Signs of the times

[BigV]

Don't knock it until you've tried it.

But as a beginner, I urge you to start with the marmalade. The jelly is for experts only.

[tw]

Originally Posted by BigV

But as a beginner, I urge you to start with the marmalade.

She likes marmalade better.

Trouble is social distancing gets in the way.

[BigV]

Bow-chicka-bow-whoa, what the fuck just happened?

Tell us more about your girlfriend, girlfriend!

[Gravdigr]

[Gravdigr]

[BigV]

I second that.

[Gravdigr]

Might be a repeat:

[Gravdigr]

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by tw

Why would anyone put jelly in their navel?

Well, naval jelly *is* a corrosion remover... You can connect the dots. If you connect all those dots you get an underscore.

[be-bop]

Can someone tell me what's going on in the States when you have groups like this wandering about, and how are they allowed to?

[Ibby]

US News and World Report ran an article yesterday making the case that these militias are not actually legal, but that broadly summarizes the rationale for allowing them to exist:

Yet the groups go largely unchecked because law enforcement often does not enforce anti-militia laws due to a number of overlapping reasons, most based in ignorance or misunderstanding, analysts say. Law enforcement is sometimes simply unaware of state statutes that define and prohibit private militias and paramilitary activity.

That ignorance can be tied, McCord says, to a widely held "mythology" that the Second Amendment protects militia-like activity – an expansive understanding of the amendment's protections that has been promoted by cultural forces like the National Rifle Association, which in recent years has championed "stand your ground" laws in states across the U.S. and characterized guns as a protection against tyranny.

"I think the NRA and other Second Amendment absolutists have been remarkably successful over the last several decades at sort of just convincing people that the Second Amendment protects private militia activity, especially in open carry states," McCord says, referring to statutes that allow residents to openly carry firearms in public and in some cases permit the display of long guns like semi-automatic rifles.

The line between a citizen legally carrying a weapon in public and what constitutes illegal paramilitary action, therefore, often goes unrecognized by law enforcement.

(i'm not really sure I agree with their conclusion - that these are roundly illegal, that is - but i also don't really care a whole lot about arguing what some two-hundred-year-old document really means anyway so)

[tw]

Same attitudes brought about something called the Nazi party. Complete with justification because jews, et al were a threat to all. They were told that. So it must be true.

They need assault weapons to protect themselves using same reasoning. Adults who are still children. Nazi party targeted (recruited) same type people.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by be-bop

Can someone tell me what's going on in the States when you have groups like this wandering about, and how are they allowed to?

We are out of our damn minds over here.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by be-bop

Can someone tell me what's going on in the States when you have groups like this wandering about, and how are they allowed to?

Because we are a genuinely democratic republic. The sole source of political capital in a democracy -- and hence power -- is the electorate.

People who misunderstand civilized thought protest, "But that is just power to kill!" And so it is. What they miss completely is that the crude power to kill translates very efficiently to the refined power of the ballot.

Which is at least more polite, and an exercise of faith in the society's tenets.

The guns are for when and if that faith is lost. An unarmed electorate is an electorate *without* a power anyone's "obliged to respect." You can google that phrase and see where it came from and why it's in quotes.

In a fit of theorizing, founding father Thomas Jefferson wrote that the tree of Liberty should be watered from time to time with the blood of tyrants and of patriots. He never had to live with that more than the once, 1775-1783.

[xoxoxoBruce]

They're just rehearsing for Halloween.