Over the weekend, members of a right-wing (and entirely white) militia seized a federal building while threatening to kill any federal agents who tried to remove them -- yet the response from law enforcement and the media seemingly downplayed the situation.
The quiet response was in glaring contrast from the extreme reactions from both militarized police and the media that we have seen with the peaceful, unarmed, protests against police brutality in places such as Ferguson and Baltimore.
One of the leaders of this takeover is Ammon Bundy, the son of Cliven Bundy who infamously won a standoff against the feds over his right to let his cattle graze on federally protected land that homes an endangered species of tortoise last year.
The militiamen are protesting the prosecution of Oregon ranchers Dwight Hammond Jr. and Steven Hammond, who are heading back to prison on Monday for an arson on federal land. The duo had previously served their sentence for the crime, but that state ruled that they were unlawfully sentenced below the mandatory minimum and must go back.
These armed protesters have openly stated that they will not rule out violence.
In response to these threats and the takeover, the media called the militia “peaceful protesters” and police were not present at the property, even by Monday afternoon — days into the occupation.
Meanwhile, in Baltimore last year, the National Guard was brought in, a curfew was put into place, and chemical weapons were used on peaceful demonstrators after police “heard a rumor that someone might try to kill a cop.”
Social media was quick to call out the hypocrisy, noting that had these men been Muslim or black, they would already be surrounded by SWAT — or dead.
Many others noted the case of Tamir Rice, and how he was labeled a “thug” for holding a toy, while these men who are actually armed with rifles and threatening to use them against federal agents are called “patriots.”
Interestingly, much of those excitedly supporting the militia appear to be from the same crowd who have claimed Black Lives Matter is a “terrorist group” that want to kill police. They seem to forget that Jerad Miller and Amanda Miller left the showdown at the Bundy ranch last year to go on and murder two Las Vegas police officers before killing themselves.
Twitter responded to absurdity of it all by mocking the group and referring to them as: “Y’all Qaeda,” “Yeehawd,” “Vanilla ISIS,” “Yokel Haram,” “Cow Tipping Terrorists,” “FailQueda,” “Infantada,” “WhiteSIS,” and “Saturday Night Treason” — all of which had their own hashtags.
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