ACAB, an acronym of the phrase "all cops are bastards", is a political slogan associated with people who are opposed to the police. It is typically written as a catchphrase in graffiti, tattoos or other imagery in public spaces. It is sometimes numerically rendered as "1312", representing the position of the letters in the English alphabet.
The phrase "all coppers are bastards" first appeared in England in the 1920s, [1] [2] [3] then was abbreviated to "ACAB" by workers on strike in the 1940s. [3] The acronym is historically associated with criminals in the United Kingdom. [2] First reported as a prison tattoo in the 1970s, it is commonly rendered as one letter per finger, or sometimes disguised as a small dot across each knuckle. [4] [2] In 1970, the Daily Mirror ran the phrase as a headline, and wrote that it was borne by a Hells Angel on the street. [3] British director Sidney Hayers also used a censored version as the title of his 1972 crime drama All Coppers Are.... [5] In 1977, a Newcastle journalist saw it written on the walls of a prison cell. [1]
During the 1980s, ACAB became an anti-establishment symbol, especially within the punk and skinhead subcultures. [2] [3] [6] It was popularized in particular by the 1982 song "A.C.A.B." by Oi! band the 4-Skins. [2] [3] In later years, ACAB turned into a popular slogan among European football hooligans and ultras, [7] [2] and among anarchist and anti-authoritarian movements across the world. [3] In certain contexts, the Anti-Defamation League categorizes the phrase as a hate symbol and describes it as "a slogan of long standing in the skinhead culture", while noting the phrase is used both by racist and anti-racist skinheads. [6] [8]
In the wake of the May 2020 murder of George Floyd by the police officer Derek Chauvin, the use of the term ACAB became more frequently used by those who oppose the police. [9] As protests in response to Floyd's murder and discussions about racially-motivated police violence spread through the United States, ACAB was more frequently referenced on social media and products bearing the acronym became available. [9] Proponents of the term contended that ACAB means every single police officer is complicit in an unjust system. They argued that police officers, even if they did not take part in police brutality or racism in policing themselves, were still responsible for what their colleagues did because they did not speak out against it or try to stop it. [10]
In Germany, usage of the term is a criminal offense when it refers to a single person. It is permitted when used to describe a large group of people. [11] Both "ACAB" and "1312" have been deemed insults by state courts. In 2015, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled in reference to the term "FCK CPS" (read as 'Fuck Cops') that an insult is only punishable when it is directed at a specific, identifiable group, but left interpretation of individual cases to the criminal courts. [12] [13]
In Austria, the use of ACAB was seen as "violating public decency", which could be punished under administrative law, for example, using an administrative penal order. The fine could be up to 700 euros (or alternatively a week police detention). [14] In 2019, the Austrian Constitutional Court (VfGH) ruled that treating the slogan as a violation of decency, in certain cases, violates the fundamental right to freedom of expression under Article 10 ECHR. The specific case involved a soccer fan who had waved an ACAB flag in the stadium. According to the VfGH, the banner should "primarily refer to the tense relationship between some football fans and the police and to express the negative attitude towards the police as part of the state's regulatory power" and should therefore "not be a concrete 'insult' to certain other people". Therefore, the criticism expressed "should be accepted with a view to the special meaning and function of freedom of expression in a democratic society, taking into account all circumstances of the case". [15]
In other European countries, there are examples of police action toward people using ACAB in some fashion. Brian Stableford's 2009 Exotic Encounters states that "many years ago" during a fad for wearing ACAB shirts, a British youth was arrested for incitement to riot for wearing one, and ineffectively claimed the shirt stood for "All Canadians Are Bastards". [16] In January 2011, three Ajax football fans in the Netherlands were fined for wearing T-shirts with the numbers 1312 printed on them. [17] On 4 July 2015, a woman in Alicante, Spain, was fined for wearing a T-shirt with the acronym "A.C.A.B." printed on it. [18] On 22 May 2016, a 34-year-old woman in Madrid, Spain, was charged under Article 37 of the Citizen Safety Law for carrying a bag displaying the acronym "A.C.A.B." accompanied by the words "All Cats Are Beautiful". [19] The charges were dropped 3 days later. [20] On 15 September 2017, a man from Karlovac, Croatia posted a photomontage with the message "Fuck da Police A.C.A.B." from his Facebook profile. For this, he was later charged with violating the public order and fined €100 by the Misdemeanor Court in Karlovac. [21] On 4 April 2019, a 26-year-old ice hockey fan was arrested for wearing a T-shirt that had a numeric version of ACAB, 1312. "A.C.A.B." and 1312 are both considered "extremist information" in Belarus. [22]
