Repost: Rules of the House

ed. This is a repost of an article from last year, prior to the new blog format here. Those who followed my advice to watch “Welcome to Leith” will recognize some of the lessons-learned from that mockumentary, especially the need to have a light touch on the community even in the face of official hostility. This article is further prep for our forthcoming discussion about the lessons to be gleaned from that video in the context of a hostile local government willing to subvert law, justice and truth to harass citizens.

I want to thank all the people who have come to our facility to train and to do other work who have taken these rules to heart and respected our mission. Your behavior here has been a credit to yourselves, your leadership, your organizations and your principles; each of you have helped us accomplish our goals here in many important ways.

From time to time, I make my properties and other resources available to groups and individuals for purposes which suit my own personal mission:

Support those activities which tend to improve civilization, and deny support to those activities which tend to degrade civilization.

If your leadership and I are discussing the use of my resources, then it is because I think at least some part of your group’s motives and methods move in this direction. This does not mean that I agree with all of your motives and methods. This also means that I will be supporting other groups and individuals whose motives and methods may directly conflict with some of your core principles, or at least, you might think that they directly conflict.

To minimize the amount of conflict on areas in which we disagree, and to maximize the amount of cooperation among all groups in those directions which improve civilization, I have established these general rules which apply to all parties.

1. You and your people are here as my guests at my discretion, and I can withdraw permission for any event, activity, group or individual for any reason or no reason at all.

2. Your group must have a sane and realizable mission, and your event must support that mission. If your mission includes “fite da gubmit”, then that is insane. The following is an incomplete list of possible sane missions:

Develop skills to protect your community against lawlessness.
Help families crushed by overzealous prosecution.
Conduct and improve the practice of homeschooling.
Develop intelligence resources capable of uncovering and exposing government corruption.
Develop intelligence resources capable of identifying criminal elements which may pose a threat during emergencies.
Teach how to safely feed large numbers of people in an emergency.
Improve the practice of political strategy.
Elect a given person, or un-elect a given incumbent.
Improve the practice of public affairs.
Promote beneficial cultural heritages.
Provide coordination for emergency services.
Provide instruction and testing for amateur radio licensing.
Demonstrate alternate energy options.
Demonstrate high-density food production.
Promote local or regional businesses.
and so on.

Note that all of the above sane missions can also be realizable, depending on the group and its resources. Realizable means that there is at least a snowball’s chance of making your mission happen in the real world with the resources reasonably at your disposal, now or in any rational future. Missions which are not realizable are only fantasies, and I already have my own list of fantasies which I indulge.

Your mission and planned events will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, and chances are, your mission already contains components which are sane and realizable, at least to some degree, or you would not have received an invitation in the first place. Your leadership and I will work together to design activities for your event which emphasize those parts of your mission that are aligned with mine, or help you develop a mission, events and activities, if all you have are vague fuzzies which I think have potential. If your mission is unrealizable but can be tempered to become realizable, we will work on that also to tease the sane and realizable portions into the open, and to snip off the portions which pose a risk to everyone.

3. Your leadership must be committed to the mission and willing to enforce discipline to attain it. The mission is paramount. The role of leadership is to communicate and inspire the mission, and then ensure that all activities support the mission. If some of your members are behaving in a way which jeopardize the mission, then your leadership must enforce discipline to restore order and common effort. I can help your leadership with enforcing discipline by ejecting troublesome members for the remainder of your event, or possibly, ban them entirely. If your leadership can not or will not enforce discipline, then I will eject the entire group. As long as your leadership makes your sane and realizable mission their priority, it becomes one of mine during your stay.

4. When I am hosting your events, your mission and your event has priority over other groups I may also be helping at other times. From time to time, unaffiliated individuals or representatives of other groups may request to observe your activities. If so, I will inform your leadership of this request. If your leadership agrees, guests will be allowed to observe or even participate if your leadership desires, with the condition that no guest may interfere with the mission of the group whose event is being hosted. This means that when you are a guest at another group’s event, you are not allowed to interfere either, including through passive-aggressive means. In other words, my world is not a free speech zone.

From time to time, observers may be people whose expertise can help you attain your mission, in which case I will introduce them to your leadership as such and see if there is a way to help.

5. Because your mission is sane and realizable, that means that it exists in the real world, with real world constraints, which include the following facts:

We do not live in a free country, and innocent people are routinely targeted for thoughtcrime. It is a fact of life that malevolent provocateurs seek to create crime and criminals where none exist organically.
Public perception trumps reality.
The myth of American self-reliance is long dead, resulting in a populace which is easily stampeded into fearing people who pose them no threat, or who would even actively protect them, while embracing those who would slit their throats and rape their women.
Actual criminality (murder, rape, assault, theft) is often ignored by authorities, or in some cases actively condoned, while manufactured crimes receive the unbridled attention of official power.
Groups which promote traditional American values (improving civilization) are routinely vilified and targeted, while groups which destroy traditional American values (degrading civilization) are glorified and protected.

6. Because of the above realities, your group and its mission starts off on the losing end of a public affairs battle on day one. Getting in people’s faces and waving guns about is always counter-productive to any mission I am supporting. You will note that in the real world, in-your-face 1960s radical-style tactics only work for degenerates who have official cover which you lack. Each and every member of your group is responsible for public affairs and for exerting a positive leadership role in any community in which they appear.

Always imagine that you are playing public affairs blackjack, and that the house (public opinion bias) not only wins all ties, but any hands it holds between 15 and 25, regardless of your 21.

