emissions have been exempted from reporting requirements.

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Speaker 1: We know from the d D that the U. S.

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Speaker 1: Army emitted more than seventy million metric tons of CO

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Speaker 1: two per year in two thousand fourteen, just counting our

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Speaker 1: domestic forces and not including our overseas bases, fleets, and forces.

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Speaker 1: We know that the first four years of the Iraq

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Speaker 1: War put a hundred and forty one million metric tons

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Speaker 1: of carbon into the atmosphere. This means that more carbon

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Speaker 1: was emitted per year by the U. S Military and

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Speaker 1: Iraq than emitted by a hundred and thirty nine other

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Speaker 1: nations combined during those years. One fairly small war equaled

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Speaker 1: a hundred and thirty nine countries worth of carbon emissions

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Speaker 1: for four years. We also know that the military produces

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Speaker 1: five times as many environmental toxins as the five largest U.

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Speaker 1: S Chemical companies combined. And all this is in a

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Speaker 1: time of domestic peace. If war consumes the homeland, we

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Speaker 1: can expect to see military emissions leap. Accordingly, tens of

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Speaker 1: thousands of hum vs and a PCs and tanks currently

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Speaker 1: setting parked somewhere in the Arizona Desert will take to

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Speaker 1: the highways and byways of this land, admitting carbon every

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Speaker 1: second of every day. Artillery shells, bombs, and bullets will

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Speaker 1: also have their way with the climate. In two thousand eighteen,

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Speaker 1: California suffered its most devastating wildfires in recent memory. More

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Speaker 1: than eight thousand separate fires burnt nearly two million acres,

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Speaker 1: the largest amount of burnt acreage ever recorded in a

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Speaker 1: fire season. I keep mentioning that all these terrible things

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Speaker 1: happen in a time of peace, but that is really

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Speaker 1: worth repeating, because every natural disaster caused by climate change

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Speaker 1: gets worse when people are shooting at each other all

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Speaker 1: around the country. Over in Kurdistan northern Iraq, they face

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Speaker 1: wildfires too. The journalism collective Belling Cat has monitored these

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Speaker 1: fires and noted in two thousand eighteen that quote shelling

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Speaker 1: with light weapons and artillery resulted in the outbreak of

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Speaker 1: forest and wildfires at the parched border lands near the

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Speaker 1: north and eastern borders of Iraq. People battling these fires

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Speaker 1: were hindered by land mines or other unexploded ordinance remnants

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Speaker 1: from the Iran Iraq War. The result hundreds of thousands

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Speaker 1: of hectares of burned lands, destroyed ecosystems and agricultural lands,

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Speaker 1: air pollution, and local communities suffering from smoke and loss

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Speaker 1: of land. Now we know that climate change tends to

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Speaker 1: make wildfires bigger, deadlier, and more destructive. We also know

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Speaker 1: that large wildfires like the ones California experienced in two

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Speaker 1: thousand and eighteen contribute massively to climate change on their own. Currently,

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Speaker 1: wildfires are estimated to emit roughly eight billion tons of

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Speaker 1: CO two per year out of the thirty two billion

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Speaker 1: tons of c O two emitted worldwide, So more war

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Speaker 1: means more wildfires means more climate change means more wildfires.

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Speaker 1: And all these lurking horrors don't even take into account

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Speaker 1: the possibility that a second American civil war might involve

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Speaker 1: the use of nuclear weapons. The United States currently holds

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Speaker 1: about sixty eight hundred of these dooms data vices. Even

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Speaker 1: I can't easily imagine the government deploying them in the

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Speaker 1: event of a vicious civil war, but I can imagine

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Speaker 1: the government losing a few. In two thousand fourteen, dozens

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Speaker 1: of US New Clear Missile Officers, the custodians of the

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Speaker 1: deadliest arsenal ever assembled in human history, were caught up

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Speaker 1: in a massive scandal that involved basically all of them

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Speaker 1: cheating on regular competency exams they were forced to take,

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Speaker 1: and also dealing and doing shiploads of drugs, sometimes while

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Speaker 1: on duty watching our nukes. So, yeah, the possibility of

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Speaker 1: some nihilistic terror group getting their hands on a Nucer

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Speaker 1: three during a period of cataclysmic violence, it isn't exactly ridiculous.

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Speaker 1: I think I've made my point. The world can ill

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Speaker 1: afford a second American Civil war. But here's the issue.

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Speaker 1: The world can't afford things to go on the way

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Speaker 1: they've been in the United States either. We are the wealthiest,

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Speaker 1: most influential, most powerful nation on the planet, and for

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Speaker 1: the bulk of my lifetime at least, we've sort of

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Speaker 1: punted on taking any sort of concerted action to fix

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Speaker 1: the biggest issues of our time. Earlier this year, the

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Speaker 1: UN released a report noting that at current rates of degradation,

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Speaker 1: the world's top soil will be completely gone within sixty years.

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Speaker 1: This news could not be more apocalyptic in a way,

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Speaker 1: it's even more dire than reports of global warming. Human

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Speaker 1: beings can build air conditioning and dikes and levees, we

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Speaker 1: cannot survive period without top soil, and yet this story

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Speaker 1: has received almost no play in the international media. Earlier

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Speaker 1: this year, when Marina Helena Smeato of the Food and

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Speaker 1: Agricultural Organization announced that one third of the planet's top

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Speaker 1: soil has already been degraded, the response from the American

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Speaker 1: public was a big, fat fist on the snooze button.

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Speaker 1: If action isn't taken right now, the disappearance of our

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Speaker 1: top soil could be yet another problem that our political

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Speaker 1: class ignores for decades until it gets so dire that

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Speaker 1: people have to care. On a related note, Fox News

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Speaker 1: just published an article warning that climate change could cause

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Speaker 1: sea levels to rise by seven feet within the next

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Speaker 1: eighty years, rendering most coastal cities uninhabitable. The United States

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Speaker 1: of America cannot be allowed to die in violence, but

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Speaker 1: it's just as clear that it cannot be allowed to

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Speaker 1: live on either in the form that we currently know.

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Speaker 1: All of these problems are decades long in action on

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Speaker 1: climate change, the rise of Charlatan's and grifters who have

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Speaker 1: exploited and has ascerbated our divisions and son hate throughout

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Speaker 1: this nation. The increasing inequality in our economic system, and

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Speaker 1: the corruption and graft at the highest levels of political power.

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Speaker 1: All of those problems are the result of a political

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Speaker 1: status quo wherein roughly half of us vote once every

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Speaker 1: four years, and that's about all we do. If you're

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Speaker 1: the kind of person who actually volunteers every four years,

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Speaker 1: it spends a few hours handing up pamphlets through registering

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Speaker 1: new voters, you qualify as among the most politically engaged

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Speaker 1: of your countrymen. If you volunteer during the mid terms, two,

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Speaker 1: you're basically the democratic equivalent of a damned sasquatch. Chances

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Speaker 1: are if you know anyone that consistently politically active in

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Speaker 1: your life, you probably view them with a little bit

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Speaker 1: of awe. The United States of America, the one where

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Speaker 1: barely half the country bothers to vote for the president,

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Speaker 1: and someone who puts in twenty hours of volunteer time

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Speaker 1: every two years, is a superstar. That America has to

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Speaker 1: die killing. It is the only way we can save ourselves.

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Speaker 1: No one person we can vote for will fix the

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Speaker 1: problems we face. The solution to stopping the second American

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Speaker 1: Civil War starts at the bottom, with everyone who prefers

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Speaker 1: sanity and decency to bloodshed and murder. Now, as the

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Speaker 1: previous episodes of this podcast have run, dozens and dozens

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Speaker 1: of you have reached out to me asking for advice

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Speaker 1: on what you can do to stop a new civil war.

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Speaker 1: I laid out some of my thoughts and know how

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Speaker 1: to save America episode. But here's the thing. I'm just

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Speaker 1: one guy, and I'm not a particularly bright guy at that.

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Speaker 1: I dropped out of college so I could do dangerous

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Speaker 1: drugs in a shack for two years. I've drunkenly vomited

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Speaker 1: on roughly half of my friends. I am no expert

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Speaker 1: on saving the world, and now that I think of it,

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Speaker 1: I guess nobody in the world is. But for this episode,

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Speaker 1: I decided to look outside of myself and ask some

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Speaker 1: people I respect who all had insights that I thought

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Speaker 1: might provide you all with some inspiration on how we

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Speaker 1: can turn this ship around. First off, we're going to

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Speaker 1: hear from Molly Conjure. Up until two thousand seventeen, she

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Speaker 1: was just a normal, not particularly politically involved citizen of Charlottesville, Virginia.

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Speaker 1: Then Unite the Right happened. Nazis marched through her hometown

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Speaker 1: carrying torches, one of them murder at a young woman,

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Speaker 1: and Molly decided she had to do something. You know,

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Speaker 1: up until that point, I've been just a regular person,

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Speaker 1: busy with my job, didn't really have much of a life.

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Speaker 1: It wasn't really very political. And suddenly I lost my

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Speaker 1: job and I had all this free time, and then

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Speaker 1: a terrorist attack happened in my neighborhood, and I just

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Speaker 1: didn't understand how this could have happened to us. I

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Speaker 1: didn't understand how this had been allowed to happen. H

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Speaker 1: So I started going to meetings. I went to my

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Speaker 1: first child spell City Council meeting, in August, and that

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Speaker 1: was not your average city council meeting, even by our

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Speaker 1: rather rocko as standards here since then, you know, people

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Speaker 1: were screaming and people were being dragged from chambers by cops,

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Speaker 1: and it was it was dramatic. People people were traumatized.

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Speaker 1: And I don't really know what I expected to get

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Speaker 1: from that meeting, or from many of the meetings I

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Speaker 1: went to after that. I just I thought it would

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Speaker 1: help me understand. M Sorry, I edit a lot of this.

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Speaker 1: You're doing a lot of thinking about. Yeah, it helped you.

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Speaker 1: You wanted to understand what the hell was going on

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Speaker 1: that allowed this to happen, and so it's it sounds

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Speaker 1: like that's what you're saying, and it sounds like the

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Speaker 1: only way you could think of to really do that

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Speaker 1: was to just kind of stick your head inside the

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Speaker 1: local government and be like, what the what what's happening here? Right?

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Speaker 1: And you know, eventually the meetings calmed down. We're a

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Speaker 1: fairly civically engaged community, but you know, those first few

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Speaker 1: meetings were a lot of people like myself, we've never

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Speaker 1: been to a meeting before, and they just wanted to

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Speaker 1: know what the funk happened? Um. But you know, eventually

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Speaker 1: they calm down. Eventually they became more mundane and about

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Speaker 1: the business of governing a city again. And it became

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Speaker 1: clear to me that the violence of that summer was

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Speaker 1: a symptom of a disease that we've had for a

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Speaker 1: long time. It was a very visible, ugly flare up

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Speaker 1: of what is a chronic illness. Um, that there was

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Speaker 1: white supremacy just deeply baked into the way the government works.

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Speaker 1: You know, we think of that Nazi violence as when

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Speaker 1: we think of that violences as the Nazis who marched

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Speaker 1: in the streets, but really that was just a a

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Speaker 1: flare up. It was it was a cold sore caused

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Speaker 1: by the virus that reproduces in in these meetings day

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Speaker 1: in and day out. Um. You know, it became less

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Speaker 1: about spectacle and it was more about the process of

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Speaker 1: government and the decisions that get made in city council

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Speaker 1: are based on decisions meet and other meetings and boards

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Speaker 1: and commissions and work sessions. And I still didn't have

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Speaker 1: a job then, I didn't really know what I was doing.

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Speaker 1: I was kind of a drift and I had a

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Speaker 1: lot of time to kill. So I went to another

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Speaker 1: meeting and another meeting, and I realized that a lot

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Speaker 1: of the governing happening in our city was going on

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Speaker 1: in meetings that were open in name only. Know there's

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Speaker 1: no one, there's there's no one at these meetings. A

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Speaker 1: lot of this is happening in the dark. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: you know, it strikes me that you're talking about sort

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Speaker 1: of the disease of white supremacy. That like another disease

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Speaker 1: that's at play here is the fact that because of

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Speaker 1: how little engagement the average person has in their local government,

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Speaker 1: Like that's that's another illness in and of itself, Like

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Speaker 1: the fact that there are these meetings where a lot

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Speaker 1: of decisions that affect the day to day life of

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Speaker 1: people enough that like some of them lead to this

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Speaker 1: deadly rally um that they they're not even really happening

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Speaker 1: because like you know that nobody's going to show up,

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Speaker 1: So it's just whatever handful of people are actually going

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Speaker 1: to put themselves out there kind of make the decisions

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Speaker 1: and conversations with each other, and most people don't know

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Speaker 1: anything about it. Like that's a disease to um. And

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Speaker 1: it's a disease that's not just in Charlotte'esville. That's every

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Speaker 1: town in this country as far as you know, I'm aware,

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Speaker 1: it's everywhere. And you know, the news is supposed to

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Speaker 1: be just passionate, right, you know, it's it's just facts hub,

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Speaker 1: but there's you know, there's no shortage of sterile, detached

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Speaker 1: coverage of the sort of the day in, day out

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Speaker 1: mondanities of running a city. And you know, absolutely no

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Speaker 1: offense intended towards the real reporters I've gotten to know

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Speaker 1: sharing a beat with them. A lot of the coverage

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Speaker 1: of this kind of stuff that exists just doesn't connect

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Speaker 1: with people. You know. I found that people want something

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Speaker 1: more than that, you know, totally by accident. I discovered

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Speaker 1: there's a real desire for news with what I guess

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Speaker 1: you could call an audience surrogate. And that's what you've

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Speaker 1: been doing, is you've been showing up at these meetings

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Speaker 1: and working as an audience surrogate to give people sort

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Speaker 1: of to help everyone else stick their heads into your

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Speaker 1: local governments that these things aren't happening behind closed doors, right.

