There was a time—not long, long ago and in fact in this very galaxy—when we could all agree on something fundamental: America was not supposed to be a police state. Freedom, we said, was our highest value, even if it was riddled with contradictions. After all, this is a country founded on “freedom” while simultaneously enslaving human beings. Hamilton himself, in the moderately-fictionalized musical that re-popularized the founding fathers, admits the idea of freedom is messy and contradictory. And yet, despite those contradictions, our shared mythos was that liberty meant something.

Even conservatives and libertarians used to champion this. Remember the bumper stickers and the flags? Don’t tread on me. Keep the government off our backs. These were once rallying cries against the overreach of government power. But somewhere along the way, those same voices turned into cheerleaders for the Empire. They treat the police and military as if they were the Jedi Knights keeping the peace when, in reality, they function more like Stormtroopers carrying out Palpatine’s will.

So, let me be as clear as I can: if you’re standing and clapping while militarized police march through city streets, you’re not siding with Luke, Leia, and Yoda. You’re rooting for the Death Star. You’re applauding the oppression of ordinary people while pretending it’s for the sake of “law and order.” The people you once accused of wanting Big Brother to run their lives are now the ones reminding you that freedom doesn’t look like armored men shoving protesters into unmarked vans.

Further, Trump didn’t send federal officers into cities with primarily white, conservative mayors. No, his little despotic domestic invasions tend to happen in cities with Black mayors. Ostensibly, this is to deter crime. But crime stats tell a different story. Four of the top five states for violent crime are red states. Meanwhile, four of the five safest states in America are blue. So much for “facts don’t care about your feelings,” eh Ben Shapiro. The numbers don’t support the narrative, but the Stormtroopers march on anyway.

I honestly wonder how these ICE agents, these officers in camouflage patrolling American streets, see themselves. Do they imagine themselves as Jedi wielding lightsabers, guardians of peace in the galaxy? Because the reality is much darker. Strip away the fantasy, and what you have isn’t noble defenders of democracy, it’s fascism. And if we’re being honest, when the Empire rolls into majority-Black cities under the banner of “restoring order,” the white armor doesn’t just look like that of a Stormtrooper, it looks like white hoods.

So to those in uniform, I ask: Who do you think you are in this story? The Jedi, standing for freedom and justice? Or the enforcers of an authoritarian regime? Because right now, it sure doesn’t look like you’re playing the hero. When you drag protesters into vans, when you point rifles at citizens, when you patrol neighborhoods like occupiers—do you see freedom in that? Do you see justice? Do you look in the mirror afterward and tell yourself you’re Luke Skywalker, standing up to evil? Or do you recognize the truth that you are the faceless enforcers of an empire, more loyal to power than to people?

Because here’s the brutal reality: if you side with oppression, if you weaponize fear, if you turn on your own neighbors at the command of a wannabe emperor, then you are not Jedi. You are not heroes. You are Stormtroopers. And without the armor, you are exactly what history has always shown us: men in white hoods keeping “order” for a system built on domination.

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