It Could Happen Here Weekly 70

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everybody, Robert Evans here and I wanted to let
you know this is a completion episode. So every episode
of the week that just happened is here in one
convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to
listen to in a long stretch if you want. If
you've been listening to the episodes every day this week,
there's gonna be nothing new here for you, but you
can make your own decisions. Hi. Everyone, it's just me today,

(00:28):
James again, and I'm talking today with my friend Billy
Billy Ford. Billy is a program off SIR for the
Burma team at the United States Institute of Peace. And
do you want to say hello Billy James. Hi, thanks
for tuning it. Yeah, thanks for joining us without a
decent introduction. If I summed up right, what you do
get I want to get that wrong. So people will

(00:50):
have heard Billy before and heard from Billy when we
finished our last series on them, where we spoke about
the funding that the pdfc using and how they're using
a lot of unique and really innovative methods to continue
to support their revolution when they're not getting very much
at all in the way of international support, and certainly
nothing compared to countries like Ukraine. But what we wanted

(01:12):
to talk a little bit about today was the s
A C or the Hunter's attempts at kind of staging
a sham election, which they've sort of backed off on.
Can you explain a little bit about what they had
proposed and then what they maybe what they're doing now, right, yeah, UM.
So the expectation was upon UM instigating the coupe February

(01:35):
f that UM the state of emergency would end on
UM February first, which was two days ago, UM, giving
them six months after that, uh, that period to kind
of undertake an election. And so the expectation was that

(01:56):
before August one, there would be this sort of shame
UM electoral process UM, and the the Hunter would essentially
structure of the process in such way that they they're there,
their political party, the U s DP, would prevail UM,
and that the Commander in Chief men online who runs

(02:19):
the HUNTA would ascend as he had dreamed to become
the president of the country and kind of rule in
a military dictatorship model, but under kind of these auspices
of civilian governance. So that was the expectation. But things
have changed, as you kind of alluded to. Yeah, so
they've they've said they got to extend for another six months.

(02:39):
Who's that right, that's right. UM, So they said they
would extend for another six months until August first. UM.
But then this morning they also announced a new political, Economic,
and Social objectives which includes a five point road map UM, which,
for those of you who have been following m R
for some time, is often the way that they frame

(03:00):
there UM kind of sham and circuitous approaches to civilian governance. UM.
But UM that articulates a series of reforms, restoring law
and order, you know, social development, implementing a peace process,
and then holding elections UM. And this is I think

(03:22):
indicates to most people that elections are very unlikely to
occur any time in the near future. UM. They did
something almost identical in two thousand and four articulating a
roadmap to democracy, and that didn't really start until two
thousand and ten, UM, where when there were elections and

(03:43):
there weren't really meaningful ones until UM. This is kind
of an indication to I think a lot of folks
that UM, elections are unlikely this year and that there's
kind of a long road ahead. UH. The interesting element
of this will be to see how the the hunter's
kind of enablers in the international community, including Thailand, China,

(04:07):
and India in particular, how they will respond, in part
because they were pushing the SAC very hard to undertake
these elections as a potential off ramp to the horrifying
violence that is UM that resulted from the coup and um,
you know, all the atrocities that the SEC has committed.
Maybe we could talk a little bit about the the

(04:28):
international support they have, because it's still quite significant and
like especially in terms of propping up their military force
through the use of air power they can and they
don't have domestic like fighter yet manufacturing, right, So can
you talk a little bit about that, Like I think
they received a couple more planes very recently, right, Yeah,

(04:49):
from um the Chinese. UM. Yeah. There. It's kind of
an interesting dynamic whereby you have a an entire country
of fifty three ish million p bowl UM fighting against
a tiny military institution of about five thousand or fewer
UM if you include their families and all the medics, UM,
and that tiny institution is being supported by just a

(05:12):
handful of countries UM. As I said, kind of China Russia, UH,
to a certain agree, Indian and Thailand UM and a
few others UM. And the vast majority of the world
is kind of opposes this military takeover and the subsequent
dictatorship and all the her indoc atrocities that they've committed. UM.
And so there's quite a lot of international actors who

(05:33):
are providing kind of UM rhetorical support to the resistance
and some you know, support to civil society and humanitarian
assistance and others. But you know, on balance, the support
that the Chinese, Indians, Russians in particular UM have provided
in terms of material assistance to the s A c UM,

(05:56):
as well as the diplomatic assistance that the Chinese provide
at the secure the Council in particular, but also the
Ties provide UM with an ascion, is you know for
outweighs the rhetorical and small material assistance at the West
and UM. You know other supporters of the resistance movement
have provided UM. So Yes, to answer your question, the

(06:18):
you know, the Chinese and Indians continue to provide material
military assistance to the s A c UM. And you know,
my question is kind of what is there theory of
change here and how will UM supporting the sac militarily
lead to anything like stabilization. It's just kind of perplexing

(06:40):
to me when both countries are very UM interested in
in in supporting UH a level of functional stability so
they can undertake their economic and geopolitical objectives UM, many
of which go through my Mr UM. I just don't
really understand how they see kind of a military victory Bray,
the s A c is a pathway to stabilization when

(07:02):
you have an entire nation that has risen up against
UH the dictatorship and has wholly rejected it and demonstrated
that they're willing to make the these incredible sacrifices to
UM to ensure that this coup does not succeed. Yeah,
it is. It's very perplexing because like it's not in

(07:23):
in any sort of conventional sense like a consolidated regime
and no show any chance of being one. Right, Like,
it doesn't even have territorial control of a large sways
of the country that they claims. Yeah, exactly, and you're
you're even hearing this. I mean, there's been quite a
bit of research, contested research that that shows the HUNTA

(07:43):
has less than fifty control, but even today you are differ.
Yesterday you heard from an online the the Hunter Leader
UM that he's now admitting that they um only have
sixty percent control, which is a pretty sangular analysis of
what they control. Um, it's probably much smaller than that.
But you know, them demonstrating that they do not have

(08:05):
UM control over of the country as a pretty staggering
proposition and kind of indication to their allies that, UM,
you know, they just don't have the capacity to administer
a country that's unwilling to be pacified and um so
and and you know, on top of that, there's very

(08:26):
little I just don't see a pathway in which they
will capture more territory. UM. I mean they have, you know,
constrained resources. Um they have. I think they had twenty
two entrants into the Defense Service Academy last year. I
mean there's when they when there's casualties on the front lines,
you just there's not a lot of replacement happening. UM,

(08:48):
they're not able to get spare parts for their Russian
made helicopters. You know, there's just major material constraints that
the s a c. S. Military is facing, and it's
just hard to imagine that they will ever regained much
more than you know, what they say is territorial control. Yeah,
it's it's very if Then if we look at the

(09:08):
PDF by comparison, and I got banned from Twitter last
week for posting a picture of them, but it's there.
Their equipment compared to even a year ago, is vastly improved.
Like I don't know if you saw the one group
of guys with it actually international rifle, but I have
no idea where that came from, but it it's very

(09:29):
impressive that they have one. Yeah, yeah, it's kind of um. Honestly,
the resilience of this movement is partly a testament to
the ingenuity and innovation UM. I mean we saw it
in the beginning in the non violent action, demonstrating or
kind of deploying tactics that we've never seen before that
have you know, been lessons to other international non violent

(09:51):
movements around the world, just really creative fundraising tactics, as
you and I have discussed in the past. But yeah,
now it's the military ingenuity. I mean essentially creating UM
facilities for retrofitting drones for aerial attacks. Um. One of
the military's helicopters was taken down this morning. I haven't

(10:14):
I don't know exactly what weapons were used in that,
but you know, it's just kind of a level of
innovation given that these you know, the PDFs and most
of the eras have have very little access to very
few um kind of international um, you know, arms markets.
So the fact that they're able to sustain themselves at

(10:37):
all and maintain this, you know, which is probably much
more um of the territory is is kind of an
incredible testament to their innovation ingenuity. Yeah, it's this a
couple obviously of several PDF fighters who I keep in
touch with, and like they they've spoken to me about
like first or three D printed guns, which we've spoken
about extentively, but also torna CA's night vision goal goals,

(11:01):
even process is like like limbs people who have lost legs,
right to land, minds and things. So like, it's amazing
that they've set up all these things which normally require
like a massive interaction with the state and with an
international system, and they've done it using in this case,
the Internet and a three hundred dollar printer. They've got
an early Express or something. Yeah, it's incredible, Yeah, it's

(11:23):
it's extremely sort of inspiration on that sense, but also
very sad like I want to talk a little bit
about the s a C seems to have It's not
fair to say they've pivoted to war crimes, because it's
been kind of integral to what they've done from the outset,
but they seem to have given up on trying to
make like targeted strikes against the military formations and just

(11:45):
pivoted to dropping bombs on civilians. Could you talk about
a couple of those, like maybe we could talk about
the Kitchin music cultural festival that they bombed, or well
one of the other examples of that. Yeah, there's definitely
been a ship if from UM a strategy of essentially
augmenting UM or providing air support to UH kind of

(12:10):
exposed frontline light infantry to a tactic of targeted air
strikes against civilian targets and against UM armed organization headquarters
which had UM under previous UM negotiations been deemed like
off limits, but UM it seems as if there's nothing

(12:32):
off limits now. They bombed UM the Chin National Front's headquarters,
which is right on the India Chin border, UM on
the western part of the mr UM and there's pretty
reliable accounts that there were UM, there were bombs that
landed in Indian territory. UM. I mean, as you reference,

(12:54):
they there was a bombing in um a Chin state
on a on a festival, killing least sixty civilians. They've
done something similar on um Uh ethnic armed organization headquarters
in the southeastern current territories, including the our acount of
armies facilities in those areas. So there has been a

(13:16):
shift in tactic to UM targeting headquarters facilities in that sense,
and as you said, kind of civilian targets to I
don't know, you know, this is just the modus operandi
of an institution that is devoid of humanity and UM
so alienated from society that they you know, they're they're

(13:39):
willing to go to any ends to kind of protect
themselves and their control of power. I think, particularly now
that they've seen that the public is against them, and
UM probably quite concerned that if they are unsuccessful in
this military endeavor that they will be kind of strung up,
you know. So it's UM, I think it's kind of

(14:00):
a sign of desperation and as you mentioned, kind of
a tactical shift. Maybe we should explain the sort of
four cut strategy which has been a long term strategy
even before the coup of the military, and what that
means and how that sort of provide I guess, I
don't know, like a moral framework, maybe a certain way
that you know that it's it's not like they started

(14:21):
doing this ship in February one, right like that, this
is what this is how they do stuff. I mean,
this is an institution that's been at war with its
own people for seventy years. Um. Yeah, I mean the
there is an underlying philosophy of the more military that
that they essentially are the protectors of national sovereignty and

(14:45):
to a certain degree of protectors of the Bomar ethnic
group and Bomar Buddhism in particular. And um, this is
a deeply in trance philosophy within the UM military establishment.
And UM it's been to a certain degree of fairly
compelling narrative for retention and institutional solidarity, which is why

(15:08):
in some part I mean, it's one of the reasons
there are a number why this the s A C.
And the the sit that memory military is has been
resilient to UM collapse, despite you know, being extremely incompetent
and UM very isolated UM and virtually never having one
a war despite being at war for seventy years and

(15:30):
having structural and military a vantages UM. And so this
is kind of underlying the justification and the moral philosophy
of this institution that is morally UM corrupted. But as
you said, their UM tactical strategy is essentially one of
social isolation, division UM and ensuring as much human suffering

(15:54):
as possible so as to UM pacify a population into
submissi sh in. And so essentially the strategy is to
kind of cut communications and food supply and um uh
connections between communities and these sorts of things, which is UM.
For for a very long time, the military strategy has

(16:14):
been one of divide and conquer, in which they've UM
attempted to exacerbate divisions between ethnic and religious minority communities
to ensure that they would not face a united front.
And so the incredible challenge and opportunity of the current
resistance movement is one in which the MIAM or military

(16:35):
is no longer at the table in conversations with one
another UM, and they are trying to build cohesion with
one another and Frankly, this is where there's unbelievable progress
that I don't think it's enough attention and appreciation that
there's meaningful changes in behavior in terms of the bomar

(16:57):
majority of the communities, posture towards ethnic and religious minorities,
and you know, communication and coordination across um institutions that
had historically been at odds and happy to go more
into that, but yeah, the strategy of divide and conqueror
is really front and center. Yeah, and ironically, by pushing

(17:18):
that so high that they've they've done the complete opposite,
which is forced people to form like a popular front
against them. Yeah, let's talk about that, because I find
it really fascinating how like even how like e A
O s and PDFs are kind of vaguely underneath a
unified command at this point. And again, let's talk about
how those barriers which existed for so long a sort

(17:39):
of gradually breaking down now yeah, rapidly. I guess one
of the ways in which there's been a meaningful shift
has been just kind of the individual experiences of the
military's atrocities. I mean, um, I think in your previous
episode with Gantomo, he had indicated that ps uh. You know,

(18:00):
public perception of Rohenja has shifted somewhat, although it's kind
of questionable whether it's a durable shift and whether it's
meaningful and all that. But um. He had attributed that
shift in part to the fact that the Bomar majority
Buddhist population is now experiencing frankly, some of the forms
of atrocity that the Rohenja had experienced, you know, in

(18:20):
the seventies and the nineties and then in seventeen UM
when things escalated to genocide. So I think this is
one of the shifts, is that the in the Burmese heartland,
in the area where the military recruits most of its soldiers, um,
they are undertaking the most arguably the most um extreme atrocities,

(18:40):
burning villages to the ground, um, you know, just horrendous
stuff that like I don't even want to say on
the air, but just um, you know, just an incredible
campaign of terror. Um. In part because the people's defense
forces and the resistance forces are are extremely strong there
and only strengthening and respond to these atrocities. So I

(19:01):
think that's one of the dynamics is that there's um,
there's been a shift in perception because of UM, because
of the Hunter's behavior. Another is that, frankly, there's just
a massive political shift at play. I mean, you have,
you know, February one, the National League, like Nationally for
Democracy Led Government is deposed and they don't necessarily have

(19:22):
arms or an experience of military combat, whereas the ethnic
armed organizations have been fighting for seventy years against the
central government, including the National League for Democracy Led Government.
And so there is a shift in power at that
moment um that you know, shift power from the BAMAR
Center to ethnic minority communities in a in a particular way.

(19:43):
So UM, that kind of open space for greater humility
and greater dialogue and UM, you know, willingness to make
concessions to ethnic and religious mi arty communities. UM. And
that isn't there's actually been tremendous progress there. So there's
the National Unity Consultative Council, which is you know, probably
the most important dialogue platform, but one one that is

(20:05):
very focused on big picture governance challenges UM and long
term kind of national dialogue processes. But UM, there's been
some good progress there. But frankly, the most progress has
been made in UM military and governance coordination platforms. So
this includes the C three C, which is essentially a

(20:27):
command of control platform that's between the National Unity government
and ethnic armed organization leadership where they're coordinating military strategy
and tactics. So that and there's been considerable trust building
through those sorts of operations. And similarly, there's been trust
building in you know, basic things like coordinating humanitarian assistance

(20:51):
or UM local administration or policing these sorts of things.
UM where there's UM, you know, there's a problem that's
needs to be solved in the near term, and we
can come together to solve it collaboratively and in that
process sort of build understanding and trust with one another.
So UM, there's been really meaningful differences I've seen in

(21:12):
terms of cohesion across traditional lines of intercommunal division. UM.
Obviously a long way to go, but this is a
lot of what what we're working on at the U
S and stitutent piece and UM that the U S
Government is supporting is trying to support the resistance capacity
to chart a viable pathway to stabilization, and a lot

(21:32):
of that relies upon building cohesion and trust among resistance groups. Yeah,
everyone I spoke to maybe not everyone I spoke to
is Mama, some people Karen UM, and some of them
were some of the people we've spoken to that remotely
or ranger. UM. All of them said that what has

(21:52):
to come out of this is like a federalized democracy.
Do you think that that's that's likely? And what does
that look like in the country it's been a war
with itself for most of the century. Yeah, I mean,
clearly this is a question that needs to be answered
by them people. UM. And I think the National Unity
Consultative Council is a good platform for having this discussion.

