Minneapolis Uprising: Updates From The Ground and Sky

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Worst Year Ever, a production of I Heart
Radio Together Everything. So hello, welcome back to the worst

(00:23):
year ever. It's fine, it's the welcome back to the
year that everybody had fun during, the one that is
now welcome to the time of the year. I would
say that, actually, I think this is the best year
of the year, of this year. Yeah, like if we

(00:44):
had if we had to pick a year out of
that's the best we pick. I would say this this
by any metric, this has been the number one that
I've experienced. Absolutely, it's wild row different. This feels from
the last us time I talked to you in Jesus Christ.

(01:07):
But I mean, I think we can refer to what's
happening right now as an uprising. I think that's broadly
pretty fair. Um yeah maybe, I mean, yeah, it's impossible
to say where this is all going to end up

(01:27):
um and and how far any of this is going
to go. But I will say I didn't expect it
to get like this. Um. Like a lot of people
have been messaging me about, um, it could happen here
my podcast where I talked about this exact thing happening,

(01:49):
and like, oh my god, you were prophetic like you
predicted all this, and like, I'm still very surprised by
everything that's happening. I'm very surprised by how it's gone down.
Even though I did, like I did literally lay out
a lot of this very directly, the fact that it's
happening is still like deeply bizarre and it's surreal. Yeah,

(02:09):
it was, it could happen here, not it will, It
will happen here. Not a year to the day after
the episode, almost a year to the day after the
episode about the President sending tanks into an American city
under revolt. The President sent tanks into an American city
under vault for listeners, but for our listeners, just in

(02:32):
case you're not aware of what we're talking about, we
are talking about the murder of George Floyd and the
ensuing protests that have erupted all over this nation every
day for the past week. Just about I'm sure you
knew that. Yeah, I don't know what you're doing listening
to this podcast, but welcome. Yeah, there's there's a lot

(02:56):
of different things that we can talk about today. Um, Robert,
you have been on the ground in Portland's intensely covering
these protests. Last night being a truly remarkable number of
people showing up two more than ten thousand people. UM.

(03:20):
In l A. We have had protests all over the city. Uh.
It's a big city, is you know, not like one
central spot. But you're seeing them pop up in all
of the different communities, communities that are never touched by
this kind of thing. UM, it's it's it's wild right now,

(03:42):
it sure is. UM. I think I've been tear gassed
I don't know, seventy times in the last three days. UM.
I'm going to say that doesn't sound healthy. In three
or four hours probably UM, you know, maybe more um,
because they were firing impact munitions at other people. UM.
I had a couple of flash bang grenades explode right
next to me. You know that more of that will happen.

(04:04):
They've been throwing They've been just shooting the grenades at people.
I was with a tear gas grenade yesterday, UM, which
thankfully wasn't that bad. It hit me in the boot,
bounced up onto my leg. I'm curious if you're seeing
a change in the response in some capacity. So I
know that over this weekend you witnessed a lot of
brutality firsthand and documented it, and last night there were

(04:28):
so many people that the cops were outnumbered, UM, and
your live streams kept getting interrupted, so it was hard
to continue tracking at a certain point for a while.
But UM, up until that point, you had seen, from
what I understood, not very much violence from the police, UM,
not compared to the day before anyway, and I'm curious

(04:50):
how if that maintained. Obviously you got tear gas, so
I'm wrong, not wrong, But the police attempted to do
some pr yester day. There was like an article that
one of the bad local stations put about like police
kneeling with protesters and like they they described it as
an active solidarity from the police. What it actually was
was the police putting on their gas masks, and not

(05:11):
that long after that photo was taken they started gassing
that crowd. But that was one of like three protests
in Portland that night, and a much larger crowd ten
thirteen thousand people, which you know, the Portland Police Bureau
was only about a thousand people, so more a crowd
larger than the whole Portland Police Bureau surrounded their headquarters
UM for hours, UM and demanded that they like kneel

(05:31):
and take off their riot gear. The police didn't. You know.
After hours and hours, the crowd thinned out to five
or six thousand, and then you know, there were some
tense moments. The police claimed that there was a break
in at the Justice center. I didn't see evidence of that.
I saw a lot of spray painting on the Justice center.
I didn't see any windows broken. Um. But at some point,
you know, a couple of plastic bottles and stuff were
thrown at police and they started firing tear gas and

(05:54):
impact munitions into the crowd. People in the crowd started
firing fireworks back at the police, mortars and stuff. Um.
And there was like a brief fight with police just
unloading everything they had into the crowd. A few people
tossing fireworks at the police. The crowd scattered, reformed three times, um,
getting smaller each time as people were like disoriented and

(06:15):
and and frightened. And then by the end of the night,
there was one point in the evening where the police
just drove a MOTORCATEI vehicles through a crowd of people,
thank you, almost seriously injured. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's all
many cities all over the country. Vehicles specifically police vehicles
just going into crowds of people. Yeah. Um, this is uh,

(06:38):
it's shades of what we've seen for the past many
many years. Um, it's very bizarre to see it laid
out Uh so much more clearly. I think for a
lot of people realizing that. Um. You know, like even
after after during Ferguson, you see all those memes of
people like, oh, run the protesters over, just run them over, right, Um,

(07:00):
it's a very popular idea to do, or to at
least joke about. Um. Then a fascist literally did that
and killed Heather Higher. Um. And now in the police
seemed to be taking some notes out of Mr Fields's book.
They we're seeing that behavior emulated by the police. Um.
So it's just, um, I don't even know the word.

