Recently a blog entry entitled Tom, Dick and Harry went viral around the III websites. A self entitled “parable” it makes the point that only some of those who proclaim themselves to be patriots really are. It goes on to describe their example of what being worthy of being called such really means.
I see a lot of that in our movement.
Many believe that being a lover of freedom isn’t enough.
There are some of the more well-known tactical trainers that go so far as to proclaim that without their training, folks just won’t make it. Or that once people get their special training, they’ve got to buy and use the trainers “special” gear and equipment.
I particularly get amused by the folks who advertise that their stuff is only for the “serious” III%er.
Some in our movement consistently belittle anyone who isn’t a sycophant of theirs. Others call for the “elimination” of anyone who doesn’t believe as they do.
You read daily of folks providing training (for a fee of course) that is the magical, special, must have training that will make you an authentic member of the III% club.
I call BS on all of them.
At a time where our numbers seem to be smaller than ever, we should be accentuating our similarities, not our differences. Many complain that they can’t find a group to join their “tribe”. Maybe the problem is yours, not the ones that won’t join your tribe.
I spent many years in the Army. I was in units that would be described as the “best of the best” and units that were populated by the category 4 soldiers that the army recruited in the old days. Every one of these units had the so-called “studs” and the so-called “duds”. Every one. Even the best ones have duds and even the worst one have studs. And yet, clever leaders found a way to motivate and get something out of every one of those who volunteered to serve.
In WWII, England formed a 1.5 million member home guard force, entirely made up of people who were determined to be ineligible for military service (at the height of WWII, it took a lot to be considered ineligible). Old folks, handicapped folks, women, etc. The Home Guard even had a number of secret roles that included sabotage units who would disable factories and petrol installations following invasion. Members were also recruited into the commando teams of the Auxiliary Units. Old folks, handicapped folks, women, etc.
Due to logistical issues, they weren’t even all armed!
And we want to proclaim that there is a magical standard that people who believe in freedom must ascribe to?
No one would deny that you need doctors in a hospital. Yet, even the candy-stripers have a role. Infections are a huge problem in most modern hospitals. No one in the medical field belittles the role of the janitors and others who are responsible for sanitation.
We need to stop denigrating and belittling those who come to our cause just because they aren’t exactly like us. Figure out why you claim to be a III%er, lover of freedom, patriot, you name it. At that point, decide if folks are more like you than dislike you. Embrace all who are more like you than against you.
Just because someone doesn’t believe exactly what you believe doesn’t make them evil.
We like to say that we make up 3% of our society. I’d suggest that the truly evil in our society are about the same percentage as us. The rest can all be won over.
Until you demonstrate to me that you are in the evil 3% I see you as a potential ally. Potential allies become real allies based on us, not on them.
I understand that it’s an uphill battle. We have a society where the evil are smarter than we are and consistently demonize us, demonize what we believe in and denigrate all that we hold dear. However, it’s hard to for people to hate us if they know us.
Americans are seeing this right now. Ignore the characters of Trump and Sanders for a moment and see what they represent. They represent a citizenry that is finally fed up with the out of control crony government that we’ve grown into.
The time is ripe for us to grow our numbers exponentially.
Now is not the time to come up with purity standards, contrived litmus tests and other efforts to determine who are “serious” patriots.
georgepatton325 
[…] Do We Really Believe in America? […]
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[…] I see a lot of that in our movement […]
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Sadly, brother; most if not all of us have identified who the real sower(s) of discord, untruth, etc.; are, in this wide spread dysfunctional family we call the patriot movement, are. Sadder still is the fact he won’t just ‘go away’; and insists upon continuing his inanity. For the rest of us, there’s focus. ‘Something wicked this way comes…’ … it is time for heavy lifting, for doing that which needs to be done.
We are indeed on the cusp of times… and whether they be heroic, tragic, or comic – will depend on us, and our resolve.
“We will fight for unity” is more than just ‘words’…..
There are still those in our midst who must by necessity be “culled out”. No time like the present…
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“At a time where our numbers seem to be smaller than ever, we should be accentuating our similarities, not our differences. Many complain that they can’t find a group to join their “tribe”. Maybe the problem is yours, not the ones that won’t join your tribe.”
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“Many complain that they can’t find a group to join their “tribe”. Maybe the problem is yours, not the ones that won’t join your tribe.
This subquote from the larger quote above leaves me confused. Are you expressing the complainers can’t find a group to join the complainers tribe or are you expressing the complainers can’t find a group (tribe) to join?
