Why Isn’t the State Scared to Use Force Against Us? Self Defense and the Police

Why is the state unafraid to use force against us?

Why do they think they will never be met with defensive force when they incarcerate people for victimless crimes, seize children from loving parents, or when the police kill an innocent person? Why do they think they can pass laws that infringe on our most basic rights, and trust that police will enforce them?

Because they think people won’t retaliate: because people usually don’t retaliate. This article is not suggesting anyone do anything, but the truth is, the government believes they are impervious to consequence for ordering police to use force against people for peaceful actions they have deemed “criminal.”

If an ordinary person threatened to lock you in a cage for possessing cannabis for example, what would you do? You’d probably flee the scene or defend yourself with force. If you were in a place like Texas, you might shoot them in self defense.

Speaking from personal experience, Texas is relatively safe when it comes to robberies and crime because most people there practice self defense. However, the police will shoot you quickly in Texas: cops can be incredibly aggressive there.

So what makes aggression initiated by the police different?

Nothing. We don’t defend ourselves with force when police arrest us because if we did, they’d crush us with overwhelming force. Unlimited resources and equipment, money endowed from the state: overwhelming force and unlimited funds. That is the glue that holds together the power, and defends the hegemony of the wealthy class.

If you disarm a cop and run, or shoot a cop in self defense, you’re probably going to be completely crushed by the state, incarcerated for years or for life, or be killed instantly unless you get away.

But reality is grim for people of our class. This societal equation is undeniably true, and it is a pattern that has repeated throughout history: the state will make laws that remove our basic rights until we use force against them in self defense. If a people are disarmed, the situation becomes infinitely worse.

Documentaries have been made about what can happen to a disarmed population.

Until the police are genuinely scared to enforce unjust laws, they will keep doing it.

Until it is completely impractical for people to take up jobs as police officers, because too many people are defending themselves against them, the state will continue passing laws that are more and more coercive and detrimental to our future.

Shooting a person even in self defense is an incomprehensibly grave action of course, unfortunate for the aggressor and their loved ones, but nonetheless if officers of the law are pointing guns at peaceful people, enforcing laws that instruct them to lock people in cages at gunpoint, for instance, for possessing or growing cannabis, they have initiated a conflict that is no different from robbery.

In fact, it’s much worse. A robbery from some average criminal could be a single small loss. Arrest could mean years of incarceration.

As a result of people’s understandable unwillingness to defend themselves with force when police try to arrest them, as grave as this sounds, the US government believes they can infringe on our rights with increasingly few boundaries. It’s a societal problem that does not go away.

In certain other countries, people are disarmed worse than the US, and they are often subject to intense laws. For instance, in Australia the state believes they can take children away from parents for almost anything, and the pharmaceutical industry tied Prime Minister is pushing mandatory vaccination.

Australia is almost completely disarmed. You can’t own mace, a taser, or even a crossbow in most places there. Extremely strict regulations are imposed on guns, and difficult to acquire licenses are required for people who want to hunt with them.

Self defense there is almost completely criminalized, and home invasions can be frequent in rougher areas. The Australian government and their media have abused shooting incidents to justify disarming the public, such as the Port Arthur Massacre of 1996.

After the massacre, propaganda aided the government in justifying disarming the public. According to Wikipedia:

“Following the spree, the Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard, introduced strict gun control laws within Australia and formulated the National Firearms Programme Implementation Act 1996, restricting the private ownership of high capacity semi-automatic rifles, semi-automatic shotguns and pump-action shotguns as well as introducing uniform firearms licensing. It was implemented with bipartisan support by the Commonwealth, states and territories.”

As a result, the government of Australia feels impervious to consequence. Imports to Australia are strictly regulated: that means government force is used to prevent the free flow of goods to and from the country. You could call it “domestic sanctions.”

But in many places in the US, people still bear arms for self defense. The US government has been concerned about an armed public ready to use defensive force for many decades: one might say that’s why FBI operation Patcon (Patriot Conspiracy) occurred, which involved infiltrating “right-wing militia groups” in the 90’s, using agent provocateurs and other methods to destroy “patriot” movements. This was the strategic seed of their efforts to divide militia movements and gun owners in the 2010’s decade.

This FBI operation to destroy gun owning “patriots” mirrored the FBI’s efforts to destroy black revolutionary movements in the 60’s. Patcon FBI activity was tied to the OKC bombing and the massacre in Waco, Texas.

This is evidence that they are concerned about gun owners: they cannot pass a certain threshold in using force against citizens or people will retaliate, in an armed society.

Many people suspect that in shootings such as Sandy Hook, they made use of actors to try and disarm the American people. Gun owners are a more formidable threat to tyranny than many might realize.

Some people have spoken about an oppressed people using defensive force against the state as an eventuality.

But as the American people behave now, quite understandably as no one wants to lose their life over an unnecessary conflict, the state can do almost anything to citizens using the police.

They can take people’s children for possessing or cultivating a plant. They have locked up people for decades over cannabis.

Police have killed about a few thousand people in the US this decade, and it’s been going on for many more decades before that. If you’ve paid attention, you’d know tragedy after tragedy has been dealt to innocent people this decade by violent police who think they are untouchable. Police accountability movements have exploded in this 2010’s decade, and they will go down in history.

So our situation begs the question: at what point will people use defensive force when the state agresses upon them?

Image credit: Malcolm X, Immortal Technique