Rape-publicans, Bathrooms, and Bigotry

Ever since their defeat in the 2003 Lawerance v. Texas decision, which removed the ability of the right-wing religious bigots from breaking into peoples homes to tormet, beat, and arrest people for consensual relationships in the privacy of their own home, right-wing bigots have been searching for an avenue of attack.

The conservative movement believes it has hit upon an unbeatable legal strategy with their current crop of Bathroom crotch sniffing and Christian Bigotry Bills. By couching their bigotry in phrase sincere religious beliefs and euphemistically used title Privacy ,conservatives believe their Pro-Discrimination anti-transgender Bills would easily be signed into Law in states run by Republican Legislatures and Governors and survive challenges in the Right-Wing dominated SCOTUS.

Of course, while conservatives dominate gerrymandered and voter-suppressed States they don't control social media or society at large any longer and the backlash against Conservative Bigotry has been swift.

There are no credible reports of a Transgender person accosting someone in a bathroom. The laws in Tennessee, Mississippi, and North Carolina do not reference incidents or police reports because they do not exist. In fact, it's much more likely, a Republican Congressman like Dennis Hastert or Mark Foley or a Conservative blowhard like Rush Limbaugh or Ted Nugent, will rape your child than a transperson.

But, look at the way conservatives frame their talking points, for instance Curt Schilling Facebook post which cost him his job at ESPN. It's Rape and/or fear of Rape.

While an element of gay panic and hatred of the other comprise a significant part of these laws, there is the deep dark desire of Rape underlining these Republican laws.

Conservatives and Republicans are seemingly always a hair's-breadth away from forcing themselves onto young girls. It's why Republican officials are always talking about Rape because Rape is always on their mind. Republicans can't stop talking about how they want to break into bathrooms and rape young women.

Rape-Rape-Rape. It's the first thought of Rape-publicans when they wake up in the morning and their last thought at night. Rape-Rape-Rape. Thus, because projection is their strongest belief, Republicans believe that must be the case with the LGBTQ community.

The New Centurions (1970) by Joseph Wambaugh pretty much encapsulates the conservative view on LGBTQ persons. Wambaugh's books exude a reactionary ethos, especially, when he writes about liberals and race relations but, when he writes about the LGBTQ community, which he does extensively in all his books, it's with fascinated revulsion bordering on the homicidal.

"Did you guys hear how many marines Hollywood vice busted last weekend?" asked Simeone...
"What's happening in Hollywood?" asked Gant
"What always happens?" Said Simeone. "The joint is lousy with faggots. I hear they got twenty marines in fruit pinches last weekend. They're going to notify the general at Camp Pendleton."
"That pisses me off," said Gant. "I was in the corps but things were different in those days. Even marines are different now." (Ibid. 177-178)

Wambaugh devotes an entire chapter of his belief that gay and lesbian people are akin to hardened criminals,

"You know The Cave?" Gant asked Roy.
"The fruit joint on Main?"
"Yeah, but it's not just fruits. There's lesbians, sadists, masochists, hypes, whores flim flammers, paddy hustlers, hugger muggers, ex-cons of all descriptions, and anybody else with a kink of some kind or other." (Ibid. 174)

And

"It's a beautiful place," said Roy.
"The park? Oh, yeah. But it's full of faggots and thieves and assholes in general. No decent people dare hang around here after dark." said Ranatti. (Ibid. 189)

Towards the end of the chapter the Vice squad and uniformed backup raid The Cave. Wambaugh's phrasing is perhaps revealing, "he watched the blue wedge of bodies insert itself into the opening of the Cave." And "the cathartic blue wedge of policemen withdrew from the mouth of The Cave". Emphasis mine. Perhaps Wambaugh is being cute and having a chuckle at his clever phrasing or perhaps...

The only character in The New Centurions who shows a scintilla of humanity or respect for Civil Rights is "Roy Fehler",

Roy was not completely certain that he would like to receive an eighteen-month assignment to vice because he respected the privacy of others. He believed that this undercover surveillance smacked of fascism and he believed that people, damn it, were trustworthy and there were very few bad ones despite what cynical policemen said.

But, Roy the Liberal gets told off by Wambaugh in blackface and gets shot on two occassions, the last fatally to close the book.

But, foruntaely times have changed so much so that in the Cop Series Southland (2009-2013), which used portions of Wambaugh's books as source material, one of the main characters "John Cooper" is homosexual. The series does treat the character's sexual orientation as an intergral issue often leading to tension between partners and civilians on the street.

While, I could go further into Wambaugh and Reactionary Police Officers, that's a subset of this issue, and the Officers of Wambaugh's day are 2 or 3 generations removed from working the job.

What we are looking at with the Sincere Religious Belief Laws and Patriotic Bathroom Privacy Acts are hopefully the last gaps of the bigoted hateful right-wing. But, I don't believe so.

One would think small-government loving conservatives would be wary about ensconcing such far-reaching invasive laws into the hands of Government Officials, one would think that Libertarians, those haters of Government intrusiveness and the State, would be taking to the ramparts to decry such an expansion of the corrosive powers of the State, but libertarians have this odd way of justifying the use of force by the government against those they don't deem worthy of legal protection.