Beyond that, and not knowing from whence you sourced the comments that you formed your opinion from, I am one of the people that commented in the WRSA thread about the difficulty of finding people. I suppose my comment could be construed as a complaint. I assure you it was not. What I was really doing was lamenting how difficult it is to find like minded people to even discuss things with. Trust me when I express I was not and am not looking for people to join me. More on this below the fold.
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“Maybe the problem is yours…”
This I can agree with to a degree, I am part of the problem because I’m not looking for a glorious leader and I’m certainly not looking for followers.
I have a number of years of kicking around on this marble we all live on and over the years I have mostly been disappointed by people or maybe a better way to express that is too many people have failed to meet my expectations.
Normalcy bias is very strong for most people and their assumptions are reinforced daily through a multitude of sources. As long as people think they are ok there is no way you or I are going to be able to influence what they believe or convince them to make any effort to become better informed or to improve and broaden their skill sets.
Though high population densities can create a hostile environment for finding fellow “patriots” low population densities, even in areas considered as being in the american redoubt, often present the same challenge.
Many of the people I meet on a somewhat regular basis are totally clueless, unskilled, inept, dependent on the system and lacking in cognitive abilities. They are not someone I would want to be in any loose association of people I was going to count on to be there through tough times.
It would be nice to have a like minded individual or two or a few fellow patriots down the street or a couple of blocks over but that isn’t the situation where I am and I certainly don’t need any more dead weight to carry around. At some point you cut your losses and call it a day.
Maybe, with God’s grace, we’ll meet during the coming festivities and find someone we can count on to stand steady to our left or right.
Cordially,
~wes
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Wes, I understand your frustration, but I take heart from your resolve. I liken it to – in my situation – a son (my middle of three) who just doesn’t seem to get it, no matter what we do. At 30 years old, he still insists on living like he’s in his teens… Two wives, four kids – dispersed from one end of the country to another. And now he’s got a new ‘girlfriend’ – “but dad, this one is ‘the one’ ” Whatever. And she’s pregnant, of course…
Brother, we do not have control; years ago I resigned as ruler of the universe – and now trust the real ruler of said universe, and trust in my knowledge and skill, and a precious few friends. I live in a large metro area, which is not a sustainable area at all. I have made connection with other like minded people, and my plan is to move – soon – to where they are, almost regardless of personal hardship; in order to be part of a community of like minded individuals. I encourage you to pray, but do so with the understanding that much as has been modeled in scripture, there are times when we must shake the dust off our feet and move. I would love it, if God would see fit to make where I am “the place”, but it is not.
So, I step out in faith and move to where the place is… and trust Him to provide. He has not ever failed me, in a life filled with trials…
Godspeed to you brother, and I too pray that before the excitement, we have a moment of fellowship and breaking bread.
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Wes:
Thanks for the comment and for just reading it. The point I was trying to make (and probably failed at) was that all of us sometimes have too high of an expectation of what it takes to be a valued member of the resistance. Most folks have had a lifetime of being taught and believing that the “government is good in everything they do”. You aren’t going to change that overnight. Heck if you tried they would probably put you away. Start with a neighborhood watch perhaps, or the local high school football booster club, or the volunteer fire department. Anything where folks have volunteered to do more. Slowly and gradually talk about some of the things that are going on in your area, state and nationally.
You’ll find some folks that are open to discussion. Figure out the plan to develop them. That doesn’t mean the others can’t be helpful. Just not in the short term.
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I think I missed the point with my response. What I am suggesting is that although it would be great if we could find folks that were just like us and possessed all of the skills that we’d like them to have, that is probably unrealistic. If we can’t find folks already “ready to go” then we need to make our own! We’ve got the advantage because we’re already thinking correctly. Folks that aren’t already there aren’t all bad folks. They just don’t know. There are lots of folks out there that are leaning our way, we just have to get them useful. EMTs for example are a folks that don’t get paid a lot. They do it because they really like emergency medicine. Motivated and could be very useful to us. Make friends with them by volunteering and slowly feel them out. Lead by example. Volunteer firemen are in the same boat. Fundamentalist religious folks are already pretty much against our evil largess government. Another good source to cultivate. Some of them don’t believe in guns, but their prepping talents are valuable. Hate or love Mormons, but they are a great group to work with. In many places you don’t have to be a Mormon to take advantage of their stuff. Neighborhood watch groups can be cultivated. They already see a threat. They may not envision a response quite as serious as we do, but it’s a start. Once they know and like you and see that you are reliable, then you can start moving them in the right direction. My current wife spent the first 50+ years of her life believing in the “government will take care of you” mantra. Katrina changed all for her. She lived in the area and saw regular folks come to blows over a gallon of gas. Her eyes opened. The good news is that soon after that she met me! She still comments that she was amazed that she didn’t really “see” what was going on. For us to open folks eyes though we have to start at the bottom. First they have to like us. Then they will see that what we say isn’t crazy stuff. Like Alex Jones (and folks like him) or not, he’s been painted with the “crazy” brush so many times, he is unable to convince the masses. He preaches to the choir. None of this is easy. Locally it’s taken me a long time, and we’re still not completely where I’d like to be. But progress is being made and we’re gaining allies and converts daily. I’m regularly amazed at the number of folks out there that kind of think like us. They just don’t realize how many of us are out there. I run into folks all the time that ask about local prepper groups. Home school and charter school parents are a great group to start with. You’d be amazed at how many folks have gone to the efforts of making bug out bags. Sams Club sells survival food by the pallet. We gain our tribe one person at a time, and they don’t have to be combat killers to be valuable members of your group.
