# Oathkeepers.org for US military/police/etc **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 30, 2009, 9:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707 "2009-10-30T09:00:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/21 "2009-10-30T15:14:30Z")
They should call themselves the Oath _Breakers_! I agree with #2, #3, #7, and #10 #4, #5, #6, and #9 needs more explanation #1 and #8 are just stupid. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/22 "2009-10-30T15:20:39Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > The OP is Australian. I’m not certain why he considers this organization so important. > > Anyway, the Oathkeepers are a classic right-wing militia group, plain and simple. The only unusual thing is that they’re most currently serving military and law enforcement personnel, rather than retired/discharged ones. I’d argue they’re much less than that. The militia groups that were so much in the news a few years back were, at least, actual groups, often with rudimentary headquarters and command stuctures, “occupying” territory (usually someone’s farm.) This group appears to be just people on the Internet talking shit. Words are cheap. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/23 "2009-10-30T16:19:26Z")
> [@JohnClay](#): > > I think this organisation about following the constitution and bill of rights is very important… (but feel free to disagree) Before I’d agree or disagree, it would be helpful to know why you think this is important, and why the normal course of action (court challenge) is not the way to go. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/24 "2009-10-30T16:27:27Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I’d argue they’re much less than that. > > The militia groups that were so much in the news a few years back were, at least, actual groups, often with rudimentary headquarters and command stuctures, “occupying” territory (usually someone’s farm.) > > This group appears to be just people on the Internet talking shit. Words are cheap. Nah. They have meetings and initiation ceremonies. See [here](http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=1092). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/25 "2009-10-30T16:29:15Z")
[The Southern Poverty Law Center knows all about these assholes.](http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=1092) > [@](#): > > **The Second Wave** > Evidence Grows of Far-Right Militia Resurgence > By Larry Keller > > In Pensacola, Fla., retired FBI agent Ted Gunderson tells a gathering of antigovernment “Patriots” that the federal government has set up 1,000 internment camps across the country and is storing 30,000 guillotines and a half-million caskets in Atlanta. They’re there for the day the government finally declares martial law and moves in to round up or kill American dissenters, he says. “They’re going to keep track of all of us, folks,” Gunderson warns. > > Outside Atlanta, a so-called “American Grand Jury” issues an “indictment” of Barack Obama for fraud and treason because, the panel concludes, he wasn’t born in the United States and is illegally occupying the office of president. Other sham “grand juries” around the country follow suit. > > And on the site in Lexington, Mass., where the opening shots of the Revolutionary War were fired in 1775, members of Oath Keepers, a newly formed group of law enforcement officers, military men and veterans, “muster” on April 19 to reaffirm their pledge to defend the U.S. Constitution. “We’re in perilous times … perhaps far more perilous than in 1775,” says the man administering the oath. April 19 is the anniversary not only of the battle of Lexington Green, but also of the 1993 conflagration at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, and the lethal bombing two years later of the Oklahoma City federal building — seminal events in the lore of the extreme right, in particular the antigovernment Patriot movement. > > Almost 10 years after it seemed to disappear from American life, there are unmistakable signs of a revival of what in the 1990s was commonly called the militia movement. From Idaho to New Jersey and Michigan to Florida, men in khaki and camouflage are back in the woods, gathering to practice the paramilitary skills they believe will be needed to fend off the socialistic troops of the “New World Order.” > > One big difference from the militia movement of the 1990s is that the face of the federal government — the enemy that almost all parts of the extreme right see as the primary threat to freedom — is now black. And the fact that the president is an African American has injected a strong racial element into even those parts of the radical right, like the militias, that in the past were not primarily motivated by race hate. Contributing to the racial animus have been fears on the far right about the consequences of Latino immigration. > > Militia rhetoric is being heard widely once more, often from a second generation of ideologues, and conspiracy theories are being energetically revived or invented anew. “Paper terrorism” — the use of property liens, bogus legal documents and “citizens’ grand juries” to attack enemies and, sometimes, reap illegal fortunes — is again proliferating, to the point where the government has set up special efforts to rein in so-called “tax defiers” and to track threats against judges. What’s more, Patriot fears about the government are being amplified by a loud new group of ostensibly mainstream media commentators and politicians. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/26 "2009-10-30T16:29:35Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Ho ho ho, it seems that there’s dissension in the ranks of Oathkeepers: > > [A blog, obviously.](http://tekgnosis.typepad.com/tekgnosis/2009/09/will-the-real-stewart-rhodes-please-stand-up-are-the-oathkeepers-genuine-defenders-of-the-constituti.html) That is a serious amount of crazy. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/27 "2009-10-30T16:39:52Z")
