THREAD: For me, even high level drug busts don’t warrant police breaking into people’s houses in the middle of the night. 2 years ago, the NYPD came into my apartment looking for one of my then roommates who—to my great surprise—turned out to be a heroin & fentanyl dealer. 1/? https://twitter.com/robbysoave/status/1308839825534050306

It was 6am and my other roommate had opened the door because it was a knock warrant. After swarming our apartment, they banged on my bedroom door, startling me from sleep. 2/x

I came out of my bedroom, hands up and was thrown face down on my couch and handcuffed. I immediately began crying and hyperventilating. The roommate who answered the door was brought into the living room and sat next to me, also in handcuffs. 3/x

The drug dealer roommate was brought into my room and strip searched. The roommate who was seated next to me had his handcuffs removed along with mine. 4/x

The cops started demanding to know if any drugs or weapons were in the house and that if we didn’t tell them we’d go away with the drug dealing roommate. 5/x

I was still crying and hyperventilating but got enough air to say that I didn’t think so but I didn’t know. They asked me if I needed water or medical attention because I was still hyperventilating. They finally assured me they knew I had nothing to do with the investigation. 6/x

Long story short, the roommate was taken into custody, they flipped his room upside down, found drugs—it turned out he was a part of a drug ring and was likely going to be going away for a long time as he was on parole (which I knew but that’s a long story for another day). 7/x

I bring this up because as mad (& traumatized) as I was for having been put in that situation, it also infuriated me to experience just how much power the state has over our lives. & for what? Drugs? Why isn’t drug dealing treated at worse as a civil crime, if a crime at all? 8/x

It also recently occurred to me that if that warrant had been a no-knock warrant, my other roommate and I might be dead right now because neither of us would have known what was going on as we burst out of our bedrooms and trigger-happy cops have terrible and deadly aim. 9/x

It is unsurprising and devastating that yet another Black person has paid with their life and left a family with justice denied. I feel conflicting feelings about the current police defunding/abolition movement but I think that’s because of my feelings about the state. 10/x

The state will stop at nothing to maintain power. People are like ants beneath the boot of the state. And in this country we’ve come to accept the authority of the state in so many ways far beyond these horrible stories of constant racist police violence. 11/x

I think about the stories of people like Assata Shakur, Julian Assange, Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning, and Reality Winner being hunted, jailed or tortured for the state. I think about American foreign policy in Saudia Arabia, UAE, Israel and Venezuela. 12/x

I think about the NSA and how the state is in league with big tech and social media and always tracking us. 13/x

I think about ICE & Homeland Security and the NDAA & the Patriot Act which both political parties keep renewing year after year even though it was supposed to expire in 2005. I think about the IRS & our tax structure. 14/x

The state is everywhere in our lives & we mostly just accept it. 15/x

And we’re less than two months away from a presidential election and there has been no major debate about the horrifying power of the state. I hope that we can get to a place where that changes. 16/x

I hope we can get to a place where we can link the death of someone like Breonna Taylor to the destructive power of the state at home and abroad and use that knowledge and rage to rise up as citizens in solidarity against the tyranny of the state. END.