this post was submitted on 19 Nov 2024
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Pretty much the title. I certainly believe Trump, Maga, the Military, and the Police will, sooner or later, probably sooner, get around to at least attempting to deanonymize and round up online antifascists and leftists and imprison them. How organized and effective that attempt is I am less sure of.

To be very transparent, this is something I'm pretty sure I'd be on the hook for. I have a long log of anti trump, antifascist, left sentiments, and am 75% sure I'll be disappeared at some point in the next 4 years as I have no plans of shutting up. The only reason I'm not 100% sure is because of how expensive it would be. But hey, maybe it's less expensive than potentially losing power? So I don't know.

Never? Not likely? Maybe? Very? Extremely? Definitely?

Thoughts?

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[–] [email protected] 53 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Everyone's like "it won't happen" but I remember post-9/11 a specific Linux news site got hit with claims of radicalism and some folks who frequented the site got put on watch lists. For interest in Linux.

There was a reason folks like me were against all the surveillance from the PATRIOT Act back then, and this is why.


EDIT:

Similarly, the Bush admin had the FBI spying on Quakers, the only religious group that anti-violence is such a central tenet to their religion that they by default are considered conscientious objectors and cannot be drafted into the military without violating their beliefs.

Post-9/11 the government thought peaceful Quaker anti-war activists were dangerous.

That was post-9/11 in the War on Terror years... It can happen here.


Sources:

Linuxjournal gets "extra surveillance:"

https://www.linuxjournal.com/content/nsa-linux-journal-extremist-forum-and-its-readers-get-flagged-extra-surveillance

Quakers being spied on by FBI:

https://www.wired.com/2009/09/fbi-nsac/

[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 month ago

Personally, I would be worried if I was you. The first Trump term can’t be compared as he had some guardrails with his recommended cabinet picks from the traditional GOP. Now that those GOP members have been expelled from the party, those guardrails are no longer there. His cabinet picks are loyalists and is a stress test to weed out any non-loyalists in Congress.

His cabinet picks will have free will to do what they want as long as they do two things: 1) praise Trump for the popular things they accomplish and 2) take the fall or blame other groups if it’s not popular.

And it’s not the government coming after these groups that is most worrying. We all see the lengths regular citizens would go to right a perceived wrong. January 6 case in point.

We’ve all seen this film before. It doesn’t have a good ending.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Likely. The federal government has SharePoint sites with information gathered about journalists and other activists who are pro immigration. To my knowledge, these individuals have not officially been disappeared.

https://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/source-leaked-documents-show-the-us-government-tracking-journalists-and-advocates-through-a-secret-database/3438/

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

And absolutely all of the roadblocks, legal restrictions, grownups pushing back, worry over public sentiment, etc have been eliminated. Expect it to be much, much worse than you thought.

Any comparison to what has happened in the past is out the window.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 month ago

Unless you're doing actual organizing, unlikely. The DNC isn't friendly towards Leftist orgs either, though MAGA groups themselves may become more millitant.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago

It all comes to how anonymous you are on the net. I'd say having a mainstream social media account is right now a high risk if you live in the US, specially considering that Kethamine Karen owns one one of them.

This to say that deanonymizing you might be cheaper than you think, making it more likely than we all expect. If you want to keep using tnose socials, I'd start by deleting my accounts and creating new ones using new data (such as disposable mails or aliases that forward to your real email)

Of course, a trusted vpn is a must in these cases. And there is a lot you should be doing on top of all this.

Right now, if you want to keep your anti-trump line, be prepared to be treated as an enemy, so consider the deanonymation a highly likely possibility.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago

I don't think it's very likely. Even if it was even remotely affordable or feasible he actually needs opposition to define himself and his base 'ruggedly independent' and as 'freedom fighters'.

If he's going to go after anyone at all I think it will be high profile people for maximum media impact.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Online? No. Online disorganized leftists aren't actually leftists, they're leftist sympathizers. You need to be in a leftist org to actually be a leftist.

You're not a threat unless you're actually doing stuff.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It's a proud fascist country now. Be prepare for ANYTHING.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

And then realize you hadn't prepared nearly enough.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Not likely. Trump doesn't even know what those words mean. Temporarily jailing them and protesters is likely a different story, though.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

For people organizing protests and taking part in them, Maybe to Likely.

For people just posting things online, Very unlikely. They'll have their hands full with all the immigrants and protesters first, and there's far too many people who have said something leftist online.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

Given the majority of the supreme court are constitutional literalists, I'm going to stake a claim on very unlikely. That is literally against the first amendment.

