DotTeeVee: Sovereign Citizens Being Owned, Part 3

It's with bittersweet feelings and wistful yearnings for past days that I bring this amazing trilogy to a close. Like reaching the end of a beloved novel or one of those "Save often!" video games there's a certain sadness that it will soon be over, that I'll have to spend my time doing something other than watching socially retarded suburban rebels make meaningless and doomed stands against the apparatus of power. I guess we should smile because it happened instead of weeping because it's about to end. Let us create joinder one more time, you're not being detained but I'll ask you to stick around anyway and join me among real "We are the dead" heroes who just won't provide those papers without a long and pointless struggle that ends with ownership.

Am I not under arrest?

We're right back in the thick of things with a so-called "roadside safety check," which we all know it how Hitlerism got its foot in the door. This time we get a good look at our spectacled resistor with his squared away haircut and demeanor that starts out relatively pleasant and non-crazy. If they only knew. We get the usual dog-chasing-tail act of asking if this counts as being detained and it's pretty clear that is the case, but better ask a fifth time just to be sure. 

Then, the impossible happens and a sovereign citizen is actually right about something! I know, law of averages, broken clock twice a day, but it's still surprising. The officer says he asked for identification and is told by the Free Man of the Land that he hasn't and a quick review of the footage reveals this is indeed the case. You pretty much have to stop this unconstitutional pull-over now, in the face of a rare victory. Instead the state sponsored violence ramps up as the badge thugs open the car door and our hero lets out a series of "Whoas!" like he's a young Joey Lawerence or something. 

World's Mildest Police Videos.

The system tool explains that driving is not a right, which sure sounds like fascist talk to these ears. Officer Angry has clearly lost all patience with the freedom rider and in the face of this the necessary papiern is meekly handed over. Like a mobious strip we continue to eat that tail forever as it's time for more questions about detainment and its relationship to the driver's current status, which is met with more barking and a little reminder that the State of Illinois does not tolerate back-sass. Maybe try it in Minnesota next time, I don't even know.

After all this our protagonist wishes to remain silent unless an attorney is present. The query that prompted this cliched response was "Is this your address?" Let me please confer with legal counsel before I answer that, and then when I do I'll take the fifth. Isn't it taser time yet? Instead we briefly discuss the fifth amendment and then are indeed free to leave, having accomplished the noble purpose of making another human unit angry.

Bin ich verhaftet?

The scene shifts to an interior where difficult questions about names are about to get bizarre responses. Our unseen champion claims not to have a first or last name, so I guess it's the Clint Eastwood character from all those westerns, with all the toughness and likeability stripped away, naturally. Then he says his name is "Robert," provoking laughter from the civil servant. Nothing funny about our right to play legal make-believe, man.

Please tell me more about how the Magna Carta gives you the right not to have a name.

It's then explained that our dissenter is not a person, and as such isn't subject to the admiralty and maritime law of this court. Now everyone is having a nice chuckle, but the fact remains that there's no denying the unpersonhood of our narrator. Kind of like in grade school when you're not part of the game of tag and as such can't be made "it" or be given girl cooties. This is how jurisprudence works.

"What are you?" is sadly not answered with a claim to be the Bat Man, but merely an ordinary man who is also not a citizen of the United States according to a misreading of a treaty with Tunisia from 1795 or whatever. At this point I half expect references to the Code of Hammurabi, it would be just as relevant. He then claims to be a "State Citizen" which at least gets us up to about 1861 or so. The smile is now long gone from the questioner, replaced with annoyed bemusement.  

I regret to inform you that the Civil War is over and your side lost.

It turns out that our non-person is from Idaho, which of course didn't enter the Union until 1890, putting another bullet into a legal argument that's already long dead. As per tradition a request for a license becomes an issue of contention. His person has one, but he doesn't. Wait, I thought you weren't a person? It's almost like you're just firing off random phrases and concepts with no real understanding and in general making a fool of yourself for no good reason, but we all know courts are bad so keep up that good fight. 

"I don't wish to create joinder with you." If you were a sexy woman, well maybe. With that the interaction ends and it's time to go address the prosecutor. However the way is blocked by government goons infringing the freedom of movement. The jack-boot squad won't let the Idaho citizen in with the camera, provoking more righteous passive-aggression. This Braveheart moment is somewhat undermined by one of the thugs telling him to leave the camera with his mother, who is apparently sitting across the room. Not now Mom, I'm fighting for my rights! No, I didn't get a job today.

