[HN Gopher] Tennessee man arrested, accused of threatening a sho...
___________________________________________________________________
Tennessee man arrested, accused of threatening a shooting, after
posting meme
Author : zzzeek
Score : 258 points
Date : 2025-10-11 18:17 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (reason.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (reason.com)
| iancmceachern wrote:
| No one is safe in this environment
| nerdponx wrote:
| Conservatives mostly can get away with anything right now.
| mindslight wrote:
| There's nothing "conservative" about the fascist movement.
| It's regressive / reactionary (to use Yarvin's own label).
| baobabKoodaa wrote:
| Self-identified "conservatives" are pushing this wave of
| censorship and autocracy. You're not helping anyone with
| those rhetoric tricks.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Self-identified "conservatives" are pushing this wave
| of censorship and autocracy_
|
| Are they? MAGA has made it a point to purge the former
| GOP of conservatives.
| baobabKoodaa wrote:
| I'm gonna need a source for that with specificity to the
| "conservative" self-identification.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| You're the one who made the claim that "self-identified
| 'conservatives' are pushing this wave of censorship and
| autocracy." Isn't the burden of proof on you?
|
| In any case, we have polling around non-MAGA Republicans
| [1]. And contrasting Trump 1 and 2 seems to show how
| having non-MAGA Republicans, many of whom identified as
| conservative and didn't endorse the 2020 coup attempt,
| makes a difference.
|
| [1] https://d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/econt
| oplines...
| baobabKoodaa wrote:
| Here's one example of the MAGA crowd self-identifying as
| conservative: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_
| Political_Action_...
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Here 's one example of the MAGA crowd self-identifying
| as conservative_
|
| Sorry, I didn't mean to imply _no_ conservatives are
| MAGA. Just that I would be surprised if a majority of
| self-identifying conservatives identify with MAGA. (I
| wouldn 't be surprised if a majority of former
| conservatives were now MAGA.)
|
| The difference is meaningful, because by unifying MAGA
| and conservatives one loses resolution on a powerful
| breakaway faction. (The main reason we had a free and
| fair election in 2020 is because some Republicans upheld
| their oaths to the Constitution.)
| boston_clone wrote:
| This just in, the National Socialist Party of Germany in
| the 1930s is not actually Socialist !
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _the National Socialist Party of Germany in the 1930s
| is not actually Socialist_
|
| Good comparison. One of the victims of the Night of the
| Long Knives were the Strasserists [1][2]. It's absolutely
| legitimate to point out when the German Socialist
| movement was coopted by Hitler.
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Long_Knives
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasserism
| baobabKoodaa wrote:
| No true socialist could do such a thing.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _No true socialist could do such a thing_
|
| You're really going to reduce a historical event to
| platitudes?
|
| What people call themselves matters. It may not be
| strictly correct. But it's an identity, and that predicts
| how they'll align in a crisis or movement.
| baobabKoodaa wrote:
| It was a reference to "no true scottsman"
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _It was a reference to "no true scottsman"_
|
| I know. A platitude is a trite and obvious remark.
|
| Whether the Nazis are true socialists is a red herring.
| The point is the people who called themselves socialist
| before the Nazis were systematically purged by the Nazis
| once they coopted their party. It would be incorrect to
| say self-identified socialists were responsible for
| everything the Nazis did; it _would_ be correct to say
| they enabled them to rise to power.
|
| Most importantly, however, would be observing that right
| _before_ the Nazis consolidated power, it was the former
| socialists who could have been peeled away, potentially
| to huge consequence.
| mindslight wrote:
| > _Self-identified "conservatives" are pushing this wave
| of censorship and autocracy_
|
| Yes, exactly! They are lying to themselves, and as a
| group. They're not conserving our society, but rather
| throwing it away. I'm not doing a rhetorical trick - they
| are doing a rhetorical trick, and I am calling it out.
| Bratmon wrote:
| This is a distinction without a difference. "Regressive",
| "reactionary", and "conservative" are three words that
| refer to the exact same people and mean the exact same
| thing.
| mindslight wrote:
| No, the words mean different things. When used to refer
| to a group, those meanings confer connotations. The point
| is that we need to stop referring to people destroying
| our society as "conservative".
| hyperhello wrote:
| > Bushart did not elaborate, but the context seems clear: Why
| should I care about this shooting, when the sitting president
| said I should "get over" this other shooting?
|
| From one perspective, this is clearly bad governance. He's using
| his free speech rights that generations of us died for, to point
| out hypocrisy.
|
| I'm going to say it, and we'll see if I get arrested for it.
| Charlie Kirk was one of the useful idiots groomed from high
| school to push conservative propaganda. One of his assignments
| was to minimize the cultural impact of school shootings. He died
| in front of thousands in a school shooting.
|
| Maybe that irony is something and maybe it is nothing. But the
| essence of conservative propaganda, that will survive any
| individual propaganda and any individual regime, is the central
| idea that some of us have rights and freedoms and some of us
| don't. So any deviation from that idea must be punished very
| severely.
| rayiner wrote:
| School shootings have gone up dramatically since the 1960s.[1]
| Since that time, the percentage of children with divorced
| parents had gone up dramatically, while the percentage of
| households with guns has gone down, significantly.[2]
|
| The conservative view simply is that this correlation is
| causal, while the liberal view is that the causation runs in
| the opposite direction of the correlation. That's not
| "propaganda," it's one way of trying to make sense of the
| world.
|
| [1] https://www.theviolenceproject.org/data-on-social-
| media/numb...
|
| [2] https://www.vpc.org/studies/ownership.pdf
| wbl wrote:
| Are the children in the divorced houses doing the shooting?
| rayiner wrote:
| Most of them: https://www.secretservice.gov/sites/default/f
| iles/2020-04/Pr.... See pages 29-30.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _while the percentage of households with guns has gone
| down, significantly_
|
| The civilian gun stock has grown significantly since the 60s
| [1]. These data, together, seem to imply a large (but
| declining) number of households with a couple of guns and a
| few households with a _ridiculous_ number of guns.
|
| Of course, the dagger in your argument is that American
| divorce rates are not extraordinary [2]. Our gun ownership
| and school shooting rates are.
|
| Given school shooters [3] (and now political shooters) come
| from gun-owning households, it seems fair to pin the blame
| for these events on that fraction of one third of American
| households who maintain private armories.
|
| [1] https://www.thetrace.org/2023/03/guns-america-data-atf-
| total...
