As IF Times

source:  https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/rick-moran/2020/06/13/nashville-protesters-set-up-their-very-own-autonomous-zone-at-capital-n525485

This is all the rage in America these days, to set up autonomous zones right within the center of a large, urban metropolis.  It’s working so well in Seattle that the idea has spread faster than the Covid virus to other cities as well, with Nashville being the latest aspirant.  But burgeoning nations states are brewing in Texas and Georgia as well.

Parents will recognize this as playing Barbie dream house for the girls or in the case of the boys, building a fort in the basement during their own simpler youth.  You simply arranged a few cardboard boxes as barricades and voila, instant play zone.  Using their fertile imaginations, kids could create their own worlds and and pretend scenarios…up until the time their parents called them to clean up for dinner.

As some pundits have noted, it’s been pretty easy to create a new nation state since there hasn’t been a lot of pushback by those who would be most affected.  Wait, what…I’m no longer in the U.S.?? Thus far, the plucky nation builders have managed to arbitrarily carve out pieces of cities to be declared self governing zones independant of the host cities and limited only by the amount of concrete barriers they can get their hands on.  It’s as if the kids gathered some folding chairs in the basement and declared the boundaries to be impassible to outsiders.  They seem to think that their new zone is so desirable that walls are needed to keep wanna be citizens away.  Hmm.

In Seattle, city officials, who are notionally charged and paid to protect the citizenry, are instead indulging the plucky nationalists by offering support items such as food, Gatorade and of course cigarettes as if they were permissive parents supporting their children’s fantasies.  In fact, there’s quite a list of demands to the outsiders for all kinds of support items including soy and vegan items but with soap being notably absent.  We could dub this zone, state of caricature or SOC instead of CHAZ….or perhaps Soapless In Seattle.

How could this not seem fun to people who would copy this idea? Given that the support demands are being met for all kinds of creature comforts including WiFi and portable toilets, why wouldn’t you hang out and play bongos with like minded people, or more correctly, fellow citizens of the new state? It’s like living in your mom’s basement, adult version. Taking the advice of a former President who infamously invoked “You didn’t build that” the new nationalists are nevertheless living under the figurative roof of those that provide the comfort of their new digs. Except in this case, you get to wield real guns instead of fake ones and you really get to boss people around.

It’s fun, intoxicating and the publicity and notoriety are a large part of the charm in this world of make believe for the heroic nationalists.  Who wouldn’t want to act out childish fantasies as an adult without fear of consequences?  But, just like when they were kids, the adults will eventually want to have their room back and those not complying may get the adult version of a deserved spanking.  In wisdom apparently rooted as far back as Roman times, “it’s all fun and games until someone loses an eye”.

source: https://www.mlive.com/news/flint/2020/05/flint-area-police-join-protesters-marching-to-seek-justice-for-george-floyd.html

Rules and laws only work with two important conditions.  One, you need to have a population willing to follow the rules ( assuming that they’re enforced equally) and two, you need some means of enforcement if these rules are flouted.

In a nominally free country, people generally agree to abide by rules of social conduct because they wish to be part of a harmonious society.  It’s hard to know when the rules are too oppressive, but I would argue that people have been conditioned over the years to be more and more malleable by the governing overlords, so the threshold is now quite high.  A few hundred years ago, people got pretty incensed over an increase in the  taxes imposed on tea.  Next thing you know, they dumped it in the Boston harbor and that eventually led to a war which led to the formation of a new nation.

Today, people pay virtually half of their income to taxes, but they dutifully pay with only minor grumbling. People were obviously a lot less tolerant back in the day.

The recent rioting observed in many US urban cities is portrayed as anger over the death of a defenseless and subdued suspect, George Floyd, at the hands of a police officer. This abhorrent event re-opened the perpetual wound of racism accusations which never ever seems to heal in America.  Egged on by political opportunists, the howls of righteous indignation devolved into the predictable pattern of wanton looting, rioting and property destruction.

It’s a certainty that the vast majority of the rioters will never be held accountable for their criminal actions.  In fact media and civic leaders are all but excusing their behavior as justifiable.  The narrative is that people’s lives, black lives in particular, are at risk by institutionalized racism on the part of the police.  This narrative continues to be pushed even as cold hard statistics prove otherwise.

Contrast this to the behavior of the vast majority of the population when restrictions were imposed by governments upon their movements, their social interactions and their very ability to earn a living.  Shockingly, everyone complied and still do, even as more and more evidence comes forth about the exaggeration and mishandling of the ‘crisis’.  Again, cold hard statistics don’t support the narrative.

You’d think that people would be rightly incensed at having their lives and businesses destroyed, of having the government’s figurative knee on their necks until they succumbed.  And you’d be wrong.  As outrageous and unwise as much of the shutdown has been, people are still not burning and looting even though the devastation many have suffered was and is very real.  There were a few brave souls who pushed back, but their actions resulted in jail time and fines.

Turns out they would have been better off looting and rioting.  Apparently, all of the pent up anger and frustration could have been salved by throwing a few bricks, breaking storefront windows, setting some cop cars ablaze and getting some five finger discounts on flat screen TV’s and running shoes.  All without consequence. It’s hard to know when to follow the rules and when not to.