Vigilantes

Vigilant descends from the Latin vigilare, “to be awake, watch,” from vigil, “awake, alert.” If you stay awake vigilantly all-night, you’re keeping watch or keeping a vigil.

A vigilante (pronounced vij-uh-LAN-tee) is a person who acts outside the legal system to punish crime.

A member of a self-appointed group of citizens who undertakes law enforcement in their community without legal authority, typically because the legal agencies are thought to be inadequate is a vigilante.

After the founding of the United States, a citizen’s arrest became known as a procedure, based in common law and protected by the United States Constitution where a civilian arrests a person whom they have seen or suspect of doing something wrong.

A vigilante is a person who considers it their own responsibility to uphold the law in their neighborhood and often does so summarily and without legal jurisdiction.

You have seen them. They have been having those ‘liberate’ protest. They are self-described militias or ‘citizen soldiers’.

A militia is generally an army or some other fighting organization of non-professional soldiers, citizens of a nation, or subjects of a state, who can be called upon for military service during a time of need, as opposed to a professional force of regular, full-time military personnel, or historically, members of a warrior nobility class (e.g., knights or samurai).

Generally unable to hold ground against regular forces, it is common for militias to be used for aiding regular troops by skirmishing, holding fortifications, or irregular warfare, instead of being used in offensive campaigns by themselves.

Local civilian laws to serve only in their home region, and to serve only for a limited time often limit militias; this further reduces their use in long military campaigns.

With the emergence of professional forces (in the form of mercenaries whose livelihood was military service) during the Renaissance, Western European militias wilted; later however, they would be revived as part of Florentine civic humanism, which held that professional militaries were a result of corruption, and admired the Roman model.

Beginning in the late 20th century, some militias (in particular officially recognized and sanctioned militias of a government) act as professional forces, while still being “part-time” or “on-call” organizations.

For instance, the members of U.S. Army National Guard units are considered professional soldiers, as they are trained to maintain the same standards as their “full-time” (active duty) counterparts.

Why be concerned by this fringe of society?

Does the term ‘Contact Tracing’ sound familiar?

Just download the app on your screen and wherever you go, it will keep track of your every moment and whom you get close to.

Surveillance?

These are different times when a conversation with a neighbor could be deadly, so if you have been close to or in contact with someone who has been tested and ‘has it’; you must be quarantined in isolation or detention to keep the scourge from spreading.

Sounds simple enough. Get a phone call that tells you to go inside and stay there for two weeks.

This, like all the official decrees and executive orders, ask for the public to voluntarily comply. We are pretty much like lemmings and will follow what everyone else is doing. (Wonder if we all dyed our hair red?)

The question is ‘who keeps track of you following orders’?

If you were to wander outside without a facemask, one of the neighborhood busy bodies could report you to the police. (Not sure what the fine for that is…) Then the police would have to come to your quarantined area, investigate the accusation, write a report and perhaps leave a ticket. Maybe electronics would alert some distant data center that you have left the area by tracking your phone GPS?

Either way who is going to keep you from going to the beach with your buddies or playing a game of hoops or a backyard barbecue when the sun comes out?

The police are busy directing traffic and catching robbers. The state police are giving speeding tickets to the few cars on the road. The National Guard is helping the tornado and hurricane victims. The army is overseas fighting terrorist and the navy is guarding the floating oil reserves.

The ‘citizen soldiers’ who live in your area are a reasonable choice. They are armed to the teeth and they got nothing else to do since they are out of work. There is no telling what the chain of command is but they will obey whatever law they think was broken.

These packs of toy soldiers could roam the streets in their camo, packs, flags and long guns to suppress any and all offenders.

If this scenario seems ridiculous, you’ve never lived in a rural area or a big city or a place where the schools are closed, the courts are closed, the government buildings are closed and the hospitals are full of dying people.

These are different times and there are no predictions of what the future brings. Little green men from outer space could invade us. “Take me to your leader?”

Sorry, wrong planet.