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_divorc
| e_r...
|
| [3] https://publications.aap.org/aapnews/news/27379/Study-
| Adoles...
| robotresearcher wrote:
| > Of course, the dagger in your argument is...
|
| Reading comprehension moment: the parent comment was
| carefully not claiming either side of the argument.
|
| Your response, and the downvotes, are as if they declared
| for the locally unpopular side. They did not.
| mft_ wrote:
| Not sure I agree, based on (more subtle?) reading
| comprehension.
|
| > The conservative view simply is that this correlation
| is causal, while the liberal view is that the causation
| runs in the opposite direction of the correlation.
|
| You're right that the poster doesn't make it clear
| (deliberately or not) but the use of the word "simply"
| feels sympathetic, and suggesting that the "liberal view"
| is that correlation and causation are opposed (when that
| would typically be counter-intuitive) sounds critical. At
| least, that was my comprehension of the post, as someone
| without any skin in the game.
| maleldil wrote:
| Suggesting both points of view as reasonable is an
| indication of what they really think.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Your response, and the downvotes_
|
| I upvoted rayiner's comment because it's argued in good
| faith.
|
| (What _would_ be in bad faith would be putting forward a
| third party's flawed argument without pointing out the
| flaws for shits and giggles.)
| rayiner wrote:
| I certainly believe in the argument so no problem
| ascribing it to me.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| For what it's worth, I don't think the science on this is
| settled. I think the evidence swings towards too many
| irresponsible Americans having too many guns. But the
| single-family bias in school shooters is something I
| hadn't read about before.
|
| One takeaway from that evidence, however, could be that
| single-parent homes should have restrictions on how many
| guns they can own, what kind of guns those can be and how
| they must be stored. The fact that American single-family
| kids turn into school shooters, while the rest of the
| (rich) world's do not, continues to speak to a uniquely
| American nexus. The most obvious and evidenced one is our
| prevalence (and loose regulation) of guns.
| rayiner wrote:
| Surely the more relevant metric is the percentage of
| households with at least one gun? Guns are durable goods
| that people don't dispose of, so of course they accumulate.
| My father in law has boats, old cars, and guns piling up
| around his house. But school shootings typically aren't
| committed by people rummaging through their grandparents'
| basements, right?
|
| Similarly, it surely is better to compare the same country
| over time instead of comparing different countries which
| differ in many additional respects? If your thesis that the
| availability of guns causes school shootings is true, you
| should expect to see school shootings going down in the
| U.S. as the practical availability of a gun goes down.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Surely the more relevant metric is the percentage of
| households with at least one gun?_
|
| Why?
|
| > _Similarly, it surely is better to compare the same
| country over time instead of comparing different
| countries which differ in many additional respects?_
|
| Mass shootings are a distinctly American phenomenon. (One
| happened today. It probably won't make any front pages
| [1].) It absolutely makes sense to ask what we're doing
| wrong relative to other countries.
|
| > _If your thesis that the availability of guns causes
| school shootings is true, you should expect to see school
| shootings going down in the U.S. as the practical
| availability of a gun goes down_
|
| One would expect to see more school shootings in states
| with "more permissive firearm laws and higher rates of
| gun ownership" [2]. One does.
|
| I also challenge the notion that fewer households with
| more guns makes guns less available to kids. A household
| with one or two guns is probably keeping track of them in
| a way one with a new gun every Christmas is not.
|
| 82% of school shooters don't grow up in stable homes [3].
| Practically all of them are from gun homes. More
| critically, the prevalence of two-parent households has
| been going _up_ since the mid-2000s [4]. So have mass
| shootings.
|
| (Kirk's assassin grew up in a stable home. He used the
| rifle his family gifted him to do the deed [5].)
|
| [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gvgr7w2yko
|
| [2] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35449898/
|
| [3] https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/shoot
| ers_myt...
|
| [4] https://ifstudies.org/blog/the-resurgence-of-the-two-
| parent-...
|
| [5] https://people.com/tyler-robinson-received-rifle-as-
| gift-use...
| conception wrote:
| Huh that's interesting on gun ownership though is pretty
| flat, 5%ish decrease. But also hunting has dropped a lot but
| gun ownership hasn't matched that trend so people are getting
| guns for non-hunting reasons at greater rates as well -
| weapons more than as tools.
| philjohn wrote:
| https://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations
| card_zero wrote:
| I noticed the increase over time too. In the 1920s, the era
| of Al Capone and friends shooting up restaurants with
| submachine guns, there were 10 incidents of school shootings.
| What's up with that? I guess the population was smaller ...
| was it 26 times smaller than the 2010s (259 incidents)? I
| checked, and in fact the difference is about a factor of 3,
| not 26.
| jandrewrogers wrote:
| The largest school massacre in US history[0] happened in
| the 1920s. It was accomplished with high explosives. There
| were several school bombings in the 1950s too but few
| shootings. For whatever reason, school shootings displaced
| school bombings in recent decades. It has been a long time
| since there has been a major school bombing.
|
| Bombings were the popular mode of creating mass casualties
| 50+ years ago even though actual machine-guns were widely
| available back then and almost completely unavailable for
| the last several decades.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster
| rayiner wrote:
| The U.S. population has about tripled since 1920.
| jandrewrogers wrote:
| Up until the 1960s, almost all of the mass casualty events at
| schools, including the largest one in US history, were
| accomplished using explosives. If you only look at shootings
| you'll miss the bigger picture.
|
| The most interesting question that arises from this is why
| the switch from explosives to firearms by perpetrators of
| mass casualty events.
|
| It wasn't due to regulations on high-explosives, which were
| essentially cash-and-carry for the entire 20th century. On
| the other hand, regulation of firearms greatly increased
| starting in the 1960s.
| freedomben wrote:
| Who groomed him, and who gave him the assignment to minimize
| the cultural impact of school shootings?