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Speaker 1: And it started by accident. I think the first city

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Speaker 1: council meeting that I live tweet, I was not a

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Speaker 1: Twitter user. I didn't you know sort of a you know,

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Speaker 1: I'll be thirty this year, but I'm sort of a

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Speaker 1: grandma when it comes to be things like don't It

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Speaker 1: was not extremely online until two years ago. You know,

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Speaker 1: I started tweeting from this meeting because you know, people

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Speaker 1: were being arrested and people were screaming and standing on

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Speaker 1: tables and standing on chairs and there's chaos. But it's

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Speaker 1: sort of came more than that, I think, um, you know,

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Speaker 1: as they kept going in, as it calmed down, I

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Speaker 1: kept keeping meeting minutes. And that's that's really what I

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Speaker 1: do now for for a living, I guess, is just

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Speaker 1: keep meeting minutes. A lot of people have been taken

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Speaker 1: by surprise by the sudden and vicious surge of incredibly

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Speaker 1: restrictive anti abortion laws across much of the South. A

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Speaker 1: law that would prescribe the death penalty to women who

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Speaker 1: get abortions is even being discussed in Texas right now.

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Speaker 1: The stuff that's actually been past is shocking, but it

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Speaker 1: shouldn't be if you've paid attention to the religious right

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Speaker 1: for the last twenty years. Everything happening right now is

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Speaker 1: what they've been working towards methodically, and they've accomplished their goals,

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Speaker 1: in large part by spending thousands of cumulative hours calling representatives,

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Speaker 1: putting up flyers, spreading pamphlets, registering voters, and forcing their

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Speaker 1: elected leaders to listen to them. The same strategy that

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Speaker 1: will stop these people from establishing a theocracy is also

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Speaker 1: the same strategy that will lead us towards taking these

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Speaker 1: sae necessary actions to reduce climate change. It's the same

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Speaker 1: strategy that can lead to a active action against the

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Speaker 1: spread of white supremacist terror. The solutions to all of

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Speaker 1: these problems start with all of us getting involved. Right now,

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Speaker 1: Let's see, Uh, I do just want to underscore showing up.

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Speaker 1: I just that's that that is the most important message here.

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Speaker 1: You know, a good friend of myne video graduate student

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Speaker 1: union organizer at the University of Michigan, describes for work

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Speaker 1: as just being a dumb bitch who cares a lot.

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Speaker 1: And I laughed at that at first, but she's right.

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Speaker 1: You don't. You don't have to be an expert. You

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Speaker 1: don't have to read all the books, you don't need

431
00:22:27,119 --> 00:22:28,480
Speaker 1: to know where you're going, you don't need to be

432
00:22:28,520 --> 00:22:30,040
Speaker 1: a leader. You just have to care about the people

433
00:22:30,080 --> 00:22:33,760
Speaker 1: around you. Jump in, show up, and start helping you know,

434
00:22:33,800 --> 00:22:35,560
Speaker 1: I didn't go to journalism school. I don't know what

435
00:22:35,600 --> 00:22:38,040
Speaker 1: I'm doing. I think a lot of people are hesitant

436
00:22:38,080 --> 00:22:41,120
Speaker 1: to get more involved until there's a clearer spot for them,

437
00:22:41,240 --> 00:22:44,760
Speaker 1: until there's a path forward. But there's no assigned seats here.

438
00:22:44,840 --> 00:22:48,200
Speaker 1: You just show up, Just show up. If you want

439
00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:50,320
Speaker 1: to follow Molly online, you can find her on Twitter

440
00:22:50,440 --> 00:22:52,720
Speaker 1: at socialist dog Mom. You can also find her on

441
00:22:52,760 --> 00:22:56,000
Speaker 1: Patreon under the same name socialist dog Mom. Molly is

442
00:22:56,040 --> 00:22:59,720
Speaker 1: good people, and she's a good example of achievable activism.

443
00:22:59,760 --> 00:23:02,000
Speaker 1: You don't have to make local government a full time

444
00:23:02,080 --> 00:23:04,560
Speaker 1: job like she did, but you can do something, even

445
00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:07,439
Speaker 1: if that's just showing up. And if everyone does something,

446
00:23:07,760 --> 00:23:20,639
Speaker 1: we can fix some ship. We don't. Speaking of fixing

447
00:23:20,680 --> 00:23:23,160
Speaker 1: some ship, I've talked an awful lot in this series

448
00:23:23,200 --> 00:23:26,440
Speaker 1: about Nazis, white supremacists, and the less extreme but more

449
00:23:26,520 --> 00:23:29,080
Speaker 1: numerous militias and right wing street gangs that enable and

450
00:23:29,119 --> 00:23:32,280
Speaker 1: support those literal Nazis. Something has to be done about

451
00:23:32,280 --> 00:23:34,760
Speaker 1: all of them. And while many of the outright fascists

452
00:23:34,760 --> 00:23:38,399
Speaker 1: probably can't be talked down, there are organizations who specialize

453
00:23:38,400 --> 00:23:41,680
Speaker 1: in de radicalizing these people. I mentioned Light upon Light

454
00:23:41,720 --> 00:23:44,399
Speaker 1: and Life After Hate and How to Save America episodes.

455
00:23:44,640 --> 00:23:47,680
Speaker 1: The work of those groups is worth supporting, but there

456
00:23:47,680 --> 00:23:49,720
Speaker 1: are an awful lot of people who haven't yet made

457
00:23:49,720 --> 00:23:52,399
Speaker 1: the full jump to fascism. Folks who may be enthralled

458
00:23:52,440 --> 00:23:55,440
Speaker 1: with militias of various stripes or fashy groups like Patriot

459
00:23:55,480 --> 00:23:58,040
Speaker 1: Prayer and the Proud Boys, but haven't fallen fully off

460
00:23:58,080 --> 00:24:00,879
Speaker 1: the cliff and bought an s S uniform. These people

461
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:02,960
Speaker 1: actually make up the bulk of the far right street

462
00:24:03,000 --> 00:24:05,160
Speaker 1: movement that's been involved in so much of the political

463
00:24:05,240 --> 00:24:08,200
Speaker 1: violence we've seen over the last three years. Joey Gibson,

464
00:24:08,240 --> 00:24:11,440
Speaker 1: founder of Portland's Patriot Prayer, is probably the patron saint

465
00:24:11,480 --> 00:24:14,280
Speaker 1: of this sort of extremist I open this series by

466
00:24:14,320 --> 00:24:16,800
Speaker 1: discussing my deep worry about how one of these rallies

467
00:24:16,840 --> 00:24:19,320
Speaker 1: might very easily provide the spark that ignites the Second

468
00:24:19,359 --> 00:24:22,080
Speaker 1: American Civil War. If that is the case, then one

469
00:24:22,119 --> 00:24:24,080
Speaker 1: way to make that war less likely is to try

470
00:24:24,119 --> 00:24:27,240
Speaker 1: to reach and de radicalize some of these men. Many

471
00:24:27,240 --> 00:24:29,720
Speaker 1: of them probably can't be reached, but you only really

472
00:24:29,760 --> 00:24:31,600
Speaker 1: need to reach a few of them to reduce their

473
00:24:31,640 --> 00:24:33,760
Speaker 1: numbers enough that the rest are too scared to take

474
00:24:33,800 --> 00:24:37,160
Speaker 1: to the streets. Every unhinged militiaman and proud boy who

475
00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:40,480
Speaker 1: gets brought back to sanity lowers our national temperature by

476
00:24:40,520 --> 00:24:43,399
Speaker 1: just a little bit. I wanted to provide some advice

477
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:45,040
Speaker 1: on how to do that, so I talked to my

478
00:24:45,080 --> 00:24:48,159
Speaker 1: friend Marie L. Eaton. She's a Portland based activist and

479
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:50,439
Speaker 1: she's been present for some of the very ugly stuff

480
00:24:50,440 --> 00:24:52,639
Speaker 1: that's gone down in the streets of that city. I

481
00:24:52,680 --> 00:24:54,960
Speaker 1: think her story provides a blueprint other people can use

482
00:24:54,960 --> 00:24:57,360
Speaker 1: to try and reach the other side. I do want

483
00:24:57,359 --> 00:24:59,440
Speaker 1: to know that I am mainly talking about my fellow

484
00:24:59,480 --> 00:25:01,760
Speaker 1: white folks here. When it comes to white supremacists and

485
00:25:01,760 --> 00:25:05,240
Speaker 1: white supremacist adjacent folks, the burden does fall more heavily

486
00:25:05,280 --> 00:25:07,560
Speaker 1: on us, in large part because it's more dangerous for

487
00:25:07,600 --> 00:25:10,639
Speaker 1: people of color to even attempt that work. So, without

488
00:25:10,640 --> 00:25:14,760
Speaker 1: further ado, here's Mariel I was at. I believe it

489
00:25:14,800 --> 00:25:19,840
Speaker 1: was the biggest and one of the early rallies that

490
00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:24,760
Speaker 1: happened where Joey Gibson and his crew and a bunch

491
00:25:24,800 --> 00:25:28,280
Speaker 1: of three percenters and oath keepers and other groups came

492
00:25:28,320 --> 00:25:31,720
Speaker 1: together and people from the left showed up in very

493
00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:36,359
Speaker 1: large numbers, and we were kind of separated. It was

494
00:25:36,480 --> 00:25:39,160
Speaker 1: a little bit before Portland police started cracking down and

495
00:25:39,240 --> 00:25:42,760
Speaker 1: trying to create barriers between the groups. So we just

496
00:25:42,800 --> 00:25:48,119
Speaker 1: had a street blocking us, and I was spending a

497
00:25:48,160 --> 00:25:50,520
Speaker 1: bit of time, a fair bit of time, um, just

498
00:25:50,600 --> 00:25:53,440
Speaker 1: yelling across the street at how cute their outfits were.

499
00:25:53,640 --> 00:25:57,000
Speaker 1: And I was just saying, oh, that's all, that's so cute,

500
00:25:57,080 --> 00:26:01,800
Speaker 1: all your adorable, kind of belittling them on purpose because

501
00:26:01,960 --> 00:26:06,920
Speaker 1: that felt like something that was cathartic and would maybe

502
00:26:06,960 --> 00:26:10,800
Speaker 1: be effective. After a while, though, I realized I wanted

503
00:26:10,840 --> 00:26:12,959
Speaker 1: to go across the street and see what was going on.

504
00:26:13,160 --> 00:26:16,720
Speaker 1: I of course saw Confederate flags. I saw some people

505
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:23,200
Speaker 1: who had Swastika tattoos or patches on their jackets, and

506
00:26:23,240 --> 00:26:25,000
Speaker 1: then just a lot of people kind of looked a

507
00:26:25,080 --> 00:26:28,600
Speaker 1: little bit like comic con. A lot of people dressing

508
00:26:28,680 --> 00:26:31,879
Speaker 1: up in an outfits. I'm sure anyone who has been

509
00:26:31,920 --> 00:26:34,639
Speaker 1: to these rallies or seen pictures have seen some of

510
00:26:34,640 --> 00:26:36,920
Speaker 1: the people that come out. Yeah, a lot of people

511
00:26:37,000 --> 00:26:41,240
Speaker 1: LARPing as you know, soldiers or whatever exactly. Yeah, but

512
00:26:41,560 --> 00:26:44,760
Speaker 1: not just you know, the people who look like they're

513
00:26:44,760 --> 00:26:51,000
Speaker 1: in military garb, but real just interesting comic con style

514
00:26:51,080 --> 00:26:54,479
Speaker 1: like that, dressed up like a Spartan warrior. Yeah, and

515
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:58,959
Speaker 1: you saw the photo of me confronting him. And so

516
00:26:59,000 --> 00:27:03,000
Speaker 1: I went across the street and first just walked around

517
00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:06,800
Speaker 1: and I was body checked by multiple very large men

518
00:27:07,800 --> 00:27:12,399
Speaker 1: and yelled at and I had my Fearless Survivor shirt on,

519
00:27:13,320 --> 00:27:16,240
Speaker 1: and I had some people tell me that my I

520
00:27:16,359 --> 00:27:20,879
Speaker 1: deserved my rape and a lot of other really wonderful things.

521
00:27:21,960 --> 00:27:24,600
Speaker 1: And after a while, I I, you know, I had

522
00:27:24,600 --> 00:27:26,880
Speaker 1: a few people come up to me and start talking

523
00:27:26,920 --> 00:27:29,280
Speaker 1: to me, because apparently the day before there was a

524
00:27:29,400 --> 00:27:31,159
Speaker 1: video of me that was put on four chan, and

525
00:27:31,200 --> 00:27:33,159
Speaker 1: so some people were like, I saw you on four Chan,

526
00:27:33,359 --> 00:27:37,320
Speaker 1: and some were taunting me, but some started trying to

527
00:27:37,359 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 1: bring up conversation points, and a lot of them were

528
00:27:41,160 --> 00:27:47,040
Speaker 1: conspiracy theories, white genocide style conversations that ones that you

529
00:27:47,080 --> 00:27:49,919
Speaker 1: don't even quite know where to begin. And then I

530
00:27:49,960 --> 00:27:54,159
Speaker 1: went looped around and got into an argument with some

531
00:27:54,320 --> 00:27:57,959
Speaker 1: three percenters and oath keepers, and before you know it,

532
00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:03,320
Speaker 1: there were quiet i'd say fifteen mostly men. I think

533
00:28:03,359 --> 00:28:08,120
Speaker 1: only one or two people who identified as women around me,

534
00:28:08,640 --> 00:28:12,960
Speaker 1: and they all were kind of bringing up various points,

535
00:28:13,160 --> 00:28:17,320
Speaker 1: and clearly most of them were wanting to belittle me

536
00:28:17,359 --> 00:28:19,640
Speaker 1: in some way, but some of them seem to really

537
00:28:19,640 --> 00:28:22,800
Speaker 1: want to have conversations. And I realized with all the

538
00:28:22,920 --> 00:28:25,879
Speaker 1: noise and everything, you couldn't even begin to have a

539
00:28:25,960 --> 00:28:30,040
Speaker 1: helpful conversation with anyone. And so at some point when

540
00:28:30,040 --> 00:28:32,720
Speaker 1: I got a few people who I thought I could

541
00:28:32,760 --> 00:28:34,960
Speaker 1: really sit down and try to have a conversation with,

542
00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:37,240
Speaker 1: to try to show them because they seemed to have

543
00:28:37,280 --> 00:28:41,320
Speaker 1: a lot of misconceptions at my viewpoints and the viewpoints

544
00:28:41,320 --> 00:28:44,920
Speaker 1: of the left in general, I said, hey, does anyone

545
00:28:45,080 --> 00:28:47,840
Speaker 1: want to get together to have coffee and have a conversation,

546
00:28:48,880 --> 00:28:52,560
Speaker 1: And a few of them were interested, and one in

547
00:28:52,560 --> 00:28:56,880
Speaker 1: particular Um ended up emailing me and saying, Hey, you know,

548
00:28:56,920 --> 00:29:00,280
Speaker 1: I really I think that was interesting that you wanted

549
00:29:00,280 --> 00:29:02,560
Speaker 1: to do that. You weren't just wanting to shut down views.

