February 16, 2023 • 59 mins
A Week of Action is planned for March 4th as the city of Atlanta prepares to receive land disturbance permits. We discuss how the movement might evolve going forward.
Music by the Narcissist Cookbook and Propaganda.
https://www.stopcopcitysolidarity.org/
https://defendtheatlantaforest.org/
https://www.copcitysyllab.us/
https://www.srycampaign.org/
https://scenes.noblogs.org/
https://occupywallst.nyc/news/2023/2/11/defend-the-atlanta-forest-bring-tent-march-11-2023-stopcopcity4
https://itsgoingdown.org/three-theories-of-victory/
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
In the early morning of January thirty one, news started
to proliferate that the City of Atlanta, the Atlanta Police Foundation,
and Decap County reached a quote unquote compromise regarding the
future of Cops City. Word spread that city officials in
Atlanta were about to announce a major scaling back of
the Cops City project. At the project's size would be
(00:45):
dramatically reduced and focus more on fire department and first
respond to resources, as opposed to the original plans for
the militarized police campus. Many were skeptical about this news
and saw this simply as an empty promise masquerading as
a compromise in a savvy pr move but even some
(01:08):
who were pessimistic at least saw this as a sign
that the movement is having a substantial impact. Activists rallied
outside city Hall, holding stop Cops City signs and Defend
the Forest banners. Some reporters were denied entry into the
press conference, and protesters stood outside Mayor Andre Dickens office
(01:29):
and chanted. At the press conference that afternoon, the Mayor
of Atlanta and representatives of Decapped County announced an agreement
to allow the previously announced eighty five acre Copsy project
to proceed as planned, with land disturbance permits to be issued.
(01:54):
The rest of the land parcel of forest least to
the police foundation, will be allegedly set for preservation, a
claim that was already previously promised by officials involved with
the project. De Cab County and the City of Atlanta
released a memorandum of understanding for the building of the site,
containing a quote statement of principles, commitments, and intentions unquote.
(02:20):
Mayor Dickens framed the facility as an answer to demands
for police training reform during twenties, George Floyd uprising, saying, quote,
this training needs space, and that's exactly what this training
center is going to offer unquote. The mayor also responded
to environmental concerns by claiming the area of forest slated
(02:40):
for destruction contains only quote invasive species softwoods and weeds unquote.
Officials said the so called compromise agreement would contain provisions
for preserving parts of the South River Forest. When asked
how the environment would be protected, Mayor Dickens mentioned that
it's a three hundred eighty five acre set of land.
(03:03):
Cops city is eighty five acres. The rest is green space,
and that quote the environment will be protected in that
way unquote, with no indication given on how it would
be protected or by whom. Among the few environmental promises
are quote replacing any removed or impacted specimen trees with
(03:24):
one hundred new hardwood plantings on the site or elsewhere,
as well as one specimen tree for any invasive species
tree that was removed unquote. It's unknown if they have
even counted how many trees have been felled so far.
Activists called this a ploy to hastily pushed through a
(03:44):
sequence of land disturbance permits. The most up to date
site plans has the Public Safety Training Center spread out
over a parcel of one and seventy one acres, with
about eighty seven of those acres slated for disturbance. There
is nothing in the least agreement that restricts the Police
Foundation from building outside of those one hundred and seventy
(04:07):
one acres, though they promise it will be protected green space.
This compromise pr stunt is not even a new tactic.
In auguste after initial protests against the project delayed the
city council vote, the Atlanta Police Foundation claimed a similar
quote unquote compromise. Instead of clearing the three D eight
(04:28):
so acres that they are leased by the City of Atlanta,
they would reduce the footprint of buildings and disturbed surfaces
to only ninety acres, while more of the land would
be cleared and turned into turf fields, shooting ranges, and
horses stables labeled quote unquote green space. And wouldn't you
know that sounds almost exactly identical to this new plan
(04:51):
for compromise. Unfailed at the end of last month. Upon
such rhetoric and empty promises. The movement didn't fall but
continued to demand and fight for the full cancelation of
the project, whether in the Wilani Forest or elsewhere. After
the January thirty Feet press conference, organizers in Atlanta called
(05:12):
for a week of solidarity actions starting February nineteen, through
the quote calling on all people wherever you are to
take action in solidarity with the Movement to Stop Cops City.
Protest sit in, call an email the contractors building Cops City.
Every action has an impact unquote. At stop Cops City
(05:34):
solidarity dot org. There are guides for various actions people
can take from calling Cops City contractors or investors to
posting flyers around town or planning direct action using the
interactive target map. If you do go on any movement
related website, it's strongly recommended to use a VPN and
(05:55):
a tour compatible browser like Brave. The national spot light
on the movement has certainly increased a great deal in
the past month, both with an influx of scrutiny and
support from across the country and even the world. The
press collective has always had kind of a hybrid hybrid
role both of reporting on the movement and researching the movement,
(06:18):
researching the prison farm, but a lot of media outlets
don't quite understand the autonomous nature of the struggle, so
we have kind of found ourselves in a role of
kind of liaison ing between media and the rest of
the movement. But thankfully it's not just us doing it,
(06:40):
because boys everyone interested. All of a sudden. No one
was talking about the movement at the beginning, so we
were like, all right, we'll talk about it ourselves. We've
been able to use our platform to publicize a lot
of solidarity events, not just share memorials and what people
want others to know about torts. But you know publicize
(07:03):
these things across the nation and across the world. Statements
in solidarity have come in from radicals in Italy, Germany, France,
and Rojava. After the killing of Tortuguita, vigils happened in
cities all across the United States. A wave of targeted
vandalism and direct action against cops, city investors, and contractors
(07:25):
happened across the country in response to Towards death in Atlanta.
There's a concerted effort to not seed perception of the
movement to the state. People have an intentional, collaborative way
to affect how the movement is seen externally. This media
strategy is simply one prong of the fight, along with
(07:46):
the encampments, sabotage, vandalism, pressure campaigns, and canvassing. I think
it's really representative of the type of people that are
dedicated to the struggle in general, the way that anyone
and everyone has come together to handle the influx of
media requests to make smart decisions about it, to make
(08:07):
sure that decisions are made with the consent of those involved,
be it sharing the stories of people who are arrested
that day, sharing the stories of Towards family and towards
partners and making sure to respect their boundaries in space.
Despite the diverse nature of requests, there always seems to
be somebody in the movement who is able to speak
(08:28):
on whatever aspect of the struggle is needed. You need
someone who's cut a masters and environmental engineering. There's someone
in the movement that can talk to you for forty
five minutes about the good environmental reasons to stop cop City.
You need someone to talk for three hours about the
history of the place. There's someone for that too. Um,
you need someone to talk about how the project is
(08:52):
a pretty good example of why the Black Mecca is
a myth. The movement has people who can speak to
that too. There's been a tremendous amount of attention paid
to the movement all of a sudden, and again, the
way folks have just stepped up and come together to
handle it, I think speaks to the communal nature of
the movement. It is dedicated to building. It's not just
(09:17):
about saving the forest, it's about saving the forest for
the community. When I spoke with Karen, the neighborhood mom
who started canvassing and organizing in her community, she mentioned
how even her older family who are a long time
Georgia residents haven't totally bought the state's talking points. I
can say, you know, my mom and my mother in
(09:39):
law and like, you know, family, they know that I
care about this, and you know they're boomers. But I've
been surprised how there's a lot of there's a lot
of skepticism in the police narrative, which I found really interesting.
You know, normally when something like this happens, it's just
a hundred percent police narrative. Mayor Dickens, the day tort
died put out a pretty to mistweet that just expressed
(10:03):
their condolences to the family of the trooper that was injured,
and not one single word about the person that died.
And in most fatal incidents with police, you at least
get some kind of boilerplate language about, oh, we're sorry
that someone died, and a lot of the initial statements
(10:24):
from government and large organizations just just said nothing. But
the media, even local news, and pretty much every single report,
there's at least a line or two, if not a
pretty decent chunk of you know, whatever five PM news
story it is. Let's say, protesters have questions, People have
(10:47):
questions about towards death, and given the pretty universally negative
way that local and Atlanta media in particular has covered
the Defend the Force movement, the fact that even those
outlets have to respond to the overwhelming amount of folks
speaking out about how what happened doesn't make sense, about
(11:11):
what kind of person tore it was, about how none
of this had to happen in the first place. I'd
love to say that someone who pays attention to the
meet how the media covers this, that I could have
predicted that would happen. Three members of Congress Rashida Talib,
Corey Bush, and Senator Ed Markeys have joined in calling
(11:32):
for an independent investigation into Tortuguita's death. Like I saw
a screenshot from NBC News this morning, NBC News, and
like the Chiron was protesters still have questions about towards death,
like that's from this morning, Even after after the riot
quote unquote, after the our cinem property destruction, and almost
like a week after the incident, like I mean, it
(11:54):
was It's hard to remember now, but I think it
was like almost a month after George Floyd died before
folks really yeah, before it really got national attention. With
when Ray Shard was killed here in Atlanta, it was
a little more immediate because of because of a lot
of things. During the rally at Underground Atlanta, while people
(12:15):
were speaking in front of a dozen or so news cameras,
someone talked about how there are still people in town
that are just learning about Cops City and the fight
to prevent it from being built. They of work. I
had four different conversations about the Lannie Forest in regards
to everything that's going on, UM, with four different people
who were unaware of what was happening. Um. As big
(12:37):
as this seems right now, a lot of people are
still unaware. And as long as we keep being loud,
as long as we make sure that Cops City will
never be fucking built, we just gotta keep talking about it. Um.
Maya Dickens, Ryan Millsap, you have blood on your hands. Uh,
Cops City. I think we're about to really see how
(13:03):
how the national media is going to pick up on
the domestic terrorism and frankly, the fact that they're talking
to us at all, or the fact that they're talking
to the movement at all, I think speaks to the
strength of the movement and the simple truth of it,
which is that it didn't have to die. Um. And
this is a very wide arranging movement with a lot
(13:24):
of people who have some very good reasons for being
opposed to the project, and I think those reasons are
so compelling that I don't want to say it's easy
to see past the noise, but it's not that hard.
I remember one conversation with tort where I was like,
this might just be like an egotistical or something that
I really think this is like a lot bigger than you,
(13:46):
you know, just a little neighborhood struggle. And yeah, we
talked about We're like, yeah, no, people don't know it yet,
but it's the intersection of so many things. And you know,
if more people realize is that it would be huge. Um.
And it's you know, really heartbreaking that I think they
were they were right, Um, you know, they didn't get
(14:09):
to see it. One of the main talking points the
(14:32):
state has been trying to push through to the media
is condemning cops, city protesters, and forced defenders as outside agitators.