Now, let's say we live in some kind of bizaro land where you can be taken to court without the protection of the first amendment. (Difficult ti believe I know). You would still, hopefully, have a right to an attorney. If your case is high profile, or you have enough money, an organization like the aclu would help.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Suspicion of terrorism, or nothing at all. If the libs are right they wouldn't care about charges anymore. But since libs are so rarely correct, the government can hold you for 72 hours without charge and the patriot act has a whole list of charges that require no evidence for an arrest. Also statistically you live within 100 miles of a US border if you're in the US, meaning border patrol can arrest you for any reason or no reason indefinitely.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Yeah, they added ANTIFA to the list of terrorist organizations a few years ago if you remember, so anything they disagree with such as calling for the persecution of specific people's and putting them in camps a racist act, could likely land you in such trouble I imagine if they ever have the time or crazed reasons to do so.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

Resisting arrest. Never mind what the arrest is for.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Eating a meal? A succulent Chinese meal?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

Woooo boy! I'll be right there in the camps with you buddy! Party time!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

you don't have to be imprisoned to have your life ruined. there are many relatively subtle ways to do that

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I don't think it's "Trump" thing, but the USA will probably start arresting people for the media they consume if a rapidly growing and sufficiently large portion of their citizenry spread and consume messaging they disagree with. It'll be a side-effect of losing the narrative war. I don't foresee it happening in the next 4 years.

I don't see the point in publicising it. From a PR perspective, "Posted illegal content using a platform frequented by terrorists" is less likely to meet resistance than "CommentedπŸ”»on Instagram". In fact, USA propaganda is already full of vagueties about people's online behaviour today. Usually in the form of reporting on foreign (enemy) policing as "Helpless teen (19) arrested (fined) for Tweet (Bomb-threat to head of state)".

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 month ago (3 children)

It isn't November 2016 anymore. Trump has been president before and whatever you think of his first term, you already know (roughly) what tends to happen when he is president (if you are too young, there is a near-infinite amount of news articles, social media discussions, wiki articles where you can look it up). I somewhat understood fears like this in late 2016 when a Trump administration was an unprecedented phenomenon, but now?

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

But in 2016, he didn't know what he was doing. He didn't expect to win. It's very different this time around.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

And when do you think he started to know what he was doing? 2017, 2018, 2019, never? If not in any of these years, then why would he know it in 2025?

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

the heritage foundation is surrounding trump with money and advisors so that they can finish the work that they started in this country in 1980. (they're the people who created project 2025)

they've been successful with other countries and that's taught them how to get things done within the frameworks of other governments and they've also been successful in this country with sympathetic administrations; so they have plenty of experience in making things happen.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Project 2025 is scary, but it's also stuff Republicans have been trying to do since the 80s (as you point out). If Bush and Cheney couldnt do [insert horrible policy here] when they had power, if Trump couldn't do it the first time around, how are they going to do it now?

This shit isn't actually popular, a bunch of the money behind the GOP either doesn't want it or doesn't care (see the effect mass deportations would have on major companies' workforces), and we have even less competent people in the federal government than in the first Trump admin, which itself had even less competent people than Bush.

The Democratic Party doesn't believe this stuff, either (or they just don't care) -- otherwise they'd be bending over backwards between now and January to try and sabotage it. If they cared about mass deportations, Biden could issue pardons for immigration-related offenses. Congress could grant citizenship to large swaths of the immigrants population. But they're instead busy ensuring the smooth transition of power to people they spent the last decade calling fascists.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

the heritage foundation has been learning how to do it in this country through trial and error like they've done it in all of the other countries; they've perfected the recipe as evidenced by the successful kill-the-gays laws in africa.

the administrations that were sympathetic to the heritage foundation's cause were restrained by their desire to appeal to moderates and trump, like reagan, has little-to-no such limitations.

and the democrats are MUCH worse than that since they attempted to use project 2025 as a distraction from their complicity in the gazan genocide and won't bother enacting the equal rights amendment that would help protect us from project 2025; even though it's already passed all the legal hurdles 4 years ago and there's still time for the biden administration to enact it.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

This time is quite different, actually. First, he learned his lesson about hiring institutionalists as his secretaries and advisors since they would push back against more questionable ideas, now he's surrounding himself with yes-men like RFK jr, Kristi Noem and the likes. There have also been precedents set like the infamous "official act immunity", and just many more lessons learned from 2016 in general.

There's also just much more co-ordination now in general with the whole Project 2025.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

The Supreme Court gave the office of the president full immunity for discharging duties of the office.

[–] starman -1 points 1 month ago

If you just post stuff on the Internet, you don't have to worry. At least this type of stuff.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 1 month ago

Haha I had to double check to make sure I wasnt on Reddit.