550
00:29:02,600 --> 00:29:05,320
Speaker 1: You were actually trying to answer people, and you were,

551
00:29:05,600 --> 00:29:09,000
Speaker 1: of course unable to do that in that kind of environment.

552
00:29:09,360 --> 00:29:11,880
Speaker 1: I would love to get to get together for coffee

553
00:29:11,880 --> 00:29:15,640
Speaker 1: with you and talk about this. And so we got

554
00:29:15,640 --> 00:29:21,040
Speaker 1: together and he seemed really nervous. And this is a

555
00:29:21,160 --> 00:29:25,360
Speaker 1: man that was probably six three to six five and

556
00:29:26,880 --> 00:29:31,360
Speaker 1: large as well. Um, just a large man compared to me.

557
00:29:31,400 --> 00:29:37,680
Speaker 1: I'm a five ft five woman, um, and he seemed

558
00:29:37,720 --> 00:29:39,560
Speaker 1: a lot more nervous than I was. I of course

559
00:29:39,680 --> 00:29:41,280
Speaker 1: let people know where I was going and what I

560
00:29:41,360 --> 00:29:44,320
Speaker 1: was doing, just in case. But I intentionally left my

561
00:29:44,400 --> 00:29:47,600
Speaker 1: knife at home, which I usually keep with me, h,

562
00:29:48,320 --> 00:29:51,760
Speaker 1: especially since I bust around and around late late at night.

563
00:29:51,800 --> 00:29:53,760
Speaker 1: I like to keep a knife on me. Left it

564
00:29:53,800 --> 00:29:57,120
Speaker 1: at home. And I don't know exactly what drove me

565
00:29:57,160 --> 00:29:59,440
Speaker 1: to do that. It's it's like I wanted to go

566
00:29:59,560 --> 00:30:02,800
Speaker 1: in with the intention that I didn't need to be

567
00:30:02,920 --> 00:30:09,920
Speaker 1: armed in this situation, and so I arrived. He says, Oh,

568
00:30:10,040 --> 00:30:11,680
Speaker 1: I was afraid that you were going to show up

569
00:30:11,720 --> 00:30:15,880
Speaker 1: with your anarchist buddies, and you know, you seem so

570
00:30:15,920 --> 00:30:18,360
Speaker 1: much nicer than I had thought you were going to be.

571
00:30:19,560 --> 00:30:21,960
Speaker 1: You know, I came armed and everything, and I was like, well,

572
00:30:21,960 --> 00:30:25,640
Speaker 1: I intentionally didn't come armed. And he was so taken

573
00:30:25,640 --> 00:30:29,240
Speaker 1: aback by that, and he said, but you're a petite woman,

574
00:30:29,320 --> 00:30:32,040
Speaker 1: like why would you do that? And I just explained

575
00:30:32,040 --> 00:30:34,479
Speaker 1: to him, I want to have a conversation. I didn't

576
00:30:35,080 --> 00:30:39,080
Speaker 1: want two come with any assumption that I needed to

577
00:30:39,120 --> 00:30:41,680
Speaker 1: be afraid of you. I wanted to just come with

578
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:44,400
Speaker 1: open hands and have a good conversation with you. And

579
00:30:44,920 --> 00:30:48,000
Speaker 1: we sat there for about four hours and just had

580
00:30:48,040 --> 00:30:52,440
Speaker 1: this really long conversation covered a lot of topics. I

581
00:30:52,480 --> 00:30:55,280
Speaker 1: didn't start with politics with him. I asked him who

582
00:30:55,320 --> 00:30:58,640
Speaker 1: he was and what he cared about and where he

583
00:30:58,720 --> 00:31:02,560
Speaker 1: was from, and then you know, he learned a little

584
00:31:02,560 --> 00:31:05,160
Speaker 1: bit more about me, and then we got into politics.

585
00:31:05,240 --> 00:31:09,400
Speaker 1: And what I realized really quickly into talking with him,

586
00:31:09,440 --> 00:31:12,040
Speaker 1: and it is probably something that I came with an

587
00:31:12,040 --> 00:31:16,960
Speaker 1: exception about, is that he didn't really he didn't really

588
00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:20,840
Speaker 1: explore a lot of the topics as deeply as I had,

589
00:31:21,000 --> 00:31:24,120
Speaker 1: and when I brought them up, there was a lot

590
00:31:24,160 --> 00:31:28,080
Speaker 1: that he wasn't aware of. And the news sources that

591
00:31:28,160 --> 00:31:32,800
Speaker 1: he got were a lot of the ones that are

592
00:31:33,480 --> 00:31:39,400
Speaker 1: riddled with uh, misinformation, whether intentional or unintentional. And what

593
00:31:39,480 --> 00:31:42,800
Speaker 1: sort of stuff specifically was he bringing up Alex Jones

594
00:31:43,440 --> 00:31:47,120
Speaker 1: Daily Stormer, a lot of the ones that Fox News,

595
00:31:47,160 --> 00:31:51,920
Speaker 1: a lot of the ones that just have a reputation

596
00:31:51,960 --> 00:31:56,520
Speaker 1: for not being very reliable and even intentionally misleading. And

597
00:31:56,680 --> 00:32:01,400
Speaker 1: he had even stated as well that he he wasn't

598
00:32:02,640 --> 00:32:06,400
Speaker 1: even sure if he liked Trump. He just felt like

599
00:32:06,560 --> 00:32:08,760
Speaker 1: from the information he was getting that he needed to

600
00:32:08,840 --> 00:32:12,200
Speaker 1: vote for Trump in order to keep the rule of

601
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:17,600
Speaker 1: the land in order. And you know, I a lot

602
00:32:17,640 --> 00:32:19,240
Speaker 1: of what he was saying. I could understand where he

603
00:32:19,280 --> 00:32:21,320
Speaker 1: got to that conclusion. And when I brought up some

604
00:32:21,400 --> 00:32:25,440
Speaker 1: of the news sources that I looked at, ones that

605
00:32:25,480 --> 00:32:28,080
Speaker 1: he wasn't even aware of, like Al Jazeera, he was like, oh,

606
00:32:28,160 --> 00:32:31,640
Speaker 1: is that the terrorist organization one? And so there's just

607
00:32:31,800 --> 00:32:36,480
Speaker 1: there was Yeah. I mean, he he was somebody who

608
00:32:38,040 --> 00:32:42,240
Speaker 1: any I believe, And he had said, if Trump does

609
00:32:43,520 --> 00:32:46,520
Speaker 1: some of the horrible things people think that he's going

610
00:32:46,600 --> 00:32:50,719
Speaker 1: to do, I will stop supporting him and I will

611
00:32:51,280 --> 00:32:54,040
Speaker 1: fight against him actively. And I asked him, like, what

612
00:32:54,120 --> 00:32:56,920
Speaker 1: would that take, and he didn't have a really clear

613
00:32:57,000 --> 00:33:00,120
Speaker 1: concrete answer. And I actually, when you asked me to

614
00:33:00,200 --> 00:33:03,360
Speaker 1: retell this story, I decided to reach out to him again.

615
00:33:03,520 --> 00:33:05,480
Speaker 1: And so we'll see, you know, if he wants to

616
00:33:05,480 --> 00:33:07,840
Speaker 1: get together again, and I can see if he's now

617
00:33:08,000 --> 00:33:13,120
Speaker 1: changed any of his views and where that's gone. Um. Yeah,

618
00:33:13,240 --> 00:33:17,000
Speaker 1: So did you feel like you made progress sort of

619
00:33:17,000 --> 00:33:19,640
Speaker 1: at least in kind of bridging a gap and understanding

620
00:33:19,680 --> 00:33:23,040
Speaker 1: by the end of the conversation, Yeah, I think I

621
00:33:23,120 --> 00:33:31,120
Speaker 1: made him think, and I think that it reinstilled a

622
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:36,440
Speaker 1: sense that I had that a lot of the problems

623
00:33:36,480 --> 00:33:42,200
Speaker 1: we're seeing have to do with misinformation that somebody who

624
00:33:42,520 --> 00:33:48,320
Speaker 1: supports like he was talking about the three percenters, how

625
00:33:48,360 --> 00:33:51,520
Speaker 1: he was not yet a three per center but was

626
00:33:51,560 --> 00:33:54,960
Speaker 1: thinking of becoming one. And when I talked to him

627
00:33:54,960 --> 00:33:59,440
Speaker 1: a little bit about the background of groups like that

628
00:34:00,040 --> 00:34:04,880
Speaker 1: and some of the the racist pieces that people bring

629
00:34:04,960 --> 00:34:07,880
Speaker 1: up a lot, he almost seemed surprised, and he said, no,

630
00:34:08,480 --> 00:34:11,360
Speaker 1: we really just care about patriotism, We care about defending

631
00:34:11,360 --> 00:34:14,680
Speaker 1: our country. And I think he was genuine. I think

632
00:34:14,760 --> 00:34:18,000
Speaker 1: some of the other things perhaps he hadn't encountered yet

633
00:34:18,000 --> 00:34:23,239
Speaker 1: directly and didn't believe them, or he he was just

634
00:34:23,320 --> 00:34:26,280
Speaker 1: searching for community, and I think that's what I see

635
00:34:26,600 --> 00:34:30,200
Speaker 1: a lot with, especially young white men who joined these groups,

636
00:34:30,400 --> 00:34:37,520
Speaker 1: as they're looking for community in the wrong places. So yeah,

637
00:34:37,840 --> 00:34:41,160
Speaker 1: I think that that's why, as I mentioned, groups like

638
00:34:41,239 --> 00:34:48,960
Speaker 1: Rural Organizing Project really ah inspire me because they they

639
00:34:49,040 --> 00:34:54,600
Speaker 1: realized that information and education are the things that we

640
00:34:54,680 --> 00:34:58,120
Speaker 1: need most to fight these extremist groups. By the way,

641
00:34:58,160 --> 00:35:00,120
Speaker 1: Mary l also has a message for anyone listening who

642
00:35:00,200 --> 00:35:02,200
Speaker 1: might be on the opposite side of the political spectrum

643
00:35:02,200 --> 00:35:04,800
Speaker 1: for her and want to talk. So if anyone wants

644
00:35:04,880 --> 00:35:08,279
Speaker 1: to have a conversation with me over coffee and you're

645
00:35:08,280 --> 00:35:11,000
Speaker 1: in the Portland area, you can find me on Instagram

646
00:35:11,040 --> 00:35:17,600
Speaker 1: at Ellie beaten It E L L I E beaten It. Now.

647
00:35:17,680 --> 00:35:19,960
Speaker 1: The far right extremists are only a part of the

648
00:35:20,000 --> 00:35:23,680
Speaker 1: equation of political violence in our society. The other integers

649
00:35:23,680 --> 00:35:26,920
Speaker 1: are left wing activists, generally referred to as Antifa by

650
00:35:26,920 --> 00:35:30,040
Speaker 1: the media and of course the police. I'm aware of

651
00:35:30,040 --> 00:35:32,680
Speaker 1: how Antifa is presented by the far right media, but

652
00:35:32,680 --> 00:35:34,720
Speaker 1: I've actually spent a lot of time around these people

653
00:35:34,719 --> 00:35:36,520
Speaker 1: and seeing them in the streets of a few cities.

654
00:35:36,640 --> 00:35:39,480
Speaker 1: The important thing to remember about Antifa is that they

655
00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:42,200
Speaker 1: don't tend to rally on their own. ANTIPA is not

656
00:35:42,239 --> 00:35:45,360
Speaker 1: hosting these endless marches in Portland. They haven't held a

657
00:35:45,360 --> 00:35:48,200
Speaker 1: bunch of their own torchlet marches in Charlottesville. They are

658
00:35:48,280 --> 00:35:51,040
Speaker 1: a reactive group. They would characterize what they do as

659
00:35:51,080 --> 00:35:54,560
Speaker 1: community self defense. If there aren't Nazis marching in their streets,

660
00:35:54,880 --> 00:35:56,759
Speaker 1: most of them will stay at home and chill out.

661
00:35:57,560 --> 00:36:00,239
Speaker 1: That leaves us with the police right now least of

662
00:36:00,280 --> 00:36:03,360
Speaker 1: violence is a huge factor driving anger and instability in

663
00:36:03,360 --> 00:36:06,480
Speaker 1: the United States. The most violent protests we've seen in

664
00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:09,920
Speaker 1: living memory in Ferguson in Los Angeles have been driven

665
00:36:09,960 --> 00:36:13,319
Speaker 1: by incidents of police brutality. So it would stand to

666
00:36:13,400 --> 00:36:16,480
Speaker 1: reason that de radicalizing America's police could do a lot

667
00:36:16,520 --> 00:36:19,920
Speaker 1: to stop the gears of war from cranking forward. I'm

668
00:36:19,960 --> 00:36:22,120
Speaker 1: not a cop, but I sat down with a former

669
00:36:22,160 --> 00:36:25,040
Speaker 1: police officer named Alex who also happens to be a

670
00:36:25,040 --> 00:36:27,799
Speaker 1: fan of this show. He worked as a California cop

671
00:36:27,840 --> 00:36:30,200
Speaker 1: for fifteen years, and he came to the conclusion that

672
00:36:30,239 --> 00:36:33,600
Speaker 1: there were some serious, serious issues in law enforcement that

673
00:36:33,719 --> 00:36:36,719
Speaker 1: needed to be fixed. The biggest moment that inspired me

674
00:36:36,880 --> 00:36:41,640
Speaker 1: to kind of that changed my worldview was when my

675
00:36:41,800 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 1: older brother was arrested and booked into my jail actually

676
00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:52,680
Speaker 1: that I worked at, and he received a rather resounding

677
00:36:52,800 --> 00:36:57,879
Speaker 1: physical beating from law enforcement. Um at the time, he

678
00:36:58,040 --> 00:37:01,000
Speaker 1: was mentally ill. He was, I mean, he still is,

679
00:37:01,040 --> 00:37:03,880
Speaker 1: but he was mentally psychotic. He was having a psychotic episode,

680
00:37:04,920 --> 00:37:09,439
Speaker 1: and that was the incident. It was within my first

681
00:37:09,520 --> 00:37:12,560
Speaker 1: year of being hired of him just getting the kind

682
00:37:12,560 --> 00:37:15,320
Speaker 1: of dirt stomped out of him. And it never really

683
00:37:15,320 --> 00:37:19,759
Speaker 1: it didn't need to happen. Yeah, and it really humanized

684
00:37:21,120 --> 00:37:24,719
Speaker 1: everything for me really quickly. People with mental illnesses are

685
00:37:24,840 --> 00:37:27,880
Speaker 1: sixteen times more likely to be killed by law enforcement

686
00:37:27,920 --> 00:37:31,360
Speaker 1: than the general population. Alex came face to face with

687
00:37:31,440 --> 00:37:34,640
Speaker 1: evidence of this horrible reality and it radicalized him and

688
00:37:34,680 --> 00:37:37,560
Speaker 1: so he decided to change his department from the inside.