There's a Good Crime Thing zine titled The Making of
Outside Agitators that focuses on the use of the term
as related to ferguson uprising that gave birth to the
(14:53):
modern Black Lives Matter movement. For this next section, I'll
paraphrase a little bit from that zine. The state and
media's invocation of the term in Atlanta has been accelerating
rapidly since the raids last December, using it alongside notions
of terrorism to justify the police's violent escalation of protest suppression.
(15:16):
For example, this clip from the Cops City Community Stakeholders
Advisory Committee meeting held days after the December raid that
introduced the domestic terrorism charges. Speaking is the assistant chief
for the Atlanta Police Department, and so one of the
things we charged him with, to include criminal trustpath was
domestic terrorism charge that we put on them. So going
(15:38):
forward that that is one of the charges will be
using because that's exactly what they are. None of those
people live here. They do not have a vest interest
in this property, and we show that time and time again.
Um was an individual from Los Angeles, California, concerned about
a training facility being built in the state of Georgia,
and that is why we consider domestic terrorism. There's a
(16:02):
darkly prophetic sentence from that crime thing Mazine I mentioned
quote when we hear them say outside agitators, we know
the authorities are getting ready to spill blood. A pretty
consistent talking point by the police foundation police the state
in general has been that a lot of the people
(16:24):
they've arrested for incidents related to defend the forest have
had out of state licenses, out of state addresses, and
what they describe as no connection to Georgia. They have
been sent here to to stir up trouble. Right, Um,
(16:44):
they aren't from here, They're just they're just here too
because they don't like the cops, right, They have no
they have no stake in this struggle. So there's some
pretty obvious problems with that, and there's some pretty lengthy
historic races them tied to the term outside agitators. Um,
that makes it, you know, especially heinous to to use.
(17:07):
In the South, the term outside agitators was used to
describe the freedom writers. So let's got a little bit
got a little bit of history there. Governor Brian Kemp
declaring a state of emergency so that the National Guard
can be on standby to occupy Atlanta sure seems like
outside agitation. But even the Atlanta Police Department's use of
(17:29):
the term carries with it a great deal of hypocrisy.
Ap D has since really made a big deal lot
of stepping up its recruitment efforts, and if you go
back and look at those presentations to the media to
city council, they consistently talk about, oh, we went to
New York for three days, we went to Miami for
a week. I believe it was would have been September UM,
(17:53):
just after Darren sheer Bomb was officially installed as chief
of Police, he went before the city council and talked
about how he was so proud to have personally recruited
someone from Detroit per basically a part of their loan application,
because they're applying for a loan to finance part of
(18:14):
Cops City. By their own numbers of recruits that will
be trained at this facility will come from out of state.
They are forty percent from outside the state of Georgia.
Again in ap D s on statements about the facility,
this facility is built to bring in people from out
(18:34):
of state, from out of the country. Even because Atlanta
participates in the Georgia International Law Enforcement Exchange, which is
basically an exchange program with the idea with with the
Israeli military. Where we go there, they come here. We
teach each other. News articles claiming that a majority of
those arrested are residents from other states might sound like
(18:57):
convinced the evidence to middle class readers, But anyone who
has been poor and precarious knows that the permanent address
you give when you're arrested may not be the same
as the place you actually live. You might give a
different address because you aren't sure your current housing will last,
because your landlord doesn't know your place has more people
(19:17):
in it than are named on the lease, or simply
because you don't want local vigilantes to know where you live. Instead,
you might give a more reliable, long term address, perhaps
from another state. I mean not a human level, like
how many times have you moved somewhere and not changed
your address? How many times have you Going to the
(19:38):
DMV sucks? Yes, going to the t m V sucks.
So a lot of people don't have the privilege to
be able to go to the d n B or
don't have a permanent home address. A lot of people
are dealing with housing instability like this. There's so many
aspects of this that makes it pretty egregious and not only,
of course, is this a struggle that is deeply compelling,
(20:01):
regardless of where you call home. It just doesn't match
up to like the facts of life. Like it's it's
a little bit bizarre their insistence that the local populace
couldn't possibly be that opposed to it. When grab any
one person in the movement who's from who's from Georgia
and they know tend people who's opposed to it, that
(20:23):
person knows ten people. And also you you have statistics
like during the what's seventeen hours of public comment, seventy
of people who called in were opposed to it. Basically
the only people who weren't were people who self identified
as police officers, firefighters, and those who lived in Buckhead.
(20:45):
And it's it's not that simple, but it's pretty clear
that maybe you'd be okay with building the facility somewhere else,
maybe you're an abolitionist, maybe this, that and the other.
But Atlanta doesn't want this. Atlanta doesn't want this here.
Let's imagine that some of these arrestees who gave out
of town addresses are in Atlanta for the very first time.
(21:08):
Would that make them outside agitators? Maybe if the issue
was specific to Atlanta alone, and they had no stake
in the cause. Cops City would be a place that
police agencies from all around the country and world come
to to train and practice urban militarism. Climate collapse and
(21:28):
the destruction of forests is similarly a worldwide issue and
one of apocalyptic magnitude. It's a false narrative in one sense,
because climate change effects. Everybody cutting down a forest would
make climate change worse. Like that's a very, very very
obvious talking point. If if environment of protecting the environment
(21:49):
is important to you, it is obvious that this is
a very key struggle right now, especially in the context
of Atlanta being and growing and also gentrifying city, and
this being in a largely black and brown, middle to
(22:10):
low income neighborhood, and this being such a vast green
space in those communities that don't have the manicured Piedmont
Park in their backyards. When people are suffering the same
forms of oppression everywhere, it makes sense for us to
come to each other's assistance. This is not outside agitation,
(22:32):
This is solidarity. Solidarity has always been the most important
tool of the oppressed. This is why authorities go to
such lengths to demonize anybody who has the courage to
take risks to support others. Crickets spoke at length about
the outside agitator narrative that the state has been employing.
(22:53):
I think one thing that comes to mind is something
that I've heard a lot is that the people in
this movement are not from here, quote and quote, that
they're outside agitators, that uh, they're not from this community.
They're not you know. And and it's it seems to
me very clear to be an attempt to sort of
discredit what is a very clear majority of the community
that does not want this forest destroyed, does not want
(23:14):
cops city built, you know. Um. And that argument infuriates
me because I mean, first of all, the U. S.
Military is the biggest like outside agitator in the world. Um.
And I just I find that irony sort of unbearable.
And then I think there's this question we can get
into questions of what does it mean to be from somewhere?
And what I think is a more helpful question is
(23:36):
how are you somewhere? How are you in relation to
a place? And I I think tort with someone who
was always trying to be in the right relation with
the land and in right relation with their neighbors, in
right relation with the communities here. One story that I
keep revisiting of them is when we were checking in
uh and and people are asking them, you know what,
what do folks in the forest need? What can we
(23:56):
get them? Do they need food? What? You know? What
do they need? And to it was like, oh no, actually,
you know, we have everything we need. But it would
be great if people could start we could make sure
they're giving food to the poor folks in their own communities,
Like make sure you're giving the food to the people
in your neighborhoods. Are you checking in with the un
housed communities in your neighborhood like they were? Just I
think constantly seeking to be in right relation. And I
(24:19):
think regardless of where all of us are from, if
we if we can con claim to be from somewhere,
I mean, arguably if we're not Muscogee Creek, none of
us is from here. Um, but I think it's a
more helpful direction to think about what are we doing
once we're here? How are we trying to be here?
And yeah, I mean that that specific argument. Really it
really frustrates me because I think it really Obvius skates
(24:41):
how much this is a local movement, and also having
solidarity from across state lines, from across national lines, speaks
to the intersection of our the intersections of our oppressions,
the intersections of our movements. It doesn't speak to the
fact that this is co opted or it doesn't indicate
anything other than that none of us is free. Into
all this are free. The ultimate goal of the police
(25:03):
is not so much to brutalize and pacify specific individuals
as it is to extract rebelliousness itself from the social fabric.
They seek to externalize agitation, so anyone who stands up
for themselves will be seen as an outsider, as deviant
and anti social. Noah mentioned how the outside agitator narrative
(25:27):
is rooted in stripping people of their own autonomy. It's
completely denying like the freedom of movement and and the
freedom to decide that you would like to go and
support other issues like the empathy to show solidarity with
other people. Just deciding that if you are living here
(25:51):
a bit from out of time, that somehow makes you
that makes and much more more dangerous. And if you
are an official resident and some at all I mean,
and even some of the people who were like out
of town there, like not even two hours away from
where from where the prosecutors are claiming where they're from
(26:13):
the outside. Agitator's narrative only works if we have this
sense of other nests that we talked about in the
last episode, this disconnect and separation from neighboring struggles, as
if lines on a map change the morality of actions.
Keeping people in pre trial jail for an unknown amount
(26:36):
of time could could be literally over a year because
they are deemed non local, so the judge thought they
were quote unquote flight risk beyond the charges themselves, which
are innately kind of absurd. And the brutality is is
the point she audacity of keeping people with no evidence
in cages for years um for going to a protest
(26:59):
is just it's not surprising, but it still is incredibly upsetic,
Like it's like it's no and it would be completely
decried if we're happening at any other country, right, and
a massive human rights violation. If it's happening in China
because of the U. S. China relations, like absolutely not there,
there'd be an entire like I don't know, national outcry
(27:20):
but because it's people who are resisting this government in
this state, then yeah, it doesn't get the same kind
of empathy, it doesn't get the same outcry. When I
talked with Karen, she spoke about how thankful she is
that there are people from across the country, people like
tort who care about the South rid Her forest enough
to travel to Atlanta to defend it. In terms of
the narrative of like outside agitators, you know, I'm I'm
(27:44):
really grateful that people are coming to like protect the
forest in my backyard, Like I am. I have like
so much gratitude. It is so it is so meaningful. Um, yeah,
and I I think I think after the first raid,
I told towards that and I'm glad I did. But yeah,
(28:08):
it really is like just so much gratitude. The framing
of outside agitators is meant to keep people away and
stifle solidarity, just like the domestic terrorism charges are meant
to the state is trying out every tactic to scare
people away from participating in the movement. So it feels
(28:28):
like just the past month there's been such a intense
increase in the level of state repression and state violence.
How do you see things evolving in the next few
weeks and months and or like even days at this point,
like just with how both like physical violence definitely increasing
(28:48):
with the raids and now like you know, killing somebody,
um and then the types of like you know, judicial
abuse of power of giving people seven thousand dollars bail
key being you know, many others just in jail and
perpetuity for who knows how long. Yeah, I mean, I
think it's clear looking at this movement that the state,
(29:09):
the cops police have always been the first to escalate,
have and have now murdered someone, have now assassinated someone,
and are the ones who are constantly sort of making
putting other people's lives in danger. They're really the people
who are making folks on safe and and to it
was a street medic. To it was someone who went
through street medic training with someone who was passionate about
(29:32):
protecting their community. And in street medic training, one of
the things that is taught there's a whole section on
police weapons and state weapons and ensure. We cover tear gas,
we cover on bullets, we cover all anything that you
can sort of commonly see protests or in raids, and
one of the biggest weapons that we always cover his fear.
