A one man revolt [Archive] - Legion of Lions

]LoL[Harm

02-19-2010, 09:42 AM

It's human nature that when under a large amount of stress to find a cause of that stress. And struggling with money, no matter whose to fault, is one of the largest stresses families have. Playing a blame game for self generated issues happens all the time. Pointing out that this guy is normal isn't really doing much to look at some of the more important aspects of his rant. His blame game was useless from our perspective but may have helped him cope (though we can now see plainly that it didn't) and he had no right to crash a plane into anything, though some believe that martyrdom is a valid way to get peoples attention.

That tax amendment that went into effect in 1987 was something that impacted the independent contractor negatively in both available jobs as well as in pay.

Our tax law is something that is extremely confusing and that seems to favor those who are able to claim special deductions (such as churches, big businesses and those who earn money through investments), where a normal couple who owns their home is reamed every year because they have no ability to lower their taxable income. Which is not just.

What are your thoughts on the rant outside of his blame game?

]LoL[Harm

02-19-2010, 10:08 AM

Deus Ex Malcontent often voices the same views I have on things and here is an interesting take on the whole shebang, this is of course outside of picking through his rant for nuggets of discussion: http://www.deusexmalcontent.com/2010/02/ive-just-had-enough.html

Muadi

02-19-2010, 11:21 AM

While reading his manifesto, I could not help but think about this group. I hear the same frustrations from the voices here.

You could sense his frustrations quite well, I thould he did a good job at putting his thoughts down. It was however the same old 'woh is me, everybody is picking on me' crap. I can understand being in a crappy situation, but thinking its never your own doing is just silly. We all are able to guide/direct the direction of our lives. He was wrong for what he did. It did however point out something, as he stated, that his actions/death were the only way to get his 15 minutes of a message out to the people. It worked. But like most actions like this, it will be forgotten about in 2 weeks. If he was still alive, and trying to make these statements, nobody would have listened or cared. His crappy actions atleast get the message out.

Its obvious the tax codes are insane. Every time our government tries to fix it, they add information to try and fix rather than simply remove the text. I wonder how long it will be, if ever, till there is a real revolt.

Allison

02-19-2010, 01:52 PM

LoL[Harm;172353']

What are your thoughts on the rant outside of his blame game?

It's hard to say. I read it yesterday, so it's not fresh in my mind, but as I recall, he wasn't specific enough about any particular thing to comment. It's hard to comment on a general rant about greedy politicians, the Catholic Church, a murderous medical system, and the IRS.

What was his point, exactly? That the world is unfair? And that average Joes like him who try to avoid paying taxes get fined? What a shocker. Go attend some more groups of citizens sitting around reading the tax code, and by all means, do whatever they say. That always works out. Just ask Wesley Snipes. Or cash in all your IRAs, don't file a tax return, and then cry about it when the IRS calls you on it. Or obsess for 20 years about a change in the tax code and then try to carry out a mass murder when you don't get your way. Oh the injustice.

I'm sorry, but I just can't get past his self-obsessed, warped view of reality long enough to comment on any of the obscure, overly-general "points" he made.

And frankly, it bothers me that people want to discuss the merits of his rant, as if there's something to be learned from it ... some way to decipher what drove him to fly his plane into a building. Let the psychologists parse through it. Maybe they can learn something to help the next guy. But there's nothing in there about the unfairness of society that we don't already know. Yeah, the tax code is ridiculous. Ludicrous. Impossible to comprehend. Unfair. All of that. And? In the grand scheme of things, that's what I call a high class problem.

How's that for a rant?

Noleader

02-19-2010, 02:19 PM

Allison I think his point was a larger one when him just being pist about getting caught tax cheating. He was speaking to the larger issue at hand, which is why is it right for the government to lay claim to my labor (which is your life) all while holding up the banner of freedom. Freedom is the absence of a coercive force which the current incarnation of the state is.

