From Awareness to Investigation for Stronger Movements

The movements of the past ten years have been built, more than any other strategy, on raising awareness. Raising awareness has been our obsession and where at least majority energy went to in the last 10 years. The obsession with raising awareness has sapped all notions of a balanced effort. 

Today, no one can realistically argue that awareness hasn’t been raised; indeed, it seems there may not have been any actual gap in awareness in the first place.

It turns out, people fucking know.

We are surrounded by pedophiles and economic collapse and financial warfare and cops and abusers and mass shooters and people dying in the streets with psychotic disorders and people dying in hospitals with COVID. Oppressors know exactly what they are doing, and the people who are being oppressed, are well fucking aware too.

In the rush and even competition for nebulous “mainstream awareness”, everyone was trying to take things national / global all the time; sheer numbers became the goal. This fed right into social media clout chasing and the reward systems on social media. The liberal and pseudo-leftist internet turned into a swamp of awareness that was usually highly abstracted from active on-the-ground situations in order to gain the “awareness” by numbing things down to big, blocky concepts, and certainly removed from a direct intervention. We went all-in on awareness. And we did produce… a lot of awareness. But look around you: things are worse than ever. Putting so much effort into this did not pay off. 

I’m going to suggest that we move to a different way of engaging with the public space, the material space, away from failed general awareness strategies. And that is investigation as a mode of social resistance and hopefully revolution. I want to talk to you a bit about why we should move into an investigative vs awareness-based dialectic with the system and what that would look like. I believe this will be more productive, more generative, more effective in producing change. 

Investigation is about the active process of putting together the picture of a what is going on with some enemy of ours. In detail, including financial models, identification of specific actors and formations, maps of interactions between them, profiles of organizations and actors, detailed understanding of the field. The purpose and direction of an investigation is to establish the needed intelligence to find a way to bring a system to justice. The goal of the investigation is to gain ACTIONABLE analysis and intelligence on the system. No investigator feels their job is done until actionable intelligence is put into action via justice.

A great example is the work done by the victims and independent investigators of the Catholic Church system — contrary to popular belief, this work was NOT done by the mainstream media but rather by on-the-ground footwork primarily by victims groups, who were investigating this WELL before the Boston Globe stepped in for a glamour shot after cruelly burying the story for years.

We have seen some really impressive independent investigative work done against Valeant, in another part of the economy, that actually contributed to its collapse; another example how investigation much more often than awareness, leads to a concrete dismantling or destruction. 

An investigation is a systems analysis which is the ground for systems attacks. Systems attacks is where we need to be moving: multi-point, multi-factorial coordinated attacks designed to demolish it. Awareness tends to be single-issue, even single-engagement campaigns, or work in heavily abstracted summaries. There is very little of “creating awareness” as practiced in our movements, that implies a FULL systems analysis. Awareness has and does run off of a single fact.

This is, of course, not to disregard the INVESTIGATIVE-driven work done in the past 10 years; most exemplary, there were factions of the movement against police violence that were, for example, very intent on tracking down the FBI killings of Black activists in the wake of Ferguson. The movement for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women is another good example: my colleague Lauren Chief Elk has done amazing work there in literally mapping the violence through the MMIW Mapping Project, and this was naturally directed towards police abolition and dismantling of patriarchy and colonialism. This is the type of process and engagement we should move to across the movements. 

 Investigations are active engagements with the current material standard of the world. I argue they are also economic trajectories, lent to establishing a map of an economic system and engaging on that level, the level that is closet to capitalism. Raising awareness for interpersonal ableism is extremely downwind of capitalism; vs. investigation involved in the actual living economic system itself.

For example, following an active financial conspiracy within venture capital is right in the bleeding edge of capitalism. Tracking down the Epstein ring in Silicon Valley (it was NEVER investigated) is also right along the financial system. Or conducting a global investigation into tech’s effect on cities, is very different than some wide-scale dispersal of extremely high level and open ended messaging that agitates primarily for reform i.e., “more women in tech”.

In particular, the lack of an investigative rigor has led to endless mass awareness campaigns on how to interpersonally treat each other better; of course that has come to no gain because relations between us will not improve until new economic conditions are implemented (the overthrow of capitalism). As awareness failed and failed again, there has been ever more splintering into the variances of interpersonal ableism; the awareness-based model has left the intellectual integrity of our movements destroyed and has actually cannibalized it as people search deeper and deeper for more awareness to come up with and spread. We are hollowed by these exercises. 

