Speaker 1: Ah where it's us, the podcast that we are. It
Speaker 1: could happen here behind the podcast bad stuff. It could
Speaker 1: happen here, it is, it could happen here. Okay, Well
Speaker 1: Part two of Why Police Are Occult? Thanks Garrison, Thanks
Speaker 1: for doing the job. That is one of our jobs, certainly,
Speaker 1: but apparently not mine. Alexander Williams back again, Um, Alexander,
Speaker 1: how are you? How are you feeling good? Was your
Speaker 1: life in a radically different place now than it was
Speaker 1: when we ended part one? Oh? Yeah? Like no, Well
Speaker 1: that's for the best, because anything that would change in
Speaker 1: about the thirty seconds between these episodes probably would not
Speaker 1: have been a positive change. You're letting the magic out.
Speaker 1: People are gonna know. Yeah, they should know already. Uh
Speaker 1: So the next thing you've got here in terms of
Speaker 1: characteristics that you saw inside the Police is the group
Speaker 1: has a polarized US versus them mentality, which may cause
Speaker 1: conflict with the wider society. Um. Yeah, and I I
Speaker 1: think this is the one that like, yeah, we've all
Speaker 1: we all kind of saw that one. Are you sure
Speaker 1: about that one? I'm not convinced. Yeah, it was a
Speaker 1: Eureka moment, right, Yeah, Um, I do think it's probably
Speaker 1: worth a little bit of exploration about like what it
Speaker 1: means emotionally to be told like I want to defund
Speaker 1: or even abolish the police as a police officer, like
Speaker 1: that's that's a um yeah, yeah. I remember the first
Speaker 1: time that I heard that, the concept of it when
Speaker 1: I was a cop. I think I was about five
Speaker 1: years away from getting out, um and it blew my mind.
Speaker 1: It was it was like, I'm like, you don't know,
Speaker 1: we don't have enough funding, Like how hell in the world?
Speaker 1: But we can't you our job because in you know,
Speaker 1: in our in my head, we're we're the thing holding
Speaker 1: society up. If we're not here, everything falls apart and crumbles. Um.
Speaker 1: So the idea of being told like we need to
Speaker 1: defund the police for cops, it's it's an attack on
Speaker 1: your values and your role in the world. It's also
Speaker 1: attack on like your personal life because because your life
Speaker 1: is police as well, right and and and it's and
Speaker 1: it's like you're you. You've been talking a lot about
Speaker 1: how the job becomes such a central part of your
Speaker 1: identity that it's not even just attacking like your paycheck,
Speaker 1: but it's attacking like your essence now as a person.
Speaker 1: It is It's like if you've ever had a debate
Speaker 1: with with an extremely like evangelical religious person, it's the
Speaker 1: same as trying to tell a cop like, hey, you
Speaker 1: don't actually hold society up. You're not exactly as important
Speaker 1: as you think you are. Um. And like I said, like,
Speaker 1: we don't get we don't get paid very much. Health
Speaker 1: insurance usually isn't that good um our. Our unions that
Speaker 1: we told as being the best usually pretty corrupt um.
Speaker 1: And they don't really go to bat for us and
Speaker 1: get us the good health insurance and get us the
Speaker 1: good pay. They get us just enough. And so when
Speaker 1: a cop here's like, hey we defund the police, it's
Speaker 1: like from our perspective, we think what we're hearing is
Speaker 1: we don't appreciate you. We already think you get paid
Speaker 1: too much. We we think of it less about like
Speaker 1: the structure of law enforcement, and we think it personally
Speaker 1: of like oh you don't think my kids should have dinner? Yeah,
Speaker 1: And that's uh, I mean, yeah, of course that has
Speaker 1: like of course it ends the way that we saw
Speaker 1: it in you know, or at least it continues the
Speaker 1: way we saw it continue last year, right, And and
Speaker 1: it's I think it could help like people like us
Speaker 1: are on one side of the line, and you know
Speaker 1: the other people are on the other side of the
Speaker 1: line still, and I think it could help people on
Speaker 1: our side of the of the of the barricades to
Speaker 1: understand just how willing these guys are to do things
Speaker 1: and things that they wouldn't normally do, things that you
Speaker 1: would never consider doing on your own, but for the
Speaker 1: job and as an order, they'll do it because again,
Speaker 1: it's part of their identity, and it's it's if you
Speaker 1: know you're attacking me, you're also attacking my family. You're
Speaker 1: you're It goes back to that grossman thing of being
Speaker 1: We told a lot of um, no matter what you do,
Speaker 1: you go home tonight. So no matter what I do
Speaker 1: on my shift, I go home tonight. It's better to
Speaker 1: be judged by twelveth and carried by six. Yeah that one, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of like the police of the riot line,
Speaker 1: and yeah, you can see them being like middle aged
Speaker 1: conservative dudes, like look at all these like fucking like
Speaker 1: gay queer teenagers. Throws to fat me. Right, it's like
Speaker 1: the specific thing you're like, oh you you like I'm
Speaker 1: getting attacked by like the lowest of the low society.