And that is really what I see happening with this escalation,
(29:54):
is that, yes, there's a sort of increase of literal weapons,
of of of arms, of just everything we've heard about
in in the forest. Um. But I think when you
take that, in combination with the ludicrous charges, what they're
really trying to weaponize as our own fear, as our
our our own emotions, making us think that it's too
dangerous to be in the forest, that it's not worth it,
(30:15):
that it's too risky, making us think that the forest
itself is somehow an unsafe place, making us think that
the people who protected are unsafe. And I think that's
the that's the sort of trend that I'm seeing. I
think in terms of what's coming next, I think they're
going to keep leaning into the weapon of fear. I
think it's um. I think it's you know, it's it's
(30:35):
it's not not ha ha funny that they accuse protesters
and the people who have been charged with domestic terrorism
of intimidation, when clearly they're using those charges to intimidate people,
both the people who are charged with it and anyone
who might consider themselves an ally or a friend of
the forest and a friend of the forest defenders. So
what I see moving forward in terms of carrying towards
(30:55):
legacy forward, in terms of carrying this movement forward, is
not buying into that bullshit like very much being fear
walking and not trying to say people shouldn't be scared
or not have those feelings. But one of the memories
of tor that I have is them very clearly refusing intimidation.
Whether it was cops, whether it was you know whoever
the sort of representative of the state was, they never
(31:17):
gave into that. And I think that's what I'm trying
to carry forward. A lot of us are trying to
carry forward. Noah spoke similarly about fear being a powerful
weapon of the state and a very insidious one because
it doesn't punish people for actions they may or may
not have done, but instead works to prevent people from
taking action in the first place. Fear the number one
(31:42):
that the state ranch to bear. All of their their
toys and their guns and ship do not have the
reach and do not have the capacity to stop fear
making people afraid of the idea of volting of the
(32:03):
idea of dissidence is extremely powerful, and it's something that
we all have to combat in our own ways. It's
something we will have to resist in our own ways
because like obviously the state is capable of murdering and
of putting people in prison for a very long time,
and that is scary, and that is a valid thing
to be afraid of. But we stand to lose so
(32:27):
much if we do not combat that fear to face
off with them, that it's just something that I've found
I have to manage. It's something that because we I'm
so much more afraid of what we all lose if
we don't stop them here than I am of myself
being harmed or going to prison. We all stand to lose.
(32:50):
Ten tens of millions of people stand to lose everything
if we allow climate backalypse to bear, if we allow
the powers that be to get signific becoming more effective
out combining dissidens in the streets from not not just
for in the United States, but for cops national struggling. Mean,
this is the same police department that cross training. If
(33:15):
you think the idea wouldn't becoming the facility to train
better heart to you know, kill past and dissidence yourself
like this will mean something too, every foreign military, foreign police,
for every police forson. There's a quote from Tortuguita talking
about how to deal with fear. What I'm about to
(33:37):
read also demonstrates as their partner said that tort was
very aware of the risks inherent to resisting the state,
especially as a non white forest defender, But with an
understanding of that risk and the fear associated with said risk,
they chose it was worth it to keep on fighting. Quote,
(33:59):
Am I scared of the state? Pretty silly not to be.
I'm a brown person. I might be killed by the
police for existing in certain spaces. Fear is the mind killer.
That's a quote I think about often. I must not fear,
and fear's the mind the killer. And here's a little
death that brings total of liliteration. Will face my fear.
(34:22):
I'm permitted to pass over me and to me to
continue what Torts said quote I am scared, but you
can't let the fear stop you from doing things, from living,
from existing, from resisting unquote. In the early nineteen sixties,
(35:04):
Atlanta was dubbed the city too Busy to hate. The
phrase can be traced back to a civil rights era
marketing slogan attributed to Mayor Ivan Allen, who spent millions
of dollars in the nineteen sixties to promote Atlanta as
a business oriented city, a city moving forward from its
racial past and into a hopeful new future. This was
(35:27):
the beginning of the Atlanta Way. Still today, you can
find the city too busy to hate everywhere on on murals, posters,
and T shirts. It's become part of Atlanta's identity, or
at least Atlanta tries to tell itself that. Within the
slogan lies this admission of the belief that racism and
(35:48):
oppression can be beaten by hyper capitalism, meaning the first
and foremost goal of the city is economic progress. Equality
and racial just dis must take a back seat because
the city is just too busy. There's a few better
examples of this in action than the black neighborhoods that
(36:09):
were demolished to build infrastructure for the Nine Olympics and
later the Mercedes Benz Stadium. Since then, the belt Line's
original vision of public transit to green space and affordable
housing has been abandoned in favor of developing luxury apartments
and gentrified retail joints. As Fouko's Boomerang brings the internal
(36:31):
colonization of gentrification and increasing police militarization to Atlanta, it
only makes sense that Cops City and the battle to
stop it is happening here. Towart died two days right
after Martin Luther cat Jr. Memorial Day. We're in Atlanta.
There's this whole section of the Delta Airport in Atlanta
dedicated to John Lewis. You can hear his voice on
a loop saying good trouble. And yet as soon as
(36:54):
the festivities are over, as soon as the fundraising is over,
when someone is shot resisting the state and a peaceful,
a nonviolent direct action, they're labeled a terrorist. I don't
understand how someone can possibly reconcile those two things. They
seem to me to be grotesque. I mean, it's it's disgusting,
but I don't see that reflected in any mainstream narrative.
(37:14):
Noah talked with me about how he first got involved
in the top Cops City movement and then my introduction
the cops and started where much people and land. Where
they got firstly that this was a thing that the
city was planning. I remember having just a very like
oh my god, what the reaction to realizing like they
(37:36):
want to destroy the largest urban canopy and the country
to build a big fake city for them to practice
during urban combat. And that's like parity Dysturbian. And very
quickly people were organizing various different ranges to stop them,
to make their voices heard that this was not something
(37:57):
that it Lanta is okay with. This is not something
we were okay with having our communities is not something
that anybody wanted. That took a lot of different frends.
For me, I mean that went from working, whether that
be on the streets too, just doing food destroys and
medical finance, to scampering around the woods with my friends
(38:18):
like that took many different forms forms of resistance to
m and over time that has interchange and evolved. But
I still think it's something that I working on a
lot of different Frenchs to be persons possible when it
comes to resistingness. The sheer resiliency we've seen in Atlanta
(38:41):
post has been incredibly impressive and inspiring. After the radical
communities in a lot of cities dealt with pretty extreme
burnout to do to such a grueling summer, and ever
since then people seem to be recovering and anticipating the
next cycle of mass uprising. As news spread of Memphis
(39:03):
police's brutal beating of Tyree Nichols, which resulted in his death,
there was renewed discussion if it was going to spark
the quote unquote next But Atlanta is one of the
few cities where things really haven't halted since Defend the
four stuff has been going pretty hard ever since, like
(39:27):
um and it's been a very compressive amount of resiliency.
Can you can you kind of talk on that aspect
of how people have been able to do that. I
think it comes down to having a really good support
network of people of people who are willing to um
B support active financially make this possible. And it also
(39:56):
comes down to that to defend the Fourish movement and
show it is so important to anybody, It should be
so important to anybody who looked at as a strike
back against police violence what cops it It means for
all of us is a world in which is much
harder to resist police, especially in cities, and for a
(40:19):
lot of activists who come out from the forest became
an extension of that fight. It became its own, and
it's one fight to perhapt the forest and an extension
of the battle against the violence of the state and
against the ability of the police to further the militarize.
I think that kept a lot of a lot of
people going. UM. But I certainly happens. I mean it is.
(40:39):
It can be really exhausting work, it can be really
defeating at times, and it's been really important I think
for people everywhere and and here to have you know,
friends and and things that they can do to decompress
and take time off when needed, to stay to keep
the ability to keep doing this UM and to not
(41:00):
burn up completely and to be able to keep going
against what feels like a set terms. UM. Also just activists,
they are pretty fucking resilience. Just I'm continuously so impressed
by the people I see just continuing to guard after
day and working behind the scenes, doing everything possible to
(41:21):
make sure that we can keep going. There's other different
has a couple of things. I'm getting money on people's
commissaries and the past has done like later writing campaigns
for a political prisoners across the country, which is certainly
like a thing that you know, we're looking at posential
people being held very long term. Um, that's absolutely going
to be something in the coming weeks that I helped people,
(41:43):
um spread to them. Like obviously these people who are
incarcerated are support in every way we can possibly possibly
do that. If the people currently incarcerated are granted bond
during the appeal process and it's set to the same
amount as the last two individuals, that would be three
hundred and fifty five thousand dollars per person for at
(42:04):
least five more people. That included with like the previous
bonding match that were set for previous rage and me
we're approaching three million dollars and prejunction bonds, which is
just designed to drain people are as much as possible
and make the idea of protests same impossible. And again
this is just another at this perpetuate power in fear
(42:29):
and making it same as impossible to protestants and making
it seem like if you were to get arrested that
you would never get out because that's terrifying. That's that's
the number one. There have been a few semi distinct
stages in the struggle against cops City in summer one.
(42:49):
The initial stage was trying to get the city council
to vote no on the project. There was a lot
of canvassing, calling representatives, involvement from large above ground organizations
like the d s A and Sunrise, you know, people
trying to quote unquote campaign the right way to get
the project shut down before even started. And then even
(43:10):
despite sevent of the local people who called in not
wanting this, the city council voted for it anyway. And
then starting two months after the vote, and for over
a year now, we've had this forest occupation or encampment stage,
people going into the woods and having their continuous physical
(43:32):
presence there itself be a deterrent for construction. Concurrently, there
have been random acts of sabotage, with construction equipment spontaneously
bursting into flames, alongside pressure campaigns targeting subcontractors and cops
city investors. With the past few police raids having been
increasingly violent, the last one resulting in the death of
(43:55):
a force defender. I asked the people I spoke with
if they saw any forthcoming new stage of the movement,
considering the cops are trying really hard to make it
very dangerous to camp in the woods right now? What's
your sense from on the ground, how stuff might you
know with these increasing charges increasing, with the bail phones
(44:16):
increasing you so forth, what's some kind of ways that
you feeld stuff might start changing on the ground, Like
do you like, do you think the encampment style we're
content will continue or will it kind of evolve in
a new kind of unexpected direction. It remains to be
seen how um the approach to living in the woods
will adapt to these changes. Um. The decap County Police
(44:39):
Department has claimed that they're going to increase their surveillance
and patrol of the neighborhood that the woods is in.
