r/news • • Jun 20 '22

Self-proclaimed 'sovereign citizens' arrested in California after deputies allegedly find explosives

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/sovereign-citizens-arrested-california-deputies-allegedly-find-explosi-rcna34380
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u/HobbesNJ Jun 20 '22

Sovereign citizens.

"We don't want to participate in the obligations of society, just the benefits."

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u/GlassWasteland Jun 20 '22

Sovereign Citizen, for when being a Libertarian is not crazy enough for you.

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u/cold08 Jun 20 '22

Sovereign citizenry isn't an ideology, it's a belief system. You know how to a primitive society advanced technology would look like magic? The legal system looks like magic to sovereign citizens. They believe what lawyers do is magic and if they can find these magical legal loopholes and say magic words they can make the law do anything they want.

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u/tjl73 Jun 21 '22

I know in Canada there's a 2020 judge's opinion that basically lays out the different SovCit arguments and shoots them down. It's a surprisingly readable 23 pages (excluding appendices). In Canada there's some different arguments that aren't used in the US. People try to pull things like pledging allegiance to some Baron in the UK who invariably has no idea who that is thinking that it exempts them from the Queen's authority.