(07:24):
It sucks, sucks so bad. Well, let's talk. There's so
much to talk about. UM, it's hard to watch the news.
You want to watch the news, And I will say
that a lot of the coverage does mention, you know,
people protesting peacefully, um in passing, but most of the

(07:49):
coverage is talking about the looting and the police response
to looters in the chaos, when what we're seeing in
most of these places are a militarized response to the
peaceful protesters, and that usually instigates a lot of the looting.

(08:12):
But like here in cal in Santa Monica yesterday for example,
and at the Grove Areas and the other part of
l A that there was a big protest, you're seeing
this huge response to the protesters, but the areas that
they want to protect that are getting looted, they're not.
There's not a presence there. Uh, And it's maddening. It's

(08:33):
maddening also just the emphasis on the looting in general
instead of why people are angry, why this is happening.
I actually saw Chris Cuomo did a pretty good coverage.
I was surprised by the way that they were handling
it the other night where he made that case himself

(08:55):
of like we're all talking about the looting, but we're
not talking about the anger, the years and years and
years of this issue being ignored, and what happens when
people don't have anything else like you, Nobody will listen
to you, so you have to look to other ways
to get attention. Um, that's actually surprising. I know I

(09:15):
was texting Cody while it happened, Like I honestly can't
believe this, And then he interviewed an African American journalist
who was covering Minneapolis for a long time about her experiences,
saying like, I can't possibly look at the situation under
the same lens as you do. Please please educate me.
And it was really pretty powerful. I'm seeing it is

(09:39):
it's the the idea of like I'm seeing seeing a
distinction being made right between the peaceful protests and the
looting or the damage um, and that is more often
than not being framed as this outside agitator thing. Like
anytime you see it, it's like, oh, those are outside agitators.
That's not the protest. But like by doing that, you're

(10:00):
delegitimizing the thing that Cuomo apparently talked about, Like, uh,
if you it makes this distinction between acceptable forms of
protests and unacceptable forms of protests and makes makes it
seem like the people like that, they're not angry enough
to do that. It's just this other thing going on
and you can ignore this. This is the these are

(10:20):
like the evil the white anarchists. They're doing this exclusively. Well,
it creates um an easier and more digestible narrative. I
mean the people with what was happening, And now a
lot of liberals can say, Oh, don't worry, it's the
it's the bad people. It's not. It's not that. The
thing is is that obviously a lot of the organizers
of these protests, a lot of people that are protesting

(10:43):
don't want there to be violence. Of course, of course
they don't, you know, but they don't speak for everybody
that's showing up, for everybody's anger. The organizer of this
protest is not responsible for that person's emotions, you know,
or how they react. And of course these are intended

(11:03):
to be a reasonable exercise of our rights. And I
shouldn't even say reasonable because I'm not saying that the
other responses aren't unreasonable. But but that's not what anybody wants.
This is a reaction to what happens when you when
people aren't heard, but people are dying, when people are dying, right,

(11:23):
and um, like it's the h I keep coming back obviously,
like I'm sure seen everyone say this, but it's that
it's that MLK quote. Riots are the language of the unheard, right, um.
And people have said that quite a bit up until
that outside agitator narrative kicked in and now it's like, so,
I guess riots are the language of the outside agitators.

(11:45):
Is that where we're going with now? Like, when you
make that distinction, you delegitimize what's going on UM. And
I'm not just that's not to say that like there
aren't people taking advantage of this situation or you know,
opportunists and things like that. Obviously they're going to be
that kind of thing in any mass protest UM. But
by making that distinction, it really it just it it

(12:06):
helps people feel more comfortable about what's going on, UM.
But the whole idea is that it's not comfortable. It's
an uncomfortable thing. Ye. Yeah, I want to make this
point while we're still kind of talking about this stuff.
When this started in l A, I saw and had

(12:26):
conversations with several of my white friends who would consider
themselves allies and supportive of this movement, being really frustrated
that the first day of protests here were in the
populated Beverly Hills, not quite Beverly Hills, Fairfax District. It's
different than Beverly Hills for people that are listening from

(12:47):
other places. It's got a different culture. It's a lot
of old Jewish families. Um, but there's also a lot
of it's a big shopping hub as well, and being frustrated.
I think a direct quote from one of them was like,
what did they think was going to happen if they
brought a protest here? And it was like this, you know,

(13:07):
He's like, why don't this one person? Why don't you
take this downtown? Because nobody's downtown. The point is all
protests happen downtown. Also there are people there that are
being affected. Also there is protesting downtown. You know that
live there. Every area in l A has some amount
of a residential neighborhood, but this is largely a wealthy,
more affluent neighborhood. And I'm sorry that that makes you uncomfortable.