Prosecution on the grounds of ACAB being offensive is not limited to Europe. In 2018, a group of Persija Jakarta football fans in Indonesia were arrested for displaying a banner with the message "All Cops Are Bastards" on it during the league match day. [23]
Following a 2020 Black Lives Matter protest in Phoenix, Arizona, United States, 15 protesters were charged with assisting a criminal street gang for using the phrase "all cops are bastards" while wearing black clothes and carrying umbrellas. The police officers who arrested them said the protesters were members of "a group known as ACAB All Cops Are Bastards." [24] Criminal charges against the protestors were dropped and a probe characterized the case as "deeply flawed", "insubstantial", and lacking credible evidence in support of the claim that "ACAB" is a gang. [25]
The abbreviation was often used musically in the 1980s. The 4-Skins, a British Oi! punk band, popularized the initialism A.C.A.B. in their 1980s song of the same name. [26] The term has also been used elsewhere in music:
The 2012 Italian drama film ACAB – All Cops Are Bastards follows the work of a group of riot control force policemen and tensions within the community. [34]
A skinhead or skin is a member of a subculture that originated among working-class youths in London, England, in the 1960s. It soon spread to other parts of the United Kingdom, with a second working-class skinhead movement emerging worldwide in the late 1970s. Motivated by social alienation and working-class solidarity, skinheads are defined by their close-cropped or shaven heads and working-class clothing such as Dr. Martens and steel toe work boots, braces, high rise and varying length straight-leg jeans, and button-down collar shirts, usually slim fitting in check or plain. The movement reached a peak at the end of the 1960s, experienced a revival in the 1980s, and, since then, has endured in multiple contexts worldwide.
Punk fashion is the clothing, hairstyles, cosmetics, jewellery, and body modifications of the punk counterculture. Punk fashion varies widely, ranging from Vivienne Westwood designs to styles modeled on bands like The Exploited to the dressed-down look of North American hardcore. The distinct social dress of other subcultures and art movements, including glam rock, skinheads, greasers, and mods have influenced punk fashion. Punk fashion has likewise influenced the styles of these groups, as well as those of popular culture. Many punks use clothing as a way of making a statement.
Slime, a German punk rock band founded in Hamburg in 1979, became a defining band in the 1980s German punk scene, and is the most widely recognized example of the musical style Deutschpunk.
The Hammerskins are a white supremacist group formed in 1988 in Dallas, Texas. Their primary focus is the production and promotion of white power rock music, and many white power bands have been affiliated with the group. The Hammerskins were affiliated with the record label 9% Productions. The Hammerskins host several annual concerts, including Hammerfest, an annual event in both the United States and Europe in honor of deceased Hammerskin Joe Rowan, the lead singer of the band Nordic Thunder.
Criminal tattoos are a type of tattoos associated with criminals to show gang membership and record the wearer's personal history—such as their skills, specialties, accomplishments, incarceration, world view and/or means of personal expression. Tattoos have been empirically associated with deviance, personality disorders, and criminality.
"Fuck tha Police" is a protest song by American hip hop group N.W.A that appears on the 1988 album Straight Outta Compton as well as on the N.W.A's Greatest Hits compilation. The lyrics protest police brutality and racial profiling and the song was ranked number 425 on Rolling Stone's 2004 list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. In 2021, Rolling Stone re-ranked the song at number 190 in an updated list.
White power skinheads, also known as racist skinheads and neo-Nazi skinheads, are members of a neo-Nazi, white supremacist and antisemitic offshoot of the skinhead subculture. Many of them are affiliated with white nationalist organizations and some of them are members of prison gangs. The movement emerged in the United Kingdom between the late 1960s and the late 1970s, before spreading across Eurasia and North America in the 1980–1990s.
CHWDP or HWDP is a frequently used Polish acronym or initialism of the Polish phrase chuj w dupę policji, literally meaning "(put a) dick up the police's ass." This anti-authoritarian and anti-police slogan, often written on walls in Poland, is used as a vulgar form of provocation against the police and authorities.