 There is surely a time and place for education, REVOLUTIONARY education is vital and must be ongoing. But the use of mainstream awareness should be strategic and not default. The measure of success has been awareness. Page views, likes, RTs, sign-ups, members, email lists. Awareness is only one strategy and moving into a more active, engaged, aggressive, forward-moving stance through investigation, is something we should seriously be considering as we re-evaluate the movements of the past 10 years and try to move into a more material place, from a reformist to a revolutionary place, as we confront rapidly emerging threats such as the fascist conspiracy in Silicon Valley. Awareness is not, by nature, generative. It simply pushes and tries to imprint on things. It doesn’t seek new information; it is a vessel for old information. It is a blunt force tool best used for strategically mobilizing energy into targets that have been determined via investigation and attack vectors that have been determined by investigation in a coordinated way suggested by investigation.

In my mind, investigation in and of itself encompasses the awareness; the awareness is just only part of a multi-factored strategy that emerges naturally from the structure of the investigation.

With investigation, our goal is to understand a system and how it is operating. This is so that we can engage in systems-level attacks, as opposed to the single-issue reforms proposed by more awareness-oriented movements. 

Some investigative efforts I’ve participated in: 

- Investigating the Andy Warhol mass pedophilia + associated ring (ties to Epstein!!!). This is ongoing but deals with concrete actors and ongoing financial actors like museums, art academies, art dealers, etc. Awareness is a TOOL in this investigation but not its primary focus.  

- Maps of how pedophilia itself works on a material level in the school system, in the financial system — such as number of victims, perpetrators, average number of victims per perpetrator, major sites of activity, definition and structure of a pedophile ring, effects on victims across a lifetime, etc. 

- Investigating the a16z + PayPal Mafia conspiracy in Silicon Valley - this has meant a decade + of rigorously following their moves, investment patterns, strategies, etc. In a recent example, the fall of Silicon Valley Bank, located within an investigative understanding, provided the opportunity to slip legal framing for take-down to a number of interested parties. An investigation is ongoing until it is closed; it may last decades. It is not a “campaign” .

This is about picking a scoped sect of capitalism —  could by crypto, could be venture capital, could be a charter school system, or an academic institution —  and figuring out the material flow of money, fleshing out the entities and actors, identifying the major criminals, exploring vulnerability and attack factors, figuring out which threats can be marshaled, which techniques designed, what concerted, multi-factor efforts deployed. Ultimately, the goal is to get a systems understanding for a multi-factorial systems attack. 

An investigation often INCLUDES work with a community or set of people through the process of collating information, data, interviews, etc. It is not done in isolation. An investigation often PRODUCES awareness when its results are published and made available to the public. So nothing is lost, but a great deal is gained by taking a much more expansive approach. Investigation gives us fresh air and fresh perspective and a fresh mode of engagement. Especially functioning as the basis of a revolutionary movement, investigation offers a much more rigorous and intensive, dynamic, material engagement with the system than the hunt for “mainstream awareness” in its only goal. 

We are in a position of trying to change from a reformist position to a position of active confrontation with the capitalist economic system. I would suggest that awareness, as implemented, IS a reformist strategy. The awareness is almost always an end in and of itself; much of it is simply designed to make people more “sensitive” to various groups around them, to reduce ableism, sexism, equality in the workplace, etc. Etc.  All well and good, but these strategies are reducing a system to the point where what is being propositioned, is but a slight difference in the relations between people, to address the deep chasms that have resulted from the economic system. This is reform.  

Further, when action is indicated by the awareness it mainly consists of reformist strategies — how many petitions have we seen, political donation drives, voting campaigns, mailing lists. Even protests have limitations, as we’ve seen; so have major media blitzes that have left nothing in their wake. Awareness fizzles out and disappears, leaving nothing behind it except itself. It has no innate impulse to dig out, destroy, ruin, undermine, explode. With an investigation, there is an underlying drive, the attempt to establish a strategy for take-down from a material analysis; in the context of a revolutionary movement, this means that all investigations are fundamentally about driving towards a revolution of the economic system. 

I’ll talk a bit about my major, long-term investigation into the economic system of tech venture capitalism, just to give you some idea of how this plays out in the field. First, we identify the venture capitalist as a primary, first-order problem and actor in the economic system. The goal of the investigation thus becomes to specifically map out the entire venture capitalist system of venture capital. We look at how it affects housing, cities, users of the technology, we look at how it raises and spends money, the returns it generates, where the money goes and when and to who. We look at who has invested in the same companies together repeatedly. We look at which companies entered a given part of a city on what timeline. We read financial reports and listen to earnings calls. We learn about the startups and what each one does and what they do in a formation. 