It remains to be seen what that will mean for
the encampment and how active they're going to be in
you know, repressing people in a day to day sort
of thing. And also I think one change is reconsidering
(45:01):
what on the ground means and what the bounds of
the forest are. There's more woods that black Hall plans
to develop on nearby, so reconsidering what on the ground
is you know, brass field and gory construction sites could
be considered and on the ground site you know for actions,
and you know, I think there's a lot of room
(45:22):
to grow in that direction as well. Like do you
see this moment as like a substantial turning point. I mean,
I don't think it couldn't be a turning point. I
think that every every escalation of violence that this happen
has been perpetrated by law enforcement. There's never been a
moment in which the people can buying the unforcement have
been the ones to escalate the violence. And I think
(45:46):
that this marks a willingness of the the government here
in the city government that this is the help that
they're willing to die on. This is where they're going
to standard ground and where they are proving to work,
that they are are committed and so committed to the
idea of Voilding Cops City that they are willing to
kill people. And I think that that is a turning point.
(46:09):
And how we as a movement have to be willing
to respond to the state, and how we have to
be willing to look at them not just as this
entity that we are facing down like in the courts
and doing fun blast because they're clearly doesn't work, they
are just going to murder us, but as a force
that is a you know, like offensive militarized force coming
(46:31):
after us. I think that is a that it marks
a really big to shift and overallly looking at what
the city government he is willing to do to get
this done. And I think that a variety of tactics
will always being play. People are always going to have
different ways that they feel comfortable and safe and responding.
But I do think that I think what we saw
(46:55):
on Saturday was a but very response to that that
that people shut up and very clear that we were
not going to take this line. That people aren't going
to be willing to let the state and they don't
let the police answer. And from that we see more
(47:20):
and more people taken up acts of physical resistance to
enforcement prevent them from building copsy and prevent them from
committing for the act of violence for comrades. So far,
the forced occupation has proved effective in delaying the construction
of Cops City. In the past, barricades have inhibited the
movement of construction equipment, Machinery left in the woods has
(47:43):
been sabotaged, and during attempts to fell trees, force defenders
have put their own bodies on the line by climbing
into the treetops to prevent them from being cut down.
Other prongs of the movement have similarly produced successes. Pressure
campaigns focused on getting contractors and businesses to divest or
pull out of the project resulted last April in a
(48:05):
Reeves Young Construction, the initial contractor for Cops City, severing
ties with the project after months of pressure, and just
this month, Quality Glass Company announced that they would not
be working on Cops City, as well as no longer
doing business with brass Field and Gory, the current contractor
for the facility. These pressure campaigns can include protests at
(48:27):
company offices, phone calls imploring them to drop the contract or,
actions more along the lines of vandalism at job sites,
or visits to the neighborhoods of company executives, even to
simply drop off flyers or banners. I don't think this
we're going to win one front. The amount of people
(48:48):
that was really beautiful to see. The state was always
going to be able to put multiple fronts, and that includes,
you know, that includes having uh that conclude having physical
presence in the forest and preventing machinery from coming in,
(49:08):
but that also includes our acts of sabotage, making sure
that contractors who are as signed on the cops that
he do not feel comfortable and do not feel safe
signing on this project and making this economically impossible for
the city to continue doing. As far as it being
like a new strategy, I don't know if it would be.
(49:30):
News've already seen you know, procuipment spontaneously combust and such things,
but I do think this marks a point and potentially
like the frequency of this things happening, and also and necessary,
I think evaluating where we are now and thinking realistically
about what our next steps are to make this an
(49:52):
untenable situation for the city to continue to proSP well.
One evolution that I see happening is a consensus amongst
long term organizers in Atlanta that we want as many
people coming here to participate as possible, and also that
I think one change is being less picky in who
we invite to participate and encouraging like liberals and moderates
(50:16):
to be a part of this. They've always been a
part of it, but really um emphasizing that side of
the movement more. Back in the Defend the Atlanta Forest
episodes from last May, I talked about the Shack model,
the aim of which is to make construction economically untenable
by maintaining a presence in the forest, sabotaging work, and
(50:39):
targeting specific subcontractors locally and elsewhere. In addition to contractors,
corporate funders affiliated with the APF can also be targeted
to distancentivized affiliation with the project. Solidarity actions targeting Atlanta
Police Foundation contributors have been happening nationwide. As mentioned at
the top of the episode, a Week of Solidarity is
(51:02):
coming up on February and Stop Cop City Solidarity dot
org has many resources. In the past, actions have included
everything from office protests, divestment campaigns, vandalism, and actions by
workers within these companies to pressure them into cutting ties.
No action is too small or too ambitious. In analysis
(51:25):
on tactics published recently on its going Down said this
regarding the targeting of Cops City investors. Quote In other campaigns,
banks like Wells Fargo have been forced to divest from
police and prison expansion, but these efforts often take years
and lots of resources. Atlanta Police Foundation supporters like public universities,
(51:49):
Georgia State University, Georgia Tech, or Emery University could be
lower hanging fruit comrades should identify which cops city funders
are most vulnerable a pressure where potential allies like student
groups and unions are positioned and share this info and
synchronize actions. Unquote. Bureaucratic red tape can also be effective
(52:11):
in delaying progress. Ongoing zoning appeals could result in an
official stock work order, but it remains unseen if such
an order will even be followed, as currently laws around
zoning appeals are being ignored by the contractors and the
Atlanta Police Foundation. Tortuguita had spoken of a theory of
(52:32):
THEIRS concerning the potential for intense police repression and how
the aftermath of that might play out. Quote. They could
come in and completely destroy the place, raise it, arrest
everybody they could find, kill anybody who resists arrest. They
could do that, and then days later there would be
(52:54):
a shipload of people back here. For every head they
cut off, there would be more who would come back
to avenge the arrested, to avenge the tort did not
finish that sentence, but resuming, what I'm saying is if
they do a huge crackdown and completely try to crush
the movement, they'll succeed at hurting some people. They'll succeed
(53:17):
at destroying some infrastructure, but they're not going to succeed
at stopping the movement. That's just going to strengthen the movement.
It will draw a lot of attention to the movement.
If enough people decide to do this with non violent action,
you can overwhelm the infrastructure of the state. That's something
they fear more than violence in the streets, because violence
(53:37):
in the streets they'll win. They have the guns for it.
We don't unquote. No matter how the movement continues, the
weight of towards absence will be felt as long as
this fight carries on. It's such a huge loss um.
But as we as we keep thinking about you know,
w W t D, what would do uh, It's continue
(54:01):
to support those projects. It's continue to uplift the spaces
and groups that are supporting the most vulnerable amongst us
and uplifting their voices, uplifting their safety, and they're going
to continue to be trainings offered, training specifically for folks
who are marginalized and afraid of gun violence and want
to know how to be able to protect themselves and
protect their friends. This came about specifically in the wake
of the shooting at the gay bar Um I guess
(54:23):
a few months ago now, Jesus um. And that was
something that Towart was helping organize. So yeah, we're gonna
we're gonna keep doing that work. How do you think
like a continue on without without towards there? Now? Um,
you know, I think they set me up the hardest
thing to navigate, like, Okay, what can I do? Where
(54:47):
can I fit in? Like I'm short of you know,
living in the forest. And I think with just like
the canvassing, I feel like I've really figured out the
ways I can you know, my place in it enough
to keep me busy. It was towards kind of very
instrumental to having you help figure out like your role
(55:07):
in this. I mean honestly, I would just like spit ball,
you know, an idea and they'd be like, yeah, you
should do that, um or we were like yeah, they'd
be sick, and that gave me the confidence to be
like okay, and also like, I think this movement is
interesting because it's totally different from any other organization or
(55:28):
anything I've done in that like, if you want to
volunteer in any other thing, like you know, you make
a graphic and you check it and you send it
to someone and get it approved, you know, and just
like the kind of deconstructing that thinking was, like, I
mean toward was really instrumental in that And it can
be like difficult to navigate, but really just walking all
(55:52):
that back and being like if you want to, like
you know, canvass your neighbors, like you just do it.
The Stop Copsity movement has called for a fifth Week
of Action to be held on March fourth through March
eleven in Atlanta, Georgia. They are asking all those opposed
to Cops City to come participate in a variety of
(56:13):
events and actions both in and out of the forest.
And if you're able to bring a tent, if you're
unable to travel, there's still calls to support people in
your own community who might be able to do so.
This Week of Action will be a key moment in
the next phase of the fight to defend the forest.
I want people to know that being in the woods,
(56:35):
even if just for a few days, will transform you
and unexpected and delightful ways. And that's something that we
witnessed with Towart. Towart lived in the woods for less
than a year, and they transformed and blossomed into their
purpose in unexpected and beautiful ways. And so if you
have the opportunity to come and spend any amount of
(56:57):
time in these woods, I encourage you to do so,
because I think that you'll find that it will nourish
you and aid in your growth as a human. The
police have not succeeded in scaring everybody out of the forest.
We Lonnie People's Park is still legally required to operate
as a public park. Last month I saw regular people
(57:19):
jogging the trails. People still come every day. The movement
has only grown despite the repression and now force defenders
in Atlanta are urging people everywhere to organize for the
upcoming mass convergence. A large list of resources and movement
websites I'll be putting in the description for people to
(57:39):
learn more and stay up to date with information regarding
the Week of Action. I'll end this series by reading
from a defend the Forest poster that I saw around Atlanta. Quote,
it is your mission to stop cops city by all
of the means at your disposal, without hesitation. Defend the
(58:00):
forest from destruction, the city from commercialization, the future from ruin,
the imagination from conquest, and the heart from resignation. Do
not wait for further instruction. Reality is the battlefield. Yeah,
the rain on leaves tickling the earliest of instruments, the
(58:21):
melody we mimic in as the sound of wind whistling
long before the safety. It's channing under the stars, Camped
under the vorganicpy she sang a song, and she was
far from silent. No virus or violets, but the fragrance
of her flowers that continued to invite us of medicine, materials,
of vitamins, of minerals, and all that is essential, which
just grew right beside us. And Tyson started fighting over
(58:43):
the gifts that she provide us, scorching the very soil
that all of us derived from. And when empires learning
can't withstand bio, we returned to the land where our
ancestors rain dance. We are all her creatures, We still
bear her features, the one and only reason all living
things is breathing. The city's deceive even leave, Go see
the dark, young, Go be among the lungs of mother arthuse. Yeah, yeah,
(59:29):
before let's shot them down. There was a forest music
by the Narcissist Cookbook, and a propaganda It Could Happen
Here is a production of cool Zone Media. For more
podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zone
media dot com, or check us out on the I
Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
(59:50):
You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
monthly at cool zone Media dot com slash sources. Thanks
for listening.