(13:30):
I'm sorry that you had one night where it was
terrifying outside, where there was chaos happening. That's one night
that you were inconvenienced, you know what I mean, and
what's going on right and shown what's going on a
way that you can't ignore it. It's hard for me
to tell how liberals around the country are reacting. Um,

(13:51):
I can say it was heartening yesterday in Portland because
what after two days of police largely police rioting the
vast majority. The first night, there was a lot of
property damage by protesters. The second day UM after local
activists who were people of color asked protesters to refrain

(14:12):
from that UM, the protests were entirely peaceful until the
police began beating people in the head and face and
tear gassed all of downtown tear gas hundreds of cars, UM,
including cars that had like children. And then they were
just gassing all of downtown like traffic got gassed in
addition to thousands of activists. UM. I watched. At one point,
I saw a man fall on the ground after a
police officer hit him, and a young woman laid across

(14:35):
his body to protect him, and four cops just beat
them both with truncheons while they lay there. UM. I
saw a police officer drop his stick and just pummel
a man with his fists in the face. UM. After that,
you know, the previous Friday and Saturday. Friday was to
three thousand people, Saturday was three four thousand people maybe. UM.

(14:57):
On Sunday there were two different protests in downtown of
about three thousand people, and then a totally separate protest
that started up at Laurel Wood Park, which is like
the wealthiest part of Portland, and somewhere around ten to
thirteen thousand people showed up and marched in one gigantic
mass through the wealthiest neighborhood in Portland against police violence,

(15:19):
down to surround the police station. And that crowd was
there were a lot of very you know, experienced activists
who were helping to organize it, but the vast majority
of the crowd were people who had not been out
to protest before UM, but who were inspired by the
police violence to show up. UM. So I don't know,
I can't tell you what. I can tell you how
kind of like liberals reacting around the country, But I

(15:40):
can tell you how a lot of liberals reacted in Portland,
and it was to recognize that they need to stand
up in solidarity UM and against police violence if you
don't want to live in a police state. So that
that's what I saw where I live. Yeah, I mean,
that's that's inspiring and that's heartening to hear that. I
would say, I see a mixed bag here. I see

(16:01):
people that are frustrated. I mean I have one story
of an acquaintance whose parents optometry shop was hit hard
and looted, and they they got out there with all
the glass frames and all the things. UM, and I
bet they had a lot of nice stuff in that
Santa Monica shop. But the problem is is that in

(16:22):
that case, this is a small business that the insurance
does not cover the the loss of um, the merchandise. Uh.
The owner had been retiring and renting the place to
a young opotometrist who is now not going to continue
with the business, and so this owner is in a
really bad position, and that sucks, you know, to Katie's point,

(16:43):
you guys like I had this difficult conversation with my parents,
who are small business owners, where businesses were being looted
right near There's where the conclusion is, it's just stuff.
I was looking at my dad. You're still going to
wake up a white man tomorrow. You're still yeah, and
I'm still going to start with that privilege. Okay, So
you're b You're building might get destroyed, and you're you're

(17:05):
physically still you tomorrow with privilege. Before we started recording,
I mentioned this story to the guys. I went and
helped clean clean up a little bit. The day after
the first big protest to hit here, and I felt
conflicted because I didn't want that to be conflated with,

(17:26):
you know, being like, oh, these damn looters. But also
this was my neighborhood, my old neighborhood that I lived
for ten years and love, and I was blown away
by people fall colors working together and helping and a
lot of the people that I chatted with were at
the protests and we're planning to go protests later. One

(17:47):
of shop owner was cleaning up and she said just
that it's just stuff, So that is also really heartening
to me. Yeah, there's been a lot of that on
Nico m Unicorn riots stream in Minneapolis, like even some
people who had their businesses burned. And I'm not going
to say this is the norm from people that the
businesses burned, but there are certainly people who were like, yeah,

(18:09):
it sucks, but also like something had to happen, and
years of peaceful protest against the Minneapolis police department choking.
It just came out today someone counted at forty four
cases in the last couple of years of Minneapolis police
um asphixiating people into unconsciousness. Um, yeah, that's I have
seen a lot of sirens gone by right now too,

(18:31):
also just like yeah, it sucks. I'm insure I get it,
like I get it that that's that's the thing. I
think that that's my frustration. I think with the the
outside agitator line, which again some people take advantage of
this stuff, but that make but like by make that distinction,
it makes it so you don't get it um. And

(18:53):
like with like something like ferguson um where like action
isn't really taken after that and then you years go
by like I saw earlier, like earlier today or yesterday,
Jeff Stein from Washington Post had been trying to get
in contact with them, like some aids for the for
Congress and congressional aids and stuff, sort of asking around
like what do you think will happen because of what's happening,

(19:15):
Like what do you think Congress will do? Um? And
every response was either WHOA, they're not going to do
anything or like laugh cry emojis, like the idea that
they would do anything is preposterous. Of course they're not
gonna do anything. Um. And that is that's what that's
what this is. That's why this is happening, right, Like

(19:35):
if you have like riots and then you don't do
anything about it. Well, the next time they're riots, they're
gonna be worse. It's gonna be worse next time. Um.
It's like when you if you don't treat uh a virus, um,
and then it's gonna come back, and it's gonna be
worse if you don't treat the underlying problem. Right. UM.

