Long declared himself a sovereign citizen and member of the âUnited Washitaw de Dugdahmoundyah Muâur Nation, Mid-West Washita Tribesâ in paperwork he filed with the Jackson County, Missouri Recorder of Deeds in 2015.
The Southern Poverty Law Center describes the sovereign citizen movement as a âcomplexâ movement with âantigovernment beliefs," including that they are above laws and regulations such as paying taxes. A case against Long for unpaid taxes was dismissed last month in Kansas City.
Which makes the APâs story earlier today and itâs desperate attempt to make him not associated with an extremist group odd today the least.
What we are looking at, both here and in Europe, is basically a kind of mass psychosis - an epidemic of troubled young men ârunning amok.â The driver in Nice was cut from the same cloth - a warrior or jihadist only in his own mind.
This mass psychosis is being driven by the media and by the darker corners of the internet. Destroying ISIS militarily wonât end it, and neither will turning America into a police state.
As killing technology continues to advance, running amok will just get deadlier and deadlier. Thoroughly depressing.
Oren Segal, director of the Center on Extremism for the Anti-Defamation League, told AP that there was no information that organization was aware of that connected Long to an extremist group or movement.
Maybe the ADL might want to talk to the SPLC as should the AP, from June 15, 1999:
Income inequality does tend to make young men feel impotent. Thatâs why most sane societies try to find them productive work at a middle class standard of livingâŚinstead of outsourcing those jobs to third world countries where young men there become enslaved to low wages and unsafe working conditions.
He wanted to be a Bundy gang member.
I wonder how the men feel who he counseled to become more âalphaâ? Looks like kind of a waste of effort, huh?
It seems as if this guy is connected with the sovereign citizen movement at least as much Omar Mateen was connected with ISIS. If Mateenâs action was an instance of Muslim terrorism this guyâs act is surely an instance of American right-wing terrorism.
I dunno. Seems Long is a little more âconnectedâ to the Sovereign Citizens movement than Omar Mateen was to ISIL (and the raft of conflicting jihadists groups he previous stated he was aligned with, who are fighting each other itâs worth noting) which seemed far more like a rationalization for his being a fucked-up closet case.
Gavin Long identified as a Sovereign Citizen. But I thought that group had ties to Bundy and friends.
Cuckoo Bananas⌠got it.
I really donât know what set this particular guy off, but it seems to me the overall threshold for violence in our society has been significantly lowered. It appears that more than a few people with a grievance are lighted fuses about to go off.
The reasons are probably multifactorial. Whether itâs Isis-inspired or a sovereign movement thing or retaliatory measures against law enforcement due to racial disparities (Dallas), or outright racially inspired (Dylan Roof), or something else, or a combination of factors; the common thread is a way too easy access to high caliber weapons.
Not saying sensible gun laws would solve all our problems, because obviously, they run deep. But that would be a start.
The other part of the equation has to be that people realize language has consequences, first amendment notwithstanding. So when people talk about executing someone or question someoneâs patriotism or talk about secession, or not following federal laws; the end result is that it divides us further and serves to demonize the âotherâ. From there, itâs not a huge leap into violence by those less tethered to sanity.
I thought the Sovereign Citizen movement was only supposed to be for white people angry at imagined abuses by the government?
I agree. Thatâs why I said he was âat least asâ connected to his cause as was Mateen to his. But as far as a mainstream narrative is concerned Iâll settle for equal treatment in these two cases. What I wonât accept is Mateenâs incoherent ideology serving to make him an ISIS sympathizer while Longâs ideology is discounted and his skin color alone taken as important.
Hmmmm ⌠How is it possible to have everyone at a âmiddle class standard of livingâ?
I donât think having a âmiddle-classâ job or lifestyle diminishes the real fear Blacks have of police or any less resentful.
Theyâve apparently started making inroads among incarcerated African-Americans. The worst kind of jailhouse lawyer.
Not for nothing, but the guy is a better logo designer than the Trumpence team.
This group is an anti government hate group.
Iâm no expert on the âSovereignâ Citizen movement, but I think they are a bit like the Judean Peopleâs Front and the Peopleâs Front of Judea. There are a lot of groups that all adhere to the same general set of âprinciples,â but they wouldnât all necessarily support each other.
I remember reading that a lot of black men in prison have turned to the SC movement as they feel otherwise helpless in the American judicial system. Being able to claim that they can categorically ignore various laws and regulations can feel empowering. I doubt very much that the Bundy crowd and the SC prison groups have much in common beyond the desire to personally nullify laws. The Bundys are tied to the SC movement primarily because they want the right to foul their âownâ nest without consequences, nevermind that they never owned the land in the first place.