1st Prison Sentence in Bundy Standoff - Nevada Edition

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**Frazzled**

Neither of these are a threat to the average American-way less a risk than a a meteor hitting them in the head.

Vegetables. Now there's a threat!

**Spinner**

Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Spinner wrote:
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
There is a danger that when these people get jail time, they could end up being martyrs and thus encourage more groups or individuals to take action...

Automatically Appended Next Post:
There is a danger that when these people get jail time, they could end up being martyrs and thus encourage more groups or individuals to take action...

I think the bigger danger would be 'no jail time means this is okay/consequence-free'.

I don't disagree with you, but in this day and age with bombs going off everywhere, who knows what people will do...

It's highly unlikely, and I hope it never happens, but it's not beyond the realms of possibility that somebody could open fire at the courthouse or something similar.

History teaches us that desperate men do desperate things.

So we're supposed to let the 'desperate men' do whatever they want in case they try to shoot us or plant a bomb or something?

There are consequences for breaking the law, whether you're a self-declared patriot or militia member or sovereign citizen or whatever. These guys need to understand that they can't just wave a gun at the evil Federal government, scream 'freedom!', and magically get to do whatever they want.

**NinthMusketeer**

Militia's may be more active than Islamic terrorism in the US, but Islamic terrorism is nearly nonexistent on a statistical level. Both of those combined are a tiny fraction of crime overall.

**d-usa**

Some people might assume that by electing people based on their promised treatment of statistically insignificant people who are different from us, while ignoring the statistically insignificant people who are similar to us, the focus is less on the statistically insignificant threat and more on the similarity of the persons to ourselves.

**Prestor Jon**

d-usa wrote:
Some people might assume that by electing people based on their promised treatment of statistically insignificant people who are different from us, while ignoring the statistically insignificant people who are similar to us, the focus is less on the statistically insignificant threat and more on the similarity of the persons to ourselves.

That's always been true, tribalism has always been with us. No matter who is in charge they will find some "other" group to scapegoat in order to make bad policy palatable to their supporters.

**TheAuldGrump**

Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Trying not to turn this into a gun thread, but as American dakka members know, there is a constitutional right to form a militia.

So if 'paramilitary' groups or more of these militias spring up, it could be problematic IMO as an outsider.

Why? Obviously, if they break the law, they get dealt with.

But, even turning up in large numbers to intimidate people, without breaking the law (because a large crowd can be scary in some situations) could be used to menace people or get a message across.

and from a legal perspective, it could be hard to stop such gatherings or stop groups forming as they have the constitutional right.

From the outside, it potentially could get tricky...

Look up the term 'Brandishment' - using a gun to intimidate or menace is a crime in many (most?) states.

The Auld Grump

**NinthMusketeer**

d-usa wrote:
Some people might assume that by electing people based on their promised treatment of statistically insignificant people who are different from us, while ignoring the statistically insignificant people who are similar to us, the focus is less on the statistically insignificant threat and more on the similarity of the persons to ourselves.

Probably veering into politics area here.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

TheAuldGrump wrote:
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Trying not to turn this into a gun thread, but as American dakka members know, there is a constitutional right to form a militia.

So if 'paramilitary' groups or more of these militias spring up, it could be problematic IMO as an outsider.

Why? Obviously, if they break the law, they get dealt with.

But, even turning up in large numbers to intimidate people, without breaking the law (because a large crowd can be scary in some situations) could be used to menace people or get a message across.

and from a legal perspective, it could be hard to stop such gatherings or stop groups forming as they have the constitutional right.

From the outside, it potentially could get tricky...

Look up the term 'Brandishment' - using a gun to intimidate or menace is a crime in many (most?) states.

The Auld Grump

Here in California I'm pretty sure that holding a gun by the handle qualifies as intent to kill (sarcasm).

**Galas**

There has been demostrated that a proper prosecution of crime is more usefull that very hard punishment but low proportion of people punished.

If the punishment for drug dealing is death but you only catch and apply that to 5% of the drug dealers, people will still try it as a way of living.

If the punishment is 8 years but you catch 70-80% of the drug dealers, then things begin to change.

And no one should go free when they commit a crime, no matter how small it can be. Is the "Broken windows theory". Broke a window in a building and don't repair it in a week. The week after all the others are gonna be broken too.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory

**Ouze**

The broken windows theory has been largely debunked, FWIW.

**jhe90**

TheAuldGrump wrote:
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Trying not to turn this into a gun thread, but as American dakka members know, there is a constitutional right to form a militia.

So if 'paramilitary' groups or more of these militias spring up, it could be problematic IMO as an outsider.

Why? Obviously, if they break the law, they get dealt with.

But, even turning up in large numbers to intimidate people, without breaking the law (because a large crowd can be scary in some situations) could be used to menace people or get a message across.

and from a legal perspective, it could be hard to stop such gatherings or stop groups forming as they have the constitutional right.

From the outside, it potentially could get tricky...

Look up the term 'Brandishment' - using a gun to intimidate or menace is a crime in many (most?) states.

The Auld Grump

Also Militia, its a pretty open term from a group of real veterans who do have skills and some could be genuinely dangerous to others who wanna join something, maybe go shooting and hunting as a group and just want to sound cool and honestly are low grade threat..

Its a term that has no one single definition or set level.

Also paramilitary tends to define maybe a group with a more organised structure than a militia?
In legal world the exact meaning of a word seems to carry some weight and importance.

**djones520**

In terms of legallity, there is two militias. The Organized, which is the National Guard (and state guard, for those states who have that as well).

Then you have the reserve militia. The reserve militia is made up of everyone age 17-45 of able body. They can be called apon by the state to take up arms.

Private organizations that call themselves militia's are not truly so. They're just private groups who use the title for their own purpose.