Speaker 1: I'm being attacked by like did like degenerates and like
Speaker 1: this weird kind of scum. I'm actually what society should be.
Speaker 1: The people that are fighting against me are like this
Speaker 1: weird anti social thing, right, That's that's how it is
Speaker 1: from their perspective. Um when almost an actuality. I've been
Speaker 1: I've been slowly kind of appropriating that type of language
Speaker 1: for when I see a cop do something horrible, I'm like, wow,
Speaker 1: look at that, like anti social, violent freak, because you
Speaker 1: can look at that language because it flips the way
Speaker 1: we usually view like aesthetics when you know, because like
Speaker 1: when you see someone do something quotably horribly violent but
Speaker 1: they addressed in a uniform, it is it has the
Speaker 1: appearance of being proper, but like, no, that actually still
Speaker 1: is anti social and extremely violent. So I think flip,
Speaker 1: I've been playing around with like flip flipping that language.
Speaker 1: But you can definitely see it on the cops faces
Speaker 1: when a whole bunch of like young queer as fun
Speaker 1: people are throwing water bottles at them. Oh yeah, you can't.
Speaker 1: And and the thing that the thing to remember about
Speaker 1: most cops is they're there their ego is paper thin
Speaker 1: their skin. They cannot take a joke, they cannot take
Speaker 1: an insult. The the number of cops that I would see,
Speaker 1: and I would argue that I saw some of the
Speaker 1: worst worst behavior than on the streets, because because inside
Speaker 1: the jail, you're you know, you're in your own little world.
Speaker 1: You're inside these walls. The public can't see you unless
Speaker 1: you're on camera and pre body cameras. You know where
Speaker 1: all the cameras are. And I the the amount of
Speaker 1: guys that like an inmate would call them like the
Speaker 1: f slur or any other slur, and the cop would
Speaker 1: just snap, we just lose their mind. And me and
Speaker 1: another couple other guys being the only kind of cops
Speaker 1: that would get in the guy's way and be like no.
Speaker 1: And it was never we couldn't say no, that's wrong,
Speaker 1: don't do that. It was always no, it's not worth it,
Speaker 1: or no, you're gonna get in trouble, or no, you
Speaker 1: know if you do that, he wins man. Because if
Speaker 1: we said don't do that, it's wrong, we may have
Speaker 1: we may have stopped that bad thing from happening, but
Speaker 1: we have now marked ourselves as being, you know, potential apostates.
Speaker 1: Against the close. Um so yeah, that's yeah, calling them
Speaker 1: names works. Six and stones do break coops bones, Like,
Speaker 1: oh boy, it does work. Like in terms of if
Speaker 1: if the goal is make them extremely angry, yes it
Speaker 1: doesn't work. It's yeah, obviously. The next one you've got
Speaker 1: is the leader. The leader is not accountable to any authorities, um,
Speaker 1: which the police regulate and investigate themselves. That's one of
Speaker 1: the most basic ones. But it does it kind of.
Speaker 1: It does lead to this, Like it is interesting to
Speaker 1: think about the way the Church of Scientology handles uh
Speaker 1: misbehavior from its agents and the way that, like a
Speaker 1: police department does. Because there's not a ton of daylight
Speaker 1: betwixt the two. There's not listening to you the l
Speaker 1: Ron episodes, anyone who hasn't listened to them, go back
Speaker 1: and listen to them. They're fantastic, one of my favorites.
Speaker 1: Um yeah, listening to that. And the way that they're
Speaker 1: a little internalized security system was structured was very very
Speaker 1: analog to exactly what happens law enforcement with their so
Speaker 1: called policing themselves b s. Because god, they don't, they'll
Speaker 1: do every little thing to manipulate the situation to have
Speaker 1: the cop come out on top and not be in
Speaker 1: trouble because who's gonna hold them responsible? That my own
Speaker 1: guy at my own department's interviewing me. We've known each
Speaker 1: other since we were kids, or I've known his dad,
Speaker 1: or his dad's known me, or or he's you know,
Speaker 1: related or whatever. It never works when the you know,
Speaker 1: the watchmen are watching themselves. It doesn't work. I don't
Speaker 1: know how. We don't, well, I do know how, but
Speaker 1: I really wish there was if we do have to
Speaker 1: still have law enforcement civilian oversight with actual power, actual
Speaker 1: authority to do. Yeah. That's that's the thing is that
Speaker 1: everywhere and a lot of the times that's been try
Speaker 1: to put into legislator, it doesn't. It's always like neutered.
Speaker 1: It's always like and like I've I've seen versions of
Speaker 1: it pop up in Portland and it just never does anything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And that's I mean, obviously, the whole the question of
Speaker 1: is to what extent can increasing civilian oversight UH solve problems?
Speaker 1: To what extent is it like papering over them? Those
Speaker 1: are all things worth discussing. Um. I think I want
Speaker 1: to kind of keep us focused on the mindset that
Speaker 1: that inflicates because that that's the thing that I don't
Speaker 1: think people get in part because like most people who
Speaker 1: are part of these abolitionous movements, most people who are
Speaker 1: are on the sides that we are on this um
Speaker 1: either probably don't know a police officer very well part
Speaker 1: and certainly almost most of them have not been police officers.