(22:15):
But there is a number of free requisits for for
having that discussion is and one of them is kind
of new norms of dialogue based on trust and mutual
um respect. But yeah, I think that, um, the only
viable pathway to stability is you know, is one that

(22:37):
results in a federal democratic system in which subnational federal
units have a degree of autonomy UM, and in which
there is a baseline of equality. UM. There's rule of law,
independent judiciary, UM. You know, just the basic fundamentals that
ensure protections of minority populations. Uh. UM. You know. Another

(23:01):
challenge being that even you know, within states like Kachin State,
where you know, the Kachin at the community is an
ethnic minority at the national level, but there are also
subminorities that you know, like the Shawnee population, and and
there's concerns that you know, there may um there needs
to be productions for the minorities within the minority state.
So you know, all of these things need to be

(23:22):
sort of worked out. And this is of course like
a maybe a decade long national dialogue process that will
ultimately culminate in a new federal governance structure, a new
security structure that you know, maybe doesn't have a federal
you know, a union level military with the level of
autonomy or political involvement that you know has played this

(23:44):
country for so long. But this is really like the
key to long term peace and stability in the country.
And frankly, like it felt a long way off under
the NLD administration. I mean, they were making a lot
of progress in a lot of ways, but you know,
building a just and inequitable governance structure in which ethnic

(24:04):
and religious minorities had a voice and didn't feel oppressed
by the dominant but mor Budhist population. Um. Frankfully, it
was it was quite a ways off, and this, you know,
as horrible as the coup has been, it is definitely
a shock to the system that may open up new
pathways for dialogue, um, new opportunities for trust building, and

(24:26):
you know, the opportunity to you know, think about a
new model of governance that is you know, more just
more equitable and more inclusive. Yeah, it's definitely bought in
a whole generation of younger people who like aren't sort
of why didn't come through the institutions that created the
old regime and just came at this. It's like I'm
seventeen and I'm bucking angry and like, I'm going to

(24:47):
make this better sort of however I can. And yeah,
they're they're really, i mean obviously very inspirational and then
fascinated to talk to I wonder, like, how do you
see the end to this conflict? Because we're still a
long way from either side having a definitive military victory. Right, Certainly,

(25:08):
all these big cities are still more or less controlled
by the Hunter, and that's there's not an immediate way
that I can foresee them not being that way. So
if I could ask you to like speculate a little
bit or look at the way things are going. How
do we get out of the situation where the hunters
bombing schools and music concerts and right, um m hmm,

(25:29):
it's yeah. This is honestly like I think everyone is
kind of lost, um in our attempts to make predictions
of where this is going. Um. Honestly, I don't know
that there is a path to a military victory for
either side here. UM. I mean it seems pretty unlikely

(25:51):
that you'll SEEPDS marching on nepied on capturing the Ministry
of Defense anytime soon. Um. But equally unlikely that the
s a C will consolidate, you know, control of the country.
I mean, that's just that's just not going to happen. UM.
So I mean the the a lot of our work

(26:13):
is thinking through the best postile outcomes and increasing the
probably trying doing the work to try to increase the
probability of those outcomes. And I think the um, this
is where it's just like I have questions for a
lot of the international actors that are supporting the s
a C because I I just don't know of any
possible pathway to peace and stabilization that goes through a

(26:35):
stronger s a C. It just seems unfathomable. Um, But
you know, there are pathways to stabilization that go through
a stronger resistance movement that either yields some radical transformation
of the SACS composition and then some sort of dialogue
process UM or you know, just a very very extended

(26:59):
uh um conflict in which you know, the resistance holds
territory UM in some parts of the country, the SAC
controls some other areas UM. Over an extended period, the
ethnic armed organizations contain kind of UM act more and
more autonomously. And you have areas in you know, Kachin
and Wa Ho Kong and the Chinese border re kind

(27:22):
state that kind of gained a bit more autonomy and
sort of act more independently of one another. So like
this sort of fragmentation process. And honestly, if if there
is an election, you know, a sham election by the
s a C, it seems to increase the probability of
this fragmentation scenario. Um. You know, it increases the probability

(27:44):
that the s a C just maintains its presence in
the in the urban areas and then rekind state Kachin
State Waw State, these kind of become more autonomous regions,
Chin State, UM, and they start to operate as some
independent states. So honestly, that's that's part of why I
feel like support to the SAC. Not only is it

(28:07):
sec for the elections, I should say, not only does
it almost definitely increase violence because you know the elections
are a target, but also it increases the probability of
national fragmentation UM. And it doesn't do anything to increase
the probability of stability. So I just don't I don't
really see that that being a pathway to any form

(28:32):
of stability or ending the SACS bombings of schools. Yeah,
I think it gives them this way talking point bit
at the Russian shamow elections in the dom Bass, like
like because we saw like I think it was a
mobi a PDFU. I don't know if you saw this,
but they did a drive by and shot some people
who were polling for it out doing some kind of

(28:52):
election stuff, and obviously that gives them this kind of oh, look,
our election workers are being attacked with terrible people. The
PDFs a kind of but you know, if you've spent
more than ten minutes your entire life reading about Miama,
then you're realized that that's the false claim. The international
community just just doesn't seem to care to a large
degree about the trustees in Miama, about the revolution in Miama,

(29:17):
about the cou and miam A certainly doesn't care in
the same way that it cares about what's happening in Ukraine. Right,
it doesn't care with man pads and tanks and guns
and training and all the things that could bring this
water an end much more quickly. Do you think that
that will change or it's just going to be Burmese
people liberating Burmese people because the world doesn't care about

(29:40):
them or it doesn't care in a material fashion. Yeah,
I think there's like, yeah, I think there's um sort
of like two dynamics that player. One is that, yeah,
people care a lot less than Ukraine or Tiwan or
other geopolitical interest. They see this to a certain level

(30:00):
as a domestic issue that doesn't have regional implications, something
that we're very focused on demonstrating is totally untrue. Um.
And the other thing is that people don't know what
to do. And like I mean, even um, the US
Congress just past the Burma Act, which is a piece
of legislation that essentially signals congressional interest in Burma and

(30:23):
more to be done UM, alongside appropriations and resources to
support it. UM. The challenge now is figuring out what
is the best use of resources. And I think that
UM countries like Japan and UM, honestly some U states,
you know, Ascan states. It's more they are very uncomfortable

(30:45):
with the engaging with revolutionary actors and there's just not
a lot of certainty as to how to help because
there's like, okay, military assistance UM to the end eu G.
It's like there's a lot of concern that you know,
you know, significant expansion of arms access in the countries.

(31:07):
You know, you have this mass proliferation of weapons. You
have you know, concerns about post conflict warlordism or weapons
and resources getting into the hands of narco traffickers. UM.
You know, there's just a lot of uncertainty, and so
there's not an adequate given what the first point that
this is really a kind of peripheral regional matter in

(31:29):
the eyes of some UM. It yields a very low
risk tolerance and uncertainty as to what to do. And
so this kind of has resulted in a couple of things,
one being that the buck is just passed to multilateral
institutions like ACON. I mean, I think China has done

(31:50):
a very effective job of ensuring nothing happens in the
international realm UM by pushing it to ascon which it
knows is incapable of doing anything meaning well. UM, and
so it's just relegated to multilateral platforms where nothing will happen.
You always have a veto from UM Highland Cambodia or
Russia and China at the n S, at the Security

(32:12):
Council UM, and so you know, it's these combinations of
factors that really challenge this thing. And even within the
U S. Government there's like a very robust inter agency
debate about exactly what is the best form of assistance,
what is the most ethical way of engaging and UM
what are risks associated with different forms of assistance to
the resistance movement UM. So I think that uncertainty plays

(32:36):
a lot into it, and so UM a lot of
what I think there's a lot of value that could
be added if UM the resistance movement can come together,
essentially around a common set of requests from the international community.
Essentially saying this is what we need, um to be effective.

(32:56):
And you know you, based on your risk tolerance, help
us as you can. But we're demonstrating to you that
we have we're unified in these ways, we have these needs,
and um, you know, help us however you feel is
most appropriate given your risk tolerance. So I don't know,
it's incredibly complicated. I think them having China, India, Bangladesh,

(33:21):
Thailand and Laos as your neighbors also makes this just
incredibly challenging. You can't access the country in the way
that you can um for Ukraine. Um, so just logistically,
it's incredibly challenging. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, it does seem
still like like you said, like it's like in Ukraine,
we also have deeply problematic groups who we are, who

(33:43):
we are arming, And yeah, it's it's ironic that their
concern is spreading the preventing the proliferation in arms, and
what they've done is helped like a giant leap forward
in I don't artisanal homemade weapons technology, like we're probably
only seeing the very tip of and like our reporting, like,
I'm sure that's more stuff that we'll see as time

(34:06):
goes on. And but I wonder what can people do?
People often ask like if where they can donate, how
they can help, right, because obviously it is extremely difficult
to see little kids getting shot in schools and want
to do something. And I wonder what you would suggest
for people who are looking to help. We've both spoken
to people who are collecting money through click to donate,

(34:28):
which is one thing people can do. But um, do
you want to explain that, actually explain how people can
and can participate in click to donate? I think that's cool. Yeah,
I mean there's been a number of really fascinating fundraising models. Um. Yeah,
the click to notating model is essentially the resistance leveraging
what it has um a comparative advantage in which is

(34:49):
huge numbers of people on their side. And essentially, um,
the resistance creates creates web pages or YouTube content or anything,
and you know, just engages the advertisements on those pages,
which create increases the value of those that ad space
and then they can kind of generate revenue that way. Um.
The National Unity government has also done some really fascinating

(35:11):
stuff issuing bonds, uh, conducting a lottery, um, selling off
you know s a c military properties. I think they
just sold the mini on a lines house and yangon
for a considerable amount UM. So it's kind of a
an incredible fundraising model and requiring tremendous innovation. They also

(35:35):
created uh a financial technology called and u g pay
and a digital current currency d mmk um. So yeah,
it's it's kind of a remarkable um innovation there. Um.
In terms of what kind of a uh your listeners
could do, I think, UM, you know, I think engaging

(35:57):
in UH so of the international kind of advocacy and
awareness raising is really valuable. I think some of these
things like if you know, if you're a congress person
acknowledges demand for this, then that can increase that the
pressure that they put on the State Department, d D,
National Security Council UM and potentially increase the risk tolerance

(36:19):
of the US government if if there's just more pressure there.
So those sorts of things I think, UM. Honestly engaging
with some of the content that's being that's being created
by the resistance, learning about my mr um, you know,
just just following the story. I mean it's like, I
don't know, you've probably experienced this doing your reporting, but

(36:42):
it's just like the most unbelievable stories of human resilience
and just like, I don't know, it's it's such like
an honor to be nearby these people who are just
risking so much for such a for such an honorable
pos that they truly believe in. It's just like the

(37:03):
quintessential example of integrity and um, yeah, goodness, Yeah, it's amazing.
It's stuff you couldn't make up, and like it's stories
you can sell as fiction almost like yeah, their integrity,
like even they're like and one thing I find absolutely amazing,
Like you said, perspectives on ethnic groups have changed on

(37:23):
so many things that people they're willingness to be like,
I've examined my stance on this and it was the
wrong stance, and I'm changing my stance on this. It's
like we spoke to so many young people who were like, yeah,
I was fairly misogynist, like a February first one, and
since then, like I fought alongside women. I've you know,

(37:46):
I've seen them do things that I didn't. I've been
told that they weren't capable of and I've changed I
was wrong, and like we need to not be a
misogynist country going forward. Yeah, no, there was I was
maybe you know this group, but I was engaging with
organization and that was it's led by kind of an activist,
former activist um and he was kind of saying that
they've essentially tried to eliminate all of the sort of

(38:10):
misogyny in their in their training protocols, like even just
using terms like man up or something. It's like wiped
it from their approach because it's like that's a misogynistic
kind of you know, approach to thinking about strength and power.
And so it's like what you're saying is I'm here,
I'm feeling the same hearing the same things. It's which

(38:31):
is incredibly powerful given particularly given the pressures and what
they're all going through, just having the wherewithal to kind
of like their head ups and think about, you know,
be reflective of themselves. Like imagine in the American political discourse,
people actually changing their minds for once. It's remarkable. Yeah, yeah,
the genuine is. And it's it's refreshing in that sense

(38:52):
to see people like wanting the right thing and not
letting tiny differences like blow them into seven thousand different pieces, right,
the broad date ring on one thing, yeah, exactly, And
that's kind of the remarkable. I mean the Nationally Unity
Consultative Council for example. You know, it's how its challenges
UM as a dialogue platform, but it's still going and
that is like people are still coming to the table.

(39:13):
And frankly, it's remarkable because repeatedly, in quote unquote peace
processes in MR history, they've collapsed because you know, someone
said something and you know another party left the table
um and didn't return. So the fact that these dialogues
are continuing on is an incredible testament to people's willingness

(39:35):
to kind of open up and be more humble and
kind of consider the other's opinion and question their own,
which is you know, a lesson we could all learn. Yeah, yeah, definitely, Billy,
where can people like, where can people find you online?
And where can they find more good information about my
mba UM I am. You know, if you search Billy

(39:57):
Ford at us I P dot org, you and find
the stuff I've written recently, and then I'm on Twitter
at b I L L E. The number four, the
letter d UM and good sources of information. I mean
there's great UM investigative work by Myanmar witness UM which
is just an incredible group of researchers. Um, there's been

(40:21):
a couple of good reports recently by Global Witness and
Earth Rights related to sanctions that just came out. Um
U s I P. You can check out some of
our writing. My colleagues Jason Tower in Brasilo Coop just
published something related to how the conflict has regional consequences
that could be of interest. Um and UM there's I

(40:43):
don't know, there's innumerable great um meam R think Tanks,
the Chin Human Rights Organization has done some incredible research
and reporting about military atrocities and Chin state. Um. You
could go on and on, but um. Yeah, if you
don't know, check out my Twitter. I've I tend to
repost stuff that I find fascinating and there's there's a

(41:03):
lot out there. Yeah. Great, Well, thank you so much
for giving us some of your time this afternoon. I
really appreciate it. It's good to catch up. Yeah, thanks
for having me. James has been great, no worries, Hello

(41:27):
and welcome to It could happen here once again hosted
by myself and Drew. As you know, we talked about whatever.
We've entered a new year, so you know, Happy New
Year by the way, James, I don't think I told you.
Oh yeah, Happy New Year, Andrew. Yeah. What I've in
question this time is carrying over from some of the
discussions we had in the previous year, because you know,

(41:47):
time moves forward. Uh, And with time moving forward, hopefully
to know it, it becomes excreasingly necessary, very very necessary
to interrogate into uproot a lot of the classical capitleists
I ideas embedded in a world, an ideology, for example,
it just won't die, that idea of development, despite as

(42:12):
many critics over the past few decades, despite the colonizing
and post clear nations, people of those nations you know,
rallying against such projects of development due to the harms
they've caused socially environments and otherwise, this ideology, this idea
of development, just won't die. Um. But here we are,

(42:37):
and I think at least here in this podcast, among
the audience of this podcast, we can agree that the
time has come for some kind of alternative. Maybe some
kind of alternative can happen here, you know, a different view,
a new path you all frecurrently have and stage right
when vere are you familiar with the concept, I'm not

(42:58):
actually no, we fun to learn about all right, well, fantastic,
So you could ask anything any questions you have about
it as I go along. So a lot of the
early concepts related to this idea of when Vivie arose
in reaction to the classical economic development strategies that have
ripped through communities in their environments. I'm talking of course

(43:18):
about acts of inclosure, prioritization, new life, new liberalization, economic
imperialisms and so forth. Capitalism and its element basically government
projects that lyne the pockets of politicians and bureaucrats, development banks,
quote and quote that really never seemed to fund the
people directly. When Revere draws from this heritage, a heritage

(43:42):
of indigenous communities, uh, particularly in South America, in some cultures,
they have no concepts analogous to the modern western capitalist
concept of development. Of course, modernis and coots. There's no
concept of a linear life, a linear time, even with

(44:02):
a foreman subsequent state. And so the idea of underdevelopment
and development of primitive and advance just does not mesh
with that ontology. And all these and these concepts of
wealth and poverty, no are they are necessarily concepts of
wealth and poverty as we understand them based on the
accumulational lack of material good I've said when revere probably

(44:25):
a dozen times by now. The question is what is
when revere? In Latin America, the concept of gen vivere
or good life or good living provides new alternatives to development. UM,
and it's very nstitute. I feel like, I feel like
it's something that we should have been working on for
a really long time. UM. You know, like me personally,

(44:48):
I don't know what you James, but I really care
about GDP growth or increase in return on investment. You know,
I care about living a good life. I care about
gen vivere. And so I think the name of the
philosophy itself and the name of the concept itself automatically
gets you to ask the question what is a good life?

(45:08):
And the answer, the beauty of the answer is that
you decide that, I decide, that we decide that our
communities decide that collaboratively. The good life is not some
sort of policy proposal or government project or development initiative.
For imposition, the good life is a pluralistic concept. Is

(45:32):
when nos contrivers it's a different ways of living well
together it's not a single homogeneous or unrealizable good life.
It's not like this single homogeneous pursuit of profit that
our entire system is built around. Now now the good
life when revere, it's more about people living well together
in a community, in different communities living well together, and

(45:55):
individuals and communities living well with nature. And that these
concepts sound familiar, it's because you know, they must have
heard it from other places. It's a it's a trend
we're starting to see around the world in this twenty
centery and even prior to then. Uh, these ideas are
solely gained one more esteem as time goes on. Um.
You know, the ideas presence in social ecology, The idea

(46:17):
is present in various animals, tomtologies, and they're really being
brought to the forefront in this time because we need
them now more than ever. Despite efforts of Western forces
primarily to erase and to redact and to confine these
ideas and these contexts of the realm of irrelevance or

(46:39):
backwardsness or superstition, they endure in sometimes new forms, as
with gen Revere. What Reviere is about quality of life,
but also molso the idea that quality of life I
will well be in as individuals. It's only possible within
a community. The community, which as I mentioned includes the

(47:00):
floor and flour that's surround us and in many ways
that can be interpreted, which is the real beauty of it.
So as a concept, you kind of look at wend Revere.
It's two word phrase and it's also a double barrel
of a concept. It's a two for one package of
both criticism of the classical western capitalist notion of development

(47:22):
and an alternative to that Eurocentric tradition but onto indigenous
traditions plural and so that two for one package within
that and you can really unpack that package and see
that you know, you see the idea of the same
sort of basis that the growth is getting its critique
from the same sort of ideas being shared. And in

(47:45):
terms of alternatives, when you look into wend review, you
sort of see the anarchic bent that has become ever
more present in a new political imaginations over the past
few years. At least it feels that way to me.
That's um, that sort of community oriented, autonomy oriented, liberatory,

(48:08):
decoding oriented mindset is becoming more and more prevalent. Of course,
I could be you know, my own Internet biases and
algorithms present to me what I want to see. But
I would like to think that more and more people
are exploring these ideas. Yeah, it is hard to say
his because I feel the same way, Like am I
am I seeing whatever? It's like, Oh that these new

(48:30):
institutes and initiatives and programs and movements, it's so amazing
all these things are developing. And then like you talk
to somebody who is not like in this fair and
they haven't heard of any of it. Yeah, you know,
it's like they still think anarchism means, like I don't know,
throwing a breakthrough a window like that is the whole ideology.

