activism, infiltration, slightly vent-y
I wish people in activist spaces would spend less time arguing about who is or isn't a cop, and more time figuring out strategies where it doesn't materially *matter* if some people are cops.
Like, you can try reading tea leaves until you're blue in the face but it's just going to cost you a lot of energy that's better spent driving effective change.
activism, infiltration, slightly vent-y
Relatedly: maybe stop playing by the state's rules? Half the point of infiltration is to create paranoia in the group, and because cops always have more resources than your radical group does, they essentially have full control over how much of your energy gets spent chasing them.
You're not going to get an advantage there. Look for your advantage in strategies and areas that the state (fundamentally) cannot competently deal with, and that they do not have a lot of resources in.
re: activism, infiltration, slightly vent-y
@joepie91 the experience from Britain was the spycops were able to infiltrate activist groups because they volunteed for boring/nerdy stuff such as paperwork/administration, transporting people etc (being fairly well educated having more access to cars and other resources).
Incidentally during 90s when I got involved with activist groups/rave crews I was regularly copjacketed and suspected of being both part of MetPol and MI5 at the same time, partly as a form of hidden racism (although it was also common for MetPol to deploy brown/black officers in undercover roles in subcultures where drugs were widely used) but also because I wouldn't immediately suggest actions that resulted in open conflict but preferred more subtle forms of subversion (on those crews there were a lot of angry young men who just wanted conflict and contrarianism, which is also exactly how/why cops found it easy to infiltrate some of them, especially those with a macho/hierarchical culture)