Speaker 1: And I'm kind of wondering, what are you actually scared
Speaker 1: of doing as a police officer, Like what what what
Speaker 1: are you actually scared of in terms of like the blowback,
Speaker 1: the fault, Like what what is it you actually get
Speaker 1: worried about if it's not pissing off everyone else in
Speaker 1: the city who wasn't a cop, you know. So Yeah,
Speaker 1: what it comes down to is, uh, you know that
Speaker 1: the the church of law, the Church of criminal justice,
Speaker 1: and what they're scared of is so if I get
Speaker 1: a dirty cop who's not blatantly doing something bad, like
Speaker 1: he just he hit a guy too art or something,
Speaker 1: it's something that hasn't hit the news yet. Um, but
Speaker 1: I have to morally, like ethically, on paper, I'm required
Speaker 1: to have an I A division investigate these people. The
Speaker 1: reason that in my head, when I was there and
Speaker 1: being interviewed for these things, it's because you have to
Speaker 1: hold up the infallibility of the law. It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: what really happened. All that matters is what's in black
Speaker 1: and white on paper in our files. If we ever
Speaker 1: get audited by a federal body and we can say, look,
Speaker 1: a bad thing happened, Yes, we investigated it. Here's what
Speaker 1: Here were the results. And it's all about holding up
Speaker 1: the infallibility of the law because if it really gets
Speaker 1: out and cops really get in trouble for stuff like
Speaker 1: some of the stuff that's been happening, where cops are
Speaker 1: actually being convicted finally for doing terrible things, it erodes
Speaker 1: the blind faith that the masses have in law enforcement.
Speaker 1: Because I've heard people here in Utah, which is a
Speaker 1: very conservative place, look at some of those shootings that
Speaker 1: have happened where the cops have actually been found guilty,
Speaker 1: and they've actually been like, oh wow, like I never
Speaker 1: once thought a cop would do this, and it doesn't
Speaker 1: sound like much, but in their head, that's that's a
Speaker 1: seed that's setting in their consciousness. And that's that's the
Speaker 1: whole point of the blue wall of silence and keeping
Speaker 1: everything in the house is if everybody realizes that We're
Speaker 1: just a little weird man behind a curtain. You know,
Speaker 1: the Wizard of Oz doesn't work anymore. We have to
Speaker 1: maintain this false image that we are infallible and we
Speaker 1: know we know exactly what we're doing, and we are
Speaker 1: taking care of you. You have to believe that, so
Speaker 1: they'll do anything to maintain the lie. Wow. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: makes sense. It's bleak, but it makes sense. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: felt bleeping in there. This ties into kind of the
Speaker 1: the role of like lying, right, and and and the
Speaker 1: kind of the cult thing you're tying this into is
Speaker 1: that like colts will often talk about how the things
Speaker 1: the cult is doing are so important that you can
Speaker 1: do terrible things to achieve them. Right. You see this
Speaker 1: in the Church of Scientology and their dirty tricks programs.
Speaker 1: Sent and On had its its version of this. Um
Speaker 1: and you you've written here we are taught to lie
Speaker 1: to get what we need. It's only true if it's
Speaker 1: on tape or written down. As long as it looks good,
Speaker 1: it is good. Um. And I uh mean, it made me, think,
Speaker 1: among other things, of a guy I used to know
Speaker 1: who became a local prosecutor um and eventually quit because
Speaker 1: he kept being assured by police officers that like something
Speaker 1: that they had put in like the charging document was true,
Speaker 1: and then being unable to prove it in court. Um,
Speaker 1: and it it pissed him off after a period of time. Um,
Speaker 1: And I'm interested, like in the I'm sure like obviously
Speaker 1: some fraction of people doing it are just like just
Speaker 1: literally don't give a ship. But how does someone who
Speaker 1: actually does have a moral compass and believe in the law.
Speaker 1: How does someone who really believes justify lying to screw
Speaker 1: somebody over? Um, So asked the guy who was there,
Speaker 1: who had morals, which is why I'm not there anymore.
Speaker 1: I couldn't. And I actually got in trouble on a
Speaker 1: couple of instances of everybody was going one way on
Speaker 1: a story and I was going in the opposite direction.