(48:52):
And yeah, I don't know. We can hope, we can hope,
we can hope. I would like to think it's getting
more prominence, but we can only hope. And so like
so like anarkis are too keen on, you know, necessarily
submitting to earn and I gus some sense that's like
Google Vlee and sense or some kind um. But I
would like to think that anarchic ideas UM, I mean,

(49:14):
and all the exploration that I've done of um various
parts of the world however, you know, shallow my expliration
has been so far, Um, I just I see it
could be my anarchist tinted glasses seeing anarchic principles and everything.
But I see it in certain practices, in sign ideologies

(49:38):
and sign ideas and you know, ways of living. And
I think gen Vere is a sort of a recognition
of that in one sense. So there is no single
gen Vivere, right, there is no single good life, you know,
I might want. For example, my ben view might look like, uh,

(50:00):
sailing the Caribbean Sea, um, you know, touching down in
various islands and exploring the ecology therein. Or my good
life it looked like a more settled sort of homestead
existence um, or sort of a fusion of urban and
rural living. Uh, sort of a good ending for the suburbs,

(50:21):
where you're able to live in a walkable sort of
environment and community that is both not too far from
you know, the goings on of human social interaction, but
also very much rooted and connected with, um, what's happening
in the natural world. But I mean, what might your

(50:43):
good life, your ben revie look like. James, Yeah, that's interesting,
isn't it. I think, Uh, you know, I grew up
in the countryside, so with light the idea of living
in a rural area and still having community and having
like that, being like to nature, and still also being
close to people who I care about and being able

(51:03):
to look after each other. I think it's interesting how often,
like at least the sort of set like colonial concept
of rural life or the construct of real life. I
guess in America it's like, oh, rugged individualism, being on
your own one in fact, like living in the countryside,
people have to look after one another. Yeah, exactly, exactly.

(51:26):
We maintain this kind of this this false idea that
it's you against thee against the elements and crushing nature
and subjecting it to your will and all this stuff. Yeah,
And I think that's there's something interesting about at least
the people have spoken to um in various circles and stuff.
When I asked them, you know, what is your ideal life?

(51:46):
What is your good life? I don't necessarily say when viewed.
I just asked them, you know what do you want? Um?
And you dig into it? You asked him a couple
of problem questions, and people, despite ben vvie being a
pluralistic concept, people tend to generally want similar things, and
so it sort of begs the question, like, why are
we in this situation in the first please, you know,

(52:09):
because like everyone says, well, you know, I want like
an involved community, and I want like I want to
be able to grow my plans, and I also want
to be able to do my arts and uh, you know,
enjoy my time of people and do a bit of
travel and not work my whole life and that kind
of thing. People of course phrase it and frame it

(52:29):
in certain ways. And so that's why I asked the
proving questions because what might initially say, oh, well, like
I want to retire early. I want to really dig
into that means it's like I don't want to spend
my whole life working, you know. Or they might say
something like, um, you know, I want to I want
to travel a lot, so I want to like start

(52:50):
a business. When you ask them what kind of business
they want to start, why they want to start a business,
it really comes down to I want autonomy. I want
flexibility in my labor. I want to control of my
own le book kind of thing. Like yes, of course
they are people who have they couldn't qute entrepreneur spirit
who want to just be at the top of the
food chain. But then I think mostly entrepreneurs they couldn't

(53:12):
qute entrepreneurs that I've met up in people who just like, oh, well,
you know, I started selling candles because I really like
making candles and I wanted to share them with people,
and I also need to make a living and I'm
just passionate about it or whatever that kind of thing.
It's undernecessarily wanted to grow it or whatever. They just
want to be able to sustain themselves doing something that

(53:32):
they enjoy. Yeah, it's interesting because we're always sold like
every new advancing technology and in production that comes along,
like these concepts you're talking about, like like working less,
having community, all these things like always sold as what
that's going to do, right, like, but instead we end
up working more or the same amount and instead just

(53:53):
generating more income for a certain group of people. Like
we don't get any of these good things. But yeah,
there's there's always a carrot in whatever this kind of
neoliberal capitalism that we have is, but we never get
there exactly. That's the tragedy of it. Another aspect of
you know, the idea of the good life is that
it's not a static concept, right, It's not like we

(54:15):
come up with this good life that's when we here
where we want for ourselves. Now we etch it into
stone tablets and piously here to them forever like the
Ten Commandments. Like nah, you know, the good life is
supposed to be flexible when the video is what responding
to your conditions, the conditions of the community or ecology, etcetera,
and really redefineing what it means to go to live
a good life continuously, you know, in response to change

(54:36):
and circumstances, because you know changes life. Um, of course
not is this idea to good life quote unquote backward
concept so problematic fram in and of itself. But um
sometimes you have to use problematic shortcuts to community kids effectively.

(54:57):
But the yea when revideo is not like an invitation
to return to some idea like past or ide like
non past, you like nonexistent world that people are sort
of mentally constructed, as in the case of a lot
of these romanticizations you see on social media. Um, be
in video is not like some kind of religion with

(55:19):
its own rules and functions. But it's and it's not
Also it's not imposing that you must become a home
insteader or a forager, you must live in a rural
community to live a good life. There's more possibilities yet unrealized. UM.
And it should be something that is, it should be
considered something that is undergoing a constant construction and reproduction process.

(55:42):
And that's I think way of the global potential that
when review a lize UM. You know, that's why I
think there's viral potential for it. I mean, of course,
when you look at a lot of the things that
end up dominating the social media news cycle, it's a
lot of negativity UM dominating current discourse right now, I

(56:03):
think is the topic of masculinity and UM, particularly the
prevalence of ah Andrew teats and you know, UM, you
also have the constantly bubbling under the surface existence of

(56:23):
in cells UM and so and then you go on TikTok.
I don't know if you go on TikTok, James, I
don't know. That's the point I would just like anymore. Yeah,
I should have made that decision, But I mean I
kind of like TikTok because UM, I don't know how

(56:45):
other people are curiats in there their fo you pages,
but by four you pages. Um a place I enjoy
being out a bit too much, which is why I
have like limits on my phone to prevent me from
staying on TikTok for too long. But yeah, it's a
place that I enjoy way and um. You see a
lot of trends come and go on TikTok right now.
The big thing is like Niche stock and core core um,

(57:08):
which I know is is probably Greek to you, yes, um,
but in that general v and if you were to
see what those trends were, I think you get a
sense of when I'm talking about Niche shock and Corko
and then as well, so it seems to be an
attempt to um rebrand the idea of Sigma um and

(57:30):
the Sigma male. It started off as a very you know,
patriarchal thing, and then I've seen a couple of different
creators who who didn't a sort of an ironic or
a post ironic sense um as a sort of a meme,
because it became a meme to make fun of people
who take it seriously. Um. And then from that that

(57:50):
sort of mumification of it, people said reclaimed the tomb
um and then it became a sort of you see, um,
you see like a video where I, um does something
polite or something, you know, shiver us something kind and
the comments are like, um, typical sigma, true sigma, this

(58:11):
is what true signal looks like. Kind of um. So
I think it's just a national aspect that they fluid
it to you the Internet, the fickles of the interne
because I'm sure they're still they have the misogynistic Sigma people,
they still exist. But then there's also people who memes
themselves into a brand of Sigma that's kind of a

(58:32):
way pseudo positive masculinity. It's kind of interesting. Um. I'll
continue to do my TikTok anthropological research and and you know,
discuss my findings as this situation develops. But in that
vein of in that vein of comunification, and those are developments,

(58:54):
I think there is a potential of wend Vera to
become a global phenomenon, to have that Google potential, to
have a global reach because and then there's something in
it for the people. The there's also an anti work
current present in a lot of TikTok trends, so you know,
it's it's something too and again again, I see there's

(59:15):
an anti currency or the TikTok trends, but those are
the TikTok trends. I ain't being presented with the post
ironic rebrandification or whatever. Sigma is something my for you
pee has given me. It's not necessarily reflective of the
entirety of reality. And that's the scary part of the Internet, right,
Like you're not seeing the full reality, You're seeing algorithmically
produced version and skewed version of reality. Yeah, yeah, it's

(59:39):
interesting to me, how like, like most people I encounter
on a daily basis will not know what will where
me and marras and like if I look at my
Twitter page right now, it's just all like half of it.
It's in Burmese, you know, and there's lots of people
I follow and that that's like my reality. But yeah,
sort of. Then I get really frustrated when when people

(01:00:00):
don't have a clue what's going on there exactly exactly,
it's it's it's it's can't tricky. It's kind tricky because
you really in terms that they really get a sense of,
how you know, in moments like those where you confront
that in real life, it's like okay, So like my
my possession of reality is like slightly skewed by the Internet,

(01:00:22):
you know, yeah, in ways that I am aware and
not aware of, in ways that other people are aware
not aware of. So that's interesting. We're back to when review,
right when we view. I think it is also like
a path for decolonization, you know, sort of a way
to let go of a lot of the Western norms
and impositions and speech and dress and labor and lifestyle

(01:00:43):
and knowledge and social norms and relationships and ceteral and
adopting ways of life that are count for our cultures
and conditions free of those mental I think that it's
the power of when reviere. So I guess another question arises,
who or where, oh when did when review come from?
And so the radical questioning that birthedpen Revere was made

(01:01:06):
possible within several indigenous traditions in South America, which, as
I said, culturally lack tic concepts of developmental progress. And
so the contribution of indigenous knowledge brend Revere continues to
be the sort of critical threat. Associated values and experiences
and practices and worldviews of interview already existed in some

(01:01:26):
form before the arrival of um European conquistadors, but they
were of the process of qualization, silence, and marginalized and
even openly opposed. Brendeverea is part of a long leg
you see, long quest along pursuits of alternative lifestyles forged

(01:01:48):
from the passionate battles of indigenous peoples and nations seeking
new ways of life, seeking freedom from the Latin America
and the quintessential American oliga called nation state. Brutish is
of course rooted in clunialism and new liberalism, and so

(01:02:09):
we are seeing through renvivere within renvie outside of and review.
Adjacent to ren review um utopias in the making, the imagination,
the imagining of utopias of the Andes and of the
Amazon that are shaping discourses, shaping political projects, that are
shaping social and cultural and economic practice. The good life

(01:02:32):
been revere is not something that is unique to Latin America.
Of course, it has been practiced in many different epochs
and regions of this Earth. It's been known by many
different names. The concept has been known by many different names.
In Ecuador, it's known as suma um, which is a
Quechua wording for a fullness of life and community together

(01:02:53):
to the persons in nature and believia The iyemarra concept
for it is called suma kamana in the Mapuche in Chile,
and the Guarani in Paraguay, and the Kuda and Panama,
and the chu Aqua and Ecuadorian Amazon, the Maya and
Guatemala and Chiapas Mexico, and of course the African to
Ubuntu and the Indian concept of saraje. They are all

(01:03:18):
these sorts of threads of what a good life, good
life and community, radical ecological democracy and community. All of
these sort of concepts sort of threaded within developing diffront
in different forms in different contexts. However, UM the concept
has also been adopted in some sense by certain states,

(01:03:42):
most notably Bolivia and Ecuador. Recently, Bolivia, you know, rewrote
its constitution um establishing itself as a flury national state,
and they've taken it to what they quality the orban um.

(01:04:02):
They're trying to basically propose economic model that accommodates various
diverse cultural origins. In Ecuador, UM that conceptual freework is
a bit different. They take one vera and they use
it as a sort of described as a set of rights,
rights to shelter, to health, to education, to foods, the environment.

(01:04:25):
So it's less of an ethical principle, more of a
complex set of rights that are also found in Western
traditions but also include, uh, you know, the the right
to freedom, participation, communities, to protection, and to nature. Part
of that recognition of the right to nature and the

(01:04:47):
fundamental rights of water has led to the banning of
any form of privatization of water um, and also the
promotion of leaving crude oil in Ecuadorian Amazon blew the ground. Um. However,
I feel like I need to point out that I
don't believe the state is compatible with the essence of

(01:05:09):
when vere with the practice of when vere um, and
so the use of those concepts and state propaganda uh
in state rebranding efforts unnecessarily encouraging to me, doesn't necessarily
make such states the power corn so they would paint
themselves to be because to me, when vie can only

(01:05:30):
really be grassroots concepts. So I think we must be
careful of fall into that trap of accepting uh you know,
state propaganda on the good life um, you know, compromising
the concept and allowing it to be co opted or
water down. As I previously noted, I think there's a

(01:05:54):
major overlap between concept of de growth and the idea
of when Revere and both agree that one of the
fundamental problems is, you know, this idea, this constant commercialization
of societal fabric and of nature of criticism of capitalism,
this criticism of the way that progress felt an economic
growth understood and implemented um. And so they almost they

(01:06:17):
sort of complement each other, right, because I think a
criticism people who have of the growth is that as
this destructive thing, as it's negative thing, as negative freemen.
And so in a sense, when Vere and the growth
can sort of be coupled, the growth as the couldn't
quote missile wood destructive. Well, Gwen Vivere is you know,
presenting a constructive alternative. As you know, we attempt to progress,

(01:06:42):
to move away from capitalism, transitions and new systems. There's
a lot to learn with have a lot we can
learn from various non capitalist practices around the world. And
I think gen vivie um is a concept that really
tries to look at the way is a way of
harmoniously quite sisted as humans in our environment Um and

(01:07:03):
the way is that you know, a good life can
be combined with the growth efforts. There's also a measure
of fluidity present in green vivere Um that seeks balance socially, ecologically, politically, economically.

(01:07:25):
UM encompasses and encompasses within that balance people, plans, and animals.
There's not separate nature from society as found in classical
Western dualism, and that sort of perspective is necessary if
we were to move beyond the exploitation of nature for

(01:07:47):
the propos of accumulating capital cell that has really placed
us in this mess and even in that and recognized
and that we need to move beyond exploitation of nature
baked into that because we are part of nature. It's
a recognition that we need to stuff exploiting humans. They
need to recognize human beings as part of a community,
that we are not just as my individuals, that we

(01:08:10):
are in communities, that we must be part of community
used that our community is the people within them and
the lands we are part of must cooperate in harmony.
I think there's a challenge to one review. Of course
what the video is not restricted to the countryside, but
it did it did originate there. UM. I think the

(01:08:32):
challenge one review is to confront today's urban spaces where
much of humanity's population lives UM, to find ways to
deal with environment respectively and solidarity in an urban setting,
to find to conceptualize a good life for and in cities.
We can't exactly expect everybody to move to the countryside,

(01:08:53):
nor should everybody, UM, and so we need to find
ways that city life, urban I life UM can be reconstructed.
And so one potential sort of way that that has
manifested is through the Transition Towns movement, which you can

(01:09:13):
look more and to have something that interests you where
people are basically attempting to taking truth of their communities
and to survive the challenge that is climate change and
to create you know, sustainable economies and ecologies. Wherefore they
find themselves movements. It can be found in many different countries.
You know, you might even find it in your area

(01:09:34):
and your country. Look it up, UM, and it has
a lot in common with the concept of Ween Revere.
Like I said, like I feel that they're selling different
movements and ideas and philosophies, you know, sort of with
the same ideas that seemed to be feel like they're
on the rise. Ultimately, I believe wend Revere is highly

(01:09:56):
h subversive. I believe it looks not to return to
the past or to you know, get caught up in
any kind of strict rules or positions. It seeks a
good life. It seeks to oppose cleanism and its consequences,
to encourage new, more sustainable ways of living drawn from

(01:10:17):
old examples and models, and to really create horizontal society,
a cooperative society, to develop self management instead of new
forms of top down governance. UM the one that rejects
both the market and the state as solutions to our
issues and looks to ourselves. One that looks one that

(01:10:39):
rejects the markets in the state, has potential solutions, and
looks to ourselves. The idea of development is an almost
a zombie category, as some writers have described it. It's
supposed to be dead and yet it lives. And so
gwen Vivere provides an opportunity to move away from development

(01:11:05):
and look towards when it recognizes that all may never
create a perfect life, we can create a good life.
That's it thanks here, and that's really interesting. I like
that you can find me on YouTube at Andrewidsum on
to dot com slash and is called saying Drew, and

(01:11:28):
if you're so inclined, you can support me on picture
dot com slash saying Drew. This has been Andrew at
happen here with James signing off, Hello and welcome to

(01:11:53):
it could happen here. This is Sharne and today I
will be talking to you about the series of devastating
earthquakes that have happened in Turkey and Syria this week.
I am recording this the afternoon of Tuesday, February seven.
I am giving you that disclaimer because the numbers keep
changing as far as the casualties and the death toll goes.

