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Webcomic Author Deemed a Terrorist Threat
Posted by
kdawson
on Sat May 05, 2007 04:55 PM
from the now-that's-just-silly dept.
from the now-that's-just-silly dept.
CaptainCarrot writes "Writer/IT contractor Matt Boyd, formerly the man who made up the words for webcomic Mac Hall and who now does the same for his and Ian McConville's new comic Three Panel Soul, was recently fired from his government job. His conversation with a co-worker about a gun he intended to buy for target shooting was overheard by someone in a nearby cubicle. As it was unfortunately the day of the Virginia Tech shootings, the eavesdropper panicked and reported him to management. That was bad enough. But when he used the comic to document the meeting where the reason for his firing was explained, he was visited by representatives of local law enforcement investigating him on suspicion of making a "terroristic threat" using the Internet. No charges have been filed. Yet. FLEEN interviewed Matt about the incident."
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nexuspal writes "Over 20 confirmed dead at Virginia Tech. Shooter killed some at residence hall then two hours later killed others in classrooms. Worst school shooting in US history. "
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"Terroristic threat" != "terrorist threat" (Score:5, Informative)
The term and legal notion of "terroristic threat" has been around for a long time, and has nothing to do with the "war on terror", 9/11, the Bush administration, or censorship.
Also, he is a contract employee who can be released at any time for any reason, even moreso than a normal at-will employee who also can be released at any time for any reason.
Even Boyd himself in his interview [fleen.com] correctly notes that "a terroristic threat is an old legal concept".
He is also not charged with any crime (though technically he could be), but that's always true. He says the "detectives at least seem satisfied" that he was "harmless", and showed samples of his work to one of the detectives.
It would be better to read his interview [fleen.com], instead of believing someone thinks this has anything to do with "terrorism" or a "terrorist threat" (no one does; remember, "terroristic threat is a legal concept that has been around a long time).
Actually, I take that back. There are people painting this as allegedly being thought of as "terrorism". It's people who want to get all indignant about it [dieselsweeties.com].
By the way: anyone who thinks Virginia Tech could have "prevented" this shooting somehow, this is exactly what you get [slashdot.org].
Re:"Terroristic threat" != "terrorist threat" (Score:5, Insightful)
That's ridiculous. And I'm even pro-2nd amendment.
The comic writer didn't threaten anyone. The impetus for the investigation was an overheard conversation about a gun purchase. Neither is cause for an investigation of this level and a firing.
Compare that to the VA Tech horror--if you remove entirely Cho's writings (which is not a good level of judgment anyways), he should have been stopped during the purchase of his one gun at a gunshop, as he lied about being mentally incerated and such info is in the state's own judicial system which could have been cross-checked with answers when purchasing that gun. In fact, this past week, I believe the legislature of VA removed that roadblock; the law was fine, the implementation sucked.
Second, imnsho, and this isn't popular, I think the police HUGELY dropped the ball in the VA Tech situation (and by that opinion, the University is far less contributory through indifference in the 2nd shooting site deaths). If a police officer had been shot in the foot, they would have gone after that guy wholeheartedly, just as they did earlier in the year with a person who allegedly shot a deputy upon escape. The police dropped the ball--even they admit they were investigating another person who they "knew" had killed the first 2...oops, except he didn't. See, if a couple of kids get shot, you're not part of the FOP, it's thrown into a "domestic dispute" craphole where they go after the nearest; investigation is separate from correctly ascertaining threat, which comes full circle in demonstrating why the handling of web comic thing is so incorrect.
btw, I've never understood the whole firing thing in any case--besides clearly not a threat, you want to make the person even more out of their luck and prone to do something? Amazing how the US becomes more and more like China these days (China is far worse, but the approximations seen over the past 6 years in stories makes that gap narrower).
Parent
Re:"Terroristic threat" != "terrorist threat" (Score:4, Funny)
Ah yes, he was a contract employee, well it's all good then.
Parent
"Contract" != "less rights" (Score:5, Informative)
Also, he is a contract employee who can be released at any time for any reason, even moreso than a normal at-will employee who also can be released at any time for any reason.