Speaker 1: And without using blatant terms, they use all the like
Speaker 1: the little you know, legal legal fuckory terms to not
Speaker 1: say what they're trying to say, but implying and getting
Speaker 1: it across to you of like you need to get
Speaker 1: on the same page, you need to tow the line,
Speaker 1: you need to you need to get in here. And
Speaker 1: I could never do it. I just I don't know,
Speaker 1: that's just my moral fiber won't let me do that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. Um. I once was told by a
Speaker 1: lieutenant that I had my moral fiber was too high,
Speaker 1: Like he literally told me, because you can't expect everyone
Speaker 1: else to live up to your moral standards. And I'm like, dude,
Speaker 1: we're we're supposed to be like a little bit above
Speaker 1: the typical moral standard. We're supposed to be the example
Speaker 1: of how you know, our civilians, our citizens are supposed
Speaker 1: to act. But it wasn't the truth. Yeah. I mean,
Speaker 1: my first I think kind of radicalizing thing very early
Speaker 1: on was just like the fake drug scandal in Dallas
Speaker 1: was realizing that like on a significant scale, uh, local
Speaker 1: police had been planting ship on people in order to
Speaker 1: charge them. People have gone to prison, which happens other
Speaker 1: places too, But like, yeah, um, and I'm sure the
Speaker 1: bulk of the work making something like that happen isn't
Speaker 1: the people who are planting the fake drugs. The people
Speaker 1: who realize that the department will look bad if it
Speaker 1: gets out and then dedicate themselves to stopping it from
Speaker 1: getting out even beyond because you have you know, X
Speaker 1: number of people are willing to plant plant fake drugs
Speaker 1: on a guy. But a much larger number of people
Speaker 1: are willing to try to cover that up, so it's
Speaker 1: not a problem. That's that's the thing I really appreciate about, Alex.
Speaker 1: You're framing of this in terms of like their main
Speaker 1: or not one of the main motivations is not, you know,
Speaker 1: actually doing the job itself. It's about it's about making
Speaker 1: sure that their reality and by extension, what they everyone
Speaker 1: else is a reality to be to stay the same
Speaker 1: like they all of the effort into whether that be
Speaker 1: lying for supposedly in their view, like moral reasons and
Speaker 1: all this kind of work. It's it's it's it's to
Speaker 1: maintain the specific version of reality. It's not it's not
Speaker 1: actually for like like it's it's it's not for like
Speaker 1: actually promoting what is like the law on the books
Speaker 1: by any means. It's it's it's it's the it's the
Speaker 1: thing like in hot Fuzz, it's for the greater good.
Speaker 1: That's that's what that is. That is what they're trying
Speaker 1: to That's what they're trying to do. So even if
Speaker 1: they like it's, as long as their reality is maintained,
Speaker 1: then you know, we have some semblance of like order
Speaker 1: in the world, whether that be you know, this nostalgic,
Speaker 1: semi like proto militaristic nationalist version of order. But that's
Speaker 1: that's that's the thing that wants to be maintained. So
Speaker 1: every every task, everything that they're doing isn't just a
Speaker 1: simple task. It's all in the overall effort of maintaining
Speaker 1: this like this perception. Um. And and that's a a
Speaker 1: much more I think interesting way to think about police. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it really is. Uh, these guys in like in pill talk,
Speaker 1: these guys would take the blue pill in a heartbeat,
Speaker 1: and then they don't rest Morpheus for trying to deal drugs.
Speaker 1: Like that's how dedicated these guys are to staying inside
Speaker 1: this version of their reality. Now, um, I kind of
Speaker 1: let's move on next to um, the next kind of
Speaker 1: cult aspect, the leadership induces feelings of shame and or
Speaker 1: guilt in order to influence and control members. And you're
Speaker 1: talking you've looten down here, toxic masculinity and the warrior mindset. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: do you have any kind of like case examples of
Speaker 1: how that that actually looks of like kind of using
Speaker 1: shame or guilt to people who aren't kind of in
Speaker 1: the this quote quote unquote warrior mindset. Ah yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean it happened a lot. Um. There was a lot
Speaker 1: of Monday night quarterbacking that would happen, especially with the
Speaker 1: advent of like cameras and things becoming more popular. Uh
Speaker 1: I loved my body camera. That was my little best friend.
Speaker 1: But we would go you know, you go back and
Speaker 1: you'd watch videos of incidents and things, and if somebody
Speaker 1: wasn't like engaging fast enough, they would get roasted hard
Speaker 1: like haze and you know, made fun of and mocked it.
Speaker 1: And when you were in this, you know, we're a
Speaker 1: family mindset, and you're you know, were we got each
Speaker 1: other's backs and we only understand each other. And then
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you're on the outside because you
Speaker 1: dared to have even a remotely moderate to liberal position
Speaker 1: on anything, or you didn't jump in on the you know,
Speaker 1: the the ass beating on something. You fast enough, they
Speaker 1: turn on you fast. Like. The only thing I could
Speaker 1: compare it to is like you know, every eighties and
Speaker 1: like nineties military movie or or you know nerds movie
Speaker 1: where people just haze the ship out of each other,
Speaker 1: and it's that that dude brow. Everyone's got a our
Speaker 1: wire sun tattoo on their bicep just rampant everywhere. I mean,
Speaker 1: it permeated the whole place. It drove me that that
Speaker 1: was one of the things that really drove me because
Speaker 1: I've never been that kind of guy. I've always been
Speaker 1: a a more of a a de escalation person and
Speaker 1: a book reader. And then I think it helps explain
Speaker 1: a lot why you see some of these videos where
Speaker 1: it's just like, why did they go to zero to
Speaker 1: tend from zero to tend so fast? Well, because somebody's
Speaker 1: gonna make fun of them and call them names if
Speaker 1: they don't go hard enough, fast enough on somebody when
Speaker 1: they do certain things like and yeah, the zero to
Speaker 1: a hundred thing also ties into that whole, that whole
Speaker 1: hyper vigilance thing, that always being um a compressed spring.
