The Yeehawist National Front
The Yeehawist National Front have taken over a federal building in Burns, Oregon.
If they weren't white there'd be a huge pile of dead brown bodies now. Thank the Lord Jesus for that white skin! Yeehaw!
Oh yeah, the link I put up there doesn't say this but: they are 150 armed militia members.
If they weren't white there'd be a huge pile of dead brown bodies now. Thank the Lord Jesus for that white skin! Yeehaw!
Oh yeah, the link I put up there doesn't say this but: they are 150 armed militia members.
Comments (108)
You have to love gun nuttery.
With all due respect discoii, you are race baiting with your OP. If you want to argue/debate/discuss the situation in Oregon that is fair game but to use the foundation of skin color to justify what has or hasn't happened seems to be a less than genuine approach.
It is a wildlife refuge that is only there because the ranchers back in the 1800's dug water ways thru the terrain to water their cattle and where cattle go, the birds will follow.
Could you please explain how they are "welfare ranchers"?
Committing arson is intentionally setting fire with the intent of destruction. Performing a controlled burn is very legal and replenishes the soil, giving it new life with the ash and providing a fire break (back burn) to remove the fuel in a defined space to stop a fire from spreading. Has anyone ever performed a controlled burn that got out of control? You betcha. Is everyone convicted of it? Hardly ever.
Quoting Landru Guide Us
Not all fools carry guns.
Gotta hand it to them though: they've got some balls even though, let's face it, they weren't really at risk anyways. At least for the time being. Let's see what these Yeehawists will actually do when the state decides to remove you them from the premises. Will they actually fight? Will the state gun down 150 white people? What would happen if they do that?
Did you just Sarah Palin him?
Also something I saw was that the group claimed 150 militiamen, while other sources claimed seeing 15. If my experience serves it's probably in between. I very much doubt the 15 figure. People were probably asleep or not in the immediate vicinity. But if the last episode of Wild Bundy's Adventures is anything to gauge by the YNF isn't known for maintaining any real sort of cohesiveness or discipline outside of their hatred of all things "government" (they devolved into infighting between groups as soon as the thread had subsided), which from my own experience means that logistics aren't the strong suit of the group.
And, yes, the racial aspect of this event is palpable in the face of the recent events of Tamir Rice, as well as the difference in treatment at Ferguson.
It would be reporting of "Armed and dangerous" criminals or possible terrorists in the area. First and foremost, the media wouldn't be allowed to interview the "terrorists". Schools wouldn't be just closed,the media would show schoolchildren and families being evacuated from the little town for their safety. Besides, when these people are "old friends" of the government already, the officials know them. Did the US government storm with SWAT teams last time the Bundy family was protesting? At least, I don't even remember how that ended. I think this is the reason that this isn't as sinister situation that it could be.
Typical US media frenzy that will extremely likely die out when the next BIG THING happens. And then we'll comment here that BIG THING.
No, I don't know what would have happened if 150 African Americans converged in rural Oregon to protest someone's prison sentence. It'd have been odd, given the demographics of rural Oregon, but I don't expect that there would have been a shootout as you suggest. The location is significant, considering I'd expect a very different response from the government had these protestors (and that's not really what they are: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2016/01/03/militia-members-occupy-us-building-in-oregon-after-protest/78226600/) staged a takeover of a federal courthouse in Manhattan, for example. I'd also expect a different response if the protestors took to the streets in an urban area and set fire to police cars.
There is a context here that cannot be overlooked, and the fact that these nuts are far away from civilization fighting for causes that most of us care little about is critical, having little or nothing to do with race. But, for the record, if these folks are all beaten with sticks and taken to jail, you won't get an objection from me.
Besides, there have been armed black demonstrations, so it isn't so far fetched that the police would be at first quite calm in a similar situation...if they understood it's a protest, not a robbery. Totally different thing with a single African American walking in the streets with an semi-automatic rifle. That's dangerous.
Granted, a similar response came out from the state during Occupy Wallstreet, but not during the Tea Party rallies. So... it seems pretty clear who the state is protecting, and it's in lexical ordering, and in that lexical ordering is a heavily weighted racial adjuster yielding: more protection for whites and antagonism towards non-whites.
You're not aware that BLM leases to ranchers on public lands are at below market value and represent a taxpayer subsidy to the "ranching lifestyle", one that degrades public lands and externalizes the costs to the taxpayers? I guess you're not very informed on the subject.
The Hammonds were convicted of arson. I guess you've decided, like the rightwing goons, to decide who is innocent and who is guilty and what a crime, outside our democratic and judicial process. We're all supposed to let you and the goons decide, it appears.
Like I always say, you and the gun nuts really have a beef with democracy and the rights of others, don't you?
The Tea Party didn't camp out in public places. There's a difference between protesting and living in the street.
Regarding the Oregon situation, these folks seized an unoccupied outpost, so it's not like they ousted anyone or confronted anyone. Had the media not shown up, I'm not sure anyone would have known. Who knows, maybe the same thing is going on somewhere in rural Idaho but word hasn't gotten out yet.
The Yahooists were replaced by the Googlists, both of whom were predated by the AOLists.
A 3 hour Tea Party Rally, as subversive as that might actually be, is less threatening to public order than a 3-week or 3 month 24/7 sit in for goodness and light. Political activities by gray-haired people with slightly wrinkly skin is less disturbing to public order than more energetic political activities by people with youthful skin and brown/blond naturally wavy hair.
A demonstration in an urban setting is more 'disturbing' than the same thing in a rural setting. 100 farmers demonstrating at the local feed mill about unfair prices isn't the same thing as 100 black folks throwing rocks at the police in the city.
Poor people getting together in large numbers, or colored folk, or undocumented aliens, or all sorts of marginal people leaving the margin and heading toward the middle of the page (so to speak) is a major unsettling challenge to the Established Order.
White working class unionized men and women going on strike against Hormel Meat (in a rural county) was worth calling out the MN National Guard to prevent them at gunpoint from blocking scabs going into the plant -- and that in a liberal state which is mostly white working class people.
Surprise!!! The Established Order protects itself, and can tell the difference between friend and foe.
We don't have to like the crap the Established Order offers, but it is a waste of outrage to complain that a bunch of white guys out in the woods weren't greeted by a SWAT team.
So, equality in this case wouldn't be an equality of the lowest common denominator. Rather, all people deserve to be treated as if they are human, with the needs and rights that entails.
I agreed with the first half of your post where you pointed out that varying responses to varying threats made sense, but then you devolved into arguing that really it was all political.