What these laws are designed to do is to feed the hatred which consumes the Right-Wing and to put fear into the LGBTQ community. To let them know that anyday, someone can complain about them and they are only free at the whim of the bigoted conservative/libertarian/right-wing community.

The NYPD, Broken Windows, Collars for Dollars and Control of the Poor

Continuing the topic of Police Departments the discussion now focuses on what is the role of Police Departments have in society.

Contrary to popular belief and the motto's stenciled on squad cars, Police Departments were not created to 'Serve & Protect' and keep the peace but, to exert control over the poor and working class. The creation of the Modern Police Force in the United States coincided with increases in immigration, the Industrial Revolution, and the end of Slavery. As such Police Departments were tasked by the Ruling elite to keep the American Working Class, immigrants and minorities in check.

The 1% actually sees only two legitimate "Constitutional" Roles for the US Government, a military for expanding and opening up Foreign Shores for exploitation and the quelling of Domestic Dissent and control of the Poor by the Police

As the work slow down by the New York Brats in Blue has shown not much changed on the home front.

Apparently, the NYPD thinks their slow down is helping them win in their Political Struggle against Mayor Bill de Blasio. As a Police Officer I'm disappointed by their acknowledgement their arrests, notices to appear and citations were not to 'Serve & Protect' but, for the purpose of revenue collection and social control.

It's more than a tacit admission, it's a bold statement the Broken Windows Policing doesn't reduce serious crime but, transforms Police Officers into revenue streams.

The Broken Windows theory, a hypothesis first appearing in 1982 that clamping down small crimes will help keep down more serious crime, while compelling is not supported by the evidence of the last 30 years.

Broken Windows, though it still has its' adherents (namely Rudy Giuliani), has been undercut by an actual analysis of the data. Jens Ludwig and Bernard Harcourt in their 2006 thesis Broken Windows: New Evidence for New York City and a Five City Social Experiment posited the "Broken Yankees Hypothesis" wherein the number of NYC homicides decreases with the increase in Yankees Championships.

Additionally, the elimination if Lead in gasoline has been credibly linked to an overall decrease in crime.

But, that's the point, whether or not the rank and file of New York's Whiniest know it, they weren't created to 'Serve & Protect' and modern police practices are designed as a powerful social control to keep the established Plutocratic Hierarchy in place.

And the Working Classes in their place.

Review the iconic image from Occupy UC Davis, where non-violent "criminals" were treated savagely but, Wall Street criminals guilty of far worse offenses not only avoided this treatment but arrest and prosecution almost entirely,

Now, recall the overall crackdown on Occupy Wall Street and other sister demonstrators by Police Departments Nationwide was cheered and supported by 100% of conservatives. While later, 100% of conservatives supported recalcitrant lawbreaker Cliven Bundy and his army of insurrectionists with their plans to murder Law Enforcement Officers and use women and children as human shields, while Bundy and his other Cattle Barons annex US land for their profit.

In Joseph Wambaugh's first novel, The New Centurions, we follow 3 titular centurions conducting police work in the Civil Rights era in Los Angeles. As demonstrated by several chapters in Wambaugh's novel, the cops spend most of their time gleefully busting homosexuals and prostitutes as part of Vice Squads.

Wambaugh's later works especially The Blue Knight better captured the ennui of Police Officers but, Centurions while honestly reflecting the day-to-day grind of police work, is rife with Reactionary themes, including the "liberal" Officer getting shot mid-way through the book and being killed in the Watts Riots because he's too soft and Wambaugh's most racist 'I don't see black or white just assholes' speech presented by a "black" Officer.

But, another theme running throughout Centurions, is the belief in an early form of "Broken Windows",

"But today the 'dont's' are dying or being murdered in the name of freedom and we policemen can't save them. Once the people become accustomed to the death of a 'don't', well then, the other 'dont's' die much easier. Usually all the vice laws die first because people are generally vice-ridden anyway. Then the ordinary misdemeanors and some felonies become unenforceable until freedom prevails." - The New Centurions, pg. 86

The problem is once theories like, Broken Windows, Stop & Frisk, and the War on Drugs become conventional wisdom, accepted and entrenched in organizations as Reactionary as Police Departments they are difficult to dislodge.

The post Mike Brown death response by the Ferguson Police was the at least as egregious as Brown's killing. Faced with discontent over the situation the response was the force. It was a typical Police response, when faced with push back and perceived challenges to authority.

But, once you have gone with the full forceful response there are no other options than to further ratchet up force until the situation spirals out of your control.

But, well before the August 2014 killing of Mike Brown, the people of Ferguson have complained that like many poor neighborhoods they are faced with constant harassment and mistreatment by the Police as small infractions and petty violations are punished by fines, fees and costs.

And, once again, therein lies the real reason Police Departments were created for in the first place; Control.

Under the guise of Law & Order, poor and working class people are exposed to constant harassment, "Collars for Dollars", and criminalization for infractions which really aren't crimes. Because it controls them.