The Charlottesville Police Department is making it clear that it will not tolerate threats of any kind, including those made on its own social media channels.
On Monday, the CPD published a message on its social media pages alerting the public to a student walkout downtown protesting Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The department asked drivers to “use caution due to increased pedestrian activity, including children walking in the roadway.”
There were nearly 1,000 comments posted to Facebook alone in response to the message, with some people applauding the teens for speaking out and standing up for democracy and humanity; others chose another way to respond – threatening the high-school students and demeaning those they disagreed with.
The kind of dangerous rhetoric and profanity emerged that unfortunately is par for the course in Trump’s America, where people follow the president’s lead, and seek to bully and degrade people with opposing viewpoints. Trump and his administration have attacked those on the opposite side of the aisle on official White House pages and on the president’s Truth Social account.
Many who weighed in on the CPD comment thread called the teens “speed bumps” or “traffic targets” – shocking words in the very city where Heather Heyer was killed. Heyer was run down by a vehicle while protesting against a “Unite the Right” rally in 2017 where white supremacists fueled with hate descended on the city.
“If they get in my way, they won’t be blocking traffic for long,” wrote someone under the name Keith Quesenberry, who wrote that he lives in Zion Crossroads but was on Fifth Street Extended during the conversation on Monday afternoon. “I’ll gladly send them to be with the other worthless worm food Renee [Good] and Alex [Pretti].”
In the contentious thread, Quesenberry wrote that it “would be worth it just to watch them bleed.”
Another person asked if the student protestors were supposed to be walking in the roadway in response to the alert from police.
“If they are trying to meet the good Lord early,” wrote Ryan Liskey about the teenagers using their First Amendment right to speak out against ICE.
Don J. Shelton wrote: “you people keep f*ckin’ around, and you will all find out,” a common refrain used by Trump supporters to justify shooting protesters in Chicago and Minneapolis.
Nick Hermann wrote: “Don’t impede traffic or become a chalk outline.”
Charlie Welsh wrote: “Run over the retards.”
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Sadly, these men were not alone in promoting violence in response to a peaceful protest; there were numerous other comments and images where people shared a similar sentiment – FAFO, in other words, if you participate in the walkout, these people reason, you are putting yourself in harm’s way and deserve whatever might happen.
The comment thread was an ugly back and forth demonstrating the divisiveness that is rampant in the U.S., exacerbated by the rise of the MAGA movement and a push by the administration to demonize those who do not support the president and his agenda.
The insults ran the gamut: libtard, piggy, inbred, c*nt, dipsh*t, democommies, retarded, sh*theads, braindead sheep, pothead, bigot, b*tch and worse.
A few of the comments appear to have been deleted; it’s unknown if the CPD or the individual poster removed them.
CPD said in a post this evening that its investigations bureau “is reviewing the comments to ensure no content within those comments rise to the level of criminal activity.”
In other words, it probably wasn’t good judgement to post threats or imply violence on the police department’s social media page.
“In the event a comment rises to the level of a crime, it will be handled as any other criminal investigation, and appropriate charges could be filed.”
Not sure if the CPD has a social-media policy, but even if comments don’t result in criminal charges, at the very least it should ban some of the people who commented on the thread and remove their ability to potentially incite violence in the future.
If you observe a comment that appears to involve an active or credible threat, the Charlottesville Police Department is asking you to report it on its non-emergency line at (434) 970-3280. If there is an immediate danger, call 911.
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Crystal Graham
