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Webcomic Author Deemed a Terrorist Threat
CaptainCarrot writes "Writer/IT contractor Matt Boyd, formerly the man who made up the words for webcomic Mac Hall and who now does the same for his and Ian McConville's new comic Three Panel Soul, was recently fired from his government job. His conversation with a co-worker about a gun he intended to buy for target shooting was overheard by someone in a nearby cubicle. As it was unfortunately the day of the Virginia Tech shootings, the eavesdropper panicked and reported him to management. That was bad enough. But when he used the comic to document the meeting where the reason for his firing was explained, he was visited by representatives of local law enforcement investigating him on suspicion of making a "terroristic threat" using the Internet. No charges have been filed. Yet. FLEEN interviewed Matt about the incident."
Unless you know everyone around you, this probably isn't an appropriate conversation for the workplace, which Boyd says is a verbatim transcript of what got him fired^H^H^H^H^Hreleased from a contract position that he can be released from at any time.
.22 to kill them, and then makes light of it to the point where someone got scared again. Do you think the police are monitoring his comic? Someone obviously complained, and it's the police's job to follow up, who then determined he's not actually a threat, according to his own description of the meeting with the detectives.
And this, even if joking, is probably not, all things considered, the wisest response. Only he, or people who know him well, knows he's not serious, frankly. Yeah, it's funny. But he already got fired for talking about how many times you'd have to shoot someone in the face with a
Can we find something else to get all in a huff about? I'm sure there's another story we can run about how the 2004 election was stolen.
It gets kind of ridiculous.
If the VT shootings hadn't happened, this whole episode wouldn't have happened.
If nobody read his comics, this whole episode wouldn't have happened.
There are many reasons that this episode shouldn't have happened, but people are afraid and over-react to 'err on the side of caution'. For many, better safe than sorry is the catchphrase of the week. They don't stop to think, or try to figure out what might be the level headed way to handle things.... like ask why they are talking about guns at work!
Now, why is it that the US in particular is so fearful? That is the better question, not 'is this guy going to shoot people?' For fscks sake, my retired mother has a 9mm which she uses at the gun range. I don't think that anyone will fear that she is a terrorist. Why should people think anyone that talks about guns is going to go on a killing rampage. If they were going to go kill people, the probably wouldn't be talking openly about guns!! There are millions of guns in the US and save for a few whackjobs, they generally are doing no harm to anyone. (street/drug/mafia crimes not counted) The point is that not everyone with a gun is a murderer. Not everyone from the middle east is a suicide bomber in training.
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First they came for the web comic artists, and I did not speak out.
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I'm really starting to get worried about our government, and the common American. All of this terrorist crap is turning into one big witch hunt. I don't like my neighboor, maybe I should report him and have the men with the black bags take him awawy...
"Terroristic threat" != "terrorism" or "terrorist threat"
.22. Someone who probably doesn't know him personally at all (or at least well) overheard this and reported it. On the day of the biggest mass shooting in the US to boot (which was admittedly why he was even talking about it in the first place).
It's not the "US" that's fearful. Someone overheard him talking about how many times you'd need to shoot someone in the face to kill them with a
Then he got released from a position that he can, as a contractor, be released from at any time, for any reason.
Then he humorously recounted his "firing" the next day in his comic, which someone felt threatened by, and which they reported to the police. It is, in turn, the police's job to follow up on such a complaint, which they did, and after which he himself said the detectives determined that he wasn't actually a threat, and viewed samples of his work.
And yeah, there were a bunch of things that coalesced to make this happen, but all that means is that actions have consequences, and no matter how unfair you might think they are sometimes, it doesn't make it any less true. The government didn't do anything to him, he is not charged with any crime, and no one "censored" him (as is especially evidenced by the fact that the comics are exactly where they've always been: still up on the web).
Come back down to reality, here. Whenever there's a school or workplace shooting, everyone always rants about the "warning signs" and "why didn't anyone call the police when they guy was talking about shooting people in the face on the phone the other day?" (and NO, no one will necessarily know that he's joking, especially if they don't know him personally - that's stupid to talk about in a setting like work at all, much less one where you don't know everyone around you personally).
Will the real terrorists please stand up? Yes, you, the one who intentionally works to incite fear in people. And you too.
This type of thing has been going on since at least the Oklahoma City bombing and I assume it wasn't new even then.