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| An uncaring algorithm that maximizes engagement.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Rush Limbaugh and Bill Montgomery for the first bit.
|
| The second bit he was hardly innovative on. That's been a
| thing since at least Columbine.
| eth0up wrote:
| There's a large group of people saying that anyone who doesn't
| accept a guy from a couple thousand years ago into a primary
| organ in their chest area, that not only do they deserve to
| die, they will, and then be damned for eternity.
|
| Others openly suggest capital punishment for nonviolent crimes.
| E.g. narco boaters, repeat offenders, homeless (see:
| Killmeade), drugs etc. In fact, we have no sanctions on
| Singapore, a land where one can indeed be killed for fussing
| with drugs. There are of course, many other similar examples.
|
| Both the left, right and many between recommend death for many
| people, in a manner having nothing to do with self defense,
| response to murder or in alignment with current law. Ouch.
|
| We have a LOT OF PEOPLE TO ARREST! I expect hypocrisy to
| complicate the process a bit though.
|
| Edit: I should say, by the speed of the dvotes, I'll be on the
| hitlist too. And upholding the First Amendment and the rest of
| our Constitution is well worth it.
| daseiner1 wrote:
| large-scale drug smuggling is absolutely a violent crime.
| eth0up wrote:
| Even when it isn't?
|
| Edit: what your type tends to be highly obtuse to, is the
| impending reality of blowback, where your warping of law is
| turned upon you. But it feels so good now, it must be worth
| it.
|
| Abuse of power has serious consequences.
| childintime wrote:
| Then corruption should be on the list too.
|
| Corruption at the very top is what I'd like to see capital
| punishment for. Exclusively.
| eth0up wrote:
| There's a group that plays with Guilt by Association.
| It's fun. Until someone else does it. But the frenzy
| comes when everybody does it. And some just can't see
| that coming.
| oceansky wrote:
| How?
| vkou wrote:
| The excuse for why he was arrested (some school in the area
| shares the same name as the one that Trump was downplaying a
| shooting at) is, of course utter bullshit.
|
| Its amazing how far people are willing to bend over backwards to
| explain how the speech of these public figures is harmless and
| non-threatening and none of us have anything to worry about
| (despite their actions putting the lie to it), but apply an
| entirely different set of standards to people criticising them.
|
| Much of Kirk's public life and the life of his political allies
| was devoted to minimizing the impact of and the empathy we should
| feel for school shootings (because the ends justify the means of
| furthering his political agenda). He went on to die in one.
| NetMageSCW wrote:
| What school shooting did he die in?
| vkou wrote:
| He was at a school, he got shot by a man who got a gun and
| took it to a school with intent to kill.
|
| This happens every day to other people, and the advice of him
| and his political allies has always been to get over it and
| to stop politicizing it. It would be great if they could
| collectively take it and stop politicizing it.
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| The utah valley university shooting
| card_zero wrote:
| #497 by my count, excluding non-fatal ones.
| nailer wrote:
| The Kirk assassination was awful, as well as the plainly false
| things said about his life by some parts of the media. But nobody
| is obligated to have a particular political opinion and Kirk
| himself would have pointed out that civil disagreement is this
| man's right as an American.
| watwut wrote:
| Kirks career literally started with organised harasment of what
| they perceived as leftists professors. Kirk himself was pretty
| atrocious verbally to people he looked down at. And he wink
| wink condoned violence against husband of democrat.
|
| His murder was wrong. It is not true that he would be some kind
| of universal "civil disagreement" advocate.
| nerdponx wrote:
| Murdering bad people is _probably_ wrong, up to certain
| limits. Arresting someone for saying that the victim was also
| a bad person is definitely unequivocally wrong.
| nailer wrote:
| I'm pretty sure murder is wrong.
| nailer wrote:
| Do you want to post an example? Kirk would defend students
| being harassed for unrelated political matters - eg the most
| recent case on his channel was an Agriculture major who had
| to take some kind of 'equity in agriculture' class and was
| being bothered by her professor for not being left leaning.
| watwut wrote:
| Kirk on the attack against Pelosi husband: "Why has he not
| been bailed out? [] By the way, if some amazing patriot out
| there in San Francisco or the Bay Area wants to really be a
| midterm hero, someone should go and bail this guy out,..."
| That was about attacker by the way. Like common, the start
| if Kirks career was making a list of "leftists professors"
| and promoting their harassment. Kirk literally
| intentionally created and promoted toxic culture we have
| now. That is who he was.
|
| Yeah, he would defend right winger or bigot. He would
| attack anyone not right wing. The rights of people who were
| not white conservatives did not concerned kirk. He was
| literally against civil rights, openly. Blacks are all
| stupid and trans are all groomers. They all should be
| fired.
|
| I have no idea about what happened between that "left
| leaning professor" and student. But there is about zero
| reason to believe what right wing activist like Kirk says
| about the issue. As far as he was concerned, left need not
| exist and need to be punished for existing.
| whatshisface wrote:
| I think this is an example of using slow trials as a nonjudicial
| weapon. The defendant did not break the law and isn't likely to
| be convicted (at least not on appeal), but they can hold him in
| jail for months because they got mad at his Facebook post.
| _heimdall wrote:
| That should be where the right to a speedy trial comes into
| play. If he is held in jail because he isn't released on bail,
| the best thing to do is repeatedly file motions for the speedy
| trial.
| everforward wrote:
| A speedy trial is much slower than you'd probably think. I
| can't find specific guidelines for Tennessee beyond having
| the right to one. The federal guidelines are generally 30
| days to make a specific charge, and 70 days from then to
| appear before a judge. That also doesn't ensure the case goes
| to trial, just that you've had a hearing.
|
| Ie you can spend over 3 months in jail before an hearing and
| still be considered to have had a speedy trial. He'd have to
| wait til after that period to even file a motion for
| dismissal on speedy trial grounds, and then wait for the
| hearing on that to happen.