Speaker 1: And then it ties back into that warrior mindset of
Speaker 1: like they tell you flat out like if anyone ever
Speaker 1: attacks you, they're trying to kill you. It's it's there's
Speaker 1: there's no ifans or, but you need to act like
Speaker 1: they're trying to kill you, because it goes back to
Speaker 1: the whole I'm going home at the end of the
Speaker 1: shift kind of thing. And once once that's ingrained itself
Speaker 1: into like your muscle memory, and that becomes the reflex
Speaker 1: that becomes the thought that passes in front of your
Speaker 1: mind when a critic incident happens. Then that's how you're
Speaker 1: gonna act, and you're gonna do, and you're gonna go
Speaker 1: from zero to a hundred because you're going to assume
Speaker 1: that any little furtive movement movement which god, there's that language,
Speaker 1: furtive movement, um, any little movement that someone makes, like
Speaker 1: that's that's a green light. That's an excuse that I
Speaker 1: can end whatever interaction I'm having with this person with
Speaker 1: violence because they flinched enough where I think, Okay, I
Speaker 1: got this. Yeah Jesus. Now one of the next ones
Speaker 1: you have here is talking about recruitment, which obviously coult STU,
Speaker 1: but also like it's a job and jobs do this
Speaker 1: constantly recruiting. I'm kind of wondering because you've you've listed
Speaker 1: here things like Explorer programs which are like r OTC
Speaker 1: or the Boy Scouts kind of these different one of
Speaker 1: which Kyle Rittenhouse did like ways in which kind of
Speaker 1: people get onboarded. I'm wondering sort of what how you
Speaker 1: see how you see police recruitment as a kind of
Speaker 1: different in a fundamentally cult your way. Then you know,
Speaker 1: every job has to bring in new people, right like, yeah, uh,
Speaker 1: it's it's it didn't used to be this way. But
Speaker 1: I think in the in the two thousands, especially when numbers,
Speaker 1: staffing numbers really started to drop because it's I don't
Speaker 1: know if they've just realized it wasn't worth it or
Speaker 1: they found somewhere better to get paid. But employment has
Speaker 1: gone down for law enforcement, and so recruitment goes up
Speaker 1: in response. But now they have a more active role
Speaker 1: in most places where it's almost on part with the military.
Speaker 1: They'll go to job fairs, they go to high school
Speaker 1: career days. Um, they didn't used to do that stuff.
Speaker 1: And when they do, they'll they'll find someone to like
Speaker 1: pull stuff out of the pulp culture zeitgeist. What we know?
Speaker 1: What cool? Yeah? Yeah, yeah. What can we what can
Speaker 1: we cash in on to try and draw these kids in,
Speaker 1: because just like the military, cops are looking to pull
Speaker 1: in disenfranchised kids who probably aren't going to go to college,
Speaker 1: don't think it's an option, And here's this job. All
Speaker 1: you need is a high school diploma, here's the health insurance.
Speaker 1: Here's the tyrant package, which is trash. But you're seventeen,
Speaker 1: you don't know that, you don't know how to read
Speaker 1: all this, but it looks real goal yeah yeah, um yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: they explore stuff. I mean you're familiar with that. So
Speaker 1: but yeah, they get little kids to go out and
Speaker 1: you know, the little baby cops and it's I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's one of those things, like some of this
Speaker 1: is so much deeper than even the the individual departments
Speaker 1: or any choice made by the police, because like, as
Speaker 1: a kid, some of the first toys I had were
Speaker 1: cop toys, right, like everything every boy, I think, like, yes,
Speaker 1: some of the first what you're gonna get badge a gun,
Speaker 1: you're gonna play detective, You're gonna be watching cops shows,
Speaker 1: You're gonna be watching movies where cops are the and
Speaker 1: that's I mean that that's a bigger subject than today.
Speaker 1: But like, yeah, no, that is like the one of
Speaker 1: the most prevalent forms of media that's instilled in young
Speaker 1: uh boys. I guess yeah. You know what else is
Speaker 1: instilled in young boys the love of capitalism and products
Speaker 1: and specifically and services find a child and whisper the
Speaker 1: names of our sponsor into their ears, preferably a child
Speaker 1: that's yours hopefully know any child, any child throw something
Speaker 1: so their parents look away and then leaned down and
Speaker 1: whisper better. Hell, you know, only counts if you get caught.
