College Group Forms Protection from “Snitches” Coalition

There is a group – an “anarchist’ group at the University of Pittsburgh – that has created a ‘free service’ called “The Didn’t See Sh*T Crew.” The crew says, “We’re sick of seeing good kids get expelled, arrested, or otherwise screwed over because some holier-than-thou bootlicker decided to (eff) up someone’s life.”

Some of the actions that group says they are going to stop are people who report graffiti artists, turn in people for making ‘darknet mail orders,’ snitch on people for distributing flyers, bring it to the authorities’ attention when someone tries to hold an event without a permit. or even going after RAs who conduct random dorm searches.

Caveat:  I don’t know much about this group, so I can’t say I endorse, or do not endorse all of the group’s beliefs and actions.

I chose to highlight this story not so much because I might agree with everything about what this group may or may not be doing, but because this group is taking proactive action to diminish the effect, at least in part, of people who are trying to harm people who have not directly harmed others.

For instance, of the actions this group will be working to stop that I listed above, only one might be up for dispute, reporting people for doing graffiti (that would be debatable if we’re talking about public property, which might be viewed by some as not being legitimately ‘owned’ property, which would then remove the status of victim from the effect of the event, creating graffiti on non-owned property).

They also include trying to stop people for turning in students who stole textbooks. This action would certainly not be one I support.

From what I see, though, MOST of what this group says it’s about – the action it’s trying to prevent – is protecting people being targeted by authoritarian trolls who are trying to punish people for not following muh arbitrary rules, rules that attempt to prohibit actions that do not directly hurt others.

The sensationalist reaction to this group’s actions by the conservative blogs reveals the deep-seated law and order, authoritarian nature of American conservativism.

The group is talking about dealing with “snitches” through social shaming and “unsolicited interviews.”

They’re not talking about taking violent action, they’re talking about making it known to everyone else who the authoritarian trolls are. Let the community decide how to react to these order followers.

The conservative blogs, despite giving lip service to liberty, tow the authoritarian party line. Maybe, perhaps, these blogs are just following orders.

Here’s an example of how the conservative blogs are covering this story, a two-for-one, since it’s one conservative blog sharing the story from another conservative blog.

From Legal Insurrection:

Anarchist Students at U. Pittsburgh Offer Free Service to Deal With ‘Snitches’

Left wing college students in America are devolving into Mao’s Red Guard right before our eyes.

The Daily Caller reports:

Anarchist Students Offer Free Service To Deal With Snitches

Anarchist students at the University of Pittsburgh are offering a free service to deal with snitches to “discourage” “toxic behavior.”

The Didn’t See Sh*t Crew advertises: “help dealing with a rat” via “snitch-shaming” and “unsolicited interviews” in addition to legal support and poster design or op-ed writing.

“We’re sick of seeing good kids get expelled, arrested, or otherwise screwed over because some holier-than-thou bootlicker decided to fuck up someone’s life,” the group states, “because some snitch reported a graffiti artist, or tipped off a Pitt employee about a darknet mail order, or called the cops on students for flyering and promoting events without a permit, or chose to be an asshole of an RA and actually conduct a random dorm search, or ratted out a student who stole the textbooks they couldn’t afford.”

The Didn’t See Sh*t Crew’s site features an embedded poster depicting two children in front of a police car with the phrase “Snitches Get Stitches.” The kid in the background appears to be talking with the police officer, while the kid in the foreground appears to be hiding a revolver behind his back

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Not sure how conducting a voluntary action of shaming against people who are using authority to target people for taking action that did not directly harm others is indicative of what Mao’s Red Guard was, as the Legal Insurrection writer Mike LaChance wants you to believe it is.

The Red Guard killed people for saying bad things against communism and Mao, among other things. This group is talking about using social shaming and interviews that make it visible to the community who these authoritarian trolls really are.

But, much like the statist (and even anarchist) left that sees Nazis behind every face that does not endorse some form of socialist, communist, hierarchy-smashing ideology, the right (even the anarchist right) sees Stalinists and Maoists behind every face that does not endorse “Capitalism” and/or “Law and Order.”

So, while I don’t know enough about this group to endorse or embrace what it stands for, the action itself, of shaming the ‘just following orders’ snitches is one that I approve of. It is an excellent example of what can be done to counter authoritarians, be they of the left or right variety, wherever you find them.