It’s the middle of the night and this might get lost, but I haven’t seen another diary on this and it deserves to be showcased somehow.
Like many of you, I watched the redhat insurrection on television most of yesterday, bouncing back and forth between various news channels and the congressional coverage on C-SPAN.
Every now and then it got to be too much for me and I escaped to Buzzr or the Game Show Network just to take a mental break and calm myself down.
So I consider myself fortunate that I just happened to be watching MSNBC live when Joy Ann Reid decided she had no more effs to give and just started telling it like it T-I-Z.
This is the reason we need black voices and BIPoC perspective on national news. Because HOURS went by before anyone just said straight out what the vast majority of blackfolks were thinking. I was at the point where I couldn’t take one more naive hand wringing moment of someone asking “HOW could this HAPpen” and “Why were the police so ‘unprepared’?”
Capitol Police weren’t unprepared.
They just assumed that particular demographic didn’t have insurrection in them.
Those of us who look at gatherings of AWM and see a seething mass of passionate irrational hatred in their eyes, have had January 6 circled on the calendar for a while as a day when anything could happen.
Even *** tweeted about how it was going to be “wild”.
But the Capitol Police just took it all in stride.
Perhaps LEOs were buying into the lie that violence during summer protests was all done by the left. Since there were no counterprotests planned for January 6, what could possibly go wrong?
Maybe they assumed that redhats, being “conservative” and all, would respect the police and make an extra effort to stay peaceful. Not like those loonie lefties—watch out for them! They’re always causing trouble! If THOSE guys were talking about violent protests to “stop the steal” and save America, we’d really need to gear up for them!
One commentator mentioned that Capitol Police are used to dealing with tourists, who will stop themselves when they find a locked door, who won’t pick up and move police barriers, and basically will do what they are told by any authority figure, especially a guard or police officer.
So at best, the people responsible for protecting the U.S. Capitol in case of an unexpected terror attack, completely misread the level of stored emotional intensity that hateradio and social media and StateTV have been winding up tighter and tighter and tighter in the white grievance demographic. That’s at BEST.
And it’s just a cherry on top that it never occurred to them the January 5 Georgia senate elections would pour gasoline on the fiery embers of their entitlement-fueled rage, regardless of the results.
What DO cops see when they look at redhats? Because they sure as hell don’t see them the way we see them. Do they see a bunch of ordinary guys? Just letting off steam? Sure, let them come up on the steps and wave their flags if they want. What’s the harm?
Is this is just example number infinity of the way that police treat a man differently if they identify with him somehow—if they look at him and see a reflection of themselves? Is that what makes them give these guys the benefit of the doubt? Is this what holds them back from using heavy-handed policing from square one? Is that what keeps their decisions measured and shields them from over-reacting? Do they look at them and think: “that could be my brother or my son or my father or my uncle? I must respect his body, respect his rights, respect his anger.”
We go around in circles asking these questions because the only alternative is to jump to the obvious answer.
Below is eight minutes of Joy Ann Reid riffing on the obvious answer.
EIGHT MINUTES OF JOY ANN REID TELLING
THE TRUTH, THE WHOLE TRUTH AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH
Part One: This is a Riot At Minimum, it’s insurrection
* * *
Part Two: Guarantee you if that were a BLM protest in DC...
I have nothing else to add to a rant so righteous. I just wanted a post I could share and link to for everyone who has not seen/heard it.
link to other diaries in the TRUE BLUE REPORT series