This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
January 6th agitator Ray Epps has pled guilty to one charge of disorderly conduct. The NYT story contains this sentence:
I'm not so sure about that. For those who haven't paid attention (a group that included myself until a discussion here a while back), Epps is on video repeatedly urging other members of the crowd to go into the Capitol. Many people have speculated that he was in fact some form of federal agent or informant. The fact that this is the legal outcome for him heightens, rather than lessens, my personal suspicion that he was working for the feds.
It is a very minor charge. Now granted, Epps did not enter the Capitol himself - but his open agitation of the attack nonetheless seems to me like it should constitute a significantly more serious offence, such as incitement to riot.
Speaking of which, it's very odd that he did not go into the Capitol himself, given that he loudly and repeatedly urged others to.
The fact that this minor charge plea deal has taken so long is very eyebrow raising as well. We typically saw the less serious cases dealt with quite quickly, while the big trials with serious jail time on the line took much longer - and even they got dealt with more quickly than Epps!
It's also extremely curious to me that they arranged a plea deal with Epps before he was ever charged with anything. That's not the normal way things go, as far as I'm aware - usually they throw everything they can at you, and then agree to drop some charges in exchange for guilty pleas for the others.
Now, it may be that there are matters of fact or law that I'm not aware of that makes all of this very normal and reasonable, and if so I would be delighted to be informed of them. But as it stands I am at a loss to explain how this guy is getting this treatment if he is not some kind of undercover operative.
EDIT: Thanks to @huadpe and @Gillitrut who have convinced me that the elements of more serious charges against Epps could probably not be satisfied.
You might want to add an additional edit reflecting that Huadpe's point got so demolished that he deleted his entire account and vanished from the site. Leaving up just your prior edit might give a misleading impression.
It's not clear to me from those arguments that the actual point that I'm interested in was in fact demolished - namely, whether or not evidence exists to prove more serious charges against Epps. I'm open to being persuaded back to my original position, though.
The charge I had in mind was incitement to riot - that seemed the clearest match to his actions. But I wasn't aware of how strict the SCOTUS precedent was on that.
What's the specific charge that you think could be proven against Epps? @Bleep seems to be gesturing towards conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. Is that what you have in mind?
First of all, I'd just like to say that I come squarely down on the side of "this dude is obviously a fed" - Huadpe's arguments were just utterly unconvincing when compared to the Revolver piece, and when he explicitly mentioned in one comment that he was angry over people trying to blame the government so they didn't have to blame Trump I just lost faith in his ability to be an honest interlocutor. Where's any attempt whatsoever to grapple with the fact that this supposed Trump supporter who claimed he went to Washington to hear Trump's speech missed Trump's speech because he was too busy telling people that they have to go into the Capitol? Why did he then send a text message about how he "orchestrated the movement of people into the Capitol"?
That does however put me in a slight bind when it comes to answering your question - I'm not sure exactly how he could face any actual charges without being able to proffer the defence "I did this because the government asked me too, and I was not trespassing or causing damage because I was authorised to do so by the federal government". But if we assume he isn't a fed and the DOJ just...forgot to charge him (I honestly can't even come up with a good excuse that also covers the removal from the most wanted list)? Then it turns out I'm actually lucky, and someone has already done my homework for me. Specifically Darren Beattie, who put up a nice twitter thread on the topic - https://twitter.com/DarrenJBeattie/status/1547396130513846275
From what I can see, his "when we go in" comment gets him done for conspiracy the same way George Tanios does, and I REALLY want to know what he was saying to PB Maroon (and who was that guy anyway) because it really looks like he was giving orders and organising the removal of barricades. I'm not sure I'd be able to convict with that footage, but I'd definitely be able to get a warrant for more information! He also goes into the restricted zone, but that's just icing on the top at this point. There are probably more charges that could be summoned up, but I'm not enough of a lawyer or prosecutor to figure out exactly what they would be. All I can do is compare his conduct to that of other people who were convicted, and so that's the standard that I use.
The guy is on video saying "The Capitol IS the Enemy." The guy's sermons are just ridiculous and only make sense in hindsight given what happened the next day. I've never seen anything remotely similar being said by others and it's such a goofball thing to say his fellow diehard MAGA/Trump supporters were weirded out and regularly called him a Fed and other names.
Given the mountain of publicly available evidence and how the guy fits a perfect caricature of how the government and their media mouthpieces wanted to portray Jan6 (an Oath Keeper leader on video making statements to go IN TO the Capitol which is OUR Enemy and fighting with cops), his wildly disparate treatment for 2.5 years is preposterous to me without an explanation that he was working for the fed gov in some capacity and acting on their behest in some capacity.
you wouldn't be on a DC jury
given what we've seen from DC juries and DC judges, if this was charged against other Jan6 defendants he would be convicted
I totally agree with you here, but I'd just like to point out that
I was assuming this would be from the perspective of a prosecutor... and I agree that they wouldn't let someone like me handle a case like this even if I was.
Ah, I understand now. This crystalized a point I was trying to make but you gave me words to organize it and do so concisely: To me, it's a waste of time/missing the point to engage in technical legal arguments about any particular charge, elements, or hair splitting about interpretations because what we see in the Jan6 cases is prosecutors, judges, and jurors in DC demonstrably do not care. I can give example after example after example of statutory interpretation stretched beyond their breaking point and historical precedent being tossed out the window in order to get "the bad guys."
Every argument which others have posted in defense of Jan6 prosecution or Epps's wildly disparate treatment has already been argued by decent lawyers in some Jan6 cases both in trial and before trial and almost all of the time these arguments were rejected. It's extremely black-pilling to me having spent years of my life in the legal field including in criminal defense to see these clownish showtrials in the Nation's capital.
And the saddest thing about it is these precedents, and lines, and laws weren't crossed and tossed to imprison Satan himself; they were tossed to destroy regular productive otherwise good (even if you disagree with their conduct and their politics here) people with no criminal history in their entire lives.
It's simply incredible to me that anyone continues to give these actors and this system the benefit of the doubt. Sorry for the rant.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link