(19:56):
So like just like seeing that, like the all the
is like militaries police in the streets, and then Congress
being like noah, we're not gonna do anything. Um, that
is a recipe for a bigger disaster later on. Um. Yeah,
I think we got to take a real quick break. Yeah,

(20:17):
then we're gonna talk more about this well together, everything
back back. I love to be back here now. Yeah.

(20:39):
I want to talk a little bit about the idea
of a cop riot, because that was there was a
good Slate article with that title police around the Nation
erupted violence or something like that, um, which I think
is is accurate. Um. The vast majority of the violence
I've seen, the only violence directed human beings that I've seen,
has been from police. UM. And that's seems to be

(21:01):
the case nationwide that the vast majority of the violence
is being dealt out by the police, and I think
it is in reaction to the burning of the Third
Precinct in Minneapolis. It is police around the country being
scared that the kind of nationwide police regime that we
have all been living under for quite a while, and
that most of us are kind of white enough that

(21:22):
we're relatively insulated from it except for an odd moments. Um.
But but we've all we all have lived under this
regime our entire lives. It's just gotten worse. And they,
for the first time in my lifetime, had a real
challenge to their power in Minneapolis, and it was assigned
to the entire country that that can be done, that
the police can be overwhelmed. And I think they are

(21:44):
responding nationwide. You know, we have these protests which are
inspired by solidarity from the protesters. Well, the police are
showing their own solidarity, but it's a solidarity based around
their power to continue to get paid very substantial amounts
of money to be violent to people. That is what
the police are rioting in supportive is their ability to
do violence to us without any consequences. Um. I was

(22:08):
having a conversation with a dear friend of mine who
is out in the country thankfully right now about what's happening.
And as they talked about the police just driving into
crowds that I saw last night, about them just firing
into random groups of people on the street, she was like,
that's illegal. They can't do that, and I said, it's
not illegal if they're the police, because at the end
of the day, whoever has the weaponry makes the rules.

(22:34):
That is the That has always been the real nature
of power, and I think a lot of liberals in
this country allowed themselves to forget that because they don't
want that to be true. But it always is in
every country. At the end of the day, the people
who can the people who have access to the most
deadly force, have the power, and they make the rules.

(22:55):
Whatever it says on pieces of paper, That's how it
actually is. Yeah. I keep seeing uh stuff like that,
and of like, but they can't do that, it's illegal,
And it's like, well, what do you think the protests
are about. Yeah, like that's the point, right, Yeah, I
do think, but I do think that like a lot

(23:16):
of I think that there are a lot of people
that are seeing, um, just every five minutes. There's an
example of a cop doing something like that that would
make you like just like flinch and go like but that, wait,
how can they do that? Um? And seeing that they can,
and I think also it probably helps unfortunately like that

(23:37):
Donald Trump is the guy in charge now, so they
conflate a lot of authority these days and institutions with
him specifically, and they hate him. UM, so when they
see this kind of behavior under him, I think it
makes them even more furious. Where different president doing it,
it would be forgiven in a way, UM, that a

(23:58):
lot of like more a steadically respectable leaders and politicians, uh,
would be doing the similar things. Yeah. It's one of
those things like if we're if Biden or Hillary were
president right now, Like I don't know, I think, um,
I think George Floyd probably still would have been murdered. UM.

(24:19):
I don't know how this would have been different. I
don't know how like this, this uprising would have been different.
I'm sure they're they're definitely would have been protests. I
don't know if things would have gone different in Minneapolis. UM.
I do know that we would probably have less of
an issue of armed civilians shooting at people driving cars
into people. I think the difference in rhetoric would probably

(24:41):
mean that there would be a somewhat lower level of violence.
But I we wouldn't have had a president tweeting about
thoughts and if they looting and shooting, you know, yeah,
there'd be less of this like Antifa stuff. There'd be
fewer like yeah, I wouldn't be the journalist attacks attack
like literally like them like police targeting journalists and like

(25:04):
shooting in the throat and stuff that would that would
on the camera, that would still be happening. I want
to make that clear that like that's not a new phenomenon. Um.
It happened during Standing Rock, happen during Ferguson. It happens.
This is like the police aren't like friendly to journalists.
They knew Trumpian feature, um, and but uh they're probably

(25:26):
less of it. They probably feel less emboldened to do that,
but they don't. They wouldn't fear being caught, um because
they never have, right Yeah, yeah, And it's the kind
of thing I think it would be. I think less
people would be hurt and probably dead right now, but
I still think it would be this would be happening,

(25:47):
and it is. It is worth noting that Joe Biden's
um main response to this was to recently state that
like he wishes police were trained to shoot people in
the leg a loss, I can't like, I cannot think
of it. It is amazing that it's not thinking. I

(26:07):
cannot think. You couldn't write a better metaphor for the
two parties we have right now. Republicans shoot you in
the heart, Democrats shoot you in the leg and expect
you to thank them for it. It is amazing that
he just it's out loud. It's incredible, like that's that's
one of the most darkly humorous things that's happened during
and also frustrating just how many people are probably going, yeah,

(26:32):
good point, yep, yep, yeah yeah. But at least he's
not the freaking like what the Blasio walking around tweeting
like I saw some protests today. That was nice. It's
calm over there. Just saw It's been funny to see
like what famous people have risen to the occasion. I

(26:52):
wouldn't have called John Cusack like getting beaten by the
police for his year. Let's John all right, John, Okay.
It's especially amazing because I I keep seeing people like
in response to that, like yeah, he was at protest.
You wanted to check it out, and he like got
like you can get like sucked up by the police,

(27:13):
but like, uh, just all these people being like, wow,
I didn't see this because John Cusack blocked me for
not supporting Hillary and the primary. What John, what happened?
The Louisville mayor just fired their police chief? I fucking hope.