Speaker 1: We're back. Um. And your next point was the group
Speaker 1: is preoccupied with making money, which is a huge thing
Speaker 1: for cults. Um, not all of them. There are some,
Speaker 1: like you know, there there are some cults that were
Speaker 1: shall we say pure, um, but they're nearly all about
Speaker 1: getting like hey man Manson just it was all about
Speaker 1: the music, and the Heaven's Gate was a pure cult. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: Heaven's Gate. It certainly wasn't just the money for Heaven's
Speaker 1: But yes, cops, cops have civil ascid forfeiture which they
Speaker 1: just took a hundred thousand dollars from someone in Dallas
Speaker 1: and the person did not get charged with anything, um,
Speaker 1: which is usually the case. Yeah. But um, but I
Speaker 1: mean yeah, like you have written here that like the
Speaker 1: main the main way is just increasing their budget as
Speaker 1: much as possible, which you have. Most police departments right
Speaker 1: now have the biggest budget they've ever had. Um. Specifically
Speaker 1: in like main cities we have, they're they're the most
Speaker 1: funded department. Um in in for the whole city. There's
Speaker 1: there's this there's this great gag in the opening episode
Speaker 1: of a show called Ugly Americans that's about trying to
Speaker 1: rere financialize the city's budget. And they have like a
Speaker 1: social spending and a cop budget, and they take like
Speaker 1: all of social spending and move it over and leave
Speaker 1: this one tiny sliver and they're like, oh, there, that's better.
Speaker 1: That will solve all the problems. Um it's it is
Speaker 1: a better sketch than what I explaining. It just like
Speaker 1: this sounds not funny, but the scotch is actually pretty good.
Speaker 1: Not far off, but yes, and and it is and
Speaker 1: it is relatively accurate in terms of just moving all
Speaker 1: the funding from social programs over into law enforcement. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So there's uh, you know, there's everyone gets their financial
Speaker 1: different ways. There's county, there's stayed, there's there's city. But
Speaker 1: a common thing that would happen was, uh, law enforcement
Speaker 1: agencies would try to take anything that they could under
Speaker 1: the umbrella of law enforcement. So if it was like, hey,
Speaker 1: we want to have more you know, security equipment at
Speaker 1: the high school, and then the cops will be like,
Speaker 1: no, no no, no, no, no, give us that money. We'll
Speaker 1: give you another another officer on campus. Or they want
Speaker 1: to hire something for the part, you know, and we
Speaker 1: want to install lights the city park to increase security.
Speaker 1: No no no, no, no, no no. You just give us
Speaker 1: that money. We'll make sure our guys patrol it more.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. So they actively try to just like coach
Speaker 1: money from everybody else. Yeah. I mean, and you you
Speaker 1: can see this in a lot of towns where like
Speaker 1: the number one use of public funds is the police.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's all over the country at this point. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: that makes sense. Uh. So members are expected to devote
Speaker 1: inordinate amounts of time to the group and group related activities.
Speaker 1: Um yeah, because you have written here four years with
Speaker 1: no days off, but scored a satisfactor, I was told
Speaker 1: to put in more time outside of work. Yeah. So,
Speaker 1: like I said, our emails were always sounds so much
Speaker 1: like MLM shit. It is it is they they every
Speaker 1: time you go in for an email, they neg you
Speaker 1: like no matter what are Our scoring system was one
Speaker 1: to ten. Um, nobody ever got higher than a six. Maybe.
Speaker 1: I think I saw like one or two sevens in
Speaker 1: my entire time there, And when I became a supervisor,
Speaker 1: I asked the brass I'm like, hey, I want to
Speaker 1: give this guy this this upper grade of like an
Speaker 1: eight or nine. And he told me flatt because no,
Speaker 1: we don't do that, Like, no one's allowed to get
Speaker 1: higher this seven. And if you want a seven, you're
Speaker 1: gonna have to like write a novel about how great
Speaker 1: this person is to get them this rating. Um, it
Speaker 1: was just yeah, it was. It was consistently just pinning
Speaker 1: you down. The four years no dated off. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I did, uh four years straight without calling it sick once,
Speaker 1: like I took vacations. But um, when I went in
Speaker 1: from I evail and he slides me a thing that
Speaker 1: says it says attendance satisfactory, And I was like, what
Speaker 1: are you talking about. I was like, I haven't taken
Speaker 1: a day a sick day in four years. You know,
Speaker 1: I have three kids. How do you think I managed that?
Speaker 1: Like I've sacrificed to be here that much. And his
Speaker 1: response was well like yeah, but I never see you
Speaker 1: at barbecues, I never see you at the union meetings.
Speaker 1: I never see you at the fundraisers for the sheriff's reelection.
Speaker 1: Even though it's blatantly against policy and illegal to do.
Speaker 1: And I told him that. In his response was were
Speaker 1: you gonna do telling me who you're gonna tell Jesus? Yeah? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean who are you going to tell that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And it is. It's also just like this, It isolates
Speaker 1: you from a or people. It stops you from knowing
Speaker 1: folks that aren't cops. And it's yeah, it's a lot
Speaker 1: like what your up line is gonna tell you if
Speaker 1: you're selling mary kay and that that that that ties
Speaker 1: into the that ties into the next point. UH members
Speaker 1: are encouraged or required to live and or socialize only
Speaker 1: with other group members. Um. And you say this is
Speaker 1: like part of the hyper vigilance is isolation cycle. But
Speaker 1: I also see this in terms of like something I
Speaker 1: get into for fun is I join like a wife
Speaker 1: of cops um Facebook groups just because it's fast just
Speaker 1: to have all of just to have all of these
Speaker 1: like cops spouses in a Facebook group, And it's super Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like it's it's a really interesting like culture of like
Speaker 1: just associating with other people on the job. You know,
Speaker 1: there's like cop barbecues like you mentioned, and all this
Speaker 1: kind of stuff where it's like we're the only ones
Speaker 1: that can understand you. So we're gonna build like this,
Speaker 1: like you know, force field around all of us and
Speaker 1: we can be together as a family and keep out
Speaker 1: everyone else because we're the ones that really know what's up.