|
| This is part of why plea deals are so common. Even if he were
| somehow to be convicted, his sentence would probably be less
| than the speedy trial window. At a certain point, the
| prosecution will offer to bump it down to some kind of
| misdemeanor with jail time less than he's already done so
| it's time served. He may as well plead guilty to that because
| otherwise he'll keep sitting in jail waiting on a trial and
| do more time for no reason.
|
| There's no realistic route where he gets compensated for
| being wrongly prosecuted, even if he goes to trial and is
| found not guilty.
|
| The justice system is deeply, deeply flawed and unjust.
| gamblor956 wrote:
| At the state level, if a defendant does not waive their
| right to a speedy trial, the time from being charged
| (arraignment) to trial is limited by law. It ranges from 30
| days for misdemeanors to 6 months for felonies. .
|
| In California, the clock for a misdemeanor is 30 days if a
| defendant is taken into custody, or 45 days if not in
| custody. For a felony, it's 60 days from arraignment. If
| the defendant remains in custody after arrest, arraignment
| must occur within 48 hours of arrest, or on the first
| business day after the 48-hour period expires if it ends on
| a weekend or court holiday. If the defendant is freed from
| custody prior to arraignment, then arraignment can occur at
| a later date.
|
| In NY and most red states, the clock is approximately 6
| months for felonies. Due to the longer clock, in many of
| these states the clock begins when the defendant is taken
| into custody (or the state has a shorter timeframe for
| trial for defendants in custody). Florida just changed its
| laws to make the clock start on arraignment, lengthened the
| time required for arraignment to 30 days for defendants in
| custody, and made the speedy trial right an affirmative
| right that the defendant must specifically assert. Unlike
| pretty much every other state, the clock also restarts if
| the prosecutor withdraws and re-files the same charges (in
| almost every other state, the clock is only started anew
| for new charges.) FL also made the consequences for
| violation of these rights a mere dismissal without
| prejudice. (TLDR: don't get arrested in Florida.)
|
| Most defense lawyers will advise clients to waive their
| speedy trial rights. This is for the lawyer's benefit, not
| the client's. It allows the lawyer to preserve their
| negotiating relationship with the prosecutor for future
| clients. In California, due to the shortened time frames,
| 99% of the time it is advisable to assert speedy trial
| rights (especially in felonies, but even in misdemeanors)
| because the prosecution usually can't get its act together
| in time. Some forensics can't even be completed in the 60
| day window. The defense win rate in proceedings where the
| defendant asserts their speedy trial rights is so high that
| prosecutors will _always_ offer a sweetheart plea deal to
| avoid going to trial.
|
| (Of course the obvious solution is for the prosecutors to
| just wait until they have an actual complete case before
| filing charges. But if they did that we wouldn't need
| speedy trial laws in the first place.)
| scythe wrote:
| I think if there's a major constitutional right to be invoked
| here, it's the Eighth Amendment "excessive bail shall not be
| required". Two million dollars?! For a 61-year-old posting on
| Facebook? What kind of risk does he pose exactly?
| someemptyspace wrote:
| He can post again, so highly likely to "reoffend".
| estearum wrote:
| Pointing attention at the basic hypocrisy and complete lack
| of principle of Dear Leader's party is an existential risk!
| bn-l wrote:
| Bail is set at 2 million. So it's a strategy
| marcusb wrote:
| As they say, you can beat the rap, but you can't beat the ride.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _but you can 't beat the ride_
|
| You sure as hell can get paid for it afterwards.
| overfeed wrote:
| Those settlements need to come out of police retirement
| funds, to better align interests.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Those settlements need to come out of police
| retirement funds, to better align interests_
|
| If the sheriff, DA and judge each thought this was a good
| idea, it's fair for the voters who hired them to take the
| hit.
| tremon wrote:
| Are sheriff, DA and judge directly electable positions
| then? I thought they were appointed by the Council or
| Senate (no, I don't live in the US nor do I have any
| desire to).
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| In some places in the states, yes, all three can be
| elected.
|
| Typically the sheriff is always elected, the DA almost
| always elected, and for the judges it depends, but if
| they aren't elected they are appointed by elected
| officials.
|
| The other thing to remember is that the US judicial
| system varies tremendously by state. No two states are
| the same so there is no easy way to summarize it.
| shredprez wrote:
| Had the exact same thought. How is there not a reasonable
| maximum time you can hold someone pre-trial? As always, rich
| offenders walk free.
| philjohn wrote:
| IIRC some states have defined timeframes where charges are
| dismissed if the case is not brought to trial.
| senkora wrote:
| The process is the punishment.
| IlikeKitties wrote:
| And that's why there should be serious consequences for
| everyone involved in this prosecution and prosecutions like it.
| If the case is as described here, there should be jail time
| involved for kidnapping and false imprisonment. But any justice
| system always protects their own.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _why there should be serious consequences for everyone
| involved_
|
| Do we have names of the arresting officers, prosecutors and
| judge this is in front of?
|
| With that we can determine who above them is elected.
| culll_kuprey wrote:
| > "numerous...teachers, parents and students" somehow
| interpreted Bushart's meme--with its citation in fine print
| about a previous school shooting at Perry High School in
| Perry, Iowa--as a threat to carry out a similar shooting at
| nearby Perry County High School.
|
| Wouldn't matter. Those elected would likely be re elected.
| This wasn't Trump advising some federal agency to bully
| someone he doesn't like. It was the community organizing.
| This is the will of the people.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Wouldn't matter. Those elected would likely be re
| elected_
|
| This is just rationalising laziness and nihilism. They
| may get re-elected. That doesn't mean you can't create a
| lot of chaos and cost for them along the way.
|
| Like, I wish _my_ adversaries would preemptively conclude
| that even attempting to oppose me is not worth it.
|
| > _This is the will of the people_
|
| You're concluding this how?
| IlikeKitties wrote:
| You are 100% correct. Just recently a single website that
| linked some e-mail addresses destroyed the EU Plans for
| chat control. Apathy and Cynicism would've led it happen
| but just the act of making one website and posting it at
| the right places, something everyone here could easily
| do, changed the course of law dramatically.