(27:35):
So that'd be good news if that, if that has happened,
that is Louisville mayor fires police chief. Good. I have
a question. I have a question that's a little different
from this, but yeah, they fired the police chief. They're great. Um,
you talked earlier about how it was a PR stunt

(27:59):
to about all of the police kneeling. They were actually
putting on their gear, you know, their gas masks. Um,
there's a story of I believe it was a New
York precinct that kneeled and then later in the day
we're beating up protesters. Do you think that that's true
across the board, that this is a PR stunt every

(28:20):
police precinct that's doing it. Yeah, because that is something
that a lot of people bring up, like isn't this heartwarming?
And I want to like, in some way it is,
I guess you want. That's what you want from the cops,
except that it's covering up the actual story here. Yeah,
well so right, So like I see every day it's like, Okay,

(28:41):
here's this pr thing, and then later that night they're
just like fucking people up. UM. But I think there's
a it's important to make the distinction between um like
de escalation and solidarity um the way, because that's what
it is, for the most part, is a de escalation thing.

(29:01):
It's not like if if like I haven't seen a
moment where uh an officer was like, oh I quit, right, Like,
that's solidarity. If the police not like their gear and

(29:23):
m refusing to attack crowds and in leaving, whether or
not they quit, if they just, if they just leave,
if they just I would say, yeah, that that that
is they get. Then they'd get fired and would qualify
for unemployment too, and that they would also qualify In
my head, I would say the good cops right now,

(29:44):
if there are any, are the cops that have been
fired for refusing to do violence to citizens. The officer
that get fired are afforded every opportunity to clear their
name and regain their regain their lost jobs, and it happens,
getting fired doesn't mean much. Yeah, so many when those
four officers were fired, the statistic is that of fired

(30:08):
Minneapolis police officers rehired because the union goes to bad
for them. And I think there is a good chance
that the man who murdered George Floyd will not serve
any time for it. Yeah. When I say fired, I
mean there's a difference between a police officer that as
a leave of duty or is you know, ceremonially fired

(30:28):
for and then comes back to the job later, versus
if if a police officer decide to just say like
I'm out, I support there are police and I refused
to order, they will not be getting their jobs back.
You can bet that nobody's going to bat for them, right,
And I'm not saying that that's happened. I'm saying this

(30:49):
is a theoretical. But like, I can't count the number
of times I've seen people just be like, hey, this was,
here's these cops um kneeling with everybody and doing this
nice little moment, and then thirty minutes later they're shooting
him with tear gas and rubber bullets. It's a farce,
is what it is, but it is a it is

(31:10):
an effective de escalation tactic. Like I my talk to
my mom the other day, like she was like, what,
like what do they do? What do they do? I'm like, Oh,
they do this. This is how you de escalate a situation.
You let people protest um and you don't, they'll get
tired and they'll go home eventually. Robert, you mentioned earlier
that you don't know what will come of this, and

(31:33):
of course you don't, none of us. Also, we might
not be the people to theorize on this, in which
case we can cut it. I'm just what do we
think might come from this? What is the best case
scenario in the short term in the long term versus

(31:53):
the you know, reality of what will probably happen. Do
you guys think or is this not our place as
a bunch of no, no, no, it is. It's our
places American citizens to want to know what's going to happen,
to think about it that that's not it's not a
black or white thing, to want to know how this
is going to work out. I think that we are

(32:16):
what is what has happened? Well, the death, the murder
of George Floyd was the inciting incident. This is about
more than that, and what we are all being asked
as citizens right now is are we going to live
under a police state? Are we going to be people?
It's one of if there are two directions, we can
go from here, um in varying degrees and varying types.

(32:39):
But it's two directions and I don't Yeah, I don't
know the answer to that. Yeah, it's hard. It's hard
to wrap my mind around it because it's like, okay,
on the one level, uh, you know when you say
the most obvious thing, well, this man should be charged
at the appropriate level, as well as all the other officers,
and then you hear people saying like, well, that's not

(33:01):
going to happen because there are these protections in place,
and it's really difficult to get that prosecution. So it
makes more sense to do it this way. Fuck that,
let's change that. Change why it's so hard to prosecute
a cop for murdering someone. That's not okay to say
that's not going to happen. Fucking fix it. So there's
one thing I can say, but that's like a drop

(33:22):
in the bucket. I don't want to just be doing
things that play kate people for the for right now
without saying like there's some real dramatic reform that has
to happen, some real change, And that's what's easy to
get hung up on. I guess for some people, like
what is the endgame of this? Because it makes again
it's about comfort and uh and forgetting about it right,