(01:12:17):
So if the numbers are different by the time this
comes out, which they probably will be, that is why. Unfortunately,
that is the nature of disasters like this. So there's
nothing much that we can do. But let's talk about
the earthquakes themselves. First. The initial earthquake was a magnitude
of seven point eight and it happened in southeastern Turkey

(01:12:38):
early on Monday morning their local time, and it was
followed by magnitude seven point five earthquake only nine hours later.
Amidst several aftershocks. All aftershocks are individual earthquakes, but as
long as they are not stronger than the original quake,
they are considered after shocks. But the seven point five
magnitude tremor that happened after the seven point eight one

(01:13:01):
only point three of a difference. It was an unusually
strong aftershock. According to seismologists, aftershocks are typically about one
point to magnitude units lower than the original earthquake, so
if there was a magnitude eight earthquake, the aftershock would
be in magnitude seven. So this was all a very rare,
disastrous occurrence. The second earthquake was a shock notable all

(01:13:26):
on its own, as well as in relation to the
primary earthquake. As of Tuesday morning, according to the United
States Geological Survey, at least one and twenty five aftershocks
measuring four point zero or greater have occurred since the
initial seven point eight one. The frequency in magnitude of
the aftershocks are decreasing, as is expected as we get

(01:13:48):
further out from the time of the original earthquake. However,
five point zero and six point zero aftershocks are still possible,
and they bring a risk of additional damage to structures
that are compromised from the original earthquake. This brings a
continued threat to rescue teams and survivors. The aftershocks stretched
for more than four d kilometers or about two fifty

(01:14:09):
miles along the fault zone that ruptured in southern Turkey.
It stretches from the Mediterranean Sea off the northern coast
of Syria up to the province of Malatia. The initial
tremor was centered about twenty miles from a major city
and provincial capital, Gauziantep and seismologists said that this first
earthquake was one of the largest ever recorded in Turkey's history.

(01:14:33):
It was also the region's strongest earthquake. In nearly a
century nine, an earthquake of the same magnitude killed thirty
thousand people. Earthquakes of this magnitude are rare, with fewer
than five occurring each year on average anywhere in the world.
Seven earthquakes with magnitude seven point zero or greater have

(01:14:53):
struck Turkey in the past twenty five years, but the
one that occurred on Monday it's the most powerful. The
effects were also felt in the neighboring countries of Cyprus, Lebanon, Israel,
and Egypt, to name a few. But there's a reason
why earthquakes are so frequent in Turkey. Turkey sits on
fault lines, and these earthquakes in the region have caused

(01:15:15):
deadly landslides in the past. Turkey is situated on two
massive tectonic plates, the Arabian and the Eurasian, and these
meat underneath Turkey's southeastern provinces. Along this fault line, about
hundred miles from one side or the other, the earth slipped.
Seismologists refer to this event as a strike slip, where

(01:15:36):
the plates are touching and all of a sudden they
slide sideways. In a strike slip, the plates are moving
horizontally rather than vertically. This matters because the buildings don't
want to go back and forth, and then the secondary
waves begin to go back and forth as well. Because
of the nature of this seismic event, the aftershocks could

(01:15:57):
last for weeks and months. I have had to update
the death toll many many times in preparing this episode.
I am probably going to have to update it many
many more times before this comes out, but as of now,
when I am recording this, the evening of Tuesday, February seven,

(01:16:18):
the death toll is over seven thousand and nine hundred
deaths in Turkey and Syria combined, and it's expected to
rise significantly more in Syria as these days go by.
The exact number that is being reported is seven thousand,
nine hundred and twenty six people. The Syrian Civil Defense

(01:16:39):
a k a. The White Helmets said that the number
of fatalities and rebel held areas in northwest Syria rose
to a thousand, two hundred and twenty and the number
of injured people rose to two thousand, six hundred, and
these figures are expected to rise significantly due to the
presence of hundreds of families under the rubble. The White
Helmets said quote, our teams continue search and rescue operations

(01:17:02):
in difficult circumstances, and they described a tally of more
than four hundred collapsed buildings and more than one thousand,
three hundred partially collapsed buildings and thousands of others that
were damaged. Additionally, at least eight hundred and twelve deaths
have been confirmed in government controlled parts of Syria. In Turkey,
at least five thousand, eight hundred and ninety four people

(01:17:23):
are dead and thirty four thousand, eight hundred and ten
are injured, and this number is only going to continue
to rise. I don't know when it will stop. Maybe
a week from now, maybe a month. I don't know
how many more people will be unaccounted for and not
reported about. But this is what we have for now.

(01:17:46):
You've probably seen pictures or videos of the devastation that
is happening. In all the destruction. There have been really
disturbing images of the ground literally just opening up in
two and as if you can see the core of
the earth, and other videos show the collapsed buildings and
the rubble that rescuers are trying to dig underneath to

(01:18:10):
find survivors. This is one story out of many, but
a newborn baby was reportedly rescued from the rubble in Syria,
and there is a video of this. A baby girl
was rescued from the rubble of her home. Her umbilical
cord was still attached to her mother when she was found,
and her mother is believed to have died after giving birth.

(01:18:33):
One of the men that found her said, we heard
a voice while we were digging. We cleared the dust
and found the baby with the umbilical cord intact, so
we cut it and my cousin took her to the hospital.
The girl is receiving treatment at a children's hospital and
as of now, she is stable, but arrived with bruises, lacerations,
and hypothermia, and she's the sole survivor of her immediate family.

(01:18:56):
They lived in a five story apartment building that was
leveled by the quake. And again, this is one example
of the stories of thousands of people. And I think
what's important to remember is that even after someone is rescued,
they're not exactly home free. They can have many injuries
or hypothermia because it's very cold over there right now,

(01:19:18):
and their recovery is going to be brutal. And I
feel like that's a good thing to keep in mind
when you hear the word rescue, because the trauma doesn't
stop there. Almost six thousand buildings have been destroyed by
this earthquake, and this includes residential buildings, hospitals, schools, and
the damage is even more severe in northwestern Syria because

(01:19:39):
it had been in the process of attempting to reconstruct
itself since the Syrian War started in Thankfully, members of
the international community have stepped up to coordinate relief efforts
to Turkey and Syria after the powerful earthquakes. However, sending
aid to Syria is going to be difficult because there's
no central guf are meant to take care of the

(01:20:01):
multisectorial response. The Turkish government said quote, we do not
know where the number of dead and injured can go.
In Syria, rescue workers used headlamps and floodlights to work
throughout the night. Many Syrian war refugees are also in
the quick stricken area of Turkey. Turkey has taken in

(01:20:21):
three point six million Syrian refugees, more than any other country,
and this is according to the u N Refugee Agency,
which runs one of its largest operations in Gaussian Tepe,
where the first earthquake happened and again. Videos shared on
social media from Turkey and across the border in Syria
have showed destroyed buildings and rescue crews searching through piles

(01:20:43):
of rebel for survivors. Some people fled their homes in
the rain and took shelter in their cars, and governments
around the world quickly responded to Turkey's request for international assistance,
many of them deploying rescue teams and offers of aid,
which I will get into in a bit. The World
Health Organization warned that the number of casualties are likely

(01:21:05):
to increase as much as eight times as rescuers are
finding more victims in the rubble. Rescuers have been combing
through mountains of rubble and freezing and snowy conditions to
find survivors, and these freezing conditions will leave many people
without shelter, adding to the dangers. It is freezing over there,

(01:21:27):
and that obviously only makes things more difficult and more
painful and more complicated. And we always see the same
thing with earthquakes unfortunately, which is that the initial reports
of the numbers of people who have died or have
been injured will increase quite significantly in the week that follows.

(01:21:47):
The situation on the ground seems to be more disastrous
in Syria, and this is according to the country director
in Ghazian Tep for the Syrian American Medical Society Foundation.
He said it's a disaster stiss situation in both Turkey
and Syria, although Syria is more disastrous. Over a decade
of conflict in Northern Syria has fostered a poor economic situation,

(01:22:09):
to say the least, making it very difficult to respond
to the current crisis. In contrast, the situation in Turkey
is coordinated through a very well settled government and Northern
Syria unfortunately has no government that gives a shit about it.
In Northern Syria, most of the services and help are
provided by n g o s and this is due

(01:22:30):
to a long term lack of investments in early recovery
and infrastructure. One of these groups again is the White Helmets.
They were one of the main saviors or helpers ever
since the Syrians Civil war started in eleven They have
been on the ground helping and they are made up
of Syrian volunteers. And I think that's important to keep
in mind because many Syrians have relied on each other

(01:22:53):
and each other alone because they didn't receive help in
the past. And I'm going to get into later how
much the country's civil war has made things exponentially worse.
Several parts in northwestern Syria, including the city of Islab,
are still controlled by anti government rebels. This representative added
that they evacuated to maturity hospitals because of the physical

(01:23:16):
impact of the earthquake on the infrastructure and so the
question is where are these people going to go. There's
no shelter, it is freezing, and there's not enough aid
to go around. And I'm hoping the countries that have
said they will help are in the process of actually
doing so, and I'm going to get into some of
them in a moment, because I'm grateful that there's help

(01:23:40):
coming from somewhere. And amongst all this, there have been
calls to ease the Syrian border restrictions and controls for
countries to offer their aid. And again, the rebel held
on clave in northwest Syria, across the border from Turkey,
is among the areas that have been hit the worst
by this disaster. International pledges, as I said, of emergency

(01:24:02):
aid have poured in for Turkey and Syria, leading to
calls for the international community to relax some of the
political restrictions on aid entering northwest Syria. The Turkish President Aragon,
who was facing an election only a few months, said
the offers of aid to Turkey had come from forty
five countries, ranging from Kuwait to Israel, Russia and the UK.

(01:24:23):
Syria said it had received offers of help from China, Russia,
Lebanon Algeria and the United Arab Immirance. Aid from around
the world is thankfully heading towards Turkey and Syria, and
some seventy countries and fourteen international organizations have offered their assistance.
Here's a roundup of some of the latest pledges. There

(01:24:46):
is a Hungarian rescue team of fifty people, including five
military doctors and to search dogs. South Korea plans to
offer humanitarian aid worth five million to Turkey and sent
about a hundred and ten disaster relief workers a military
personnel to support its search and rescue work. You may
notice that I'm only saying they're sending aid to Turkey

(01:25:07):
and a couple of these, and I will get into
why in a little bit, But to continue, the Palestinian
International Corporation Agency will deploy seventy experts to the quake
later this week, sending two crews comprised of the Civil Defense,
Ministry of Health and the Palestinian Red Cross, as well
as doctors and engineers. There are also teams from the

(01:25:29):
Palestinian Red Crescent and they are carrying out earthquake rescue
and relief operations in the Palestinian refugee camps and the
surrounding areas in Syria. At least three Palestinian refugee camps
in Syria were struck by the earthquake. Pakistan deployed two
contingents of emergency services to Turkey. China said it will

(01:25:50):
send about five point nine million dollars worth of aid
to Turkey, while also coordinating with Syria for emergency supplies
and accelerating ongoing food aid projects. Two Israeli aid groups
chartered a special flight to Gauzi and tep on Tuesday
to bring personnel and equipment to victims. Germany's Federal Agency
for Technical Relief is sending a team of fifty recovery

(01:26:11):
experts to Turkey. The Dalai Lama committed to sending rescue
and relief efforts early today, and Taiwan increased its donation
to Turkey from two hundred thousand to two million dollars
and it dispatched about a hundred and thirty rescue teams.
Indonesia also supplied aid for Turkey. The Vice President of
Indonesia highlighted the urgency of dispatching humanitarian aid to Turkey

(01:26:35):
to return the support granted by the country to Indonesia
during their times of need over natural disasters in the past.
Canada also pledged seven point five million dollars to earthquake relief.
Egypt offered relief assistance to Syria in the wake of
this earthquake. Ukraine will send eighty seven emergency staff workers

(01:26:55):
to Turkey to assist with the relief efforts. And not
just countries, but also companies and nonprofits have offered their
help this week. For example, Amazon announced that it will
help the victims of the Turkey earthquake by donating food, medicine,
and equipment from its Istanbul warehouse. Amazon has about two

(01:27:15):
thousand employees in Turkey, and in a statement on Monday,
it said that it activated its quote disaster relief capabilities
and was preparing to donate relief items including blankets, tense food,
baby food, and medicines. Even here in the US, the
Virginia Task Force one is sending a crew of seventy
nine members and six dogs to Turkey, and there are

(01:27:38):
seventy eight members of the l A County Fire Department
who left Monday evening to Turkey. And then there's Greece,
who set aside tensions with Turkey to send aid but
helping Syria. They said is more complicated. Despite its tensions
with Turkey. Greece was among the countries that have dispatched
help to the country, but conflict torn northwest Syria makes

(01:28:01):
the same efforts more complicated, the Prime Minister said. Grace
and Turkey, he said, are quote neighbors who need to
help each other through difficult times. This is not the
first time earthquakes have struck our countries. This is a
time to temporarily set aside er differences and try to
address what is a very, very urgent situation. He continued
to explain that in Syria, however, there is no official

(01:28:24):
person or official from the government to have a dialogue with,
and no assurance that aid will make it to the
impacted area and people, and that makes relief efforts hard
to pull off. No country on its own has the
ability to actually make these sort of arrangements. That's why
I think it is important that these negotiations could take
place either through the u N or through the European

(01:28:47):
Union by pulling resources. I would not feel confident having
these sort of discussions at a bilateral level. He also
added that he has not directly communicated with Damascus. He
went on to say that quote. I want to stress this,
this is not about geopolitics, This is not about recognizing
any sort of regime. This is about saving people and

(01:29:08):
horrible conditions who desperately need our assistance. So the scale
of aid being offered is going to require a large
coordination effort as well as delicate diplomatic maneuvers to supply
aid to Syria, where the leadership of Charla said is
not recognized in the West. It's not recognized for me either,
and many Syrians feel the same way. But that is

(01:29:29):
the monster that we are currently dealing with and there's
not much we can do about that at this certain
point in time. And so, as I mentioned, the Syrian
side of the border is going to be a challenge
since the worst affected areas contain hundreds of thousands of
Syrian refugees that are locked in a war zone and
still facing attacks from Syrian government forces. Aid agencies reported

(01:29:51):
that some of the roads from Turkey into Syria were blocked,
including the main cross border crossing used by international aid agencies.
The White Helmets said hundreds of families were still trapped
in the aftermath of the earthquake. They also added that
terrible weather conditions, including freezing temperatures, had compounded the crisis,
and they're continuing rescue operations in Syria despite great difficulties

(01:30:15):
and aftershocks, they said. The White Helmets also urged the
Assad regime and Russia to refrain from military activity, and
they affected areas in order to allow international groups to
unify and help the people affected. A spokesperson from the
White Helmets said, our teams responded and until now many
families are under the rubble. Our teams are trying hard

(01:30:38):
to find all the casualties. Northwest Syria is now a
disaster area. We need help from everyone to save our people.
I think this would be a moment to take a
little break. I don't have the capacity or emotional bandwidth
to think of a clever segue. So here are some
ads and are back. We're talking about the difficulty sending

(01:31:03):
aid to Syria along the Turkey Syrian border. Last month,
actually the U N. Security Council agreed to allow aid
into northwest Syria from Turkey across one border crossing Bablahella,
surprising no one. The Syrian regime has been resistant to
allowing aid into a region serving more than four million

(01:31:24):
of its people because it regards the AID as undermining
Syrian sovereignty and reducing its chances of winning back control
of the region. Yes, that is correct. The Syrian government
doesn't want to help more than four million of its
own people because one day it wants to control them again.

(01:31:45):
Are you fucking kidding me? I? I don't understand that
malignant desire to rule over a land that you have destroyed,
in a people that you have murdered. I don't get
the fucking point. But regardless, that is one of the
many reasons why getting aid into Syria is going to

(01:32:08):
be much more complicated than getting aid into Turkey. Additionally,
Mark Locock, the former head of UN Humanitarian Affairs, said
the area's worst affected by the earthquake inside Syria look
to be run by the Turkish controlled opposition and not
by the Syrian government. It is going to require Turkish
acquiescence to aid in these areas. It is unlikely the

(01:32:31):
Syrian government will do much to help. Yes, Mark, I
think you're right. The Syrian government isn't gonna do shit,
if anything. Charles said, is probably happy seeing all these
people dying, because that's his whole mma, just to kill
the Syrian people anyway. A video from a hospital posted
by the Syrian American Medical Society showed that it was

(01:32:54):
immensely crowded. They said, our hospitals are overwhelmed with patients
filling the hallways. There is an mediate need for trauma
supplies and a comprehensive emergency response to save lives and
treat the injured. Initial needs are for tens of thousands
of tents, heaters for the tents, tens of thousands of blankets,
thermal clothes, ready to eat food, and basic first aid kits.

