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Who's Gaming The George Floyd Protests / Riots?

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kamalktk said:
This letter sounds like the head of the US military just publicly sided with the protesters. This sort of statement is absolutely unheard of in the US. ...
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Well, no ... Or at least "not so much" ...

First off ... The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs isn't the "head of the US military" - that's the role of the Secretary of Defense. He's the chief executive officer over the entire defense establishment, and his authority is second only to the President.

The memo doesn't "side with" anyone. It merely reminds the reader(s) that free speech and lawful assembly are effectively sacrosanct, and these rights aren't subject to military intervention.

It implicitly reminds folks that the purely federal level US military is forbidden to engage in domestic law enforcement unless triggered by proclamation of a national emergency - in the context of civil unrest, under the Insurrection Act (which hasn't happened).

It reminds folks that the National Guard components are controlled by the individual states' governors, and DOD can't override them without the same sort of proclamation / order from above that hasn't happened.

Finally - and most importantly - it generally declares anything that happens is going to happen "by the book" (i.e., in accordance with the Constitution), and all the addressees are subject to that same constraint.
 
In case you missed the following addendum to this thread's opening post ...
NOTE:
This thread has been stripped of the substantial number of postings that addressed "politics" and other matters not directly related to parties leveraging the current wave of George Floyd related protests and riots to their own ends. This housekeeping exercise was the only (I repeat - only ... ) acceptable way to avoid simply trashing everything that had been posted about the protests / riots and whose interests may be served.
  • This thread is dedicated to conspiracy aspects of the protest / riot events. That's why it's in the Conspiracy section.
  • This thread is NOT about the Floyd killing per se, police brutality in general, gun control in the USA, social inequality, other protests and movements, the history of race relations in America, or racism in general.
  • This thread is not an acceptable venue for inquiries about the posted material that's been removed nor discussion of where and / or how discussion of those other subjects may occur.
  • This thread will survive only so long as members stick to the stated topic.
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This Associated Press report provides an overview of the looting behavior indicative of opportunism leveraging the circumstances afforded by protest actions.
Police: Well-coordinated thieves capitalize on protest chaos

Police in a small San Francisco Bay Area community were about to help authorities in neighboring Oakland keep the peace during a protest when a more pressing crisis hit home: groups of thieves had pillaged malls, set fire to a Walmart and stormed a car dealership.

By the time San Leandro officers arrived at the Dodge dealership, dozens of cars were gone and thieves were peeling out of the lot in $100,000 Challenger Hellcat muscle cars.

Nearly 75 vehicles were stolen Sunday, including models driven through glass showroom doors to escape. It’s one of the most brazen heists law enforcement has seen in a wave of thefts nationwide targeting big box electronics stores, jewelry shops and luxury designers ...

“It was very strategic,” Sgt. Ray Kelly of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office said about the auto thefts and other recent heists.

Many of the smash-and-grab thefts have coincided with or followed protests over the death of Floyd ... They have been carried out by caravans of well-coordinated criminals who capitalize on chaos, communicate via messaging apps and use both the protests and other tactics to throw police off their trail. While opportunists have sometimes joined the frenzy, police and experts say there is a sophistication that suggests a level of planning that goes beyond spontaneous acts.

It’s hardly the first time legitimate protest has been used as a cover for crime. But crime experts note the scale of the thefts, as they have taken place coast-to-coast, in big and small cities and in suburbs.

“I’ve been a student of these things. And I have never seen anything like it,” said Neil Sullivan, a nationally recognized expert on mass-events security and retired Chicago Police Department commander.

People who stole during civil-rights protests in the 1960s, he said, tended to be individuals who saw crimes of opportunity as demonstrations spun out of control. By contrast, many of the break-ins that have happened the last week appear to be meticulously planned and coordinated, he said.

One of the first of these crimes unfolded Saturday in Emeryville, a tiny city of retail shopping centers next to Oakland, when a crowd showed up and broke into stores after an Instagram post said they would “hit” the Target and “break every stores” (sic). ...

“This wasn’t the mafia and organized crime, but this wasn’t individuals acting alone,” said Mayor Christian Patz. “There definitely was some organization.”

In New York, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said this week that some people stealing from stores were using encrypted messaging to communicate and posted lookouts to warn if police were coming.

In the Southern California city of Long Beach, groups of thieves hit store after store Sunday as marchers demonstrated nearby. Mayor Robert Garcia said they went “from protest to protest” so they had cover to steal.

Police in Los Angeles, which had widespread burglaries for several days, said the crimes didn’t occur until a third night of protests and shifted from thieves on foot to those in cars able to haul more off.