Like I said before I disagree with his action but I do understand his disputes with the system.

Also Harm I do think the only way we will ever see real change in this nation is via revolt. That being said I don't think it would have to be armed revolt, just a masses finally deciding we no longer want part in the system the way it is. The deciding factor for the armed/unarmed part is how the state responds.

Noleader

02-19-2010, 02:38 PM

Or obsess for 20 years about a change in the tax code and then try to carry out a mass murder when you don't get your way. Oh the injustice.

This really strikes a cord with me because it is ignoring one side of it. While I don't think it is the right of any person to take a life (state included) I don't think those in the IRS office have clean hands. Those same people that became the victims today made victims of countless Americans over the course of their employment. Just because they did it with the states backing does not lessen the fact that they left destruction in their wake for a number of hard working Americans that might have taken the wrong deductions or forgot to claim some pay that was 1099'ed to them.

I read a interesting excerpt from a book someone posted on a topic similer to this, while I don't agree it is a great fit for this current topic I would like to share it none the less.

"Real life isn't like the movies. In the movies, the bad guy is always so obviously evil that when he dies, in some spectacular finale, everyone stands up and cheers. That's not how it works in real life. In real life, the people who have to be killed to protect the innocent are hardly ever truly evil themselves. Instead, their sin is usually just being stupid, and doing what they're told. That's all. ... The state uses violence for everything it does. Every law is a command, and if anyone disobeys, force is used to make them comply. And good people don't want to resist. Even if they don't like the law, even if they think it's unjust, the last thing they want to do is kill some poor pawn who is just doing what he was told. It would be so much easier if only evil people committed evil, but through the belief in 'authority,' otherwise good people routinely become agents of evil. Even the atrocities of Hitler's regime, Stalin's regime, and all the others, were the result of a few truly evil people, and thousands upon thousands of merely obedient people. The real villains aren't stupid enough to go to the front lines themselves. That's what compliant subjects are for. But the result is that the good people of the world are left with a choice: either allow evil to occur, or kill people who are merely misguided or ignorant. Most people choose the first option, and mankind has suffered unspeakable horrors because of it."

]LoL[Harm

02-19-2010, 03:10 PM

Nice rant Allison, now that's what I'm talking about as a response!

Did you read the Deus Ex Malcontent yet? It's how I feel about the issue.

And though I agree with what you said here: "And frankly, it bothers me that people want to discuss the merits of his rant, as if there's something to be learned from it", I just like having discussions about things, and well this was the topic of the day. :)

And I totally dig that book quote Noleader.

Allison

02-19-2010, 09:29 PM

Yeah, Noleader. I get that he had a bigger point, though he didn't state it very well. I just think his response to the unfairness of the tax code was unreasonable. And I think it's pointless to rail against the government as if we live in some evil dictatorship. Sure, a lot of people don't always get what they want from government, but that's the nature of democracy. And for all our flaws, we still live in a representative democracy, and the people get the government they create.

And what is that excerpt from? My only two options are to either allow evil to occur or to kill ignorant and misguided people? Okay, sure, I can see that ... in extreme circumstances. But let's get a little perspective here. Go live somewhere where you're tortured and left for dead for speaking your mind, or where there's 70% unemployment, or where you have to bribe city officials to buy property or have someone arrested, or where women can't leave the house without a male escort ... and then come talk to me about how evil our democratically elected government is. (Edit: Not you, personally, Noleader. Just ranting here.)

I'm not saying we don't have problems. We do. And people should work to correct whatever they think needs correcting. But I'm so tired of hearing people speak about our government as if we're living under the Taliban. It's ludicrous.

Allison

02-19-2010, 09:52 PM

Almost forgto ... yes Harm, I did read that other link. Good stuff.

And for your funny-bone pleasure, a translated version of "The Rant." http://rimbosity.com/writings/joe-stack-translated.html

Noleader

02-20-2010, 06:01 AM

I will have to find the place I got the excerpt from because I can't remember where it is from.