The Nazi Lowriders, also known as NLR or the Ride, are a neo-Nazi, white supremacist organized crime syndicate, and prison and street gang in the United States. Primarily based in Southern California, the gang is allied with the larger Aryan Brotherhood and Mexican Mafia gangs, and fellow peckerwood gang Public Enemy No. 1. The Nazi Lowriders operate both in and outside of prison.
ACAB – All Cops Are Bastards is a 2012 Italian drama film directed by Stefano Sollima.
"Hands up, don't shoot", sometimes shortened to "hands up", is a slogan and gesture that originated after the August 9, 2014, police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and then adopted at protests against police brutality elsewhere in the United States. The slogan implies one has their hands in the air, a common sign of submission, and is therefore not a threat to an approaching police officer. Witness reports from the Brown shooting are conflicted as to what Brown was doing with his hands when he was shot. One witness claimed Brown had his hands in the air before being killed, which was the basis for the slogan.
"Je suis Charlie" is a slogan and logo created by French art director Joachim Roncin and adopted by supporters of freedom of speech and freedom of the press after the 7 January 2015 shooting in which twelve people were killed at the offices of the French satirical weekly newspaper Charlie Hebdo. It identifies a speaker or supporter with those who were killed at the Charlie Hebdo shooting, and by extension, a supporter of freedom of speech and resistance to armed threats. Some journalists embraced the expression as a rallying cry for the freedom of self-expression.
Jon Eric Ritzheimer is an American political activist. He is affiliated with the 3 Percenters and formerly associated with the Oath Keepers group, and has used social media to declare his opposition to Islam and the Bureau of Land Management.
Mister X are a Belarusian street punk band formed in Grodno, West Belarus, in 2003 by Igor Bancer and Boris of Oi! Bombers. They openly identify as SHARP and belong to the small, but healthy and growing anti-racist skinhead scene in Belarus. They are well-known on the underground punk scene in Poland, where they have numerous times been referred to as "the most well-known Belarusian punk rock band" and "the flagship of Belarusian street punk", though they frequently tour other parts of Eastern Europe as well and have played in Western Europe too. Although most of their work is in Russian, they are also known for singing in Polish, Belarusian, and occasionally English – almost all of their digitally released albums are annotated in Russian, Polish, and English. Their frontman and founder Igor Bancer is of Polish descent. Mister X prides itself in being the first Oi! band in Belarus; their inspirations are: The Analogs, The Business, Oxymoron, The Oppressed, Cock Sparrer, Last Resort, and many more.
White Lives Matter (WLM) is a white supremacist slogan that emerged in 2015 as a reaction to the Black Lives Matter social justice movement that started a few years prior. The phrase has been used by neo-Nazis, Ku Klux Klan groups, and other white supremacists to recruit new members into white supremacist movements and demonstrations. Proponents of the slogan argue that they use it to raise awareness against a supposed "white genocide" and build support for a white ethnostate, and it has been frequently found at "pro-white" rallies across the United States.
Yetnahaw Gaa, often written Yetnahaw ga3 !, is a slogan in Algerian Arabic, which appeared during the protests that took place in Algeria from 2019 to early 2021. It has become a sort of rallying cry of internet surfers since the publication of a video on social media showing a young Algerian interrupting a local correspondent of the television channel Sky News Arabia, on the evening of 11 March 2019 where ex-president Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced he was giving up a fifth term. The idea behind this slogan is that anyone who has led or participated in any way in the governance of the country should be hunted.
Anti-police sentiment refers to a social group or individual's attitude and stance against the policing system.
"I can't breathe" is a slogan associated with the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States. The phrase originates from the last words of Eric Garner, an unarmed man who was killed in 2014 after being put in a chokehold by a New York City Police Officer. A number of other Black Americans, such as Javier Ambler, Manuel Ellis, Elijah McClain, and George Floyd, have said the same phrase prior to dying during similar law-enforcement encounters. According to a 2020 report by The New York Times, the phrase has been used by over 70 people who died in police custody.
Ihre zahlreiche Anti-Polizeisongs sind bis heute Hymnen der linken Bewegung, die Refrains oft Schlachtrufe, so etwa A.C.A.B. - All cops are bastards.
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