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June 4th, 2016 
Awake Goy
This week on Copblock Radio our hosts were myself (Severin Freeman) from Lehigh Valley Copblock, Matt Taylor of Carbon County Copblock, and Rick Gonzalez of Allentown Copblock. Sadly, Derrick J couldn’t join us, so the phone lines were unavailable for this episode.
We opened the show by showing off our new toys: radio scanners! What we discovered while programming our toys led us into our first discussion: Allentown police are using encrypted radio communications – a system that they spent 1.1 million dollars on against the wishes of the city council, the concern of citizens, and an outcry from members of the press. We speculated why they would do this & touched on government corruption through secretive & shady practices.
Next, we started to talk about Matt & Scott Marshall’s park activism, but got cut off by a commercial break. When we returned, we plugged Allentown Copblock’s 3-day event this weekend (Thurs 6/2 – Sat 6/4). You can find out more here. We also mentioned the show “Cops” is being filmed in Hazelton, PA ( located just north of Matt’s town) & what we would do if we made it on the show for filming them.
The following discussion was filled with my gloating update on Brett Sanders’ penny video. It has gone viral & has been picked up & reported on by Now This!, NBC, Bill O’Reilly, and many other major & alternative media outlets. This led to another mini-debate on whether the act was a waste of time or effective activism.
Next up, we talked about a tiny bit of justice for Eric Harris, who was fatally shot & told “fuck your breath” as he lay dying. The deputy who fired the shot, Robert Bates, was found guilty of second-degree manslaughter & sentenced to four years in prison. During the trial, it was discovered that he was never even certified to carry a weapon and didn’t complete all of his required training. We agreed that the sentence was too short & voiced the unfairness that this deputy is getting off easier than the average citizen due to his badge.
Afterward, we reported on a lawsuit where five officers charged into a home and massacred three dogs— one of which was pregnant. In all, the cops shot these dogs excessively: seven shots to the grey pitbull named Debo (whom the owner had reached down to grab), another three to the black pitbull named Smoke (who was locked in the bathroom), & an undisclosed amount to Mama, a pregnant white pitbull (who was laying in the basement). The lawsuit claims the cops then laughed about it. This story made us sick and we cannot imagine what the owners are going through.
Then, we brought up a story about Bronson Campbell running for Sheriff. You may remember Campbell from two articles I published which told horror stories of two of his victims: Angela Matson in Enterprise, KS and Jamie Petitt in Valley Falls, KS. After recalling these accounts & numerous lawsuits filed against him, I could not believe he had the balls to run for office! We went on to discuss small towns, how his open letter claims to want transparency (yet he is blocking everyone who mentions the lawsuits), & censorship of public pages.
Shortly after, we gave two quick updates on previously discussed stories. First: Michael Slager, who murdered a victim from behind on camera, was indicted by a federal grand jury. The new federal charges are in addition to the state-level charges he already faces. These charges also bring with them the possibility of a death penalty sentence should Slager be convicted. Second: Two of the four officers being investigated in Oakland PD’s under-aged sex scandal have resigned.
After our long break, we were joined by Scott Marshall of The Oath Accountability Project. He spoke about his activism on Memorial Day where he engaged the public in a conversation about “What does Freedom mean to you?” It seems like a really simple question, but it’s difficult to answer as “freedom” is a perception of each individual. You can watch the four live-streamed videos here.
The rest of the show was a discussion of “when is it acceptable, if ever, to use violence in activism?” Rick believes violence is never a solution to anything. Scott says violence is only justified when you of your property are being severely threatened or harmed & only in a non-lethal way to diffuse the situation. I feel violence would be okay if we as a whole country decided we’re not going to let the government run things anymore & it was the only way to accomplish that. Matt’s stance is violence is never okay unless it’s in a defensive manner. We ended the show by discussing what would happen if we actually succeeded in kicking the government out: what about the US Army? Is this a viable scenario? How would society function?
Tune in June 8, 2016 for a new episode of Copblock Radio! We air 10pm EST on LRN.fm or at copblock.org/show. Subscribe to the Youtube channel for alerts when we go live. Download the LRN.fm app to hear our radio feed. As always, remember: collect those badge numbers!
Source Article from http://www.copblock.org/161036/copblock-radio-ep-121-violent-tendencies/
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