One thing I would like to correct in your rant is that we do not live in a Democracy (granted it is more like one now). As the structure of our government was designed as a Democratic Republic. Our founders actually had very few good things to say about Democracy.

MickeyFinn

02-20-2010, 07:10 AM

Everybody needs to get off their high horse and stop extrapolating the situation. A man tried to kill innocent people because he was mad. He's a murderer. End of story.

]LoL[Harm

02-20-2010, 09:42 AM

Yeah that point has already been conceded Mickey. Not only is he a murderer he is in all truth a terrorist. But I always like a good talk, even if the topic is dredged up by some terrorist action.

Noleader

02-21-2010, 06:50 AM

Everybody needs to get off their high horse and stop extrapolating the situation. A man tried to kill innocent people because he was mad. He's a murderer. End of story.

Why is it so bad to talk about things like this?

Granted he tried to kill a lot of people but to just pretend their is no meaning to it, or lessons to be gained from it, is just stupid. If we ever hope to prevent actions like this in the future it helps to understand what the guy was thinking.

Last week it was just that one guy being crazy and crashing a plane into a IRS office. Tomorrow it might be a small, but growing, group of people that decide armed revolt is the answer to their problems (and if things get worse that becomes more possible). We should know what the motivation for these people is so we might be better equipt to disarm the 'trigger' before it goes off.

To just dismiss what happened as 'crazy guy' is the equivalent of saying Osama hates America because we are free and rich. It is just mouth service to a bigger issue that we just don't want to address.

Allison

02-21-2010, 12:28 PM

See, the problem is, Noleader, is that you see this guy as someone with legitimate concerns who had finally had too much and just snapped. I see him as a narcissist who couldn't accept his own failures, and who, if he weren't obsessed with the IRS, would have been obsessed with the Dept of Agriculture or the Piggly Wiggly or alien abductors. The fact that he may have had some legitimate concerns is irrelevant.

Saying we should analyze his concerns to prevent future attacks is like saying we should examine the concerns of the wife beater to prevent future wife-beatings. Their concerns may happen to be valid: the IRS may suck and the wife may be a nag. But it's not a matter of fixing the IRS and teaching women not to be nags and then everything will be fine. People who commit acts of violence for less-than necessary reasons have problems. If they don't do it for this reason they'll do it for that one. It's a mental health issue. If you want to examine anything, examine why this person wasn't able to cope and what can be done to prevent that kind of mental illness in the future.

Post

02-21-2010, 04:49 PM

"To just dismiss what happened as 'crazy guy' is the equivalent of saying Osama hates America because we are free and rich."

I disagree. The importance in understanding bin Laden isn't because bin Laden does crazy things, it's because his mindset is a mindset that a lot of people have, and that a lot of people are driven to do terrible things.

Now, is this guy like bin Laden? I guess it's possible, but frankly, there's a very very small likelihood simply because it's not happening all the time. People aren't going to war for it. Not "tea party meeting" war, but "willing to kill yourself" war.

The much higher likelihood is that, no matter how good this country is to its people (and still in the real world and functioning), this guy would still be nuts. He'd probably still be doing things messed up. Now, while bin Laden may have fallen in the same boat, there wouldn't be an entire region feeling the same way willing to give their lives for that feeling.

That's the difference. Thinking otherwise is ignoring Ockham's razor by a huge degree.

MickeyFinn

02-21-2010, 05:30 PM

Oh, Ockham's razor reference. I like it.

Noleader

02-22-2010, 03:16 PM

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704757904575077381781219798.html

Post

02-22-2010, 03:40 PM

And that particular issue may very well be worthwhile to understand their motivations. But understanding this guy's mindset - someone who had a beef with the IRS and happened to go to jail for tax fraud, so he ran a plane into a building with no intentions other than killing himself and garnering attention - because it may have a correlation with the death threats to the IRS?