As also mentioned in other threads: Where were these “Oathkeepers” during the Bush Admin, when some of the things they complain about were actually happenning? ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/28 "2009-10-30T16:50:09Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > As also mentioned in other threads: Where were these “Oathkeepers” during the Bush Admin, when some of the things they complain about were actually happening? Nowhere, because the President was Republican and white. Therefore whatever he was doing was to protect us from “furrin terrerists.” ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/29 "2009-10-30T17:22:04Z")
Still serving the tail end of their Clinton-era prison sentences, I imagine. ---
**Author:** ![ZPG\_Zealot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e47c2d/32.png) [@ZPG\_Zealot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZPG_Zealot)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/30 "2009-10-30T17:44:14Z")
I would like to see how fast these Oathkeepers would react to protect the right to weapons, search and seizure protection, free speech, etc., of American people who are not white, Christians. I think a mosque should call them up and ask for help keeping their skeet shooting club from harassment. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/31 "2009-10-30T19:05:33Z")
> [@JohnClay](#): > > I think this organisation about following the constitution and bill of rights is very important… Why? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/32 "2009-10-30T19:36:35Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > 1. We will NOT obey any order to force American citizens into any form of detention camps under any pretext. Actually a valid point and they quite rightly express indignation over the Japanese-American internment of WW II. Maybe I’m just being uncharitable, but I can’t help wondering exactly how they define “American citizen.” ---
**Author:** ![Henrichek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5daacb/32.png) [@Henrichek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Henrichek)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/33 "2009-10-30T20:07:27Z")
What do US military uniform regulations say about these patches that some of them seem to sew on their uniforms? [http://oathkeepers.org/oath/wp-content/uploads/000000S4200090-500x445.jpg](http://oathkeepers.org/oath/wp-content/uploads/000000S4200090-500x445.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/34 "2009-10-30T20:20:34Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > Haven’t there been analogous groups in the Israeli military, that refused to take part in Israel’s military action in Gaza? Yes, there are, and they are lauded and praised by left-wingers constantly. Anyway, I think if there was something like this except without the part about refusing to disarm people, and a bigger emphasis on objection to the “enemy combatants,” the left-wing crowd would be falling all over themselves to praise these “brave men and women.” They would be saying, “these are the true patriots.” There would be no criticism of them at all. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/35 "2009-10-30T20:25:42Z")
Did you see that guy’s blog? Nah, he’d still be crazy. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/36 "2009-10-30T20:56:03Z")
> [@Argent\_Towers](#): > > Yes, there are, and they are lauded and praised by left-wingers constantly. > > Anyway, I think if there was something like this except without the part about refusing to disarm people, and a bigger emphasis on objection to the “enemy combatants,” the left-wing crowd would be falling all over themselves to praise these “brave men and women.” They would be saying, “these are the true patriots.” There would be no criticism of them at all. Except there wouldn’t, because only crazy right-wingers take oaths about what they’ll do in absurd hypothetical situations. ---
**Author:** ![5\_time\_champ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/5/278dde/32.png) [@5\_time\_champ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/5_time_champ)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/37 "2009-10-30T21:35:38Z")
> [@](#): > > 1. We will NOT obey orders to detain American citizens as “unlawful enemy combatants” or to subject them to military tribunal. Hmm- this is about the only scenario that has actually happened. So these traitors would have refused to capture John Walker Lindh of the field of battle in Afghanistan? ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/38 "2009-10-30T21:37:11Z")
Absurd hypothetical situations? > [@](#): > > 1. We will NOT obey orders to disarm the American people. Police went around confiscating firearms during Hurricane Katrina (the time when people needed them most) in one of America’s most egregious violations of the 2nd Amendment - this actually happened. It was real. > [@](#): > > 1. We will NOT obey any order to force American citizens into any form of detention camps under any pretext. Americans were put into detention camps during World War II. This actually happened. The other things on the list only seem like absurd hypotheticals because they never happened in America. They _have_ happened in other countries, and there’s no reason to think that someday they couldn’t happen here. The messenger of this “oathkeeping” thing may be objectionable, but the sentiment itself is not. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/39 "2009-10-30T21:43:53Z")
There’s no part of the oath against taking up arms against the lawfully elected government of the United States. I would think that would be a pretty basic thing to state about if one is truly concerned about protecting the Constitution. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2009, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707/40 "2009-10-30T21:56:38Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > There’s no part of the oath against taking up arms against the lawfully elected government of the United States. I would think that would be a pretty basic thing to state about if one is truly concerned about protecting the Constitution. In fairness, there’s also nothing about not raping children or setting fire to old ladies. The entire thing appears to be a **refusal** to do things, not a plan to do anything. It’s pointless, but harmless. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oathkeepers-org-for-us-military-police-etc/515707.md?page=3)