(33:44):
Like I see that everywhere like well, yeah, they charge
the officer, so like you did it, why are you
still protesting? Like, well, it's deeper than that. That's the
point every time this happens. Do we want to have
like massive like unrest? Is that is that the game now?
Like Okay, in order to charge a cop, you gotta
do this, That's what they're saying basically, um, And it's

(34:08):
just a weird, like willful dismissal of the actual point,
Um that this is a thing that keeps happening and
it's uh worse now because the problem hasn't been taken
care of. And if you're just going to say, okay,
well there are protests, so we're going to charge the cop,

(34:28):
that's not the point. That's not enough. That won't stop
the next George Floyd from getting murdered. I mean, the
next Church Floyd. A couple of them have been murdered
all already. I mean yes, of the last like twenty
four hours. The crackdown is um gonna get worse and worse.
I don't know where that's gonna ahead, Um, because there

(34:49):
is that like there are fewer of them quote than us.
Quote right, Robert, you tweeted something very true, which is
now the whole country knows just how easy it is
to take over a police precinct. I wouldn't say easy,
but possible. A thing that has happened now. Um. Yeah,

(35:14):
and if it's possible, it's easier than you would think. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
it can be done. And the the actual power that
the police and even the military can exert over the
people of this country, Um, if the people are persistent,
um and and diligent and united, is not what you

(35:39):
would think it is. Because the police are can be
out are very outnumbered. The military certainly has the killing power,
but they don't have the will as a as a
force to just massacre tens of thousands of people. I'm
already saying I follow a number of people who are
active duty soldiers right now who are particularly horrified over
Republican leaders talking about quarter like I have a bunch

(36:01):
of people who are active duty soldiers like tweeting right
now saying that like that is a war crime. That's
not what we do. We can't do that on soldiers
and a foreign battlefield. You can't declare no quarter. It
is a war crime. It is a violation of international law.
It's murder. I do believe certainly there are national Guards
people who have already proven willing to fire on protesters. UM.
But I don't think as a massive force. I think

(36:24):
there is. I think that if the protests continue to
escalate at the rate that they have for the next week, um,
two weeks, three weeks, four weeks, um, I think the
police will never get tired of hurting and killing people.
But I do think the military would hit a point
where they would say no. UM. I don't know if

(36:45):
it will get that far. Because the police may be
able to deploy enough violence to stop this, to crack
this down, um. The state, the government, you know, by
by going after quote unquote Antifa, may be able to
arrest and frighten enough people into hiding, and this may
all get um clamped. Know that that is a possibility,
but it doesn't appear to be as of as of

(37:05):
this Monday at Pacific standard time. I'm not seeing evidence
that it's slowing down nationwide. No, I don't think it neither.
I don't get the sense that it will. I mean,
I'm blown away by the helicopters and sirens going by
right now. And this isn't even a neighborhood where there
are protests. We're all I think we're all in different

(37:26):
areas in l A right now, and it's the same
where I'm to Katie. Wow, should we do we take
a quick break? Guys? Yeah, let's take a break and
circle back after a quick break. Just a quick one though,
just a quick one together. Everything alright. Um, So I've

(37:56):
been pretty open. I don't I don't always go on
rants about my own personal politics, but I've been pretty
open for a while that m I I personally identify
closer to an anarchist than anything else, you know, kind
of libertarian municipalism is the political system that I think
I would most like to live under, which is kind
of in a system that has come up with a

(38:18):
guy by a guy by the name of Murray book Chin,
and a version of it is in what I saw
enacted over in Rojava. And one of the things that
they had to deal with in Northeast Syria and Rojava
when the civil war kicked off and Isis rose up,
is that like the government just left and so suddenly
the police who had been there weren't there anymore. The
thebat the secret police you know, kind of their equivalent
to the c I A FBI, were suddenly gone, and

(38:40):
they didn't replace it with the same thing um they have.
They don't have police like we have police over there.
They have the SISH which man checkpoints, um and are
the kind of the terrorism police, basically like military police,
and their job is to be an armed presence deal
with ISIS sleeper cells, because you know, there's violent people
who want to do harm to the citizenry and they

(39:00):
do need to be armed people to stop that. But
the us I should don't do like they don't pull
you over for speeding. They don't police you know, people
who were like like in their homes and stuff like.
That's not their job. Their job is to to stop violence.
Most of what we we think of his law enforcement
is done by groups of citizens, local communes and councils

(39:23):
that are like democratic groups that kind of are based
in neighborhoods UM, who provide patrols and security UM and
deal with problems of violence, you know, when there's domestic
violence or something like that. UM. There is a court
system that things can get escalated to. But the general
idea is that number one, neighborhoods are policed and and
kept safe by the people who live in those neighborhoods.