689
00:37:38,120 --> 00:37:42,320
Speaker 1: So a lot of people don't really understand what happens

690
00:37:42,320 --> 00:37:44,360
Speaker 1: with cops when you first become a cop, and I

691
00:37:44,400 --> 00:37:46,359
Speaker 1: think that's that's one of the issues is there needs

692
00:37:46,360 --> 00:37:49,720
Speaker 1: to be more transparency about the whole process of becoming

693
00:37:49,760 --> 00:37:53,600
Speaker 1: a cop. Um. You know, you go to an academy,

694
00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:56,120
Speaker 1: you get a certificate that says that you're you're a

695
00:37:56,120 --> 00:37:58,440
Speaker 1: baby cop. Now you're not a cop cop. You're a

696
00:37:58,440 --> 00:38:00,320
Speaker 1: baby cop. You have to go get a job first,

697
00:38:00,360 --> 00:38:04,480
Speaker 1: and then you have to pass a field training program,

698
00:38:04,520 --> 00:38:06,880
Speaker 1: and then you have to stay with that department for

699
00:38:06,920 --> 00:38:09,040
Speaker 1: a year, and then you finally get a post certificate

700
00:38:09,080 --> 00:38:13,680
Speaker 1: and then you're finally a cop. But what happens is

701
00:38:14,480 --> 00:38:17,239
Speaker 1: these guys go to these academies, they get taught the

702
00:38:17,360 --> 00:38:21,000
Speaker 1: right way, They get taught the at least in my

703
00:38:21,040 --> 00:38:24,880
Speaker 1: personal experience, they were taught the ideal way of dealing

704
00:38:24,880 --> 00:38:28,840
Speaker 1: with people, the ideal way of de escalation. This is

705
00:38:28,840 --> 00:38:31,719
Speaker 1: how you should be interacting with the public. This is

706
00:38:31,760 --> 00:38:35,640
Speaker 1: what you shouldn't be doing. Um and that's all hunky dorry,

707
00:38:35,640 --> 00:38:39,640
Speaker 1: it's it's all you know, hypothetical at school. And then

708
00:38:39,640 --> 00:38:42,640
Speaker 1: they get out into the real world and they get it.

709
00:38:42,640 --> 00:38:45,560
Speaker 1: They get they get a job finally somewhere, and then

710
00:38:45,600 --> 00:38:46,960
Speaker 1: they go into f t O and then they get

711
00:38:47,000 --> 00:38:50,440
Speaker 1: some guy that's their ft O officer sitting in the

712
00:38:50,520 --> 00:38:54,160
Speaker 1: cruiser with them. And one of the first things that

713
00:38:54,200 --> 00:38:55,799
Speaker 1: guy's gonna tell you is everything you learn in the

714
00:38:55,840 --> 00:38:58,560
Speaker 1: academy throw out the door. It's not gonna do any good.

715
00:38:59,719 --> 00:39:02,120
Speaker 1: It's uh, that's not how the real world works, is

716
00:39:02,120 --> 00:39:05,160
Speaker 1: what they'll tell you. And this guy holds your career

717
00:39:05,160 --> 00:39:09,279
Speaker 1: in his hands. He if he doesn't like you, he

718
00:39:09,320 --> 00:39:12,120
Speaker 1: can fail you. And technically that doesn't end your career,

719
00:39:12,920 --> 00:39:15,080
Speaker 1: but it doesn't mean you're not working at that department anymore,

720
00:39:15,400 --> 00:39:17,120
Speaker 1: and it does make it harder for you to get

721
00:39:17,200 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 1: hired at another department. So, if your heart is really

722
00:39:21,040 --> 00:39:25,200
Speaker 1: set on being a law enforcement officer and you know

723
00:39:25,280 --> 00:39:27,400
Speaker 1: the score and people have told you what this program

724
00:39:27,480 --> 00:39:29,479
Speaker 1: is like, the FTO program. It's the same ever where

725
00:39:29,480 --> 00:39:31,400
Speaker 1: you go. When this guy tells you, you're gonna do

726
00:39:31,480 --> 00:39:33,960
Speaker 1: what I tell you. If you want to pass, that's

727
00:39:33,960 --> 00:39:36,759
Speaker 1: what you're gonna do. You're gonna become the cop that

728
00:39:36,840 --> 00:39:40,120
Speaker 1: this guy wants you to be, and he wants you

729
00:39:40,160 --> 00:39:43,560
Speaker 1: to be a cop just like him. And it's this

730
00:39:43,719 --> 00:39:49,239
Speaker 1: perpetuation of you know, that idea of well, this is

731
00:39:49,280 --> 00:39:50,840
Speaker 1: how we did it back in my day, and my

732
00:39:50,960 --> 00:39:53,000
Speaker 1: day we had it hard. In my day, it was rough.

733
00:39:53,040 --> 00:39:55,920
Speaker 1: In my day, it was this and instead of looking

734
00:39:55,960 --> 00:39:58,200
Speaker 1: forward and being like, I want the next generation to

735
00:39:58,239 --> 00:40:02,719
Speaker 1: have better, instead they're like, no, you're gonna have just

736
00:40:02,880 --> 00:40:04,719
Speaker 1: what I had, and you're gonna have to go through

737
00:40:04,760 --> 00:40:07,120
Speaker 1: all the same crap that I went through, and I'm

738
00:40:07,120 --> 00:40:09,640
Speaker 1: gonna make sure that happens to you. What Alex is

739
00:40:09,640 --> 00:40:12,160
Speaker 1: saying is that the way this fundamental part of training,

740
00:40:12,200 --> 00:40:16,440
Speaker 1: this police apprenticeship program works, allows the biases, bigotry, and

741
00:40:16,480 --> 00:40:19,479
Speaker 1: bad behavior of one generation of cops to pass down

742
00:40:19,480 --> 00:40:22,239
Speaker 1: to the other forever endeavor. I can speak to a

743
00:40:22,239 --> 00:40:26,799
Speaker 1: friend of mine who went out to patrol. He had

744
00:40:26,800 --> 00:40:30,480
Speaker 1: been working in the jails with us for years, and

745
00:40:30,560 --> 00:40:32,120
Speaker 1: he was a good cop. He knew his stuff, he

746
00:40:32,200 --> 00:40:36,000
Speaker 1: knew his penal codes. Uh. He was firm but fair

747
00:40:36,440 --> 00:40:39,600
Speaker 1: with with our inmates and you know, enforcing rules, regulations.

748
00:40:40,440 --> 00:40:42,280
Speaker 1: And I think he was out on the FTO program

749
00:40:42,320 --> 00:40:44,000
Speaker 1: for two weeks when they sent him back to the jails,

750
00:40:44,320 --> 00:40:47,879
Speaker 1: and the rumor mill starts running. You know, everyone's like, oh, man,

751
00:40:47,920 --> 00:40:50,200
Speaker 1: so you heard so and so failed. What happened? What happened?

752
00:40:50,239 --> 00:40:54,040
Speaker 1: What happened? And the only thing we could kind of

753
00:40:54,080 --> 00:40:56,439
Speaker 1: glean and the only thing he would tell us because

754
00:40:56,480 --> 00:40:58,399
Speaker 1: he didn't want to be want I mean, he didn't

755
00:40:58,400 --> 00:41:03,840
Speaker 1: want to be a snitch, right, um is his fdo

756
00:41:04,440 --> 00:41:08,400
Speaker 1: didn't like how handed off he was during an arrest.

757
00:41:09,760 --> 00:41:13,080
Speaker 1: And when he told his training officer, you know, you

758
00:41:13,120 --> 00:41:15,840
Speaker 1: don't we don't have to do these things this way anymore,

759
00:41:16,520 --> 00:41:18,759
Speaker 1: he said the training officer. He didn't say anything out loud,

760
00:41:18,760 --> 00:41:23,400
Speaker 1: but he gave him this long, thousand miles stare. I

761
00:41:23,440 --> 00:41:24,759
Speaker 1: just told him, I don't, I don't think this is

762
00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:28,399
Speaker 1: gonna work out for you. And then the very next

763
00:41:28,480 --> 00:41:30,480
Speaker 1: day he was done. He was back in the jails.

764
00:41:30,960 --> 00:41:34,239
Speaker 1: Changing this FTO program would be a significant alteration of

765
00:41:34,280 --> 00:41:36,920
Speaker 1: the way many police departments work. It's the kind of

766
00:41:36,960 --> 00:41:39,040
Speaker 1: thing that would have to be approached piecemeal in a

767
00:41:39,160 --> 00:41:42,560
Speaker 1: department by department basis via the work of concerned citizens

768
00:41:42,600 --> 00:41:45,719
Speaker 1: getting involved in their local communities. But it's also the

769
00:41:45,760 --> 00:41:48,320
Speaker 1: sort of thing that individual officers could work to change

770
00:41:48,320 --> 00:41:50,880
Speaker 1: from the inside. I know we do have some cops

771
00:41:50,960 --> 00:41:53,680
Speaker 1: listening to this show, which honestly surprised me at first

772
00:41:53,719 --> 00:41:56,160
Speaker 1: when y'all started reaching out to me. In case you're

773
00:41:56,200 --> 00:41:59,239
Speaker 1: still listening, here's Alex's explanation for how he tried to

774
00:41:59,320 --> 00:42:02,320
Speaker 1: change things in his department from the inside. So what

775
00:42:02,440 --> 00:42:05,040
Speaker 1: I did back in my department that I worked at,

776
00:42:05,160 --> 00:42:10,240
Speaker 1: I weaseled my way into becoming the FTO supervisor. And

777
00:42:12,200 --> 00:42:15,200
Speaker 1: what I did was I started making as many people

778
00:42:15,640 --> 00:42:17,640
Speaker 1: f t O s as I could because what I

779
00:42:17,680 --> 00:42:22,640
Speaker 1: found was nobody wanted the job. Um because it did

780
00:42:22,719 --> 00:42:24,600
Speaker 1: it had a pay boost on it. They would pay

781
00:42:24,640 --> 00:42:29,120
Speaker 1: you like a three increase in pay during the hours

782
00:42:29,120 --> 00:42:33,520
Speaker 1: in which you were actually training somebody. Um, But nobody

783
00:42:33,520 --> 00:42:35,880
Speaker 1: wanted to do it because there was a ton of paperwork,

784
00:42:36,560 --> 00:42:38,600
Speaker 1: just tons and tons of paperwork you had to do

785
00:42:38,920 --> 00:42:41,760
Speaker 1: on top of all the other paperwork you do. And cops,

786
00:42:42,360 --> 00:42:44,640
Speaker 1: I mean, we're bureaucrats. With guns on our hips. I mean,

787
00:42:44,680 --> 00:42:50,160
Speaker 1: our lives are paperwork, it really is. And so what

788
00:42:50,239 --> 00:42:52,440
Speaker 1: I did I started making as many people f t

789
00:42:52,520 --> 00:42:56,680
Speaker 1: os as I could, um to spread out the responsibility.

790
00:42:56,760 --> 00:42:58,320
Speaker 1: Because what I found with a lot of these guys

791
00:42:58,320 --> 00:43:00,319
Speaker 1: that were having that that you're going to go through

792
00:43:00,320 --> 00:43:02,360
Speaker 1: what I went through attitude and you know back in

793
00:43:02,440 --> 00:43:05,680
Speaker 1: my day, attitude was they were they were kind of

794
00:43:05,680 --> 00:43:09,399
Speaker 1: just generally burnt out on the job in general. Um.

795
00:43:09,440 --> 00:43:10,960
Speaker 1: And so we were taking a guy who was in

796
00:43:11,040 --> 00:43:14,360
Speaker 1: like the last ten years of his career and having

797
00:43:14,480 --> 00:43:18,440
Speaker 1: him mold the future minds at the department. And in

798
00:43:18,600 --> 00:43:22,600
Speaker 1: my my opinion was we take younger guys who have shown,

799
00:43:23,320 --> 00:43:25,440
Speaker 1: you know, good skills and leadership and then have a

800
00:43:25,480 --> 00:43:28,400
Speaker 1: clean record, and we make these guys as many of

801
00:43:28,440 --> 00:43:32,080
Speaker 1: them as we can trainers so that maybe a training

802
00:43:32,120 --> 00:43:35,520
Speaker 1: officer would train one to two new hires a year,

803
00:43:36,239 --> 00:43:38,799
Speaker 1: whereas a lot of them are training somewhere between ten

804
00:43:38,800 --> 00:43:42,120
Speaker 1: and twenty and it's all they do. They don't they're

805
00:43:42,120 --> 00:43:45,080
Speaker 1: not even cops anymore. They're not really doing what they

806
00:43:45,239 --> 00:43:49,440
Speaker 1: wanted to do with their career. They became glorified examiner

807
00:43:49,480 --> 00:43:54,120
Speaker 1: proctors because these guys they don't even teach these new cadets.