(01:33:17):
A UNICEF representative in Aleppo said that the hospitals in
Syria are absolutely overloaded. Hospitals are full of patients with trauma,
broken bones and lacerations, and some people are going to
the hospital to seek help for the mental trauma they
endured after the earthquake struck, The UNISEF representative Angela Kearney said,

(01:33:38):
while hospitals are functioning, the task has been overwhelming. Describing
the scene in Aleppo when the earthquake struck on Monday,
Kearnie said children who have already been traumatized by war
were bewildered. They didn't know what was happening. Kearnie said
that on Monday morning, when UNISEEF began its work in
the area, there were seven schools and a bow that

(01:34:00):
are being used as shelters. By Tuesday morning, that number
grew to sixty seven and currently it is nearly two
hundred and all of those schools that are partially damaged.
There are families there who left their apartments, left their
houses with just their pajamas, she said. She also added
that while aid is starting to go into the affected areas,

(01:34:22):
there is still a desperate need for blankets, food, clean water,
medical care and nutritional care. She said that water, sanitation
and nutrition needs are the most urgent. The aid is
starting to go in, but it is overwhelming. The needs
are very great. There are discussions under way to open
aid corridors from the government controlled parts of Syria to

(01:34:43):
the rebel held areas. Hammad Hammoud, Syria Country manager at
the Norwegian Red Cross, said that he hopes with the
help and efforts from humanitarian communities, this would happen in
the coming days, and he said currently nothing has moved there,
but there are discussions about moving aid and access to
these areas. He continued to say after being asked if

(01:35:06):
the Syrian government in Damascus has been helpful to these areas,
he said. They have stated that they are open to
cross line intervention, meaning from government held areas to these
non government held areas. They are open to it. They'reout
doing ship though obviously earlier today, the head of the
Syrian Arab Red Crescent, which described itself as an independent

(01:35:30):
and volunteer based humanitarian organization, said that the organization is
ready to immediately send aid convoys to rebel held areas,
including Islib through the u N. Hammoud added that the
humanitarian situation is worsening. He said, we are in a
race against time. In describing the rescue and search operations,

(01:35:51):
Hammoud said that due to the lack of machinery, most
of the work on clearing the rubble is done by
hand and the cold weather conditions are not helping. He
also added that the buildings are already weakened because of
eleven years of war. In addition to the thousands of
people that have been lost to this tragedy, there are
also some cultural sites that have been permanently damaged in

(01:36:12):
both Turkey and Syria. UNESCO, the United Nations Cultural organization,
said it's going to provide assistance following the cultural site damage,
UNESCO said that it is particularly concerned about the situation
in the ancient city of Aleppo, which is on the
list of World Heritage and Danger. It added that the
citadel had significant damage, the old city wall has collapsed,

(01:36:36):
and several buildings and the sux have been weakened. In
the Turkish city of the yad Beka, UNESCO lamented the
collapse of several buildings. The city is home to the
World Heritage Site, the Yabukat of Fortress and the he
cl Gardens cultural landscape, which is an important center of
the Roman, sun Acid, Byzantine, Islamic and Ottoman periods. The

(01:36:58):
organization says it is mobilizing experts to establish a precise
inventory of the damage with the aim of rapidly securing
and stabilizing these sites. Aleppo was also one of the
city's worst damaged by the Syrian regime. It is a beautiful,
beautiful place. Everything that the regime has destroyed was a beautiful,

(01:37:21):
beautiful place. Aleppo had a lot of history, though, and
that region is just home to so much history, and
it's just really heartbreaking to know the extent of the
loss that doesn't just include lives. In talking to my
mom and my family about this, the sentiment seems like

(01:37:44):
it's the same that it's been for the past decade. Essentially,
Syrians don't have a government. There is no government. Assad
in his regime doesn't care about the Syrian people. My
mom literally said, we have no one. We've known this
for years, no one helped us. Syrians are the ones

(01:38:05):
supporting each other. The White Helmets is a great example
of this. One of our family's friends on the ground
in the city of Hamma, which is where my mom
is from, was saying that it was absolute chaos. Everyone
is in the streets and no one is daring to
go back inside their homes. Another person was telling us
about his experience, and he said, I was asleep and

(01:38:27):
felt the earthquake start in my bed. My son was terrified,
and I went to hug my son. I kept telling
him it'll be over soon, It'll be over soon, and
then the roof started crumbling on top of us. So
then he ran outside and he saw many people doing
the same, just running outside their homes if they were

(01:38:47):
able to make it out, and watching their homes just
crumble in front of them. Let's take a break, and
when we come back, I want to set the scene
of what Syrians have been going through even before this
earthquake been happened, and how sanctions in particular have made
the impact of this disaster exponentially worse. So we're back

(01:39:08):
and we're going to talk about how sanctions have only
aided in the suffering of the Syrian people. Twelve years
after the eruption of the Syrian Uprising and the eleven
subsequent conflict, the us IS Syria policy has constrained political
pressure on the Assad regime to broad economic sanctions, but

(01:39:29):
despite an expansive approach that targets entire economic sectors, these
sanctions have had little to no effect in pushing the
regime to offer political concessions, engage meaningfully in a peaceful
settlement of the conflict, or improve its human rights record.
All the while, conditions in Syria have steadily worsened as
sanctions along with the destructive effects of twelve years of conflict,

(01:39:51):
the economic crisis and neighboring Lebanon, and the COVID nineteen pandemic.
All of this has fueled an economic collapse that has
left more than i d percent of the population in
Syria living in poverty. In nineteen seventy nine, the United
States listed Syria as a state sponsor of terrorism, and
since then it has pursued sanctions as a primary tool

(01:40:14):
in its policy towards Syria. The George W. Bush administration
issued a series of sanctions under executive orders aiming to
limit serious destabilizing influence in Iraq. However, after the uprising,
the Barack Obama and Donald Trump administrations sanctioned the Assad
regime on an unprecedented scale for its gross human rights

(01:40:36):
violations against his people. These sanctions ultimately accumulated in the
passing of the Caesar Act in twenty nineteen, and this
allows primary and secondary sanctions targeting both those who commit
the sanctionable offenses and those who enable them. Just three
months ago, in November two, a u when appointed independent

(01:40:57):
human rights expert urge the United States to lift the
unilateral sanctions against Syria, warning that they are perpetrating and
exacerbating the destruction and trauma suffered by ordinary citizens since
the brutal war began in This expert's name is Alana Dohan,
and she said, I am struck by the pervasiveness of

(01:41:18):
the human rights and humanitarian impact of the unilateral coercive
measures imposed on Syria, and the total economic and financial
isolation of a country whose people are struggling to rebuild
a life with dignity. In a statement that followed her
twelve day visit to Syria, Dohan presented detailed information on

(01:41:38):
the catastrophic effects that sanctions have had on all aspects
of Syrian life. Currently, serious population is living below the
poverty line, she said, pointing to their limited access to food, water, electricity, shelter,
cooking and heating, fuel, transportation, and healthcare. Moreover, growing economic

(01:41:59):
hards ship threatens to trigger a massive brain drain in
the country, she said, with more than half of the
vital infrastructure either completely destroyed or severely damaged. The imposition
of unilateral sanctions on key economic sectors, including oil, gas, electricity, trade, construction,
and engineering, have quashed national income and they undermine efforts

(01:42:23):
towards economic recovery and reconstruction. These sanctions have committed various
human rights violations in their existence, including these serious shortages
and medicines and specialized medical equipment. My family and I
have direct experience with these repercussions of the lack of

(01:42:43):
medicines and medical equipment. My cousin, a child, had brain
cancer and it got worse and worse, and the city
they were in did not offer the treatment necessary or
even key mo to help his condition. So his mother
would drive to Damascus, where at least some of the

(01:43:06):
treatment options were available. But the road to Damascus, even
though it shouldn't take more than a few hours, can
sometimes take all day because there are so many checkpoints
and road closures and just the regime making it so
difficult to do anything. Ultimately, my cousin was suffering for

(01:43:28):
the remainder of his very young life, and he didn't
get the treatment that he needed. And I really think
these sanctions have a lot to do with the lack
of access that my family and many families have in Syria.
And that experience that my family went through is one

(01:43:50):
of many that many Syrian families have endured because of
these sanctions. So I want you guys to keep that
in mind. That numbers also contain individual lives, and each
one is devastating all on its own. And I know
I say that often, but I think it bears repeating

(01:44:13):
every time. I don't want us to be numb to
statistics and numbers when it comes to casualties and suffering
and loss. And maybe it sounds obvious, but I just
think we need to remember the value of human life
and what it means to take it away. So that's

(01:44:36):
what I'm going to say about that for now. Let's
get back to the reports that Ms Dohan was showing
the US back in November two about the effect of
the sanctions, so including the impact that sanctions have had
on these serious shortages and medicines and specialized medical equipment
due to the unavailability of equipment and spare parts. She

(01:44:57):
warned that the rehabilitation and development of water distribution networks
for drinking and irrigation has stalled, with serious implications for
public health and food security. Twelve million Syrians are experiencing
food and security. This is pre earthquake. The number is
probably much higher now. Dohan urged for the immediate lifting

(01:45:19):
of all unilateral sanctions that severely harm human rights and
prevent any efforts for early recovery, rebuilding and reconstruction. She said,
no reference to good objectives of unilateral sanctions justifies the
violation of fundamental human rights. The international community has an
obligation of solidarity and assistance to the Syrian people. I

(01:45:43):
want to add something that UNICEF said about the children
in Syria. Children in Syria continue to face one of
the most complex humanitarian situations in the world. A worsening
economic crisis. Continued localized hostilities after more than a decade
of grinding, con liked mass displacement, and devastated public infrastructure

(01:46:04):
have left two thirds of the population in need of assistance.
Water Borne diseases pose another deadly threat to children and
families affected. And all of this is again pre earthquake.
This is the life that Syrians have known for years
now without any assistance. Sanctions have done nothing but contribute

(01:46:25):
to the increase in the suffering of Assyrian people, and
now countries and organizations might have a hard time providing
aid because of these sanctions. Sanctions have done nothing but
contribute to the suffering and pain of Assyrian people. They
didn't do anything they were supposedly meant to do. The
assad regime isn't going to change anything. It hasn't changed anything.

(01:46:49):
It's still killing its people. I also want to mention
that last year on MATEO, the EU extended its sanctions
against the Syrian government for another year. Who knows if
this will change, but for now that's the reality. So
I'm really hoping these sanctions get eventually lifted or else.

(01:47:10):
Helping the Syrian people is going to be extremely difficult,
and right now rescuers are still digging through thousands and
thousands of flattened buildings in near freezing temperatures. The death
toll is only going to continue to rise, and everyone
there needs all the help they can get. And I know,

(01:47:33):
at least for me, it feels really helpless. I've felt
pretty helpless for a long time when it comes to Syria.
But if you're able to donate any money at all,
I would really urge you to donate to a charity
that you trust. I really like the White Helmets because
they're just on the ground and they've been doing the
work for years. So if you're able to, I think

(01:47:55):
help can go a long way. I want to end
with something that Atlanta Dohan, the UN appointed independent human
rights expert that gave the US this report about the
sanctions in November. She quoted one view that she heard
expressed many times. She said, I saw much suffering, but

(01:48:17):
now I see the hope die. So that's where the
Syrian people started, that's where they've been. Nearly seventy of
the Syrian population was already in need of humanitarian aid
before the earthquake even happened, and it's an issue that's
only been compounded by the tragedy today. The UN said, quote,

(01:48:39):
this tragedy will have a devastating impact on many vulnerable
families who struggle to provide for their loved ones on
a daily basis. The statement outlined the impact of serious
twelve year war, describing a country as grappling with economic collapse,
severe water, electricity and fuel shortages. They issued an appeal

(01:48:59):
to all donor partners to provide assistance necessary to alleviate suffering.
The U N and humanitarian partners say they are currently
focusing on immediate needs including food, shelter and non food
items and medicine. And the devastation of this earthquake because
of this is truly devastating. I cannot emphasize that enough.

(01:49:22):
So again, if you're able to donate, I really urge
you too, And if you can't, just keep raising awareness
because someone else might be able to donate. And that's
all we really have for now. So that's the episode.
I hope it was informative or eye opening in any way.
Thank you for listening. I will talk to you later.

(01:49:53):
It seems like hardly a month goes by where we
are not bombarded with horrific images of far ride Islands,
mass shootings, the target synagogues, black churches and queer nightclubs,
death threats to hospitals spurred by post from online trolls.
In a barrage of fascist groups attempting to intimidate everyone

(01:50:14):
and everything, from children's events, black Lives Matter protests, pride celebrations,
and abortion clinics. Wooden resistance is mobilized and people do
push back. The media often frames these confrontations the clash
simply between two sets of extremists. On today's shows, the
It's Going Down crew once again takes over. It could happen.

(01:50:34):
Here we look at how far from being just confined
to small sets of antifast super soldiers, mass community self
defense is part and parcels to the DNA of grassroots
movements for liberation in the so called United States. We
can see this throughout the ongoing history of indigenous resistance
to colonization. In the fight against slavery and racial apartheid.

(01:50:56):
Radical labor unions such as the i w W organized
against Ku Klux Klan attention that even led to running
gun battles, while militant organizers like Robert F. Williams and
groups such as the Deacons for Defense, who helped inspire
the Black Panthers, fought back against white racist mobs. In
the book This Non Violent Stuff Will Get You Killed,

(01:51:17):
author Charles E. Cobb documents this history, discussing the wide
use of arms and defending civil rights organizers from white supremacists.
Groups like Anti Racist Action or a r A carried
on this trajectory, working to set up chapters of organized
anti racists that confronted neo Nazi groups the Clan, and
participated in defense of abortion clinics. Once again, I'm Mike Andrews.

(01:51:41):
Let's get into it. In two thousand five, in the
wake of Hurricane Katrina, the levy surrounding New Orleans broke,
flooding working class communities and homes. Those that could evacuate fled,
while many, often poor and black, were stuck behind to
fend for themselves. Stepping into this setting was a group

(01:52:01):
of Black Liberation and anarchist activists who worked to set
up mutual aid hubs and free clinics, dubbed Common Ground.
But as these volunteers worked to feed people, restore people's homes,
and provide free medical care, they quickly found that they
weren't the only organized force on the streets of New Orleans.
In this following interview, Sunseri Ali Shakur discusses how the

(01:52:26):
group came up against and defended themselves from a formation
of armed racist white vigilantees who worked directly with local
police and our suspected of carrying out multiple murders of
unarmed black men a warning. However, this interview was graphic
in details death, racist violence, and anti black racism. My

(01:52:46):
name is s I'm organized out of Wasson and d C.
I went to New Orleans UH doing Kataka add the
mass and I helped um co co found Common Ground
Relief and Common Ground was formed as a response to

(01:53:08):
the calamity of Katrina and um Common Ground was also
the brainchild of the Angola Three, so a lot of
the base organizers of Common Ground were already in New Orleans.
UH organized and the help the Angola Three. So the
Angle of Three was basically the god fathers of common

(01:53:31):
ground ground relief. We lost a few of the of
the elders, Alfred wood Fox as such, and we still
got King, Uh King, Wos and everything. A note to
our listeners. The Angola Three referred to here is a
group of formally incarcerated black political prisoners and members of

(01:53:52):
the Black Parther Party in the ninet seventies were imprisoned
in the notorious Angola Facility in Louisiana. This included Robert
Hillary King, Albert wood Fox, and Hermann Wallace. King was
released in two thousand one, and, along with another former
Black Panther, Malik Raheem, became involved in mutual aid and
disaster relief efforts in New Orleans following Katrina in two

(01:54:15):
thousand five under the banner of common Ground. Wallace was
released from prison in October one, only to pass away
sadly three days later, a day after being reindited by
the state. Albert Wood Fox was finally released in February
of two thousand sixteen and passed on six years later
due to complications from COVID nineteen tireless activists on both

(01:54:38):
sides of the prison walls together the angal of three
endured a combined total of one fourteen years in solitary confinement. Yeah,
my job when I when I touched down the common
ground was basically I was a relief scout UM. I
wore many hats, I was a mediation person, head of
security UM. And I also organized about seven UM makesuret

(01:55:04):
hurricane distribution UH centers from New Orleans to the Bayou
and I spent eighteen months there and children's free breakfast program,
anything that the community needed, you know, I provided UM.
I used to drive like fourteen hundred miles a week
taking supplies from New Orleans UH into different bious and

(01:55:28):
different surrounding areas in New Orleans. That was my my job.
When I first got there, I ran into Malink Rahim,
a former black pather in New Orleans, thus Minister of Defense,
and when I touched down, he had told me that
there were a group of white vigilantees, up to eighteen

(01:55:50):
of them, riding around and murdering black people as they
walked through these white communities and Algiers and alger Point.
Algiers wasn't affected by water, but it did have a
great deal of wind damage. Most of the houses wasn'ttact
It just wasn't no electricity and the water was also

(01:56:11):
a problem. Well, what they would do they would tie
uh cans from one fence to another beginning of the
neighborhood of the street. And if they were in their
homes and uh you bumped in, you know you you
tried to get up under the cans, and the cans
started ringing. They would open up windows and and and

(01:56:33):
begin uh fire at you. And they were jumping their
pickup trucks and chase you down. And some uh you know,
some are murdered, you know, point blank. And those whom
they wounded, they were throwing the back of the truck.
Take to a garage and pour gasoline over your wounds,

(01:56:55):
put cigarettes out on you, and uh some didn't make
it out. That's such suation. They like I said, they
dropped about court and information. When we got they dropped
nineteen and some black men and the brothers in the
community got tired of of of these guys, and they
broke into a pawn shop and stole all the guns
out the powd shop. And there was about to be

(01:57:16):
a major race war. And um, you gotta understand too,
how tight the situation was because their base, their house.
The day they hung out at their backyard connected with
our backyard, so it was extremely tense. So when the
brothers broke into the pond shop got the weapons out,
just so happened. The next day the National Guards showed up.

(01:57:39):
But if the national Guard didn't show up the next day,
it would have been extremely ugly out there. Uh and everything.
And yeah, they used to patrol the streets and the
pickup trucks. We would see them all the time. I
would see them all the time. And they were cowards man,
you know. They would tender one. It's always tender one,
you know, ten vigilantis the on black man, unharmed black man.