In the early morning of January thirty one, news started
to proliferate that the City of Atlanta, the Atlanta Police Foundation,
and Decap County reached a quote unquote compromise regarding the
future of Cops City. Word spread that city officials in
Atlanta were about to announce a major scaling back of
the Cops City project. At the project's size would be
(00:45):
dramatically reduced and focus more on fire department and first
respond to resources, as opposed to the original plans for
the militarized police campus. Many were skeptical about this news
and saw this simply as an empty promise masquerading as
a compromise in a savvy pr move but even some
(01:08):
who were pessimistic at least saw this as a sign
that the movement is having a substantial impact. Activists rallied
outside city Hall, holding stop Cops City signs and Defend
the Forest banners. Some reporters were denied entry into the
press conference, and protesters stood outside Mayor Andre Dickens office
(01:29):
and chanted. At the press conference that afternoon, the Mayor
of Atlanta and representatives of Decapped County announced an agreement
to allow the previously announced eighty five acre Copsy project
to proceed as planned, with land disturbance permits to be issued.
(01:54):
The rest of the land parcel of forest least to
the police foundation, will be allegedly set for preservation, a
claim that was already previously promised by officials involved with
the project. De Cab County and the City of Atlanta
released a memorandum of understanding for the building of the site,
containing a quote statement of principles, commitments, and intentions unquote.
(02:20):
Mayor Dickens framed the facility as an answer to demands
for police training reform during twenties, George Floyd uprising, saying, quote,
this training needs space, and that's exactly what this training
center is going to offer unquote. The mayor also responded
to environmental concerns by claiming the area of forest slated
(02:40):
for destruction contains only quote invasive species softwoods and weeds unquote.
Officials said the so called compromise agreement would contain provisions
for preserving parts of the South River Forest. When asked
how the environment would be protected, Mayor Dickens mentioned that
it's a three hundred eighty five acre set of land.
(03:03):
Cops city is eighty five acres. The rest is green space,
and that quote the environment will be protected in that
way unquote, with no indication given on how it would
be protected or by whom. Among the few environmental promises
are quote replacing any removed or impacted specimen trees with
(03:24):
one hundred new hardwood plantings on the site or elsewhere,
as well as one specimen tree for any invasive species
tree that was removed unquote. It's unknown if they have
even counted how many trees have been felled so far.
Activists called this a ploy to hastily pushed through a
(03:44):
sequence of land disturbance permits. The most up to date
site plans has the Public Safety Training Center spread out
over a parcel of one and seventy one acres, with
about eighty seven of those acres slated for disturbance. There
is nothing in the least agreement that restricts the Police
Foundation from building outside of those one hundred and seventy
(04:07):
one acres, though they promise it will be protected green space.
This compromise pr stunt is not even a new tactic.
In auguste after initial protests against the project delayed the
city council vote, the Atlanta Police Foundation claimed a similar
quote unquote compromise. Instead of clearing the three D eight
(04:28):
so acres that they are leased by the City of Atlanta,
they would reduce the footprint of buildings and disturbed surfaces
to only ninety acres, while more of the land would
be cleared and turned into turf fields, shooting ranges, and
horses stables labeled quote unquote green space. And wouldn't you
know that sounds almost exactly identical to this new plan
(04:51):
for compromise. Unfailed at the end of last month. Upon
such rhetoric and empty promises. The movement didn't fall but
continued to demand and fight for the full cancelation of
the project, whether in the Wilani Forest or elsewhere. After
the January thirty Feet press conference, organizers in Atlanta called
(05:12):
for a week of solidarity actions starting February nineteen, through
the quote calling on all people wherever you are to
take action in solidarity with the Movement to Stop Cops City.
Protest sit in, call an email the contractors building Cops City.
Every action has an impact unquote. At stop Cops City
(05:34):
solidarity dot org. There are guides for various actions people
can take from calling Cops City contractors or investors to
posting flyers around town or planning direct action using the
interactive target map. If you do go on any movement
related website, it's strongly recommended to use a VPN and
(05:55):
a tour compatible browser like Brave. The national spot light
on the movement has certainly increased a great deal in
the past month, both with an influx of scrutiny and
support from across the country and even the world. The
press collective has always had kind of a hybrid hybrid
role both of reporting on the movement and researching the movement,
(06:18):
researching the prison farm, but a lot of media outlets
don't quite understand the autonomous nature of the struggle, so
we have kind of found ourselves in a role of
kind of liaison ing between media and the rest of
the movement. But thankfully it's not just us doing it,
(06:40):
because boys everyone interested. All of a sudden. No one
was talking about the movement at the beginning, so we
were like, all right, we'll talk about it ourselves. We've
been able to use our platform to publicize a lot
of solidarity events, not just share memorials and what people
want others to know about torts. But you know publicize
(07:03):
these things across the nation and across the world. Statements
in solidarity have come in from radicals in Italy, Germany, France,
and Rojava. After the killing of Tortuguita, vigils happened in
cities all across the United States. A wave of targeted
vandalism and direct action against cops, city investors, and contractors
(07:25):
happened across the country in response to Towards death in Atlanta.
There's a concerted effort to not seed perception of the
movement to the state. People have an intentional, collaborative way
to affect how the movement is seen externally. This media
strategy is simply one prong of the fight, along with
(07:46):
the encampments, sabotage, vandalism, pressure campaigns, and canvassing. I think
it's really representative of the type of people that are
dedicated to the struggle in general, the way that anyone
and everyone has come together to handle the influx of
media requests to make smart decisions about it, to make
(08:07):
sure that decisions are made with the consent of those involved,
be it sharing the stories of people who are arrested
that day, sharing the stories of Towards family and towards
partners and making sure to respect their boundaries in space.
Despite the diverse nature of requests, there always seems to
be somebody in the movement who is able to speak
(08:28):
on whatever aspect of the struggle is needed. You need
someone who's cut a masters and environmental engineering. There's someone
in the movement that can talk to you for forty
five minutes about the good environmental reasons to stop cop City.
You need someone to talk for three hours about the
history of the place. There's someone for that too. Um,
you need someone to talk about how the project is
(08:52):
a pretty good example of why the Black Mecca is
a myth. The movement has people who can speak to
that too. There's been a tremendous amount of attention paid
to the movement all of a sudden, and again, the
way folks have just stepped up and come together to
handle it, I think speaks to the communal nature of
the movement. It is dedicated to building. It's not just
(09:17):
about saving the forest, it's about saving the forest for
the community. When I spoke with Karen, the neighborhood mom
who started canvassing and organizing in her community, she mentioned
how even her older family who are a long time
Georgia residents haven't totally bought the state's talking points. I
can say, you know, my mom and my mother in
(09:39):
law and like, you know, family, they know that I
care about this, and you know they're boomers. But I've
been surprised how there's a lot of there's a lot
of skepticism in the police narrative, which I found really interesting.
You know, normally when something like this happens, it's just
a hundred percent police narrative. Mayor Dickens, the day tort
died put out a pretty to mistweet that just expressed
(10:03):
their condolences to the family of the trooper that was injured,
and not one single word about the person that died.
And in most fatal incidents with police, you at least
get some kind of boilerplate language about, oh, we're sorry
that someone died, and a lot of the initial statements
(10:24):
from government and large organizations just just said nothing. But
the media, even local news, and pretty much every single report,
there's at least a line or two, if not a
pretty decent chunk of you know, whatever five PM news
story it is. Let's say, protesters have questions, People have
(10:47):
questions about towards death, and given the pretty universally negative
way that local and Atlanta media in particular has covered
the Defend the Force movement, the fact that even those
outlets have to respond to the overwhelming amount of folks
speaking out about how what happened doesn't make sense, about
(11:11):
what kind of person tore it was, about how none
of this had to happen in the first place. I'd
love to say that someone who pays attention to the
meet how the media covers this, that I could have
predicted that would happen. Three members of Congress Rashida Talib,
Corey Bush, and Senator Ed Markeys have joined in calling
(11:32):
for an independent investigation into Tortuguita's death. Like I saw
a screenshot from NBC News this morning, NBC News, and
like the Chiron was protesters still have questions about towards death,
like that's from this morning, Even after after the riot
quote unquote, after the our cinem property destruction, and almost
like a week after the incident, like I mean, it
(11:54):
was It's hard to remember now, but I think it
was like almost a month after George Floyd died before
folks really yeah, before it really got national attention. With
when Ray Shard was killed here in Atlanta, it was
a little more immediate because of because of a lot
of things. During the rally at Underground Atlanta, while people
(12:15):
were speaking in front of a dozen or so news cameras,
someone talked about how there are still people in town
that are just learning about Cops City and the fight
to prevent it from being built. They of work. I
had four different conversations about the Lannie Forest in regards
to everything that's going on, UM, with four different people
who were unaware of what was happening. Um. As big
(12:37):
as this seems right now, a lot of people are
still unaware. And as long as we keep being loud,
as long as we make sure that Cops City will
never be fucking built, we just gotta keep talking about it. Um.
Maya Dickens, Ryan Millsap, you have blood on your hands. Uh,
Cops City. I think we're about to really see how
(13:03):
how the national media is going to pick up on
the domestic terrorism and frankly, the fact that they're talking
to us at all, or the fact that they're talking
to the movement at all, I think speaks to the
strength of the movement and the simple truth of it,
which is that it didn't have to die. Um. And
this is a very wide arranging movement with a lot
(13:24):
of people who have some very good reasons for being
opposed to the project, and I think those reasons are
so compelling that I don't want to say it's easy
to see past the noise, but it's not that hard.
I remember one conversation with tort where I was like,
this might just be like an egotistical or something that
I really think this is like a lot bigger than you,
(13:46):
you know, just a little neighborhood struggle. And yeah, we
talked about We're like, yeah, no, people don't know it yet,
but it's the intersection of so many things. And you know,
if more people realize is that it would be huge. Um.
And it's you know, really heartbreaking that I think they
were they were right, Um, you know, they didn't get
(14:09):
to see it. One of the main talking points the
(14:32):
state has been trying to push through to the media
is condemning cops, city protesters, and forced defenders as outside agitators.
There's a Good Crime Thing zine titled The Making of
Outside Agitators that focuses on the use of the term
as related to ferguson uprising that gave birth to the
(14:53):
modern Black Lives Matter movement. For this next section, I'll
paraphrase a little bit from that zine. The state and
media's invocation of the term in Atlanta has been accelerating
rapidly since the raids last December, using it alongside notions
of terrorism to justify the police's violent escalation of protest suppression.