There is a difference between protesting in favor of greater workers rights and physically blocking people from going to work. The first is legal, the second not.
The SWAT team didn't greet the folks in Oregon, not because all the protestors were white, but because, other than the local sheriff and maybe a deputy or two, there is no additional law enforcement there, much less a SWAT team.
In Ferguson (which seems to be the alluded to other event), a young man stole some stuff from a convenience store, knocked down the store owner, and, when confronted by police, charged at the officer and attacked him through the officer's window. He was shot in what was described as a struggle for the officer's gun.
That death resulted in a number of false reports by witnesses at the scene, all contradicted by the physical evidence. As a result of the death being ruled justified, the citizens threw rocks, fired guns, burned buildings, and looted stores.
So, let's treat everyone equitably, but first explain to me how the two are similar so that we can properly apply precedent. Would you rather be standing in that town in Oregon right now or in Ferguson during the riots? I'd suspect the former (despite it probably being really cold there right now). Why? Could it be that you realize that the former is much safer than the latter. If so, wouldn't the safer place require less police action? Isn't that how it works?
This rather misses the point. If some Muslim activists or Black Lives Matters took over an empty federal office with guns, want to make a bet they wouldn't be surrounded by SWAT and federal marshals with an ultimatum to surrender or die?
So much for gun nuts love of free markets.
I guess in retrospect the environmentalists should have gotten guns and occupied the BLM offices saying we are the ones to decide the law, just like Arguing Aristotle above claims the goons have a right to do about arson.
The one piece of context, in spite of your harping, that you seem to be either ignorant of or ignoring is the history of blacks in the United States. Recent history, even. A more salient comparison would be the MOVE bombings in 1985.
Do you really believe that this Oregon conflict will end with an air strike?
Here's where you say "it would too be different," and I say "no it wouldn't." We then would go back and forth calling each other out of touch for a little while and then we'd go on talking about something else.
To the extent that you want to change the facts to include an urban area or an argument over some other cause, then we'd have dissimilar, inapplicable facts.
There is a difference between engaging in the (just barely) feasible and legal right to strike for better wages, job security or other desired ends and having the state and the corporation conspire to destroy the ability of unionized workers to withhold their labor as leverage to pry out a better share of reward for their work.
What the state got for it's interference was the loss of about 1200 jobs held by local citizens that paid quite well (and drove the local economy) in exchange for 1200 immigrant laborers (legal and otherwise) who worked for significantly less, repatriated a significant share of their wages south of the border, and to boot had to work in less safe, unhealthier conditions. (How unhealthy? the rate of injuries were high -- well over 100%--meaning all workers could expect at least 1 significant (usually) knife-related injury every year, plus injuries from slipping, lifting, standing, repetitive motion and so on.
The worse injuries were neurological -- from the "pig brain blaster" that was used to extract brains from pig skulls for use in Korean stir fry. Workers in the vicinity of this operation developed grave, immune/neurological problems from inhalable particles of pig brain.
Hormel was profitable before the strike (some years ago) and it is still profitable. The margin on turning a hog into Spam and pork chops is pretty generous. It isn't like the union was bringing the company to its knees. What was important to the Established Order was suppressing workers rights.
I don't think it will, nor do I think it will end in a deadly inferno like Waco.
The bottom line here is that you likely admit that the danger posed in Ferguson was greater than that in Oregon. That being the case, why complain about the disproportionate response if the dangers are different?
Here's what's fairly obvious to me: The ranchers are upset because their livelihood is being negatively impacted by government action and they feel their way of life is being unfairly jeopardized. It's hardly ideological at its base, but they've tried to turn it into an over-reaching government argument, suggesting that if the government would just let them be, they could live independently. As we've all pointed out, their argument fails. They are just as dependent on the government as others, and their way of life, despite being romantic and rugged, is no more sacred than the hot dog vendor who depends upon his exclusive license to sell at the corner of 42nd and Main.
That their political views aren't terribly consistent makes them pretty much like every other group. Their just mad because it's their ox being gored. They've reacted in a political way (which makes them also pretty much like every other group) by drumming up support from those who idolize the Old West and the individualism it requires. As a group, they aren't terribly dangerous, although there are likely some nut jobs who might actually do something dangerous among them.
Ferguson was a street riot, causing imminent danger to all nearby. It was not a black lives matter movement. There was damage to people, property, and the community. It deserved immediate action. If everyone would ignore the Oregon situation, no person or property would be harmed.
Anyway, following your logic, if "all lives matter" and Ferguson is directly analogous to Oregon and you believe the Ferguson folks were treated too harshly, then the correct response would be to treat the Oregon folks as gently as you believe the Ferguson folks should have been treated. That is, if all lives matter, then neither should be mistreated, not that if you mistreat one group, you should mistreat the other. Your argument ought to be that everyone should be treated fairly, not that if one is treated unfairly then fairness requires the other to be treated unfairly as well.
Uhm, I mean, it's a little weird quoting myself, but that's exactly what I said to BitterCrank:
Quoting Moliere
Especially when the officials well know the Bundy family. They made a similar stance years ago, right? Nobody got hurt. Yeah, the government backed down. What a huge victory for the Bundy's. The Bundy's didn't face long prison sentences, as they surely aren't now escaped convicts.
Really. Bunch of people occupy a wildlife refuge building out in nowhere. Ohh... has the revolution begun?
Even now the government surely takes it seriously. Likely the government is surveying the people that come to building (or the protest) that they don't know already. And likely they have their informants and undercover agents already there. When a rich country has the money to put into the "fight against terrorism", you bet that anybody coming close to the Bundy family is going to be screened very well. Domestic terrorism is there with ISIS, so of course all the "Don't tread on me"-people will be watched alongside the "Occupy"-people.
I'd bet this comes at nothing. Of course some tragedy might occur, but it's very unlikely.
Mmm, stir-fried pig brains.
One of my favorite MST3K episodes.
But Torgo had a heart of gold, when he wasn't trying to get the "Master's" brides.
I think you'd lose that bet. Every GOP politician and absurd conservative pundit (i.e., all of them), along with Fox News would be calling for a death strike against the thugs and/or terrorists.
But some white welfare ranchers who support sedition and arson on my public lands - we're supposed to treat them with kid gloves.
These freaks need to be surrounded and arrested, and if they don't go peacefully, they should be shot dead. They are armed insurrectionists who represent a much greater threat to the US than some ISIS maniacs. These guys threaten the rule of law.