The arrival of more than 1,000 National Guard troops in Los Angeles County to provide security freed up officers to more aggressively try to stop crimes. Sheriff Alex Villanueva said his department was able to thwart “a very significant operation to sack” a large outlet mall in the nearby City of Commerce. Dozens were arrested.

“They were there for only one purpose and that was to loot,” he said. ...

Groups of thieves struck a series of big box stores on Chicago’s South Side on Sunday while periodically calling 911 to falsely report that a mall several miles away was being ransacked, Alderman Ray Lopez said.

By the time police rushed to the mall to find no one there, the thieves had moved on to another large store — and phoned in additional false reports to again shake police off their trail. ...

In other instances, caravans of 10 or more cars would pull up to a store, smash the windows, then wait nearby to see if police would arrive. If they didn’t, some of the same cars would return to load up with goods and speed off. ...

Kelly, from the Alameda Sheriff’s Office, said the county began to get a handle on things after imposing evening curfews on Monday. He noted there was a clear distinction between protesters who got out of hand while demonstrating for social justice and other people who seized on the uprising to steal.

“Some of the burning was done out of anger and that was understandable,” he said. “But the strategic looting was definitely for personal gain. It was not to push forward the community concerns around police brutality and reform.”
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SOURCE: https://apnews.com/86bcd9074dec5444cc8f484ac6623fbf
 
Krepostnoi said:
I realise you acknowledged this at the start of your post, but it does bear repeating that media picture editors often work to particular agendas, and look for certain (stereo)types to support their narrative.

The other question is ask is whether it's fair to criticise people for having a number of issues that will get them out on the streets. Everyone is a person of parts, with a variety of interests. It should be no surprise that certain Venn diagram circles intersect, and similar intersections will occur regardless of where you place yourself on the political continuum.
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Am well aware of agendas being highlighted by selective use of photos.

Yes some circles intersect, but seeing the intentional anti-Boris signs and disturbance at the gates to Downing Street, and the clothes some of the white people were wearing, shows me that anarchists were involved, using the demonstration as an opportunity to further their separate agenda.
 
Ulalume said:
I'd been hearing stories of pallets of bricks, etc. appearing at the sites of protests, seemingly to encourage destructive activities. Certainly warnings went out on social media that they were bait. I'd heard about them appearing in downtown Dallas the night of the particularly destructive protest there, but being there is so much disinformation right now, I was still doubtful. Then a friend whom I trust pointed out a cart full of hefty rocks had been placed - for no discernible reason - in front of her local mall hours before a protest was to start.

Now, the kicker - it happened in my town, too, at our small protest. A mysterious pallet of bricks turning up the night before, like magic. My son and his friends saw it and told us, because it was weird, and it was certainly there the next day. Fortunately, the protest was peaceful.

Here's the thing...maybe this could happen in a big city without anyone noticing, but around here, no one would have been able to unload a pallet of bricks on our picturesque little plaza without some kind of permit. Cops patrol around it all night long, and what's more, this is the kind of small town where residents get sniffy if anything's slightly out of place. The police dispatcher complains that 99% of calls are just neighbors tattling on each other for minor indiscretions.

Consider me convinced as far the brick conspiracy goes.
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Have you heard any more information as to the mysteriously apporting bricks/stones?

It is a very odd thing!

And from Rolling Stone mag online, is a curious paragraph from an article re. bricks/stones appearing quoting a senior police officer who thinks caches of stones may have been left by organised agitators in advance of protests. Although it could just be illegally dumped construction debris. And it probably was, according to the later article linked to below.

https://www.rollingstone.com/cultur...ests-george-floyd-black-lives-matter-1009178/

"...Such attempts to sow misinformation are not uncommon when it comes to high-profile news events, says Linvill. “These are fast moving stories and conversations. There are more people on social media talking about them than normal and their rates of communication are higher. The normal places one might get information aren’t moving at the speed people are hungering for, and so [social media] is an environment where misinformation and conspiracy theories are inevitably going to spread.”

When it comes to #baitbricks, it is not immediately apparent that it’s a deliberate attempt to sow misinformation. Even though many of the accounts that initially tweeted it had relatively few followers, which can be a sign of bot activity, Joan Donovan, research director at Harvard Kennedy’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, says it’s unlikely it’s a planted narrative, “because there is more talk about it than is just contained within the hashtag. It seems to have some degree of organic spread.”

