Sovereign citizen - more Loony Tunes in the USA

[Ferrocyanide]

Maybe some of you will get a kick out of this video.
There is something called Sovereign Citizen.
If you live in the USA, probably you have heard of this for decades.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tf-83ck6LyM

[Fireball]

Those knuckleheads still end up arrested and incarcerated.

[Rev. Rye]

Those knuckleheads still end up arrested and incarcerated.

I've been aware of that for well over a decade. Probably first found out about them after perusing Rationalwiki and finding that Kent "Dr. Dino" Hovind made some bizarre sovereign citizen arguments in court. I'm certain that at one point, when I was still covering "Britain's Least Wanted" for Anglotopia, I found one guy who basically refused to help his defense because he insisted he was above the laws of the United Kingdom.

And if I didn't know about it then, I definitely would have known about it when Darrell Brooks decided it was the best way of defending himself against his ramming attack in Waukesha.



It provided enough comedy to make up for the fact that one of my cousins was among the people in the crowd Brooks drove into (no injuries). It even almost made me forget that Judge Dorow was the same judge who went as far as saying that Lawrence v. Texas was "judicial activism at its worst."

I've heard people trying the "Sovereign Citizen" defense in multiple nations, and not ONCE have has it ever worked out in their favour.

[Anomalocaris]

Sovereign citizen is an oxymoron. To be asovereign citizen is a oxymoron. To be a citizen of anything you have to give up your own sovereignty.

an individual would not only need to be a knuckle dragger to be sovereign, he needs to be a knuckle dragger all by himself to be sovereign.   In which case he is the Lord of the middle of nowhere.

[Jackalope]

These kooks first hit my radar back in the early 90s. It sounded like something a meth head would cook up (besides meth). I was pretty conspiracy minded back in those days, and it sounded underpants-on-head bonkers.

[arewethereyet]

Texas is crawling with these knuckle-draggers. One of the first things that pops up is they will only 'answer to' the Texas Rangers and not other law enforcement. There are some towns that seem to draw them. Like the deep South is still fighting the Civil War, Texas still has a battle simmering regarding the state being sovereign.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

While American in origin, this brand of nuttery has spread like the clap in a commune. We have these loonies tying up courts here and in Oz as well. 'Freemen on the land', they call themselves.

Boru

[Rev. Rye]

Texas is crawling with these knuckle-draggers. One of the first things that pops up is they will only 'answer to' the Texas Rangers and not other law enforcement. There are some towns that seem to draw them. Like the deep South is still fighting the Civil War, Texas still has a battle simmering regarding the state being sovereign.

And I take it that the Rangers will either do the same thing that the other authorities were doing or tell them to just listen to the others? Or is Texas really that fucked?

[The Valkyrie]

Yup.

All over the place now.

I say, if the law of the land doesn't apply to them, then neither do any of the protections.

Deport them to an island somewhere so they can scream, "your laws don't apply to me!" at each other as much as they like.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

Yup.

All over the place now.

I say, if the law of the land doesn't apply to them, then neither do any of the protections.

Deport them to an island somewhere so they can scream, "your laws don't apply to me!" at each other as much as they like.

We witnessed one of those unhinged types locally a couple of years ago. We were at a local eatery when this whackadoo walks in and demands to be fed for free and that everyone had to leave because he owned the place. Cops were called and escorted him gently but firmly off the property, while all the while he was bloviating that this was an illegal arrest by a non-legitimate force of occupation. Hey ho.

Boru