Quite right -- the ranchers do not "get" that government lands are public lands, and actually the ranchers mostly do get to use the grass that grows on the people's land to raise their cattle. One news story pointed out that most local governments would not want to be the receivers of all this land (in many western states "the public' owns around 50% of the land) because its income is nowhere close to what it costs to manage the land and its resources (like, protect from fire and other hazards).
Why you would suggest that "we both know" an unknown outcome, if the point of my reply was quite the opposite of what you were and are suggesting? I disagree with how you presented your OP when you include race as one of the deciding factors in how this issue will be resolved, which hasn't been as of yet, nor do I expect it to be. Ranchers by and large rarely take up a position that garners any attention unless they feel as though they have genuinely been wronged. The Hammond father and son, did as they said and turned themselves in, a second time, as requested by the Government. They never said they were above the law, they fought the charges of arson, lost their case and did the amount of time first determined and have since turned themselves in for a second go. Now if you think that $400 of damage, as the result of a legal controlled burn getting out of control is worth putting two men behind bars for 5 years, then we have a different sense of what justice is. I am quite sure that the insurance companies who paid for the damage to the town of Ferguson's businesses, city property and houses of Worship would have much rather paid the $400 in damage to grazing land out in Oregon.
What you are missing is proportionality and good old common sense. The first Federal Judge to hear the Hammond case called a minimum sentence of 5 years "grossly disproportionate" to the offense. Again, the fire the Hammond family members started was a legal controlled burn, not a deliberate action taken to cause harm and damage to the very land they graze cattle on. What happened in Ferguson was intentional, meant to cause damage to the businesses that operate there and harm to the government in place to keep the peace.
The BLM leases public land, BACK to the ranchers that have been there since before the BLM. Does that not sound a bit illogical to you?
The problem with taking a position that you clearly don't believe in is that no one will take you seriously when you say it, but maybe it was fun to say it anyway.
I think they should kill everyone everywhere. That way, there'll be no more violence.
But other than that, I can't really bring myself to sympathize with the rest of these Yeehawist ideas.
You'll need to complete your thought experiment with some additional facts. Why exactly have these Muslims seized this federal outpost? Are they trying to start a Muslim state, or are they just cattle ranchers who happen to be Muslim? It would seem that if their objective is to start a theocracy in the rugged hills of Oregon, then there'd be a reason to take that threat more seriously (especially in light of ISIS) than a bunch of pissed off ranchers who want better access to grazing land.
What hurts workers wages and their work conditions isn't an Established Order of Illuminate who control the levers of society. It's not them. It's you. You're the bastard. Look in the mirror and own it.
You want cheaper food, cheaper clothes (just a guess, but I'm thinking you've got a pretty shabby wardrobe), cheaper books, cheaper movies, cheaper everything. Every time prices rise, you scream about your right to a reasonable life at your income level being infringed upon. Every time those prices drop to quell your screeches, the workers start to rise up and offer their screams at their dwindling wages. That the workers screaming has been silenced only means that you've been successful in silencing them.
Typical of gun nuts, now you're just making stuff up.
I am deadly serious. People like Bundy are attacking our democracy. ISIS just attacks buildings and people. The former is a real threat. The latter just a tragedy. ISIS is not going to destroy the US. But the rightwing mentality of militias might.
Surround the area, give them five minutes to surrender. If they don't, wipe the scum out.
The Bundy types do want to start a theocracy, and more to the point, they want to claim my public lands and not pay for it, so they are trying to take over land, and more to the point, they want to destroy our democracy and replace it with a rightwing style gang state, best described as fascism.
So by your own standard, we should be shooting these creeps with snipers while Fox news cheers the shooting on. But of course, they're white guys, so that won't happen.
What exactly am I making up in my post?
And as an aside? Your constant need to label other people gets rather tiresome after awhile. I have overlooked it one to many times and on more than one occasion I have walked away from a response to you, because of your uncalled for names and unjustified labels. It is no different than another forum member using cross slang on another member for being an Atheist, every freakin time, someone that you have decided is an Atheist.
I have never once claimed to be a gun lover, a gun owner nor a person who can legally own a firearm. In other words the only skin in the game I have, is the right to bear arms, period. FULL STOP. So back off on the broad brush strokes and kindly stop cross contaminating threads with your self drawn, baseless conclusions.
Thank you
Just playing Devil's Advocate here, but it might be that you've selected an arbitrary characteristic (e.g., skin colour) as the distinguishing feature. Perhaps white people have more friends in law enforcement (and this itself might be institutionalized racism) and so when a situation like this occurs it's not the colour of their skin that saves them but the personal connections they have to prevent the escalation. In cases where violence erupts, there might be a variety of causes and singling out skin colour is not entirely productive, even if it is somewhat (mostly) appropriate.
Another reason it won't happen (although I'm not really conceding the well thought out point that it's only their whiteness that is acting as their shield) is because they took over a shed deep in the wilderness that no one really cares about other than the media and those who see it as an analogy to something great big and important, as opposed to it really just being a shitty old shed in the freezing ass woods of Oregon.
I love it when conservatives can't remember what they just posted.
The land is public. Always has been. Your idiotic claim that the welfare ranchers have always owned it and now they've been dispossessed by the mean federal government (i.e., our democratic government) is a typical conservative meme. That is, a lie.
Gunnuttery is the kool aid of the Right.
Again, as others have pointed out, if Muslim extremists or the Black Panthers took over an isolated area, the GOP would be demanding air strikes. So you're really not dealing with the issue of how big a role race plays in this.
I really think skin color in this case is merely an index for an ideology of privilege and anti-democratic agitprop.
Conservatives, even on this forum, are sympathetic to the goons because they represent them on various levels - most importantly an anti-democratic mentality that is basically adolescent (I should get what I want, and if I want to break the rules and light fires on public land, then tough luck for other people, who are stupid!).
Conservatism has genuinely conflated the Other with democracy and rule and law, and so it thinks of whiteness in terms of their own privilege and immunity from following the rules. The result of various self-serving narratives (like the one Bundy is pitching - it's our land - and ArguingWAristotle repeating here mindlessly). Totally puerile. But that's what modern conservatism is: an ideology of adolescent boys with guns.
That's why these militia goons are much more dangerous than ISIS. ISIS can just kill people. Conservatism can put the US into the thrall of mindless self-serving narratives.
The Kool Aid has been drunk deeply.
Below is a rhetorical question and there's no need to respond:
Doesn't ISIS spread mindless self-serving narratives AND kill people? I might be wrong because I don't know ISIS principles and an effort to find out might draw suspicion upon myself (yay democracy!).