The underlying concerns about cops infiltrating protests and encouraging violence to justify force are certainly not without merit. In cities across the country, protesters have reported that actions have been largely peaceful until officials escalated violence with tear gas or rubber bullets. Viral footage showing a man in a gas mask smashing the windows of an Auto Zone with a hammer also led protesters to accuse the man of being a police plant, an allegation the Minneapolis Police Department has denied.

Yet there is little evidence that authorities are intentionally planting bricks at protest sites to goad activists. “Often in cities there will be construction areas with bricks and other materials,” says Donovan. “I think in most instances we never notice them, but they take on new meaning during moments like this. Linvill refers to the hashtag as an “organic conspiracy theory taking place in real time.”

“A few of the images I’ve seen look completely innocent, and bricks are the sort of thing you don’t notice till you’re looking for them,” he says. “And then when you do, they’re everywhere.”"

There's an article here from yesterday detailing the most prominent social media claims: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/investigating-bricks-at-protests

Which mostly concludes it's social media claims, without much to back them up while residents, protestors and police are convinced there's some kind of brick-dumping organised movement going on...


1591309578644.png
 
Those hinged lid heavy-duty plastic crates are not cheap (at least in the UK they're not). Given that the crates in the picture are right next to static refuse bins, and appear to be full of rubble rather than 'bricks', it wouldn't at all surprise me if these weren't just part of some organised regular refuse service. Doesn't mean they can't be used in a riot, of course - but I'd be prepared to bet a big bag of toffees that's not the reason they are there.

“A few of the images I’ve seen look completely innocent, and bricks are the sort of thing you don’t notice till you’re looking for them,” he says. “And then when you do, they’re everywhere.”
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This is a big factor, I reckon. Rubble and building waste is a major everyday product of any big city - where building works, big and small, are an absolute constant; if you don't notice it, it's just because you don't notice it.
 
This is peculiar. No public or private refuse company here (US) will pick up building refuse. Leaving it on the street is a misdemeanor. You have to take it to the dump or rent a dumpster commercially. Doesn't mean people don't do it anyway. But it will just sit there unpicked up. Leaving piles of things to throw here and there is an awful lot of heavy pre-planning, I've never seen it before but it does make sense I guess. The public preparation for large rallies or protests usually involves removing the public trash baskets just in case - for example Times Square New Years eve preparation. I think the question may be how many of these sites are there, really, is this now an urban legend. One site was reported to the police I think in California after this became a thing, it turned out to be part of a synagogue's anti-bomb-truck installation (a moat filled with rocks?) and the owners removed the rocks for the duration so as not to cause public nervousness.
 
I've spotted a mass rash of purported photos of protests that are all mislabelled/old/maliciously captioned (ie the good old 'fake news' pictures)

All with 'right' leaning sentiments, all over twitbook. I am thinking this sudden rash has echoes of geopolitical meddling á la 2016-2017, because of the sudden rush of images/stories and because of the lack of 'opposing' fakery (which, when it's organic user-generated content normally also appears).

There is past form for this from Russia, although with a different slant: https://slate.com/technology/2018/05/russian-trolls-are-obsessed-with-black-lives-matter.html
 

Vardoger said:
All this is of course planned as false flag by the government on some level(probably not white house, they must mean).

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1269093473787002881

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1269095726103101440
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'Like' as in their world any bespectacled middle-aged woman is substitut-able for any other :rollingw:

Which leads me to ask (being middle-aged and wearing glasses) am I a crisis actor now? Darn, I forgot to tell them I already went down on the Titanic and was on the Grassy Knoll!
 
Please don't let this thread go off topic again - the conspiracy aspects (suggested, mooted, proven/unproven, written about) alone of the current protests originating out of Minneapolis.
 
The 'Pink Shirt Pizza Guy' in the initial video from Minneapolis (with the Umbrella Man) has come out publicly as Mr EJ Easley, a community worker also involved in journalism and media. he hasn't said whether he gleaned any information after trying to follow Umbrella Man.

https://heavy.com/news/2020/06/elijah-ej-easley-pink-shirt/

 
James_H said:
one of the women is captioned as 'Dr. Aynel Sex', could the credibility of the image be called into question?
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Well, no ... The captioned name is Waynel Sexton. Letters have been crudely obscured to leave the "Aynel Sex" version.
 