7. Because your political enemies will stop at nothing to destroy you and thwart your mission, you must always be on-guard against infiltrators who would plant evidence or trick innocent people into crimes. Since groups I support are not criminals, the juvenile “snitches-get-stitches” ethic does not apply: if someone is suspected of being a bad actor, they simply aren’t allowed to participate. As a result, err on the side of safety, and don’t hesitate to speak up if you think someone is putting the group at risk; there is a good chance that it is an innocent person who is unaware that they are treading the many snares invented to entrap us. If a given individual is a gross or repeat offender, despite correction by your leadership, then that person has gone rogue, whether through stupidity or by design, and puts your event, mission and group in jeopardy. I may choose to maintain a rogue’s gallery of gross or repeat offenders; participation in events at my facilities grants me permission to do so at my discretion.

8. I might ban someone just because I don’t like him. A person being important to your group does not make that person important to me. This is my safety valve to allow me to protect my mission, and yours. See Rule #1, which exists to keep hotheads, premeditated and otherwise, from hijacking your event and redirecting your efforts into foolishness, to everyone’s detriment.

9. We don’t navigate the various political and legal shoals by charging bullheadedly forward; we must instead use our brains and our instincts to figure a rational way forward together. If you ever feel the need to tell me to “man up”, you have already lost the debate. The larger effort, and the myriad of missions I am supporting, is more important than your one thing. Make it easy for me to say “yes” to your group and your mission; a “no” often means “let’s find another way to accomplish your mission.” If you will not hear “no”, then I cannot tell you “yes”.

10. Children will only be allowed to participate with a responsible adult, meaning both responsible to the child and responsible for the child. I am not running a daycare, and I encourage responsible adults to legally carry to protect their children while at my facilities. Events which center around children or families, such as homeschool workshops or classes, will be held to an even higher public affairs standard than normal, and are even less of a free speech zone.

11. While felons are not explicitly prohibited (not all felons in thoughtcrime America are actual criminals), if they do participate they will be expected to identify themselves as such and be up-front with the group and its leadership, with me and my staff, and with guests and observers, particularly to avoid entrapment for possession charges. I may from time to time check for licenses or IDs, or the group leadership and I may also require felons to wear identifying insignia, depending on the group, its mission and activities. Felons will especially be asked to avoid child- or family-centric events, unless they are instructors or parents themselves, in which case their participation will be closely coordinated with other parents.

12. Just as my world is not a free speech zone, it is neither a second amendment zone nor a gun-free zone. I do expect all adult participants to carry sidearms in compliance with the law. For my facilities in Georgia, the weapons license or a law enforcement ID is a convenient way to sort out legal compliance with concealed carry and to weed out felon informants from entrapping people with possession charges. I encourage all participating groups to obtain Georgia weapons licenses or similar licenses in reciprocal states and then carry for their own protection. To avoid entrapment, if in doubt, hand no one your weapon unless you have seen their weapons license or a law enforcement ID.

13. Unlike personal sidearms, which can easily be legally concealed and appear non-threatening, long guns are a different story as they can damage the public affairs effort and present their own Short-Barreled-Rifle (SBR) and National Firearms Act (NFA) legal risks. By default, to avoid the latter, do not take a long gun from someone else, nor discuss the sale or purchase of weapons while at my facilities.

When outdoors, training will only use long guns if not visible to the public, or if carried or handled in such a way as to eliminate the possibility of inadvertently muzzle-sweeping the public, and even that will be severely limited. Indoor training with firearms will be conducted bolts-out unless explicitly negotiated in advance. Always keep in mind that our activities, because they lie outside the couch potato American norm, are held to a higher public affairs standard.

By default, do not bring even your properly licensed SBR, NFA or destructive devices to my facilities to avoid any needless entrapment complications. Any exceptions (rarely, if ever granted) will be considered on a case-by-case basis and then only if absolutely necessitated by the mission. More likely, the mission will be modified to eliminate the necessity.

14. Similarly, all drones operated from any of my facilities are to be properly registered with the FAA in accordance with the new regulations. All radio operations are to be properly licensed and comply with the relevant FCC regulations. We have a team of Amateur Extra Volunteer Examiners who can administer tests for all levels of amateur radio licensing to help your group get the licenses it needs.

15. If planning a militia event, consider whether your event or specific activities can be conducted in civilian clothes or without obviously gearing up. Communication, dismounted urban or suburban patrolling or discreet security exercises may be more realistically conducted without gearing up, and increases the scope of activities which can be conducted and the locations which will be available for your use. Events conducted off-property but still under my public affairs umbrella must comply with the same rules as activities conducted on-property.

16. I may also extend my public affairs umbrella by getting your group invitations to other off-property events, such as booths at public venues which I am assisting, or private individuals who are making their own property available for your use. In these instances, your behavior should be that of guests at the host venue, just as if you were guests at mine, and work to make the host venue mission a success.

17. You will be given a safety briefing for each facility, particularly my on-site properties; it is your responsibility to pay attention to these briefings. However, I make no guarantee that all possible hazards will be identified. By participating in activities at my facilities or those at which I am assisting, you accept responsibility for your safety and the safety of your children if present, even if I or others are negligent.

18. You will be given a public affairs briefing regarding the local political, criminal and community attitudes you and your group will face at any specific facility or venue. If in doubt, I or my team should be your interface to the public or venue hosts, but in all cases, public affairs is the first priority behind personal and public safety. Even though you have a legal right to defend yourself, avoid unnecessary confrontation first. After each event, I may ask your group to debrief with public affairs experiences and contacts to help better plan future work.

This is not intended to be an exhaustive list, but it should help orient you and your group toward my autocratic attitudes in helping your group define and accomplish its mission.

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