Only within the terms of his contract. Sorry, just couldn't resist after you made "contract" italics and got all righteous. "Contract employee" does not mean "company's little bitch", and in fact, a contract worker can have more protection from sudden termination. Most of us are "at will" employees, and simply having something in your contract that prohibits your employer from firing you for no reason, gives you more rights. If worded reasonably (ie not "I AM UNFIREABLE FOR A YEAR!"), you MAY get that concession.
If you don't like being an at-will employee: get fired for no reason, sue, and get it far up enough to MAYBE be heard by the supreme court, because they're the ones who set the horrendous precedent in the first place. You don't have a prayer of getting legislation even presented, much less making it past committee, because of all the lobbying.
Parent
Re:Also (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, I must be some kind of psychic then, because I've never met him and yet I was somehow convinced that he wasn't planning to murder people when I saw that comic.
Can we find something else to get all in a huff about?
Are you serious? The "presumed an insane killer until proven otherwise" attitude from his employers and the local police isn't enough to get in a huff about?
Parent
Re:Also (Score:4, Insightful)
*Sigh*.
Ok, I'll explain this to you.
Without respect to his comic at all, someone at his place of work overheard him talking about how many times you'd have to shoot someone in the face with a
He was released from his contract position (which the employer has every right to do) for the incident.
If you can't understand that was a stupid or at least marginally unwise thing for him to do, then I don't know what to say. Of course it sucks that he got "fired"/released from his contract position for it, but then, this is why we say that actions have consequences.
At this point, the comic isn't involved. At all.
Are you serious? The "presumed an insane killer until proven otherwise" attitude from his employers and the local police isn't enough to get in a huff about?
Uh, I couldn't possibly care less about his employer. They acted correctly, given the complaint and the situation. You just simply don't say something like that unless you know everyone around you knows you're joking.
Remember, the web comic still has not come into play yet.
AFTER he was fired, he humorously recounted it in his comic, which someone at some point must have seen, and in which he made what someone determined to be a threat, even if it was 100% in jest and humor. The police followed up on said complaint, which it is their JOB to do - no "guilty until proven innocent" yet - and then determined there was no actual threat (which again, is their job).
Words and actions have meaning, and consequences. Yes, there is all sorts of nuance, but we can't have this "have it both ways" collective mentality we do where we think "gee, maybe we could have stopped the Virginia Tech shootings" but then allow people to make what can be interpreted by some to be verbal or written threats. Yes, I get the comic. Haha, funny, etc. But his phone conversation about shooting someone in the face multiple times with a
This is a non-story, and yes I'm serious. But people started confusing "terroristic threat" with "terrorism", so I'm sure this will have a nice, long life on many a blog.
Parent
Re:Also (Score:5, Insightful)
My only disagreement is with you claiming that the employer acted correctly. Traditional HR policies are mostly geared around doing everything possible to keep the company from being sued, even if that isn't the 'correct' thing to do morally or ethically or even rationally.
I think lending validity to hypersensitive reactions based on overheard conversations is not a good thing for a company's long term workplace environment. And in the broader sense, pretending that things like this make us safer detracts from real issues that actually would make us safer if we had time or inclination to address them. Firing everyone who verbalizes something that someone might feel is threatening won't get us any closer to figuring out the differences between all those people and the VT shooter.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
He didn't "get" anything. If you mean probation with respect to his work, that's between him and his employer. It most absolutely is not the government's role in a situation like this to mandate that he keep a contract job that he can be removed from, legally, at any time.
Re:Also (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Also (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
They can't lie.
They can't make something up.
They can't be noticably discriminatory.
But all they do have to say is "you are fired", and if that's all they say, then there isn't much that can be done.
Gently down the slippery slope (Score:5, Interesting)
Let's face it, ideas and presumed intentions are becoming criminal. George Orwell called it.
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Re:Gently down the slippery slope (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3)
If you don't believe me do this. Go somewhere where the flavor has been banned from candy and find a cop and tell him you just thought of someone smoking pot. You're not going to ge
Sing along ... you know you want to! (Score:4, Funny)
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Matt Boyd, Matt Boyd
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
when they come for you
Well, he's going to make a comic about it... duh.