Back then I had given a friend that is interested in making primitive weapons a printout on how to make his own black powder. This was a day or two before the Oklahoma City bombing, he had another friend at work (on of the national labs) that did the same thing and brought it in to him - this was the day after the bombing. A co-worker saw it laying on his desk and decided he was getting ready to blow everything up, called the FBI, and started about a two month long investigation. Obviously it led nowhere.
A few years later someone in our college set off an "incendiary device" (the detectives later told me it was acid and aluminum foil in a plastic jug) and I was, once more, investigated for all sorts of nice things. Again, nothing came of it as there was nothing there. I do not recall now what they accused me of, I assume it would now be "terrorist" but back then there was some other hot-button label for it.
And you might as well have been whatever the most despicable thing you can think of if you were in a gun club during the mid-90's and the great crusade against "militias" (not to mention almost every single incident was somehow their fault). There was almost no one anywhere defending you then - you were an evil gun-toting maniac. It was MUCH more endemic than the current "terrorist" thing - and at least there *are* terrorist out there that want to do us harm even though we are over reacting.
After any event there are people that fly into a panic of stupid things, call someone, and it gets all blown out of proportion. Most law enforcement thinks it stupid and - like the Duke non-rape case - you will sometimes get a political position decide it is time to show the people they are "doing something" and you get to be the one screwed. If you are unlucky you get Nifong as the prosecutor, this is the local prosecutor being an ass.
------- Sorry about the spelling, I suffer from two problems. Dyslexia makes it difficult to spell well, lazy makes it
If his name is associated with this strip, he's gonna have a hard time with future employment if anyone bothers to do a background check (google search) and finds out about this debacle.
No. All he has to do is move away from the Fascist States of America. He's welcome over here in Europe. We're just that much smarter.
'By the way: anyone who thinks Virginia Tech could have "prevented" this shooting somehow, this is exactly what you get.'
That's ridiculous. And I'm even pro-2nd amendment.
The comic writer didn't threaten anyone. The impetus for the investigation was an overheard conversation about a gun purchase. Neither is cause for an investigation of this level and a firing.
Compare that to the VA Tech horror--if you remove entirely Cho's writings (which is not a good level of judgment anyways), he should have been stopped during the purchase of his one gun at a gunshop, as he lied about being mentally incerated and such info is in the state's own judicial system which could have been cross-checked with answers when purchasing that gun. In fact, this past week, I believe the legislature of VA removed that roadblock; the law was fine, the implementation sucked.
Second, imnsho, and this isn't popular, I think the police HUGELY dropped the ball in the VA Tech situation (and by that opinion, the University is far less contributory through indifference in the 2nd shooting site deaths). If a police officer had been shot in the foot, they would have gone after that guy wholeheartedly, just as they did earlier in the year with a person who allegedly shot a deputy upon escape. The police dropped the ball--even they admit they were investigating another person who they "knew" had killed the first 2...oops, except he didn't. See, if a couple of kids get shot, you're not part of the FOP, it's thrown into a "domestic dispute" craphole where they go after the nearest; investigation is separate from correctly ascertaining threat, which comes full circle in demonstrating why the handling of web comic thing is so incorrect.
btw, I've never understood the whole firing thing in any case--besides clearly not a threat, you want to make the person even more out of their luck and prone to do something? Amazing how the US becomes more and more like China these days (China is far worse, but the approximations seen over the past 6 years in stories makes that gap narrower).
Surely he has a case for unfair dismissal...
If guns are legal to own, then they have absoloutely no right to fire him for buying, or intending to buy one.
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...and here we are back in the McCarthy era again.
Has anyone called him a communist yet?
I've found it better to be quiet and not say much at any job I have today. If I have a private life, I keep it at that. It's too bad, because it would be nice to got to work as myself and feel I fit it in. Instead, I put on the face of yet another zombie trudging through my daily tasks. Don't dare mention anything that may be construed as sexual harassment, bias against any race or minority, or implying anything even remotely related to violence. The power is in the hands of the people who play the "victim" card, and I only count the days until something better can come along. Things can't always be this bad........
Where I drop a 20-ton safe on Paris Hilton.
Is that a terroristic threat? Or a mercy killing?
Yeah, my karma sucks....but so do the mods.
