Honestly I'm mostly just venting, others already replied, and then we got the inevitable "well okay if it's that big of a deal you don't need to tiptoe around it" post in response, but does anyone else have a playbook for dealing with this tactfully but directly?
These are people who are not wreckers, just sort of naive, as far as I can tell, but of course you can't know for sure. They've said shit like "well then where am I supposed to I'm a revolutionary, I'm not afraid of anything" (phrased a tiny bit nicer) in response to being told "hey keep in mind these chats are almost certainly monitored"
its like, hey, obviously people are being cagey because they don't want to denounce direct action, but also don't want you to blow up the aboveground org by being needlessly purposefully reckless in communicating about your planned heavily implied crimes. But I don't even want to explain that head-on because in that response I'd also be endorsing direct action in a semi-public forum, or tiptoeing around it the same way the other responders did. Like I want to say, and would say if we were in person, that this is an aboveground org and that you can probably use this as a network to find likeminded individuals but you're going to have to build out a little bit of trust by talking to them in DMs or in person and put together a smaller group that's not directly attached to the org, because we can't have your grudge blowing up the whole thing.
How hard is it to chat one-on-one and form a smaller more trusted group? Just because you don't fear repression doesn't mean you shouldn't take any precautions jfc
people are way too fucking open about their feelings and internet-brained, feeling like "well if I can't fedpost in this specific groupchat then where am I supposed to do it???"
I mean fuck maybe they are wreckers. But I feel like its usually marginalized people who are most like this, maybe because of feeling like they have nothing to lose, so I don't feel like we should just push them away either
I could message them privately but ultimately then 1) I've got a target on my back if they are wreckers and 2) I feel like I'm basically whitesplaining to them
Are they new? Have they seen inside of a holding cell before? I hate to say it, but doing a tour of duty in cop custody is a bucket of ice water for this behavior. The most successful orgs have a clear set of rules, and education about why they are in place. People either mellow out or they wash out. Organizing is hard enough when simply trying to establish legitimacy. Adventurism, like it or not, does not look good to the communities we're trying to organize, and history repeatedly drills this lesson into us.
Online spaces are particularly fraught because they have very low barriers to entry (including here), anonymous by default, easy participation, and easy access to history by cops. A court can still get your login and session information from your computer. These spaces should be treated like public parks, with the expected non-privacy.
one of them has been arrested at least once in the short time I've known of them, which is one more than I ever have. And yeah, any group chat or other online space no matter how much encryption I have to assume is vulnerable