Universities in the Philadelphia area were on high alert today after a threat directed at them was posted on 4chan’s /r9k/ board. The anonymous threat (everything is anonymous on 4chan) deliberately called to mind the threat/warning posted on the same message board last week, the day before a gunman shot and killed eight students and one professor at Umpqua Community College in Oregon.
“The first of our kind has struck fear into the hearts of America,” the writer of the new threat declared.
His cries have been heard, even by the president. This is only the beginning. On October 5, 2015 at 1:00 PM CT, a fellow robot will take up arms against a university near Philadelphia. His cries will be heard, his victims will cower in fear, and the strength of the Union will decay a little more. …
Martyr yourself for the cause or support those who have the courage to do so. We have the chance to make the world a better place for betas everywhere.
The deadline passed without incident — as did the deadline for a similar threat directed at schools in Edinburgh. Scotland, posted shortly after the Oregon shootings — but not without shaking a lot of people up.
Now the most malevolent trolls on the /r9k/ board, knowing that they have the attention of the world, are rhapsodizing about the coming “beta rebellion,” gleefully mocking the victims of the Oregon shootings, and posting threats aimed at an assortment of schools around the world, from Texas to the Netherlands.
And so, alongside more traditional /r9k/ topics as “Post your waifu” and “DAILY REMINDER THAT ALL FEMALES ARE DECEIVING SUBHUMAN WHORES,” the board today is filled with simultaneously ridiculous and chilling messages like these:
4chan being what it is, other anons are posting ironic “threats” aimed at, among other places, the moon, Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941, and Whoville — the latter a reference to a news reporter who mistook the board’s meme mascot, a frog called Pepe, for the Grinch.
In the wake of a mass shooting that left ten people dead, this is all a good deal less than hilarious. Yes, yes, 4chan apologists, I know that the anons writing the “real threats” are most likely shitposters, like the anons joking about shooting up the moon, in that they most likely have no intention of carrying out their threats.
But at the same time it’s clear they do intend to terrorize real people with their probably fake threats. As they know well, we have to take them seriously, given that a similar threat on the same message board only a few days ago was followed by an actual, real-world massacre.
This isn’t shitposting so much as it is terrorism, a form of terrorism enabled and in some ways encouraged by 4chan’s anonymous nature.
It’s also clear that the “beta uprising” the /r9k/ regulars are joking about — and designing flags for — isn’t altogether a joke to them either.
Aside from the picture of Hitler, there’s not much deliberate irony in this discussion. These are two people discussing the future of a would-be political movement, in the wake of an act of terrorism that may be tied to the message board they are posting on. One thinks the terror caused by the shootings in Oregon will lead people to take their “issues” seriously; the second sees to think that continued violence is the only answer.
I’m not seeing a joke here.
@Alan
Not yet, the little guys were preserved in alcohol so it’ll take some finagling to get usable DNA out of them. Even then, we’re not CSI, it’ll probably be a few months at the least. =P
But,if there’s one thing I learned from television it’s that a perky goth lass on roller skates can extract DNA from anything in just 5 minutes! Do you not have such a person?
On the intersection of ‘trying teenagers as adults’ and ‘creepy stalkers’…
A while back I was called up for Jury Duty. We ended up sitting around in the court room for hours waiting to find out what was going on before a judge came in and explained things.
The case we had originally been summoned for was a murder case against a teenager. In Canada, the modern Young Offenders Act will by default require an adult jury trial for murder, but it can be changed to judge alone if both defense and prosecution agree on it. In this case, they agreed on it, but not until after the jury panels had started to gather at the courthouse, so people were already there.
A different judge came up, and asked the attorneys of that case if he could ‘borrow’ the jury since we had already arrived and weren’t needed anymore. He had one of those cases that judges hate. The case started off as a simple restraining order telling a man to stay clear of his ex-girlfriend, but over the previous several years it had extended into a list of something like fourteen orders and contempt charges without the earliest ones ever beng settled. The guy was a serious stalker and refused to accept that he wasn’t wanted anymore.
