A group of backwoods vigilante rebels, in an act that can only be described as domestic terrorism, have taken over a federal building and threatened violence to anyone who tries to interfere with what they are calling an act of “patriotism,” bearing a striking resemblance to the type of Helter Skelter that would make Charles Manson proud.
This event, which has yet to find its conclusion, is a direct result of the fear-mongering and hatred created by Roger Ailes and his network Fox News. Any lives that are lost in this conflict are on the hands of Ailes and those in his network as he has spent decades profiting heavily from the weak and fearful in this nation. The Fox News Network, with Ailes at the helm, has featured soundbite after soundbite of divisive, hate-inspiring rhetoric which has directly inspired the actions now taking place in Oregon.
Oregon, and particularly the region where this showdown is taking place, is incredibly rural and isolated. It is the kind of place where people are left with nothing much to do, and in these isolated pockets, hatred and anger festers, particularly when they have their televisions tuned to Fox News. Now, this small group of angry and self-victimized men threaten to erupt into true acts of violence.
These men have chosen to take this action, which they describe as “patriotic,” because Fox News and corporate media have told them that they are entitled to take what they want because they are white men in rural America who have guns. What more justification should they need? Over and over again, Fox News has purposefully inspired a distrust of government and one’s fellow man in order to cash in.
These small-minded terrorists feel threatened and devalued by the changes in America, and as a result, feel that they must attempt to strike down their government. Why wouldn’t you believe that it is your right to kill and maim in order to steal public lands if it weren’t for the constant and unceasing rhetoric from the right wing Fox News telling you that you must do something, anything, in order to “make America great again”?
Fox News has spent decades profiting from making uneducated, rural Americans fear everyone and everything, and now the chickens have come home to roost.
This has been a violent start to 2016, but there is reason to believe that this is only the beginning as the “silent majority” begins to step up and act out their Roger Ailes Helter Skelter fantasies against innocent Americans in the name of “freedom.”
