These are hardcore airsoft guys who go buy comms, night-vision, IR, with airsoft weapons that function like real weapons. There are multi-day events with NATO vs RUS forces. Look up "milsim west" on Youtube and you can get a sense of it.
There's a good amount of folks that just like to have fun, but there is a subset that use it as a type of militia-esque training.
Your resistance proves your guilt. Insisting on your fourth and fifth amendment rights? Noting other cases where innocent hobbyists were threatened and trying to avoid the same? Seems like violent extremism.
Although the history of LARP as a legal defense is narrow, the authors share the concern that it may soon become commonplace. Early attempts at such a strategy have been made by a defendant acting alone or in loose cooperation with members of a fantasy group who knew each other only in the virtual world, claiming “artistic expression” to excuse threatening language.
This is a reasonable concern.
I will note anecdotally not all role players are playing with a full deck -- though I am more familiar with role playing gamers, not LARPers (granted: not entirely separate groups). Some are mildly cracked, sometimes harmlessly -- the guy who exclusively played female characters and might have identified as trans had he been born later -- and some not so harmlessly -- the gal who forged her own sword which she took with her everywhere, even the mall, by concealing it under a cape, and genuinely believed she was the last special warrior of some sort from a fictional series.* She believed she was female to signify she was the last.
So that may complicate sorting out who is just playing games from who is a genuine threat of planned violence.
The exact differences they point out, such as "spectators being welcome" vs "secrecy is paramount" are clear, universal, well thought out, and interesting to read about and consider.
> To prepare for a violent attack, terrorists possess and practice real weapons and live ammunition. LARPers would have no need for such destructive instruments when preparing for their event.
Nobody loves guns more than LARPers. I know more people into pyrotechnics that play wizards in larps than pretty much any other category of weirdo, and I know a lot of weirdos. It's a power fantasy, but it's one that they love to live out in a small way, and range-shooting is one of the most common expressions of it.
Audience: "Spectators accepted or desired" vs "Secrecy demanded"
Quite some LARP people who want to avoid spectators, since quite some conservative or religious people tend to associate some fantasy stuff to be "satanistic" or "sacrilegious". Thus, to avoid really annoying discussions, they prefer no spectators.
Components: "Features of organized gaming (e.g., rules, character sheets, scenario scripts, in- and out-of-character designations)" vs "Absence of documented rules, character sheets, scenario scripts, in- and out-of-character designations; all “characters” are frontline fighters or operational support personnel"
There exist LARP system where there exist many rules, but also those where such things are handled in a more "loose"/"spontanous"/"improvisatory" way.
Relationship with law enforcement: "No concern with law enforcement in out-of-character life" vs "Demonstrated concern with law enforcement and prosecutions of similar criminal behavior"
Of course, those who distrust the law enforcement (often for good reasons) are suspicious to be extremists - that is what the FBI claims ;-) . Seriously: there likely exist LARP players with about any possible stance concerning law enforcement.
Equipment: "realistic prop weapons often discouraged in the rules"
It depends on the LARP system whether these are discouraged or encouraged.
Personal grievance: "No personal grievance toward out-group(s) outside the voluntary, fantasy world" vs "Personal grievance toward out-group(s) believed to pose an imminent and existential threat, requiring violent action" and Mood: "Euthymic and joyful; anticipatory fantasy to enjoy the event" vs "Dysphoric and angry; anticipatory fantasy to harm or kill the target(s)"
This depends a lot on the setting of the LARP: of course some cyberpunk, horror or dark-fantasy themed LARP will be much more dark than, say, some high fantasy or utopic science-fiction setting.
Regular police investigative techniques can disambiguate intent of (an) individual(s) by searching their items and questioning their plans. Someone LARPing isn't going to play act with live ordinance, contagious pathogens, or actual firearms. They may well carry swords, but then they'd also be wearing padded armor. I think it's up to a judge or jury to decide if the Free Staters of Terrorism were committing terrorism or not in highly-suspicious, ambiguous circumstances.
Leaping to the deep-end of paranoia about mostly innocent play would create a society with a corrosive, suspicious attitude.
Now an awful thought: Although it seems a weird and terrible idea, I could imagine a group of kids going somewhere hopefully unoccupied and unlikely to be patrolled by police LARPing as terrorists, school shooters, or any other taboo archetype.
For the record, a dying (and now late) friend of mine was once violently arrested in a parking lot for playing Ingress in Los Altos, CA.
And then this:
> Meetings may entail impassioned rhetoric and rehearsal of tactical operations for the ultimate future apocalypse when citizens will overtake the government or institute their own community policing.
This quote is fucking insane, imo. "citizens will overtake the government" – aren't citizens already supposed to be in charge of the government? A very strange choice of words. What about all that "We the People" stuff. And second, "or institute their own community policing" - it is how the policing in the US works. Local police forces account for the majority of police force in the US according to National Sources of Law Enforcement Employment Data [1].
I disagree with this bit completely. As a practitioner of a weapons based martial art I had to be very familiar with the law to ensure that I didn’t break the law by accident. Ignorance of the law is not a defence.
Fbi quietly putting psyops telling anti- government is extreme belief lmao.
Boy is it. I’m gravely concerned the threat LARPing posed to our democratic government.
> "Never believe that [they] are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. ... They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert." — JPS
> Conversely, violent extremists or terrorists want secrecy. This desire may contribute to the sense of clandestine excitement that surrounds them and their preparation on a pathway to actual violence.9
What is this? Why is the FBI writing stuff like this and publishing it?
Congratulations you're as out of touch as our parents were.
>Individuals can engage in such activity informally or as part of an organized group. Presumably, the earliest formal LARP group was Dagorhir Battle Games, founded in the United States in 1977.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1913_Gettysburg_reunion
Now if only these experts could use google leaping for 30 seconds before writing an add for their consultancy services.
>Ms. Amman is a retired FBI supervisory special agent, certified threat manager, and private threat assessment management consultant in West Des Moines, Iowa. Dr. Phil Saragoza
>Dr. Saragoza is a forensic psychiatrist, adjunct clinical assistant professor at the University of Michigan, and threat assessment consultant in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Did everyone forget that the US only exists because of treason and insurrection directly sparked from individuals refusing to allow someone else to determine whether they can arm themselves? Probably. Public school doesn't like to focus on the details anymore.
If Sam Adams existed today, he'd be on an FBI/ATF watchlist.
Because this is deeply intertwined with "politics" it becomes radioactive to discuss in polite society (e.g., HN itself), but we'd be well served to find a way to have some dialog.
But no -- it's actually about terrorists and criminals trying to claim in court that their criminal planning wasn't that at all, but just LARPing:
> For example, after Kaleb Franks was arrested in October 2020 for plotting to abduct Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, he told the FBI he and his compatriots were only LARPing. Franks later pled guilty and testified that this was a lie.
So this document is for investigators to ensure they have a specific framework for being able to collect the appropriate evidence to use in court that prevents a defendent from using a LARPing defense.
Which actually makes a tremendous amount of sense. When armed militia members claim all of their organizing/preparation is just recreational, and totally unlinked to violence that members do eventually commit, it's important to have delineated standards to be able to refute that.