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Fuck this so called specialized training. When I mobilized at Ft. McCoy in ’06 for my deployment to the sandbox, we were trained by those troops that had just came back. Even though IED’s were the main scourge for those KIA, in both Iraq and Afghanistan. It was the lack of employing basic skills that led to so many causalities, yes the lack of just the basic skill sets that we all should have learned in basic/boot camp. Hell, the US Army completely changed it’s calisthenic based PT program to what is now called battle focused PT that is ten times as rigorous.
For those of us in the III community, PT is at the top of the list, basic marksmanship, land nav(at night with zero darkness), basic and advanced first aid with basic life support(CPR), and a good set of reliable comms. A very short list, yet most of us have jobs and families that make the fore-mentioned skills list hard enough to master, let alone go to more advanced training that in all probability will do you no good in the long run other than to make your wallet much lighter.
As for those that are trying to sell $100+ garrotes and cheap magazines, well,,,,,,,, as the saying goes, “there’s an idiot born every second” and we need to expand our ranks with out the dumb asses. Every fighting force needs their cannon-fodder and these types fit the bill.
There is so much more that I would like to write, but my elliptical and weight bench await.
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Hey Wes I saw your comment over on WRSA and agree that it’s hard to find those who are awake and then of those that are awake that have common sense and decency… We have an area up here in the Bitterroot that have conservative values, belief in Liberty, and Self sufficiency and we can always use more people of like mindedness… We really don’t have any leaders or followers at this point we just have Brothers that will stand at our sides and have our back…So come on up Brother;)
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Lineman: That’s my point in a nutshell. Don’t need a zillion combat killers to create the tribe.
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Nope that’s for sure…All you need is people who value Liberty and all the rest of it can be taught… I think it will be a lot easier for those who live in areas that are self sufficient and conservative now instead of the ones who plan on bugging out even if the ones that are bugging out have tons of training… Having Community and Trust will help out most in hard times and that’s why I keep plugging away trying to get people moving now when times are still halfway stable;)
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“I spent many years in the Army. I was in units that would be described as the “best of the best” and units that were populated by the category 4 soldiers that the army recruited in the old days. Every one of these units had the so-called “studs” and the so-called “duds”. Every one. Even the best ones have duds and even the worst one have studs. And yet, clever leaders found a way to motivate and get something out of every one of those who volunteered to serve.”
Hello friends, The above quote from the article best describes how I look at the coming festivities. I (you) take what you have at the moment, figure out the other people’s strengths, and weaknesses, and figure out how and where they can best be used for the best advantage for all. The studs, of course, can help teach and train. Even the duds can (usually) contribute somehow, even if it is watching the little ones, or being in charge of garbage and latrines. Or feeding the compost pile. To borrow from WRSA, “be the leader you want” and figure out how to best use what you have. Above all, if your position is untenable, then retreat and live to fight another day.
“No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for HIS country.” G. S. Patton
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Reblogged this on ETC., ETC., & ETC. and commented:
Way to tell it……………….
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It takes time to find your niche with a tribe. It’s damn if you do and damn if you don’t. I think you would want to observe like minded souls at firearms shops, gun shows, and etc. You have to go easy with your questions but occasionally can read if someone that has the same outlook as you. You just don’t want to join the first tribe you run into. The thing is you have to be around people to associate with like minded souls
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[…] Do We Really Believe in America? […]
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As I read this post and the comments, I sense frustration, anger, and more frustration. I’m on board with that. I can only hope that when the time comes, and history bears this out, that the cream will rise to the top. Fighters will gather and leaders will emerge. In every community there are those that are known to be the type who will lead, whether it is talked about or not. No matter how bleak things look, we will endure.
In the mean time, work on you physical condition, knowledge and look around you for those that look like they are worth saving. I believe and Fu*K all those who get in my way.
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