(01:58:04):
But we noticed one they would drive by. We would
come out with our weapons on our hips and let
them know that this ain't no place to mess with.
Keep driving. You know what I'm saying. You will be
fired upon you come here with that business. And I
would have to set up patrols for our house. At night. UM,
I would sleep uh in the hallway and malnks home

(01:58:28):
with a nominal of me to car being rifle strapped
across my chest and the radio colm so I could
keep in contact with the others who were unarmed and
doing patrols, you know, watching the house while the other
thirty six volunteers have slept intense in the backyard. You know,
we're asleep, Lucky for us. They were a bunch of
cowards and they kept it moving. I would see them

(01:58:50):
all the time, and they were they were afraid of
me because they knew that I was not afraid of them,
and I was armed, and we all when we had
a few people back at the house that was armed
as well. You could ride down certain streets and there
will be uh dead bodies that were bloated, uh from

(01:59:15):
being left out in the sun. And uh those bodies
were left by the vigilantees. The rumor was that the
do on the police department told the vigilantees. We gave
the vigilantees a green light to do what they needed
to do and as far as the bodies, just leave
them near the gutter and they will come and collect

(01:59:35):
them later, which they didn't. The body stayed out there,
I would say up to two months, you know you,
I mean, they were like you can see them all
the time, and um, there a lot of people had left.
There wasn't a lot of people there because people had evacuated,
a lot of stray dogs running around uh in pacts
of thirty and what we would have to do is

(01:59:56):
get up early in the morning when the curfew was over,
take bids she's from malnks mother's room, and go out
and wrap up the bodies with these sheets. Keep the
dogs from ripping them open for fluid and food. Reporting
in the nation in Republica, investigative journalists A. C. Thompson
spent months speaking with survivors of Katrina about a racist

(02:00:17):
militia that formed in the predominantly white neighborhood of Algierst Point,
who carried out a series of deadly shootings and even
worked directly with local law enforcement. White residents told investigators
the police had given them a green light to shoot
anyone quote breaking into their property and to quote leave
the bodies on the side of the road. Others spoke

(02:00:37):
of a free for all of white against black where
whites condulged in violence with impunity. Years later, several white
vigilanties were found guilty were sentenced to prison time for
shootings and murder, and like many modern conspiracy theories pushed
by the far Ride about x FI and BLM. During
the George Foyd Uprising, the vigilantes and algiers point were

(02:00:58):
largely animated by widespread racist rumors that were nutfounded about leaders. Um.
We were harassed a lot by the and OPD. You
know a lot of times at gunpoint. They would come
to our house sometimes you know, ten cars deep in
op D wood and looking for Malink. One night they
came through looking for Malink and what we had heard

(02:01:20):
that they were out to assassinate him and anybody with him.
They came out looking for Malink one night, about ten
cars dep and they had went through the house looking
for him, and they couldn't find them. And they pulled
out this fourteen year old young man that we had
befriended to live on the backstreet for mLink and they
started beating him, saying that he had stole the cooler

(02:01:43):
out somebody's yard and minds you, you know, no one's there,
so no one's really missing that cool And the young
man thought, you know, because we didn't have refrigeration and
we hadn't put everything on ice. You know, ice was
very important at that time, and the water was very important,
you know, along with gasoline. But the young brother brought
us a cooler, and the police put shot guards and

(02:02:04):
everybody's stomachs, and they beat them in front of us
and dared us to do anything. As far as like
what the environment looked like, it was not and I
say this, it was not a rescue mission. This was
seemed like they were running a drill, a military drill,
you know, like the same hour, I mean, like the
albat project. You will look at the bridge and you

(02:02:27):
will see continue with military cars going across the cresta
city bridge at nighttime. In four corners of the community.
You would have black Hawk helicopters patrolling. You know, they
will follow you through the yard with spotlights. Also, we
had homeland security, which included mercenaries. They were sometimes up

(02:02:47):
to cars and if you were to violate, uh, the curfew,
they were ride up on you. And they had these
little and I used to have to interact with them
because we had some some some young people there. They
thought they had privileged from up north would translate in
New Orleans, which it did not. Um they've seen any

(02:03:08):
white person outside of New Orleans as a bunch of
quote unquote nigga levels. So I would have the negotiate
with these homeless security people. UM, you had to be
very calm, very still, because you could see the pupils.
Their pupils were dilated with small anybody that's been in
war like Vietnam and such an Uh, there's a storm
they know when these people when the pupils are dilated

(02:03:31):
like that, that means these people have killed several times.
And my huncle used to call it a hundred miles there.
And you had to be very calm with these people
because if you flinched, if you did anything that they
didn't like or they felt threatened in any type of way,
they will open up fire on you. Um. They were
they had a R fifteens. All of them had a

(02:03:53):
R fifteens and not milling me distrapped to their legs.
So it was more you know, it's seemed more like
a military takeover, like I said before, then ar rescue
and further down the line. For in the months, you
had National guardsmen that opened fire on people, uh into
busy traffic. Um. You will find bodies in the seventh ward,

(02:04:17):
in the eighth ward in different houses, UH with bullets
in the back of their head, you know, execution style.
And um our investigating team will go out and witness
this firsthand, and I was a part of that investigating team.
They would do a walk through the house where the
body was at. It was shot in the back of

(02:04:37):
the head, and the rumor was, you know, we had
some rogue National guardsmen executing you know, people who didn't
have homes. We're home some homeless people, you know that
were left behind. Number one lesson I learned uma trainer
was you may be a pacifist, but you might need

(02:04:59):
to passive fists. You may need to go out and
get you firearms. Of course, we want you to get
proper training. Of course, we don't want you to do
anything illegal. Get your legal firearms and get some training.
The second lesson was that human beings are incredible. We

(02:05:21):
saw a lot of destruction, but we also saw a
lot of beauty and a lot of love. In my
experience too, we were common ground. People came together in days,
and we fell in love with each other within days.
Because of the pressure of the situation. If we didn't
love each other, if we didn't get along with one another,

(02:05:45):
we had to, you know, in order for survival. Things
were so bad that if your car had broken down
on the side of the highway on the road you
had to call us and five different vehicles will be
speeding to your low cases. Um, you know to see
who we'll get there first before Homeland Security or a

(02:06:06):
vigilante group will roll up on you. You can't rely
on the state. Can't rely on the state. Stay with
us as it could happen. Here returns after the short
break and a word from our sponsors. The same year
that Sinceria was facing down armed racist vigilantes in New Orleans,

(02:06:27):
the stage was also set for an uprising to kick
off in Toledo, Ohio. In our next interview, Tom tells
us how a largely black community an archists affiliated with
anti racist action hit the streets against the National Socialist
Movement for the NSM and participated in uprising that exploded
not just against the neo Nazis, but the police that

(02:06:49):
were protecting them as well. The Toledo anti racism protests
really began when a National Socialist Movement member who was
living in a black neighborhood in Toledo pulled a gun
on two black children that were playing in the alley
behind his house. Um. Those kids then went home and
told their parents. Their parents then showed up to his

(02:07:10):
house with weapons. The guy pulled a gun on them
and then called the National Socialist Movement, who then showed up.
And so they had been This is back when Bill
White was still the head of ns M and NSM
was actually starting to make some headway, like they were
growing really quickly. They targeted Ohio as a recruiting ground
UM because they thought that they could gain a lot
of membership there, and so Toledo was kind of their

(02:07:30):
first foray into trying to do stuff in Ohio. And
so they announced a date and the organizers on the
ground and Toledo did something really interesting. Then instead of
organizing activists, they went and organized in the community directly
UM that they were going around the streets talking to people.
Street gangs were calling truces for the day, right, and
so when October fifteenth rolled around, like everybody showed up,

(02:07:52):
like there were anarchists there, but there were like tons
of people from the neighborhood there. The whole protest didn't
last very long. It was this is October fifteenth and five.
They sort of n s M was there and they
had their shields and people were hooking stuff at them,
but they were kind of too far away to really
like hit. So the cops started surrounding them and allowing
them to mark and as they were marching, they got
within projectile range of people and then started pelting them

(02:08:16):
with everything that they could think of. The cops and
got them to run, got the Nazis to run so
they could kind of try and get them out of
the area. A group of people sort of cut back
behind the school trying and cut them off. I got
tear gased, and when the tear gas flew, everything just
got set off. There was rioting on and off for
like three days in this neighborhood. After this, a bar

(02:08:36):
owned by a cop got burned, got looted, and then
burned to the ground. People trying to burn this Nazi's
house down. They had to declare state of emergency over this.
And so there are a number of things that were
really important about that day. I think for for us,
one was it really did point to the effectiveness of
community anti fascist work. People that neighborhood were already mad,

(02:08:57):
but it was this sort of like mobilization work which
was down by people in the neighborhood and also done
by kind of anarchists that were down in the neighborhood
working with people to really make that what it was right,
And it really showed what a community can do when
Nazis show up in their name, and how much a
community can reassert its ownership over their space when the
police decided to protect the Nazis that are attacking their neighborhood.

(02:09:19):
But the other thing that really demonstrated that it really
kind of created was it created a dynamic in Ohio
which had been sort of building for a little while,
but you can kind of still feel the ramifications of it.
So starting with the over the Rhine riots, which I
think we're in two thousand three or two thousand one,
when the Cincinnati police killed Timothy Thomas, there had kind
of been this escalating series of you know, tensions with

(02:09:42):
with the state around this period of time. It's also
the period of time that a lot of Ohio cities
were sort of beginning. They're the really cute period of
their decline that they had been sort of declining for
a while, but this is really when things got bad.
It was starting really like the early two thousands, mid
two thousand's um the financial collapse in Cleveland, for example,
was in two thousand six, um. But it had already

(02:10:04):
been sort of going for a couple of years before that,
and so there were these political conditions that were in
place that facilitated this. But this also kind of created
a dynamic of confrontation with the state and created a
mentality within anarchist communities about being really realistic about what
those confrontations look like. UM that instead of being idealistic

(02:10:27):
sort of like people were in the anti war movement
and um, sort of approaching police from a perspective of
ideas and discourse, what we learned during those days is
that we should probably approach the police as a logistical
force and understand them as such. Um. It was after
that point that people really started researching police tactics in
this area of the country, and that has had really

(02:10:48):
profound impacts over the last fifteen years. Right. It really
did create an entire culture of really digging into those
kinds of things very carefully and doing it in a
way which wasn't bombastic, but was focused on actual research.
The reason that that could happen was what went down
on those days was so intense. UM. It was the
first time a lot of people had experienced like full

(02:11:10):
blown major rioting before and like major large scale urban
writing before, and it definitely changed a lot about the
way that anarchists in this area of the country approached
things um and you can still feel the the ramifications
the ripple effects of that today. Stay with us. We're
gonna take a quick break and we'll be right back

(02:11:31):
after these words from our sponsors. In our last segment,
we're going to speak to anti fascist researcher and author
Spencer Sunshine. But first, let's rewind the clock to when
Trump first came in as president in two thousand seventeen,
kicking off riots, walkouts, and protests around the country, and

(02:11:53):
grey protests soon spilled into airports. His people in the
tens of thousands took action to defeat the Muslim band Um.
February second, a massive riot kicked off at you see
Berkeley against the far right troll Milo Napolis, shutting down
his scheduled talk. The far right responded by holding a
series of free speech rallies throughout the summer, and anti

(02:12:15):
fascists soon found themselves out flanked in the streets by
a loose coalition of militia members, Proud Boys, Neo Nazis,
and Alt right groups seeking to seize on this moment.
The White Nashal swing of the movement called for another
free speech rally in Charlesville, Virginia, and the scene was
set for historic and deadly showdown. It was pretty clear,

(02:12:36):
especially as the run up to it happened, about how
big it was going to be, how many different kinds
of groups were going to be involved, and that for
the first time, although there had been increasing mobilizations throughout
the year especially, it was the first one that was
gonna be led by open fascists. Some of the other
ones fascists participated in them, but there were more a

(02:12:57):
pan far right. We were like pan far right events
like what happened in Berkeley, but this one was going
to be led by fascists, and they were all those
many different kinds of groups, and they were coming out
of the woodwork. We had old activists who had been
around in the eighties um who stated they were going
to come, and there was clearly a lot of energy
behind it, and it seemed like it was the big bid,
and there were some of the participants were openly saying

(02:13:18):
this it was gonna be the big bid for power
and legitimacy of the ault right. I believe it was
Richard Spencer who said, or Matthew Hibeck. I forget which
one actually said, there's gonna be before Charlotte's Ville and
after Charlotte's Bille, which was true, but not in the
way that they hoped for. I think it was a
success for anti fascists and other people who wanted the

(02:13:39):
ault right to wanted that inertia to stop and eventually
end um. But it was not a success I think
in the way that people wanted it to be or
think about it um as a success. It could have
it was. It could have been a failure very easily
after the event. The event itself was fairly neutral. I mean,

(02:14:03):
there was all the fighting that is in people's minds
that all happened before the rally was supposed to start.
That was kind of a draw, which certainly was not
a success that anti fascists stopped the rally. They did not.
It did not stop people from entering into the rally grounds.
The police dispersed it before the rally itself actually started,
so that can be seen as a success. And then

(02:14:24):
the car attack, of course was well in some ways
a failure for us, and I think at the very beginning,
many of the fascists, you know, were excited about it,
like it really did add to their inertia, and the
whole thing could have been forgotten about very quickly, in
which case I think it then would have been seen
as a success for the fascists. If people remember the
first when it happened, Trump immediately was like, nazis bad.

(02:14:47):
And then the next day he made his very fine
people on both sides comment, and this is what energized
liberals essentially to condemn him and to jump on the
bandwagon against him. If he had and said that, this
could have just sort of passed out of the public
eye very easily, and it be seen, at least by
fascists that anti fascists were unable to mobilize enough people

(02:15:09):
to stop them, you know, and the only stopping of
them only happened because the police did it. So I
think it could have easily been a draw or neutral
or a failure without Trump's comments. It did end up
being success because of this backlash against them. It did,
for whatever reason, did finally bring it to the consciousness
of people that um this huge rising in the far

(02:15:33):
right that Trump had engendered. What it really meant how
violent it was really going to be, what a threat
it really was, and it did motivate people two and
the and the aftermath in particular. Unfortunately, this sort of
went away fairly quickly to take the streets and come
out in big numbers and condemned. The alt right, and
the fascist wing of the right did collapse fairly soon afterwards,
by spring of the next year. Charlottesvill was real interesting

(02:15:56):
because people had been killed by the ult right before it,
but not in such a dramatic manner, not in public
and not on video. And it was sort of like,
I think for people, and I've said this before, I
kind of you remember the first murders, you remember the
first blood, and in that sense, because afterwards a lot
of people were killed during the Trump administration and car attacks.
I mean, I think a few dozen people during the

(02:16:17):
Black Lives Matter demonstrations. It became almost wrote where you're like, oh,
someone was killed at a demonstration again. But it was
the shock of this at first, because this had not
been seen for a very long time in the United States,
that someone would be murdered at a demonstration, um, and
that really sort of stuck with people and in that
way it became a symbol. Um you can even today

(02:16:38):
still say Charlottesville unless people are you know, teenagers or something,
don't remember, people know what you're talking about. Biden invoked
it when he was running for president. So it's good
it remains as a symbol of how big the really
really far right, you know, the fascists can become quite quickly,
and how violent and murderers they are, and so that

(02:17:01):
remains is as symbol to people, I think, and frankly
that there can be resistance to it. Like people also
saw there was real resistance and people were willing to
fight them, and especially after one six like there's no
more of this idiotic discourse. Bet if it's okay to
punch and nazi, I really think most people do think
it's okay now, you know, after they've seen what unfolded

(02:17:21):
under the entire arc of Trump from Charlotte'sville to the
capital takeover. If people had stayed at home, if there
wasn't the allart the mobile zathent that did occur, it
would have been a total victory for them. They would
have taken it as a total victory and then moved
on to the next thing. And tried something bigger. Absolutely,
if you held a demonstration and a thousand people came,
you know, wouldn't you be and you did your thing,
wouldn't you be like cool? Like, let's move on to

(02:17:43):
the next thing that was successful. Over the years and
I've done more and more activism, I come to realize
what nothing succeeds as success means, Like once you start going,
when something succeeds, more people come to it, and you
can move on and move on as a bigger thing
and be able to do things you weren't able to
do before. So this is why I always say we
need to confront people. We have to break their movement.
We can't let it jump from either success to success

(02:18:06):
or just simply not a failure. Because if you're already
moving and you hit something that's not a failure, you'll
just go on to the next thing. Nothing will stop you.
And we need to need these things to stop. The
night of Heather Higher was murdered, thousands hit the streets
and cities across the United States, tearing down Confederate statues
and marching in solidarity. A few weeks later, when far

(02:18:29):
right activists tried to hold a rally in Boston, over
forty hit the streets to shut it down. A week later,
in San Francisco and Berkeley, tens of thousands of march
to shut down more alright rallies. In Berkeley, a black
block of several hundred strong march information as part of
a wider anti racist coalition, pushing both far right activists

(02:18:53):
and heavily armed riot police out of a downtown park.
Were only months before far right activists had driven out
anti fascists. The events of the first eight months of
the Trump administration showed that there was mass militant opposition
on the streets of the US against the far right,
which destabilized the Trump regime and made it back pedal.

(02:19:15):
But more importantly, it showed millions of people across the
country the resistance was possible. That is going to do
it for us today follow i g D at It's
going Down dot org and on masodon at i g
D Underscore News. Thanks so much for tuning in and
be sure to come back next time as it could
happen here returns. We will continue to tread where we

(02:19:36):
please into the fascist No passan Hi have one, It's
meet James and just before we start today we're going
to discuss in quite some detail the being to death
of Tyry Nichols by the police in Memphis. And if

(02:20:00):
you don't want to hear that detail, that's totally fine,
But we wanted to let you know now so that
you didn't get surprised by it and your money commute
or whatever. So if you want to skip this one,
if you don't listen to that one, then we are
trying to give you that warning ahead of time. Discourse discourse.