808
00:43:54,200 --> 00:43:57,239
Speaker 1: They're just evaluating them. And it's like, you know, we're

809
00:43:57,239 --> 00:43:59,239
Speaker 1: gonna go to this call rookie and you're gonna do this.

810
00:43:59,360 --> 00:44:00,640
Speaker 1: And then when he met says it up, he just

811
00:44:00,680 --> 00:44:02,520
Speaker 1: tells him, hey, you screwed that up, don't do it again.

812
00:44:03,040 --> 00:44:04,640
Speaker 1: But they don't actually sit down and go, Okay, here's

813
00:44:04,640 --> 00:44:08,640
Speaker 1: what you did wrong. Let me help you out, because

814
00:44:08,800 --> 00:44:11,680
Speaker 1: like I said, they're they're they're burned out, they're done.

815
00:44:12,800 --> 00:44:16,920
Speaker 1: So what I noticed in my department when I started

816
00:44:17,000 --> 00:44:21,719
Speaker 1: spreading the responsibility out to everybody was part of the

817
00:44:21,800 --> 00:44:26,040
Speaker 1: culture of trainee and rookie or you know, the the

818
00:44:26,080 --> 00:44:30,840
Speaker 1: green guy um that started to fade away because so

819
00:44:30,920 --> 00:44:35,400
Speaker 1: many people were trainers that they started to rely on

820
00:44:35,480 --> 00:44:38,680
Speaker 1: each other for help with training. Because it seemed like

821
00:44:40,080 --> 00:44:43,120
Speaker 1: I had created a sense of community and buy in

822
00:44:44,080 --> 00:44:47,480
Speaker 1: with the other training officers who were instead of like, oh,

823
00:44:47,520 --> 00:44:49,840
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's deputy selling, so it's problem, not

824
00:44:49,920 --> 00:44:53,279
Speaker 1: my problem. Now, these guys are like, I've been there.

825
00:44:53,320 --> 00:44:55,120
Speaker 1: I remember what it's like to have a busy day.

826
00:44:55,440 --> 00:44:57,399
Speaker 1: Maybe I'll go help that guy out, take some load

827
00:44:57,440 --> 00:45:01,680
Speaker 1: off him so he can get his paperwork first trainee. Now,

828
00:45:02,080 --> 00:45:04,240
Speaker 1: most of what I've talked about up to this point

829
00:45:04,239 --> 00:45:07,400
Speaker 1: have been preventative measures, ways to lower the temperature and

830
00:45:07,480 --> 00:45:10,920
Speaker 1: potentially help unfunded this country. But in the year of

831
00:45:10,920 --> 00:45:14,560
Speaker 1: Our Lord two thousand nineteen, very few of us are optimists.

832
00:45:14,800 --> 00:45:17,400
Speaker 1: Even if the Second American Civil War does not happen,

833
00:45:17,520 --> 00:45:21,879
Speaker 1: our situation is likely to get worse before it gets better. Now,

834
00:45:21,960 --> 00:45:24,239
Speaker 1: a lot of people have asked me some variation of

835
00:45:24,239 --> 00:45:26,880
Speaker 1: the question what can I do to prepare for this?

836
00:45:27,920 --> 00:45:30,359
Speaker 1: And the answer to that question breaks down into two

837
00:45:30,400 --> 00:45:33,760
Speaker 1: separate categories, things you can spend money on to prepare

838
00:45:33,960 --> 00:45:37,279
Speaker 1: and things you can't. The money stuff is easy. First off,

839
00:45:37,320 --> 00:45:39,680
Speaker 1: get a one month stockpile of dried food for you

840
00:45:39,719 --> 00:45:42,960
Speaker 1: and your family. Wise Food sells one month one person

841
00:45:43,000 --> 00:45:46,279
Speaker 1: buckets for around seventy dollars. Amazon has a pretty wide

842
00:45:46,360 --> 00:45:49,480
Speaker 1: variety of survival rations. Survival tabs are about twenty two

843
00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:51,719
Speaker 1: dollars for eight days. If you want to eat a

844
00:45:51,719 --> 00:45:54,799
Speaker 1: little bit fancier, one month supply MRI e crates are

845
00:45:54,800 --> 00:45:57,719
Speaker 1: a hundred and forty dollars or so. Mountain House has

846
00:45:57,760 --> 00:46:00,200
Speaker 1: a one month bucket that's eighty six dollars, and in

847
00:46:00,320 --> 00:46:03,160
Speaker 1: my opinion there stuff does taste the best. I want

848
00:46:03,160 --> 00:46:05,080
Speaker 1: to make it clear that I don't receive money from

849
00:46:05,080 --> 00:46:07,239
Speaker 1: any of these companies. I just think buying at least

850
00:46:07,320 --> 00:46:10,200
Speaker 1: a month of emergency food is a sane thing for

851
00:46:10,239 --> 00:46:13,480
Speaker 1: anyone to do. Even if there's no civil war close

852
00:46:13,520 --> 00:46:16,359
Speaker 1: to the people listening to this will be hit by

853
00:46:16,400 --> 00:46:19,520
Speaker 1: a natural disaster at some point in their lives. It's

854
00:46:19,640 --> 00:46:22,920
Speaker 1: just sensible to have extra food on hand. But if

855
00:46:22,920 --> 00:46:25,080
Speaker 1: you want to be extra prepared, expand to a three

856
00:46:25,120 --> 00:46:28,200
Speaker 1: month supply. You should also get some water. You can

857
00:46:28,200 --> 00:46:30,879
Speaker 1: buy a couple of fifteen gallon containers for pretty cheap,

858
00:46:30,960 --> 00:46:32,480
Speaker 1: fill them up and just keep them in the back

859
00:46:32,520 --> 00:46:35,200
Speaker 1: of a closet or in your garage just in case.

860
00:46:36,080 --> 00:46:39,440
Speaker 1: You should also consider investing in water purification tablets or

861
00:46:39,440 --> 00:46:42,680
Speaker 1: a survival straw. If you rely on a medication and

862
00:46:42,760 --> 00:46:44,879
Speaker 1: can't afford to do so, try to get a three

863
00:46:44,880 --> 00:46:47,960
Speaker 1: month supply of whatever you need. Sometimes telling your doctor

864
00:46:47,960 --> 00:46:50,359
Speaker 1: you're going overseas for an extended period of time can

865
00:46:50,400 --> 00:46:53,200
Speaker 1: work to allow you to do this. Now, many people

866
00:46:53,200 --> 00:46:55,120
Speaker 1: have asked me about whether or not they should buy

867
00:46:55,120 --> 00:46:57,640
Speaker 1: a gun, and we'll talk more about that later, but

868
00:46:57,680 --> 00:47:01,280
Speaker 1: it's important to note that owning firearms has downsides, keeping

869
00:47:01,280 --> 00:47:04,719
Speaker 1: a sensible stockpile of dried food, water, and medication has

870
00:47:04,880 --> 00:47:08,160
Speaker 1: zero downsides other than the upfront cost. These are the

871
00:47:08,239 --> 00:47:12,040
Speaker 1: kind of things that everybody should do. But stockpiling can

872
00:47:12,080 --> 00:47:15,319
Speaker 1: only take you so far. What should you actually do

873
00:47:15,640 --> 00:47:18,800
Speaker 1: if order breaks down, the police retreat, and your community

874
00:47:18,880 --> 00:47:21,880
Speaker 1: is left to fend for itself. I've never been in

875
00:47:21,880 --> 00:47:37,560
Speaker 1: that situation, but Scott crow has. In the How to

876
00:47:37,680 --> 00:47:40,279
Speaker 1: Save America episode of this series, I talked a bit

877
00:47:40,320 --> 00:47:43,920
Speaker 1: about mutual Aid disaster relief. An organization I advised people

878
00:47:43,920 --> 00:47:46,799
Speaker 1: to join and support. That group evolved in of something

879
00:47:46,880 --> 00:47:49,960
Speaker 1: called the common Ground Clinic, which arose in New Orleans

880
00:47:50,000 --> 00:47:53,040
Speaker 1: in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Common Ground is a

881
00:47:53,080 --> 00:47:55,160
Speaker 1: perfect example of the sort of thing you'd want to

882
00:47:55,200 --> 00:47:57,239
Speaker 1: build in the wake of a state pull out from

883
00:47:57,280 --> 00:48:01,240
Speaker 1: your community. It started as a handful of street medics

884
00:48:01,280 --> 00:48:05,000
Speaker 1: providing emergency medical care in the Algiers neighborhood of New Orleans.

885
00:48:05,280 --> 00:48:07,600
Speaker 1: It evolved into a network of clinics and a free

886
00:48:07,600 --> 00:48:11,120
Speaker 1: public hospital which provided care to more than sixty people

887
00:48:11,200 --> 00:48:15,320
Speaker 1: and took in more than twenty volunteers. Common Ground offered

888
00:48:15,360 --> 00:48:18,800
Speaker 1: everything from AIDS testing and psychiatric aid, to roof tarping

889
00:48:18,840 --> 00:48:22,279
Speaker 1: and neighborhood computer centers. Common Ground established more than a

890
00:48:22,320 --> 00:48:26,439
Speaker 1: hundred neighborhood gardens to help feed people. Their motto, solidarity

891
00:48:26,560 --> 00:48:30,120
Speaker 1: not charity, is the same motto mutual aid disaster relief

892
00:48:30,200 --> 00:48:34,719
Speaker 1: has today now. Common Ground was not a top down structure.

893
00:48:34,840 --> 00:48:37,759
Speaker 1: They didn't ride into impoverished areas and replace FEMA in

894
00:48:37,800 --> 00:48:41,480
Speaker 1: the federal government with another system of control. Instead, they

895
00:48:41,480 --> 00:48:44,719
Speaker 1: helped members of those communities organized to secure and see

896
00:48:44,760 --> 00:48:47,600
Speaker 1: to their own needs. Scott Crowe was one of the

897
00:48:47,600 --> 00:48:51,160
Speaker 1: people who helped organize and execute this massive effort. But

898
00:48:51,320 --> 00:48:54,000
Speaker 1: when I saw the devastation there, I you know, I

899
00:48:54,080 --> 00:48:56,080
Speaker 1: was there like two days after the storm. So what

900
00:48:56,160 --> 00:49:01,040
Speaker 1: I saw was actually the inefficiency of capitalism if you

901
00:49:01,040 --> 00:49:03,760
Speaker 1: want to use those terms, or governments in general. Um.

902
00:49:03,800 --> 00:49:06,240
Speaker 1: But I also saw the inefficiency of not just governments,

903
00:49:06,320 --> 00:49:10,120
Speaker 1: but also corporations to do anything about this. The two

904
00:49:10,160 --> 00:49:14,080
Speaker 1: dominant things in the structures in our lives, uh and

905
00:49:14,120 --> 00:49:17,040
Speaker 1: are that that kind of our permeate every every part

906
00:49:17,040 --> 00:49:20,640
Speaker 1: of civil society had they just felt they just totally

907
00:49:20,680 --> 00:49:22,880
Speaker 1: collapsed and so there was nothing to do, and so

908
00:49:22,960 --> 00:49:25,279
Speaker 1: people were really left to their own devices and what

909
00:49:25,320 --> 00:49:27,600
Speaker 1: they wanted to do. And so from that I started

910
00:49:27,600 --> 00:49:30,120
Speaker 1: to Germany on these ideas very quickly because it needed

911
00:49:30,160 --> 00:49:32,400
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, you know, we started we could do

912
00:49:32,440 --> 00:49:34,719
Speaker 1: a first date station because we could get some anarchists

913
00:49:34,719 --> 00:49:36,080
Speaker 1: to come here and do a first day station. But

914
00:49:36,120 --> 00:49:38,680
Speaker 1: what if a first date station became a clinic? What

915
00:49:38,760 --> 00:49:41,719
Speaker 1: if a clinic became a hospital, you know? And then

916
00:49:41,960 --> 00:49:43,320
Speaker 1: and then I sort of think, well, why don't we

917
00:49:43,360 --> 00:49:45,400
Speaker 1: feed people so we could get food up bombs to

918
00:49:45,440 --> 00:49:48,959
Speaker 1: come down, uh, and and and and begin to feed people.

919
00:49:48,960 --> 00:49:51,680
Speaker 1: And then what if we began to build cooperative restaurants

920
00:49:51,840 --> 00:49:55,600
Speaker 1: or we began to build uh anyway, just larger infrastructure.

921
00:49:55,600 --> 00:49:57,479
Speaker 1: I just kept thinking about it over and over again

922
00:49:57,480 --> 00:50:00,160
Speaker 1: in these larger ways. And so what we did we

923
00:50:00,200 --> 00:50:02,560
Speaker 1: started to call for volunteers and networks that we had

924
00:50:02,560 --> 00:50:06,759
Speaker 1: already built um to begin this project which we hadn't

925
00:50:06,800 --> 00:50:09,040
Speaker 1: even named yet. And it was three people that kind

926
00:50:09,040 --> 00:50:11,719
Speaker 1: of started it. It was myself, uh, this man named

927
00:50:11,760 --> 00:50:13,919
Speaker 1: Malik Raheem, who was a former member of the Black

928
00:50:13,920 --> 00:50:16,920
Speaker 1: Panther Party in New Orleans had been in shootouts with

929
00:50:16,960 --> 00:50:20,040
Speaker 1: the police and stuff. And then this woman named Sharon Johnson,

930
00:50:20,080 --> 00:50:23,239
Speaker 1: who who was a resident of Algiers and um and

931
00:50:23,400 --> 00:50:25,440
Speaker 1: just decided to take it on. She'd been working at

932
00:50:25,440 --> 00:50:27,920
Speaker 1: a bank before that, and so the three of us

933
00:50:28,239 --> 00:50:32,240
Speaker 1: began to lay the foundations of not just uh trying

934
00:50:32,280 --> 00:50:35,800
Speaker 1: to provide charity or support for people in that way

935
00:50:35,800 --> 00:50:38,320
Speaker 1: that everybody does, because everybody could see that there was

936
00:50:38,320 --> 00:50:40,400
Speaker 1: a disaster, but we wanted to use it as a

937
00:50:40,440 --> 00:50:44,760
Speaker 1: pivoting point to begin to rebuild neighborhoods blocked by blocked

938
00:50:44,840 --> 00:50:48,080
Speaker 1: neighborhood by neighborhood, not in our image, but in the

939
00:50:48,120 --> 00:50:51,240
Speaker 1: image of what the people wanted for themselves, so every

940
00:50:51,239 --> 00:50:54,719
Speaker 1: community wouldn't need the same thing. And so I took

941
00:50:54,719 --> 00:50:57,760
Speaker 1: from the Zapatistas to lead by by obeying the idea

942
00:50:57,880 --> 00:51:00,520
Speaker 1: and the concept that you know, if you're gonna lead people,

943
00:51:00,600 --> 00:51:02,520
Speaker 1: you have to ask them what they want, and then

944
00:51:02,560 --> 00:51:04,880
Speaker 1: you just have to direct them and facilitate it. And

945
00:51:04,920 --> 00:51:06,840
Speaker 1: so that's what we did. We begin to have conversations

946
00:51:06,840 --> 00:51:10,000
Speaker 1: with people while we're building stuff. But remember the thing

947
00:51:10,040 --> 00:51:13,320
Speaker 1: that made Common Ground Collective different than any other organization

948
00:51:13,480 --> 00:51:15,920
Speaker 1: as well. We were willing to go against the state

949
00:51:16,400 --> 00:51:19,400
Speaker 1: and the police and and all the forms of governmental

950
00:51:19,520 --> 00:51:22,720
Speaker 1: entities when they were when they were doing things or wrong.