(15:16):
For example, this clip from the Cops City Community Stakeholders
Advisory Committee meeting held days after the December raid that
introduced the domestic terrorism charges. Speaking is the assistant chief
for the Atlanta Police Department, and so one of the
things we charged him with, to include criminal trustpath was
domestic terrorism charge that we put on them. So going
(15:38):
forward that that is one of the charges will be
using because that's exactly what they are. None of those
people live here. They do not have a vest interest
in this property, and we show that time and time again.
Um was an individual from Los Angeles, California, concerned about
a training facility being built in the state of Georgia,
and that is why we consider domestic terrorism. There's a
(16:02):
darkly prophetic sentence from that crime thing Mazine I mentioned
quote when we hear them say outside agitators, we know
the authorities are getting ready to spill blood. A pretty
consistent talking point by the police foundation police the state
in general has been that a lot of the people
(16:24):
they've arrested for incidents related to defend the forest have
had out of state licenses, out of state addresses, and
what they describe as no connection to Georgia. They have
been sent here to to stir up trouble. Right, Um,
(16:44):
they aren't from here, They're just they're just here too
because they don't like the cops, right, They have no
they have no stake in this struggle. So there's some
pretty obvious problems with that, and there's some pretty lengthy
historic races them tied to the term outside agitators. Um,
that makes it, you know, especially heinous to to use.
(17:07):
In the South, the term outside agitators was used to
describe the freedom writers. So let's got a little bit
got a little bit of history there. Governor Brian Kemp
declaring a state of emergency so that the National Guard
can be on standby to occupy Atlanta sure seems like
outside agitation. But even the Atlanta Police Department's use of
(17:29):
the term carries with it a great deal of hypocrisy.
Ap D has since really made a big deal lot
of stepping up its recruitment efforts, and if you go
back and look at those presentations to the media to
city council, they consistently talk about, oh, we went to
New York for three days, we went to Miami for
a week. I believe it was would have been September UM,
(17:53):
just after Darren sheer Bomb was officially installed as chief
of Police, he went before the city council and talked
about how he was so proud to have personally recruited
someone from Detroit per basically a part of their loan application,
because they're applying for a loan to finance part of
(18:14):
Cops City. By their own numbers of recruits that will
be trained at this facility will come from out of state.
They are forty percent from outside the state of Georgia.
Again in ap D s on statements about the facility,
this facility is built to bring in people from out
(18:34):
of state, from out of the country. Even because Atlanta
participates in the Georgia International Law Enforcement Exchange, which is
basically an exchange program with the idea with with the
Israeli military. Where we go there, they come here. We
teach each other. News articles claiming that a majority of
those arrested are residents from other states might sound like
(18:57):
convinced the evidence to middle class readers, But anyone who
has been poor and precarious knows that the permanent address
you give when you're arrested may not be the same
as the place you actually live. You might give a
different address because you aren't sure your current housing will last,
because your landlord doesn't know your place has more people
(19:17):
in it than are named on the lease, or simply
because you don't want local vigilantes to know where you live. Instead,
you might give a more reliable, long term address, perhaps
from another state. I mean not a human level, like
how many times have you moved somewhere and not changed
your address? How many times have you Going to the
(19:38):
DMV sucks? Yes, going to the t m V sucks.
So a lot of people don't have the privilege to
be able to go to the d n B or
don't have a permanent home address. A lot of people
are dealing with housing instability like this. There's so many
aspects of this that makes it pretty egregious and not only,
of course, is this a struggle that is deeply compelling,
(20:01):
regardless of where you call home. It just doesn't match
up to like the facts of life. Like it's it's
a little bit bizarre their insistence that the local populace
couldn't possibly be that opposed to it. When grab any
one person in the movement who's from who's from Georgia
and they know tend people who's opposed to it, that
(20:23):
person knows ten people. And also you you have statistics
like during the what's seventeen hours of public comment, seventy
of people who called in were opposed to it. Basically
the only people who weren't were people who self identified
as police officers, firefighters, and those who lived in Buckhead.
(20:45):
And it's it's not that simple, but it's pretty clear
that maybe you'd be okay with building the facility somewhere else,
maybe you're an abolitionist, maybe this, that and the other.
But Atlanta doesn't want this. Atlanta doesn't want this here.
Let's imagine that some of these arrestees who gave out
of town addresses are in Atlanta for the very first time.
(21:08):
Would that make them outside agitators? Maybe if the issue
was specific to Atlanta alone, and they had no stake
in the cause. Cops City would be a place that
police agencies from all around the country and world come
to to train and practice urban militarism. Climate collapse and
(21:28):
the destruction of forests is similarly a worldwide issue and
one of apocalyptic magnitude. It's a false narrative in one sense,
because climate change effects. Everybody cutting down a forest would
make climate change worse. Like that's a very, very very
obvious talking point. If if environment of protecting the environment
(21:49):
is important to you, it is obvious that this is
a very key struggle right now, especially in the context
of Atlanta being and growing and also gentrifying city, and
this being in a largely black and brown, middle to
(22:10):
low income neighborhood, and this being such a vast green
space in those communities that don't have the manicured Piedmont
Park in their backyards. When people are suffering the same
forms of oppression everywhere, it makes sense for us to
come to each other's assistance. This is not outside agitation,
(22:32):
This is solidarity. Solidarity has always been the most important
tool of the oppressed. This is why authorities go to
such lengths to demonize anybody who has the courage to
take risks to support others. Crickets spoke at length about
the outside agitator narrative that the state has been employing.
(22:53):
I think one thing that comes to mind is something
that I've heard a lot is that the people in
this movement are not from here, quote and quote, that
they're outside agitators, that uh, they're not from this community.
They're not you know. And and it's it seems to
me very clear to be an attempt to sort of
discredit what is a very clear majority of the community
that does not want this forest destroyed, does not want
(23:14):
cops city built, you know. Um. And that argument infuriates
me because I mean, first of all, the U. S.
Military is the biggest like outside agitator in the world. Um.
And I just I find that irony sort of unbearable.
And then I think there's this question we can get
into questions of what does it mean to be from somewhere?
And what I think is a more helpful question is
(23:36):
how are you somewhere? How are you in relation to
a place? And I I think tort with someone who
was always trying to be in the right relation with
the land and in right relation with their neighbors, in
right relation with the communities here. One story that I
keep revisiting of them is when we were checking in
uh and and people are asking them, you know what,
what do folks in the forest need? What can we
(23:56):
get them? Do they need food? What? You know? What
do they need? And to it was like, oh no, actually,
you know, we have everything we need. But it would
be great if people could start we could make sure
they're giving food to the poor folks in their own communities,
Like make sure you're giving the food to the people
in your neighborhoods. Are you checking in with the un
housed communities in your neighborhood like they were? Just I
think constantly seeking to be in right relation. And I
(24:19):
think regardless of where all of us are from, if
we if we can con claim to be from somewhere,
I mean, arguably if we're not Muscogee Creek, none of
us is from here. Um, but I think it's a
more helpful direction to think about what are we doing
once we're here? How are we trying to be here?
And yeah, I mean that that specific argument. Really it
really frustrates me because I think it really Obvius skates
(24:41):
how much this is a local movement, and also having
solidarity from across state lines, from across national lines, speaks
to the intersection of our the intersections of our oppressions,
the intersections of our movements. It doesn't speak to the
fact that this is co opted or it doesn't indicate
anything other than that none of us is free. Into
all this are free. The ultimate goal of the police
(25:03):
is not so much to brutalize and pacify specific individuals
as it is to extract rebelliousness itself from the social fabric.
They seek to externalize agitation, so anyone who stands up
for themselves will be seen as an outsider, as deviant
and anti social. Noah mentioned how the outside agitator narrative
(25:27):
is rooted in stripping people of their own autonomy. It's
completely denying like the freedom of movement and and the
freedom to decide that you would like to go and
support other issues like the empathy to show solidarity with
other people. Just deciding that if you are living here
(25:51):
a bit from out of time, that somehow makes you
that makes and much more more dangerous. And if you
are an official resident and some at all I mean,
and even some of the people who were like out
of town there, like not even two hours away from
where from where the prosecutors are claiming where they're from
(26:13):
the outside. Agitator's narrative only works if we have this
sense of other nests that we talked about in the
last episode, this disconnect and separation from neighboring struggles, as
if lines on a map change the morality of actions.
Keeping people in pre trial jail for an unknown amount
(26:36):
of time could could be literally over a year because
they are deemed non local, so the judge thought they
were quote unquote flight risk beyond the charges themselves, which
are innately kind of absurd. And the brutality is is
the point she audacity of keeping people with no evidence
in cages for years um for going to a protest
(26:59):
is just it's not surprising, but it still is incredibly upsetic,
Like it's like it's no and it would be completely
decried if we're happening at any other country, right, and
a massive human rights violation. If it's happening in China
because of the U. S. China relations, like absolutely not there,
there'd be an entire like I don't know, national outcry
(27:20):
but because it's people who are resisting this government in
this state, then yeah, it doesn't get the same kind
of empathy, it doesn't get the same outcry. When I
talked with Karen, she spoke about how thankful she is
that there are people from across the country, people like
tort who care about the South rid Her forest enough
to travel to Atlanta to defend it. In terms of
the narrative of like outside agitators, you know, I'm I'm
(27:44):
really grateful that people are coming to like protect the
forest in my backyard, Like I am. I have like
so much gratitude. It is so it is so meaningful. Um, yeah,
and I I think I think after the first raid,
I told towards that and I'm glad I did. But yeah,
(28:08):
it really is like just so much gratitude. The framing
of outside agitators is meant to keep people away and
stifle solidarity, just like the domestic terrorism charges are meant
to the state is trying out every tactic to scare
people away from participating in the movement. So it feels
(28:28):
like just the past month there's been such a intense
increase in the level of state repression and state violence.
How do you see things evolving in the next few
weeks and months and or like even days at this point,
like just with how both like physical violence definitely increasing
(28:48):
with the raids and now like you know, killing somebody,
um and then the types of like you know, judicial
abuse of power of giving people seven thousand dollars bail
key being you know, many others just in jail and
perpetuity for who knows how long. Yeah, I mean, I
think it's clear looking at this movement that the state,
(29:09):
the cops police have always been the first to escalate,
have and have now murdered someone, have now assassinated someone,
and are the ones who are constantly sort of making
putting other people's lives in danger. They're really the people
who are making folks on safe and and to it
was a street medic. To it was someone who went
through street medic training with someone who was passionate about
(29:32):
protecting their community. And in street medic training, one of
the things that is taught there's a whole section on
police weapons and state weapons and ensure. We cover tear gas,
we cover on bullets, we cover all anything that you
can sort of commonly see protests or in raids, and
one of the biggest weapons that we always cover his fear.