To top all this off, two of his previous lawyers had quit in disgust, he’d refused to work with his court-assigned lawyer, and he was currently representing himself. Oh, and he was a disbarred lawyer himself, so knew all the procedural rules and how to abuse them to his own benefit, so no wonder this had taken years. (And disbarring a lawyer isn’t easy, which just shows how much of a piece of work this guy was.)
So, the judge that was talking to us went down to the room where this guy was stalling on discussing a plea bargain (apparently being the sort who saw nothing wrong with stalking), and said, “You know, if you really want, I’ve got a jury panel upstairs that isn’t doing anything right now, we could get started on the trial any time you like.”
The guy decided to accept the plea bargain, the judge came up to tell us the story of what had been happening, and we all got to leave the courthouse in the early afternoon. Sometimes even the threat of an actual trial can get action.
ALAN!
I’m so glad you’re online. Urgent problem/query: what is the process required for a client to sack their lawyer? The person in question is a 34 year old man with cerebal palsy, which came about from a birth problem and he was given compensation. His grandfather (who is now dead) appointed the man with a lawyer to take care of the money. Lawyer has basically gone corrupt. She’s charging fees while allowing the man very little of his own money and has a lot of power over him, seeing as she is the one with control over his bank account. She’s allowed him to become trapped in a care home he hates, will not allow him to be moved, and along with the care manager and social worker is helping to make his life a misery to the point where he is suicidal. She needs to be gone ASAP, at minimum from this man’s life, but hopefully from the law firm entirely (wishful thinking, perhaps).
What to do?
@Alan
Oh God I wish. Though less for work reasons and more for dating reasons… *cough*
I’ll stop there.
@ sunnysombrera
Stand by. Just collating what you’ve written
@ sunnysombrera
Few questions for you
Does the person in question have capacity? Has there ever been any official determination about that?
It sounds like the lawyer has been given power of attorney. There are a few ways that can happen.
If the person has capacity then they can just sack the lawyer. If they don’t then it’s normally the Court of Protection that supervises such matters.
One problem here is who would have standing to make an application to the court to intervene. A person without capacity makes the application through their ‘next friend’. That’s someone who can act on behalf of the person. There’s no rules on who can be next friend. Usually it’s a relative or sometimes a social etc but it can be anyone the person asks.
The court will usually make an enquiry as to the connection precisely so as to ensure a person isn’t being exploited.
In practical terms the quickest thing to do might be to contact the Solicitors Regulation Authority with your concerns. They might not be able to discuss the case with you but they will make enquiries. They’re pretty intrusive like that.
http://www.sra.org.uk/home/contactus.page
Alan:
The person has full mental capacity (what might be a spanner in the works though is if the lawyer/social worker et al try to argue he is mentally ill because of a recent threat of suicide). Physically he is wheelchair bound but can get himself to the toilet and such. However there has been no official determination that we know of. But I do know that under the 2014 Care and Disability Act you are deemed capable unless proven otherwise. There is nothing to prove he is mentally incapable, although the care home manager seems to think he is regardless.
Yes the lawyer does have power of attorney. Yes, the man does have a “next friend” who happens to be my mother (hence why I’m asking). He was a next door neighbour of ours before he got moved to the home.
Thanks for the help. We’ve had a look at the Code of Conduct on the SRA page and Lawyer has broken several of the terms, demonstrably so.
This is depressing. Not sure why 4chan exists. How in the world can the police figure out which of those threats are real.
@cincin – 😀
@scribbles – *shrugs*
Though I do respect your take, I disagree.
This is probably not a particularly fruitful conversation to have in a comments section.
Well, at least not on my end.
I’m usually replying on here while waiting for a child to get out of / finish something, waiting for our escape-artist dog to poo, or am indisposed myself…not a lot of heavy research and link dropping’ll happen.