An investigation aims for a very through map. Unlike awareness campaigns, they are focused much closer to the source of the problem in the economic system. So, where did I find vulnerabilities and actionable intel over the years, what are some of the conclusions I’ve been able to draw that can propel direct confrontation and direct engagement with the system? 

Well, I’ve identified the most serious conspiracy in the system, the one which is driving the worst outcomes and is the most dangerous. By name, model and number. There is a serious difference between identifying the venture capitalist model as a high-level abstraction, and breaking it down into what configurations are actually responsible for these outcomes and are generating these outcomes ongoingly. So, I know the three VC firms and the most active outside influence (the CIA) that are at the heart of most of the damaging financial activities. I know the portfolio companies, I know their philosophies, I know the process they use to take companies public, private, and how they are bought and sold. Almost immediately this changes the tone of the discussion and it diverges greatly from building awareness, we are able to move from “tech is bad” to “venture capitalists are bad” to “here are the 10 most important people and the 3 most important firms that are operating in this environment and here are their weaknesses and these are the strategies we think can most impact them”. Energy that is aimed in general against venture capital doesn’t hurt or affect any of them; like much of general awareness, it simply bounces back, faceless, nameless, opaque, and smooth surfaced. We are looking for the tiny niches to stick our toes in. So one of the first priorities of an investigation is to determine the actual sources of dynamism in the system and coming to an understanding of how they interface. 

Another thing is a comprehensive victim assessment. A victim assessment in the investigatory sense goes much deeper than the immediate surface level; rather than simply identifying a group of victims it identifies a plurality of victims. For example, the main note about VC as far as social change in the last 10 years has amounted to “women don’t get as much VC funding”… and surely that is a start, but after 10 years of building “awareness” for that in essentially a vacuum with zero concrete dimensions, women get less funding than ever. In an investigative model we don’t stop at this obvious case, but rather looking at all of the victims of the venture capital system — including atypical groups like pedophile victims on tech platforms, and victims of tech gentrification in other parts of the world where tech is establishing a presence.  

Getting a full map of a system in this way, allows us to make a 360-degree assessment and act on THAT assessment, not a small area of it that is being mined for a workable piece of content for social media in order to drive “awareness” with no specific goal. In fact, more operations on the left should move in silence. We shouldn’t grab the bullhorn at the first sight of things. We need moderation not gluttony on Twitter and TikTok.

Investigation naturally generates a number of tangible, material outcomes that come naturally through its structure. One, of course, is its findings; an investigation is constantly producing new findings, new information, new people to bring to bear on the problem. Discovering and connecting cohort groups, surfacing new developments, and allowing us to watch a situation as an unfolding, live scenario. Throughout the course of the investigation into venture capital, I’ve produced a free press, I’ve produced a whole body of material analyses, I’ve funded dozens of independent projects that were focused on material issues, I’ve provided a huge amount of information to other affected groups, and I’ve done a number of “actions” that weren’t related to awareness — first and foremost, in the fight to create independent infrastructure, outside of VC funding.  

An investigation finds the vulnerability points and I think that is one of the major pieces we are looking at, which needs to be added to our practice of revolutionary activity. Via investigation into venture capitalists I have been able to determine vulnerabilities like their ongoing financial crimes and how to mobilize against those using a wealth of strategies; as well as determine groups that are likely to be negatively effected by VCs in the near term, so that we can be ready to support and arm them with the rest of the resources and to build a global infrastructure for resistance. Now, these are giant enemies of course, and we will seldom win, until we have finally built up a significant enough map and practice and systems analysis. An investigation doesn’t stop until a situation is flipped on its fucking head as a result. 

I think the other thing that moving to investigation does is to help us preserve the energy of the movement. Awareness is fucking exhausting. Awareness drums up incredible momentum and energy and rage and generally blows it all in one shot, one disruption, because that is the biggest way to create “awareness”, to go all out in a specific prime-time moment. Everyone becomes exhausted over the course of the awareness and there is nothing left when the “awareness” hype cycle passes into the next awareness window. Instead of being volatile we should be dynamic and steadfast. Awareness teaches our movements to make a big fucking noise and then to do nothing, our job done. This style of awareness is a waste of energy and does not produce an ongoing engagement, whereas investigation can produce energy ongoingly, does not expect quick or easy wins, and allows for an ongoing dialogue with the SYSTEM, not an ongoing crash of social media. 

Things for thought anyway… I’ve been writing about how to build new movements from the ground up, taking in the lessons from the last 10 years of movements that have washed up dead at our feet. It is not lost, though, as long as we take the lessons from them. And I think this is one: investigate, investigate, investigate. 

Let’s figure out what it’s going to take to cause a cascading failure scenario in this bitch.