I was going to post this as a comment, but it was in an anarchism community, and I figured some sections of it might be unacceptable there. Hence, new post.

Here’s a guideline of how to interact with cops. There are more or less three modes, depending on your read of the situation. Cops are not always the enemy or the maniacal whole-job-is-making-evil thugs that Lemmy sometimes makes them out to be. It really is bad for people to get mugged or their cars broken into, and they’re the solution our society has come up with to minimize the amount of it that happens. It’s not always a bad thing.

If you find yourself talking to the cops, there are more or less three ways:

  • They’re there to solve a real problem. Someone’s car got broken into, someone got beat up. Just talk with them. Tell them what you know, help them figure out the situation. In almost all of the US, their effect on the problem will be positive, and it’ll be a lot more positive if they have a good grasp of what happened. If, in your opinion, the person they’re trying to catch really did do something that warrants a law enforcement response, then give them a hand. Use your judgement as to whether that’s warranted of course, and your impression of the justice level in your local area, since it varies quite a lot in the US.
  • They’re there for you. Shut the fuck up. Don’t say a goddamned word. It doesn’t even matter if you didn’t do it. Don’t explain. Shut the fuck up. Be polite, obey lawful orders, definitely don’t fight them or you’ll get a felony and might also get injured or worse, but tell them that if you’re suspected of a crime, then you’d like to talk to a lawyer, and you have nothing else to say. And then, shut the fuck up and cooperate. Maybe you want to go as far as “Were you shoplifting?” “What? No. That wasn’t me, man.” But any further explanation than that, just leave it alone. Definitely don’t make something up on the spot, to make yourself sound innocent, if you did do it. For the love of God, don’t do that.
  • They’re there for someone who didn’t do anything wrong. The reason for this post is, anything and everything with ICE and immigration falls into this category. Some things with local cops will, also. Just be unhelpful and simple. No, I didn’t see anything. I don’t know. I’m not sure. Be vague. Don’t get creative, keep it simple, don’t refuse to give your ID or otherwise antagonize them or commit minor crimes of obstruction, but just do your best imitation of someone who just fell from the sky. “So you’ve NEVER MET your neighbor. Your neighbor across the hall.” “Nope.” “Are you sure?” “Yeah, I don’t know.” “I mean, she gave us your name, she said she’d talked to you.” “I don’t know, I don’t remember that.” Don’t embellish. Don’t explain why. Just calmly let the silence linger and the pressure build up, without adding extra words.

Like I said, everything with ICE or other immigration authorities falls into the third category. No exceptions. Everything. The same applies with any type of federal law enforcement, I suspect, for the next few years.

  • PM_ME_VINTAGE_30S [he/him]@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Terrible advice. Please, check this guide from Projet Évasions (PDF warning) instead.

    Cops are not always the enemy or the maniacal whole-job-is-making-evil thugs that Lemmy sometimes makes them out to be.

    Yes, they literally are. All cops are bastards, always, everywhere, forever, no exceptions, no matter what they are currently doing or have done prior, and capitalism is always evil, so their whole job is in fact making evil, and anytime they do something beneficial is an accident. If a person puts on that uniform, they’re a worthless piece of shit. End of story. Individual cops can stop being pieces of shit by burning the uniform and trying to fix the lives they have broken.

    It really is bad for people to get mugged or their cars broken into, and they’re the solution our society has come up with to minimize the amount of it that happens. It’s not always a bad thing.

    Emphases mine. I’ll take them one by one:

    • Cops were and are imposed on us by the capitalist class. Any consent ever expressed for these monsters has been beaten into us by generations of police violence and then solidified by propaganda.
    • That is not their purpose. Their purpose is to maintain order for capitalism. Historically, modern police forces descended from slave-catching patrols. In interrogations specifically, their purpose is to gather information to build up a case file. The presence of police does not deter crime, and the deterrence of crime is only a pretext for the police to do what they’re actually paid to do.
    • Interacting with cops is always an immediate personal danger, especially after you have been hurt or are vulnerable, because they are unhinged monsters who will send you to the morgue if you make them too uncomfortable. You might decide to make that choice to interact with them to prevent some greater evil, for example being courteous during a traffic stop to prevent the cops from detaining you for being suspicious. But at the end of the day, we must recognize that any interaction with the cops is always treacherous.

    If you find yourself talking to the cops, there are more or less three ways:

    They’re there to solve a real problem.

    No they aren’t, they’re there to enforce the will of the capitalist class. Practically , they’re there because they either think they witnessed a violation of the law, or because someone called them. Rarely do they even attempt to solve problem, and in the rarer circumstance that individual cops do solve a problem, it is because they betrayed their actual function as cops.

    Someone’s car got broken into, someone got beat up. Just talk with them. Tell them what you know, help them figure out the situation.

    No you fucking don’t, because that cop will likely use your evidence to go after someone who didn’t do it. They don’t stop crime, they don’t solve crimes, they only provide information to the judges and terrorize the streets while doing it. Don’t help the cops with property crimes.

    In almost all of the US, their effect on the problem will be positive

    Person squatting over a 3 foot tall pile of sculpted sand that looks like the person just took a massive shit

    Use your judgement as to whether that’s warranted of course, and your impression of the justice level in your local area, since it varies quite a lot in the US.

    Don’t use your judgement, use the judgement of the victims! If they don’t want the cops involved, then they don’t get involved and that should be the end of the discussion.

    The same applies with any type of federal law enforcement, I suspect, for the next few years.

    It has applied for the entire existence of the modern police, and it will continue to apply as long as police exist. The guide I linked was written in 2022. Yes, we need to hammer this point over and over and over until people understand that no administration, even the so-called lesser-evil party, will ever be on their side except perhaps by accident.

    I was going to post this as a comment, but it was in an anarchism community, and I figured some sections of it might be unacceptable there.

    Rightly so, because it’s terrible advice and it’s clear to me that you haven’t sought out any wisdom from the community. What you should have done was asked for critique. We would have loved to talk about this in more detail on any anarchist forum.

    In my view, it is so much more important to listen to people as an anarchist (or any kind of revolutionary) than it is to spout off my views, hence why I don’t really post that often. Even this comment I expect and hope to get torn to shreds in the hope of improving the quality of my understanding of the world. So next time, please actually solicit the advice of your comrades before making statements, and in general do some research before making posts like these. Hence why I have started this comment with a link to a guide solicited from a group of anarchists.