"You are not God!" Yeah, really. Only the unmoved mover can ask me to shut off my recording devices and you ain't him, pal. After acknowledging his lack of divinity the guard absorbs a speech about rights and wrongs, but remains intractable. An attempt to enter is stopped by a human Berlin Wall and now it's already zapping time.

Isn't God, but does shoot lightning from the hands.

The shock is deployed and we get some quality agonized moans. Then it's time for the cuffs. Now Mommy will have to bail you out, nameless non-entity.

Back to the familiar confines of a motor vehicle where a rather doughy officer is demanding the usual laminated items. "As a man what right do you have to stop another man?" Wow. Our well-fed authority figure doesn't even attempt an answer and we skip ahead to a discussion of whether speeding is a crime or not. Hint: it is. An attempt to explain the contra position is severely undermined by incoherent rambling and even an "Aw, you know" in place of the expected citation of the Volstead Act or Wagonry Guidelines of 1804. Yeah, come on, you know what I'm trying to say.

Attempts to cite case law are ignored, and yes, you are being detained. More fuzz arrive and a request to "stand down" instead provokes the brown shirt.

Incredibly he doesn't actually hit anything. This time.

After what baseball announcers would call a "check swing" it's time to demand the opening of the car window. Get the supervisor! I'm going to give you all "very poors" on the customer service feedback card, officer. The window gets smashed, followed by kissing some pavement. With that this examination of our sovereign rights as free men of the land ends with both a bang and a whimper, appropriately enough.

Aaron Zehner is the author of "The Foolchild Invention" available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.   

DotTeeVee: Sovereign Citizens Being Owned

What is a sovereign citizen? After watching a twenty minute video of some of them being laid to waste by law enforcement I'm still not entirely certain, but I think I'm triangulating the concept. Start with all the worst parts of Libertarianism (So like 90% of it, haw haw), stir in the special kind of social ineptitude found in generation nothing and crown this rich sundae of pathology with a disregard for the laws of the road. Or, indeed, any laws, but it's mostly going to be things like speed limits and checkpoints that our anti-heroes will be running afoul of prior to being, as the title clearly states, owned. What we're going to get is a combination of the modern hippie and the student loan racket victim experiencing the consequences of their own poor choices tyranny.

Our first tale of truth to power ownership begins at night, already in progress. A representative of the beast system wants to see ihnen papiern, bitte. He makes this request in a thick as Russian mud in May southern accent, the kind suggestive of the villain law enforcement in a Burt Reynolds movie. What could have potentially been a teaser trailer for Stroker Ace Part 2, Am I Being Detained? is somewhat ruined by the trooper's general tractability, happily giving his own badge number and name to our faceless enemy of statism. The officer does, however, refuse to give his first name, claiming it's "irrelevant." You can practically hear the sickening thud of that boot stomping a human face, forever.

Am I free to go?

Repeated southern-fried requests for insurance and license are rejected and we discover our resistor was going 72 in a 55 mph area, which is why we have a constitution and so on. To protect that. "Is speeding a crime?" asks the motorist. You might want to brace yourself for this shocking revelation, but it turns out that yes, it is. With that clever gambit somehow defeated by John Law we get our next brilliant legal maneuver, namely "Can you prove that I'm driving." Let's turn a routine lead-foot stop into "Is this chair real?" philosophical onanism, that should save you some points against the license you refuse to show.

The sovereign citizen now claims to be "traveling" instead of driving, which should clear up everything and bring it to a successful conclusion. "I wasn't stealing, officer, I was dropping objects into my pocket and then moving them by walking." What can be done in the face of this semantic onslaught? We get one more request and then the authority enters beast mode, smashing the car window with his bare hands. You should've disclosed that you were that liquid metal terminator when I asked for your badge number, it would have saved a lot of suffering.

Where is John Connor?

The "owning" we were promised now begins in earnest. "This is assault!" gasps the traveler, as if doing play-by-play or something. He goes on to mention his lack of "consent," which is something that I'm pretty sure isn't required by the rule of law. "You can only arrest me for the murders I committed if I give continuous and enthusiastic consent!" Doesn't sound right. We get the expected appeal to police brutality, which at least is a concept with some grounding in reality, while the T-1000, Alabama Model, declares that he's "Fixing to tase you," presumably with his built-in cyborg weapons.

Said tasing occurs, we get some pathetic screaming and even some profanity, fade to black.