And that is really what I see happening with this escalation,
(29:54):
is that, yes, there's a sort of increase of literal weapons,
of of of arms, of just everything we've heard about
in in the forest. Um. But I think when you
take that, in combination with the ludicrous charges, what they're
really trying to weaponize as our own fear, as our
our our own emotions, making us think that it's too
dangerous to be in the forest, that it's not worth it,
(30:15):
that it's too risky, making us think that the forest
itself is somehow an unsafe place, making us think that
the people who protected are unsafe. And I think that's
the that's the sort of trend that I'm seeing. I
think in terms of what's coming next, I think they're
going to keep leaning into the weapon of fear. I
think it's um. I think it's you know, it's it's
(30:35):
it's not not ha ha funny that they accuse protesters
and the people who have been charged with domestic terrorism
of intimidation, when clearly they're using those charges to intimidate people,
both the people who are charged with it and anyone
who might consider themselves an ally or a friend of
the forest and a friend of the forest defenders. So
what I see moving forward in terms of carrying towards
(30:55):
legacy forward, in terms of carrying this movement forward, is
not buying into that bullshit like very much being fear
walking and not trying to say people shouldn't be scared
or not have those feelings. But one of the memories
of tor that I have is them very clearly refusing intimidation.
Whether it was cops, whether it was you know whoever
the sort of representative of the state was, they never
(31:17):
gave into that. And I think that's what I'm trying
to carry forward. A lot of us are trying to
carry forward. Noah spoke similarly about fear being a powerful
weapon of the state and a very insidious one because
it doesn't punish people for actions they may or may
not have done, but instead works to prevent people from
taking action in the first place. Fear the number one
(31:42):
that the state ranch to bear. All of their their
toys and their guns and ship do not have the
reach and do not have the capacity to stop fear
making people afraid of the idea of volting of the
(32:03):
idea of dissidence is extremely powerful, and it's something that
we all have to combat in our own ways. It's
something we will have to resist in our own ways
because like obviously the state is capable of murdering and
of putting people in prison for a very long time,
and that is scary, and that is a valid thing
to be afraid of. But we stand to lose so
(32:27):
much if we do not combat that fear to face
off with them, that it's just something that I've found
I have to manage. It's something that because we I'm
so much more afraid of what we all lose if
we don't stop them here than I am of myself
being harmed or going to prison. We all stand to lose.
(32:50):
Ten tens of millions of people stand to lose everything
if we allow climate backalypse to bear, if we allow
the powers that be to get signific becoming more effective
out combining dissidens in the streets from not not just
for in the United States, but for cops national struggling. Mean,
this is the same police department that cross training. If
(33:15):
you think the idea wouldn't becoming the facility to train
better heart to you know, kill past and dissidence yourself
like this will mean something too, every foreign military, foreign police,
for every police forson. There's a quote from Tortuguita talking
about how to deal with fear. What I'm about to
(33:37):
read also demonstrates as their partner said that tort was
very aware of the risks inherent to resisting the state,
especially as a non white forest defender, But with an
understanding of that risk and the fear associated with said risk,
they chose it was worth it to keep on fighting. Quote,
(33:59):
Am I scared of the state? Pretty silly not to be.
I'm a brown person. I might be killed by the
police for existing in certain spaces. Fear is the mind killer.
That's a quote I think about often. I must not fear,
and fear's the mind the killer. And here's a little
death that brings total of liliteration. Will face my fear.
(34:22):
I'm permitted to pass over me and to me to
continue what Torts said quote I am scared, but you
can't let the fear stop you from doing things, from living,
from existing, from resisting unquote. In the early nineteen sixties,
(35:04):
Atlanta was dubbed the city too Busy to hate. The
phrase can be traced back to a civil rights era
marketing slogan attributed to Mayor Ivan Allen, who spent millions
of dollars in the nineteen sixties to promote Atlanta as
a business oriented city, a city moving forward from its
racial past and into a hopeful new future. This was
(35:27):
the beginning of the Atlanta Way. Still today, you can
find the city too busy to hate everywhere on on murals, posters,
and T shirts. It's become part of Atlanta's identity, or
at least Atlanta tries to tell itself that. Within the
slogan lies this admission of the belief that racism and
(35:48):
oppression can be beaten by hyper capitalism, meaning the first
and foremost goal of the city is economic progress. Equality
and racial just dis must take a back seat because
the city is just too busy. There's a few better
examples of this in action than the black neighborhoods that
(36:09):
were demolished to build infrastructure for the Nine Olympics and
later the Mercedes Benz Stadium. Since then, the belt Line's
original vision of public transit to green space and affordable
housing has been abandoned in favor of developing luxury apartments
and gentrified retail joints. As Fouko's Boomerang brings the internal
(36:31):
colonization of gentrification and increasing police militarization to Atlanta, it
only makes sense that Cops City and the battle to
stop it is happening here. Towart died two days right
after Martin Luther cat Jr. Memorial Day. We're in Atlanta.
There's this whole section of the Delta Airport in Atlanta
dedicated to John Lewis. You can hear his voice on
a loop saying good trouble. And yet as soon as
(36:54):
the festivities are over, as soon as the fundraising is over,
when someone is shot resisting the state and a peaceful,
a nonviolent direct action, they're labeled a terrorist. I don't
understand how someone can possibly reconcile those two things. They
seem to me to be grotesque. I mean, it's it's disgusting,
but I don't see that reflected in any mainstream narrative.
(37:14):
Noah talked with me about how he first got involved
in the top Cops City movement and then my introduction
the cops and started where much people and land. Where
they got firstly that this was a thing that the
city was planning. I remember having just a very like
oh my god, what the reaction to realizing like they
(37:36):
want to destroy the largest urban canopy and the country
to build a big fake city for them to practice
during urban combat. And that's like parity Dysturbian. And very
quickly people were organizing various different ranges to stop them,
to make their voices heard that this was not something
(37:57):
that it Lanta is okay with. This is not something
we were okay with having our communities is not something
that anybody wanted. That took a lot of different frends.
For me, I mean that went from working, whether that
be on the streets too, just doing food destroys and
medical finance, to scampering around the woods with my friends
(38:18):
like that took many different forms forms of resistance to
m and over time that has interchange and evolved. But
I still think it's something that I working on a
lot of different Frenchs to be persons possible when it
comes to resistingness. The sheer resiliency we've seen in Atlanta
(38:41):
post has been incredibly impressive and inspiring. After the radical
communities in a lot of cities dealt with pretty extreme
burnout to do to such a grueling summer, and ever
since then people seem to be recovering and anticipating the
next cycle of mass uprising. As news spread of Memphis
(39:03):
police's brutal beating of Tyree Nichols, which resulted in his death,
there was renewed discussion if it was going to spark
the quote unquote next But Atlanta is one of the
few cities where things really haven't halted since Defend the
four stuff has been going pretty hard ever since, like
(39:27):
um and it's been a very compressive amount of resiliency.
Can you can you kind of talk on that aspect
of how people have been able to do that. I
think it comes down to having a really good support
network of people of people who are willing to um
B support active financially make this possible. And it also
(39:56):
comes down to that to defend the Fourish movement and
show it is so important to anybody, It should be
so important to anybody who looked at as a strike
back against police violence what cops it It means for
all of us is a world in which is much
harder to resist police, especially in cities, and for a
(40:19):
lot of activists who come out from the forest became
an extension of that fight. It became its own, and
it's one fight to perhapt the forest and an extension
of the battle against the violence of the state and
against the ability of the police to further the militarize.
I think that kept a lot of a lot of
people going. UM. But I certainly happens. I mean it is.
(40:39):
It can be really exhausting work, it can be really
defeating at times, and it's been really important I think
for people everywhere and and here to have you know,
friends and and things that they can do to decompress
and take time off when needed, to stay to keep
the ability to keep doing this UM and to not
(41:00):
burn up completely and to be able to keep going
against what feels like a set terms. UM. Also just activists,
they are pretty fucking resilience. Just I'm continuously so impressed
by the people I see just continuing to guard after
day and working behind the scenes, doing everything possible to
(41:21):
make sure that we can keep going. There's other different
has a couple of things. I'm getting money on people's
commissaries and the past has done like later writing campaigns
for a political prisoners across the country, which is certainly
like a thing that you know, we're looking at posential
people being held very long term. Um, that's absolutely going
to be something in the coming weeks that I helped people,
(41:43):
um spread to them. Like obviously these people who are
incarcerated are support in every way we can possibly possibly
do that. If the people currently incarcerated are granted bond
during the appeal process and it's set to the same
amount as the last two individuals, that would be three
hundred and fifty five thousand dollars per person for at
(42:04):
least five more people. That included with like the previous
bonding match that were set for previous rage and me
we're approaching three million dollars and prejunction bonds, which is
just designed to drain people are as much as possible
and make the idea of protests same impossible. And again
this is just another at this perpetuate power in fear
(42:29):
and making it same as impossible to protestants and making
it seem like if you were to get arrested that
you would never get out because that's terrifying. That's that's
the number one. There have been a few semi distinct
stages in the struggle against cops City in summer one.
(42:49):
The initial stage was trying to get the city council
to vote no on the project. There was a lot
of canvassing, calling representatives, involvement from large above ground organizations
like the d s A and Sunrise, you know, people
trying to quote unquote campaign the right way to get
the project shut down before even started. And then even
(43:10):
despite sevent of the local people who called in not
wanting this, the city council voted for it anyway. And
then starting two months after the vote, and for over
a year now, we've had this forest occupation or encampment stage,
people going into the woods and having their continuous physical
(43:32):
presence there itself be a deterrent for construction. Concurrently, there
have been random acts of sabotage, with construction equipment spontaneously
bursting into flames, alongside pressure campaigns targeting subcontractors and cops
city investors. With the past few police raids having been
increasingly violent, the last one resulting in the death of
(43:55):
a force defender. I asked the people I spoke with
if they saw any forthcoming new stage of the movement,
considering the cops are trying really hard to make it
very dangerous to camp in the woods right now? What's
your sense from on the ground, how stuff might you
know with these increasing charges increasing, with the bail phones
(44:16):
increasing you so forth, what's some kind of ways that
you feeld stuff might start changing on the ground, Like
do you like, do you think the encampment style we're
content will continue or will it kind of evolve in
a new kind of unexpected direction. It remains to be
seen how um the approach to living in the woods
will adapt to these changes. Um. The decap County Police
(44:39):
Department has claimed that they're going to increase their surveillance
and patrol of the neighborhood that the woods is in.
