• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Leader of Oregon occupation Ammon Bundy, at least 8 others arrested

Status
Not open for further replies.

lawnchair

Banned
"Bad people deserve to die" is the same framework that justifies Wild West gun culture and racialized police escalation of violence to begin with. The only philosophy that leads to a world with less violence is one that believes that any use of violence is a bad thing--even if it sometimes also less bad than the alternative of not using violence.

The reasons why someone might get involved in a group like this are long and complicated and might involve mental illness or lack of opportunity (or if for some reason you believe in it, People Just Being Evil Very Bad People Who Are Bad) but irrespective of what brought us to this situation I hope we would all agree that for the sake of the deceased, his family and loved ones, the cop or cops who had to make the decision to shoot, their family and loved ones, and the broader community, it's regrettable that it got to this point.

It's fair to celebrate that relative to other outcomes, the number of casualties was low, but why celebrate casualties at all? The better outcome is if no one, including no Bad People, died. Relief is understandable, but a measure of sobriety when considering someone died costs nothing and makes us a kinder world.

i understand your point STUMP. i didn't mean to come off as "celebratory" or anything .. I'm not HAPPY the dude is dead, but I'm going on the assumption that he was an armed criminal who got shot by a cop. On the "sadness of death" scale that's close down at the bottom for me. It isn't a "tragedy" for me, is all i'm saying.
 

Xdrive05

Member
Hey I'm all for a good stand up to your government story, but these guys were probably freeloading assholes who deserved to be taken down long before now.

At least I have yet to read a coherent defense of their actions, or even validation for their grievances. Regress them shits using the law. Not by fucking over our shared property as citizens. Assholes.
 
Thank God they finally did something, even if it did involve shots fired. But I really hope this signals the beginning of the end and we don't get treated to another 4 weeks of idiots occupying their fort and taking potshots at Federal Agents. This is all so absurd.
 

RPGCrazied

Member
Did anyone else just see CNN earlier? A reporter was there giving the story and one of the guys still there had to show off his gun. He was trying to say the man that died was killed with hands up(Don't believe that for a second), but CNN cut him off.

Scary people.
 

Furyous

Member
Honestly, what did these people expect to happen? Did they really think taking over a wildlife refuge gets their friends out of jail and the lands returned to them? There's only one constituency that has gets the benefit of the doubt and is allowed to takeover Federal lands for three weeks brandishing weapons the whole time going on media tours...

Feds need to end this occupation swiftly and then go after the Bundy family. If it's war they want then give it to them. Dismantle the ever loving fuck of their holdings which depend so much upon the government they hate. Force Bundy to pay what he owes the government. It's sickening he's gotten away with his actions thus far. Michelle Fiore needs to be thrown out of office for her support of them anyway.
 
Did anyone else just see CNN earlier? A reporter was there giving the story and one of the guys still there had to show off his gun. He was trying to say the man that died was killed with hands up(Don't believe that for a second), but CNN cut him off.

Scary people.

like I said earlier, even if his hands were up.. They seized a federal building. Kids have been shot by LEO with hands up for stealing and apparently that was justified.

this entire thing is a circus and I don't believe for one second his hands were up, fyi.
 

fixedpoint

Member
Someone is dead and I feel bad about it. However the guy was part of an armed militia that took over a federal building so.. I can't feel to bad about it.

My Facebook feed is filled with shit about an unarmed patriot being cut down in cold blood. These same people didn't give a shit about any of the countless black citizens being shot down in cold blood.

Apparently stealing a cigar is not the same as seizing a federal building.
The hypocrisy is sad but not surprising. Finicum said he'd rather die than be arrested, so I guess we'll have to wait and see. Silly thing to die over in any case.
"I'm just not going to prison," Finicum said. "Look at the stars. There's no way I'm going to sit in a concrete cell where I can't see the stars and roll out my bedroll on the ground. That's just not going to happen. I want to be able to get up in the morning and throw my saddle on my horse and go check on my cows. It's OK. I've lived a good life. God's been gracious to me."
 