His "interview" with the detectives will now show up on every background check, which are common with job applications, whether disclosed or not, so his ability to earn a living has been compromised. He will also end up flagged for airline travel, be abused and humiliated by TSA every time he flies, so his freedom to travel has been compromised. It is possible that his passport, if any, could be revoked or refused renewal, as well. The grounds for that are not disclosed, so it's hard to tell. Apartment rental agreements also often include background checks, so he may not be able to live where he chooses. This man will be "punished" for the rest of his life, regardless of whether he is ever arrested, or not. Even if he is arrested and is judged "not guilty", the record of his arrest is not expunged, nor is his cost of defense reimbursed, so he is still punished. Meanwhile, the persons who set this upon him walk unimpeded. If there were any justice, they would rot in hell for violating the Commandment against false witness.
...), should we all stop having them? Get over it.
"Better safe than sorry" is an expression of cowardice. Life is a series of risks beginning with the genetic selection at conception. Given the odds that some child conceived, somewhere, will have a genetic defect (not to mention prenatal difficulties, post-natal trauma, disease,
To my knowladge, "terroristic" isn't even a real word, except in the sense that even engrish words that come into common usage do get promoted to the OED or somesuch publication.
Basically, people who use the word "terroristic" sound like an eight year old exclaiming "meanienater" when they're told to go to bed. So I kind of doubt that the term has been around all that long. Under that name at least.
I could be wrong. American is a very strange dialect.
May the Maths Be with you!
In many government agencies, a large percentage of the new people in upper management are hoplophobes. They've never served in the military or lived in an area where gun ownership is common and accepted. They've probably never touched a firearm in their whole life. This causes problems when they are asked to make rational decisions about personnel or firearms policy and their kneejerk reaction is that "guns are evil" and "all gun owners are potential mass murderers". Instead of thinking, they let their fear dictate their actions.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The answer is obviously 42...duh!
:P)
(Nice catch, no one else seemed to notice that
There are two kinds of fool One says 'This is old therefore good' Another says 'This is new therefore better'- Dean Ing
This whole mess proves that America doesn't care about security. But it does show that the securrorists have won.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
... I can only advise him to first obtain legal counsel to seek to address his firing, if he really wants to. The NRA can be asked to assist, but frankly, as others have pointed out, his being a contractor diminishes his chances of getting his job back, since he can be released for any reason whatsoever. And to pursue the point further, would he really want to go back to that job?
/. while at work :-). These are balanced against freedom of speech... and that's about it. Technically, it has nothing to do with the right to keep and bear arms. IMO, his options are pretty limited, if non-existent, and the success path is not clear.
This situation is problematic for him from several angles: posing a terroristic threat, creating a hostile work environment, not to mention goofing off and talking about your hobby wasting company time (you know, like cruising
Generally, I advise my students to limit discussing this very fun hobby to when they know they can talk without being overheard. This is not an attempt to censor folks, but a recommendation to be prudent, realizing that not everyone shares our enthusiasm, and that sadly, there is an aura of fear that grows among the more fearful when firearms are casually discussed.
Fortunately for me, where I work, many of us are NRA members and we have been told that people feel safer with us around. I take it as a compliment, and do my best to educate the ignorant but willing to learn (but then again, there are those who choose to remain ignorant, and you can only go so far with them). I specialize in teaching those who've never held a firearm before in their lives.
Science never settles, never rests.
Sorry, you should have said "the law books don't think it is terrorism". In a day and age where your president cannot pronounce the word "education" correctly, I would not be so sure ALL of the government or state is aware of the correct definition. And when you say "no one who actually has the power to charge him with a crime", you should sit down, and think about that phrase really hard too.
No, seriously, I just come here for the articles.
> In the UK convictions (except in certain situations) expire after a while.
But the records are kept forever. "Never know when you might need them." What do you think happens to all of the motorway and street-corner camera and sound records? Automatically purged after no crime is reported for a year, or something?
> How would that end up being noticeable when he's flying?
TSA is a government agency. He'll be pulled from the security line for "special attention", if he's (a potential terrorist, remember) allowed to fly at all.
> And when he's renting etc - do members of the public have access to police records so that every chat is noted? Can I just phone the police in the States and pretend to be a landlord/prospective employer etc and find out every time you've been pulled over for having a faulty brake light?
Through licensed civilian investigators, yes. I did a contract for a computer security company that (reasonably, IMO) did a background check. Since the contract was executed in California, I was entitled to, and received, a copy of the results.
> No, but we should investigate potential threats to my safety.