It remains to be seen what that will mean for
the encampment and how active they're going to be in
you know, repressing people in a day to day sort
of thing. And also I think one change is reconsidering
(45:01):
what on the ground means and what the bounds of
the forest are. There's more woods that black Hall plans
to develop on nearby, so reconsidering what on the ground
is you know, brass field and gory construction sites could
be considered and on the ground site you know for actions,
and you know, I think there's a lot of room
(45:22):
to grow in that direction as well. Like do you
see this moment as like a substantial turning point. I mean,
I don't think it couldn't be a turning point. I
think that every every escalation of violence that this happen
has been perpetrated by law enforcement. There's never been a
moment in which the people can buying the unforcement have
been the ones to escalate the violence. And I think
(45:46):
that this marks a willingness of the the government here
in the city government that this is the help that
they're willing to die on. This is where they're going
to standard ground and where they are proving to work,
that they are are committed and so committed to the
idea of Voilding Cops City that they are willing to
kill people. And I think that that is a turning point.
(46:09):
And how we as a movement have to be willing
to respond to the state, and how we have to
be willing to look at them not just as this
entity that we are facing down like in the courts
and doing fun blast because they're clearly doesn't work, they
are just going to murder us, but as a force
that is a you know, like offensive militarized force coming
(46:31):
after us. I think that is a that it marks
a really big to shift and overallly looking at what
the city government he is willing to do to get
this done. And I think that a variety of tactics
will always being play. People are always going to have
different ways that they feel comfortable and safe and responding.
But I do think that I think what we saw
(46:55):
on Saturday was a but very response to that that
that people shut up and very clear that we were
not going to take this line. That people aren't going
to be willing to let the state and they don't
let the police answer. And from that we see more
(47:20):
and more people taken up acts of physical resistance to
enforcement prevent them from building copsy and prevent them from
committing for the act of violence for comrades. So far,
the forced occupation has proved effective in delaying the construction
of Cops City. In the past, barricades have inhibited the
movement of construction equipment, Machinery left in the woods has
(47:43):
been sabotaged, and during attempts to fell trees, force defenders
have put their own bodies on the line by climbing
into the treetops to prevent them from being cut down.
Other prongs of the movement have similarly produced successes. Pressure
campaigns focused on getting contractors and businesses to divest or
pull out of the project resulted last April in a
(48:05):
Reeves Young Construction, the initial contractor for Cops City, severing
ties with the project after months of pressure, and just
this month, Quality Glass Company announced that they would not
be working on Cops City, as well as no longer
doing business with brass Field and Gory, the current contractor
for the facility. These pressure campaigns can include protests at
(48:27):
company offices, phone calls imploring them to drop the contract or,
actions more along the lines of vandalism at job sites,
or visits to the neighborhoods of company executives, even to
simply drop off flyers or banners. I don't think this
we're going to win one front. The amount of people
(48:48):
that was really beautiful to see. The state was always
going to be able to put multiple fronts, and that includes,
you know, that includes having uh that conclude having physical
presence in the forest and preventing machinery from coming in,
(49:08):
but that also includes our acts of sabotage, making sure
that contractors who are as signed on the cops that
he do not feel comfortable and do not feel safe
signing on this project and making this economically impossible for
the city to continue doing. As far as it being
like a new strategy, I don't know if it would be.
(49:30):
News've already seen you know, procuipment spontaneously combust and such things,
but I do think this marks a point and potentially
like the frequency of this things happening, and also and necessary,
I think evaluating where we are now and thinking realistically
about what our next steps are to make this an
(49:52):
untenable situation for the city to continue to proSP well.
One evolution that I see happening is a consensus amongst
long term organizers in Atlanta that we want as many
people coming here to participate as possible, and also that
I think one change is being less picky in who
we invite to participate and encouraging like liberals and moderates
(50:16):
to be a part of this. They've always been a
part of it, but really um emphasizing that side of
the movement more. Back in the Defend the Atlanta Forest
episodes from last May, I talked about the Shack model,
the aim of which is to make construction economically untenable
by maintaining a presence in the forest, sabotaging work, and
(50:39):
targeting specific subcontractors locally and elsewhere. In addition to contractors,
corporate funders affiliated with the APF can also be targeted
to distancentivized affiliation with the project. Solidarity actions targeting Atlanta
Police Foundation contributors have been happening nationwide. As mentioned at
the top of the episode, a Week of Solidarity is
(51:02):
coming up on February and Stop Cop City Solidarity dot
org has many resources. In the past, actions have included
everything from office protests, divestment campaigns, vandalism, and actions by
workers within these companies to pressure them into cutting ties.
No action is too small or too ambitious. In analysis
(51:25):
on tactics published recently on its going Down said this
regarding the targeting of Cops City investors. Quote In other campaigns,
banks like Wells Fargo have been forced to divest from
police and prison expansion, but these efforts often take years
and lots of resources. Atlanta Police Foundation supporters like public universities,
(51:49):
Georgia State University, Georgia Tech, or Emery University could be
lower hanging fruit comrades should identify which cops city funders
are most vulnerable a pressure where potential allies like student
groups and unions are positioned and share this info and
synchronize actions. Unquote. Bureaucratic red tape can also be effective
(52:11):
in delaying progress. Ongoing zoning appeals could result in an
official stock work order, but it remains unseen if such
an order will even be followed, as currently laws around
zoning appeals are being ignored by the contractors and the
Atlanta Police Foundation. Tortuguita had spoken of a theory of
(52:32):
THEIRS concerning the potential for intense police repression and how
the aftermath of that might play out. Quote. They could
come in and completely destroy the place, raise it, arrest
everybody they could find, kill anybody who resists arrest. They
could do that, and then days later there would be
(52:54):
a shipload of people back here. For every head they
cut off, there would be more who would come back
to avenge the arrested, to avenge the tort did not
finish that sentence, but resuming, what I'm saying is if
they do a huge crackdown and completely try to crush
the movement, they'll succeed at hurting some people. They'll succeed
(53:17):
at destroying some infrastructure, but they're not going to succeed
at stopping the movement. That's just going to strengthen the movement.
It will draw a lot of attention to the movement.
If enough people decide to do this with non violent action,
you can overwhelm the infrastructure of the state. That's something
they fear more than violence in the streets, because violence
(53:37):
in the streets they'll win. They have the guns for it.
We don't unquote. No matter how the movement continues, the
weight of towards absence will be felt as long as
this fight carries on. It's such a huge loss um.
But as we as we keep thinking about you know,
w W t D, what would do uh, It's continue
(54:01):
to support those projects. It's continue to uplift the spaces
and groups that are supporting the most vulnerable amongst us
and uplifting their voices, uplifting their safety, and they're going
to continue to be trainings offered, training specifically for folks
who are marginalized and afraid of gun violence and want
to know how to be able to protect themselves and
protect their friends. This came about specifically in the wake
of the shooting at the gay bar Um I guess
(54:23):
a few months ago now, Jesus um. And that was
something that Towart was helping organize. So yeah, we're gonna
we're gonna keep doing that work. How do you think
like a continue on without without towards there? Now? Um,
you know, I think they set me up the hardest
thing to navigate, like, Okay, what can I do? Where
(54:47):
can I fit in? Like I'm short of you know,
living in the forest. And I think with just like
the canvassing, I feel like I've really figured out the
ways I can you know, my place in it enough
to keep me busy. It was towards kind of very
instrumental to having you help figure out like your role
(55:07):
in this. I mean honestly, I would just like spit ball,
you know, an idea and they'd be like, yeah, you
should do that, um or we were like yeah, they'd
be sick, and that gave me the confidence to be
like okay, and also like, I think this movement is
interesting because it's totally different from any other organization or
(55:28):
anything I've done in that like, if you want to
volunteer in any other thing, like you know, you make
a graphic and you check it and you send it
to someone and get it approved, you know, and just
like the kind of deconstructing that thinking was, like, I
mean toward was really instrumental in that And it can
be like difficult to navigate, but really just walking all
(55:52):
that back and being like if you want to, like
you know, canvass your neighbors, like you just do it.
The Stop Copsity movement has called for a fifth Week
of Action to be held on March fourth through March
eleven in Atlanta, Georgia. They are asking all those opposed
to Cops City to come participate in a variety of
(56:13):
events and actions both in and out of the forest.
And if you're able to bring a tent, if you're
unable to travel, there's still calls to support people in
your own community who might be able to do so.
This Week of Action will be a key moment in
the next phase of the fight to defend the forest.
I want people to know that being in the woods,
(56:35):
even if just for a few days, will transform you
and unexpected and delightful ways. And that's something that we
witnessed with Towart. Towart lived in the woods for less
than a year, and they transformed and blossomed into their
purpose in unexpected and beautiful ways. And so if you
have the opportunity to come and spend any amount of
(56:57):
time in these woods, I encourage you to do so,
because I think that you'll find that it will nourish
you and aid in your growth as a human. The
police have not succeeded in scaring everybody out of the forest.
We Lonnie People's Park is still legally required to operate
as a public park. Last month I saw regular people
(57:19):
jogging the trails. People still come every day. The movement
has only grown despite the repression and now force defenders
in Atlanta are urging people everywhere to organize for the
upcoming mass convergence. A large list of resources and movement
websites I'll be putting in the description for people to
(57:39):
learn more and stay up to date with information regarding
the Week of Action. I'll end this series by reading
from a defend the Forest poster that I saw around Atlanta. Quote,
it is your mission to stop cops city by all
of the means at your disposal, without hesitation. Defend the
(58:00):
forest from destruction, the city from commercialization, the future from ruin,
the imagination from conquest, and the heart from resignation. Do
not wait for further instruction. Reality is the battlefield. Yeah,
the rain on leaves tickling the earliest of instruments, the
(58:21):
melody we mimic in as the sound of wind whistling
long before the safety. It's channing under the stars, Camped
under the vorganicpy she sang a song, and she was
far from silent. No virus or violets, but the fragrance
of her flowers that continued to invite us of medicine, materials,
of vitamins, of minerals, and all that is essential, which
just grew right beside us. And Tyson started fighting over
(58:43):
the gifts that she provide us, scorching the very soil
that all of us derived from. And when empires learning
can't withstand bio, we returned to the land where our
ancestors rain dance. We are all her creatures, We still
bear her features, the one and only reason all living
things is breathing. The city's deceive even leave, Go see
the dark, young, Go be among the lungs of mother arthuse. Yeah, yeah,
(59:29):
before let's shot them down. There was a forest music
by the Narcissist Cookbook, and a propaganda It Could Happen
Here is a production of cool Zone Media. For more
podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zone
media dot com, or check us out on the I
Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
(59:50):
You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
monthly at cool zone Media dot com slash sources. Thanks
for listening.
It Could Happen Here News
Host
Robert Evans
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