(02:20:22):
Discourse is about podcast. I don't know it could happen.
Here is the podcast that you're listening to. Uh. If
you came here list looking for another podcast, then you
fucked up, But you sucked up in a good way
because that podcast was trash. Thank you for being here

(02:20:42):
with us today. Who all? Who all? Who? Who? Who's here?
Who are you people? We're a little unsure. Yeah, I'm
the along, I'm here. Wow, I'm I'm James. I'm a
little unsure about who I am beyond that, but that's
who I am. It's okay. I'm Garrison Davis and I'm
here to engage in discourse. I there's nothing I love

(02:21:05):
more than discourse. Um. Speaking of discourse. Today we're gonna
be talking about, well, I don't know, it's not really discourse,
but today we're gonna be talking about the reaction to
the video of the Memphis police murdering Tyrene Nichols. In particularly,
we're gonna be talking about the way in which kind

(02:21:27):
of the left responded to this, both online and kind
of public channels and actually in the streets, because I
think there's some interesting stuff here, um, and I think
it's kind of worth analyzing outside of uh, you know,
the broader conversation about police violence and you know, uh
that sort of thing, because I think there's some interesting,

(02:21:48):
sort of tactical stuff to kind of talk about here. UM.
And yeah, that's that's that's what we're going to be
doing today. UM. In case you've been kind of stuck
under a rock, uh, you should probably be aware that
on January seven, police from the Memphis p D Scorpion Unit,
which was a unit with a very sinister name that

(02:22:11):
existed to effectively over police UM a chunk of the
city of Memphis. Uh yeah, UM, pulled over Tyree Nichols,
a twenty nine year old black man. Uh. Tyree was
an amateur photographer. UM. He liked skating, he had Crohn's disease. UM,
he was just driving around that night. UH. And the encounter,

(02:22:35):
as we would later see on the video, went pretty
much immediately violent on behalf of the police. Nichols was
beaten very badly. UH. And he died in the hospital
three days later. And for the first few days after
the killing, obviously, you know this happened, the police did this,
and then rumors started kind of spreading in the immediate
wake of the beating, but very little was known for

(02:22:55):
certain about like what had happened, UM, about you know what,
why this had had gotten escalated so quickly. UM. One
of the first kind of signs that this was going
to become a thing on the national uh in terms
of like the national attention span, was when the Tennessee
Bureau of Investigation in the U. S. Department of Justice

(02:23:16):
independently opened investigations into the beating. UM after reviewing body
camera footage from multiple officers on scene. Five Memphis p
D officers were dismissed on January. Three days later, an
autopsy commissioned by Tyrese family found extensive bleeding caused by
a severe beating outrage around the killing grew rapidly, and

(02:23:36):
it was announced by the Memphis Police that body camera
footage of the stop and of the beating would be
released to the public. Uh. This started the rumor mill
really churning up. UM. There was kind of a couple
of leaks from people who had seen the footage, I
think who were close to the case, and they all
sort of described it as uniquely bad. The term that
I heard a lot was that it's worse than the

(02:23:57):
Rodney King beating. UM. This is just the way in
which people started talking about it. And as more details
filtered out, there were conversations around the country, particularly folks
on the activists left, who started talking about the need
to prepare for what they suspected would be the aftermath
of the video's release. UM. And one of the things
that was kind of kind of worth discussing here is

(02:24:18):
that in the immediate like immediately before the video came out,
a lot of the conversations that people on the left
we're having and that people in law enforcement we're having,
kind of focused around the same expectations, which was that
there would be widespread protests and rioting as a result
of the release of this video. UM. Police departments around
the country entered high alert. Riot squads were prepped. Um,

(02:24:40):
and then kind of on the other side of things
and sort of open channels on Twitter and massed on
and in person, and a number of of of different
cases leftists and people you know who claimed to be
that online talked about their expectations too. I heard variations
of the phrase, you know, it's going to be a
really hot year. This is going to like lead into
a particularly aggressive Some are on the ground, people are

(02:25:01):
going to make the burning of that precinct in Minneapolis
look tame. You know, get your gear together, check in
with your friends. Everything's about to go off. Um. There
was a lot of chatter kind of along those lines,
and I don't know, I didn't really speak up too
much about this, but my kind of thinking, as folks
were sort of anticipating the reaction to this was I

(02:25:24):
suspected that the actual reaction on a mass scale to
the video's release was going to be more muted and
law abiding than than people were expecting at the time.
And I guess the primary reason that I felt this
way was simply that kind of the vibes were off.
It just didn't feel like folks were ready for that
kind of a response. Um, but I do kind of

(02:25:44):
have a fact based reason for why I was anticipating
that as well. UM. On January, two days before the
video's release, five Memphis p D officers were arrested and
charged with murder, kidnapping, assault, a bevy of very serious charges.
Immediately after that, three firefighters to E. M. Tease and
a police lieutenant who had been on scene after the
beating were fired for failing to assess and provide emergency

(02:26:05):
care to Nichols on scene. And there's a couple of
ways to view what happened here. I think the less
optimistic one is that the state simply made a pragmatic
decision to throw these guys onto the bus. That's definitely
what happened. The more optimistic way to look at this
is that because people had rioted so hard for so
long in the wake of George Floyd's murder, the state
felt like it had to throw these guys under the

(02:26:27):
bus rather than, you know, risk another year of rage.
And this is also correct. I think both of these
things are are pretty accurate ways to look at what happened.
The idea that the release of the footage of Tyree's
murder would lead to massive protests. Was not quite universal,
but I didn't notice that a lot of the people
who felt similarly to me expressed the belief that if
people didn't riot over what had happened to Tyree, that

(02:26:50):
was due to a mix of liberal cowardice and racism,
since most of the officers who beat Tyree to death
were themselves black. And I think this is kind of
a short sighted and unfair take, and I'll talk about
why shortly. On January Friday, the Tyree Nichols videos were
released by the Memphis Police Department UM, along with a
lot of you. I watched them all immediately, UM, and

(02:27:11):
you can find there's a description on my Twitter page.
It's turned currently pinned to my profile of the video
if you haven't seen it but want to know what
happened there. UM To kind of summarize it in brief,
it's it's very ugly. Uh. Tyree is immediately calm as
he's pulled over and taken from his car. The police
are not calm. He attempts to de escalate them. They
accuse him falsely of resisting, then they mace him and themselves.

(02:27:35):
I think in general that The inciting incident for the
beating was the incompetent use of mace by these officers.
They hurt themselves, they got pissed, and then they beat
Tyree because they were angry at themselves for macing themselves. UM.
It's also kind of worth noting that a white officer
who has since been fired as well, also deployed his
taser on the young man. There's been some kind of

(02:27:57):
this was kind of left out of a lot of
the initial summaries of what had happened. Uh, that guy
has now been fired. UM, and yeah, it's it's bad.
The video is is very unpleasant and very brutal. UM.
Watching it, though, I think kind of the thing that
struck me most was how much like a normal traffic
stop a lot of this was. UM. I think that

(02:28:17):
if you know, they had gone a little bit less
hard and beating him a little less badly and he
had survived, they probably would have charged him with resisting
arrest and assault on a police officer. UM. And who
knows how the case would have gone. You can hear
the police preparing for this eventuality in the footage. One
officer claims that Tyree went for his gun there's no
evidence of this in the footage, uh, And you can

(02:28:39):
kind of hear them all working to get their stories
straight after they beat tyree Um for the inevitable court case,
more officers an emergency personnel arrive on scene as he's
just kind of laying there, and none of them seemed
to find what's happened peculiar or noteworthy, which is interesting
because immediately prior to the video's release, police departments around
the country all shoot statements that were basically identical, condemning

(02:29:02):
the officers who had beaten nichols Um, saying basically, this
behavior is unacceptable. These men are bad apples. This is
like an extreme example that does not represent policing values.
And there's a couple of things that are are interesting
about this. One of them is that the actual way
in which emergency responders on scene treated the beating kind

(02:29:24):
of puts the lie to that, because nobody acts as
if anything outside of the normal has occurred. And the
other thing that is noteworthy is the uniformity of these
these messages by police departments around the country. I have
not actually seen that happen before. There was kind of
a version of this that occurred in the wake of
the George Floyd video, but it was much more cohesive

(02:29:46):
prior to the release of the Tyree Nichols video. UM.
That said, there were no widespread riots or acts of
property destruction. After the video was released. There were protests
in a number of cities, most notably in Memphis, UM,
but compared to things were very subdued. There was not
kind of widespread property destruction or rioting in Portland, which

(02:30:08):
was obviously the site of intense radical street actions. In
there were two fairly small marches. UM. I'm not gonna
delve into this in tremendous detail, but there were kind
of allegations from one of the marches that the larger
and less radical of the two was an op designed
to take numbers and energy away from the radical march.
There were confrontations between members of both groups, and while

(02:30:31):
the overall story, again is not worth spending time on,
the gist of it is that very little happened. Now
this is not kind of limited to Portland. Atlanta, Georgia
is probably the city in the US today that's been
the center of the most effective radical protests against law
enforcement and the history of attempts to stop and sabotage.
The construction of Cops City, which is obviously a massive

(02:30:51):
police training compound in Atlanta's largest urban forest, has been
well documented by by Garrison Davis UM as well as
a number of other reporters. UM. I do think it's
worth noting that days before the Nichols video was released,
Atlanta police shot and killed the forest defender Tortuguia, and
a moderately large protest followed, where protesters smashing windows and

(02:31:12):
lighting one cop car on fire. This was the kind
of action that I think most of the activists I
observed expected in the wake of the Nichols video as well,
but we simply didn't see that. I'm just going to
butt in here for a little bit and you'll you'll
you'll hear more about that riot slash protest in Atlanta
next week. UM. I'm putting together a series on it

(02:31:33):
that'll that'll be out soon. But definitely one of the
things that was talked about a lot in Atlanta was
the upcoming release of this video and the potentiality of
this video getting released shortly after the death of Tortuguita
at the hands of police. Kind of both of these

(02:31:54):
things feeding off each other. Into a into a similar
like level UH uprising, and this was like no one
was like for sure about this, Like no one was
like saying, this is absolutely definitely gonna happen, But it
was something that was definitely thought about. UM, it was
something that was definitely considered. I think, honestly, if the

(02:32:16):
the video was set to come out originally on like
the Monday or Tuesday following the big downtown protest in Atlanta, UM,
it was supposed to come out just a few days later,
and that that didn't happen. It was delayed once again
for further further into the week. UM. I think if
it came out sooner, I think that could have fed

(02:32:38):
off momentum in a pretty considerable way. I think a
few things happened both in Atlanta that in the in
the next few days that kind of stunted possible possible
for their protest. UM National Guard was deployed, UM police
and Savannah were ordered to start arresting people and shutting

(02:32:58):
down gatherings of over teen UH specifically for like including vigils,
and in Atlanta, obviously there was people getting really pretty
pretty inflated, UH high level felonies and domestic and domestic
terrorism charges simply for being simply for being present at
a protest UM. So I think those those things kind
of all in all impacted people's ability to like prepare

(02:33:23):
for you know, a sequence of protests which there was
someone there was someone in l a for for like
a day or two. The ones in Memphis were pretty big,
but I think they the the timeline in which they
released the video is definitely should be considered in terms
of when they chose to release it um to like

(02:33:47):
in terms of like the state's goal of preventing you know,
large large scale protests. But that was definitely something that
was talked about a lot, uh during during like the
little over a week that I was that I was
in Atlantis, because everyone was getting ready for this. Like
everyone heard that this is going to be like the
worst of video that we've seen since Rodney King. Like

(02:34:09):
that that that that was the way it was. It
was thought up of like on the ground, you know,
just like word of mouth being being passed um, and
people were definitely like preparing for like preparing themselves for it,
like like like thinking like thinking about like what's going
to happen if this is like if this really is

(02:34:30):
the most horrific thing. What is the appropriate response to that?
And and this is kind of a lot of what
I wanted to talk around, because you have sort of
Georgia law enforcement, there's this this riot, and the response
to that as well as the response to the tree
set is a series of domestic terrorism charges. Um. And

(02:34:50):
then this video comes out and there's not a mass,
like radical street response to it, and it it seems
to me and Garrison you can correct me if I'm
wrong that a big part of that is people in
Atlanta were kind of not willing to throw more lives
and bodies at the police without kind of more of

(02:35:11):
a cohesive plan of what to do given the severity
of the repression that that was being engaged in. I mean,
obviously can't comment on people's yeah, the motivations or like
plans for for for stuff, because that's not something that
I would be would be privy privy to. Yeah. Um,
so I I don't know, there's there's there's a lot

(02:35:33):
of stuff. I mean, like, I think a big part
of why I heard a lot about it in Atlanta
was one because of a friend of a lot of
people who were involved in the force in the force
events got killed by police a few days earlier. And two.
Memphis is only a few hours away from Atlanta, but like,
it's it's it's not it's it's it's not that far,
and it's a big part of the stuff in Atlanta

(02:35:55):
is like solidarity with struggles that are not just in
your immediate vicinity. And you could argue that Memphis really
is in the immediate vicinity of Georgia. Um, but like
that that type of cross cross state solidarity is is
a big part um. But yeah, I can I I

(02:36:16):
could not comment on on on why why people did
or did not choose to do specific things. I think
that that's that's up for people themselves. Yeah, I wouldn't
want to put words into anyone's mouth. But it was
kind of interesting because I I paid attention a lot
to the reaction, and there were a lot of folks
talking about how disheartening it was that there were not

(02:36:38):
more of the kind of radical actions that they wanted
to see in the wake of the video coming out,
And I'm that's kind of the thing I wanted sort
of to talk most around because I feel very mixed
around this. But broadly speaking, I guess I'm glad that
we didn't see a repeat of the part of that
was folks standing up in front of cops shops until

(02:37:01):
riot police came in and getting charges against them, because
I just don't think that that works right now. I
don't think it works is functional anymore. Um, I don't
think it actually hurts the state because the reaction, like
there was a period of time early in those first
couple of months in particular, where you could see the

(02:37:23):
police were off balance. Obviously in like Minneapolis with the
burning of the Third Precinct was was this kind of
sea change moment um, but you could see it in
a number of cities that like they didn't really know
what was going on, and they were themselves concerned with
how out of control the situation had gotten. And then
it kind of morphed later in the year to I
think a situation they could control very well where there

(02:37:45):
were these acts of fairly minor property destruction and then
a bunch of people would get picked up and charged.
And I I think that while I understand like the
desire to react that way and to do something um
kind of very firm and uh and radical in response
to state violence like this, I'm also like deeply concerned

(02:38:08):
about people not throwing away months and years of their
lives fighting charges. Yeah. I mean a big part of
it is is people learning that treating protesters as disposable
meat bags to throw against the wall of the state
is kind of a bad idea. Um. And there's I
think this is something that that that was talked about

(02:38:31):
in conversations just just like regarding like, hey, this video
is going to come out, what do you think it's
going to happen. Like there's just a lot of the casual,
casual conversations, but like there was a lot to make happened.
A lot of things contributed to the intensity and the
length of those protests. I think, uh, COVID being a

(02:38:54):
pretty big part. This was a few months into the pandemic.
People have been stuck in their homes now for a
few months and not really like prepared for that. Like
at this at this point, we're kind of we're all
kind of used to being in our house a lot
more now, but back then it was it was new
for a lot of people. So I think the opportity,
the opportunity to get out of the house for what

(02:39:15):
seemed like an important reason I think was a really
big part of people being out of a lot of
work was a really big part of because a lot
of people did did not have the types of jobs
that they might have now, did not have the jobs
they had like in like the months before. It's maybe
because I can't really think of another example like this

(02:39:37):
from history. Obviously a lot of uprisings occur when people
are suddenly out of work, but this was a mix
of people are suddenly out of work and they suddenly
they all have cash like that, that which contributed in
a lot of ways because like that, that was I
think what funded a lot of you know, people bringing
in food and people bringing in like pallets of water

(02:39:58):
and getting gas mask and stuff. Is they had these
sort of checks for you know, as a result of
like COVID relief, which was an interesting situation as well
that hasn't been replicated since. I think there's there's another
very important factor of this that doesn't get talked about
that much, which is just the weather. Like if if
if you if you, if you go back and look

(02:40:18):
at when the largest police like largest anti police protests
in the US have happened, right, they either start like
late spring, early fall, or just the middle of the summer,
and there's reason. Yeah, like then this is I think
another this is this is the thing up in Chicago
right was it was just really fucking cold, and I
mean this this affects actually circles too, but it's like

(02:40:39):
you can't get the critical mass of just regular people
in the streets when it's like twenty degrees. I think
the other side of that is, um, just summer vacation
of a lot of a lot of the people who
go the hardest at these protests are people in high school. Um.
And during winter, fall, spring, kids are in school during

(02:41:02):
during summer, uh, people have People under the age of
eighteen have a lot more free time on their hands.
So I think that is another contributing factor. UM. And
I think there's there's there's one other aspect which is
very sinister um and but I think is worth talking
about in terms of how of how the state may

(02:41:24):
have been trying to frame this to like to to
frame the release of this video too kind of like
curtail the the the the the intensity of any type
of like um of a protest revolt uprising. Now obviously
that there was like the fucked up nature of like
making this feel like a world premiere of like a

(02:41:45):
snuff film. It was like it was it was it
was like a weird a weird aspect, which I think
it encouraged the video to be to be something that
is consumed versus something that's actually like watched and like, oh,
this is a fucked up thing that we that we
need to do something about. Instead, it turned it into
this like element of consumption and the other aspect for

