Officer Alex on the slippery slope of fighting against what you don't like
It’s over. The August 12th rally in Charlottesville in which one group of a-holes planned to have a rally to “unite the right” was met head on by a diametrically opposed different set of a-holes who felt the need to tell them that they were apparently…a-holes.
Police in that city addressed the situation by asking these two groups to stay in specific areas so that they could “peacefully assemble and exercise their rights of free speech.” But in short order, the constabulary found out that a-holes, by their very nature, tend not to follow “rules,” and chaos literally erupted.
Illinois Nazis brought shields, sticks, and tiki torches (re-read that if you care to) and the manbun-and-sandals Antifa crowd wore masks, brought sticks, pepper spray and bottles of stale piss (don’t re-read that if you care not to) because what better way is there to fight ideas you disagree with than to put on a mask and throw piss at people?
One person was killed and dozens were injured at this event, and so disgusted were people around the country (and even the world), that they decided the smart thing to do was to try to duplicate that event by hosting another one here locally five days later. Because, “feelings.”
(Does it seem stupid when it is put that way? Bananas seem yellow too when you see them fresh because they are. They’re both normal reactions.)
In Chattaboogie, we’re no strangers to rallies. I’m not talking about the tens of people that participated in the mass-camping on the lot of the County Courthouse during the “Occupy Wall Street” days in a show of solidarity against…something.
I’m talking about our own NSM rally in April of 2014 when the same subset of a-holes also got a permit, barriers were erected, and they shouted Nazi things with a Nazi loudspeaker and everybody went home neither dead nor smelling like someone threw stale piss on them.
Was there a counter-rally? Sure. But apart from a hundred or so people trying to over-shout the loudspeakers, the counter rally was held across town. Why? Because they knew that two groups of intolerant a-holes getting together was a recipe for disaster, “feelings” or not.
What has this on my mind this week isn’t the underlying disappointment in the persistent idea some have that the tenets of National Socialism are still somehow viable; no. What’s on my mind is how people are legitimizing lawlessness because if you’re fighting Nazis, there are no rules. And how do you determine if someone is a Nazi in 2017?
It’s whoever disagrees with you. Period.
Do members of the NSM also have a right to free speech? You’re a Nazi.
Is there photographic evidence of that infamous grey Charger being struck by a ball bat by the crowd before the driver took that horrific plunge into the crowd? You’re a Nazi.
Do you believe Mojo Burrito is a bad place to scream at your co-worker on the clock about their support of statues of dead generals? Nazi.
Because if you have a different opinion or views, you are automatically on the side of the opposition. And if you are declared a Nazi, why…there are no rules. You can do whatever you want to that person, because this is now the beaches of Normandy on D-Day.
This is now the Warsaw Ghetto; it is exactly like our grandfathers and great-grandfathers battle against Himmler, even if Himmler now apparently rides a moped and has peace sign tattoo’s on his arm and only herds people into burrito joints instead of death camps. Because “feelings.”
In short, it’s the legitimization of violence for the most daft of reasons that’s on my mind. And it isn’t right. In fact, it’s a mob-mentality and it’s getting a green light in the mainstream media, and it makes it harder for people to be safe, and that is my business.
I’ve protected the Occupy crowd from opposition. I’ve protected the Nazi crowd from opposition. But I’ve done so based on a set of rules—and there are people now determined to make their own.
It’s not complicated: Rules, Not Feelings. This literally is not Hitler Germany. I mean, you wouldn’t disagree…would you? Because if not, you wouldn’t want me making up the rules, would you?
When officer Alexander D. Teach is not patrolling our fair city on the heels of the criminal element, he spends his spare time volunteering for the Boehm Birth Defects Center.