Speaker 1: Um yeah, it seems uh. I mean for some people
Speaker 1: who are really into it, I guess that is, you know,
Speaker 1: that's how humans socialize in some ways. So you know,
Speaker 1: for people who think being cops that are good and
Speaker 1: then quote unquote enjoy it, I'm sure they have a
Speaker 1: decent time hanging out with their cop buddies, right, Um,
Speaker 1: And I'm sure the cops spouse Facebook groups. I'm sure
Speaker 1: they have a good time laughing about whatever viral video
Speaker 1: there is of someone using too much force you know who,
Speaker 1: who knows what? Like how how they actually think about
Speaker 1: those types of very isolated environments, because you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's about fend find you know, it's it's almost like
Speaker 1: it's it's extending out into like fandom rules where you're
Speaker 1: associating with other people the same way fandoms work, which
Speaker 1: is very just very similar to how cults work. Um.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, it's an armed militant fandom and your
Speaker 1: last point here, the most loyal members, the true believers field,
Speaker 1: there could be no life outside the context of the group.
Speaker 1: They believe there is no other way to be an
Speaker 1: often fear reprisals to themselves or others if they leave
Speaker 1: or even consider leaving the group. Yeah, so I put
Speaker 1: in the note of just self expectatory. But yeah, it's me.
Speaker 1: Quitting was weird. I knew I needed to do it,
Speaker 1: but I I had a massive existential crisis of identity
Speaker 1: and of of logistical things, but a lot of it
Speaker 1: was it was tied to my identity, and it was
Speaker 1: it was letting go of something that was like a
Speaker 1: core pillar of my personality, and it really freaked me out.
Speaker 1: And I think that if I was more inside the group,
Speaker 1: and I was more like one of the guys, a
Speaker 1: golden boy or something like, I probably would have never left.
Speaker 1: If I was, if I was getting that constant reinforcement
Speaker 1: of the good boy feelings, I don't think I would
Speaker 1: have quit. Um. But after I did quit, that actually
Speaker 1: kicked off a cascade of people around my same age
Speaker 1: and within my same seniority level in looking at their
Speaker 1: job and looking at what it was doing to them
Speaker 1: psychologically and physically and with their families and thinking to themselves, Oh,
Speaker 1: I can leave that. That is how cult How that
Speaker 1: is how leaving cults work. Yeah. Yeah. And so once
Speaker 1: I left, a bunch of other guys were like, Oh,
Speaker 1: I don't have to do this until I'm fifty five.
Speaker 1: I can I can go start another career somewhere else,
Speaker 1: I can go start another retirement plan at a different place.
Speaker 1: And I just it felt great to see other people
Speaker 1: tear away and do that. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: I know for some of that it hurt mhm really
Speaker 1: bad to to leave that behind because once you're once
Speaker 1: you are out. Um, you are kind of out. Even
Speaker 1: if you leave amicably like hey, I just want to
Speaker 1: go do something else with my life, you're no longer
Speaker 1: in those people's minds anymore because you're not part of
Speaker 1: the team, you're not in the club, you're not in
Speaker 1: the family anymore. You're that guy that used to be here.
Speaker 1: And I guess kind of at the conclusion of this
Speaker 1: and this is you know, when you when the question
Speaker 1: is like, how do you de radicalize, get people out
Speaker 1: of colts? How do you like No one has a
Speaker 1: good answer to that. So I don't think we should
Speaker 1: expect you to suddenly have like here's how to here's
Speaker 1: how to convince everybody to stop doing this because we
Speaker 1: can't do that for fucking Q and on, like de
Speaker 1: radicalization of the people who say they're involved in it
Speaker 1: are fucking drifting like it's it's it's a big mess
Speaker 1: of a of a fucking field in the first place.
Speaker 1: But I am wondering, do you have some insights in
Speaker 1: the like, yeah, how then do we de radicalize these people? Uh?
Speaker 1: Like I don't think there is Like I don't think
Speaker 1: there is a cookie cutter answer for like pulling people out. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, we can't bag them in a white vand
Speaker 1: and take them to a hotel. Uh. The only thing
Speaker 1: I can think of it would actually change the culture
Speaker 1: is a huge shift in our national culture around like
Speaker 1: mental health and toxic masculinity and you know, wrapping your
Speaker 1: identity into into your job because it's not just cops
Speaker 1: that it's it's it's it's like that is that is
Speaker 1: America now? That is that is like hustle culture. That
Speaker 1: is what the idea of a career is. My name
Speaker 1: is blank and I am a blank. Like that career.