Had it been the Black Panthers staging a sit in at a Housing and Urban Development building, refusing to leave until changes were made to policies affecting housing for African Americans, no, there wouldn't have been air strikes. If it were Muslims demanding fair treatment, I'd say the same. Of course, we can tinker with the facts and change the outcome, like if people were being held hostage or if demands were being made that the US accept Islam as its official religion. That is to say that all the variables make a difference, with race only being one of them, and not dispositive of whether there would be air strikes, where the term "air strike" is defined as any sort of over the top crazy response where people get slaughtered.
If the general point is that blacks have it tougher than whites in the US, where if you could pick your skin color, you'd be prudent to choose white, I suppose I could agree. Of course, that revelation is hardly provocative and exciting. If you're asking, though, whether this Oregon situation is proof of anything important, it's really not, other than showing that folks are at the ready to race bait at the drop of a hat.
I'm sure what you mean by this, Tiff.
I'm no expert on the history of Oregon, but know it to be relatively new as a state. Before becoming a state it was a federal territory, of course, but as such was formed by my understanding from land possessed by Native Americans who were breezily disregarded by the U.S. and Great Britain as they alternately disputed and resolved their claims over the land. The federal government, I believe, legally owned what is now Oregon until it began giving and selling its property to white settlers. It didn't sell all its land in Oregon, however. It retained land, including that which is now this wildlife refuge. Under a law which in 1908 authorized the president to designate federal lands as such a refuge, Teddy Roosevelt created Mulhear Wildlife Refuge by Executive Order, that year.
So, my understanding (which may be incorrect) is that no rancher ever owned this property. Whether they were "there" before the BLM I don't know; it's a fairly new federal agency. I don't know whether they were there before Oregon became a territory either, though I doubt it. If they were, however, their presence would make no difference as far as legal ownership of the property is concerned, no more than the presence of the Native Americans long before any white person settled on the land made any difference. It belongs to the federal government; only the federal government can lease the land, and it has every right to do so. What the ranchers may think about title to the land is not relevant. The federal government has no reason to recognize any ownership claim of the ranchers.
This dispute is about money, which is being manipulated for their benefit by people who want more money.
Sure ISIS does, but nobody in the US takes them seriously (except some disturbed individuals).
In contrast, conservatives defend the goons in the Bundy Militia and think their ideas are just peachy. The GOP presidential candidates have all lauded Cliven Bundy for his standoff with the BLM last year or so where he refused to pay his lease fees for use of federal land. Bundy threatened to shoot federal agents. Rand Paul visited him and heaped praise on him. So there's a vast difference. The loony ideas of the gun nuts basically afflict a third of our population that considers itself conservative. That's a threat to democracy ISIS isn't.
Yep. I was actually involved in some of the litigation with the BLM for leasing public land to ranchers purposely below fair market value (by manipulating auctions for the ranchers' benefit). And then allowing the ranchers to degrade public land by overgrazing.
So Tiff is just making stuff up. Or rather following the militia narrative. Pitiful counterfactual stuff.
Calling the recognition that black protesters are treated more harshly than white protesters (to the point of being shot) "race baiting" is just the kind of thing I expect from conservatives and its utterly bad faith arguments about race in America.
Playing the "playing the race card" card, as usual.
Quoting Landru Guide UsSo according to Landru a third of the US population is a threat to democracy. :D
I think the FBI and the police have a rational approach to this. They surely know the Bundy folk by now. And some those real lunatics you are so afraid of (for a reason) were last time kindly asked to leave the Bundy ranch when the last "media event" was done with the Bundy's. So I think the government understands to watch these guys, but don't make them martyrs for some lunatics, the next Timothy McVeighs out there. So I guess very many of those now at the building are undercover agents and many others informants and any new guy is thoroughly checked. The amount of money poured into fighting terrorism makes that an easy thing to do.
I still think the likely outcome is that after the Bundy's have had their time in the media limelight and when it seems that the country is moving to another subject, they'll return to their ranch "victorious".
And people will debate gun ownership, right-wingers & leftists, Obama, Donald Trump, whatever in a different context.
Far away from being ‘le snob” I am definitely ‘le slob’ when it comes to my wardrobe. Daily wear is low fashion Lee denim jeans, sweatshirts, and underwear from Marshalls discount store. (Hey Hanover, you can get high end underwear from Marshalls at steeply discounted prices. Such a deal! When you get strip searched at the court house, Security will be mighty impressed that your dierriere is clothed in Tommy Hilfiger undies and not mere Hanes.)
What do I think about Wages, Price, and Value?
In the long run, it is a race to the bottom to keep prices low (by shipping jobs overseas to countries with abysmal wages) so that the American unemployed, underemployed, non-employed, and working poor can afford at least shoddy goods.
The motivation behind job exports and low domestic wages is not abundant cheap goods, it’s high profitability for the business owners. The Chinese, Nicaraguan, or Turkish business owners are doing well; their workers are not. Service industry and low value manufacturing firms in the US are doing well, their workers are not. Domestic high end manufacturers are doing well, and so are their workers. High-end service companies and their workers are doing well.
Around 250 million Americans (give or take 10 million) can not afford high-end goods or services. They are forced by low income to shop at Walmart for cheap goods.
By tax-draining a substantial portion of the wealth out of the richest 5% of Americans, by a smarter domestic manufacturing policy, the kinds of subsidies that it takes to enable people to rise socioeconomically (provide more housing in better socio-economic areas, better health care—including mental health — and better education — through trade or collegiate schooling) can be made. Wages and prices will rise. Higher prices and higher wages are as mutually supportive as low prices and lower wages. The difference — with subsidies - is that 250 million Americans can actually live a better life.
What will happen to the richest 5%? They stay the richest 5%. The richest 5% can lose a lot of their wealth and remain plutocrats. They are that wealthy. They will just be less plutocratic than they were. This will allow some room for the country to be a bit more democratic. If the process continues, it is possible that the plutocrats would have to be downgraded to merely very wealthy. Very wealthy people are likely to spend less than plutocrats. The fourth and fifth home may have to go—maybe the ones in Belize and Singapore. The fleet of cars might need to be reduced. The and and foot service staff is still quite affordable. The swimming pool and pool house can still be enlarged for fancier parties. The rare art budget will probably have to be trimmed up a bit. Fortunately, high end fashion (very high end, actually) is using faux fur so a new wardrobe will still be possible — only ever 10 months instead of every 7 months. Maybe fox hunting can be cut out — it’s becoming de trop, so it’s probably time for it to go anyway. Private schools for the children — day care through post doctoral studies) is still essential — no corners will be cut there. After all, they need to hold down at least several elite positions to keep the family status high.