Re:Sing along ... you know you want to! (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
chilling effects? (Score:3, Interesting)
As someone who is part of the organization of another major webcomic, things like this are frightening. I like to keep my jobs, personally.
On a scale from one to ten (Score:5, Funny)
Boyd: Gonna have to go with b) surprised."
I'll go with d) confused...err... 4) confus... 10) conf.. I dunno
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
(Nice catch, no one else seemed to notice that
If you think about this (Score:4, Insightful)
If the VT shootings hadn't happened, this whole episode wouldn't have happened.
If nobody read his comics, this whole episode wouldn't have happened.
There are many reasons that this episode shouldn't have happened, but people are afraid and over-react to 'err on the side of caution'. For many, better safe than sorry is the catchphrase of the week. They don't stop to think, or try to figure out what might be the level headed way to handle things.... like ask why they are talking about guns at work!
Now, why is it that the US in particular is so fearful? That is the better question, not 'is this guy going to shoot people?' For fscks sake, my retired mother has a 9mm which she uses at the gun range. I don't think that anyone will fear that she is a terrorist. Why should people think anyone that talks about guns is going to go on a killing rampage. If they were going to go kill people, the probably wouldn't be talking openly about guns!! There are millions of guns in the US and save for a few whackjobs, they generally are doing no harm to anyone. (street/drug/mafia crimes not counted) The point is that not everyone with a gun is a murderer. Not everyone from the middle east is a suicide bomber in training.
Re:If you think about this (Score:4, Insightful)
If everyone isn't terrified, you can't justify a war on terror.
Parent
Re:If you think about this (Score:5, Interesting)
Good point. You ever notice that the real nutjobs out there that walk into some public area and spray bullets all over the place are always described as "quiet" and "shy" and "oh my, he never talked about guns" and "gee, it's so surprising because he was a really nice boy" etc etc..
I can't remember one time when they talked to people who knew one of these mass murderers after the fact and they've said anything remotely like "well, he did talk about guns a lot" and "he went to the shooting range every week".
I mean seriously, if you were planning to commit such a terrible crime, or any crime for that matter, would you let any details out before you did it? Why would you risk getting busted before the fact? Don't they teach "think like a criminal" to law enforcement anymore?
Actually, I don't suppose they could...then they'd have to march every new graduate right off the dais and into a paddywagon for "criminal thoughts".
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
And I remember a time where the only person you couldn't threaten to shoot was the president.
I find it interesting that 9/11 was almost 6 years ago.. there's people turning 18 now who were 12 or 13 when 9/11 happened. I dunno about you, but when I was 12 or 13 I had little concept of what freedoms adults had in society. As such, this year a whole generation of kids who have been raised in this 'political climate' are coming of age.
How will they see f
Re:keeping one's mouth shut (Score:4, Insightful)
Sorry, you've got to have a screw loose to construe that conversation as threatening, assuming that the quotes are accurate.
Secondly, I've heard worse in the workplace on many occasions, and we all laugh and move on. If you're so scared of your own shadow that you can't stop and think about it for a minute before running to mommy, then you're part of the problem, not the solution. You are what the real terrorists are trying to create.
--S
Parent
One word : S U E (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah! (Score:3, Interesting)
Another word: transmogrify! Why? 'Cuz it's neat! (Score:3, Funny)
Additional words : t h e H E L L o u t t a t h e m
Uh, those are letters. They are only words when they are, like, stuck together.
I hope this helps.
What the heck... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I don't like my neighboor, maybe I should report him and have the men with the black bags take him awawy...
If you do, could you post the results and maybe a FAQ? I have some annoying neighbors, too.
Real terrorists (Score:3, Insightful)
First and Second Amendment (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd be interested to hear the NRA's response to this.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Unfortunately the NRA has been MIA on a lot of this type of stuff. It used to be that a member could ask them for help, and if you were in the right, they would give you a hand.
These days The NRA is more interested in what your political and marketing value it to them. For example, they've been actively opposing the case that recently led to an appeals court ruling in the DC Circuit that affirmed the Second Amendment as an individual right and struck do
Nothing new (Score:3, Insightful)
Back then I had given a friend that is interested in making primitive weapons a printout on how to make his own black powder. This was a day or two before the Oklahoma City bombing, he had another friend at work (on of the national labs) that did the same thing and brought it in to him - this was the day after the bombing. A co-worker saw it laying on his desk and decided he was getting ready to blow everything up, called the FBI, and started about a two month long investigation. Obviously it led nowhere.