Again, I think it's possible, but not a probable avenue worth going down.

Buki

02-22-2010, 03:57 PM

Noleader you're a champion among men, just sayin. Readin through this, I can def see two sides of the coin. One face is saying the man commited terrorism, therefore all his complaints and arguments become invalid. Which I feel is important when looking at Global terrorism. Just because folks don't get there way dosn't give them the right to blow shit up.

But this fella is differant. Most of the complaints about his attitude and inability to adiquately express himself miss the fact that this man prolly wasn't always this way. I'm sure this road to disaster took him along time and given the right circumstances he would have fixed his issues if help presented itself. And in that aspect it is an individuals job to identify when they need help and seek that help out.
But to only look at the end product, and judge this whole incident on that moment is faulty. This mans agenda wasn't to secure his home land from oppressive folk, he just wanted his money issues under control.
As I'm sure whole lot of other people want help with, which is why Noleaders above post is so awesome.

Buki

02-22-2010, 03:59 PM

Oh and post You betcha as soon as people saw this guy ran a plane into an IRS building cause he was pissed, so many others picked up there phone and started bitching. Shit like this is wildfire, the idea that "this guy just ran a plane into a building, whatever I do can't be worse than that."
You see it all over the place

Allison

02-22-2010, 05:48 PM

One face is saying the man committed terrorism, therefore all his complaints and arguments become invalid.

I hope that's not the impression I gave. My feeling is this:

If an act of terrorism is committed solely for political reasons, and those political reasons are substantial, then I think it's beneficial and necessary to analyze and explore those reasons to see if changes can be made to prevent future attacks, among other things. That's a policy issue.

However, if an act of terrorism is committed for less-than substantial reasons (i.e. the prices of stamps went up), or if the individual is disturbed, then no amount of discussion or understanding about the complaints of the terrorist will prevent another attack. It's simply a mental health issue.

I think this case falls in the latter category.

Post

02-22-2010, 10:10 PM

"You betcha as soon as people saw this guy ran a plane into an IRS building cause he was pissed, so many others picked up there phone and started bitching."

Probably so. And there's a near-equal likelihood that even if our government was as real-world Utopian as it could possibly be, and people saw this guy run a plane into an IRS building cause he was pissed, many others would still be picking up their phone and bitching. Hence my point that attributing it to a sign of our sick government and not more so of a sick mind is ignoring Ockham's razor.

MickeyFinn

02-23-2010, 04:46 AM

Illiteracy aside, you can't make assumptions like (I'm going to rewrite your quote, don't take offense) "He probably wasn't always this way". That is a completely bogus rebuttal.

The argument isn't that the nutball has no point, it is that his point is both moot and irrelevant because there is absolutely no excuse to commit murder. As such, there is no reason to read his complaint.

Consider this. A woman drowns her children in a bathtub, citing that she's saving her kids from the horrible world we live in. There's no doubt she loved her children, and that she was suffering from a horrid mental illness- but it's irrelevant. She's a murderer.

Post

02-23-2010, 06:22 AM

Furthermore, it's not a red flag to see how horrible the world we live in really is.

Buki

02-23-2010, 09:25 AM

Again a point dosn't become moot or irrelevant just because you don't like how it is delivered, if that is your stance you will learn nothing from persons outside of your socially acceptable window. (if I recall correctly he didn't even kill anyone did he)

And I'm not really sure what the red flag thingy means. Only thing i can think it means is that oh shit happens so persons shouldn't be suprised when it happens to them?

Ps. I'm not the best speller or checking my posts for grammar, so if its merely for my sake you can for go pointing that out.

Buki

02-23-2010, 09:30 AM

Ah Allison I see your point, and its a good one. But we don't know if the fella is mentally ill. My only objective was to bring around the idea that Taking a snapshot of this guys life cannot possibly give you or anyone else a good enough idea about him. To decisively say, none of his problems were legit and could or couldn't have been valid.

