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Ever wish you could stop harm before it starts—without hurting anyone? We dive into ethical sabotage, a provocative framework for targeted, non-injurious disruption aimed at preventing foreseeable damage. Instead of waiting at the tracks to pull a switch in the trolley problem, we ask what it looks like to keep the trolley from leaving the station in the first place—by disabling a light, jamming a gear, or interrupting a supply line—while staying grounded in strict moral limits.

We unpack the guardrails that keep strategy ethical: zero physical injury, proportionality between means and ends, precise targets that actually change outcomes, and a hard line against chaos-inducing tools like fire. From hacktivism that exposes abuse to strike tactics that erode profit margins, we explore how small interventions at key choke points can produce outsized effects. We examine historical contrasts—Gandhi’s nonviolence versus Mandela’s constrained sabotage under apartheid—to show how the character of your opponent shapes effective, ethical resistance. And we draw practical lessons from the CIA’s declassified Simple Sabotage Manual, reframing its operational tricks as a blueprint with added ethical constraints.

Climate action provides a clear stress test: shutting down a cement kiln or stalling a high-emissions operation can be morally compelling, but only if actions are precise, reversible where possible, and legible to public judgment. We challenge the lazy conflation of broken windows with bombs and argue for a vocabulary that makes room for calibrated disruption when protest alone fails and violence is both wrong and self-defeating.

If you’re curious about where nonviolence ends and strategy begins, this conversation lays out a usable, principled middle path. Subscribe, share with a friend who loves moral puzzles, and tell us: where would you draw the line?

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Email: [email protected]
Adam: @ajbraus - [email protected]
Scot: @scotmaupin

adambraus.com (Link to Adam's projects and books)
The Perfect Show (Scot's solo podcast)

Thanks to Jonah Burns for the SFM music.