One thing is for sure: The rich won’t be reduced to canned beans or stopping at White Castle for a snack.
Don't you mean "Couldn't care less"?
Cripes, what kind of gay man are you? I suppose I shouldn't stereotype, but I always thought you folks were supposed to be snappy dressers. I know you live in the Midwest, so perhaps you still set the bar rather high compared to some of your neighbors...
But having occupied public space before, and having no real qualms with firearms, it's not the tactic that bothers me. Just the end-goal. It does pretty much strike me as a rich man's quest to have more control over their land. Not sure if the couple should really spend more time in jail -- I'm not a big fan of jail or mandatory sentences -- but I also don't know my ass from a hole in the ground about the case, and it strikes me that the demand isn't commensurate with that story really.
Didn't you mean " my asshole from a hole in the ground"? >:).
Sorry, gross and uncalled for I know, but in the context it just kind of jumped out at me. O:) .
It usually comes as a harsh and dreadful shock to many heterosexuals, but not all gay men are clothes horses, accomplished interior decorators, neatniks, crafty mixologists, Broadway Musical fans who know all the lyrics, and Episcopalians. Some are -- that is true. Quite a few are. But many of us found our metier in the 1970s butch clone look: blue jeans, plaid shirts, leather vests, chaps (maybe), mustaches or beards. The look owed something to hippies. Why did we like that look so much? It hearkened back to our oppressed pre-sixites youth when we got to enjoy the stiff masculine rasp of new (unwashed) Levis blue jeans from Sears which, in rural schools of the 1950s and early 60s, was kind of a uniform.
Plus, they could be shrunk to fit, and if they were nice and tight they showed off such assets as one had. Polyester pants from Montgomery Wards (or anywhere else) wouldn't do that. In fact, if one showed up in plaid polyester pants at a gay bar one might not get past the persnickety bouncers. If one did get past the bouncers, one might be dragged out the back door by bikers and be forced to provide blow jobs for the entire biker gang. Quelle Horreurs! (How many in your party?)
Later on, I found that the blue jeans costume fit well in working class anarchist / socialist circles too -- well, maybe not the chaps without blue jeans underneath. There are limits. Then I aged into the gay bear phase -- gray hair, white beard, balding, various degrees of over weight, blue jeans, plaid shirts, leather jackets, the whole deja vu thing all over again.
So here we are. Plain blue jeans are cheaper than fancy ones, hold up well, and if gay boys are anything, we are smart shoppers (much of the time).
If you need more detailed information, please call your local Gay / Lesbian / Bisexual / Transgender / Fag / Queer / Lesbian Separatist / Log Cabin Republican and Just-Plain-Stupid Community Center hot line and ask them.
The idiom calls for "ass" not asshole. Two holes in one sentence is ineffective. You might like "don't know my ass from my elbow" better.
February 14th, 1859 is relatively new? They were #33.
I can see a relation to be confused about between an ass (we spell it 'arse') and an elbow, given they are both body parts, but none at all between an ass and a hole in the ground, except for the 'hole' part.
I prefer to use "asses and elbows" to mean a hustle and bustle which is disorganized due to a mixture of incompetence and a lack of resources. Often understood to mean that you have to fight for yourself. i.e., "There is 15 minutes for shower time, there's 50 of you and 5 showers, so it's going to be nothing but asses and elbows"
I concur w. @Bitter Crank --
I mean, uhhhh. . . think very literally. A hole needs ground around it to be a hole.
I guess a realist might argue you could have a hole in a hole. Just because we cant tell where the bigger hole stops and the smaller hole starts, it doesn't mean it isn't there.
Yeehawist National Forest. I say that because I wish to remain on topic.
If you are the sort who spends considerable time creating the perfect "I don't care" look, then you fall squarely in the gay camp (but could also be metro). If you truly don't care but wear what you must in order to avoid harassment, then you're hetero. If you are just now finding out that you are in fact hetero and have been going about things the wrong way all these years, I expect you'll be feeling a certain amount of embarrassment, but who among us hasn't committed some sort of faux pas?.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-armed-oregon-ranchers-who-want-free-land-are-already-getting-a-93-percent-discount/
I mean...it's not as though I actually have a significantly intelligent point to defend here!
Is your objective simply to point out the hypocrisy of those who claim to be conservatives by showing that they receive the same sort of government subsidies they condemn when received by those on the left? While I get that you wish to present your position in the most mocking and inflammatory way possible, when logically considered, all that you're really doing is demanding consistency. That would mean that you would be perfectly satisfied if the government ceased providing any subsides to anyone.
That being the case, I'll just assume you're a rightwing conservative, but just a bit disillusioned by those who claim to be in your camp because they too accept government handouts when it's to their benefit. The solution (and I think this would work for both of us) is that these nut jobs should not be considered rightwing, but should instead better be understood to be what they really are: liberal wolves in conservative lamb clothing.
No my purpose is to show that those who support these thugs by claiming "they have a point" are using counterfactual memes, which is basically all conservatives ever do.
Bundy's militia of goons and conservative "intellectuals" think exactly alike.
Continue to argue about this incident in the typical discourse, over the usual things such as the gun laws, right-wing and left-wing memes, right wing militias, land ownership, the security state, Trump & GOP candidates, Obama and whatever, but here's a telling story about the actual reality of this unimportant and mindless media-frenzy:
(See Rawstory article here)
What's also interesting to note is how Russia Today, the Russian proganda machine, reports about the current events:
ISIS: Idealists
Gun Lobby: Idealists
Christian Right: Idealists
Skin Heads: Idealists
GOP: Idealists
I'm sorry, but the greatest threat to democracy is idealism... as that always... ALWAYS leads to a totalitarianism via a surrender of the mind to a 'great ideal'.
best song to address this issue:
Meow!
GREG
Over the years these two strands have been further colored and changed. In general, though, one could say that the Puritan strand represents the strongly liberal, social interventionist, local-federal partnership approach. The other approach is strongly conservative, anti-federal-local partnership, and takes a non-interventionist approach.
These is a crude summary, and of course there are contradictions. Conservatives don't mind federal subsidies for business and agriculture, or having the state build roads which improve commerce. But in general, there is a bi-pole relationship to the government. Liberals seem to be attracted to central government; conservatives are repulsed. And for good reason. Liberals prefer active regulation of commerce, conservatives generally prefer a more unregulated marketplace.
