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Interesting. Sounds like a pretty intelligent officer to ask "Oh, I see the stickers now. I guess you think of yourself as sovereign, huh?" Most of the cops a

Interesting. Sounds like a pretty intelligent officer to ask "Oh, I see the stickers now. I guess you think of yourself as sovereign, huh?" Most of the cops around me couldn't find their home town on a map if you pointed to it, let along understand what anarchism is.

mindcrime 13y ago
Yeah, I was actually a little surprised by that myself. I doubt most average street officers understand much about the notion of "individual sovereignty" or know much anarchist theory. In this case, give the guy even more credit, because my particular "flavor" of anarchism is anarcho-capitalism, and the stickers include a "Read Rothbard" sticker, a "V for Voluntary" sticker, one that shows two stick-figure cops beating another stick figure and has a caption "Government, protecting and serving the shit out of you" and one generic circle-A sticker, mixed in with a bunch of mountain biking and heavy metal band stickers. OTOH, I know local police and state police do occasionally receive bulletins and notices and training stuff from the feds, and I think at least a few of those have mentioned anarchists and "individual sovereignty"... I think at least one of those got widely circulated on Slashdot, Reddit, here on HN, etc., under a headline like "The FBI Thinks You Are A Terrorist If You Read The Constitution" or something.
- mturmon 13y ago
  The reason the sovereign citizen movement caught the attention of law enforcement is, of course, this incident: "...In 2010, two Arkansas police officers stopped sovereign-citizen extremists Jerry Kane and his 16-year-old son Joseph during a routine traffic stop on Interstate 40. Joseph Kane jumped out of the vehicle and opened fire with an AK-47 assault rifle, killing both officers..." See: http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/september-2011/sovereign-citizens http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforceme...
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - mindcrime 13y ago
    I love this bit: The FBI considers sovereign-citizen extremists as comprising a domestic terrorist movement, which, scattered across the United States, has existed for decades What a load of shit. Sure, some people who refer to themselves as "sovereign individuals" have done things that would be considered terrorism, but by no means does believing in the inherent sovereignty of the individual automatically imply that someone is a terrorist.
    - throwawaykf02 13y ago
      > Sure, some people who refer to themselves as "sovereign individuals" have done things that would be considered terrorism... You mean like extremists? Seems like you're agreeing with the bit that you love.
      - mindcrime 13y ago
        Apparently I parsed that differently. I took it as the FBI saying that everyone who believes in / advocates for, individual sovereignty, is a "sovereign citizen extremist" and therefore a "domestic terrorist".
- cpursley 13y ago
  You and I are on the same page in terms of political philosophy. There needs to be an organization called 'Americans for Voluntary Society' or something like that.
  - mindcrime 13y ago
    There probably is. For me though, the Libertarian Party gets close enough to the spirit of what I believe (especially when you factor in the "Radical Caucus" folks) and has more traction in terms of influencing public policy than any other libertarian / voluntaryist / anarcho-capitalist leaning group that I'm aware of.
- nilved 13y ago
  Please do not refer to anarcho-capitalism as an anarchist school of thought. Capitalism and anarchism are mutually exclusive.
  - llamataboot 13y ago
    This is really a debate to have elsewhere - not in a hacker news comment thread. Libertarian socialists, which is most schools of anarchist thought, don't see anarcho-capitalism as a strain of anarchism, but there is certainly a long history of individualist strains of anarchism that anarcho-capitalism draws on and anarcho-capitalists certainly consider themselves anarchist. And I say this as an anarcho-communist who disagrees with the economic theories of anarchy capitalists but am well schooled in anarchist theory - traditional and contemporary.
  - mindcrime 13y ago
    Sorry, but this really isn't the place for this argument. We disagree, that's all I'll say.
jmccree 13y ago
The officer was likely referring to the sovereign citizen movement. Most officers are aware of them.

mindcrime 13y ago

Yeah, I was actually a little surprised by that myself. I doubt most average street officers understand much about the notion of "individual sovereignty" or know much anarchist theory. In this case, give the guy even more credit, because my particular "flavor" of anarchism is anarcho-capitalism, and the stickers include a "Read Rothbard" sticker, a "V for Voluntary" sticker, one that shows two stick-figure cops beating another stick figure and has a caption "Government, protecting and serving the shit out of you" and one generic circle-A sticker, mixed in with a bunch of mountain biking and heavy metal band stickers. OTOH, I know local police and state police do occasionally receive bulletins and notices and training stuff from the feds, and I think at least a few of those have mentioned anarchists and "individual sovereignty"... I think at least one of those got widely circulated on Slashdot, Reddit, here on HN, etc., under a headline like "The FBI Thinks You Are A Terrorist If You Read The Constitution" or something.

mturmon 13y ago
The reason the sovereign citizen movement caught the attention of law enforcement is, of course, this incident: "...In 2010, two Arkansas police officers stopped sovereign-citizen extremists Jerry Kane and his 16-year-old son Joseph during a routine traffic stop on Interstate 40. Joseph Kane jumped out of the vehicle and opened fire with an AK-47 assault rifle, killing both officers..." See: http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/september-2011/sovereign-citizens http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforceme...
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- mindcrime 13y ago
  I love this bit: The FBI considers sovereign-citizen extremists as comprising a domestic terrorist movement, which, scattered across the United States, has existed for decades What a load of shit. Sure, some people who refer to themselves as "sovereign individuals" have done things that would be considered terrorism, but by no means does believing in the inherent sovereignty of the individual automatically imply that someone is a terrorist.
  - throwawaykf02 13y ago
    > Sure, some people who refer to themselves as "sovereign individuals" have done things that would be considered terrorism... You mean like extremists? Seems like you're agreeing with the bit that you love.
    - mindcrime 13y ago
      Apparently I parsed that differently. I took it as the FBI saying that everyone who believes in / advocates for, individual sovereignty, is a "sovereign citizen extremist" and therefore a "domestic terrorist".
cpursley 13y ago
You and I are on the same page in terms of political philosophy. There needs to be an organization called 'Americans for Voluntary Society' or something like that.
- mindcrime 13y ago
  There probably is. For me though, the Libertarian Party gets close enough to the spirit of what I believe (especially when you factor in the "Radical Caucus" folks) and has more traction in terms of influencing public policy than any other libertarian / voluntaryist / anarcho-capitalist leaning group that I'm aware of.
nilved 13y ago
Please do not refer to anarcho-capitalism as an anarchist school of thought. Capitalism and anarchism are mutually exclusive.
- llamataboot 13y ago
  This is really a debate to have elsewhere - not in a hacker news comment thread. Libertarian socialists, which is most schools of anarchist thought, don't see anarcho-capitalism as a strain of anarchism, but there is certainly a long history of individualist strains of anarchism that anarcho-capitalism draws on and anarcho-capitalists certainly consider themselves anarchist. And I say this as an anarcho-communist who disagrees with the economic theories of anarchy capitalists but am well schooled in anarchist theory - traditional and contemporary.
- mindcrime 13y ago
  Sorry, but this really isn't the place for this argument. We disagree, that's all I'll say.

jmccree 13y ago

The officer was likely referring to the sovereign citizen movement. Most officers are aware of them.