This week, as writer Kevin Williamson noted at the National Review, “Los Angeles Unified School District police officials are considering whether they need the armored vehicle and grenade launchers they received from the U.S. military.” Please, everyone, take the time to re-read and digest that sentence. It is a real sentence. It involves grenade launchers used as back-to-school supplies. How are we not rebelling?

“Answer your own question, lady,” you might be thinking. “You’re the one writing the column.” OK, fair enough. We aren’t rebelling, I would argue, because we’ve slowly gotten used to it. The creeping American police state has made us believe it is normal, not insane.

Reflecting on Ms. Roy’s run-in with Child Protective Services, it’s worth noting that she didn’t know the neighbor who turned her in. If you read up on similar cases, that variable shows up again and again. With this in mind, perhaps the first step to fighting America’s creeping police state—right after reviewing your Fourth Amendment rights—is simple: Get to know your neighbors, and get involved in your community. Friends rarely call the cops as a first resort. Alienated strangers often do—and isolated, atomized communities are often the first to hand over authority to a faceless, overpowering state.