A lot of people will agree with you, that idealism is a threat to democracy and ALWAYS leads to totalitarianism. They just have a different "Idealists" in their mind: Leftist socialists (Idealists), environmentalists (Idealists), Gay right activists (Idealists), Occupy Wall Street activists (Idealists), Democrats: Idealists, whatever, you name it. But for many people it is totally inconcievable and utterly incomprehensible to even think that the loony dangerous other side could ever reason anything or have in common any values. That's what I have learned for example following Philosophy Forums and other US forums.
I personally think that idealism isn't a threat to democracy. What is only dangerous when people resort to outright violence. And any political ideology that starts from the idea that violence is necessary, is a threat to democracy and will lead to totalitarianism. It's as simple as that.
I think that all political ideologies start with, in practice, the question of how much violence. Violence itself is always part and parcel of any form of ideology.
I probably shouldn't, but it seems to offend a lot of people when I make this statement... or maybe they are uncomfortable or... really I have no idea, but the reactions are simply not very good.
Funny thing is, I really don't support any collective idealistic efforts. I find Leftist socialist just as totalitarian and the Right Wing conservatives. I don't really get the gay rights activists in that they highlight difference rather than embrace similarities. I find that equality of rights is not when one recognizes differences, but that differences are something that really don't matter; thus are for the most part background noise. Environmentalists have the tendency to make claims that mankind is solely responsible for the environment, which seem a bit of an arrogant perspective. We are part of the environment and not the 'masters of environment'. Occupy Wall Street was honestly short sighted and a list of complaints of which the protestors were themselve largely responsible for, but wished to play the blame game... oh, and they never really offered up any constructive solutions or viable alternatives. The mantra of 'what do we what: CHANGE, when do we want it: NOW, what should that change be exactly: WE HAVE NO IDEA AT ALL, who should make this change: SOMEONE ELSE'... reminded of the unsatisfaction of teens... as if simply being annoyed was a productive solution.
Anyway.... back to the real topic...
Perhaps I have simply seen too many movements that seemed to be 'harmless idealistic mantras' that have later proven to become totalitarian rules of a power driven megalomaniac sitting on the throne of that power. The potential destructive powers of idealism just puts me off that track. I cannot think of any notion of idealism that is immune to this potential of becoming a totalitarian rule that surrenders the mind by negating adaptation of notion and disallows (or tries to disallow) accumulation of new information/experience/knowledge.
I fail to see that such idealistic notions of status we might field match up with the relative nature of accumulation/adaptation of the universe; thus to stay consistant with the function of the universe I'm only part of I drop all my idealism as best I can... a sort of try again, fail again try to fail better approach. Perfection is a totalitarian myth and not worthy of consideration, as perfection cannot be defined without making an appeal to a special case or a personal preference. If it is defined in a manner that it must apply to call cases and be the standard of measure for all preferences, that is when the dangers must arise... some sooner than others.
Meow!
GREG
Quoting Mayor of SimpletonThe problem with fully fledged idealism is that the supporters of any ideology seldom accept a compromise, to gain some kind of consensus with people having totally different opinions, which means that some things have to be dropped and some things not wanted have to be implemented. Making compromises "with the enemy", as it can be seen, is something that goes against idealism.
I think there is a some kind of social aspect of group behaviour in this. In political movements it's usually the "purists", the staunchest supporters of that ideology that come to dominate the movement. Moderates that would be willing to look for a compromise are seen as "selling out". Perhaps it's because people that tend to get active in political movements are themselves dissatisfied with the present.
Ideologies give us clear and simple answers to what the reasons are for our problems and what ought to be done.
Doubtless a more apathetic or nihilistic mindset is less prone to violence and chaos than the crusading mentality of the idealist - but also less likely to love and hope and long for a world with more passion and beauty and 'justice'. There, spoken like a true idealist against the coldhearted 'realist'. Somehow the virtues of both positions need to be synthesized in a thoughtful manner rather than set up as incompatible enemies; I think it can be done to a certain extent.
Indeed that is the case, but I often wonder why it is considered to be such a good and nobel notion.
I still view democracy as a process and not an ideal leading to any idealistic ideas that functions as fixed points in value notions.
Truth is, I find that the nobel people who have died for what we've considered to be ideals are often those who oppose idealists that place limitation of ideals upon the freedoms of these nobel people and thus they wish to protect...
... it gets all muddled up with freedom of ideals against freedom from ideals and the dying for ideals for the sake of living for freedom of ideals and ...
... it gets messy.
Personally I find that the term ideals is a loaded term. On one side we are speaking of nobel concepts of freedom and such, but on the other side we are speaking of limiting absolutes placed upon freedoms by a totalitarian dictator of sorts. Unfortuantely the razors edge is everywhere when speaking of ideals.
This applies to justice or beauty or whatever value attribution one wishes to put forth into motion. For the life of me, I greatly question any absolute polarities of value in any of these ideals. As I see it, ideals have meaning within a very specific context, but are themselves limited to that constraint of that concept and are still subject to adaptation due to accumulation of information/experience like it or not. When such ideals expand beyond the bounds of their limited context, they run the risk of becoming a totalitarian concept when failing to take into realization the relativity of the nature of values and the accumulation of information/experiences;thus negate the adaptive refinement that ideals are subject to... so ideals when applied in an absolute/universal manner are arguments that collapse upon the weight of their own arguments... unless the one proposing the ideals insists upon suspending accumulation/adaptation... I just cannot figure how one is supposed to stop accumulation/adaptation, as one simply cannot stop the arrow of time placing a hault to information/experiences, unless they wish to demand and command a surrender of the mind by those upon whom they impose their ideals... no matter how nobel they might appear to be.
Personally I feel that all arguments for the establishment of ideals is simply appeals to special case that is subsequently misapplied upon cases that simply do not apply, but are forced to comply.
Please understand that I do indeed have my ideals (principles) and I do field value notions upon these (my) ideals, but I try my best not to have the never to suggest that my ideals are indeed the absolute standard of measure with which all others must form their world perspectives. All I can do is try, as often I really fail at this effort.
Maybe I fear too soon, but that seem to be far better than reacting too late. Ideals that seem to be nobel can quickly garner a special status of being beyond criticism and off the table for critical debate. Religion had this self-granted grace for a long time and in many ways still has this self-justified self-acquired liberty. Personally I find that movements such as Occupy Wall Street or Anti-Globalization or Global Warming tend toward this special status of criticism is off the table... in short it's a bandwagon.
(Where would I be without a silly sequitur non-sequitur YouTube music video?)