A few years later someone in our college set off an "incendiary device" (the detectives later told me it was acid and aluminum foil in a plastic jug) and I was, once more, investigated for all sorts of nice things. Again, nothing came of it as there was nothing there. I do not recall now what they accused me of, I assume it would now be "terrorist" but back then there was some other hot-button label for it.
And you might as well have been whatever the most despicable thing you can think of if you were in a gun club during the mid-90's and the great crusade against "militias" (not to mention almost every single incident was somehow their fault). There was almost no one anywhere defending you then - you were an evil gun-toting maniac. It was MUCH more endemic than the current "terrorist" thing - and at least there *are* terrorist out there that want to do us harm even though we are over reacting.
After any event there are people that fly into a panic of stupid things, call someone, and it gets all blown out of proportion. Most law enforcement thinks it stupid and - like the Duke non-rape case - you will sometimes get a political position decide it is time to show the people they are "doing something" and you get to be the one screwed. If you are unlucky you get Nifong as the prosecutor, this is the local prosecutor being an ass.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I got it figured out.... (Score:5, Funny)
Oh I feel so much safer now....
Ridiculous... (Score:5, Insightful)
If guns are legal to own, then they have absoloutely no right to fire him for buying, or intending to buy one.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Really? Because I'm thinking of renting a truck, and filling it up with bags of fertilizer.
Nothing illegal about that.
jeez (Score:3, Insightful)
Has anyone called him a communist yet?
after columbine (Score:5, Interesting)
In context it's kind of hilarious because our school had a problem with gang violence (it was the suburbs and middle school, so this wasn't exactly the stuff you see in the movies, but it was pretty bad), that the administration more or less ignored.
I guess (Score:3, Interesting)
Hoplophobes (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Hoplophobes (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
"fear" worse than "love" (Score:5, Insightful)
In the case of guns, people who were brought up in areas where they were normal (I am not talking inner cities...), are generally taught firearm safety and respect for weapons. They are tools, like chainsaws, sticks of dynamite, kitchen knives, and scalpels. They all have their uses and their dangers. People who hate guns and are afraid of them do not see them as tools (for any use) and do not see any other side than fear.
I respect people who do not like guns and want nothing to do personally with guns, just as I respect vegetarians (especially as I was one for a while). I respect people who are concerned about guns, crime, and gun safety. I do not respect people who hate guns, who hate omnivores, who are rampant homophobes, etc. There are a lot of those around. Oddly, a lot of the people who hate guns, seem to want to enforce a ban of them *with guns*. I don't think they understand the disconnect. Why is Policeman Bob a priori and *always* more trustworthy than Farmer Joe? Why think Policeman Bob is always going to be closer to hand when someone else with a gun shows up? They weren't there at VA Tech. Guns exist. Hating them doesn't change that. Learning a bit about them at least provides an understanding of the problem and might be a small piece of the solution.
Note, that on the other side, it is not "gun-lovers" that is a problem, it is people with other kinds of unreasoning fears, such as (rabid) fear of government oppression, rabid racial hatred, rabid isolationism, and extreme fundamentalism. Poking the beehive with a stick (actually oppressing them) just makes things worse. There are actually reasonable people in the middle.
Parent
Re:Hoplophiliacs (Score:4, Interesting)
I honestly have to assume that at least some people who are afraid of guns and gun owners watch a hell of a lot of television. It's also fairly interesting the amount of stereotyping which goes on unchallenged about gun owners and their motivations. In many cases the people who routinely stereotype gun owners are the same ones who get bent out of shape when they, themselves, are stereotyped in some way.
My gun has killed a few hundred soda cans.
That's it.