|
| That small victory really made me reconsider.
| grafmax wrote:
| I think you have a lot of faith in democratic processes at
| this point, despite widespread evidence such as this very
| article that they are being clearly undermined.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _you have a lot of faith in democratic processes at
| this point_
|
| I think civic laziness and nihilism, particularly in
| Silicon Valley, did a lot to get us to where we are.
| astura wrote:
| Months? This shit can go on for years. Emanuel Fair spent 9
| years in prison and was ultimately acquited.
|
| https://www.investigationdiscovery.com/crimefeed/seeking-jus...
| ta12653421 wrote:
| Funfact:
|
| Icon backgroundcolor of targetsite reason.com seems to be the
| same as HN icon backgroundcolor :-D
| oncallthrow wrote:
| rgb(244, 108, 52) vs rgb(255, 102, 0)
| ta12653421 wrote:
| Well, very quite in the (optical) range, I'd say? (-:
| Aloisius wrote:
| The comments on this article are horrifying. It's clear people
| have lost their damn minds.
| squigz wrote:
| Don't make the mistake of thinking comments on a random article
| are indicative of the way the population actually thinks. They
| may not even be real.
| vkou wrote:
| Oh, they are real, they aren't just bots, and they've all
| been emboldened.
|
| Go on these people's facebooks, or invite them to
| Thanksgiving, you'll see the same firehose of shit.
| culll_kuprey wrote:
| > Go on these people's facebooks, or invite them to
| Thanksgiving, you'll see the same firehose of shit.
|
| A fun game is to look at Facebook profiles selected from
| random comment sections.
|
| By doing this, I have come away with even less
| understanding of people's believes, motivations, etc.
| squigz wrote:
| Profiles can be faked too
| BolexNOLA wrote:
| I used to think that, then the last decade happened. The
| conspiracy theorists are in the halls of power now and their
| followers are frothing at the mouth for revenge against
| perceived enemies. The uncomfortable uncle at Thanksgiving is
| now driving national health policy and funding.
| bongodongobob wrote:
| They are real. I cleansed 100s of people from Facebook that
| were planning Charlie Kirk vigils and shit. It's real.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| There is a huge difference between holding a vigil and
| demanding retribution.
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| Are you seriously claiming it to be objectionable to mourn
| for a man who was murdered in cold blood? That's pretty
| fucked up if so.
| standardUser wrote:
| What concern of it is yours? Will you mourn whomever I
| ask you to mourn? Sounds like an absurd proposition.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _claiming it to be objectionable to mourn for a man who
| was murdered_
|
| To be fair, a vigil held in the wake of a death is in
| mourning. A "vigil" held today for Kirk is a right-wing
| rally.
| oceansky wrote:
| Which comments you have an issue with?
| lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote:
| I presume they are referring to these ones:
| https://reason.com/2025/10/10/tennessee-man-arrested-
| gets-2-...
| yibg wrote:
| Funny thing is, I'm not 100% sure which "side" you are
| referring to...
| causal wrote:
| A common theme in these comments is justifying retribution
| against the left as if everyone in the country is for or
| against one team or the other- when in reality many of us are
| in the middle and think injustice remains evil no matter who
| does it.
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| Reason is a big part of how we got here. Billionaire funded
| climate denial etc. so they have big audience of idiots they've
| cultivated.
| tootie wrote:
| Libertarianism is often described as a broken clock and it's
| their time of the day again.
| deadbabe wrote:
| They're bots.
| TrackerFF wrote:
| I looked at the pictures, and even with no context, it was
| obvious that he was pointing out the hypocrisy of Trump with that
| meme.
|
| Ain't no way people looked at the picture, and genuinely thought
| _" Is he threatening to shoot up the school?"_. But then again,
| there are some incredibly stupid people out there.
|
| To me, it mostly seems like manufactured outrage. Someone saw him
| posting edgy memes, got offended, and called to the cops that the
| guy was posting about doing a school shooting.
| baobabKoodaa wrote:
| > Someone saw him posting edgy memes, got offended, and called
| to the cops that the guy was posting about doing a school
| shooting.
|
| I don't think even that happened. Most likely some law
| enforcement officials sat down at a table for a brainstorming
| session trying to figure out a pretext to jail this guy.
| overfeed wrote:
| He is being punished for his speech. His persecutors aren't
| bold enough yet to publicly proclaim their violation of his
| constitutional rights, hence the verbal gymnastics.
| somenameforme wrote:
| If you're not aware, credible threats of violence (or any
| criminal act) are not constitutionally protected. It's one of
| the very few exceptions to the 1st amendment. The Supreme
| Court has taken a very pro-free speech stance on this since
| it crops up fairly often with things like rappers, but it's
| not like some open and shut case because of the 1st
| Amendment. It will largely come down to whether the courts
| think he understood that it would be interpreted as a threat.
| overfeed wrote:
| The article discusses this, and explains why the sheriff is
| contorting the plain meaning of his 4-words and an image
| (about Kirk) into a threat of violence (to a nearby
| school). This won't stand in court, so they are punishing
| him before then.
| somenameforme wrote:
| Without context, it seems like somebody obviously just sharing
| some tasteless memes, but the context is precisely what makes
| things not so clear. This is a former police officer (in other
| words: armed) who was obviously rather unhinged, a political
| extremist, lived near a Perry High School, and then posts an
| image that shows Trump saying "We have to get over it." with
| the subtext being "Donald Trump, on the Perry High School mass
| shooting, one day after." All under the title, "This seems
| relevant today..."
|
| It's very easy to see how people could genuinely interpret that
| as a credible threat of imminent violence. Imagine somebody
| similar in your area did the exact same thing except with your
| local high school's name. So this is going to be a very
| interesting case, because what it's going to come down to is
| the prosecution arguing that he was aware that it would be
| interpreted as a threat on the nearby Perry High School, while
| the defense will claim he shared the meme without understanding
| the perceived threat it might cause and assumed people would
| understand he was referencing a previous shooting that occurred
| at a different Perry High School.