Funny thing is it is very diffucult to form a bandwagon for relativism, as the bandwagon is indeed the comfortable ride for ideals to be pimped as absolute ad populum musts or the given. I seem to make a habit of questioning the given, as I tend to take nothing for granted
Indeed idealism may lead the way in the fight against various other idealistic notions... but funny thing is if they dropped the idealism we'd have very little to fight about in the first place. Afterall, the idealist who fights for freedom is fighting the other idealist who constraints that freedom.
Then again, this would require all sides to drop the idealism at the same time and maintain this drop, so I suppose that's not gonna happen anytime soon, so I'm left with my 'anti-Idealsitic Ideals'... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oShTJ90fC34
I sort of wish we'd adopt a position of relativist accumulation/adaptation 'oh... that's different... cool... collect' rather than the ideal of absolute/universals 'oh shit... that's different... that's wrong... kill'., but that's a wish.
Anyway...
... what was the OP writing about?
Maybe I should stop ranting and get back to the OP... the jet lag is killing.
Meow!
GREG
Now, now, you're just being silly. I hope.
Idealism isn't the same thing as fanaticism.*** Fanatics have an odor of mania and possession about them (smells like burning electric insulation), whereas idealists reference a standard of perfection; a principle to be aimed at: tolerance and freedom, the liberal ideals. Idealism smells like lily of the valley.
Realism, on the other hand, is neither fanaticism or idealism. Is there such a thing as being "too realistic"? No. Real is real. Reality doesn't get more real. (It can get less real, however, as when someone exclaims in exasperation, "Unreal!")
Ideals (Christ-like love, abolition, anti-war/peace, universal suffrage, organic farming, direct democracy, elimination of poverty...) become the subject of fanaticism when some narrow aspect of the ideal becomes the object of a very narrow focus. Christ-like love can be perverted into a life-denying obsession of self-denial which is no benefit to anyone. Political ideals about the rights and obligations of the people can be perverted into the "get government off our backs" obsession which boils down to 'no government except when I want something from it'.
Idealism is, I think, an essential leaven in societies which do (and must) run mostly on realism. Yes, idealists like Henry David Thoreau (check out his essay, Civil Disobedience) can be a nuisance. Massachusetts threw him in jail for not paying his taxes (Emerson paid them for him). His refusal wasn't libertarian tax avoidance, it was on behalf of either abolition of slavery or opposition to the Mexican American War (sorry, can't remember which. Probably the MA war...).
We really need idealists to challenge the status quo. (Leaven, as you know, changes a brick into a loaf.) Change-agents need their ideals, which we might not like. One of the most-loathed groups working for black civil rights in the south during the 1940s and 50s was the Communist Party, USA. They were on the side of the angels in their efforts. That was before they were effectively neutralized, along with much of the left by ruthless Republican realists like J. Edgar Hoover, et al.
***[ORIGIN mid 16th cent. (as an adjective): from French fanatique or Latin fanaticus ‘of a temple, inspired by a god,’ from fanum ‘temple.’ The adjective originally described behavior or speech that might result from possession by a god or demon, hence the earliest sense of the noun ‘a religious maniac’ (mid 17th cent).] [1 the practice of forming or pursuing ideals, esp. unrealistically: the idealism of youth. Compare with realism... a standard of perfection; a principle to be aimed at: tolerance and freedom, the liberal ideals.]
Given the context in which we live in, probably, but philosophically not really. Non-contextual idealism is a cancer of the ego.
Quoting Bitter Crank
True it isn't the same, but it is the foundation upon which fanaticism is born; thus I tread lightly in granting idealism such a postitive status.
As for it smelling like a lily of the valley... I'd say more like a rose:
To every idealist I feel the lyrics apply:
I know you'd like to think your shit don't stink
But lean a little bit closer
See that roses really smell like poo-poo-oo
Yeah, roses really smell like poo-poo-oo
(sorry, I just cannot resist YouTube)
Quoting Bitter Crank
That I can agree with...
Quoting Bitter Crank
Indeed, but to be fair we can spin ideals to be either positive (good) or negative (bad). If we try a bit harder we can even re-spin these attributions of postive and negative to be the polar opposite given a different context. The problem is when one wishes to ignore that spin of a pet value notions can be re-spun to a very different direction; thus changing the value attribution to the ppint it could be the polar opposite of the original notion, is not really a view consistant with realism.
Quoting Bitter Crank
I think it was a poll tax that's fund went to the MA war...
Quoting Bitter Crank
I could have stated that first sentence her to be "we need idealists to challenge the other idealists sitting in the seat of power"... a sort of tit for tat?
Well... when the revolution is over and the rebel wins, doesn't the rebel become the establishment?
I sort of think the leaven was a brick loaf all of the time...
... then again, we have not much other option as this utopia of relativism I have is simply a philosophical notion, that (unfortunately) cannot ever be tested until all abandon ideals as fixed points in value outside of special case context.
Quoting Bitter Crank
I always find this to the major league bullshit.
There is not standard of measure for perfection, as perfection in the face of accumulation/adaptation is a myth for the sake of totalitarian control.
I do not endorse tolerance.
Toleration is a horrid ideal. It is a lie for the sake of saving face and faking peace. It is the effort to deny real thoughts and intentions for the sake of social pressures. It requires no effort to understand or dialog leading to any understanding. Tolerence is simply silent hatred with a smiling face that has a unspoken limit to it's patience. When that unspoken limit is reached and the tolorator is not long able to be silently patience, more than not, a spontanious explosion of seemingly irrational yet calculated conflict occurs. Toleration is not a road to peace, but rather the prelude to war. In no way do I ever advocate tolerance, but rather dialog and communication that leads to understanding and possible an accord, but an accord is not necessary.
I'll remain with my anti-idealist ideals as best I can.
Meow!
GREG
Herbert Marcuse coined the phrase "repressive tolerance", which is what you are probably thinking of, MOS.
Tolerance, to my way of thinking, is not intolerance disguised. They are opposites with quite different consequences. Lately the concept has been given a negative spin: pejoration. Tolerance is not used sometimes to mean "loathing without action". One 'tolerates' what one loathes, until one doesn't tolerate it anymore, then attacks it. So, in this school of thinking, tolerant people are a time bomb who will eventually explode all over some suffering minority.
I think that is quite wrong. Tolerance is not embrace, true. But it is a making room for, an acceptance of, more than a grudging willingness to interact with. I can tolerate muslims, but I won't be converting. Muslims can tolerate Christians without converting. And both without any sort of punitive action. Tolerance isn't rejection disguised. It's open rejection and acceptance of the difference. I reject the founding principle of Islam, for instance, but I accept others belief. And viva versa with respect to Islamic/Christian interactions.