(02:42:06):
this in terms of a lot of hardcore activists like
like like people who have thrown down in the streets before,
people who have who have who have seen fucked up
ship is that the intensity, what was the violence depicted
on this video was framed as being extremely horrific, being
being a very very unusual, a very um like uncommon

(02:42:29):
but but but but horrifying display of violence and display
of brutality by the police. This is this, This is
what police departments were faring it as. This is what
the President of the United States was framing this as
like this, this is a case of a few of
a few bad actors who who did an egregious, um
but you know, uncommon thing. And I think when a

(02:42:51):
lot of people who have thrown down watched this video,
it just reminded you of stuff that you've seen before, Like, yeah,
they saw a thing they had seen it was it
was not shocking in the same way that it was
getting framed as. Because what separates this from most of
the arrests that happened in Portland during is very little
Like one or two punches that were that were thrown

(02:43:13):
just a little bit too hard is all that separates
this from most like violent police arrests, Like this was
not an uncommon display of violence. This was an ordinary,
an ordinary encounter that just a few things were pushed
just barely over the edge. And I think a lot
of people watched, Like my first reaction was like, oh,

(02:43:33):
like this, this is not as bad as what I
thought like this and that that that should be like
a condemnation of the police's actions. Like That's why I
think one of the most important things to watch is
how the other cops who were not present for the beating,
but who show up immediately after or at the end
of it, because some of them did watch the others
beat him, how they react because they're just kind of

(02:43:59):
even the MTA, right who turned up, Oh yeah, this
has happened where we we we do a stand back
when this happens. Right, the people on the ground were
not concerned, Like it was not you could you could
slowly watch because like a lot of this video was
not of the actual beating. It was it was of
the aftermath. And you you you could you could watch

(02:44:19):
these cops slowly start to realize that maybe they went
a little too hard, just very slowly over the course
of thirty minutes. But for most of the time they're
on the ground, they're like making jokes. They are talking
about how fun, like how fun it was to beat
up this person and there each other. That is most

(02:44:40):
of the video. I think it's worth noting like a
couple of things. One like it's extremely long, Like I'm
not in the in the way that the George Floyd
video like fits into the attention span of stuff we
consume on our telephones at a time minute versus minutes
versus like an hour of footage. Right, Yeah, if Tyree
Nichols had just been seriously disabled, had life altering injuries,

(02:45:03):
been charged with disting rest all the things that very
plausibly could have happened if a couple of punches had
handed in different place. This body camera footage would have
been denied under the investigative exemption right then have said, no,
we're investigating his resistance of arrest. You can't you can't
see it, and none of this ship would have happened.
And like, yeah, the normalcy of so much other than

(02:45:25):
the outcome. I don't know that that stritched some of
the rage away, but it's important context. I think a
few things I mean, and this is again one of
the things that I think you can see from this
that is evidence of sort of a positive long term
result to and it's it's a very mixed bag when

(02:45:45):
I say it's positive, but that is kind of a
positive sign. Is that they acted so quickly to throw
all of these guys. They are firing and charging a
lot of city employees over this. It's going to be
between all of the people fired and all of the
people charged, more than a dozen people by the time
this is all done, which I can't think of another

(02:46:08):
time when that has happened this quickly over an incident
of police violence. And they did that not because it's
the right thing to do, but because they were scared.
And again I do I want to emphasize here the
thing that they're scared of is not that like radical
left wing protesters will take to the street. It's that
liberals and moral they know that the consequence of the

(02:46:31):
cops beating someone to death is that like someone sucker,
mom will fucking abandon how many vans wing a snehammer
into your cop shop? If you don't do this, do
like give a scapegoat? Right, like do the fair the
bare minimum? And so the positive the thing that I
can say that is probably positive about this is that
it does show there's still some fear there on their behalf.

(02:46:53):
The thing that's negative is that, like, well, it it
worked because I will say, on a moral level, I
think a why variety of radical actions are morally justified
by what was done to Tyrene Nichols. Now that said,
like back to the sort of the point we were
making the start of this, I don't particularly urge or
encourage that just because, like I don't like seeing people

(02:47:16):
get arrested and charged and spend years of their life
fighting ship in court, um for the chance to like,
let's say, carry out minor acts of property destruction on
a cop shop. Um, I don't think like that sort
of activism works right now, um, it certainly doesn't work
without them, without the critical mass of like liberals sort

(02:47:40):
of behind it, without enough people saying like we like
again you look at like the fact that the burning
of the Third Precinct in Minneapolis is still one of
the most popular things in modern American politics. But that
was the product of a fairly unique moment, And I
just don't I see some positives in like the lingering
fear of that moment, but I also don't see the

(02:48:02):
material conditions that make me think it's something like that
is coming again in the immediate future. And especially because
this this situation around this video demonstrates how much more
effort the state's putting into trying to prevent things from
happening before they start. Like there was a lot of
like inter agency work put into having all of these

(02:48:25):
local police departments and release statements, having the FBI release statements,
having uh, the president, yea, like having having the president
release statements, and it's it is all made slightly more
bizarre considering that the contents of the video are not
the on on the level of like uncommon or like
rare rare displays of violence that the police do, like

(02:48:46):
this is this is this is relatively standard, um and
that that kind of one thing I've been thinking about
is like why did they choose this video? Like why
did they why did they make this one? Like what
were they afraid of, like for this video, because like
other other other videos have come out in the past

(02:49:07):
few years, like other like other police killings have happened,
like this police killing is all the fucking time. But
they they did a lot of work on this one specifically, um.
And it's kind of it's kind of interesting that, like
why why they chose this specific video to to dedicate
all of this work into Because not not only did

(02:49:27):
they like you know, denying stuff, but they also they
like they like hyped it up. They're like you using
this as like an example, Yeah, like like using this
as an example, like here, this is what bad cops
look like. Watch us punish these bad cops. Well, but
I think I think I think there's a rate. I
think there's a huge racial aspect of this, right, which
is that like you know, like the cops were getting prosecuted.

(02:49:48):
Are only the black cops who are involved in this, right?
And I think that's a huge part of this entire strategy.
I think that's why they framed this as exceptional violence
is to play on people's racism, right. I think I
think that's why why this is is allowed to happen,
which was that yeah, you can it is. It's like
even inside the police it is a lot easier to
throw black cops under the bus and it is there
white cops under the bus. That's just how the system works.

(02:50:09):
And it doesn't trigger that same like visceral response right
that that we all had to seeing the George Floyd video,
I don't think quite like like there is a j
old tradition of white men doing violent to black men
on behalf of the state. And I think also it's
it's also easier politically inside of the police departments because

(02:50:30):
I think I think there would have been a lot
more pushback from it, like the police part Like there
hasn't been much that I've seen like internal pushback, like
from inside of police partments, because I I think if
it had been five white cops, I think this would
have been a huge fight, and I think you would
have had like the fucking police union, like calling Biden
like an anti cop, like whatever. But I I think
I think these were people who they were like we

(02:50:50):
could tell these people onto the bus and doesn't looking
matter because who cares? Yeah, so arity isn't there for them.
I think those are I mean, that's certainly like significant
aspect of why like this was the one they focused on.
But I also think a major aspect of it is
that it shows and records the reaction of other city

(02:51:12):
employees to this, and you can see in real time
the police putting together um that story like it's it.
There's I think a few things about this that are
are really unique, but even I don't know the it's
relatively unusual to have an angle, which is not like

(02:51:33):
the body camera, right, which really I think the violence
in this was was captured and depicted in a way
which was more explicit than you would get from many
individual cops body camera. And like the fact that they
most of the time when cops kill people to do
it with guns, right or maybe to taste or something.
That the fact that they took minutes, you know, like
several minutes to be a man to death. It's it

(02:51:55):
is just it should be. We've we've said like how
this isn't unusual, and it's not, But it doesn't mean
it's not repulsive. No, No, it's sucking disgusted by it.
It's it's nightmarish. Yeah, yeah, it's it's it's even more
nightmarish considering how common this is, because yes, they did
spend a few minutes doing this, but it was really

(02:52:16):
only I think one or two punches that threw it
right over the edge. Like it wasn't just a punch.
Is the thing that I think one of the things
that I saw that I think was probably critical and
why he died. No, it was when they tackled him.
His head bounced against the ground with a significant amount
of force. There's a number of like a perfect storm

(02:52:39):
of factors, right, that went into making this the inctident
that they talked about, and like this the incident that
didn't start two. I guess like it's no one particular thing,
it's all these things that led to it. And I
do think also, like we have Joe Biden as president, right,
like a lot of the same bullshit it's still happening
that we've covered, right, like talking about the cops, talking
about the border, talking about all this stuff, but it's

(02:53:00):
not being shoved in people's faces by legacy media outlets.
Liberal folks have not been getting gradually angry or more
upset at like the appearance of vulgarity from the White House.
And yeah, and that's also a big aspect of why
things went the way they did in is you had
four years of pent up frustration on behalf of the

(02:53:21):
a large group of liberals as well. Although I do again,
I don't like pushing kind of the simple narrative here
because I see that on the left a lot that like, oh,
the Libs they stopped coming out because Biden one, and
they never really cared. And I think that like, that's
there's certainly like a decent chunk of people who who

(02:53:43):
showed up because it was the thing to do and
we're not committed. But I also think the folks who
are just like, um, you know, people stopped coming out
because they suck. That's a that's a little bit of
a reductive summary of the take. But I think that
that that broad idea leaves out a lot. One of
the things that leaves out is that a lot of

(02:54:04):
those those Libs and moderates who showed up in got
the ship beaten out of them and got pretty traumatized
and are probably would be willing to get back out again.
But are going to need to feel like there's a
an actual chance of doing something because they understand the
consequences of showing up in the street better. Um, and

(02:54:24):
they're like, well, I don't want to do the same
thing that I just got my ass kicked and there's
still cops. Um, there is a decent amount of evidence
that for kind of the long term positive impact of
getting all those people out in the street and of
the fact that so many more people in witnessed police
violence with their own eyes. Um. There's a couple of

(02:54:45):
places you can go to look at this, But I
was I was watching going through a recent ABC News
Washington Post poll that showed that from three, confidence that
police treat black and white people equally fell from fifty two,
where it was the thirty nine percent among Americans. Um,
and confidence that yeah, and confidence the police still a

(02:55:06):
lot like it's too it's certainly too high, but that's
a significant change. And confidence that police were adequately trained
to avoid use of excessive force fell from f to um. Like,
and confidence in both of these things fell twice as
fast from twenty three as it did from and that

(02:55:28):
like thirty something percent number is just that is also
just like close to like the number of people who
are like active, like like actively hardcore racist about of
the country are biggest. Yeah. Yeah, I don't think the
election was real think that. Yeah. I want to quickly
mention that, like some of those liberal folks as well,

(02:55:49):
like like this is not we don't do like shipping
on the lips or whatever it's use Listen, it doesn't help.
But like a lot of those folks have been out
doing other ship too, Like I've seen folks so I
haven't seen since twenty like to protect trans kids, trying
trying to stop biggest shout and get little children going
to the pantomime ship like they they've been doing stuff,
and and that contributes to close to people being you know,

(02:56:09):
fatigue from other actions. A large part of what I'm
seeing people not being willing to do anymore is like
the same ship that they did in that stopped working, right,
it didn't continue to be effective. Yeah yeah, And I
think also like and this this also you know the
s sspectors, like the weather, like the stuff that was
happening in the very very like the first week, we're

(02:56:32):
like I don't know, like the cops lost control of
like the sid at the center of Chicago, right, like
that the kind of people who did that stuff like
aren't really like that. Those those those are those those
that was not being done by people who were sort
of like political liberals or whatever. That was being done
by people who like had like very various tines, very
tenuous connection to politics at all under normal circumstances. And

(02:56:56):
you know, like eventually, eventually you'll get we'll see something
like that again. I don't know, I mean it took
like six six five or six years between like Ferguson
and like that. That will happen again. But there's that
kind of that that kind of stuff doesn't happen that
Like those those like the kind of people who actually

(02:57:16):
riot very significantly, who are not in the sort of
like cadra of like hardcore left or organizers, like, they
don't throw in that often. And a lot of political
conditions have to like converge exactly correctly for it to happen,
and it's just not going to happen most of the time.
And that's in pressing in a lot of ways. But
like you like that's just that's just what reality is. Yeah,
I don't think there's been enough time between cycles in

(02:57:40):
order for things to really pick up, because yeah, it
hasn't required a lot of people to forget, to forget
the brutality of what the cops did to people, and
like and and and and and just like material conditions
and like recovering from burnout, and it creates Like one
thing that's been so incredible about Atlanta is the level
of atliency because they've not they've not really stopped since

(02:58:03):
like they've like they've they've kind of they they've they've
kept going in a very particular way that both like
encourages people to take care of themselves and not to
be treated as disposable. And I think a big part
of that is having like a multi pronct movement, Like
the movement isn't it's not built around a singular thing
like going out and breaking windows or even even just

(02:58:26):
like camping in the forest. Like, the movement isn't just
those things. There's a lot of other various aspects. So
when you're exhausted from one single thing, you can move
on to one of the other many aspects and like
do that as like as your recovery um and and have.
Having that, I think it's contributed to the level of
resiliency that we've seen, um, but I don't think the

(02:58:47):
rest of the States has those types of practices. Like
people in Portland are definitely still extremely burnt out from
from and I assume a lot of a lot of
other cities are dealing with similar level of fatigue. One
thing I do want to address really quickly is the
horseshit framing of this by legacy media. Again, like the

(02:59:08):
very fucking people who, like on the day that Derek
Chauvin went to Joe retweeted that initial statement where Minneapolis
p D like basically said George Floyd died of a
heart attack. I think we had a cardiac condition or something. Um,
the very same people who retweeted that statement said never
again are we going to be calmed by this ship
and now out there fucking just carrying water for the cops,
like CNN saying that Tyry Nichols had an encounter with

(02:59:31):
the police, Like I don't understand what it fucking takes
for these people to understand, Like and I've been like
I was on NBC this year trying to persuade other
NBC journalists to maybe critically assess the claim to the police,
and like here we are again doing the same ship again,
and we should we should probably close out here soon.
But one kind of final thought that I've had is

(02:59:53):
the other another kind of crucial difference between how this
was treated as opposed to the George Floyd videos. At
the person who recorded the George Floyd video was like
a bystander, Like they were just there and they posted
that on their own accord, and it was able to
grow to it was able to grow traction over the

(03:00:15):
course of a few weeks kind of slowly in like
underground um like in like underground communities, you know, people
who are much more aware of police violence, and then
that's the least seeped out into the mainstream. I think
there's a difference in having that type of natural growth
of people learning about like hey, did you see this
fucked up thing that my friends sent me where like
did you like Like there's that level of like, oh,

(03:00:38):
we found this thing that is really fucked up and
people need to care about this, versus the framing of
the police and how they used this as like a
world premiere of this like of this of this like
snuff film. It's it's like that there was like a
fucking countdown to to to to to watch the video,
and that that immediately frames this as something to be consumed.

(03:01:00):
That immediately frames this is something like the way to
engage with this is to sit down and watch it
and then you're done. Like that, then the that is
the like they're they're they're framing this the same way
that you would watch like a movie or like a
music video drop like that is that is the style
of engagement. Because this video is being published by the
police like they are. They are they are from from

(03:01:23):
the very start, They're controlling the way that information is distributed.
They're controlling what information is distributed. It like creates this
scenario where the consumption of the video itself like is
the event as opposed to any type of like follow
up action or protest or direct action that instead of

(03:01:44):
that being like the action event, the action event is
just the consumption of the video based on how it
was hyped up as as this thing that was to
be like officially released and you like count down for
it and then you watch it and you're like, Okay,
that was it, that was the thing, um, And I
think that does just really impact it when it's like this,

(03:02:04):
like sanctioned premier versus this thing that's spread by regular people. UM. Yeah,
I think you're right. I think it kind of became
this act of penance. Like you watched the video, you say,
holy funk, that's disgusting, and then like the thing is
already done right like that, the cops are already fired,
So you just do your penance. You go through the
painful thing, rather than the George Floyd thing, which was

(03:02:26):
like nothing has been done about this. I've got this
organically from my friend and I'm fucking furious. Oh yeah,
I think you're right. I think it's very different. Yeah, alright,
well I think that's probably going to do it for
us today. Um until next time. Uh, I don't know.
Don't don't let your city name a police elite unit

(03:02:51):
scorpion or anything else. Yeah you can tell stuck. Yeah yeah,
I don't have special police if. Yeah, I would prefer
no cops. If you're going to have a special police unit,
maybe call it like the Barney Fife Battalion or something

(03:03:12):
like that. Um, at least at least try not to
hype them up to be scorpions. Yeah. Um, anyway, that
that that that that the fuck? Howeveryone it's James again
book ending the episode, and I'm just here to ask
you again to donate if you have the means, if

(03:03:34):
you're able to, to relief for people in Syria who
are obviously experiencing terrible consequences from this earthquake. The new
cycle kind of moves on, but people's lives don't, and
they still need your help. So a couple of plays
you can donate. The White Helmets that's White Helmets dot org,
slash e N for English Syrian American Medical Society Foundation,

(03:03:56):
that's s A M S hyphen USA dot net, metsan
San Fontiere, Doctors Without Borders and that's Doctors Without Borders
dot org. And the Curtish Rear Question h E y
V A S O r u K dot r G.
Those were all great places and we'd love it if
you could spare little money to help people out. Thanks bye, Hey,

(03:04:25):
We'll be back Monday with more episodes every week from
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(03:04:47):
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