951
00:51:23,000 --> 00:51:25,759
Speaker 1: We stopped them from killing people in the streets. You know,

952
00:51:25,840 --> 00:51:28,000
Speaker 1: I took up arms against the police. I took up

953
00:51:28,080 --> 00:51:32,200
Speaker 1: arms against um, against white militia guys who were actually

954
00:51:32,280 --> 00:51:35,680
Speaker 1: killing people in the streets, to stop them from killing

955
00:51:35,680 --> 00:51:38,279
Speaker 1: more people. Now, I'm gonna stop Scott right there for

956
00:51:38,320 --> 00:51:40,120
Speaker 1: a moment, because he's just moved on to a topic

957
00:51:40,160 --> 00:51:42,520
Speaker 1: that I don't think most people know much about. In

958
00:51:42,520 --> 00:51:44,920
Speaker 1: the wake of Hurricane Katrina, a lot of news coverage

959
00:51:44,960 --> 00:51:48,279
Speaker 1: focused on the supposed chaos, largely blamed on violent gang

960
00:51:48,320 --> 00:51:51,080
Speaker 1: members and looters. In our episode on the Upsides of

961
00:51:51,080 --> 00:51:54,160
Speaker 1: the Second American Civil War, I dispelled those rumors. National

962
00:51:54,160 --> 00:51:56,480
Speaker 1: Guard officers have come out on the record saying gang

963
00:51:56,520 --> 00:51:59,320
Speaker 1: members were actually some of the most active volunteers in

964
00:51:59,360 --> 00:52:03,719
Speaker 1: their relief. Words, but there was insane vigilante violence in

965
00:52:03,760 --> 00:52:07,960
Speaker 1: the aftermath of Katrina. White supremacist militiamen who refused to

966
00:52:07,960 --> 00:52:11,120
Speaker 1: evacuate spent days hunting down any black people who had

967
00:52:11,160 --> 00:52:14,000
Speaker 1: the temerity to exist near them. You don't have to

968
00:52:14,040 --> 00:52:17,400
Speaker 1: take Scott's word for this or mine. Here's several militiamen

969
00:52:17,400 --> 00:52:20,360
Speaker 1: and women bragging about what they did after Hurricane Katrina.

970
00:52:20,960 --> 00:52:23,520
Speaker 1: It was great. It was great. It was like pheasant

971
00:52:23,600 --> 00:52:28,080
Speaker 1: season in South Dakota. If it moves shot, that's out

972
00:52:28,080 --> 00:52:30,400
Speaker 1: a pheasant. We're not in South Dakota. What's wrong with

973
00:52:30,520 --> 00:52:35,080
Speaker 1: this picture? Who walked the street with it side on? Yeah?

974
00:52:35,239 --> 00:52:39,040
Speaker 1: You had no choice. It was that bad, she said,

975
00:52:39,480 --> 00:52:41,359
Speaker 1: said just put him on a silad because they knew

976
00:52:41,360 --> 00:52:43,920
Speaker 1: what they were doing wrong. You know, I said, just

977
00:52:44,000 --> 00:52:45,600
Speaker 1: put him to the side. That's all we could do.

978
00:52:46,360 --> 00:52:49,839
Speaker 1: I am no longer a Yankee. Yeah, I earned my

979
00:52:50,160 --> 00:52:53,560
Speaker 1: understands the N word now, I learned my wing. These

980
00:52:53,600 --> 00:52:56,680
Speaker 1: interviews were shot during a barbecue and everyone involved was drinking.

981
00:52:56,800 --> 00:52:59,040
Speaker 1: You can hear how they briefly attempt to blame their

982
00:52:59,080 --> 00:53:01,760
Speaker 1: victims by painting them as looters. I think their comments

983
00:53:01,800 --> 00:53:04,279
Speaker 1: about learning the meaning of the inward put the lie

984
00:53:04,360 --> 00:53:07,680
Speaker 1: to that. There is an extraordinary amount of video evidence

985
00:53:07,719 --> 00:53:11,000
Speaker 1: and interviews that attest to the exterminationist crimes of white

986
00:53:11,000 --> 00:53:14,839
Speaker 1: supremacist militias during this period. I'd like to quote next

987
00:53:14,920 --> 00:53:18,640
Speaker 1: from a book called A Paradise Built in a Hell. Quote.

988
00:53:19,480 --> 00:53:21,759
Speaker 1: The vigilantes had gotten the keys of some of their

989
00:53:21,840 --> 00:53:25,239
Speaker 1: neighbors who'd evacuated, set up barricades, even felling trees to

990
00:53:25,280 --> 00:53:28,480
Speaker 1: slow people's movement through the area, accumulated an arsenal and

991
00:53:28,560 --> 00:53:31,560
Speaker 1: gone on patrol. Unfortunately, there were also between the rest

992
00:53:31,600 --> 00:53:34,000
Speaker 1: of New Orleans Parish and the Faery terminal from which

993
00:53:34,000 --> 00:53:37,040
Speaker 1: people were being evacuated. A lot of people had good reason,

994
00:53:37,080 --> 00:53:39,360
Speaker 1: as well as every right, to walk through those streets.

995
00:53:39,640 --> 00:53:41,839
Speaker 1: At one point, they even demanded a black man leave

996
00:53:41,880 --> 00:53:44,160
Speaker 1: the neighborhood, even though he lived a few blocks from

997
00:53:44,160 --> 00:53:47,560
Speaker 1: where his neighbors threatened him. Suddenly, in that mixed neighborhood,

998
00:53:47,600 --> 00:53:51,200
Speaker 1: blacks were intruders. The vigilantes were convinced that their picturesque

999
00:53:51,200 --> 00:53:53,000
Speaker 1: neighborhood on the other side of the river would be

1000
00:53:53,040 --> 00:53:55,680
Speaker 1: overrun by looters, but they did not report the loss

1001
00:53:55,680 --> 00:53:57,759
Speaker 1: of even a garden hose or flower pot from a

1002
00:53:57,840 --> 00:54:01,640
Speaker 1: single front yard. There's a good article in the Nation

1003
00:54:01,680 --> 00:54:05,040
Speaker 1: about this, called Katrina's Hidden Race War. It notes that

1004
00:54:05,160 --> 00:54:08,319
Speaker 1: right wing news website Cox News called these murderers the

1005
00:54:08,440 --> 00:54:12,960
Speaker 1: ultimate neighborhood watch, and while police claims about gang snipers

1006
00:54:12,960 --> 00:54:16,320
Speaker 1: shooting at them have been largely debunked, substantial evidence exists

1007
00:54:16,320 --> 00:54:19,680
Speaker 1: to back up Scott's claims of police brutality against black residents.

1008
00:54:20,000 --> 00:54:23,040
Speaker 1: I recommend the pro public article Body of Evidence if

1009
00:54:23,040 --> 00:54:26,120
Speaker 1: you want to read more about that. What struck me

1010
00:54:26,200 --> 00:54:29,160
Speaker 1: as I researched all of this was the similarity between

1011
00:54:29,200 --> 00:54:32,279
Speaker 1: what these white militias did in Katrina and what neo

1012
00:54:32,400 --> 00:54:35,920
Speaker 1: Nazi organizer Lewis Beam planned back in the nineteen eighties

1013
00:54:36,239 --> 00:54:39,200
Speaker 1: when he attempted to organize an underground Neo Nazi army

1014
00:54:39,239 --> 00:54:42,240
Speaker 1: for the race war he believed was imminent. I quoted

1015
00:54:42,280 --> 00:54:44,759
Speaker 1: Beam in an earlier episode, and I'd like to quote

1016
00:54:44,800 --> 00:54:48,200
Speaker 1: him again here. Quote We'll set up our own state

1017
00:54:48,239 --> 00:54:50,480
Speaker 1: here and announce that all non whites have twenty four

1018
00:54:50,520 --> 00:54:52,640
Speaker 1: hours to leave. Lots of them won't believe it or

1019
00:54:52,680 --> 00:54:54,640
Speaker 1: won't believe us when they say we'll get rid of them,

1020
00:54:54,640 --> 00:54:56,600
Speaker 1: so we'll have to exterminate a lot of them the

1021
00:54:56,680 --> 00:55:00,719
Speaker 1: first time around. This brings me to the subject of

1022
00:55:00,920 --> 00:55:04,120
Speaker 1: armed self defense and whether or not you should consider

1023
00:55:04,160 --> 00:55:07,279
Speaker 1: purchasing a firearm. I can't make that decision for any

1024
00:55:07,280 --> 00:55:09,640
Speaker 1: of you. I can't answer that question for any of you,

1025
00:55:10,000 --> 00:55:12,040
Speaker 1: and I'm not an n R. A loving evangelist of

1026
00:55:12,120 --> 00:55:15,839
Speaker 1: firearms is magical talismans against danger. Having a gun does

1027
00:55:15,880 --> 00:55:19,280
Speaker 1: not guarantee anything, but it does provide you with options

1028
00:55:19,320 --> 00:55:22,720
Speaker 1: that people without firearms do not have. And because Scott

1029
00:55:22,760 --> 00:55:25,560
Speaker 1: and his fellow activists at Common Ground had guns with

1030
00:55:25,640 --> 00:55:28,080
Speaker 1: them in the wake of Katrina, they had the option

1031
00:55:28,160 --> 00:55:32,680
Speaker 1: of defending their community against rampaging racist militiamen. So, again

1032
00:55:32,719 --> 00:55:36,440
Speaker 1: taking a page from anarchists books and also from the

1033
00:55:36,520 --> 00:55:40,160
Speaker 1: zapatistas um, what we did was we wanted to create

1034
00:55:40,520 --> 00:55:43,600
Speaker 1: an area within a few square blocks that was that

1035
00:55:43,680 --> 00:55:46,319
Speaker 1: was under our control, mostly not and I say our

1036
00:55:46,360 --> 00:55:49,120
Speaker 1: control that means community control, not the not the people

1037
00:55:49,160 --> 00:55:52,239
Speaker 1: in Common Ground, but the people in the neighborhood. And

1038
00:55:52,280 --> 00:55:55,040
Speaker 1: so that gave us safety to be able to build

1039
00:55:55,440 --> 00:55:58,319
Speaker 1: the clinic, to build the food distribution in the and

1040
00:55:58,360 --> 00:56:01,120
Speaker 1: the hygiene distribution, to begin to build the programs, to

1041
00:56:01,400 --> 00:56:04,279
Speaker 1: begin to do the health, to do the the free

1042
00:56:04,280 --> 00:56:07,200
Speaker 1: schools and things like that. But the the armed defense

1043
00:56:07,600 --> 00:56:10,480
Speaker 1: was in a major component at the beginning because the

1044
00:56:10,600 --> 00:56:13,160
Speaker 1: police were out of control and they turned a blind

1045
00:56:13,200 --> 00:56:16,800
Speaker 1: eye to white militias and algiers and in the um

1046
00:56:16,840 --> 00:56:20,360
Speaker 1: in the French Quarter who were killing black men, largely

1047
00:56:20,680 --> 00:56:23,680
Speaker 1: unarmed black men, and and um. And the thing is

1048
00:56:23,719 --> 00:56:25,520
Speaker 1: it wasn't a lot of them. It didn't take a lot,

1049
00:56:25,600 --> 00:56:27,359
Speaker 1: but what they did was they shot at a lot

1050
00:56:27,400 --> 00:56:30,520
Speaker 1: of them. And so two white guys from Texas, myself

1051
00:56:30,520 --> 00:56:34,160
Speaker 1: and another guy, we joined with three guys in the neighborhood.

1052
00:56:34,400 --> 00:56:35,960
Speaker 1: This is in the early days, this is when we

1053
00:56:36,000 --> 00:56:38,279
Speaker 1: first came to do the search and rescue, and that

1054
00:56:38,440 --> 00:56:40,360
Speaker 1: was one of the things that people needed. We said,

1055
00:56:40,520 --> 00:56:42,920
Speaker 1: they said, we need people to stop, we need to

1056
00:56:43,040 --> 00:56:46,600
Speaker 1: we need we need to form community community patrols to

1057
00:56:46,680 --> 00:56:48,799
Speaker 1: stop these white militia guys from killing people because they

1058
00:56:48,800 --> 00:56:51,400
Speaker 1: were driving around like the clan in the backup trucks,

1059
00:56:51,520 --> 00:56:55,000
Speaker 1: drunk with totally armed shooting people. I mean, it looked

1060
00:56:55,000 --> 00:56:58,080
Speaker 1: like something out of Somalia or something, except it was

1061
00:56:58,239 --> 00:57:02,040
Speaker 1: totally white dudes, you know, and they weren't sensitive and

1062
00:57:02,080 --> 00:57:04,080
Speaker 1: they were just they were just drunk rednecks is what

1063
00:57:04,120 --> 00:57:06,839
Speaker 1: they were. And so uh, you know, and I'm gonna

1064
00:57:06,840 --> 00:57:09,400
Speaker 1: redneck myself, so I could see myself and them, but

1065
00:57:09,440 --> 00:57:11,520
Speaker 1: that's you know that we had to stop them. So

1066
00:57:11,600 --> 00:57:13,600
Speaker 1: we ended up in an arms standoff with them that

1067
00:57:14,000 --> 00:57:18,160
Speaker 1: really literally lasted for minutes, but it changed the shape

1068
00:57:18,160 --> 00:57:21,800
Speaker 1: of power and that that block of neighborhoods just us

1069
00:57:21,960 --> 00:57:25,080
Speaker 1: doing that because they stopped patrolling as often as they did.

