AI
Thursday, August 27, 2020 1:40:38 PM
This Is Not a Recipe for ‘Order.’ It’s a Recipe for Chaos.
The words of Tucker Carlson and Kenosha Police Chief Daniel Miskinis are profoundly dangerous.
_By Jack Holmes
Aug 27, 2020
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a33813049/tucker-carlson-kenosha-shooter-police-chief/?source=nl&utm_source=nl_esq&utm_medium=email&date=082720&utm_campaign=nl21119313
When a violent incident occurs—say, storefronts are vandalized, or a fire is set—there are specific people we as a society have entrusted with the power to respond. They have the authority to detain people, and even to use deadly force against them. They are public servants, paid by taxpayers, to do this.
Other people who are not members of law enforcement do not have this authority. This is not just a way to pick out who's who by whether they're wearing a uniform. It's about accountability—at least in theory. If agents of the state entrusted with this awesome power misuse it, we as citizens retain the right to hold them accountable for that.
That is what's at the root of the massive demonstrations against police misconduct that have risen across the country in response to George Floyd's killing—and now, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in response to the shooting of Jacob Blake.
People are demanding that agents of the state, who they believe misused their powers and trampled on the rights of citizens, are held accountable. The anger is a crescendo of these and countless smaller, daily abuses, but these are the triggers.
Protesters are declaring that the social contract has been violated, that they have not been granted the full rights of citizenship, that there must be consequences when people with a badge kill Black people without justification. These protests are almost uniformly greeted with a militarized response from police, which only serves to escalate tensions. Sometimes, it boils over, and some minority of people in the street turn to vandalism.
But even when this happens, and even with all the intense criticism of the people with the badge, few would advocate for other people, who have no authority granted by the polity, claiming the police officer's powers for their own and wielding them in the streets of an American city. Few, it seems, except the host of the most watched show on cable news.
Tucker: How shocked are we that 17 year olds with rifles decided they had to maintain order when no one else would...
It is not "maintaining order" when some guy travels to another state with an assault rifle and starts patrolling the streets where he doesn't even live. Throwing random people with semiautomatic weapons into the mix is not a recipe for order, it's a recipe for further chaos, which is what Kenosha got.
Not to mention how Carlson and the Trumpists he's allied with have for months been breathlessly pushing a theme of American Cities in Chaos that completely outstrips reality, telling people things have descended into outright anarchy.
Even if you think the authorities are not doing a sufficient job maintaining order, take it up with them. The public has not entrusted the accused here—or any of the militia members with whom he seems to have found common cause—with the power to enforce order in the street or use deadly force. He is not deputized.
We, the public, have not assented to this through any democratic or legal mechanism. It is lawless. This is Stand Your Ground on steroids, or maybe PCP. It might not be your ground, and you might have to travel across state lines to stand there, but as long as you're the Right Kind of guy with a gun, some people will make excuses for you.
The New York Post already has an article out about the suspect that is essentially the opposite of the "he was no angel" stories that always appear about Black men who are shot by the police.
And why does a 17-year-old have access to this weapon anyway? And how is it acceptable, as we've seen in so many cities for so many years now, to have armed militias in military cosplay patrolling the streets? Who are these people? To whom are they accountable? Who granted them the authority to continually communicate the threat of force against their fellow citizens?
The answer, I suppose, lies in part with the state legislatures that made toting your gun in public legal. The impulse to do so is the culmination of a long-building national psychosis. The consequences now have terrifying potential.
After all, it's not just cable-news hosts or social media hardos making excuses for this. Look at how the Kenosha police chief described what had happened.
Kenosha Police Chief Miskinis responds to the murder of two protestors by saying it wouldn't have happened if people weren't out after curfew: "I'm not gonna make a great deal of it, BUT ...
Uh, sir, what the fuck are you talking about?
This is some classic CopTalk, the kind of passive-voice language police insist on when an officer is accused of wrongdoing. But this is way beyond "officer-involved shooting," and not just because of the extra-mangled language. ("Last night, the 17-year-old individual from Antioch, Illinois, was involved in the use of firearms to resolve whatever conflict was in place.")
He is applying the evasive language of non-accountability to someone who is not even entrusted with this kind of power by the polity. This has the effect of almost deputizing this alleged vigilante murderer, welcoming him into the ranks of those with the power to use deadly force to "resolve whatever conflict" he gets himself into. He's not a cop, but this police chief is talking as if they're on the same side. This is a profoundly dangerous moment.