How could any person with functional faculties regard this as a threat?
Even if so, the investigation itself triggers so many unconscionable consequences for the subject that it makes the rest of the citizenry complicit in state terrorism (mild in this case, so far, but an endpoint in the range of actions to the torture and murder of the presumably innocent until proven guilty that are all justified by the same excuses).
First of all, from my understanding (IANAL) of the law, assault would require that the comments be directed at a particular person. The person in question was eavesdropping on the conversation, and therefore could in no way be construed as a potential target of the comment -- and that's forgetting the context of the conversation, which was obviously "I don't want a weapon, I want to shoot targets, so I bought a weapon that's harder to screw up and kill someone with."
Sorry, you've got to have a screw loose to construe that conversation as threatening, assuming that the quotes are accurate.
Secondly, I've heard worse in the workplace on many occasions, and we all laugh and move on. If you're so scared of your own shadow that you can't stop and think about it for a minute before running to mommy, then you're part of the problem, not the solution. You are what the real terrorists are trying to create.
--S
-- sigs cause cancer.
The funny thing is that the real terrorists will laugh at him being searched by TSA.
As a poster above mentioned, the securrorists have won.
No, seriously, I just come here for the articles.
I'm not a big fan of potheads myself, but why would you pass a law against a flavor, if not to criminalize an idea? My point is that these type of laws are moving from the abhorrent (pedophilia) to the simply dumb (pot). It's a progression in a distrubing direction. It's parallel to extending the extra legal protection from assault police officers get into: it is illegal to publicly criticize law enforcement agents.
We are all just people.
McCarthyism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism looks likes its alive and well in the Good'ol USA
People who are afraid are generally the bigger problem, not just with guns, but with anything. Fear is unreasoning.
In the case of guns, people who were brought up in areas where they were normal (I am not talking inner cities...), are generally taught firearm safety and respect for weapons. They are tools, like chainsaws, sticks of dynamite, kitchen knives, and scalpels. They all have their uses and their dangers. People who hate guns and are afraid of them do not see them as tools (for any use) and do not see any other side than fear.
I respect people who do not like guns and want nothing to do personally with guns, just as I respect vegetarians (especially as I was one for a while). I respect people who are concerned about guns, crime, and gun safety. I do not respect people who hate guns, who hate omnivores, who are rampant homophobes, etc. There are a lot of those around. Oddly, a lot of the people who hate guns, seem to want to enforce a ban of them *with guns*. I don't think they understand the disconnect. Why is Policeman Bob a priori and *always* more trustworthy than Farmer Joe? Why think Policeman Bob is always going to be closer to hand when someone else with a gun shows up? They weren't there at VA Tech. Guns exist. Hating them doesn't change that. Learning a bit about them at least provides an understanding of the problem and might be a small piece of the solution.
Note, that on the other side, it is not "gun-lovers" that is a problem, it is people with other kinds of unreasoning fears, such as (rabid) fear of government oppression, rabid racial hatred, rabid isolationism, and extreme fundamentalism. Poking the beehive with a stick (actually oppressing them) just makes things worse. There are actually reasonable people in the middle.
I have no idea why you are addressing your questions at me, as I took no position. I answered the question as to why someone might want to ban pot flavored candy. Whether it's the answer that such proponents actually believe I don't know. I don't really care. I just pointed out that banning one thing does not criminalize a related idea. Ie. banning downed cattle from human consumption is absolutely nothing at all like criminalizing the idea of eating meat.
Desensitization is a real phenomena. Your spastic response doesn't change that particular truth.
Every time I point out that someone is showing evidence of being completely stupid the "delicate flower, can't we all just get alone" (and the "I disagree but am incapable of forming a cogent argument") mods hammer me down as flame bait or troll, but you know what? You appear to be exceptionally stupid. I say this to help you. Now you can review the several flaws in your thinking that led to your post and better yourself. To give you an example of the stupidity you exhibit and the basic flaw in your post, I will address to you a question that implies a position you never claimed:
"You want to have anal sex with six year old boys, is that what you are trying to say?"
An answer to your question: the only thing I'm trying to say is that I get tired of reading morons with some paranoid agenda spewing logically inconsistent crap.
Of course, now I have to add that it's laughable how freakishly monomanic you are about your video games that conversations that have nothing whatsoever to do with them cause you to leap into a passive aggressive defense. Why don't you save your energy for the next Jack Thompson story?