(39:45):
And number two, UM, things are only escalated to courts
when people in a local area can't solve a problem. UM.
So that that's the system I like, and it's the
system we outline in the Women's War, And it kind
of gets in with with people ask like what can
we do about these about what's happening with the police?
And I have two answers, you know. One of them

(40:06):
is sort of the what do I think is reasonable
and to agitate for in a way that like we
can actually I think we have a decent chance of
maybe making happen UM. And that would be that the
officers in Minneapolis who killed George Floyd all be jailed
and tried UM and convicted because they're guilty UM, and
that officers around the country in places like Louisville, places
like Portland, places like Los Angeles, d C. Who have

(40:29):
been caught on video assaulting people, breaking the law, beating
people unlawfully be prosecuted. Um. And that a system of
civilian review boards be put up around the nation so
that police are being policed by civilians. Um. So that's
what I think is a reasonable thing to demand that
we could actually make happen. What do I really want though, Um,

(40:49):
I'm a police abolitionist. I do not want police. I
don't think we need them there. I think there are
certain jobs that the police do that are necessary. For example,
we need detectives. When people are murdered, somebody should figure
out who did the murder, right, that's a that's a
job that should exist. And I want somebody that I
can call if I'm being raped. You know, yes, I'm
being attacked, and there should be uh, you know, some someone.

(41:13):
But but I don't see. I don't see that the
people investigating murders or the people who will respond if
you are having violence under you should be, for example,
the same people who try to make sure that people
aren't driving drunk on the road. Yeah, there's a whole
conversation right now, about the l A city budget right
about how uh in the wake of COVID, all these programs, education,

(41:39):
to schools, everything is being defunded, but the police force
is getting a raise. Um and and they talk about
it like, well, you know the thing about the police
forces that we've got to have people that are trained
as trauma responses, you know, for her different crisis. How
help her, you know, all this stuff, and that's not

(42:01):
what they should be doing. We need people that are there,
you know, social workers. I saw this point. Social workers
don't show up with a gun, like that's not a
police that that's not what I want those detectives, those
officers to be doing. Well. And here is another thing Katie,
that is uncomfortable to talk about but necessary. If you

(42:22):
are being raped, the police won't stop it. That almost
that that is a thing that virtually never occurs. The
police can attempt to prosecute people and catch them after
the rape has been committed, but that also is pretty rare.
I mean, look, even as I was saying that, I
was like, would go to the police, you know, I
mean I would because I feel like it's a duty, uh,

(42:44):
you know, to report what happened. But it's like, how
effective is that now. I had an experience fairly recently
where I was being harassed by someone online and it
was really unnerving, and I filed a police report and
I was really grateful that they gave me UM the

(43:06):
time of day, that they paid attention. I'm a white woman.
I'm sure that factored something into it, and UM also
and nothing really then, but it was also uncomfortable because
they were asking me questions that it was like, well,
actually that's pretty personal and I don't need to go
into that information with you. I don't think for the
purposes of this UM and I don't know, it's just

(43:28):
all fucked up. I can cut that actually probably, no, no, no,
that's actually you know Vermin Supreme, who is one of
the only men in American politics I've ever respected in
my life because I've been in it's spent a lot
of time or in protests with Vermin watching him keep
people safe. He has a little chant. He likes to
sing ah. He likes to get the crowd singing UM

(43:50):
when things get tense and the chant goes ships fucked
up in bullshit, Yes it is um, ship's fucked up bullshit,
Yes it is. Getting the whole crowd chanting that it
really is nice and accurate. Yeah. Um, I just feel

(44:12):
like there's a video of a guy doing a different
version of that. That's just like a song that's just
Ship's fucked up over and over and over. It's very catchy.
Oh yeah, no that there's a great war in Zevon
song called My Ship's Fucked Up. It's it's about it's
cancer diagnosis. Actually, yeah, I went to the doctor. I
was feeling kind of rough. He said, let me break

(44:33):
it to your son, your Ship's fucked up. It's a
great song. Think of a different one then, but it's
always important to remember that ship's fucked up. Um. Yeah,
ship is fucked up in bullshit and we shouldn't be
okay with it. And um, you know people were asking
by either that's something that yeah, it's it's just still

(44:54):
surreal to see just like why did the police use
tear gas? Excuse me? Like are you new? And like
how new are you? It's just a very uh, I
don't know. We need it's uncomfortable, it is. We need
to see that, you know, we need to see what's
happening everywhere and what their potential is if you push

(45:16):
back on something that in the grand scheme of things.
I mean, this is not in any scheme of things.
This is a thing that we should be pushing back on.
This is what we should have been pushing back on
all along, and and this is the response. I had
a lot of people asking me on the live stream
last night, like, hey, I'm and I had. I had
a lot of people I lost count come up to

(45:38):
me during the actual march and say they were out
because of the streams that they've been watching that I've
been filming. But also people who you know, were in
other parts of the country were being like, I want
to get involved, I want to go to a protest,
but I'm scared. Can you give me any advice? And
I kind of want to end on on that. Um,
My first piece of advice is that it is scary
to be out there. It is scary to be shot
at by police. It is scary to not know if

(45:59):
they will let you disperse or if they will beat
and arrest you. It is scary to not know what
will happen if you wind up in a cell. It
is scary. Um. They are unpredictable, rabid dogs, and they
are scary to be around. Um, but it is important
that you get out there and you exercise your legal
and constitutionally guaranteed right to register your discontent with this situation. UM.

(46:26):
So again some basic advice for being out in a
protest like that. Number one. There will always be medics. Uh.
Medics are good people to rally around. You know, if
the crowd gets dispersed in situations of chaos, because they
are helpful people who generally have experience, it will be
the ones with the big medic sign on their back. Um.
Water is what you used to wash out tear gas.