| throwaway173738 wrote:
| I actually agree with this, because there are a lot of people
| out there who are unaware of anything outside of the 50x50
| mile area they live in.
| crtasm wrote:
| Where did you find this context? in particular
|
| >obviously rather unhinged, a political extremist
| estebarb wrote:
| "Investigators believe Bushart was fully aware of the fear his
| post would cause and intentionally sought to create hysteria
| within the community"
|
| Someone tell the LHC at CERN folks to avoid Tennessee...
| nomilk wrote:
| I wish the article would show a screenshot of what was posted,
| however 'uncivil'.
|
| Found this on a linked facebook post - no clue if it's accurate.
|
| https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=25571453995778528&se...
| rglover wrote:
| If this is accurate, this whole thing is beyond hysterical.
| Irrespective of political beliefs, this is an _insane_ thing to
| have happen in the U.S. (this example is innocuous speech
| protected under the 1st amendment).
|
| Spooky shit as it sets precedence for _anyone_ to go after
| _anyone_ for a social media post on _any_ grounds. That 's
| psychotic.
| idle_zealot wrote:
| > Irrespective of political beliefs,
|
| I wish people would stop pretending that this has nothing to
| do with politics. Belief that the rules should punish anyone
| you don't like and protect those you do is incredibly
| popular, and the dominant ideology of this administration and
| its supporters. It _is_ a political belief, and nobody is
| seriously combatting it. Still we act as though there are two
| sides with a shared goal of creating a better world, and
| differing ideas of how to accomplish that. It 's been pretty
| clearly demonstrated that the goal of this incarnation of the
| Republican party is an authoritarian police state dedicated
| to punishing and eradicating whomever they deem an "enemy
| within". And a lot of voters are ok with this, so long as it
| doesn't apply to them personally, so long as they're a
| favored party.
|
| The apparent hypocrisy is naked and insulting. They'll cry
| "cancel culture" and censorship over companies deciding not
| to platform bigots while cheering when the police kidnap
| protestors or outspoken political opponents. I say "apparent"
| because this all makes perfect sense when you realize that
| they never cared about free speech or anything else they
| claimed to. It was always about "good guys" getting to do
| whatever they want, and "bad guys" getting hurt. The friend-
| enemy distinction. No policy goals, no principled stance on
| issues, just a convenient facade.
| E-Reverance wrote:
| The article has a hyperlink on it : "Bushart shared an image[1]
| of President Donald Trump with the quote"
|
| [1] https://x.com/aaronterr1/status/1970272191884468241
| Animats wrote:
| Google search for 'trump "get over it" cartoon shooting'
| turns up many cartoon images. This is a major meme.
| geor9e wrote:
| That is directly linked in the article, in the sentence "The
| image was one of several Bushart posted".
| nomilk wrote:
| Thanks, I must have clicked on every link in the article
| except that one.
|
| Here it is to save anyone else:
|
| https://wopclive.linkedupradio.com/assets/images/2025/IMG_73.
| ..
| anigbrowl wrote:
| This Sheriff Weems is either a fool or a knave.
| yibg wrote:
| Amazingly even this post is a reflection of the discourse around
| Kirk. There are replies equating any criticism of Kirk to
| celebrating his death and glossing over his past nasty behavior.
| All seems to detached from reality.
| mullingitover wrote:
| There is a group who has never debated anything in good faith,
| and they are certainly not about to start now.
| krapp wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horst_Wessel
| tootie wrote:
| Kirk, among many other right wing figures, have absolutely made
| light of past violence against Democrats. The discourse around
| Paul Pelosi was utterly vile and despicable. Nobody ever
| threatened his first amendment right to say horrendous things.
| nailer wrote:
| FWIW I agree Kirk shouldn't have made fun of Paul Pelosi. I
| think Kirk probably wouldn't be proud of his own behaviour
| there.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _think Kirk probably wouldn 't be proud of his own
| behaviour there_
|
| He had _years_ to apologise. It could have meaningfully
| altered the temperature of our discourse, particularly
| among young men. He never did. Kirk gets no credit for
| amends he never made.
| tastyface wrote:
| This is how Charlie Kirk got on my radar:
|
| "Mere weeks before his death, Kirk reveled in Trump's
| deployment of federal troops to DC. 'Shock and awe.
| Force,' he wrote. 'We're taking our country back from
| these cockroaches.'"
|
| Cockroaches! Literally language of the Rwandan genocide.
| And it's a Christian saying this about other human
| beings? The man never changed.
|
| (Obviously, he should not have been shot. But his
| sanctification is repulsive.)
| heavyset_go wrote:
| In case the reference doesn't click[1]:
|
| > _Twenty-five years ago this month, all hell broke loose
| in my country, which is tucked away in the Great Lakes
| region of Africa. Hordes of members of the Hutu ethnic
| majority, armed with machetes, spears, nail-studded
| clubs, and other rudimentary weapons, moved house to
| house in villages, hunting for Tutsis, the second largest
| of Rwanda's three ethnic groups. The radio station RTLM,
| allied with leaders of the government, had been inciting
| Hutus against the Tutsi minority, repeatedly describing
| the latter as inyenzi, or "cockroaches," and as inzoka,
| or "snakes." The station, unfortunately, had many
| listeners._
|
| > _The promoters of genocide used other metaphors to turn
| people against their neighbors. Hutus, by reputation, are
| shorter than Tutsis; radio broadcasters also urged Hutus
| to "cut down the tall trees."_
|
| > _In urban centers, government soldiers and well-armed
| members of the Interahamwe militia affiliated with the
| ruling party set up roadblocks filtering out Tutsis and
| killing them by the roadside. It was an easy task to pick
| them out. Ever since independence from Belgium in 1962,
| national identification cards specified ethnicity._
|
| > _Within 100 days, an estimated 1 million people, the
| overwhelming majority of whom were Tutsis, lay dead. The
| worst kind of hatred had been unleashed. What began with
| dehumanizing words ended in bloodshed._
|
| [1]
| https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/04/rwanda-
| sho...
