Let’s Consider This Theory That The Cops and CIA Are Behind All The Fireworks

Image: Anuj Biyani via Flickr

The fireworks have been ringing loud and all night long, from Oakland to Mission Street to Daly City, with fireworks complaints up across the Bay Area this summer. New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, and really the whole country are experiencing an explosion of firecracker antics and resulting complaints to law enforcement, against a backdrop of George Floyd demonstrations and unemployed peeps with time on their hands because of shelter-in-place restrictions. 

No it is not a coincidence that folks from various cities around the country are reporting fireworks starting at the same time every night for the last couple of weeks.

No. Way.

— #PriscillaSlater Died In Police Custody (@FeministaJones) June 21, 2020

People complain that the fireworks are “worse than ever this year” every year. Back in 2017, the Examiner reported that fireworks complaints had doubled over the previous July 4 weekend. And Oakland, Mission Street, and Daly City residents will tell you that oh hell yes the July 4 fireworks start in June, well before Independence Day. But the underlying social unrest this year has led to speculation that law enforcement, the CIA, or some organized alt-right assholes might be slyly operating some sort of psy-ops campaign to terrorize communities of color, or make people lose sleep so they are worn down and unable to continue protests and demonstrations.

Author Robert Jones, Jr. describes this above in posts that went viral on both Facebook and Twitter. “The media is reporting this as though it’s just Black and Brown kids blowing off steam, but I don’t believe that’s the case,” says a post on his Son of Baldwin account. “My neighbors and I believe that this is part of a coordinated attack on Black and Brown communities by government forces; an attack meant to disorient and destabilize the #BlackLivesMatter movement.”

“The goal, we think, is multifaceted,” it continues. “Sleep deprivation as a means to create confusion and stoke tensions between Black and Brown peoples. Desensitization as a means to get us so used to the sounds of firecrackers and other fireworks that when they start using their real artillery on us we won’t know the difference. It’s meant to sound like a war zone because a war zone is what it’s about to become.”

In West Harlem, 3am. NYPD putting on a show with fireworks in the background. @NYGovCuomo this is what they are paid for huh? pic.twitter.com/KKOhH5xyBl

— Jeo (@fromzerotojeo) June 22, 2020

Late-night cop chicanery as definitely afoot in various urban areas, and the poisoned Shack Shack hoax has rightfully undermined law enforcement’s credibility. (That plus, you know, killing people.) A New York Post report claims to catch NYFD firefighters in the act of lighting fireworks, though the video has no proof of firefighters setting off the firecrackers.

We cannot disprove the theory of law enforcement involvement, because police do not go around telling the press about their secret operations. But we can prove that amateur firework sales are way up this year.

The CIA did not compel me to drive 3 hrs to rural pennsylvania to buy $200 worth of fireworks!! I did this solely because thing go boom

— Human Mel (@melhuman) June 22, 2020

“There is definitely an increase in backyard consumer fireworks sales, starting earlier than in previous years,” American Pyrotechnic Association executive director Julie Heckman told Vox. Some fireworks companies are reporting as much as a 400% increase in sales over previous years. Add to that how most cities have canceled their fireworks displays because of COVID-19 spread fears, leaving people to their own pyrotechnical devices.

“Folks have been locked in their houses and are looking for a little relief and looking for a little entertainment with their families with all the shows being canceled,” Uncle Sam Fireworks manager George Bennett told Block Club Chicago. “It’s been pretty busy this year. All the stores are busy.”

personally. i don’t think you should set off fireworks. for any reason ever

— Thoughts of Dog® (@dog_feelings) June 23, 2020

And just like with chirping birds, outdoor activity is louder and more amplified to our human ears under shelter-in-place, with fewer cars, airplanes, and industrial white noise blocking them out. A New York Times study found that urban street noise has declined significantly under stay-at-home orders, so sounds like bird calls and fireworks carry louder and further.

If law enforcement is indeed lighting off their own fireworks to quell George Floyd protests, the strategy has been kind of a hilarious self-own. As you can see from our lists of upcoming Bay Area protests, any attempt to calm these protests is definitely not working. If they’re using fireworks to stop the demonstrations, it’s backfired.