Without even a pause to get our heads right it's off to the next case, now daytime but still in a car. "I come in peace," announces the World Citizen and for just a moment I wish I was watching Fulbright Scholarship recipient Dolph Lundgren in the action movie dud of the same name. Believe it or not, the video we get here is actually even better. I know it's a bold statement, especially considering the officer probably won't say "Then go in pieces" while blasting the Last Free Man.

"I do not consent to you searching my spaceship."

The representative of the Global Ruling Elite, all wool cap and general hang-dog demeanor, attempts to reason with the prison planet inmate, insisting that he smelled wacky tobacco smoke coming from the car and now must follow up on this lead. Using the smallest words possible the badge monster tries to explain probable cause, but it really doesn't seem to be taking. The driver than asks to see "Your Supervisor" as if this is a truculent fast food employee who made your Dinner Dog incorrectly or something. 

Instead of getting the manager the tool of oppression reaches into the vehicle, prompting less than masuculine cries of "Help!" and "I do not consent!" while a woman and baby scream away in the back of the car. Our reefer smoking friend denies residency in the State of Indiana, which is a nice logical talking point to fall back on after howling various nonsense like a ninny. 

The face of oppression.

"You do not smell marijuana!" whines the modern patriot. I guess he's been reduced to attempting Jedi mind-tricks now. "These are not the stoners you're looking for. Move along." Instead the officer declares the car "reeks" of it, which earns the brilliant rebuttal of "No, it doesn't!" Man, I can't wait to see what society looks like in twenty years.

Back-up arrives and it time for another "assault" which consists of dragging our scruffy THC lover from the driver's seat. More screams for "Help!" and, almost unbelievably, "Call the police!" Yes, really. And yet there's still a few cranks that insist smoking something called "dope" might affect your intelligence. "Sir, we are the police." 

It's already time for the taser. Say what you want, but it's more humane than hitting someone over the head with a steel baton. "What crime have I committed!" is now the battle cry of this peaceful warrior fighting for our inherent right to get baked in a parking lot. Apparently the batteries are low on the old sparky because it fails to subdue the weedhead or even generate much in the way of pitiful wailing. "You tried to attack my nuts!" Either a squirrel somehow gained the gift of speech and is bemoaning the encroachment of humanity on its personal hoard or this is the next bit of play-by-play from a drug freak. He also calls it "Improper use of a taser!" Five yard penalty, repeat third down.

Then it's time to kiss the pavement while the rest of this brave man's family (?) moan and make tearful requests. Can we get that lengthy conventional foreign war going again, or what?

I do not consent to you moving my corpse.

The vanquished pipe-puffer wants a lawyer. The child screams about getting out of the car and this sorry scene comes to an end.

We're in the cab of a truck, but don't worry, our driver is not the hard-working and generally decent sort of person you might associate with that profession. "I'm getting too old for this," Lethal Weapons our next enemy of individual rights as he awkwardly climbs up to have a chat. The smiling bully boy inquires about U.S. citizenship, but our smarmy hero wants to "Opt out." "I don't care if you're German or whatever," says the criminal with a badge, which sure is ironic considering he's acting like a German, circa 1940.

Another face full of pure, concentrated evil.

The big rig pilot declares a general policy of not answering questions. That will certainly help move this along. It's then time to discuss code 18.111, which is a much better use of your time than simply answering a straightforward question and then driving off with your load of refrigerator parts. After some dull civics class we come back to trying to get some answers, but no go. Then it's time to discuss borders and checkpoints. Maybe this guy is just lonely after a hard day of truckin' and just wanted a semi-friendly conversation. Who knows?

We talk about the fourth amendment and, big surprise, the noble rebel doesn't really understand it. After clearing it up a little nothing gets settled and we cut away.

Believe it or not, all of this amazing footage represents only about a third of the video's total running time. I'm not gonna call this my new regular Saturday night thing, but let's get real, this needs to happen. 

  

Komment Korner  

I hope you get AIDS.

The first cop just ripped the window out with his bare hands, that's metal as fuck!

So the key to being a "sovereign citizen" is to pretend like asking really dumb questions like "ARE YOU ENTERING MY VEHICLE" will short-circuit the entire U.S. legal system? 

I live in Russia and I think we don't have any checkpoints, only traffic control posts.  

Where did you deploy?

Aaron Zehner is the author of "The Foolchild Invention" available in paperback and e-book format. Read free excerpts here and here.