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Notes -
With the recent arrest of Don Lemon, I think it's worth asking how society should respond to the sorts of activities he (allegedly) engaged in?
Disrupting a church service is not exactly terrorism, since there was no actual violence used. But it's not civil disobedience either -- nobody is seriously arguing that the laws against disrupting meetings are themselves unjust.
It's sort of Terrorism Lite. It's kind of like, as another poster analogized, to holding your fist a millimeter away from someone's face while chanting "I'm not touching you." The point is to (arguably) inflict as much harm as you can get away with, to grab attention, to intimidate, to provoke a response, etc. while plausibly claiming that you are non-violent.
Maybe it's my imagination, but I feel like I've seen more and more of this Terrorism Lite in recent years. Things like traffic-blocking; meeting disruption; etc.
While it's true that there are already laws on the books against these sorts of things, I think an argument can be made that there needs to be a more focused and vigorous response. By analogy, in theory blowing up a bomb in a train station is already against the law, whether or not it's in support of some political objective, but there is value in having special laws on the books against terrorism and especially against those who finance or otherwise support it.
In the same way, there could be laws which sanction people, organizations, and governments for providing material support to what I have called Terrorism Lite. (Perhaps someone can suggest a better term.)
It's intimidation, harassment, or something similar. And it has (or should have) a high probability of triggering a Civil Rights investigation as the 1st Amendment begins with the religious freedom clause.
It's not civil disobedience because no church represents the local/state/federal government. This is also why it isn't terrorism per se.
To the specific Don Lemon case, this just shows how profoundly dumb that man is. America is a very secular nation. Especially in regards to Christians, "The Culture" is openly antagonistic unless you're one of those "christian" groups with LGBTQ flags and female pastors.
But actually running in to disrupt a service is still faux pas. People are still woo-woo enough that they aren't okay with this. It would've been fine if Lemon and his weirdo friends picketed outside the church. It would've been more than okay for him to make up just-so false equivalents to random Bible excerpts. Since at least the early 1990s, it's been totally okay to parody solemn Christian institutions to the point of profanity.
But don't go into the Church, dude.
I wouldn’t chalk it up entirely to Don Lemon being dumb. Like many other leftward organizations and people, he got used to the government, the media, big tech, the legal system and federal law enforcement all simultaneously running interference for him. There are tactics which are very effective in a permissive threat environment like that, but will quickly bite you in the ass in a less permissive one. If he had done something similar to this in 2014, he may genuinely have come out on the other end being made to look like a hero. Or at worst, looking like a jackass with no other actual consequences.
He hasn't lost yet; he can go to Federal court to have the indictment quashed, if the judge is willing.
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