(46:48):
Pour it over your eyes with them closed briefly, then
open your eyes and continue pouring. Um. Flash bangs are frightening,
but they do will not harm you generally. UM, So,
just don't panic and stampede. I I want to chime
in and just say thank you. I I tweeted this,
so a lot of our fault listeners probably saw it
as well. But I used that. I took that to

(47:12):
heart when you said that before. And there was a
big flash bang right by me and everybody panicked and
started to run, and the people immediately around me, I
was like, don't run, don't run, it's just a flash
bang and someone's like, what's a flash bang? I said,
it's loud. That's what it is. Rubber bullets. There's nothing
to do but try to protect your head. Wear a

(47:32):
helmet if you have one, If you can, you know
that that's the only thing that will protect you from
a rubber bullet. Um. It's not a bad idea if
you can safely do so to where you know, if
you have kevlar to wear it and for body blows.
But if you do that, wear it on the outside
of your clothes and make it very clear that you're
a protester, not an undercover police officer, because people get
kind of jittery and paranoid, and there's always disinformation that

(47:53):
kind of spreads at these events too. Um. Yeah, that's
that would be my basic advice in and get out there.
Know that it is scary, um, but that it's not
always safe to be free. And I'll also say parts
of it are inspiring too. Yeah. I've never felt threatened

(48:15):
by a crowd in a crowd at one of these
types of events, even at riots. The people at riots
are always very nice and very kind and very supportive
of each other, and there is a lot of mutual
aid and taking care of each other. Like a lot
of this has been described as anarchy. Then there will
be a picture of like people being gassed and stuff,
and those photos of like munitions flying through the air

(48:37):
and people fighting. That's not anarchy. Anarchy is the street
medic clearing your eyes of tear gas? Law and order?
Are the police rolling around in vehicles firing wildly at
strangers with impact munitions? Um? Yeah, I just can't that
stuff that like the the the anarchists are trying to

(48:57):
do the violence, like most of them literally are there
to help people who get hurt. I don't know. Apparently
the president is giving a speech right now where you
can hear tear gas being fired off in the distance.
Very cool. Um Oh. A quick note on the rubber
bullets that I I said that during I think during
the break that I just it's something to think about,

(49:18):
um in regards to a problem with cops, whether they
get trained poorly or are violent thugs. Rubber bullets are
meant to be shot at the ground so that they
bounce up and then like hit you in the legs
or something like that. They're very big and if you'll

(49:39):
notice their video after video of people getting shot in
the chest, of cops literally holding up the gun pointing
them at people's faces and shooting them in the throat
or the eye. That's not how they're supposed to be used. Um.
I would posit that they know that and they don't care. Um,
but if they don't know that, maybe train cops better.

(50:00):
I don't know, maybe train cops better. UM. You know.
There there's there's the I always try to split things
in my head between like what I want as a
person who believes the things I believe to be done,
and then what I am I think is reasonable to
agitate for because it can actually other people can get
on board with it, because you know, the world that
we have is um a collaborative thing, and you you

(50:22):
can't just like I don't think it's always a particularly
good idea to just like push for whatever it is
you happen to believe, even if it's something that you
know you're not going to get enough other people on
board with. I do think sometimes that needs to be done, because,
for example, that's how the abolition movement started. UM, so
maybe that is what we need. Like I am in
a police and a prison abolitionist at the same time, like, um,

(50:46):
there's a more moderate set of goals that would make
things better and save lives right now. And if I
I tend to err on the side of whatever I
think will reduce the number of people getting hurt and killed,
that's what I will push for in the moment. All right,
Well do that do it for us today? Mm hmm
yeah today? Yeah, so good luck, godspeed you guys. Be

(51:11):
safe home if you can when you can utilize your
legal right to register your discontent. Yeah, take care of
each other. Fuck this ship, this sucked up. Suck it
follow us online at worst. I will say I do

(51:33):
love the Twitter, and I have to think it must
have been Jack Dorsey who had because I can't see
a random Twitter employee making the statement, referring last night
after the news broke that the president had been taken
to a bunker, referring to it as the Presidential Palace. Yeah,
does anybody know if they take Miladia and the kid
to the bunker? I don't know what happens to them,

(51:56):
but I love it. So okay, So everyone was like, oh,
they turned off the lights. It's like when you're it's
Halloween and you want people to go away. Because you
don't have any candy, right, Um, and uh, I couldn't.
I couldn't stop thinking about an old story about President Trump. Um,
it's from a book from to Washington Post reporters from

(52:18):
a couple of years ago, and how he would in
like the eighties and nineties, he would go on these
these extravagant dates with women to like go out and
get be seen like, oh, I look, it's Trump with
a beautiful woman in a restaurant, and he would take
them back to his place and leave the woman in
the living room to watch TV and he would go
into the other room and eat a big bowl of
candy by himself. And I it's irrelevant, it does not matter.

(52:44):
He's a f cody. That was a very important point
to make. And it's so funny. Alright, guys, we're going
to get back later, either this week or next. I
don't know. Everything so dumb. Everything's so dumb, and it's

(53:05):
not again. N I tread. Daniel Worst Year Ever is
a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from
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or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.