All of the time and energy that could be spent actually trying to do something to address the completely fucked way this culture has come to regard and often glorify violence is spent in this bizarrely misguided struggle to take guns away from the people least likely to abuse them, and then money and time spent fighting these same efforts - money that could be used for gun safety education or some other effort to address the disturbing turn this country has taken in the past few years. I *am* afraid. I am afraid of the complete lack of ethics or sense of citizenship - by which I mean membership in and ownership of a society - that people seem to feel. I watch people litter and tag their own communities, pissing in the proverbial same river they drink from. It makes no sense to me. I certainly do not think that violence *isn't* a problem or that violence is over-hyped. There's a problem in the US, and it needs addressing - we have become an ugly, decadent culture, somehow...
But the guns follow; they certainly do not lead. If that was the case, we would have had the problems we have now a hundred years ago.
But the tone of this debate isn't helping. I admit that I contribute to it because I get wound up, insulted, and feel threatened sometimes by things I hear others advocate which would directly impact me, personally.
Most disturbing is the sanctimonious "I am so incredibly enlightened" attitude that some people who have an agenda against gun owners seem to have. In particular, this is vexing coming from the Left, who will (rightly) point to the abuses of this administration and its taste for police-state style surveillance measures against its own citizens, the illegal detention of people they refuse to charge with a crime, phony wars fought under completely false pretexts, and so on. And yet they will, in the end, suggest to you that they are entirely comfortable with this government having a completely monopoly on guns. In the end, even the loudest critics of government, would not want to be far from the safety of its embrace. Which is revolting to me, personally, but there it is.
There are people who, even after all of the incompetence, malfeasance, corruption, and crass cruelty of this administration, still trust them more than they do their neighbors. It really bothered me to watch the gun confiscation that went on in New Orleans, even when something that everyone said was impossible happened - and civilization broke down completely. There were few police around at all, but there were enough, apparently, to take guns from homeowners and residents, leaving them at the mercy of looters and criminals. This scenario was, until Katrina, a supposedly paranoid hypothetical that people claimed time and time again would not - and could not - happen in modern America. And yet, it did, and the police did the absolute worst thing they could (The NRA actually sued over this, and won).
If you ask me who we should really be afraid of, it's not peaceable gun owners. It's people who are paranoid and afraid of the freedoms of others. It's not just the serious, organized, politically active gun control advocates either - it's the people who think all homosexuals are potential pedophiles, or people who want to control what you can read or watch or listen to. It's the person in the room who wants all conversations sanitized because someone *might* be offended by something being discussed. Its the busybodies who report their neighbors to H
Parent
As an NRA Instructor... (Score:5, Insightful)
This situation is problematic for him from several angles: posing a terroristic threat, creating a hostile work environment, not to mention goofing off and talking about your hobby wasting company time (you know, like cruising
Generally, I advise my students to limit discussing this very fun hobby to when they know they can talk without being overheard. This is not an attempt to censor folks, but a recommendation to be prudent, realizing that not everyone shares our enthusiasm, and that sadly, there is an aura of fear that grows among the more fearful when firearms are casually discussed.
Fortunately for me, where I work, many of us are NRA members and we have been told that people feel safer with us around. I take it as a compliment, and do my best to educate the ignorant but willing to learn (but then again, there are those who choose to remain ignorant, and you can only go so far with them). I specialize in teaching those who've never held a firearm before in their lives.
The USA eats itsself alive... (Score:3)
The levels of crazy in the USA just keep skyrocketing. Everything seems to create hysteria, panic, and endless problems for ordinary, innocent people.
The country is fubared.
Re:So...? (Score:5, Insightful)
"Better safe than sorry" is an expression of cowardice. Life is a series of risks beginning with the genetic selection at conception. Given the odds that some child conceived, somewhere, will have a genetic defect (not to mention prenatal difficulties, post-natal trauma, disease,
Parent
You're completely and 100% wrong (Score:5, Informative)
He will not be on any TSA, or any other, watch lists (and wouldn't be even if he was convicted of a crime - WTF? Oh, you're one of those people who think "terroristic threat" somehow is equated with "terrorism", even though they're utterly and completely different concepts, and unrelated).
He will not be "punished", for anything, and the only way anyone will know about this is because of the life it will have on blogs, and no one in any official capacity, save for possibly the individual detectives who talked to him about it remembering with their own minds, will have any knowledge of it.
I can't believe how wrong your entire post was, and that it got modded up to boot.
Parent
this isn't security, it's securrorism. (Score:3, Insightful)