Lb8535 said:
This is peculiar. No public or private refuse company here (US) will pick up building refuse. Leaving it on the street is a misdemeanor. You have to take it to the dump or rent a dumpster commercially. Doesn't mean people don't do it anyway. But it will just sit there unpicked up. Leaving piles of things to throw here and there is an awful lot of heavy pre-planning, I've never seen it before but it does make sense I guess. The public preparation for large rallies or protests usually involves removing the public trash baskets just in case - for example Times Square New Years eve preparation. I think the question may be how many of these sites are there, really, is this now an urban legend. One site was reported to the police I think in California after this became a thing, it turned out to be part of a synagogue's anti-bomb-truck installation (a moat filled with rocks?) and the owners removed the rocks for the duration so as not to cause public nervousness.
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Well, that makes it more interesting. The rules are generally the same over this side of the pond, although different local authorities deal with it in slightly different ways - I think my own used to have some sort of paid pick up service for small amounts of rubble, but not any more, and I've always just taken mine to the dump.

That said, I can't help thinking that there's something oddly soccer mom about leaving rubble out in lidded crates - 'and your sandwiches are in the bottom crate...don't forget the first aid kit. And back by midnight, hear?'

I still think it's probably, in many cases, an example of a regular occurrence which has been unnoticed suddenly coming into focus. I also wonder if one of the knock on effects of the shutdown, and its effect on services, has been an uptick in illegal trash dumping - (incidents of fly-tipping have apparently increased considerably in the UK over the last few weeks).
 
Vardoger said:
All this is of course planned as false flag by the government on some level(probably not white house, they must mean).

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1269093473787002881

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1269095726103101440
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It does seem highly suspect that a teacher kept a piece of work done by Floyd in the early 1980s. And it just happens to be his Black History Month piece.

Possible, I suppose. Any teachers here, do you keep work of your pupils for 40 years?

Would be interesting to see if anyone can verify being taught by Waynel Sexton in the 1980s, with a name like that you would remember...
 
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My dad kept hold of a few cards and things that he'd been given by his pupils over the years - and when, some years back, I attended a primary school reunion (which turned out to be much more of a laugh than I'd ever anticipated) the teacher who had been invited, (our final year teacher - a feisty old Scot) I was surprised, and really quite touched, when she handed me a story I'd written back then.

So, yes it happens. But to be honest I see that as a bit of a distraction from the main point, which is - what on earth would the point of 'crisis actors' be in this particular context? For all I know there may be more - or less - to the individual claim, and Ms Sexton may, as an individual, be trying to write herself into the story, but I can't see how as a 'crisis actor' she would fit into any wider conspiracy. To what purpose?
 
I Googled Dr Waynel Sexton and I only see one reference outwith the media references in relation to George Floyd, who she says was known as Perry at school.

Google offers you instead Dr Wayne L Sexton, who turns out to be Dr Perry Wayne Sexton when you click the links...

Anyhow, the one reference to Dr Waynel Sexton takes you to the webpage of a school in Texas and a list of short bios which gives Dr Waynel Sexton's history.

"Waynel Sexton PhD., Board Vice-President
Dr. Waynel Sexton was born in Borger, he is an assistant professor in the Department of Developmental Pediatrics at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHSC-H).She works in the Children Learning Institute (CLI) and manages the Texas Reading First (TRF) Grant. CLI delivers professional development activities and technical assistance to funded Texas Reading First districts and campuses. Dr. Sexton's degrees include a doctorate in Curriculum and Instruction with a concentration in Reading and Teacher Education. She has 32 years of public school experience with extensive teaching and administrative experience serving as a teacher for 26 years, a literacy coach for 3 years, Associate Reading Manager for the Houston ISD for 3 years, and as a private consultant for 3 years. As a teacher, Dr. Sexton worked with at-risk students and taught over 400 children how to read. Dr. Sexton has been published in the Journal of Educational Research and is the recipient of the Teacher of the Year Award for Houston ISD and the Patrice Johnson Outstanding Graduate Award for Leadership Houston."

Checking into the source of this page it was last modified on 5 June, the day that most of the articles with Dr Waynel Sexton were published...

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Looking into those details and awards for Dr Waynel Sexton....

Nothing comes up for a Patrice Johnson Outstanding Graduate Award for Leadership Houston, but there is a Patrice Johnson Distinguished Alumnus award, won by:
1989 — 90 Wayne L Sexton Class VIII
https://www.leadershiphouston.org/patrice-johnson-award

I guess that can be accounted for as a typo, given that Waynel seems such an unusual name. Unless Waynel used to be Wayne...?

But maybe not, as searching the Teacher of the Year Award for Houston ISD throws up this...