Tolerance is a recognition that others are different. Not the same. and OK, but without a wish to become like. I can tolerate transsexuality. I accept that it exists. I don't feel anything that transsexuals report feeling. Much like heterosexuals who accept homosexuals don't feel what homosexuals feel. We get that each other's attractions are different, and we accept that. But we are not the same.
I don't need to be loved, embraced, celebrated, etc. by people who are not homosexual. They can even be appalled by my lifestyle to their hearts content. BUT, tolerate my existence. Leave me alone. You mate your way, I mate my way. If you don't want to come to my party, fine. I might not want to go to your's either.
Many people tolerate behaviors they decidedly don't like--all sorts of things. Toleration is what makes complex urban life possible. We don't have to look at every case of difference (like, people who decide to get their faces tattooed with pseudo-prison-style ink and feel a wave of warmth, "Ah, sweet diversity." Frankly, I'd just as soon people keep their ugly tattoos on their scrawny bodies to themselves. I tolerate their display. Now, if handsome hunks with great tribal tattoos want to walk around the grocery store naked -- I could tolerate that too. (So far, haven't had the opportunity. Too few stores tolerate tattooed naked handsome hunks walking the aisles looking for good deals in canned peaches. And the weather in Minneapolis is fairly unforgiving at this time of year -- the high for today is only 8F. The naked walk from car to door would be way too long, no matter how short it was. It would be... intolerable.
Well... it's spooks me to see that someone of credibility has addressed this topic. It makes me feel less alone in my madness. Thanks!
Meow!
GREG
But of course leftists aren't occupying public land with guns trying to get free stuff. Rightwing knownothing ranchers are. And the same is true about gun rights weirdos and anti-gay weirdos and the religious right - all intent on imposing their views on others.
In contrast the left supports tolerance, democracy and multiculturalism.
This is the classic "reverse-meme" used by conservatives: call those fighting intolerance intolerant because they are against intolerance. It demonstrates the total intellectual bankruptcy of the right.
So, Marcuse meant the exact opposite of people rising up against Wall Street and its financial power, for instance. He contrasts repressive tolerance with "liberating tolerance" which he explicitly defines as intolerance of the Right and tolerance of emancipatory movements of the left.
You can read his essay on this here. http://www.marcuse.org/herbert/pubs/60spubs/65repressivetolerance.htm
Then there's the what I referred to the past "Sagebrush rebellion", the idea that federal "landlordism" was destroying their economic lives (as there are actually people living in the countryside you don't care much about). It isn't at all what the Bundy's are rambling about, as a major incentive was to get land from the federal level to the state level and cesession of federal lands to state lands isn't actually what Bundy's want. They would likely see the state as irritating as the US government in the end.
Similar arguments of the intrusiveness of the Central government to rural things is something present even here in Finland in Lapland, and the people there surely aren't in any way similar to some American right-wing ranchers. Here too a huge part of the most Northern Communities are Wildlife Preserves and Government lands and the people there tend to think their livelyhood as at stake when some environmentalists from the South want everything to be part of a nature park (with similar condescending attitude to the ideas that the people there have about their livelyhood as you have). Yet they don't have any ideas of the type of Frontier mentality and/or American individualism as in the US.
Here's a picture of Government land ownership in Finland. Government land in green (government owned water areas in blue). From the map it ought to be obvious that there might be friction between the Government and the few people living about land rights.
I had personal experience with the Sagebrush Rebellion in the 80s. My view is that they are no different from the Bundy Militia types. They wanted to abuse land for their own profit through resource extraction, mostly through abusive mining and cattle grazing, and resented national policies against that. The cattle ranchers and miners had been given a free ride to use public lands for a century in the West and simply didn't want to face the reality of how their abuse had degraded the productivity of the land, requiring a new cost/benefit analysis at the very least.
The larger question you raise about central government "interference" in rural affairs is probably the real issue here. Needless to say, I don't think it is interference. I think it's rational policy relating to land use. I frankly don't want rural people to control large portions of land - history indicates they abuse it and history indicates it results in land oligarchs arising.
Let fishermen decide how much to fish and within a short time there will be no fish for the fishermen or the rest of us. That's why resources need to be regulated, and for the most part owned democratically. We tried the alternative. It's failed.
Native Laplanders likely live a more compatible lifestyle in forested land in Finland and northern Sweden and Norway. The rebellious sagebrush people are not native to the area, and are, for the most part, introducing lifestyles that were developed in much more forgiving ecological settings. What works in the well-watered, warmer, and lower parts of the US doesn't work so well in high, dry areas.
In the 19th century, railroads were built across the Great Plains of North America, and settlers encouraged to take up residence. (Hauling immigrants was one of the few income-producing activities the railroads had -- they were built without adequate economic justification.) The immigrants established farms and small communities and started farming. 40 years later, a lot of the immigrant farmers had packed up and left because the land was not actually capable of supporting agriculture. The soils were too dry and the climate was too harsh. One of the consequences of this settlement was the severe dust storms of the 1930s.
The Great Plains still do not have a bright future as agricultural lands, for the same reasons now as then. (Irrigation has helped, but the Oglalala aquifer which has supported irrigation isn't going to last too much longer.)
There have been proposals, not altogether unreasonable, to depopulate much of the Great Plains and let the land lay fallow.
Now unlike in the US, the real problem is actually making the distinction between those who are Sami people and those who aren't. Finns have been populating Lapland since Antique times, time of the Roman Republic, along with the Sami people, and there actually hasn't been any similar colonization of Lapland as lets say in North America. Here there haven't been such tumultous demographic changes as lets say in Central Europe. Hence there is the Finnish Sami Parliament that basically decides who is Sami and who isn't. There are about 8 000 Sami people living in Finnish Lappland. As the indigenous people are given more perks for example in reindeer herding than Finnish families have, that have lived in Lappland for long time too, the legislation protecting indigenous people strikes a bit of a discord today (in Norway and Sweden, reindeer husbandry is legally protected as an exclusive Sami livelihood).
Sami children. Notice that there isn't any racial difference from other Nordic people (even if that in the heyday of racism was tried to be proven, especially in Sweden).
Quoting Landru Guide UsWell, this is quite universal. If you are a cattle herder or a reindeer herder, yep, you will likely want to have those grazing rights. Reindeer don't know just where they legally are permitted to graze and where not.