1070
00:57:25,400 --> 00:57:27,920
Speaker 1: Now the police still turned a blind eye to it.

1071
00:57:28,280 --> 00:57:30,600
Speaker 1: But the police were also killing people. And when I

1072
00:57:30,600 --> 00:57:32,439
Speaker 1: say the police, I'm not talking about just random police.

1073
00:57:32,440 --> 00:57:35,800
Speaker 1: I'm talking about New Orleans Police Department. We're actually randomly

1074
00:57:35,840 --> 00:57:38,479
Speaker 1: killing people. And many of the officers were indicted later

1075
00:57:38,640 --> 00:57:42,680
Speaker 1: for many atrocities of crimes, and then they walked away

1076
00:57:42,720 --> 00:57:46,440
Speaker 1: with many other ones. And so the arms self defense

1077
00:57:46,640 --> 00:57:50,200
Speaker 1: component was only a piece to hold a space while

1078
00:57:50,240 --> 00:57:53,160
Speaker 1: we began to create this other stuff. And again taking

1079
00:57:53,160 --> 00:57:55,600
Speaker 1: a page out of the Zapatista playbook, what they did

1080
00:57:55,640 --> 00:57:58,840
Speaker 1: was they rose up in n with arms, and then

1081
00:57:58,880 --> 00:58:01,400
Speaker 1: they said, we will put our arms away when we

1082
00:58:01,480 --> 00:58:03,960
Speaker 1: have enough safety and security from those around us in

1083
00:58:04,000 --> 00:58:06,160
Speaker 1: civil society who are paying attention to what's going on.

1084
00:58:06,480 --> 00:58:09,240
Speaker 1: And so we use the same thing, the arms we

1085
00:58:09,480 --> 00:58:11,880
Speaker 1: you know, because the way I want to build liberatory

1086
00:58:11,880 --> 00:58:14,760
Speaker 1: community arm self defense is not that we perpetuate the

1087
00:58:14,800 --> 00:58:18,360
Speaker 1: problems of power of those with guns have more power

1088
00:58:18,400 --> 00:58:20,960
Speaker 1: than the rest of the people and communities, and so

1089
00:58:21,520 --> 00:58:24,240
Speaker 1: we the whole idea was to take up arms and

1090
00:58:24,280 --> 00:58:26,600
Speaker 1: put them away when we didn't need them anymore, because

1091
00:58:26,600 --> 00:58:28,680
Speaker 1: there's enough people on the ground doing the things, and

1092
00:58:28,720 --> 00:58:31,200
Speaker 1: we could use other forms. We could use media to

1093
00:58:31,240 --> 00:58:34,560
Speaker 1: talk to people, we could use community control, um, you know,

1094
00:58:34,680 --> 00:58:37,400
Speaker 1: within the community to actually stop people from being killed,

1095
00:58:37,480 --> 00:58:41,000
Speaker 1: just physical protection. And so that's what we did. And

1096
00:58:41,040 --> 00:58:42,920
Speaker 1: so within the first few weeks we put the guns

1097
00:58:42,920 --> 00:58:46,240
Speaker 1: away and then continue to build all of these programs

1098
00:58:46,560 --> 00:58:49,400
Speaker 1: and and and and after disasters. One of the things

1099
00:58:49,400 --> 00:58:53,480
Speaker 1: I've recognized is that you know, disasters take many forms, right,

1100
00:58:53,880 --> 00:58:59,080
Speaker 1: It's ecological, it's political, it's economic, and war. These are

1101
00:58:59,120 --> 00:59:01,680
Speaker 1: all forms of dis maasters that have very similar things

1102
00:59:01,720 --> 00:59:04,480
Speaker 1: where everything that you think you know about the world

1103
00:59:04,600 --> 00:59:09,400
Speaker 1: disappears immediately and people begin to die. And as as

1104
00:59:09,440 --> 00:59:14,080
Speaker 1: climate change causes human induced climate change is causing more

1105
00:59:14,200 --> 00:59:18,160
Speaker 1: and more calamities and disasters. I think that what we

1106
00:59:18,240 --> 00:59:21,200
Speaker 1: need to do is build more autonomy, more communities that

1107
00:59:21,280 --> 00:59:25,720
Speaker 1: are autonomous but networked. So while firearms are important tools

1108
00:59:25,720 --> 00:59:28,240
Speaker 1: to have in the event of a civil collapse, focusing

1109
00:59:28,280 --> 00:59:31,440
Speaker 1: on building an arsenal is probably a mistake. Having a

1110
00:59:31,480 --> 00:59:34,080
Speaker 1: gun can be part of a survival plan, but guns

1111
00:59:34,120 --> 00:59:36,520
Speaker 1: alone will not keep you safe when you get right

1112
00:59:36,560 --> 00:59:38,960
Speaker 1: down to it. The only thing that really provides long

1113
00:59:39,080 --> 00:59:42,840
Speaker 1: term security and a disaster is a community. That's what

1114
00:59:42,880 --> 00:59:45,560
Speaker 1: Scott Crowe in the Common Ground Clinic proved in Katrina.

1115
00:59:45,880 --> 00:59:48,240
Speaker 1: Training with a rifle has its place, but you'll gain

1116
00:59:48,240 --> 00:59:51,840
Speaker 1: more benefit from volunteering with street metic collectives and organizations

1117
00:59:51,840 --> 00:59:54,720
Speaker 1: like Mutual Aid disaster relief, because that will help you

1118
00:59:54,720 --> 00:59:57,680
Speaker 1: build connections with local networks of people you can rely

1119
00:59:57,800 --> 01:00:01,040
Speaker 1: on and cooperate with in the event the state falls apart.

1120
01:00:01,360 --> 01:00:04,480
Speaker 1: This is not just your hunky dory um scenario where

1121
01:00:04,480 --> 01:00:06,280
Speaker 1: we're just like, oh, everything's okay, and we can do

1122
01:00:06,280 --> 01:00:07,960
Speaker 1: this and we can have time. We had to build

1123
01:00:08,000 --> 01:00:11,600
Speaker 1: all this from scratch, with no money, no infrastructure except

1124
01:00:11,680 --> 01:00:15,320
Speaker 1: for the larger networks that anarchists had built around the

1125
01:00:15,400 --> 01:00:18,720
Speaker 1: country over the over the preceding fifteen or twenty years

1126
01:00:18,720 --> 01:00:22,000
Speaker 1: and and the and the rise of the alternative globalization movement.

1127
01:00:22,040 --> 01:00:24,680
Speaker 1: We had created these networks of like street medics, anarchist

1128
01:00:24,680 --> 01:00:27,040
Speaker 1: street medics who had been showing up at all these

1129
01:00:27,040 --> 01:00:31,160
Speaker 1: protests around the country and providing support for protesters or

1130
01:00:31,280 --> 01:00:33,360
Speaker 1: or food not bombs, chapters that have been around for

1131
01:00:33,360 --> 01:00:36,400
Speaker 1: thirty years but had also been had formed these networks.

1132
01:00:36,520 --> 01:00:38,480
Speaker 1: We were able to call these networks in and so

1133
01:00:38,560 --> 01:00:44,000
Speaker 1: these people were willing to risk folonious arrest to feed people,

1134
01:00:44,120 --> 01:00:47,880
Speaker 1: to risk felonious arrest or to be killed, to just

1135
01:00:47,960 --> 01:00:51,840
Speaker 1: provide basic medicare medical care to people. And so with

1136
01:00:51,920 --> 01:00:54,040
Speaker 1: that is like we just started to build. And as

1137
01:00:54,080 --> 01:00:56,680
Speaker 1: more people came, they brought ideas of building more and

1138
01:00:56,720 --> 01:01:00,520
Speaker 1: more projects and more and more programs, and so, uh,

1139
01:01:00,560 --> 01:01:03,040
Speaker 1: you know, we started with three people and and you

1140
01:01:03,080 --> 01:01:06,080
Speaker 1: know and self defense and community arm defense, and then

1141
01:01:06,120 --> 01:01:09,400
Speaker 1: from that we began to build this incredibly beautiful train

1142
01:01:09,440 --> 01:01:12,280
Speaker 1: wreck called the Common Ground Collective. The state is fragile.

1143
01:01:12,480 --> 01:01:14,480
Speaker 1: It never looks that way when times are good, but

1144
01:01:14,520 --> 01:01:17,520
Speaker 1: disasters like Katrina are a peak behind the curtain. They

1145
01:01:17,520 --> 01:01:20,120
Speaker 1: revealed that behind the armored riot cops and tanks and

1146
01:01:20,160 --> 01:01:23,600
Speaker 1: flags is a naked old magician relying on smoke and mirrors.

1147
01:01:23,960 --> 01:01:27,520
Speaker 1: The state is as brittle as the power lines infrastructure

1148
01:01:27,600 --> 01:01:31,280
Speaker 1: that the things that we rely on, the electricity grid,

1149
01:01:31,400 --> 01:01:35,240
Speaker 1: the food grid that delivery deliveries, the fuel grids, they

1150
01:01:35,240 --> 01:01:38,680
Speaker 1: all go down really fast. It doesn't take very long

1151
01:01:38,760 --> 01:01:41,720
Speaker 1: for them to just takes a few key places for

1152
01:01:41,760 --> 01:01:44,360
Speaker 1: them to go down. So if it floods somewhere like

1153
01:01:44,400 --> 01:01:48,240
Speaker 1: on the coastline, all the oil production in Texas stops.

1154
01:01:48,280 --> 01:01:50,960
Speaker 1: And when oil production stops in Texas and it's the

1155
01:01:51,080 --> 01:01:54,000
Speaker 1: refineries and stuff the extra processing, then that means it

1156
01:01:54,040 --> 01:01:57,160
Speaker 1: stops for the whole country, the whole United States, like quickly.

1157
01:01:57,600 --> 01:01:59,960
Speaker 1: So this is, this happened at Harvey, this happened in Katrina.

1158
01:02:00,000 --> 01:02:02,120
Speaker 1: Of this happened, and I just keeps happening over and

1159
01:02:02,120 --> 01:02:05,040
Speaker 1: over but hasn't had a complete stop yet. But it's common.

1160
01:02:05,600 --> 01:02:07,600
Speaker 1: And so I don't even live and I don't live

1161
01:02:07,640 --> 01:02:11,640
Speaker 1: in fear about things. But so just recognizing that I watched,

1162
01:02:11,880 --> 01:02:14,600
Speaker 1: I watched what happened at Katrina as an isolated thing

1163
01:02:14,680 --> 01:02:16,360
Speaker 1: like in the in the region that happened like in

1164
01:02:16,400 --> 01:02:19,440
Speaker 1: three or four states, like like most hurricanes do. But

1165
01:02:19,520 --> 01:02:23,000
Speaker 1: what I watched was that the stores that had their

1166
01:02:23,080 --> 01:02:27,720
Speaker 1: delivery warehouses are all predicated on this very minimal thing

1167
01:02:27,760 --> 01:02:30,240
Speaker 1: where they just barely keep them stopped and so they

1168
01:02:30,240 --> 01:02:32,960
Speaker 1: can run out really fast food, water, like you know,

1169
01:02:33,000 --> 01:02:34,920
Speaker 1: like all the things that would be in a warehouse

1170
01:02:35,120 --> 01:02:39,280
Speaker 1: for Walmart, not you know, pitching them, but anywhere. And

1171
01:02:39,320 --> 01:02:42,240
Speaker 1: so it's concentric circles, so like it's New Orleans and

1172
01:02:42,520 --> 01:02:46,160
Speaker 1: say it's Mississippi and Alabama, like isolated storms right that

1173
01:02:46,240 --> 01:02:49,000
Speaker 1: have happened. But then then all of a sudden, the

1174
01:02:49,080 --> 01:02:52,360
Speaker 1: infrastructure spreads to the northern and western parts of those

1175
01:02:52,360 --> 01:02:54,840
Speaker 1: states where there's like in concentric rings where there's no

1176
01:02:54,880 --> 01:02:58,280
Speaker 1: supplies available, and then within two more weeks there's nothing

1177
01:02:58,320 --> 01:03:01,120
Speaker 1: available within the states nearby, within that you know, and

1178
01:03:01,120 --> 01:03:04,600
Speaker 1: then it keeps going until at Katrina, people didn't start

1179
01:03:04,600 --> 01:03:07,960
Speaker 1: to bring supplies in from until it was like four

1180
01:03:08,040 --> 01:03:11,120
Speaker 1: states away. There was nothing. There was nothing to get

1181
01:03:11,480 --> 01:03:13,680
Speaker 1: like you could even in Texas. You couldn't bring water

1182
01:03:14,080 --> 01:03:17,160
Speaker 1: to people in Katrina unless you were far like you

1183
01:03:17,200 --> 01:03:19,280
Speaker 1: were getting a nel passo. This was only in the

1184
01:03:19,280 --> 01:03:22,560
Speaker 1: first few weeks. So I watched like watching that, watching

1185
01:03:22,560 --> 01:03:25,280
Speaker 1: the grids go down really quickly, really changed the way

1186
01:03:25,320 --> 01:03:28,920
Speaker 1: I think about stuff. But I am not somebody who

1187
01:03:29,000 --> 01:03:32,760
Speaker 1: wants to sit in fear and worry about how we're

1188
01:03:32,760 --> 01:03:34,720
Speaker 1: going to do this, because I can tell you all

1189
01:03:34,720 --> 01:03:37,800
Speaker 1: the fear mongers, like that asshole Alex Jones, the fucking

1190
01:03:38,400 --> 01:03:42,919
Speaker 1: dumbfucker that he is. Um, those guys they make their

1191
01:03:43,000 --> 01:03:45,959
Speaker 1: they make their money on fear. But fear only goes

1192
01:03:46,040 --> 01:03:48,960
Speaker 1: so far. Preppers and militiamen and their ilk like to

1193
01:03:49,000 --> 01:03:51,480
Speaker 1: present an aura of power and preparedness, but many of

1194
01:03:51,480 --> 01:03:54,240
Speaker 1: them are ultimately quite fragile. To A network of human

1195
01:03:54,320 --> 01:03:57,360
Speaker 1: beings working together to protect one another are stronger than

1196
01:03:57,360 --> 01:04:00,720
Speaker 1: any bunker. They're stronger than any state. Those bonds are

1197
01:04:00,720 --> 01:04:02,880
Speaker 1: not just what will save us if the state collapses,

1198
01:04:03,040 --> 01:04:05,000
Speaker 1: they're the only thing that can carry us through to

1199
01:04:05,040 --> 01:04:07,760
Speaker 1: a better future. We've all seen in the months and

1200
01:04:07,840 --> 01:04:10,080
Speaker 1: years since two thousand and sixteen the fragility of the

1201
01:04:10,080 --> 01:04:12,400
Speaker 1: world order most of us grew up taking for granted.