1988 Press Photo Crystal Waynel Sexton named Houston ISD ...
https://www.ebay.co.uk › itm › 1988-Press-Photo-Crystal-Waynel-Sexton-na...
Sexton teaches the first grade at Douglass Elementary School. The 15-year veteran teacherreceived a $5,000 cash award. HISD.Photo measures 8 x 10inches.

But there is nothing at the link, nothing cached...

To confuse things further, it could be [Crystal] Waynel [L] Sexton... as presented in "Standards-Based Reform and the Poverty Gap: Lessons for "No Child Left Behind"" eBook, published in November 2008.

Anyhow, here is the Facebook page of Waynel Sexton, she has 600+ friends, not beyond possibility that it is fake, but it seems legitimate.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=2936102483155090&set=a.1011081182323906&type=3&theater

However, the picture of his work is not just a bit of paper in a folder, it is seemingly framed and stuck and is incredibly well written for a child. Again not impossible, but it is very, very neat and well written. Compare it to the picture. Would a child drawing such a basic picture, write so well? I guess it could have been dictated, young George Floyd telling the teacher his dreams and the teacher writing the piece? Or maybe kids just develop writing skills far better than drawing skills.

It's a rabbit-hole. If you look hard enough you can find many things that will fuel your conspiracy, whatever agenda you want to push. Occam's Razor says it is typos based on a weird name. It's Sunday morning, I've got nothing better to do....

But, to come back to Spookdaddy's question. What is the point? I guess it would be pushing the narrative that he was a young kid with big dreams that was crushed by the American system that he cannot succeed within. But what would be the point of faking that?
 
McAvennie said:
...But, to come back to Spookdaddy's question. What is the point? I guess it would be pushing the narrative that he was a young kid with big dreams that was crushed by the American system that he cannot succeed within. But what would be the point of faking that?
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Not really any - especially as the experience described is a universal aspect of the human experience, which clearly transcends racial boundaries, and existing examples will be so numerous that making one up would seem ludicrously superfluous.

Looking back at those tweets, it's beginning to appear to me that, for many mindsets, the application of the conspiracy theory model to - it seems - everything, against even the principles of the most basic of logic, has created something like a version of Douglas Adams' Shoe Event Horizon:

The whole rationale overbalances. Conspiracy theories outnumber every other kind of theory, and it becomes intellectually impossible to build anything other than conspiracy theories. Every event in the world ends up a subterfuge, full of elements no one can rationalise...
 
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Another conspiracy allegation is that old police cars have been left unmanned at riots scenes...as if they were bait to be vandalised or set on fire.

Two thoughts:

Perhaps the police do have to drive a certain amount of older vehicles?

Or, the local police deliberately leave these vehicles, so that they can be vandalised, then an insurance claim is made and new vehicles bought?
 
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Victory said:
... Or, the local police deliberately leave these vehicles, so that they can be vandalised, then an insurance claim is made and new vehicles bought?
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Just for the record ... There are two additional justifiable interpretations ...

(1) The surplus police vehicles are being pre-positioned at a scene where they may be needed (e.g., to transport people who've been arrested).

(2) They're being parked for display as symbols or reminders of police presence - analogous to the way police vehicles are sometimes parked along highways to spook speeders.

Both are known tactics; I've witnessed both tactics used.
 
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Who's Gaming The George Floyd Protests / Riots?

As far as I can tell it’s pretty much everybody and anybody you can think of with any skin in the game no matter how tenuous, could probably be said to be “gaming” in some fashion or another.

But mostly its the cops. Seems to be backfiring tho.
 
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I've seen posts and a cable news channel posit that the old guy in Buffalo who was pushed over and cracked his skull on the pavement was faking it.
 
kamalktk said:
I've seen posts and a cable news channel posit that the old guy in Buffalo who was pushed over and cracked his skull on the pavement was faking it.
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Please post them. He certainly seems to have fooled the doctors and the DA. The tv coverage clearly showed him being pushed by a police officer, striking his head on the ground and blood coming from his ear. I guess that could have been faked as well and maybe he had a fake blood capsule in his ear.
 
ramonmercado said:
Please post them. He certainly seems to have fooled the doctors and the DA. The tv coverage clearly showed him being pushed by a police officer, striking his head on the ground and blood coming from his ear. I guess that could have been faked as well and maybe he had a fake blood capsule in his ear.
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Here:


It's OAN. It's nonsense.
 
That OAN clip uses a warped argument:

Because the man is an activist,
Because he was "scanning the police",
Therefore he faked being pushed over.

Clear to see he was pushed and tripped.

As @Yithian points out, it's OAN.
A rightwing news channel with a pro-Trump agenda.
 
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