But speaking of links…
@Quantum – I came here to post this link (seemed to go along the lines of general interest for this blog), but it also seems to specifically address some of your points:
http://zite.to/1VDEH1k
Oh, and didn’t mean to offend with “gulag” – was employing hyperbole.
@EJ – I didn’t take offense to the first thing.
And Faramir’s cool, hated what they did to him in the movie (all the turmoil about the ring when in the book he’s like, “You know, I could totally just take this thing…but what kind of dick move would that be, am I right?”).
@ sunnysombrera
Ah, well if your mum is already ‘next friend’ that makes it simpler. If the lawyer doesn’t step down voluntarily then she has standing to make an application to the Court of Protection to have them removed.
The test for incapacity can be fairly hArd to get past. There was one case I was involved where the experts were giving some examples they were seeking to rely on (a few occasions of absent mindedness and the like) where the judge interjected
“If you’re going to say that counts you’re going to have to go beyond this building to find a judge “
@Alan
Thank you, that’s good to hear. I hope that once we get rid of the person controlling his money it will be easier to get him out of the care home he hates. The next issue is his social worker, who keeps insisting on visiting him unannounced when he a) doesn’t want to see said worker and b) is alone. It’s written in black and white that social worker CAN’T visit him without my mother present, if the man wants her present (and he always does). Pretty sure there’s a regulations board we can contact regarding useless, selfish people in the care sector.
Again, thanks for the help. 🙂
Ugh. I hope I outlive my brother so that he never has to have his care in the hands of anyone incompetent, corrupt or well meaning but overloaded with way too many cases.
@ SFHC
If you like perky goths, these were my favourites. I love the lyric.
https://youtu.be/UYHicnQd1SY
@sfhc
Remember that cracked has many different writers and some of them disagree with the majority. The site itself tends to be more liberal then not but they hired a few writers who basically just troll readers for views. I don’t know this one though I haven’t read cracked for a while.
Mbut it’s a large site and what one writer says doesn’t reflect on all of them. Especially since anyone can become a writer or submit and article and they will print it as long as it seems interesting. :p
Coming a bit late to the free speech sidebar, but I do wonder — for anyone that thinks that free speech exists only to perpetuate privilege, how do you imagine that controlled speech would do anything but be worse? In the U.S., consider who is in power in the house…would we want to give them the power to control “threatening” speech? Im trying to imagine any set of laws that would extend government power to policing MRAs for terrorism that wouldn’t be used as an absolute hammer against the Muslim community.
Full disclosure, I am outwardly a member of the privilege class, but as a transgender atheist, I’m pretty sure that less free speech wouldn’t be good for people like me.
@sunnysombrera
Hope this isn’t awkwardly late – that all sounds really concerning. If this is in the UK and you suspect the care manager is viewing your friend as having reduced capacity and acting accordingly (and they absolutely do not have that right, only a mental capacity assessment can dictate this) or if you have any other concerns then the CQC (Care Quality Commission) are a good authority to turn to, as they’re the regulatory body for care services in the UK.
Also, the actions of the social worker are veering close to institutional/organisational abuse, as they cannot make unscheduled visits if the vulnerable adult has capacity and requested that they do not (and even if he hadn’t, social workers shouldn’t be doing this anyway without an airtight justification, such as a current DOLs, as it goes against his right to privacy and right to make decisions about how he receives social care and support. Even if the unplanned visits are part of some crisis management plan due to his suicidality, the social worker should be working with his request to have a specified person present, not against it) so the local Adult Safeguarding Board would be ideal to contact.
This message is a test.
I was unable to post here for several days. I wasn’t sure if I had been moderated or my WP account was broken or whatever. It wasn’t moderation; my posts go through instantly now, and the posts I tried to make earlier are gone. Anyway, the conversation has moved on, so I’ll be brief.
–I spoke up “in defense” of 4Chan because I predicted what did in fact happen — multiple people calling for 4Chan posters to be jailed — and I wanted to get out ahead of that.