1202
01:04:12,760 --> 01:04:15,800
Speaker 1: As the climate worsens, as disasters grow more frequent, as

1203
01:04:15,800 --> 01:04:19,000
Speaker 1: fascism surges forward, we find ourselves in a position we're

1204
01:04:19,040 --> 01:04:22,320
Speaker 1: just patching holes in the dike. Isn't enough. We need

1205
01:04:22,360 --> 01:04:25,640
Speaker 1: to build new, more resilient systems if the things we

1206
01:04:25,720 --> 01:04:29,160
Speaker 1: love about our culture, our society, our species are going

1207
01:04:29,200 --> 01:04:31,800
Speaker 1: to survive. I know the task of building a new

1208
01:04:31,840 --> 01:04:34,439
Speaker 1: world is a scary thing to consider in its own way.

1209
01:04:34,560 --> 01:04:38,000
Speaker 1: It's as frightening as the thought of collapse. When I

1210
01:04:38,040 --> 01:04:40,560
Speaker 1: was young, I read a book by Stephen Pressfield called

1211
01:04:40,560 --> 01:04:43,400
Speaker 1: The Gates of Fire. It's a fictional retelling of the

1212
01:04:43,400 --> 01:04:46,920
Speaker 1: Battle of Thermoboli, and a much more historically accurate depiction

1213
01:04:46,960 --> 01:04:49,360
Speaker 1: of events than the one scene. In Frank Miller's Three hundred,

1214
01:04:49,920 --> 01:04:52,160
Speaker 1: there's a running question in the book, asked by several

1215
01:04:52,240 --> 01:04:55,640
Speaker 1: of the characters, what is the opposite of fear? What

1216
01:04:55,800 --> 01:04:58,000
Speaker 1: is the thing that binds people together in the most

1217
01:04:58,040 --> 01:05:01,439
Speaker 1: desperate and hopeless of situations. By the end of the book,

1218
01:05:01,600 --> 01:05:06,000
Speaker 1: one of the characters, Dianikis, finally answers that question. The

1219
01:05:06,080 --> 01:05:10,440
Speaker 1: opposite of fear, he says, is love. I hope this

1220
01:05:10,520 --> 01:05:12,360
Speaker 1: series has had an impact on all of you. I

1221
01:05:12,400 --> 01:05:14,920
Speaker 1: hope it inspires you to read Cities under Siege and

1222
01:05:14,960 --> 01:05:18,280
Speaker 1: Scott Crowe's own book about Katrina, Black Flags and Windmills.

1223
01:05:18,600 --> 01:05:21,560
Speaker 1: I hope it convinces you to study democratic confederalism and

1224
01:05:21,600 --> 01:05:24,160
Speaker 1: what's happening in Rojava. I hope that many of you

1225
01:05:24,200 --> 01:05:27,840
Speaker 1: will start volunteering on farms, studying emergency medicine, and volunteering

1226
01:05:27,840 --> 01:05:31,160
Speaker 1: with groups like Mutual Aid, disaster Relief and Food Not Bombs.

1227
01:05:31,800 --> 01:05:34,160
Speaker 1: More than anything, I hope it convinces you that the

1228
01:05:34,240 --> 01:05:37,000
Speaker 1: only antidote to the hatred and suspicion tearing apart our

1229
01:05:37,040 --> 01:05:41,760
Speaker 1: society is solidarity, and at the core of solidarity is love.

1230
01:05:42,920 --> 01:05:44,760
Speaker 1: At the end of the first episode of this series,

1231
01:05:44,840 --> 01:05:48,320
Speaker 1: I talked about Jeremy Christian, the fascist extremist who stabbed

1232
01:05:48,360 --> 01:05:50,760
Speaker 1: two people to death on a Portland max Light rail

1233
01:05:50,800 --> 01:05:53,880
Speaker 1: train in two thousand seventeen. I talked to fair amount

1234
01:05:53,920 --> 01:05:56,280
Speaker 1: about Christian in that episode, his support for the right

1235
01:05:56,280 --> 01:05:59,280
Speaker 1: wing street gang patriot prayer, his belief that his murders

1236
01:05:59,280 --> 01:06:03,040
Speaker 1: were justified by the perceived liberalism of his victims. To me,

1237
01:06:03,440 --> 01:06:06,680
Speaker 1: Jeremy Christian is a human microcosm of everything pushing this

1238
01:06:06,760 --> 01:06:10,280
Speaker 1: country to madness. It is important to talk about him,

1239
01:06:10,320 --> 01:06:12,480
Speaker 1: but it might be more important to talk about the

1240
01:06:12,520 --> 01:06:15,800
Speaker 1: men he killed. On that terrible summer day in Portland,

1241
01:06:15,920 --> 01:06:18,560
Speaker 1: Christian had focused on two young women, one of whom

1242
01:06:18,640 --> 01:06:20,840
Speaker 1: was black and the other of whom wore a hijab.

1243
01:06:21,360 --> 01:06:24,200
Speaker 1: He started screaming in their faces about how all Muslims

1244
01:06:24,240 --> 01:06:26,800
Speaker 1: needed to be exterminated. When several men on the train

1245
01:06:26,880 --> 01:06:30,160
Speaker 1: decided to intervene, the two men who would die defending

1246
01:06:30,200 --> 01:06:32,680
Speaker 1: those young women could not have appeared more different from

1247
01:06:32,680 --> 01:06:36,120
Speaker 1: each other, at least on paper. Tallis and murder Nam

1248
01:06:36,200 --> 01:06:38,720
Speaker 1: Kaim Mesh was a twenty three year old social justice

1249
01:06:38,720 --> 01:06:42,320
Speaker 1: advocate from Ashland, Oregon. He was passionate about environmental issues

1250
01:06:42,360 --> 01:06:44,960
Speaker 1: and wrote eloquently about Islam and an effort to counter

1251
01:06:45,000 --> 01:06:49,040
Speaker 1: the prejudices many Americans have towards the faith. Rickie John

1252
01:06:49,080 --> 01:06:51,640
Speaker 1: Best was a fifty three year old army veteran, a

1253
01:06:51,720 --> 01:06:55,160
Speaker 1: father of four, a devout Catholic, and a registered Republican.

1254
01:06:55,840 --> 01:06:59,680
Speaker 1: Based on the conventional political wisdom of our increasingly polarized times,

1255
01:07:00,040 --> 01:07:02,520
Speaker 1: Tallison and Ricky should have been yelling at each other.

1256
01:07:03,240 --> 01:07:06,520
Speaker 1: But when two young, vulnerable members of their community needed defending,

1257
01:07:06,840 --> 01:07:09,480
Speaker 1: both Ricky and Tallison stood up and put their bodies

1258
01:07:09,520 --> 01:07:12,960
Speaker 1: in harm's way to protect strangers. The emotion that propelled

1259
01:07:13,000 --> 01:07:15,800
Speaker 1: them forward in those last moments was love. As he

1260
01:07:15,840 --> 01:07:18,360
Speaker 1: bled out on the floor of that train, Tallison told

1261
01:07:18,400 --> 01:07:21,160
Speaker 1: the woman attempting to render first aid to him, tell

1262
01:07:21,240 --> 01:07:24,680
Speaker 1: everyone on this train, I love them. Having love in

1263
01:07:24,720 --> 01:07:27,000
Speaker 1: your heart, like having a gun in your hand, does

1264
01:07:27,040 --> 01:07:31,120
Speaker 1: not guarantee anything. It does not mean victory. But I

1265
01:07:31,200 --> 01:07:33,920
Speaker 1: also know that we can't turn this ship around without it.

1266
01:07:35,320 --> 01:07:37,840
Speaker 1: And that's it. That's all I got. It's up to

1267
01:07:37,880 --> 01:07:40,440
Speaker 1: you all now to go out and unfunck this country.

1268
01:07:40,800 --> 01:07:45,440
Speaker 1: So good luck, godspeed. One last time, I'm going to

1269
01:07:45,480 --> 01:07:48,439
Speaker 1: turn to four fists to play us out I never

1270
01:07:48,520 --> 01:07:54,680
Speaker 1: been to war. Knock, neither of you so doing pretty good.

1271
01:07:55,400 --> 01:08:01,400
Speaker 1: I never killed a man. I would start this. I'll

1272
01:08:01,480 --> 01:08:04,439
Speaker 1: just make leave. I think I'm George Patton Herbert Hoover,

1273
01:08:04,720 --> 01:08:07,520
Speaker 1: speaking Shakespeare to the stones, hope that they will be

1274
01:08:07,560 --> 01:08:11,480
Speaker 1: moved by woods, turn riffles into reservoirs. I think I'm fuck.

1275
01:08:11,800 --> 01:08:15,000
Speaker 1: He's to think guy's hasting over. But I chrome on nowadays.

1276
01:08:15,880 --> 01:08:19,000
Speaker 1: Never I sleep without. I used to worship popular Spanish

1277
01:08:19,080 --> 01:08:22,719
Speaker 1: Civil War fishing off the keys. Three sense the guards.

1278
01:08:22,800 --> 01:08:25,880
Speaker 1: Me and that ship don't work for me. I'm a Superkowsky.

1279
01:08:26,040 --> 01:08:30,080
Speaker 1: Heaven help us. Isaac Rock's right, turning over every single

1280
01:08:30,160 --> 01:08:32,679
Speaker 1: stone in search of suns of light. Kind of nice

1281
01:08:32,960 --> 01:08:36,080
Speaker 1: quiet life. Yeah, far from the guns bore. Run my

1282
01:08:36,160 --> 01:08:40,280
Speaker 1: fingers through the grass and listen to you so seland

1283
01:08:40,320 --> 01:08:44,000
Speaker 1: in the curtains, records on your skin. And this my empress,

1284
01:08:44,040 --> 01:08:47,880
Speaker 1: this my super this myself on shackleton. Yeah, lengths protests me.

1285
01:08:47,960 --> 01:08:50,680
Speaker 1: All my bits got dead love like air spring. They

1286
01:08:50,720 --> 01:08:55,519
Speaker 1: are frontier, they are endless, in there in everything. This Sunday,

1287
01:08:55,560 --> 01:09:19,320
Speaker 1: So I got y r. I'm ready. I'm pacing our way.

1288
01:09:19,320 --> 01:09:21,920
Speaker 1: Wait wait, wait, no, I ain't. I'm scared and I'm

1289
01:09:21,960 --> 01:09:25,479
Speaker 1: quick to escape. And he went that away maybe flattered

1290
01:09:25,479 --> 01:09:30,600
Speaker 1: and scattering or flattened and shattering or collecting dad and

1291
01:09:30,680 --> 01:09:33,680
Speaker 1: he's an unbaffling group free where the freezer take me?

1292
01:09:34,040 --> 01:09:36,880
Speaker 1: Hell yam and ballooma no string because but nobody wanted

1293
01:09:36,920 --> 01:09:39,280
Speaker 1: to be stuck. Stuff under was so out of sinking.

1294
01:09:39,640 --> 01:09:43,799
Speaker 1: Just remember to breathe, Just remember the breathe. Just remember

1295
01:09:43,800 --> 01:09:45,680
Speaker 1: how feast to be reached. Like anything you do that

1296
01:09:45,680 --> 01:09:48,120
Speaker 1: ship easy if it comes easy, just to get easy

1297
01:09:48,160 --> 01:09:50,120
Speaker 1: to do what it needs me. There ain't no freezes

1298
01:09:50,439 --> 01:09:52,800
Speaker 1: earn with your keeping like they do not need me,

1299
01:09:52,840 --> 01:09:55,479
Speaker 1: because they don't. If you're sleeping, caught in the romance

1300
01:09:55,479 --> 01:09:58,280
Speaker 1: and drama, woe with me stopped from catching, they open

1301
01:09:58,360 --> 01:10:01,960
Speaker 1: it and they won't be credits. Let's stop happening every Sunday,

1302
01:10:02,040 --> 01:10:19,320
Speaker 1: sound design your I'm learning never be since that's okay,

1303
01:10:20,560 --> 01:10:24,640
Speaker 1: Like his weapon self shall best place. There's not a

1304
01:10:24,720 --> 01:10:28,320
Speaker 1: hair a hair, but just each day left is a

1305
01:10:28,400 --> 01:10:31,960
Speaker 1: death in themselves, and I can't chase. I'm hurting the

1306
01:10:32,040 --> 01:10:36,000
Speaker 1: leg of a letter, the soul strength that's the front

1307
01:10:36,040 --> 01:10:40,960
Speaker 1: of me. Now I'm made up the buber myself, you see,

1308
01:10:41,160 --> 01:10:44,439
Speaker 1: and at you're racing best. Back when I lost to

1309
01:10:44,560 --> 01:10:52,679
Speaker 1: I ain't it. I ain't ain't it I. I ain't

1310
01:10:52,800 --> 01:11:04,880
Speaker 1: it I I ain't I I I. I hated my,

1311
01:11:06,680 --> 01:11:18,720
Speaker 1: I hated I. I hated I. I b