I don't think they can. Treason involves foriegn actors if I remember correctly.


Sedition is the charge. But, either way they're looking at a laundry list of felonies.

Treason charges have been brought against non-foreign actors (e.g the Whiskey Rebellion and Civil War) but the US definition is deliberately severed from common law and specifies only a handful of offenses but they are pretty vague.

I do think you're right that these guys probably don't meet the definition given though. They probably didn't levy War against the United States* and they didn't give Aid or Comfort to its Enemies**.

*You might be able to argue this one but you'd probably be redefining war so much as to be meaningless.
** This is just flat out inapplicable unless you're going for a circular definition.
 

fixedpoint

Member
In regards to the guy dying with his hands up, i ran into this article that seems to refute it. They also have some surprising opinions that make them sound like hipster militants.

http://www.rawstory.com/2016/01/eye...-about-lavoy-finicum-dying-with-his-hands-up/

Note that I had never heard of this site previously and don't know how accurate it is.
Well there it is.
He said Cox told him that Finicum crashed into the snowbank, jumped out of the manual transmission diesel pickup with the rear wheels still spinning and charged toward law enforcement officers.
“He was not on his knees, none of that,” McConnell said. “He was none of that nonsense. You know, that was a miscommunication on somebody else’s part. But he went after them. He charged them. You know, LaVoy was very passionate about what he was doing up here.”
 

Tigress

Member
Hey I'm all for a good stand up to your government story, but these guys were probably freeloading assholes who deserved to be taken down long before now.

At least I have yet to read a coherent defense of their actions, or even validation for their grievances. Regress them shits using the law. Not by fucking over our shared property as citizens. Assholes.

This article isn't a defense of their actions but more a look at the other side of the story (ranchers who feel that they are being trod on).

I don't know if I agree with all his points (certainly not that all ranchers would be totally good about being conservationists) but I do think it's good to look at at least another side of the story and he does raise some things to think about. The best solution is one that works for everyone, not just one side.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/post...you-dont-understand-about-the-bundy-standoff/

As for the bundy group trying to play off that they were peaceful, bullfuckingshit. I don't believe for one second that people holding up a building with guns are peaceful. And honestly their actions to me say they wanted to force a standoff. This is probably disappointing to them that it was so small (and quite probably that it wasn't so easy to make it look like the feds pushed things as I really doubt the police shot the guy as he was kneeling. If they were going to just outright murder him, why leave witnesses?). I don't believe for one second that they didn't want to push a standoff and try to make it look like they were the ones who were being persecuted.
 

GaimeGuy

Volunteer Deputy Campaign Director, Obama for America '16
When an armed group invades and seizes federal land, how is that not an act of war? Weird that people call armed occupation and inva sion of land a protest. Any state-sponsored force doing the same thing would be viewed as an act of war.

So, given that these people were committing an act of war/sedition, I'm not going to view being killed by LEOs while charging at them in the same way as I would a random street criminal. One is an enemy combatant engaged in war who refuses capture. The other is a simple criminal that should be apprehended and prosecuted if at all possible.
 
When an armed group invades and seizes federal land, how is that not an act of war? Weird that people call armed occupation and inva sion of land a protest. Any state-sponsored force doing the same thing would be viewed as an act of war.

So, given that these people were committing an act of war/sedition, I'm not going to view being killed by LEOs while charging at them in the same way as I would a random street criminal. One is an enemy combatant engaged in war who refuses capture. The other is a simple criminal that should be apprehended and prosecuted if at all possible.

I think you make a good point in the first 2 sentences but being backed by a state does add rather more force to almost anything. Imagine someone reading top secret documents for their own amusement compared to someone reading top secret documents to leak to a foreign government. Heck someone riling up a crowd for personal purposes is different to riling up a crowd for a foreign state.
 