Speaker 1: Career comes from the word that means like careening, Like
Speaker 1: you are going full force into this thing. That is
Speaker 1: that is what you are doing now. That is your existence,
Speaker 1: is your career. You're going at it um. That is,
Speaker 1: that is what this whole country is built on. Uh
Speaker 1: So getting out of that for a lot of people,
Speaker 1: for just regular jobs, it is difficult. Now adding on
Speaker 1: the idea that you are the thing that holds society together,
Speaker 1: that is that that has a whole other level of
Speaker 1: complexity like psych logically for the person inside it um
Speaker 1: because I'm sure like telemarketers, if you can get really
Speaker 1: into it and make money, sure that can be a career.
Speaker 1: But you know, you're not holding society together, and like
Speaker 1: that's not that's not that's not a delusion that you have.
Speaker 1: And nobody outside there's there's there's there's no thin telemarketing
Speaker 1: line of supporting you. So it is it is different
Speaker 1: for like police specifically, even more so than like firefighters
Speaker 1: or like E. M. T. S Um. This particular fandom
Speaker 1: that's developed around police and and and like the the
Speaker 1: incredible self importance that they is that is cultivated um
Speaker 1: to Yeah, like the idea of I'm doing this to
Speaker 1: maintain reality is like a very like big thing to
Speaker 1: tell yourself and get getting out of that seems uh challenging. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it really is. It's like it's almost it's almost worst
Speaker 1: than most like churches in a sense because in this
Speaker 1: version it's it's still materialized. It's it's yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: it's right in front of you. I can reach out
Speaker 1: and touch it because I'm part of society. But if
Speaker 1: I'm not here and we're not here, you know, anarchy
Speaker 1: the bad guy the way people think the word means
Speaker 1: you know, everything's gonna catch fire, and the only reason
Speaker 1: people are good to each other is because the law
Speaker 1: makes them be that way and all that kind of
Speaker 1: toxic bs. So the only thing I can think of
Speaker 1: to be like to help de radicalize people is it's
Speaker 1: almost like treating someone in your family that listens to
Speaker 1: too much Q and on is to you know, if
Speaker 1: you know a cop or you have a friend that
Speaker 1: used to be a cop, and he ever like reaches
Speaker 1: out to you, maybe with like kid gloves, kind of
Speaker 1: be like, hey, how you doing just small things because
Speaker 1: that could maybe lead to him putting them putting something
Speaker 1: on their shelf, just like when people get out of
Speaker 1: religions and things, they'll often reach out to people and
Speaker 1: be like, hey, this is this is such a fucking
Speaker 1: it kind of means something if he's going outside of
Speaker 1: the group, and so yeah, maybe recognize that, Like you
Speaker 1: have an opportunity. Yeah, if if a cop reaches out
Speaker 1: to you, it's just like someone in a religious institution.
Speaker 1: They're reaching out to you because they feel safe talking
Speaker 1: to you, because you're not going to turn them in.
Speaker 1: You're it's not gonna have any uh immediate impact on
Speaker 1: their life right now. Yeah that makes sense. Um, all right, well, Alexander,
Speaker 1: anything else you wanted to get into. I mean I
Speaker 1: could talk about this kind of stuff for days and
Speaker 1: days and hours and hours, the whole hyper vigilance cycle,
Speaker 1: And like I said, I've read a bunch of books
Speaker 1: on it. I really tried to get training on just
Speaker 1: the hyper vigilance cycle. Like, well, if you ask most
Speaker 1: cops about hyper vigilance, they would just look at you
Speaker 1: and be like, I don't even know what that means
Speaker 1: what you're talking about, which is why I used to
Speaker 1: I used to give this book, the Emotional Survival Bound
Speaker 1: for law Enforcement. I would I gave it to new hires,
Speaker 1: and some of those new hires didn't come back, and
Speaker 1: I'm fine with that. Yeah that's good. Yeah. Some of
Speaker 1: them look at it and we're like, no, I'm not
Speaker 1: signing up for this because you you really don't know
Speaker 1: what you're signing up for the real stuff that you're
Speaker 1: signing up for until you're in it. Yeah yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean also like a cult um Yeah yeah, well all right,
Speaker 1: Uh Alexander, thank you so much for coming on and
Speaker 1: for sharing this with us. I think it's a useful
Speaker 1: look behind the curtain um that that folks need um.
Speaker 1: And this has been it could happen here. You can
Speaker 1: find Garrison on the internet. Go go go track down
Speaker 1: Garrison's fake Facebook account. You know what goes do that
Speaker 1: you can't? You can? I I have I have made
Speaker 1: up possible specifically for this reason, a cop wife group
Speaker 1: with Harrison should be and Vanessa so we could discuss
Speaker 1: our husband's careers. Hey, for all you know, you may
Speaker 1: cause the de radicalization of a cop. Yeah, or Garrison
Speaker 1: just gets really weirdly into role playing as the wife
Speaker 1: of Like EOD episode is over, we are done, this
Speaker 1: is I am pulling the plug. What could Happen Here
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Speaker 1: for listening.