Anarcho-tyranny grips Britain and the US
The events unfolding in Britain highlight a troubling trend across the West. Governments are placing ideological narratives and social justice causes over the concerns and safety of their citizens.
The United Kingdom is facing extensive civil unrest after an atrocious stabbing attack that claimed the lives of three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class and seriously injured eight others earlier this month. The perpetrator, a second-generation British citizen born to immigrant Rwandan parents, has sparked nationwide anti-immigration protests as well as violent clashes with law enforcement.
The current trajectory of governance in the United Kingdom and across much of the Western world is dangerous and unsustainable.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer has completely disregarded the concerns of British citizens by choosing to ignore the root causes of the unrest — particularly the unprecedented levels of both illegal and legal immigration destabilizing British society. Instead, he has vowed to do “whatever it takes to bring these thugs to justice,” focusing on the specific perpetrators rather than addressing the underlying issues.
It turns out, “these thugs” include not only violent rioters but also people who simply post “inaccurate” or “offensive” memes on social media. Incredibly, even being a “curious observer” of a “far-right” protest could result in arrest without bail.
Due to the extensive nature of these mass arrests, the U.K. has launched “Operation Early Dawn,” a measure that will expedite the release of thousands of convicted criminals from British prisons to accommodate the more than 1,000 protesters who have already been detained.
Starmer, whom Elon Musk dubbed “two-tier Keir,” has imposed noticeably harsher penalties on white “far-right” protesters as compared to minorities and other groups who have engaged in violent protests around social justice causes.
During the 2020 Black Lives Matter riots in London, violent protests injured 27 officers as unrest swept the West after George Floyd’s death. Despite the violence, Metropolitan Police literally knelt in solidarity with the protesters. Starmer, who was not yet prime minister, proudly published a photo of himself taking a knee for the cause of racial justice.
Of course, at the time, the prevailing media narrative suggested that only a “minority” of protesters turned violent while also finding a way to heap blame on white counter-protestors who, in part, gathered to protect historical monuments and statues from being destroyed by leftist mobs.
And even when protestors were arrested and prosecuted for destroying historical symbols such as a bronze statue of Edward Colston, they were later acquitted of causing criminal damage, proving that rioting for “social justice” oftentimes means you get to avoid justice.
These events in Britain are just a few examples of two-tier policing and highlight a paradox in governance known as “anarcho-tyranny.”
The late philosopher Samuel T. Francis coined the term, which he discussed in a 1994 essay for Chronicles magazine. Anarcho-tyranny describes a system where the state selectively exercises excessive control over one group of people while simultaneously failing to maintain order or enforce laws against another group engaged in criminal or antisocial behavior.
This paradox is clearly illustrated when authorities convicted and sentenced native Briton Wayne O’Rourke to three years in prison for “stirring up racial hatred” online in relation to anti-immigration protests while they gave illegal immigrant Abdul Shokoor Ezedi only a nine-week jail term for committing sexual assault.
Instead of protecting its citizens and deporting Ezedi, the British government granted him asylum despite his crimes. Ezedi later attacked a woman and two children with acid before drowning in the River Thames after a manhunt.
These are just a few of the many egregious examples of how the British state has prioritized political correctness and identity politics over the safety of its citizens, even turning a blind eye to the rape of thousands of children by groups of largely Pakistani men for fear of being labeled racist.
The events unfolding in the United Kingdom highlight a troubling trend across the West, where governments are prioritizing ideological narratives and social justice causes over the concerns and safety of their citizens.
In the United States, anarcho-tyranny and two-tier policing are evident when authorities drop charges against people who assaulted police officers and defaced a Christopher Columbus fountain and the Liberty Bell during a pro-Palestinian protest in Washington, D.C., while multiple individuals face felonies and years in prison for leaving tire marks on LGBTQ rainbow crosswalks.
Or how most charges were dropped against BLM rioters for their participation in the “fiery but mostly peaceful protests” of 2020, but today, the U.S. government is continuing to track down every last grandma who attended the January 6, 2021 protest at the Capitol.
Speaking of grandmothers, the not-so-ideologically-blind American justice system sentenced a 75-year-old woman to two years in prison for blocking access to an abortion clinic, while 80 pro-Palestinian protesters had their charges dropped after being arrested for criminal trespassing.
The current trajectory of governance in the United Kingdom and across much of the Western world is dangerous and unsustainable. Blatant double standards in law enforcement and justice, where some groups are harshly punished while others are given a free pass, are fraying the social fabric that holds nations together.
As the state increasingly exerts control over certain dissident groups while ignoring the lawlessness of other regime-approved groups, the trust between the government and its people will continue to erode — sadly proving Samuel Francis right.