| nailer wrote:
| You dislike Kirk because he called criminals cockroaches
| and that reminds you of the Rwandan genocide?
|
| ok
| estearum wrote:
| Yes it is very bad to call your countrymen "cockroaches"
| even if they're criminals and you really don't like them.
| It's especially bad to do so atop a gargantuan media
| organization that looks to you for moral and political
| guidance.
| zzzeek wrote:
| NARRATOR: he was, in fact, proud of his behavior there,
| plainly visible by comparing such behavior to hundreds of
| other publicly recorded instances of such behavior for
| which he was also quite proud
| WickyNilliams wrote:
| Not an American so I don't have a horse in the race. Didnt
| Kirk also describe Biden as a "tyrant" and that he should be
| given the death penalty [0]. Calling for the (then sitting)
| president to be put to death seems pretty extreme to me.
|
| [0] https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/charlie-kirk-biden-
| death-p...
| ithkuil wrote:
| Those who think that criticizing Kirk is always calling for
| this death, would this comment above also be considered
| violent?
|
| Or is this comment also unacceptable?
|
| Where is the demarcation?
| blockmarker wrote:
| After seeing millions of comments on social media saying that
| Kirk deserved it, or had it coming, for things Kirk said, or
| even things that he did not actually say but others made up, it
| is normal to see any such comment as support for murder.
| adrr wrote:
| Were the posts about Kirk deserving it or posts critical of
| Kirk. People conflate the two. Most of the quotes weren't
| made up. He did call for political violence like the
| execution of Joe Biden and for a "patriot" to bail out the
| person who tried to murder Paul Pelosi.
| standardUser wrote:
| You speak as if you've never read a YouTube comment section
| before. Yet you say you've read millions of comments? Maybe
| consider not reading rage-bait garbage all night long and
| talk to real people instead.
| estearum wrote:
| Not only are such comments generally _not_ support for
| murder, but I 'll let you in on a little known fact:
|
| In the US Constitution there's a thing called the First
| Amendment.
|
| It actually protects your right to say that you support
| murder. Either a real historical one or a hypothetical future
| one.
|
| The more you know!
| standardUser wrote:
| It's a cudgel. It doesn't matter if it makes sense, it fits in
| your hand and you can whack your perceived enemies. As always,
| logic doesn't matter, only owning the libs matters.
| titanomachy wrote:
| It doesn't matter. Charlie Kirk could have been the greatest
| saint of our generation, and it would still be unjust to
| imprison someone for posting a meme saying that they don't care
| about his death.
| estearum wrote:
| It would be unjust to imprison or even have law enforcement
| _knock on the door_ of a person who was _celebrating in the
| streets_ that he died!
|
| This is completely out of bounds for the United States. But
| that's the Woke Right for ya.
| tavavex wrote:
| This entire story is a culmination of this effect. If
| 'celebrating someone's death' was a crime in the US, there's no
| doubt they would've used that to accuse that man. But since
| that's not actually illegal, they had to bend it out of shape
| until his milquetoast barely-criticism could somehow be
| interpreted as an active threat against some random high
| school. It would be funny if this wasn't completely acceptable
| behavior now.
| DarkmSparks wrote:
| $2m should be the minimum compensation he is entitled to when the
| dust settles.
| bigjobby wrote:
| I want to be living in the 80s again. The world is an absolute
| shit show at the moment
| Aloisius wrote:
| The 1980s wasn't great either, depending on where you were you
| had: AIDS, the Cold War, crack epidemic, war on drugs/mass
| incarceration, Satanic Panic, Iran-Contra, Tiananmen Square,
| plane bombings, peak gang violence, MOVE bombings, S&L crisis,
| sky-high interest rates, a couple deep recessions with high
| unemployment, Chernobyl, the Iran-Iraq War, widespread
| homophobia, Ethiopian famine and civil war, etc.
| throwaway173738 wrote:
| Of course it was called GRID instead of AIDS back then.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Is there a legal defence fund?
| thegrim33 wrote:
| The guy made multiple posts, which, taken together, made people
| supposedly consider him as making threats. The journalist here
| decides to cover this story, but only mention the content of one
| of his posts, and completely ignoring and not mentioning the
| contents of the other posts.
|
| Surely the other posts are completely benign and there's nothing
| of interest in there, right? Surely the journalist had a reason
| for only reporting on the contents of one of his posts, and not
| the others, and that choice wasn't intentional in order to
| present a biased interpretation of reality. Surely.
| baobabKoodaa wrote:
| The other posts were linked in the story. They were your
| everyday internet meme stuff. No person genuinely thought that
| this guy was threatening to do a school shooting.
| wtfwhateven wrote:
| >Surely the journalist had a reason for only reporting on the
| contents of one of his posts, and not the others, and that
| choice wasn't intentional in order to present a biased
| interpretation of reality. Surely.
|
| Yes because the sheriff explicitly stated it was the trump
| quote picture, and nothing else, that got the man arrested,
| charged and thrown in a cage.
|
| https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2025/09/23/tennessee-l...
|
| The article even links to the above.
|
| Makes me wonder if you even read the article or already knew
| what I just said and are being dishonest.
| onetimeusename wrote:
| There is a little bit more context here in a different article
| where the sheriff explains how the posts were interpreted as a
| threat
|
| https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2025/09/23/tennessee-l...
| bonsai_spool wrote:
| > There is a little bit more context here in a different
| article where the sheriff explains how the posts were
| interpreted as a threat
|
| >
| https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2025/09/23/tennessee-l...
|
| There isn't anything there that wasn't in the original article.
| onetimeusename wrote:
| The Reason article said there was no reason to interpret this
| as a threat and that it was entirely just political. The
| article made it seem like the memes were held completely out
| of context. It mentioned there happens to be a nearby Perry
| High School just by chance but the nearby Perry High School
| is the central reason why this was interpreted as a threat.
| This was posted in a group that was organizing an event at
| the high school. I could see how someone might construe this
| as a threat more clearly from the tennessean article if they
| were being overly cautious. Also the sheriff mentioned the
| arrest was not done for legal speech content but more for the
| coincidental possibility this was a threat. Reason didn't
| elaborate on this.