So to say something like
Everybody needs to get off their high horse and stop extrapolating the situation. A man tried to kill innocent people because he was mad. He's a murderer. End of story.
Just shows that you're unable to appreciate the other side of the coin

Noleader

02-23-2010, 01:24 PM

The argument isn't that the nutball has no point, it is that his point is both moot and irrelevant because there is absolutely no excuse to commit murder. As such, there is no reason to read his complaint.

While I agree there is no excuse to commit murder it does not mean that we can just sit back and pretend it did not happen because we don't like the nasty side of things.

I am going to take some liberity here to express my point a bit. Lets say this guy was involved in a sect like that of the manson family and he thought the revolt was coming. After a while when it was not starting he decided to go out and provoke the revolt with a act of murder. You are saying that knowing about this, reading up on his mindset, serves no purpose? Are we to assume acts far outside the social norm are relegated to those that pose no threat once their own life is lost?

I mearly offer that regardless of how we feel about the act committed it is right and proper that we understand why they were committed. If it turns out to just be a crazy that was off his meds then by all means forget about it and move on. If there is more to the story I think we owe the victims of said attack a little time in figuring out what provoked the attack and how to prevent it in the future.

Consider this. A woman drowns her children in a bathtub, citing that she's saving her kids from the horrible world we live in. There's no doubt she loved her children, and that she was suffering from a horrid mental illness- but it's irrelevant. She's a murderer.

With that mindset we would have never had the break throughs in the understanding of the brain when dealing with postpartum depression, and thus saving some childrens lives. You can't just look at an act and not consider all the things that lead to the act.

While some things in this world are black and white one must understand that we spend most of our time in the gray zone.

Post

02-23-2010, 03:01 PM

"Again a point dosn't become moot or irrelevant just because you don't like how it is delivered, if that is your stance you will learn nothing from persons outside of your socially acceptable window."

I'm not stating he didn't have a point. I'm stating the point he was making isn't more important or urgent because he killed himself, nor was the things he was making points about legitimate concerns as causes of his death. Just because he was crazy (and he was, taking you own life is crazy by depression or SOMETHING invoking a non-normal response), doesn't mean he was wrong. I get that.

1) He did crazy actions AND he may be right. (true)
2) He did crazy actions (even partly) BECAUSE he may be right. (false)

No one here, on either side, is disagreeing with (1). And who knows? Maybe there were other things that invoked his crazy actions, be it upbringing, drug use or whatever. But the things he was ranting about in his suicide note?

No.

Buki

02-23-2010, 03:33 PM

I guess I need to make quotes more, cause those comments weren't directed at you there post :p

Post

02-23-2010, 03:36 PM

Doh? My reply can also substitute for further explaining what I mean by a "red flag," too.

MickeyFinn

02-23-2010, 06:12 PM

With that mindset we would have never had the break throughs in the understanding of the brain when dealing with postpartum depression, and thus saving some childrens lives.

We wouldn't make any breakthroughs with that state of mind if they had all gone on a murder/suicide spree though. It's very hard to diagnose or learn from a mental illness from a brain that is sprawled about the floor.

As a liberal person on many topics, this thread wreaks of bleeding heart. To give this man credence is to insult the innocent people he killed. There are plenty of intelligent, well spoken, educated people who can make that same point (and do) every day.

I suppose my point is that crashing a plane into a building is the only thing this man did differently than someone else- and that act, my friends, should not be a reason to give him the time of day.

]LoL[Harm

02-23-2010, 11:38 PM

Bleeding heart? Eh?

I haven't given this man any credence. I gave credence to some of the things that were in his suicide note, and no one has given any credence to his actions. So not sure where any of your second paragraph is coming from.

I wasn't even aware of the legislation or its history before reading this mans suicide note and got the urge to research it some, so in that at least I've learned something. I'm sorry you weren't able to find anything of use to you.