STOP COP CITY! Organizing Against an Expanding Police State

Cocktails & Capitalism

In this episode, I speak with 3 activists working to STOP COP CITY – a highly militarized police training facility that would pave over one of the largest remaining forests in Atlanta. These 3 are part of a broad coalition of activists without centralized leadership who have come together to resist this development and defend the Atlanta Forest.
Days after we recorded this episode, fellow activist and forest defender Tortuguita was shot and killed by the police during a massive raid. Calls for an independent investigation into this killing have been growing, as the version of events publicized by the police seems highly questionable. 7 more activists were arrested and charged with domestic terrorism.
Cop City would be located right next to black and brown working class neighborhoods in Atlanta. These communities would be subjected to increased police harassment as well as the environmental consequences of destroying the forest: poorer air quality, hotter summers, and less protection from flooding.
This $90 million military-grade urban warfare training center would be the largest facility of its kind in America. It would have a testing area for explosives, 12 firing ranges, a helicopter landing pad, and a center for practicing crowd control. In addition to boosting police morale and recruitment in the wake of the 2020 uprising, Cop City would serve a much more sinister function: to expand the police state and crush movement building in America and around the globe.
In addition to exposing the fundamental connection between capitalism and policing, this episode examines the legacy of racial oppression that Cop City would inherit. We discuss the theft of this land from the Muscogee people as well as its use as a slave plantation and prison farm. We also address the important role that Indigenous and Queer activists have played within this movement.

CALLS TO ACTION:

*DONATE to the Atlanta Solidarity Fund to support legal costs

*Call Atlanta Police Foundation investors, ask them to divest from Cop City (stopreevesyoung.com)

*Form an action committee in your city!

*GO TO THE PARK IN SOLIDARITY!

RESOURCES:

*Defend the Atlanta Forest website

*Follow Defend the Atlanta Forest on

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