|
| The Reason article is making this seem like it's entirely
| political and unreasonable. I don't think an arrest should
| have been made, that is too far. This seems like an
| unfortunate coincidence but someone looked at all this and
| reported it as a threat. The fact Perry High School's name is
| highly relevant here was not included.
| 3eb7988a1663 wrote:
| The officer's fabricated justification there is just as weak as
| the referenced article.
| beloch wrote:
| People outside the U.S. should care about this because so much
| social media is based in the U.S..
|
| i.e. If you post an anti-MAGA meme to Facebook or reddit from an
| identifiable account you could be charged as this man was.
| Perhaps the U.S. will try to extradite you. (I would hope most
| nations have sensible checks and balances to prevent extradition
| over this sort of thing, but it would still be a PITA.) However,
| the U.S. might also choose to wait and then arrest you if you
| ever travel to or through the U.S..
|
| The U.S.'s slide away from freedom of speech could have a huge
| global impact on people who might think it doesn't effect them.
| We are _far_ too reliant on American social media.
|
| Canada, the E.U., etc. should be looking at protections to
| prevent social media companies operating servers in their
| jurisdictions from sharing information with the U.S. government.
| It's no longer a hypothetical situation. There is a real threat
| that is clearly evident now.
| bilegeek wrote:
| > I would hope most nations have sensible checks and balances
| to prevent extradition over this sort of thing, but it would
| still be a PITA.
|
| EDIT: If you're an emigrant:
|
| More than just a PITA, you could still fail; see [1].
|
| Also - I can't find the source right now - I remember hearing
| about Russian emigrants in Europe being charged with serious
| crimes in absentia over criticism of the war, and they were
| slated for deportation because the bureaucracy still considered
| all such Russian warrants as valid. The US would probably be
| harder to excise in this regard.
|
| [1]https://www.dw.com/en/germany-shelters-russians-
| persecuted-f...
| canucker2016 wrote:
| People outside the US can be in tons of trouble already for
| social media postings.
|
| UK and Germany come to mind where the police/law will go after
| people for what they post.
|
| That's just for developed countries. Consequences are worse in
| developing countries.
| tavavex wrote:
| Which developing countries? I thought that many of those
| countries were either tied up with 'real', physical crime or
| just wouldn't care about internet stuff all that much. Lots
| of sketchy websites (like lots of piracy-related stuff) are
| hosted in countries where legal consequences are unlikely,
| even if it's illegal on paper. I can see how the more
| authoritarian countries can be going after social media posts
| based on grudges, but I'm wondering about which ones actively
| practice it - I don't know much about it.
| tavavex wrote:
| > Perhaps the U.S. will try to extradite you. (I would hope
| most nations have sensible checks and balances to prevent
| extradition over this sort of thing, but it would still be a
| PITA.)
|
| I don't think there's any countries that allow extradition for
| actions that aren't crimes in their own country. Extradition
| treaties, as far as I know, aren't straightforward conveyor
| belts that let any countries hoover up anyone inconvenient for
| them, the requested countries don't want to let go of their own
| people for no reason, and can deny these requests as they see
| fit.
|
| Being held up at an entry point to the US is a real worry, but
| at this stage I feel like they're not quite psychotic enough to
| be causing international drama over a Facebook post, so actions
| like these will probably remain domestic for a while.
|
| The location where these websites are hosted probably doesn't
| matter - if you posted something the US doesn't like and you
| end up in a situation where they can get to you, no one would
| care about where exactly you posted it. All bets are off.
| standardUser wrote:
| Trump's America. Don't forget to wipe your phone before
| travelling. You don't need to break any laws to have your life
| ruined, you just have to stumble into the crosshairs of the most
| vindictive leader we have ever had to endure.
| JohnTHaller wrote:
| Due to Tennessee law, he has to come up with $210,000 himself to
| get bail from a bondsmen. And he loses $10,000 of that
| permanently. TN law is designed to keep non-rich folks in jail.
| He likely won't get his trial for months in TN. Also by design.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _he has to come up with $210,000 himself_
|
| Source?
| Legend2440 wrote:
| The linked article.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Nothing in the law [1] requires he come up with that sum
| _himself_. (The qualifier implies _e.g._ a legal defence
| fund or even family member couldn 't help.)
|
| [1] https://www.capitol.tn.gov/Bills/114/Bill/SB0464.pdf
| mft_ wrote:
| Obviously an interesting test case for the US, especially in
| light of Vance, Musk, and Farage attacking the UK (especially)
| and the EU for apparently lacking free speech.
| kleton wrote:
| Here are some "I-told-you-so"s regarding Douglass Mackey's
| original guilty verdict for posting Twitter memes, who, since
| then, was acquitted on appeal.
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43531283
| bitsage wrote:
| This thread is looking at this from a political angle, but he was
| arrested and charged for threats of mass violence. This seems to
| be a case of over zealous policing regarding school shootings in
| a very tense environment rather than a guy arrested over
| offensive memes.
| overfeed wrote:
| There's no "tense environment" around school shootings. Like
| the president said: We have to... on second thoughts, maybe I
| should not be quoting him either.
| whearyou wrote:
| If/when this gets tossed - does the have grounds to sue (and who
| would he be suing) on wrongful arrest, or something else?
| spacechild1 wrote:
| This is just crazy! Just look at the actual post:
| https://x.com/aaronterr1/status/1970272191884468241. There is no
| way this can be interpreted as "Threats of Mass Violence on
| School Property and Activities". How should anyone trust law
| enforcement and the judicial system when they fabricate cases
| like this?
|
| Once more, it demonstrates that MAGA only cares about free speech
| as long as it serves their own interest. This is almost comical
| when you think about J.D. Vance' speech in Munich.
|
| Thanks to reason.com for strongly calling out the BS!
| scoofy wrote:
| How on earth does this get past a grand jury?!?
| RickJWagner wrote:
| I wish we could see all of the offending posts. Without that,
| it's hard to tell if the messages are threatening or not.
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