Jack Holmes Politics Editor
The words of Tucker Carlson and Kenosha Police Chief Daniel Miskinis are profoundly dangerous.
_By Jack Holmes
Aug 27, 2020
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a33813049/tucker-carlson-kenosha-shooter-police-chief/?source=nl&utm_source=nl_esq&utm_medium=email&date=082720&utm_campaign=nl21119313
When a violent incident occurs—say, storefronts are vandalized, or a fire is set—there are specific people we as a society have entrusted with the power to respond. They have the authority to detain people, and even to use deadly force against them. They are public servants, paid by taxpayers, to do this.
Other people who are not members of law enforcement do not have this authority. This is not just a way to pick out who's who by whether they're wearing a uniform. It's about accountability—at least in theory. If agents of the state entrusted with this awesome power misuse it, we as citizens retain the right to hold them accountable for that.
That is what's at the root of the massive demonstrations against police misconduct that have risen across the country in response to George Floyd's killing—and now, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in response to the shooting of Jacob Blake.
People are demanding that agents of the state, who they believe misused their powers and trampled on the rights of citizens, are held accountable. The anger is a crescendo of these and countless smaller, daily abuses, but these are the triggers.
Protesters are declaring that the social contract has been violated, that they have not been granted the full rights of citizenship, that there must be consequences when people with a badge kill Black people without justification. These protests are almost uniformly greeted with a militarized response from police, which only serves to escalate tensions. Sometimes, it boils over, and some minority of people in the street turn to vandalism.
But even when this happens, and even with all the intense criticism of the people with the badge, few would advocate for other people, who have no authority granted by the polity, claiming the police officer's powers for their own and wielding them in the streets of an American city. Few, it seems, except the host of the most watched show on cable news.
Tucker: How shocked are we that 17 year olds with rifles decided they had to maintain order when no one else would...
It is not "maintaining order" when some guy travels to another state with an assault rifle and starts patrolling the streets where he doesn't even live. Throwing random people with semiautomatic weapons into the mix is not a recipe for order, it's a recipe for further chaos, which is what Kenosha got.
Not to mention how Carlson and the Trumpists he's allied with have for months been breathlessly pushing a theme of American Cities in Chaos that completely outstrips reality, telling people things have descended into outright anarchy.
Even if you think the authorities are not doing a sufficient job maintaining order, take it up with them. The public has not entrusted the accused here—or any of the militia members with whom he seems to have found common cause—with the power to enforce order in the street or use deadly force. He is not deputized.
We, the public, have not assented to this through any democratic or legal mechanism. It is lawless. This is Stand Your Ground on steroids, or maybe PCP. It might not be your ground, and you might have to travel across state lines to stand there, but as long as you're the Right Kind of guy with a gun, some people will make excuses for you.
The New York Post already has an article out about the suspect that is essentially the opposite of the "he was no angel" stories that always appear about Black men who are shot by the police.
And why does a 17-year-old have access to this weapon anyway? And how is it acceptable, as we've seen in so many cities for so many years now, to have armed militias in military cosplay patrolling the streets? Who are these people? To whom are they accountable? Who granted them the authority to continually communicate the threat of force against their fellow citizens?
The answer, I suppose, lies in part with the state legislatures that made toting your gun in public legal. The impulse to do so is the culmination of a long-building national psychosis. The consequences now have terrifying potential.
After all, it's not just cable-news hosts or social media hardos making excuses for this. Look at how the Kenosha police chief described what had happened.
Kenosha Police Chief Miskinis responds to the murder of two protestors by saying it wouldn't have happened if people weren't out after curfew: "I'm not gonna make a great deal of it, BUT ...
Uh, sir, what the fuck are you talking about?
This is some classic CopTalk, the kind of passive-voice language police insist on when an officer is accused of wrongdoing. But this is way beyond "officer-involved shooting," and not just because of the extra-mangled language. ("Last night, the 17-year-old individual from Antioch, Illinois, was involved in the use of firearms to resolve whatever conflict was in place.")
He is applying the evasive language of non-accountability to someone who is not even entrusted with this kind of power by the polity. This has the effect of almost deputizing this alleged vigilante murderer, welcoming him into the ranks of those with the power to use deadly force to "resolve whatever conflict" he gets himself into. He's not a cop, but this police chief is talking as if they're on the same side. This is a profoundly dangerous moment.
Jack Holmes Politics Editor
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