–I *do* think 4Chan should probably be taken down. It’s a hotbed of illegal activity. As we’ve seen, it harbors terrorists. I’ve heard that child porn is traded there, though I have been lucky enough not to find out. The site needs to go.
–Most posters are not terrorists or pedophiles. They’re either decent people or, more often, shitty people who are not committing serious crimes. There’s no need for law enforcement to look into everyone who uses 4Chan, just the people on r9k and similar.
Now to catch up.
I’m pretty sure it wasn’t multiple people saying 4chan’ers should be jailed, but ONE person who was trying to bait everyone and just generally being troll-y.
Lots of people said it was a really bad idea.
After my comment, both Strowbridge and Vanir called for mass arrests of channers. I don’t remember Strowbridge from anywhere, so maybe they were a drive-by troll, but I’m pretty sure Vanir has been posting for at least a couple weeks. Prior to my comment, you have a couple ambiguous posts, such as Fruitloopsie calling for “these terrorists” to go to jail, without explaining who exactly they meant. Fruitloopsie is generally reasonable, so I assume they meant “people threatening violence,” or “people threatening violence and people directly encouraging them,” rather than “everyone who posts on 4Chan”, but with people like Strowbridge and Vanir running around, I think it’s a good idea to speak as precisely as possible. Precision makes the conversation more interesting, anyway, and while like all of us I want to see more than 0 and less than everyone arrested, I can’t actually know whether I agree with Fruitloopsie without a few more specifics.
Oh, and in case anyone wondered why I made a point last week to say that freedom of speech is important, note that we have Scribbles in this thread saying “fuck the First Amendment.” (Also Kirbywarp and someone else calling for porn to be censored, about a month ago) I happen to like the First Amendment and want to keep it. We don’t need to get rid of it to stop the violent parts of GG and 4Chan. We have RICO and tons of other tools if the will is there to use them.
@Orion
I hear you, it’s terrible to suggest that anyone who posts on 4chan be arrested. That would be a violation of civil rights. I can understand why, given that context, the phrase “fuck the first ammendment” would sound like an echo of that sentiment. Personally, I took it to be more of an expression of frustration at how people hold up the first ammendment like free speech is the most important right we have, and who think it trumps everyone else’s right to live without fear. Most of the time the freedom of speech doesn’t apply when it encroaches on safety, like the shouting fire in a crowded theater example that’s so popular, but in the case of Internet harassment and Internet terrorism, suddenly it’s considered okay for people to incite terror.
Personally, I don’t get why people act like the Internet isn’t real. If I were to get a threat in a letter, would it be less of a threat because it wasn’t said in person? You could argue that they clearly know where I live, making it more credible. Okay, what about a threat over the phone? The phone number is no longer even tied to a geographical area because cell phone numbers can move with us, so a person calling me on the phone to threaten me might not know anything else but my phone number, but it’s still taken more seriously.
I once had a friend threaten suicide over ICQ. It was extremely difficult to convince his local police department to go check it out for me (he lived over an hour from me, so j could not have gotten there quickly) because I made the mistake of telling then that the friend told me his plans over an online chat service. I had to convince them I had met him in person before they were willing to even check it out. I had his address, he had told me a specific method he was planning to employ, but suddenly the Internet makes it not credible.
Sometimes I wonder if this is related to the weird attitude I’ve seen in people where they don’t even seem to understand that the people on the Internet are people. I had a coworker defend his trolling by saying it’s just words on a screen and if his victims are upset by that it’s their own fault. He doesn’t see the people he’s interacting with as people or the words he’s reading as coming from a human being. There was a similar story on This American Life where a troll came forward and apologized to a woman for harassing her. He didn’t realize she was human until he read an article she wrote describing what he was putting her through. http://m.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/545/if-you-dont-have-anything-nice-to-say-say-it-in-all-caps
I don’t know what my point is. I guess I’m frustrated that the majority view right now seems to be that the Internet isn’t real. That things that are said are not to be taken to heart even though the same would not be expected of face-to-face conversation.