Jesus. The stupidity and desperate calls for violence and murder on display here boggle my mind. I guess if you're sitting in an echo chamber with other people who're also just hyping themselves up for the carnage it all makes sense.....these guys are really setting themselves up to have a huge showdown. I hope it ends up being defused peacefully so these people can look back on it with their lives and realize how stupid it was
 

Nivash

Member
In regards to the guy dying with his hands up, i ran into this article that seems to refute it. They also have some surprising opinions that make them sound like hipster militants.

http://www.rawstory.com/2016/01/eye...-about-lavoy-finicum-dying-with-his-hands-up/

Note that I had never heard of this site previously and don't know how accurate it is.

I love that Mark guy. Apparently he's been getting flak for being released so quickly. This is his response:

"I've seen a thing now that I must be a fed or whatever. No. I'm just smarter than your average retarded bear. And a lot smarter than your average conspiracy theorist"
 

fixedpoint

Member
*sigh*

Doubling down on the stupid.

This won't end well

They've been digging trenches with that backhoe all morning. Dude with the long hair has a string of shotgun shells draped around his neck.

xTuCCLu.gif

pehtta8.gif
 
Watching some of their other videos posted this morning are really hilarious/sad. To listen to them they actually believe, without a doubt, that all their countrymen are driving up there now to start a second "revolution". One guy is on the phone with his mom talking about how the next revolution is about to start today, they'll die free men protecting their country and they'll be "taking back our country"

The level of self delusion is epic
 

MattyG

Banned
Watching some of their other videos posted this morning are really hilarious/sad. To listen to them they actually believe, without a doubt, that all their countrymen are driving up there now to start a second "revolution". One guy is on the phone with his mom talking about how the next revolution is about to start today, they'll die free men protecting their country and they'll be "taking back our country"

The level of self delusion is epic
Oh boy.
 

"I'm sorry mom, my whole life has been leading up to this day"
"I didn't choose this it was chosen for me"
"We're taking this country back today"
"I believe God got this. Today is the start of the second revolution"
"Anyone out there who's trying to get up here if a Leo stops you KILL THEM!"

Good luck with that guys. Seems to me after watching it today that there buddy being killed was just what they wanted. Gives them an excuse to escalate things
 
im coming in late can someone catch me up? they are digging out a wildlife refuge now instead of just occupying it?? wtf? why?

If that's recent, they are probably trying to fortify the place.

If its old, their entire purpose in occupying the place was to "reclaim" it from Federal holding for the use of (themselves and their friends) so they've been treating it like their property basically.
 
See a situation like this is why I have a hard time buying the "we need guns to keep the government in check" because if we truly did have a tyrannical government that didnt give a shit these idiots would've been drone striked out of existence.

also where's the dude on this forum that said he'd be a leader of a militia movement or whatever? now's your chance!
 

fixedpoint

Member
"The American people better get here right now and fight for their country!"

Uh, is he asking me to go there and take up arms against him?
I just watched the video - these people are sad.
American people better wake up, get here and fight for your country right now, it is on

All you military that's been fighting for your country overseas, you can fight for your country right here in America, get here, get some!

This is history in the making

There are no laws in this United States now, this is a free-for-all armageddon

Any LEO or military or law enforcement or feds that stand up and fuck their oath, don't abde by their oath, are the enemy.

If they stop you from getting here, kill them!
 

besada

Banned
In case anyone is curious about where the bullshit story regarding Finicum on his knees came from, it came straight from the lying mouth of Ammon Bundy. He phoned his wife from the back of a police car, and told her that Finicum had been shot on his knees with his hands up, and she told Fiore who then spread it around like the dumb asshole she is.

I do appreciate that McConnell is at least attempting to get the real story out and slow down some of the fiercer morons who might do something stupid about it.

Also, for guys worried about the government murdering them, they sure are spending a lot of time outside with no cover. I suspect if the government wanted to murder them, federal snipers could have already put those folks in the ground.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom